Welcome back to
"The Liberty Insider."
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Before the break
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I was grilling Dr. John
Graz about his early life
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and you know, from my
side, thinking about this
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and remembering my father,
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I know he did
many things in his life
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started off in
publishing ended in-
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and you shifted ending
up in Religious Liberty.
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But I know my
father was inspired
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through it all by
the text from Peter.
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I think it's 2 Peter,
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"Casting all
your cares upon Him,
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for he cares upon
you, cares for you."
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You know, what's inspired you?
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You mentioned that you
were studying the Bible
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as a young man and
that moved you into faith.
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Had there been any thoughts
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or Bible texts
that have really been
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your guiding light?
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As I said you know,
when I became an Adventist
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or a Christian really,
the text that you know,
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"Seek first the kingdom of God"
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was very impressive for
me and I took that really.
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And but after when I became
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an Adventist and
that changed my life.
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I had to face many challenges,
you know, to study again
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and so on and so on.
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And normally I should
have said that's not possible.
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But another text came to my mind
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was the word of Jesus,
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"Everything is
possible for the one,
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for he who believes,
everything is possible."
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And I said, "with God
everything is possible."
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It means it was like
an explosion in my life.
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I had a lot of
limitations in my mind.
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You know, many,
most of the time,
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the limitations are
not physical limitations
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but it's in your mind.
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I thought that I
will never able to study
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after the secondary school.
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I thought many things like that.
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I thought that I will never,
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never be able to
go to the university.
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Never be able to speak in public
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and to speak another
language and so on and so on.
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But you know, the moment
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the way I became
Christian, if Jesus in my life,
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everything became
possible and I said,
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"With God
everything is possible."
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Then after when I
had all these challenges
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and I see all
of these challenges
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and how God helped me.
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And another
verse, that was in 2006,
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I remember well,
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after ten years at
the General Conference
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as a director of
Religious Freedom,
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I thought that I was re-elected
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and I thought that you
know, I have to do something new
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because you know,
I don't want just to
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do a regular thing
that we have to continue
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the regular thing
like the congresses,
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the simple doing...
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but there is
something else to do
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and I dreamt about this big,
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you know, festival
of Religious Freedom.
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It means big
celebration but how to do that.
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how to do that?
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And you know, at this time
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a verse in the Bible, a
verse came to me to my mind,
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that was in Deuteronomy,
yeah, I read and read again,
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"The Lord will make you
the head and not the tail."
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And I think that could
be also for my ministry
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not for me
personally but for my ministry.
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Well, Adventist
pioneer, Ellen White,
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applied that to the
Adventist movement, didn't she?
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We ought to be the
head and not the tail.
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Yeah, exactly.
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Exactly that applies
to Religious Liberty.
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Yeah, this is what I thought
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you know, it has to be
applied to every ministry,
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every school, every institution,
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everything which gives to
God as you know, as an offering.
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And I said to God,
"That's not my problem
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how many people will come,
I know that you can do that."
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And I saw the answer, you know,
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that a lot,
that's a really miracle
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at the very time, you know,
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someone where in this department
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for a short period of time.
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But the guy who was
there, he was able to put
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15,000 people in a
stadium at the beginning.
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And it shows to the other
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but 20 people
outside, it shows to the other
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that we can do that.
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And after we had a
peak with 40, 50,000 people.
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And where was the
first program again?
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The first mass
festival was in Sao Paulo.
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Yeah, I knew it
was in Latin America.
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And Williams Costa, you
know, was the organizer.
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And that was fabulous
and afterwards in Lima,
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fabulous program, 45,000 people.
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And from the
beginning the plan involved
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young people and
music, didn't it?
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Young people and music
and so on and that was,
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you know, I thought
it will happen in 2009
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and it was in 2006.
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It means that when you really
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want to dedicate
your life to God,
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don't think that
it's not possible.
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Everything is possible
for God and God will do it.
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It means you have
to say to the Lord,
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"I am here, I do my best
but you will do the rest."
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And the last verse, you know,
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because after when
things are going well,
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you may forget
that you are just...
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You think you are doing it.
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Well, Peter found
that out, didn't he?
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Stepped out to meet
the Lord on the water
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and then, oh, down you go.
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But in my case,
which was interesting
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is that big things
were not organized by me.
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It was, I just, you
know, brought the seeds
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and people say,
"Uh, we can do that."
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But that's more
vindicating of our shared goal
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of Seventh Day Adventist
that shows that there are
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others who were
willing to do this too
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and together
right things happen.
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And that was really, you know,
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people realize
that that's a good idea
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like the festival
of Religious Freedom.
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You know, the idea is to
say, thank you God, publicly
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and thank you to my
country for Religious freedom
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and the message is
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"we love Religious
Freedom and we want to keep it."
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You know people
can get that and say,
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"We can do that."
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You have to find but
everywhere you have people
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that are able to do that.
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And it's not necessary,
this is a rhetorical question,
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that the country
that you're doing it
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in is
circumspect in every regard
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on Religious Liberty
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because you are granting
them the benefit of the doubt.
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Exactly.
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That this is the country,
that is in their interest.
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You don't say
that they are perfect.
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But you say,
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"Hey, religious
freedom is important for us,
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we may not have the total."
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And thank you for what
you've done to facilitate that.
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But still thank
you because you know,
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we have meeting, we have church,
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we have hospital, we
have institution and so on,
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thank you for that.
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There are so many
places around the world
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where people cannot have.
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And the last one
was, be humble yourself,
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humble yourself on
the mighty hand of God
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and I like it very much
because it said, the text said,
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"He may you know,
rise up in the due time."
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I don't know what you've learned
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but I've learned that life
tends to be humbling anyway.
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Better to give it
to God and recognize
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that you have to
be humble before him
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than to find out the hard way
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before life, it beats you down.
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Absolutely true.
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This is why, you know,
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sometime when
something good happened,
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well, you can say,
"Oh, I did very well."
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Very often just after
something comes and hits.
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What is that, "Pride
goes before the fall?"
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But I know you've
done some wonderful things
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you've been the lead person
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to facilitate some
very inspiring things
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on Religious Liberty
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and that might
be forgotten easily,
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more than forgotten,
that won't be let go of.
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Others are going
to follow through
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and carry this on and...
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We have already
planned for the future
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and I hope that...
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And you'll be there in
some of them. I'm sure.
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You're not going to be,
they are not taking away
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your frequent flying experience.
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We have a World Congress,
we have a World Festival
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and now we are trying to develop
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Continental congresses
and Continental festivals.
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And where is the
next World Congress?
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That's down in US I think.
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It will be in US,
it will be in 2017
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and next World
Festival, we are talking about
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maybe in the US or
maybe in Peru again,
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in Lima and some places
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where we can
bring people really.
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In Peru, you can get
the huge crowd there.
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Almost every year we
will have an international,
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a big international event.
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It means that you maintain
or you develop the, what is it?
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Infrastructure.
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The infrastructure you develop,
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people are able to
promote Religious Freedom,
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the awareness
of the authorities,
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of the government and after,
of course what is happening now
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it's, you know,
people ask us to do
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more and more things.
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Even government ask us.
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Even organization,
powerful organization ask us
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to be a part of their programs
and we have more and more...
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I mean, this aspect of it
is a very positive PR aspect.
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I can't imagine
any public entity
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or a government
being opposed to it.
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They just need to see the model
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and then they'll want
it, like you're finding out.
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Yes and sometimes, you
know, people don't see,
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"Yeah, you know, you
organize a big meeting
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but doesn't help really
those who are persecuted."
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Yes, because it
opens many doors.
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You know, when you have
to deal with a government,
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if you know people from
another country, it helps.
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They can
introduce you. Absolutely.
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And when you have
people visiting the countries,
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from government where you
have Christians persecuted,
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all the believers persecuted
and you want to deal with that.
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You can be invited and talk...
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I just you know, was
invited for a meeting
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with Prime
Minister for a country
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where people are really
under a lot of restriction.
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It could be an
opportunity to talk with him
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and to defend Religious Freedom.
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And do you know
the line of causality,
00:09:31.20\00:09:33.80
what made him aware
of Religious Liberty
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and the need to talk to you?
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Do you know? Who the-
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The invitation
from the Prime Minister?
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Yeah, yeah, of course I
know, you know, it's very easy.
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It comes from a
friend who is impressed,
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who has been
impressed by our work.
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Seeing one of these conferences?
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Yeah, exactly, and
it's happened like that.
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You invite people to
speak, they say that,
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"Man, that's incredible.
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I would like you to come
to come to our own congress."
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Then you meet official
there. They introduce you.
00:10:03.63\00:10:06.37
Networking.
That's the networking.
00:10:06.40\00:10:07.74
That is, in our work,
00:10:07.77\00:10:10.51
the Ministry of
Religious Freedom,
00:10:10.54\00:10:12.44
the networks is really the key.
00:10:12.47\00:10:15.34
You need a large
network of friends.
00:10:15.38\00:10:17.91
This is what our
President, Ted Wilson,
00:10:17.95\00:10:20.52
always said you
know, he said, we have to,
00:10:20.55\00:10:23.28
we need to have a
good network of friends.
00:10:23.32\00:10:25.62
Make friends.
00:10:25.65\00:10:26.99
And he's been very supportive
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for the Religious
Liberty program, I know.
00:10:28.39\00:10:29.92
He has been very supportive--
00:10:29.96\00:10:31.33
It's not so much to
diminish any other President,
00:10:31.36\00:10:32.96
but there's no question
that in his last five years,
00:10:32.99\00:10:36.23
Ted had been very
close to get identified
00:10:36.26\00:10:37.80
with Religious Freedom.
00:10:37.83\00:10:39.17
Yeah, exactly and also,
00:10:39.20\00:10:40.54
he is the one who encouraged
00:10:40.57\00:10:41.90
our new program
on church ambassador,
00:10:41.94\00:10:43.34
you know, this program
say that in every church
00:10:43.37\00:10:46.14
you need to have an ambassador
00:10:46.17\00:10:47.61
to represent the
church in the community.
00:10:47.64\00:10:49.68
And I should get an ad
in for Liberty Magazine
00:10:49.71\00:10:52.05
like in our current issue
00:10:52.08\00:10:54.28
or the upcoming
issue in July 2015.
00:10:54.32\00:10:57.29
There's an interview that
you conducted with Ted Wilson,
00:10:57.32\00:11:00.09
where he lays out
his strategic vision
00:11:00.12\00:11:02.79
for Religious Liberty.
00:11:02.82\00:11:04.63
So you know, I think
it's great. Wonderful.
00:11:04.66\00:11:07.13
Great interview,
yes, as a President,
00:11:07.16\00:11:10.00
he said to- I
don't frankly speaking
00:11:10.03\00:11:13.03
I don't remember having
heard another religious leader,
00:11:13.07\00:11:16.91
top religious
leader speaking like him
00:11:16.94\00:11:19.31
about Religious Freedom.
00:11:19.34\00:11:20.68
Yeah, that's good and we hope
00:11:20.71\00:11:22.04
that it continues,
pray that it continues.
00:11:22.08\00:11:23.41
Yeah, pray.
00:11:23.45\00:11:24.78
So that could be
your farewell gift
00:11:24.81\00:11:27.88
to have one last
indoctrination session
00:11:27.92\00:11:31.22
with our church leader.
00:11:31.25\00:11:32.82
But I'm sure that
this is going to continue.
00:11:32.85\00:11:35.16
There are just so
many imperatives to that,
00:11:35.19\00:11:39.03
no leader, no church
can ignore this anymore.
00:11:39.06\00:11:41.86
As we said in another program,
00:11:41.90\00:11:43.77
Religious
Liberty in the negative
00:11:43.80\00:11:45.53
is seen by an unprecedented
persecution of Christians
00:11:45.57\00:11:48.37
and others
minorities around the world.
00:11:48.40\00:11:50.97
Yeah, and you know,
00:11:51.01\00:11:52.34
what I would say Lincoln is...
00:11:52.37\00:11:54.81
It has been a
great adventure we've got
00:11:54.84\00:11:57.48
and defending
Religious Freedom for me.
00:11:57.51\00:11:59.28
It's a really a
ministry and I am serving,
00:11:59.31\00:12:02.08
I am serving God in doing it.
00:12:02.12\00:12:05.15
Listening to Dr. John Graz
00:12:05.19\00:12:07.69
give some
reminiscences of his service
00:12:07.72\00:12:10.63
for the church and
for Religious Liberty
00:12:10.66\00:12:13.19
and thinking of
what that really means
00:12:13.23\00:12:15.03
for those of us
that remain behind,
00:12:15.06\00:12:17.77
I can't help but thinking
00:12:17.80\00:12:19.13
in the Bible of
the story of Elijah,
00:12:19.17\00:12:22.07
preparing on instructions,
I'm sure to meet the Lord
00:12:22.10\00:12:27.14
and go to heaven and
his disciple, Elisha,
00:12:27.18\00:12:31.41
saying, "You don't leave now,
00:12:31.45\00:12:32.78
I'm not going to let
you out of my sight."
00:12:32.81\00:12:35.18
We need to realize that
there's a continuum in service
00:12:35.22\00:12:39.32
and that the Elijahs might
00:12:39.35\00:12:41.39
move on to another phase of work
00:12:41.42\00:12:43.86
but there are
Elishas that remain behind
00:12:43.89\00:12:47.06
and with this
great cloud of witnesses
00:12:47.10\00:12:49.20
as the Bible says, those
that have gone before us,
00:12:49.23\00:12:51.93
we need to realize
that the challenge remains
00:12:51.97\00:12:54.84
and that Religious Liberty
00:12:54.87\00:12:56.20
is such an important component
of the gospel commission
00:12:56.24\00:13:00.24
that many others would be
following in, behind Dr. Graz
00:13:00.28\00:13:04.98
and that the
great work will be done
00:13:05.01\00:13:07.32
and the challenging
times now up and standing,
00:13:07.35\00:13:09.78
a great message
and a proclamation
00:13:09.82\00:13:11.65
for Religious
Liberty will be given.
00:13:11.69\00:13:15.02
For Liberty
Insider, I'm Lincoln Steed.
00:13:15.06\00:13:18.26