Participants: Lincoln Steed (Host), Greg Hamilton
Series Code: LI
Program Code: LI000364B
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00:05 Welcome back to the Liberty Insider.
00:07 Before the break with Greg Hamilton, 00:09 we were rowing through history 00:11 and drawing some parallels, not direct parallels, 00:15 but some intimations of 00:17 where our present troubles might be 00:20 eerily like what happened in Weimar Germany 00:22 which led up to the Nazi takeover. 00:26 And of course, the parallels are legitimate I think 00:28 because there was a dysfunctional society 00:30 under great stress, 00:32 and it could have gone several ways, 00:33 but it went the Nazi way. 00:35 There's no question that we're living under a society 00:38 that's feel stressed, 00:40 not to stress the Syrians and all the rest 00:42 but this is not business as usual. 00:45 Right. 00:46 Well, it seems like the people 00:48 are afraid to speak up for some reason. 00:50 Yeah, you see protests 00:52 in different places and everything 00:53 but in the end, you know, that's all going to calm down 00:56 and we'll get back to some normalcy. 00:58 Will consider what's going on right now 01:02 is just part of the fabric of what we've always been, 01:05 and Donald Trump will probably 01:07 settle into the presidency 01:09 like other presidents before him or will he? 01:11 I mean, it's like the dilemma that much of the media has had, 01:15 even Fox News says, 01:17 "Well, is he going to be a different person 01:19 than when he was in the campaign, 01:20 will he be presidential?" 01:22 Yeah, we conclude he'll be presidential. 01:23 So, I think the whole country and the whole world 01:26 is waiting to see whether that's true or not. 01:29 I'll give you my two predictions 01:31 as to what's likely to happen not so much domestically. 01:36 I think the signs are all there 01:39 and President Trump will probably 01:41 not resist a chance to do something preemptively 01:44 with North Korea, 01:46 and I think the West will miscalculate 01:49 on their personality 01:50 and rather than lose face, 01:52 Korea will lash out at the US, 01:54 and then anyone's guess 01:57 is as good as anyone else. 01:58 Well, that's interesting, for me it's a little different. 02:01 I think Vice President Mike Pence is a factor 02:04 that we don't often consider. 02:06 You know, a lot of people knock his 02:09 Free Exercise of Religion Act 02:10 or his State Religious Freedom Restoration Act in the Indiana, 02:14 was actually started out as a good bill. 02:18 But the same sex marriage community came in 02:21 and got him to back pedal 02:23 and basically turn it into a law that's ineffective. 02:27 That's a good point, but I'm not suggesting 02:29 it's because of the president we actually have. 02:33 This is not an attack on administration, 02:36 you know, it's for them to decide. 02:37 I think events are just moving that way 02:40 and this new administration 02:42 will likely give in to the military 02:45 and the think-tanks 02:46 who are pushing that way 02:47 and I think it's a very dangerous problem. 02:49 Where I was going with this is this, Mike Pence represents, 02:54 the vice president represents 02:55 the wing of the evangelical right, 02:58 essentially he's very much imbed 03:00 with evangelical right, 03:02 he's a convert to Catholicism and... 03:08 Excuse me, he's a Catholic 03:10 who's become more evangelical lately 03:12 so he attends an evangelical church. 03:14 I mean, we have no reason to doubt his personal feelings. 03:16 Exactly. 03:17 He seems someone of spiritual integrity. 03:19 Exactly, exactly. 03:20 And I think he is well meaning and he's sincere. 03:23 But I think that what happens throughout history 03:26 I've seen when strong men, 03:28 strong leaders come into power 03:30 for their moral failings in the past, 03:33 they seek atonement, 03:34 and what better way to find atonement 03:36 than to yield their powers 03:39 that be to religious powers to make them the leaders, 03:46 the guides as to what the president 03:47 should do or not do. 03:49 It's certainly a danger for the US, 03:50 my other prediction. 03:51 That seems to be that what I'm saying is that 03:53 dynamic is at play very strongly right now. 03:55 My other prediction, it's more in line 03:57 with our religious liberty agenda or concerns. 04:02 Well, that might, what I just shared was 04:04 religious liberty concerns. 04:05 I know, but I want to add my second one. 04:07 Okay. 04:08 It's actually fortuitous on one level that, 04:13 was it Jared Kushner, the president's son-in-law. 04:16 Yes 04:17 Has close connections to Israel and the... 04:19 The Jewish fellow. 04:21 Ivanka. Ivanka's husband. 04:23 Husband is converted, that's good, 04:25 but that seems to be emboldening 04:28 this new administration to synthesize 04:33 US interest with Israel in a way that 04:35 we haven't seen before, 04:37 and even the off the cuff declaration 04:40 that the US embassy will be sighted in Jerusalem. 04:44 This has the potential to like throw gasoline 04:48 on an already situation, 04:53 it's already a conflagration. 04:54 Well, it has a potential for a crusade against... 04:56 And so you know that religious right 04:58 for a long time now have the soft spot for Israel 05:02 and the apocalypse that they believe is coming 05:04 and they want to be part of it. 05:06 And it seeds, sows the seeds 05:08 towards the potential of a crusade, 05:10 and to me that mentality is very much alive and well. 05:13 Yeah, so I think one or the other 05:15 is going to overtake us very soon 05:17 and, you know, the world will go on, 05:19 that won't be the end of the world 05:20 but things will follow from that 05:22 and I believe both of those potential crises and others 05:25 we haven't thought of 05:26 have the immediate potential 05:28 to radically change civil liberties and religious, 05:30 and the religious liberty situation 05:33 will harden very quickly 05:35 if either of those gets out of hand 05:37 which is very likely. 05:38 Well, and that brings up an interesting point 05:40 because domestically the United States 05:43 is, is very much tied 05:48 to its civil religious traditions. 05:51 And when you look at the flag, you look at God and country, 05:55 when you look at mom, apple pie and Chevrolet if you will 05:59 and baseball, don't forget baseball, 06:02 don't you ever forget baseball, 06:03 anyway that, that's really what makes... 06:06 It's trouble because I tend to forget baseball. 06:09 You're from Australia. 06:10 And soccer and Aussie rules. 06:11 Yes, yes, yes and cricket, yes. 06:13 Cricket, whoever heard of cricket? 06:15 No, I don't like cricket. Oh, you don't like cricket. 06:16 Cricket can break bones. 06:19 Anyway, the point is that 06:22 with America's civil religious traditions 06:24 that are so strong 06:26 we embedded that this notion of American exceptionalism, 06:29 this notion that our country 06:35 is at stake here 06:37 and we're the indispensable nation 06:39 which I would agree 06:41 we are the indispensable nation throughout the world, 06:44 but I think that this tendency towards populism, 06:47 this tendency towards isolationism 06:50 to make America great again is, 06:52 is maybe not equivalent to 06:55 what happened in Nazi Germany obviously, 06:57 but who knows maybe it is. 07:00 My point is that when we turn on ourselves 07:04 the country when, 07:06 when leaders turn the country in and of itself, 07:08 the country will turn in on itself. 07:11 And when that happens that's, that's the seeds of 07:14 potential civil war and revolution... 07:16 And paranoia... 07:17 Yes, yes. 07:19 And it could be a constitutional revolution, 07:21 which to me is again very prophetic 07:24 and we as Seventh-day Adventists 07:26 of all people should be awake to this, 07:28 if we're not I wonder what Kool-Aid we're drinking. 07:32 And there's not much that we can do individually 07:35 or even as a church to stop it, 07:37 but our response should be to be more heavenly minded, 07:40 to be more prophetically aware. 07:42 Yes. 07:44 And as far as civil and religious liberties 07:45 speak out on this, we have an obligations on that. 07:48 Our loyalties are be, to be to God first 07:50 and country second. 07:51 Yes. Yeah. 07:53 But that's not to diminish country loyalty... 07:54 Right. 07:55 As any true patriot, we need to speak up. 07:57 We're not called to be revolutionaries, 07:59 but I think we're all called as the Bible says 08:01 to proclaim liberty throughout the land. 08:03 I'm proud of my heritage 08:05 being directly related to Ulysses S. Grant 08:09 and also to Alexander Hamilton 08:11 so, you know, I mean, I'm very proud of my heritage. 08:13 I'm proud to be an American, 08:15 but ultimately my loyalty has to be to Jesus Christ 08:18 and the Three Angels' Messages of Revelation 14. 08:20 Absolutely. 08:22 And that's really where we need to be 08:23 both as a church as a people 08:25 and as people who are looking forward 08:27 to the soon coming of Christ. 08:28 Yeah. 08:30 And the fire that we should be worried about 08:33 is not the Reichstag or the capital. 08:35 The fire that we should be worried about 08:37 it's the fire of the end times that destroys evil. 08:39 We don't want to be part of that, do we? 08:41 No, and we don't want... 08:42 We're preparing for a better new world. 08:44 And we don't want to receive a counterfeit spirit, 08:48 a counterfeit religion that causes us to be deceived. 08:51 When we look at the Reichstag fire, 08:53 we must be careful of propaganda 08:55 and to be quite frank fake news 08:58 which we've heard a lot about lately. 08:59 But as we head down this path 09:02 of these last days we call them, 09:04 what we have called it that for a long time. 09:07 We need to be careful that we put God first 09:09 and country second. 09:11 Our loyalty must be to Jesus Christ and Him alone, 09:13 not through any manmade schemes 09:16 to save ourselves or our nation. 09:19 At the end of his ministry, Jesus warned 09:21 that at the end of time 09:22 there would be wars and rumors of wars. 09:25 There's no question that the United States in particular 09:27 is going through a tumultuous period. 09:30 In this program we invoked the Reichstag fire of Germany 09:34 which was a major event 09:37 that catapulted Germany into Nazism 09:39 and of course, Europe into the horrors of World War II. 09:43 I don't know that the US is quite at that stage, 09:46 but there are some uncanny parallels. 09:48 Where as the Nazis consolidated power 09:51 with the Night of the Long Knives 09:53 about the worst you could say of the US at the moment 09:55 is that we're into the day of the long tithes 09:59 but underneath all of this, there is a troubling change, 10:05 a forgetfulness of the constitution 10:07 of a Protestant heritage 10:09 and the reliance on God not to guide the country, 10:14 but to guide each person in their individual 10:17 spiritual journey. 10:20 For Liberty Insider, this is Lincoln Steed. |
Revised 2017-05-04