Dawn’s Early Light Podcast
Empowering and strengthening Americas civil foundation through faith, service, and dialogue.
Dawn’s Early Light Podcast
Dawn's Early Light Podcast Episode 9: Christian Apologetics & Executive Change
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Alright, how's it going guys? Nice Friday weather here in Nebraska for episode nine of the Don's Early Light podcast. Um Nebraska weather's been kind of crazy recently. I don't know if our fellow Nebraskans are watching, but it was blizzard-like conditions like two days ago, and now it's bright and sunny about what 60 degrees. So beautiful day out. It's beautiful.
SPEAKER_01We're here at the park, man. We got we got an old couple playing tennis. We got a kid on a swing over there. You know, this is just this is the American dream.
SPEAKER_00This is what America's all about. That's right. We've got a couple talking points today. Uh we're gonna go through them. Our first two-ish pretty quick, and then the last one, it's kind of a heavy, not a heavy one, but a big one for us. So it's gonna be dense. Uh so the first order of business, as one might say, is uh we kind of have had an uh unfortunate falling out with one of our members. Um guys know we started the pack, uh it was three of us, it's me, Cooper, and Riker, uh, unfortunately, due to some uh just affiliations that me and Cooper uh really didn't agree with, and we thought it was best for Pac uh to move away from him that Riker was affiliated with. Uh he stepped down voluntarily. We had a conversation with him, and uh he stepped down and kind of just away from PA as a whole. Uh we'll leave it pretty brief because there's not too much to delve into there. It was pretty cut and dry.
SPEAKER_01And yeah, out of respect for Riker, we won't disclose exactly what that was just because he asked us not to, so we'll we'll respect that, obviously. Um but we talked to him first, unlike some other unlike uh incidents. The subject of episode two, you have to watch that. Um but yeah, we talked to him first, he was okay with stepping down, he stepped down. Um PAC will move forward, uh unaffiliated with uh all of those uh all of the things that he uh decided to affiliate himself with. Um, you know, we'll just leave it at that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so moving forward, it's just gonna be me and Cooper as the main two in PAC. Obviously, there's other members that help up help out with stuff, but we'll be heading all the tablings and all the other fun stuff that we've got planned for this year.
SPEAKER_01So Yeah, we were planning on tabling today, but we realized it was spring break. So there's gonna be nobody on campus.
SPEAKER_00So yeah, so hopefully next week we'll we'll get some tabling in. It's supposed to be nice as the weather gets nicer, we'll hopefully we can start recording these too now.
SPEAKER_01Um now that it's gonna be nicer and that it's not in like a building and stuff like that.
SPEAKER_00So yeah, we'll be recording them outside, and those are pretty long, so I think that'll be some some good content. Speaking of content, that's our our second topic. So as we've kind of just been uh expanding our our our our wow, our outreach. There we go. That was kind of a tongue twister there. Um not really. We not not really, but I just stuttered over that one. Uh we've been reaching into Spotify and Apple Music and just these other podcast uh websites that have just been helping us get more views and whatnot. And on this actually on our last episode on YouTube, we're going from like 10 to 15, 20 views an episode to almost 400, and so that's that's awesome. Yeah. Uh with that comes some more interactions, and so we've been getting some comments, some some back and forth with which we invite you to comment however you feel. Absolutely, and and we're here for it. And um, I was gonna read them, but as it's gonna get kind of lengthy, they kind of just went and said, you know, we're just uneducated, having, you know.
SPEAKER_01What was it like why would we listen to like a bunch of American nine-year-old schoolboys? Uneducated school, yeah, something like that. And so all of that is ad hominem.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it doesn't address the point that we made at all, but we absolutely we invite those comments, and what I'll say is um we also are pretty open to inviting people onto our podcast. I mean, we're obviously we're not like some enormous corporation, and so if people want to come and debate us on Zoom, in person outside like this, like I don't mind, uh, at our tabling, feel f feel free. I mean, this is all recorded and unedited. Uh for the most part. I mean, we'd do like small little edits here and there, but neither of us really have the time or the know-how to like try and edit. I can do very basic.
SPEAKER_01I can cut the beginning and the end and like throw in trim it up a bit. Yeah, throw in some funny things, like if the camera dies or something. Yeah, but we're obviously not here to like cut people's words out or anything like that. Yeah, like our I think our Joyce interview uh interview/slash debate was completely unedited. It was just like from beginning to end.
SPEAKER_00Literally from beginning to end, besides like cutting out the first 10 minutes for me and Cuba were just kind of hanging out, waiting for him to join. So I mean and I I believe that's our longest episode. It is, it was like two and a half hours, almost three hours, and that was that's a good episode. It is a good episode. Honestly, we need to talk about getting him back on because I think we should delve into some of those topics a little deeper. That was very surface level, like trying to feel each other out, because he's about as far opposite on the spectrum of politics as Caleb and I, I think.
SPEAKER_01I would I would agree, yeah. He's pretty pretty far left, and I wouldn't say we're extremely far right, but we're we're pretty solidly on the right.
SPEAKER_00Um so that's I think it's good to just hear those debates kind of bounce off of each other and not live in that echo chamber of just debating. Like, I mean, we had that or not debate, but interview with uh the Senator Kathleen, and obviously we don't just want to live in that echo chamber all the time.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's it's nice to you know talk with people that agree with you, but it's way more fruitful to talk with people that don't agree with you. 100%.
SPEAKER_00So yeah, we we invite the comments, we invite the the discourse and the the exchange of ideas. So keep it up and we're here for it. Obviously, these episodes are just gonna keep going to more and more platforms, and um, we're hopefully gonna get more interactions and more people that are interested in debating us. So excited for that. Now for our our big topic, do I segue us and yeah, let's do it.
SPEAKER_01So uh I wanted to, you know, the most important thing of my life is my relationship with the God who created me, which is the Christian God. Uh three-in-one, triune, father, son, holy spirit. Um there is uh a special kind of thing about religion where when we table and when we talk to people, I wouldn't say I wouldn't say a vast majority of the time, but most of the time, um it the topic of religion gets brought up no matter what, regardless of the political topic that we're debating. It kind of permeates all of like it permeates everybody's kind of consciousness in their in their minds. Religion is a very uh important topic, and so that obviously plays into uh that comes into play when we're talking about serious things. So uh being educated on uh if you are Christian, being educated on how to defend the faith, um, like Paul tells us to do, is extremely important. Um I can't remember the exact verse, but it it goes something like uh be prepared to have a defense for the things that you believe in, um, and things like that. So uh yeah.
SPEAKER_00And I think it's very telling at our uh tabling because a lot of the time we start with a political debate and people will come and listen and hear what we have to say, whether it's on abortion or the trans issue or LGBTQ, whatever it is, and then somebody afterwards will bring up, oh you guys must be Christian or you must have these beliefs, and I think that kind of speaks to our character that our our politics stems from our faith, not our faith from our politics. I think that's a big thing right now in America. Yep. Um that we we try to align our politics with our faith, not our faith with our politics. So um, but yeah, like Cooper was saying, it I'd say probably 50% of our tabling ends up being Christ or religion at some point. Um we've had a couple tablings where me and Cooper kind of split off and he's debating one person and I'm debating another, and religion gets brought up somewhere in there. We've had some where we're debating one person together and religion gets brought up somewhere in there. It always seems to end up there, and I'm super happy about it because that just means people get to hear it, uh, whether it's in passing or they're staying and listening or the person that we're debating, they get to hear the good news. Yeah. So absolutely.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely. Alright, yeah, so kind of what we wanted to talk about today is uh Christian apologetics and if you are a Christian, how to defend the faith. If you're not a Christian, uh hopefully understanding why Christians believe the things that they do, and ultimately, hopefully you can become a Christian as well, which you're always able to.
SPEAKER_00Um if you have any questions, please leave them in the comments. Yeah, leave them in the comments. This is the important stuff, truly. This is what it what it boils down to.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, this is, you know, politics is important, it's very important, but it's not number one. Number one is uh Christ. And um kind of segue into the apologetics portion. Um a big uh topic of um disconnect between uh Christians and non-Christians is uh if Christ was who he said he was. A lot of people don't believe that uh he made, you know, he did these miracles, that he rose from the dead. Uh but when you ask them, okay, do you believe that um Alexander the Great conquered um much of uh kind of the Middle East and the and parts of the Mediterranean, they'll say, oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Why do you believe that? Uh well I guess it's because a lot of people, you know, they learn it in history class or whatever, and they'll say that, but then you get to the root of, well, how do we know this in history? Well, I guess it's eyewitness testimony and um documentation from the time. And people have no problem applying, you know, that standard to secular things, but you then bring it to Christianity, which there are uh there are thousand I believe thousands of documents, both religious and secular, that point to the fact that Christ was real. And no historian would argue that Christ actually was an actual person. The only thing that there is disconnect on is if he obviously rose again from the dead. Um but Christ existed and there are plenty of eyewitness testimonies that say they saw him after he had died and that he ascended into heaven and did many, many miracles. Um when you look at what the people who were saying that Christ uh resurrected, how they were treated after this, it was very, very poorly. Um, you know, one of the strongest arguments for Christianity is the fact that the disciples went to their death defending what they knew to be true. So nobody goes to their death defending what they know to be a lie. So that's that's different than martyrs who are um who don't know but they believe. So there's a difference between belief and knowledge. Um belief is um treating something as true despite uh proof. Uh knowledge is treating something as true because of proof and because of know uh and because of evidence. Um these people were in the very unique situation to know if what they were saying was true or a lie. And they went to, you know, at some of them crucifixions, um, never denying it, and um always maintaining the fact that Christ had died and rose again. So that's it. That's very gruesome deaths. Yes, yeah, it's not just like they were shot in the head or poisoned, it was they were nailed to two crossbeams and hung up outside naked uh until they asphyxiated to death because in order to breathe on that cruci on that crucifix, you had to push yourself up against the nails and eventually you just get too exhausted and you couldn't do it. So um that is kind of the the strongest evidence in my opinion for the reason as to why Christianity is true.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and I'll say we're living through a really uh interesting time right now. I remember growing up, uh, when I was younger, like 10, 11, uh, there's a lot of people on the internet that are trying to kind of disprove like Jesus as a whole, kind of like, oh, he knows never really a person or whatever have you, but we're we're finally to this point where agnostics and atheists, I mean you have very smart atheists like Alex O'Connor, he's the big one that always comes to mind. Just very smart individuals who acknowledge that Jesus was a real person, and so like Cooper was saying, we're finally at this like crux where now it's Jesus was real, it's hard to you can't really disprove that. I mean, there's so much evidence, and like he was saying, if you're not gonna take Jesus being real, uh, then you'd have to, for example, just to kind of discredit Alexander the Great, like really any Lincoln, like any historical figure that you haven't seen with your own eyes, you can't prove that they were ever a real person because there's so many more ties to Jesus than there was anybody else. And so we're we are at this really interesting uh time period where everybody agrees he was a real person. Now we have to figure out did he really um do these miraculous miracles, rise from the dead, raise Lazarus from the dead, these uh crazy things that nobody else had done. And I think like Cooper was saying, just the idea that these people were um willing to sacrifice themselves knowing what they had seen and heard and witnessed and done. Uh these just incredibly gruesome deaths. I think that's very telling that there's a lot of proof that Jesus was real and he did exactly what the Bible says he did. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And not only just them, their families too. Like, you know, like especially like if your family was going to be persecuted, um, you would certainly not uh die defending a known lie. Um that's kind of the uh there's a there's a fancy scientific word for that uh defense of Christianity, but I'm I'm not that smart.
SPEAKER_00So And I mean you can make it very simple, like if Cooper was to claim that he did all these miracles, and I was like, yep, he did them, and then somebody comes to me and says, we're gonna, you know, string you from a tree and until you die, unless you say they didn't do them, like, alright, you got me. So, yeah. I just think that's incredibly telling about all of the disciples.
SPEAKER_01Think of it the other way. If I claim to do all these miracles, you see me do all these miracles, you see me heal a blind guy, you see me raise somebody from the dead, and then you see me die, and like you see me get crucified by the Romans, were very good at killing people. That was like their whole thing. They were like incredible at killing people. Um and then three days later, I show up and I'm like, what's up, man? He's back. Hey, you remember how I said I was gonna die and then rise again after three days? Here I am. Here I am. You if you were then faced with being strung up on the tree, and I said, if you deny me, I will deny you before the father. So you can't deny me here on earth. What would you do? String me up on the tree. Yeah, I mean, it's as simple as that. If if if you know, if somebody predicts their death and resurrection, and then it actually happens, you gotta take what that guy says seriously. That guy is uh uh that's God, right? I mean that guy, he completely defeated death.
SPEAKER_00So, and yeah, this is a big uh a big thing in the world right now. People are I think people are really hungry for an answer. Young people, uh I work with that are that talk to me about it, and I'm I am really happy about it because it's it is a very important thing to to me and Cooper and to just everybody. It's it's incredibly important. Um and so yeah, I encourage the the discourse, the debate. Um obviously we'll be on campus probably next week, and as long as the weather's nice, we're gonna be out there quite a bit. So I've got some more arguments if we're gonna be able to do that. We're here to talk about it. Yeah, let's let's hear them. I'm sure I'm pretty good with breaking this down.
SPEAKER_01So there's also the cosmetological cosmet cosmetological argument, I think is the term, um which is uh we we now know that the universe had a distinct beginning, right? That is known as the big the big bang. Um that was proven by was it Einstein? I don't know. Theory of relativity, I I'm not into all of that, but um it was proven at some point. And because the beginning, or because the universe had a beginning, that must mean that there was a cause for the beginning. Um and if there was a cause, that must mean that there has to be an uh the an uncaused cause. Because if you if you just keep going down the line, then it becomes a paradox of, well, then what about what about that's beginning and what about that's beginning? So eventually you have to delve into the supernatural logically. Um that's something defies uh natural law. So you have to go into the supernatural. Um that would be God. So you can't, so if someone doesn't believe in Jesus, um, but they do believe in God, at least you've got the fact that God uh they bel believe in God down. But before, if they don't even believe in God, you can't get into Jesus. So first you have to convince them that that God exists, and then you can move into what the actual God is.
SPEAKER_00You know, I'll say a lot of the people that we talk to nowadays, I think from all of our debating, kind of towards the end of last year, tabling, I think I met one true atheist. Everybody else is really agnostic. Like they think there's a higher power out there, and they're don't care, they don't know, whatever it might be. Um and so that's kind of what we're getting into here is there's people that believe there's a god that just, you know, they don't really care, they think he's mean, they think whatever might have you.
SPEAKER_01So Yep, and there's people that think that, oh, there may be a God, but he's a definite he's not all good. Or there there may be a God, but he's not all powerful. Um and that is that goes against Christian teaching, obviously, but um when excuse me, you look at one of the the biggest uh gripes that people who don't believe in God uh at all come up with or who are on the fence about God is the problem of evil, in which you know there's never going to be a perfect answer for that because obviously uh evil exists, right? We've we see it all around us, but um, that does not mean that all something that is all good doesn't and all powerful doesn't. So when you look into why why bad things happen, why does why do bad things happen uh in the world? To good people, to bad people, to anybody in between. So it comes down to the fact that God did create a perfect world, but us humans decided to rebel against that. And because we decided to rebel against that, uh it the sin or the world became cursed with sin, and now we live in this fallen world, but God has promised us that um we have that we will eventually uh get to that perfect world again. So it's not God that causes these uh bad things, it is uh our sinful nature that causes us to do these things. And when you look at, well, why does God even allow sin to exist in the first place? Why does God even give us the choice to sin? You have to look at love. And love, um, true love in and of itself is a choice, right? You cannot force somebody to truly love you, otherwise it's not true love. I I bring this up a lot, but Caleb, if I chained you to my basement water pipe and you couldn't get out, and I said, you are uh you have to truly love me, or else, you know, I'm gonna starve you down here or whatever. Or I'll uh not starve him, but like, I'm going to I'm not gonna give you a choice, you have to love me. That's not Caleb can't actually love me because I'm not giving him a choice. Now it's different. If if Caleb's sitting right here and I'm like, Caleb, do you love me? And he has the ability to say yes or no and act in accordance with that, either of those answers. Um true love implies the free will that chooses that love. So God knowing that uh true love requires free will, gave us free will. That's what the tree in the garden was was an opportunity for Adam and Eve to not choose God so that they could truly love him if they so choose or chose. So when you look at um kind of the argument of love and how that uh kind of plays into uh free will and everything like that, that's where you get uh God being all-loving, all good, and all-powerful at the same time while reconciling the problem of evil in the world. So there's that. Um and it's a it's a bit complicated, if you it, you know, um it's taken me a while to kind of grasp that and understand that. But um, ever since I have, it's become a lot more clear to me that you know, the only good that happens in this world is because of a choice, and the only bad that happens in this world is because of a choice. And if there were no choice, then there would be no good or evil, and there would be no joy or sorrow, there would be no yin and yang, there wouldn't be there wouldn't be light, there wouldn't be darkness. So uh you have to understand that love and goodness requires free. Will in order for itself to exist in its purest form.
SPEAKER_00I agree. And then one of the biggest arguments that I I like, uh that I like to uh bring up with people is the idea that Christianity is a very self selfless religion. I think when you're uh talking to a lot of these agnostics, because there's there's a lot of them, which I I understand, you know, just not really wanting to deal with the idea of religion in a way, or they don't really want to put time and effort into it. What I always say is uh Christianity is is you know in its truest form is this selfless religion where we're not promised a good life, we're not promised we're actually promised the opposite of a good life if we are to follow Christ. Yeah, we're not we're not promised 37 virgins after death or our own universe or planet or whatever. Um really when you when you boil down to it, we're promised persecution and we're promised um just not not the most optimal um we will be hated and that we will be um you know we have to take up our cross daily. Yeah, and and so that to me really speaks to the the true idea of our religion is that we it's it doesn't please self at all. It's really telling you to to push your flesh away and to take up your cross, like Cooper said, and to uh eventually one day reconnect with your creator on a very personal level. And so that one really speaks to me quite a bit. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Um there's a lot of uh Muslim people on campus at UNL, and I've talked to a few of them, and kind of the biggest uh gripe that they have with Christianity is the fact that God cannot be three in one at the same time. And my uh my defense to that is also love. Um so when you look at love, what is a greater form of love? Having love for one's own self or having love for others? And everybody would say, well, I guess it would be having love for others. And I would agree with that. So if God is perfectly loving, all loving, as Muslims believe, you know, uh, that has the highest form of love, then he needs others uh apart from himself to love. And that is why at the be and if God has been all-loving from the beginning to the end, and creation was and human beings were not here from the beginning to the end, we believe that there was a a seven, or I guess a six-day technically, um uh t time period of uh creation. Whether that's uh 24-hour periods or um longer spans of time is up for debate. I believe in the longer spans of time uh version of it, just because uh the Bible says a day is like a thousand years to God and a thousand years is like a day to God, but that's getting into the weeds. Um because God n needs to have perfect love from beginning to end, according to the Muslim, then therefore God needed to have uh beings apart from himself before he created us. Therefore, that's where you get uh that's where you get the Trinity. He had the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit all in one. Um different in personhood, but uh equal in uh Godhood.
SPEAKER_00So in like divine nature, you know that's kind of what it's described as. And another point I always like to bring up to anybody who wants to debate either the Trinity or kind of like the humanity of Jesus, that's another big um conversation point, is a lot of people will say there's you know it's possible for someone to be 100% God and 100% man. What always confuses me by that statement is if you believe in a all-knowing, all-powerful, omniscient, omnipotent God, why couldn't he? You know what I mean? I think that's always such a strange argument. How could Jesus Jesus be man and God? Why couldn't he be man and God? You know? And so I think that just goes along with the idea of the divine nature. I mean, it's outside of our knowledge, our know-how.
SPEAKER_01So yeah, and at some point you just have to take a leap of faith. You know, you're not going to have all of the answers uh here on earth.
SPEAKER_00And and that applies to everything, whether you're an atheist, an agnostic, a Muslim, there's faith somewhere. Eventually you're boiling it down to atheists have faith in the Big Bang, and they have faith that there's no God, and faith in science, I guess, in a in a way, and agnostics have, you know, faith that there's a God out there, but they just don't know which one, and that they're kind of hoping that they live a good enough life that they get a free ride. Um, there's some people that just truly don't care. I have a person that I work with that I had a deep conversation with on that, which was super sad. It was a really sad conversation, but just the idea that they said that they know they're going to hell, but they just don't care because they would rather have a good life here. Wow. That's just, you know, I mean Yeah, it's their choice, I suppose.
SPEAKER_01It's the And that that proves God's love, right? Is that he's not forcing that person to spend eternity with him um despite his wishes, because clearly he wishes to do what he wants here in rebellion to God. That will honor his wish when it comes to uh judgment day.
SPEAKER_00And there's a pretty uh hard-hitting quote that I've been seeing recently. It's you know, if you if you're not willing to spend your earthly time with God, why would he force you to spend eternity with him? That doesn't really make sense, you know. Like if going down the same like chaining in a basement idea, if if Cooper said he doesn't want to spend the first 50 years of his life with me, why would I expect him to spend the last 50 years of his life with me? You know what I mean? Like, what's I wouldn't, you know, be going out of my way. You couldn't break it down to like a like an ex-girlfriend, you know. If your girlfriend breaks up with you, you wouldn't come back, you know, 20 years later and be like, why aren't you with me now? You know, it doesn't make any sense.
SPEAKER_01So I mean, if if you say to God, I want nothing to do with you, God is going to say, Okay, I respect your free will. I'm going to be here if you ever change your mind. And if you don't change your mind before your time on this earth is up, then God is going to honor your wish by not forcing you to spend eternity with him in heaven.
SPEAKER_00And it'd be incredibly unloving for him to say, Well, I don't care about your choice, I'm gonna force you to come with it. That wouldn't be true love. That would be uh as we discussed earlier. Yeah. Violating your love would be Yeah. So I think there's a lot of fruit for thought there, and like like I said earlier, it's a pretty heavy topic and very open to debate to debate with it. Fruit for thought. Fruit for thought. I like that. Did you say food or fruit? I think I said fruit on accident, but I kind of like that.
SPEAKER_01It's not bad.
SPEAKER_00But um Yeah, it's very nice. Ugh. There's a little net on my leg that is. That's the worst part about summertime, the bugs. This is like perfect when there's not like a lot of mosquitoes or anything else. Right now it's March 20th, I believe.
SPEAKER_01Something like that, yeah. Um yeah, it's it's like 67.
SPEAKER_00See, and I tried not to say that earlier. Degrees. But that's that's on you. I was able to bite my tongue on this one.
SPEAKER_0168 is gonna have his day in the sun, one of these days, man. You know, uh 69 and 67 are so funny, you know. And 68's just in in between, like. One one day, 68, you'll get there. He'll get something. Yeah, you'll get there.
SPEAKER_00But uh but yeah, so I'm I mean, we're pretty I mean, honestly, I'm just excited to start tabling again. That's really what started all of this, and so I'm I'm excited to get back out there. Boots on the ground.
SPEAKER_01Yep. Which, as of four minutes ago, there there's no technically boots on the ground in Iran, but there are marines stationed on ships, like near Iran, I believe.
SPEAKER_00So yeah, so there's been a couple bombings, there's been a couple ships that are positioning in certain ways, and so we'll keep you guys updated. If anything happens, we'll probably make a podcast episode pretty quick. Um if boots are on the ground or if we withdraw, whatever ends up happening. So Yeah.
SPEAKER_01I think that uh the Persian people, man, they gotta, you know, the bombings haven't stopped yet, right? And Trump has said stay in, wait until it's over, and then then go take it. Um so I think Trump is just setting them up for the best possible, you know, scenario for them to be able to take over. Um we'll see though. Hopefully that's the case, you know.
SPEAKER_00And obviously there's still some pretty big tensions because we we bombed the original leader and then his son took over, and so that's not really uh what we wanted to happen, and so I think there's still some unfinished business there to help finish everything out. So we'll just kind of have to wait and see. It's a waiting game right now. I know there's a lot of like we have those YouTube comments where everybody's like, ah, it's a you know, it's an Israel takeover, and then there's other people that say, Oh, we're just an evil American empire just bombing the little guy. I think it's just me.
SPEAKER_01The little guy that said, uh, we're gonna kill you if we if we ever get the chance. Yep. And uh they were starting to develop nukes in the world.
SPEAKER_00And it's only so funny, you know, maybe if a if a seven-year-old says, Oh, I'm gonna stab you, haha, but then you wait ten years and now he's 17, and it's like, oh, he's a little bit bigger now, and you wait another ten years. And then he says, I'm gonna stab I'm gonna I'm I still wanna stab you. And you're like, okay, that's a little more concerning. Now he's 27, it's like, alright, that's a that's a full grown man. Yeah. And he still wants to stab me. That's a little more concerning. So that's a good analogy.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, but instead of instead of a knife, it's uh it's a nuclear bomb that can kill you know millions of people at you know, in the blink of an eye.
SPEAKER_00I still have my concerns with uh China's involvement, but they've been staying silent for the most part. And so I think if we remain out, if we keep our boots off the ground, if we uh you know just keep doing kind of what we're doing, trying to assess that regime change, I I think China will stay out of it, and I think we'll prevent an actual war. Everybody's calling it a war. I don't really see the the war part. I mean, this is like Venezuela, we're just kind of bombing a couple places and you know taking their leader.
SPEAKER_01It's yeah, it's it's a war implies, I mean, wars can be very one-sided, obviously, but like this is I think how many I think only like a dozen Americans have died, and the majority of it has been due to friendly fire incidents.
SPEAKER_00Which I am incredibly against, by the way. I I wish you really didn't have any Americans in there. I feel like we could pretty easily just drones at this point. I don't know why. That's what really concerns me personally, is why we have boots that are that close, you know, to in position if something maybe goes wrong, whatever. I'm I'm not an army general, military strategist, but uh I would prefer just some drones and just getting done what we need to get.
SPEAKER_01I think six were stationed on a base in Qatar. I can't remember what the country was, but uh Iran struck that base and killed six uh soldiers. And then six more were uh refueling uh a uh a jet and uh they got shot down by friendly fire. Um so or it was a it was an air refueler that got shot down by friendly fire. They weren't refueling the jet while it happened, I don't think. But um yeah, no, I don't think any Americans have died uh like in Iran at the moment. I don't know. Like airspace, obviously, but um like no one has been, you know. Well they're not breaking down doors and Right, it's not like Fallujah right now. Exactly. Uh I just I I just am opposed to like any sort of quagmire, any sort of like war that's going to last you know eight years. Um But yeah, there's you know, it's a nuanced issue and um It is, and uh something that is a little frustrating is how uh I feel like how simple people try to make it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Like, oh, you're either pro-murdering school children in Iran or you're against it. It's like war is a very nuanced topic. This isn't like a right or wrong, like there's a lot of gray area.
SPEAKER_01There are thousands of kids who died in the bombings of uh uh over Germany, right? But everybody says that defeating the Nazi defeating the Nazi regime was an absolute win. Um and while it was, it was a great, great moment in American history. Uh Nuking Hiroshima and Nagasaki, yeah, those are just ending the war, yeah, ending ending uh it and people always say, Oh, you didn't have to nuke Japan. Well, we dropped the first nuke, asked them to surrender, and they were like, no. So we dropped the second. So we dropped a side, and they're like, okay, we don't know how we don't know how many of these you guys have. So we're going, and luckily enough, we only had two. And um Japan. Thankfully they didn't call her a bluff. Yeah. But it wasn't really a bluff, we'd you know, leveled two cities, but yeah. Uh but yeah, Japan was going to fight to the bitter end that saves many American lives and Japanese lives by by doing that. But that's World War II is a topic for another day.
SPEAKER_00It is, but I I I only say that I think it's important to bring up that I mean war is messy, uh people are innocent people are gonna die kind of regardless. But I think as long as it's incredibly tragic. It is, but I think as long as we're keeping boots off the ground, as long as we're just trying to enact this regime change and truly just go after evil people, I see that as a net benefit as of right now. So yeah, other than that, I mean that's kind of wraps it up, a little bit of a shorter one. I mean, I'm just excited to get on and start debating again. Bring the table out, um, set up the camera, be outside for a couple hours. It's gonna be lit. It's gonna be lit. So yeah, we'll just kind of keep you guys posted with that schedule and uh hopefully we'll start getting some more people.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, we want to we want to get Abdallah on. Um I mean if if Rekker's friend Maddie is still down to come talk, even with Riker, that'd be great. Um but um you know obviously Riker's welcome as a guest, but he obviously stepped down and cut ties with us, so we'll see where that goes.
SPEAKER_00But um and then I mean we've sent some emails out to some of our other Nebraska senators. I mean, we're kind of just playing the waiting game and seeing who we can get on. Um and like we said before, if you send an email our way or hit us up on social media, I'm pretty good at keeping up on the street.
SPEAKER_01I'll have to use my use of pack email. I I send them for my personal email.
SPEAKER_00That's totally fine. Okay, yeah, but um yeah, if anybody wants to hit up the email or the Instagram or Facebook, I'm pretty active on those. So if you want to debate over Zoom, that's kind of how we've done it now. Like I really like the Zoom setting. Um like we said before earlier in this episode, we don't really cut anything, it's just conversation between people that disagree with us. Yeah. So yeah, legit. Anything else you wanna?
SPEAKER_01Um I guess just you know, um if you're a Christian, you know, consider these uh these defenses and um try and commit them to memory. Um be well versed in scripture and understand kind of the characteristics of God and understand who God is so you can better defend him.
SPEAKER_00Um one more thing I wanted to bring up, I almost forgot about this. Um I know a lot of people try to separate religion and politics. There's a lot of churches that teach we're not supposed to be involved in politics. I would say I heavily disagree with that, and I would really look into I'd read your Bible a bit more and figure out you know who David is and Solomon and you know these incredibly uh religious figures, but also, I mean, kings or politicians, and I would really consider that heavily because I think that it matters that we're in politics because when we're not in politics, we get abortions and we get just crazy, crazy importations of third world countries that hate Western values. I mean, there's so many negative outcomes that come from trying to just say, I just want to step away from politics.
SPEAKER_01So and we're called to bring heaven to earth. Um, so and the best way to do that is to, you know, the law is a moral uh guide. It's you know, w when you grow up in a country and you begin to to learn its laws, you then kind of take that into account with your own morality. And, you know, if if your country says that, oh, if if you suspect a woman of disobeying you, you're free to beat her. A lot of uh Islamic countries, um, the Quran says this, uh then you view women as less than uh valuable uh uh in in terms of comparing that to men. But if you grow up in a country that says uh men and women are of equal value, uh an infinite level of value, then you're going to view men and women on an equal plane. Um or you're more likely to rather. So yeah, get involved in uh politics and obviously vote be an informed voter.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, this doesn't mean you have to sort a podcast and a nonprofit, but I would say if you're on the fence about voting or you don't think it's important to be able to know of like, oh, which which governor should I vote for, which mayor, whatever, I'd say it's important to do do that research. Um because like Cooper was saying, it's incredibly hard uh to drive or derive morality um outside of really like a religious text in a way, um, because when you don't have something higher than a human or higher than yourself to base morality off of, you start to just derive it from what you think is good. And while obviously there's some people that think what they think or know is best, you get people like up you know on Epstein's Island who think that what they're doing is okay, and those are you know your leaders, and so you just have to be careful with allowing your Christian values to step away from any sort of political action. So yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I think that's really big. That's a big thing for me, at least, because I have a lot of Christian friends who don't want to be involved in politics, and I get it, like I said, you don't have to campaign for Peter Ricketts or anything like that, but I would definitely suggest making sure you know you're up to date and you know who you're voting for and that kind of thing.
SPEAKER_01So and uh if you're not a Christian, uh consider the arguments that I made and uh look into Christianity. Um at least give it a shot, you know. If you're gonna go through life and not consider uh very serious things, then unfortunately, you know, you're you're just not a serious person. Um consider it and come to uh you know, pray about it if you believe in doing that. And uh just you know, I'll I'll I'll pray for you.
SPEAKER_00So but yeah, that wraps it up. Um obviously we're still looking for donations.$30 gets you a pack hat. So right here, got black and tan. Black and tan. So kind of swaggy. It is, and we've we've done pretty well so far on donations, and we're just gonna keep keep hustling. That's true. Shout out Wilson, my friend Wilson bought a hat. Um he's a dog. We're gonna go fishing sometime. I can't remember if we mentioned him already, but Hell Dobb gave us a pretty sizable donation. We mentioned how to do yeah, we appreciate that. I'm always I love him. He's a really good dude. I mean, he's so smart, so much wisdom. I always I email him every once in a while, like, hey, you got advice for this?
SPEAKER_01And Hell Dobb doesn't shade you to his water basement. He does not force you to love him.
SPEAKER_00No, this is purely just because he's a good dude. So yeah.
SPEAKER_01That's that's true love right there. But yeah, I think that is Caleb and Hal. Caleb and Hal. Frodo and Sam. That is kind of yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Uh Obi-Wan and Luke. It's not a good one. I'm drawing a blank. Toad and frog? Mario and Mario and Luigi.
SPEAKER_01I guess they're brothers, yeah. Yeah, they're brothers, but um Burt and Ernie. Burt and Ernie. Uh yeah.
SPEAKER_00But yeah, so Shaggy and Scooby. Shaggy and Scooby. The combo. Yeah, that that wraps it up for me. Uh, I think pretty much good there. Alright. So we'll we'll see you on the next one. We'll see you on on campus. Yes. Alright.