Whose Side Is God On?

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Looking at our world from a theological
perspective. This is the Theology Central podcast

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making Theology Central. Good morning everyone. It is Friday, June the twenty

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first, twenty twenty four. It
is currently eleven nineteen am Central Time,

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and I am coming to you live
from the Theology Central studio located right here

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in Abilene, Texas. And I
did say good morning, right, I

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didn't say good afternoon, right,
So good morning everyone. It is Friday,

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June the twenty first, twenty twenty
four. It is currently eleven nineteen

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am Central Time, and I'm still
coming to you live from the Theology Central

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studio located right here in Abilene,
Texas. Now, I had to offer

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a little correction there just to ensure
that I was very clear, right,

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just to ensure that I gave you
the right date in the right time,

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and that every everything was right.
Everything was correct. So I had to

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just do a little extra there to
make sure that there was clarity, to

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make sure I was understood. Well, let me do that right here in

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my introduction. So for those who
are new to this podcast, I want

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to make it very clear before you, before I'm done with this episode,

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there's a high probability you're going to
start typing out an email or a comment,

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and it's going to be very negative, and you may attack me.

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But before you attack me, let
me just lay down some very important information.

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I served in the United States Military
for nineteen years, almost nineteen years

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active duty. My career came to
an end, not by my choice,

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but because, well, something happened
to me in the military. I almost

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died. I was medically retired,
and then I declared one hundred percent disabled.

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So I'm a disabled vet. All
right. I have my military retirement.

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They retired me medically, and then
I have my disability. I'm very

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grateful for all the things that I
do have. But I served my country

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for nineteen years active duty. I
wore the uniform, I was deployed.

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We could go to all the things
that I did in the United States Military.

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I want to lay that down,
not because I want any credit and

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I don't want to thank you.
What I simply want it to be said

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is don't attack me. Is oh, you don't care about this country.

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You've never sacrificed anything for this country. You hate America. Why don't you

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use pack your bags and leave.
Why don't you just get out and all

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the crazy things people will say to
you if you offer any criticism at all,

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or anything that's even perceived to be
critical. Well, let me make

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it very clear, this is a
theology podcast. I do not look at

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this at the from a patriotic point
of view. I look at it from

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a thiological point of view. I
don't look at things from a nationalistic point

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of view. I look at it
from a theological point of view. So

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I say all of that to ask
a very important question. Why is it

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that many American Christians perceive that anytime
America is involved in a military conflict,

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Revolutionary war, civil War, Nom
Korea, Desert Storm, World War one,

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World War two, or World War
two, world War one, and

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anything that we were involved in,
any conflict that we were involved. I

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know I wouldn't go in chronological order
in all of those, but you get

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the idea, any military conflict that
we're involved in. Why is it that

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many Americans have this mindset that God
is on our side? God hey worked

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out, because God worked it out
in such a way that we that we

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would be victorious and that the landing
would work. The currents were right,

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the weather it was, it was
a divine intervention, God worked it that

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way. Well, if you say
it was divine intervention and God worked it

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that way, why didn't God intervene
much earlier? I don't know, to

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stop the you know, the killing
of six million Jews? Why did millions

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of people have if God was intervening? And why do you believe God was

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intervening on our side or on their
side or that? And how do you

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determine whose side God is on in
a military conflict? Well, if we

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win, God is on our side. Well, what if they won fifteen

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battles? Well, it's determined by
who wins a war? Is that how

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it's determined? Do we perceive God
is on our side simply because well it's

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our side, so therefore God is
on our side? Because the other side

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may perceive God is on their side. Whose side was God on of on

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September of the eleventh, two thousand
and one? Whose side was God on

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during the Oklahoma Oklahoma City bombing?
Whose side was God on during Sandy Hook

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or or Columbine or any other mass
shooting? Whose side was God on the

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shooters? Whose side? We have
this kind of mentality that God is always

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on And I don't know why how
we get to declare which side God is

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on? We just say God is
on our side. And even in the

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military sometimes it would bother me greatly
when we were getting ready if there was

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a military situation where people being deployed, it's almost like God is on our

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side. Are our cause is just? God is defending us? God will

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protect Well? Who said God is
on we invaded a rock under the pretense

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that there were weapons of mass destruction. They weren't there, So God was

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on our side. If God was
on our side, I wish she would

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have intervened and let someone know,
Hey, there's no weapons of mass destruction

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there. Maybe we shouldn't be going
whose side is God on? Everyone thinks

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God is on their side, which
bothers me because that turns God not into

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the eternal creator of heaven and earth, the sovereign one over all things.

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It turns God into nothing more than
a tool for propaganda. We use God

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as a tool to promote our own
agenda, or to give us idea that

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our cause, our agenda is the
righteous one and the correct one. We're

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simply using God for propaganda, for
motivation, for you know, to to

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inspire we're going to fight this war
because God is on our side. I

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do not like that. Now we
know, as a Christian, God is

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on our side, and God is
on our side in the sense of our

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justification. Right, if God is
for me, who can be against me?

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Who can lay a charge at God's
a leg? Because God is the

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one who justifies. God is on
my side and justifying because by faith,

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the righteousness of His son is imputed
to my account. So I stand in

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Christ Jesus. But when it comes
to military combat, when it comes to

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national war, when it comes to
conflict, everyone thinks God is on their

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side. That's what is so bizarre
to me. God they you know,

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everyone believes God is on side.
The Ukrainians will believe God is on their

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side, Russians will believe God is
on their side. I guess maybe if

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you're an atheistic nation, then a
fully atheistic nation, then you wouldn't believe

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God is on your side. I
guess maybe in that particular case. So

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I really get kind of bothered or
disturbed by that, because it's almost as

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if we speak for God, and
who are we to speak for God?

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Now? If I open my Bible, If I open my Bible and I

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read something that seems to imply God
is on the side of a specific nation.

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Then okay, well, the one
nation God was ever on a clear

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side of that would be the nation
of Israel, right and not the United

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States of America. But there's this
kind of mentality within American Christians that,

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hey, God is on our side. God is on our side right now,

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my daughter is not on my side
by calling my iPad during a live

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broadcast. But okay, you get
the idea. But I mean, seriously,

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though, I think it's something to
consider. And I know that bothers

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people, and I know people get
very upset by that and get very irritated

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by that, But I think it's
a it's a worthy discussion to have.

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And the reason I'm having this discussion
is because I don't know what time it

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was, But I grabbed this sermons
two point oh app remember twenty twenty four.

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This is the Sermon's two point oh
app sermon challenge, And I found

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a sermon that says, you'd you'd
better I don't even know how to say

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it that way, you'd better know
your history, you better know your history,

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you had better know your history,
you better know your history. And

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so I thought, well, that's
an interesting title. You'd better know your

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history. Okay, all right,
Okay, sounds like something you know,

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someone older would say, you'd better
know your history. I don't know if

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i'd ever Yeah, sounds weird saying
you'd better know your well, you should

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know your history. You you better
know your history. I don't know.

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We could talk about the title,
but okay, so I I saw it,

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But the idea of that I should
know my history caught my attention because

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I love history. I love history. I love church history. I love

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history about theology. I love history
about philosophy. I love history about the

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great Country of Texas almost said state. I love history about the United States

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of America. I love history about
so many specific places. Everyone knows.

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I love Salem, Massachusetts. Everybody
knows I love that city. I love

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it, love it, love it
and the history there. I've talked about

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how the history of the Alamo has
impacted me. Some places I just walk

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into and I just feel like I'm
there, like I just am transported there,

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and I'm just I just very become
impacted by history. So when I

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saw You'd Better Know your History as
a title, I was like, Oh,

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I wonder if this is going to
be about church history. Ah,

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that could be interesting. So I
had no idea where it went. But

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as I started playing it, I
made it about five minutes and he made

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a comment. Now I don't think
this is not the thesis of his sermon,

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but he made a comment that seems
to imply that God was on a

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specific side during a specific military conflict. And it just brought these issues up,

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like why do we think that?
Why do we think that? Why

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do we always believe that whatever conflict
we get in as a nation, that

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God happened just happens to be a
you know, a American flag wearing supporter.

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I just I don't. I don't
understand that. I just don't.

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I just don't. I just don't. I just don't get that. I

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know, we always want to believe
that our cause is just and our cause

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is righteous. But even if we
believe our cause is just and righteous,

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does that mean God is on our
side? And if God is on our

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side, why don't we imply that
God is intervening at different times? Well,

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if God is intervening, he could
intervene and stopped the entire war and

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conflict that slaughtered who knows hundreds of
thousands of millions of people depending on which

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war military conflicts you're referring to.
So it's always weird, like, well,

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God intervened here, Well how come
he didn't intervene in the fifteen battles

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before it that cost a million people
a million people's eyes. But all of

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a sudden he intervened at this point. Well why did he intervene at this

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point? Because it turned out the
way you wanted or we were victorious,

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so then God intervened there, but
he didn't intervene and all of these other

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battles that we lost, Like the
whole thing is so subjective and weird,

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and when you're starting and when you
try to talk to people, the logical

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consistency just falls to the wayside and
it just becomes this mumbled like it just

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almost becomes like mindless propaganda. But
I want you to at least hear the

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part that sparked my thinking about this
today. And again, there's all these

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military conflicts happening around the world,
and you know, it's just I just

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sometimes don't understand American Christian's perspective and
and but listen, don't say that I'm

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not patriotic, don't say I didn't
serve my country. That would be utter

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fault. It makes me mad when
people attack me that way. I'm like,

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no, I serve my country for
nineteen years wearing the uniform. Okay,

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I'm a disabled vet because of what
happened to me, so don't don't

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go after me. And it's not
even an attack upon our country. It's

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an attack upon people's weird philological approach
when they're nationalism and their patriotism overrides philological

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concerns. That's my issue. So
let's hear this and you can tell me

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if you agree or disagree. Are
you ready? Here we go? Just

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turned to Ezekiel. Wow, where
did that come from? The getting me

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esther? Sorry? And exodus?
Wow. I have been in camp for

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two weeks, so your kids are
getting to me. I love them.

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I love them dearly. It's been
a blast. And as you notice,

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I don't have much of a voice, so my five year old son is

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trying to make that. I think
I'm not going to preach long. Sorry,

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Bud, I don't know. Got
my water. We'll see what happens.

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But as far as camp goes,
if I if I accidentally start humming

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a song, tonight while I'm preaching
forgive me. Let's just say we've sung

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this song so many times in camp
that my five year old son Joshua,

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who hasn't even been in camp,
knows it. So if it starts coming

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out, sorry Now. Of course
you're hearing this in a lot of churches,

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summer camp, summer camp, summer
camp, summer camp, summer camp,

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some aer camp, summer camp.
This is like the more sermons you're

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listening to right now. On the
sermons S two point oh, app,

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you're hearing vacation Bible school and camp. Vacation Bible, cool school, and

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camp. Now. I have a
very obviously different view on church camps.

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You know my view on church camps
my church. My view on church camps

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are kids are taken, they're isolated, and they're indoctrinated, in many cases,

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emotionally manipulated. I'm not a fan
of church camps. I'm just not.

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I just like, hey, we're
gonna remove you from this situation.

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Now, we're gonna take We're gonna
isolate you many cases, put away your

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phones. You're cut off from this
and this and this and this. Now

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we're gonna indoctrinate you because you don't
have nothing where to go. You got

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to listen to us. And in
many cases of strong emotional manipulation occurs,

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and this other kids crying and they're
getting emotional, and then you know,

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they they will make all like we're
gonna I'm gonna rush hell with a water

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gun, and then they go back
home and then we're life happens and within

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a month it's all gone, and
then they probably feel foolish or embarrassed or

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think maybe it wasn't real. And
I just think that there's a lot of

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emotional negativity that comes from church camps. Your experience. You may have absolutely

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loved and adored church camp. I
hear some people love it and it goes

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great for them. I just have
always seen the fallout. They go,

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they come back, they're all emotional, and then it all just seems to

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fall apart, and then they repeat
the cycle, repeat the cycle, and

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then at some point it just seems
to fall apart. So I'm not a

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fan of that, But there's probably
ways to do church camp that's actually fun

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and beneficial and helpful. I'm much
maybe when I was younger, I was

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just I was just negative over it
all. I never went I had opportunities

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as a teenager, and I'm like, I'm not going because I kept watching

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all the team. I was a
teenager watching the teenagers go, come back

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and and watch them crumble into a
million pieces. The church wasn't ever there

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to pick up the pieces. I
don't think the church or the parents ever

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saw the piece. But as a
teenager talking to the other teenagers, I

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witnessed it and I'm like, no, not doing this. And then my

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best friend at the time, his
girl, he couldn't go to church camp

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that year. His girlfriend went to
church camp and she came back from church

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camp pregnant. So something was going
on at church camp that wasn't so it's

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such a good thing. Okay,
she got pregnant at church camp. Yes,

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okay, And you say, well
that must have been a little No,

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it was a very conservative church camp. It was a very conservative church

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camp with lots of rules, and
it did not matter. So yeah,

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I'm not necessarily a fan of that. But you hear lots of churches talking

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about it right now, so you
know, and you can draw your own

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conclusions about it. Right. How
it works. The money, It takes

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all the money, time and effort
to get the kids there, you know,

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And what's weird is like all these
kids go to church camp year after

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year after year after year. Some
kids go to church camp almost every year

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of their growing up, you know, five, six, seven, eight

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times. But then we hear all
of these studies like, oh, the

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kids when they get to college,
they're losing their faith. Their faith is

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falling apart because we've got to do
better at preparing these kids for the for

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the secular university and for the secular
world. So we need a conference for

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apologetics and helping prepare kids for the
universe. And I'm like, they went

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to church camp fifteen times. Church
camp didn't prepare them for anything. What

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was church camp doing that? A
youth group? What was youth group doing?

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They had vacation, Bible school,
they had Sunday school. How come

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none of those things the church does
prepares them. And so then you have

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to have parachurch ministries come along saying
now we've got to do this to help

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prepare the kids for college. What
is the church doing other than sending them

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off for fun food and activities during
the summer. Like I sometimes it's like

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the kids who go to church camp
are more philologically illiterate than the kids who

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don't. Well, at least that
was what I witnessed. I could be

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wrong, maybe there's probably I'm not
painting with a wide brush. I'm just

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saying, if the shoe fits,
then wear it. I mean, some

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of these church camps, the kids
come back and they learn a little bit

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of moralism and don't listen to rock
and roll, and don't you know,

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you do better in their dating practices, but you know, don't look at

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porn. That maybe a lot of
morality, but typically they're just still logically

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illiterate as they were when they are
when they took off. And so that

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now the morality may be a good
thing in some ways, but I just

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I don't know. I don't know. So but so he obviously has been

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at church camp and so, but
that's not what we want to hear.

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Let's see what happens if I start
yelling at kids. Forgive me. I

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tell the kids first day at camp, I said, my job here is

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to run you so ragged that you
fall asleep on the way home. And

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if I've done my job well,
I will fall asleep on the way home.

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I've already got one almost asleep over
here, so I was effective.

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Today apparently I'm going to do something
I don't know if it's ever been done

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here before. I'm going to read
out of a history book that's not the

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Bible, which, by the way, the Bible is full of history,

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real, actual, believable history.
But as a form of introduction, my

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title tonight is going to be You'd
better know your history, okay. Winston

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Churchill is kind of known for making
the phrases famous. The further back you

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can look into history is the further
forward you can look into history, and

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you will repeat history if you don't
learn from it. I'm not quoting those

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exactly, but these ideas. And
I was teaching my seventh and eighth Bible

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class this year on Pharaoh, and
this just hit me pretty hard. So

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I figured, let's look at God's
word about this tonight. I just wanted

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to give one quick example of history, how history repeats itself, and then

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get into God's word. In eighteen
nineteen, you may have heard of what's

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called the Panic of eighteen nineteen.
It started because after the War of eighteen

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twelve, farmers started to earn higher
prices for their crops, so many people

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were going West and purchasing farmland.
Soon, so many farms were producing crops

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there was a surplus of crops.
This has played out multiple times throughout history.

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The prices of farm products began to
drop. The problem is a whole

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bunch of people had bought these farms
with loans from banks out east that they

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could not pay back. And I'm
oversimplifying it, I know. But as

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the economy titans down and the national
bank titans up, banks fall, people

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lose their farms, and it creates
a panic of eighteen nineteen and a general

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distrust of banks and suspicion of rapid
economic growth, specifically in this area of

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borrowing money that you don't have to
put into risky investments. Okay, let's

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go through a half page flip one
hundred years the Great Depression. In the

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late nineteen twenties, newspapers carried accounts
of people who had profited from get rich

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quick schemes, often motivated by greed. Spect You laters brought bought real estate

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or stocks at low prices, hoping
to sell them quickly for a much higher

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price. And I'm not going to
go into it, but basically they borrowed

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money so they could get rich,
and when the economy had a rough spot,

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a lot of people lost everything,
the exact same thing that happened about

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one hundred and tennis years before.
That history will repeat itself if you don't

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learn from it. I'm gonna put
the history book away. The other thing.

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So, a couple of weeks ago, my family and I went to

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the Great Historic Triangle of Williamsburg,
Jamestown, Yorktown. Okay, So he

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reads from a history book, basically
trying to show if you don't learn from

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history, you will repeat it.
Okay, Now I don't. I guess

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maybe that's part of his thesis here, But his thesis is obviously the importance

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of history and if you don't know
it, you will repeat it. Now

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now that I'm not so much focused
on the history part of it, what,

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there's something I think he's about to
say it right here. It's very

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quick, it's not his major point, it's not his major emphasis. But

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when I hear it, it made
me think about what I talked about in

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my introduction. Why do we always
think God is on our side? See

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if you can catch it. And
we're doing a little audio tour of Yorktown

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and we're standing on the banks of
the river. Yorktown is where the war,

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the revolution would for our purposes end, as the British would surrender and

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as the Americans, with the Allied
French now at their aid, are pushing

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back, trying to trap the British
in Yorktown. I stood on the banks

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there by Redoubts nine and ten,
looking over the York River, thinking what

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is wrong with these British? Why
didn't they just go across the river?

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How hard can it be? It's
a couple of miles. Well, as

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we're going through the audio tour,
it says they and they couldn't go across

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the river because there was a storm
and there was big waves, and they

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couldn't make it across the river.
And so we go back to mister Brady

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loved, loved his little history miracles. Throughout history, God was fighting for

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them, and that right there is
played over multiple times throughout the American Revolution.

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God was fighting for them. So
just dogmatically asserted God was fighting for

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them. God was on America's side. Now are you basing that simply on?

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So God literally intervened so America would
win. Well, why didn't he

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intervene to stop the war from the
first in the first place, like,

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why did he allow all these people
to die? But no, because we

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won, then God was on our
side. Is that the way it works?

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If you win a war, then
automatically God is on your side go

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throughout history. Now, so does
that mean you have to ultimately win the

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So if you lose fifteen battles,
that's okay. God is still on your

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side. He just wants you to
lose all of these battles. But then

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if you win the ultimate war,
God is on your side. What makes

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us think God was on our side? What made our cause in the Revolutionary

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War so just and so right?
Well? What made us the good guys

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and the story? What made what
made America's conquest of the New World right?

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Taking land from Native Americans and the
slave trade, and what made us

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the good guys and the story?
Why do we always believe God is on

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our side? Now? The issue
is from a theological standpoint, is not,

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oh, I love America. It's
not oh I'm an American. America

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is the greatest land in the world. We're not here. I'm not here

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to get into an argument about your
love for this country. I'm here to

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say, how can you so dogmatically
assert and speak for God when God has

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not revealed that in his word.
And if you can just dogmatically state that,

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then why can't someone else state it? That is what I want you

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to consider. And that's what I
want you to think about. Now There's

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more I could say, but I'm
just gonna leave it right there. Now

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you can go find the sermon.
You why owe you you D? Why

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O you D? You'd better know
your history. You should be able to

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find it. You'd better know your
history now you can. If you can't

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find it, I can send it
to you. You can email me NEWSI

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Yahoo dot com. But I just
want you to consider that mentality that we

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speak for God telling God which side
he is or isn't on. I don't

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know if we're allowed to do that, because I don't know if God has

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given us enough revelation for us to
determine that. Because if I look up

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the try to find verses about the
Revolutionary War my Bible, I'm not going

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to find it. So it means
I'm drawing a conclusion that God did this,

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or God did this, or God
did this or God did this on

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the basis of something other than scripture, meaning scripture than is not my final

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thor because now my opinion and just
judging how a war turns out, I

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get to determine whose side God is
on. Now I know I'm placing theology

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above patriotism. I'm placing theology above
nationalism, which makes people uncomfortable, but

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I think it's something to consider.
So I'd love to get your thoughts news.

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I eff at Yahoo dot com Newsif
at Yahoo dot com, I would

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say more, but I'll leave it
there, just a spark, hopefully a

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conversation and a discussion and give you
something to think about. Thank you for

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listening. Everyone, have a great
day. God bless