The spiritual condition of America, politics, culture, and current events analyzed through the lens of scripture. Welcome to the Alex McFarland Show. What is a presupposition? Hi, Alex McFarland here. We're going today to talk about truth.
And we're going to talk about many of the assumptions people have about reality that are. Not true, and in fact, besides jeopardizing one's life, one's future, one's soul, they really jeopardize the culture at large. It is imperative that we believe what is true. And I've often said this about morals and ethics. And what are ethics?
Ethics is truth applied to life and lived out. And I've often said this, not only as a speaker, and I was a youth minister for 11 years, and we still do seven youth camps every summer, and we're in front of more than a thousand teenagers. You know, obviously, the number one message is the gospel. And we talk to kids about getting saved and putting their faith in Christ and building their life on the Lord Jesus. But we talk about living right because, seriously, as the book of Proverbs says, and Yeah, I wrote a a devotional book on the book of Proverbs, God's book of wisdom.
God's Word tells us to pursue truth and to seek truth like fine gold. And it says that truth will be life to And so it is imperative that we not only believe what's right, but we live what's right. And I've said this many times, the right thing to do is rarely a mystery. I mean, really. Just a couple of days ago, I was trying to help some people at a church get through a little bit of a.
Personality conflict, and there were some hurt feelings. It was pretty minor, really. And so the person that was sort of nursing a little bit of a grudge. I said, look, you know, go and I'll sit down with you and the other person, and let's iron this out. Slice too short.
And really think about it. We could blow this up into something big, or we could show grace. And remember, grace has been shown to us. And we prayed, and this gentleman looked up and he said, You know, this is exactly right. He said, I've kind of known this all along.
I just didn't want to let it go. The right thing to do is rarely a mystery.
So let's talk about our assumptions that drive. how we live. And the Bible tells us to pursue truth. Proverbs 14:34, one of my favorite verses. It says, Righteousness exalts a nation.
But sin is a reproach to any people. In other words, sin will bring down, debase, devalue. ultimately, if it's not turned around, destroy a nation.
Now, presuppositions from the root word to presuppose. We are living in a time of some false and I would say very dangerous presuppositions. People assume things, presuppositions about Truth. Is truth something objective outside of ourselves that we discover? Or is truth something that we define for ourselves?
There are in our world today raging all around us assumptions about truth, assumptions about morality. You know, are there some objective moral guardrails that we are to live within? Or can we just call the shots ourselves? You know, I mean, if you want to look at a moral vacuum, just look at the big cities. I think about places like San Francisco and Minneapolis and Detroit that are becoming just unlivable, really.
Grocery stores, and drugstores, and restaurants, and retailing are leaving. Because in a free market capitalistic society, businesses just simply can't. continue to operate where everything but the paint on the wall is getting stolen and their employees are in danger of working there. And so a moral vacuum just turns into, I'm sure you're seeing this in the news more, the word dystopian. Uh it's just unlivable.
We're living in a time oh my goodness assumptions about biology and gender. assumptions about other ethnicities and demographics. And a genetic ethnicity is very often confused for behaviors and subjective Preferences. I'll be on shows, Colin shows, and questions come up about Islam. or transgenderism.
And if I as a Christian thinker critique Islam, They'll say, well, you're Islamophobic and you're racist. If I critique transgender behavior, They'll say that you're true. transphobic and you're a bigot.
Well, here's the thing. Islam and transgenderism These are not ethnicities. One is a worldview with a lot of behaviors that go with it. The LGBTQ trans movement is a worldview with a lot of behaviors that go with it. Let me talk about the irony.
And the contradictions of the woke leftist. Worldview. And these are the views that almost 100% characterize the Democrat Party right now. And, you know, I'm a little reticent to use labels, but these labels, I mean, they're accurate nowadays. This was on the internet.
A gentleman posted a short form video, and like in a day, it got nearly six million shares. And it was really a critique about the presuppositions of the left.
Now, we're going to talk about this in this show. And then we're going to give some undeniable facts about truth. But listen to this video that is blowing up the internet even as we speak. This man said of the left, quote, You hate white men unless they're gay. You love black people unless they're conservative.
You are for illegal immigration as long as they don't come into your home. You want us to ban guns, but you want the government to still have theirs. You hate capitalism, but you expect these corporations to change their logo for Pride Month. You hated slavery, but you hate the party that was formed to abolish slavery. And you aligned with the party that was for keeping slaves, Democrat Party.
You don't recognize two genders unless they're talking about children's hormones. You hate American values and yet you still want to live here. You say black people can't be racist, but Candace Owens, Thomas Sowell, and Larry Elder are white supremacists. you want to ban guns to save children, but keep abortion in order to murder them. You are for women's rights, but cannot define what a woman is.
And so it's been said that the woke Democrat CRT, D E I liberals lie to demean the Christian conservative Moral worldview. And conservatives simply speak the truth in order to expose the Democrat-woke Marxist worldview. And it's time, and our friend the late Charlie Kirk did this so masterfully, but calmly. persuasively, very effectively, we've got to speak about the assumptions people are believing. Because I'm telling you, there are so many presuppositions I mean, fiercely defended presuppositions about life.
family morals, government, economics, society. Certainly spiritual issues. presuppositions that are just simply Faults, and we've got to help people think. to hear truth, comprehend truth, and respond to truth. Stay tuned, a brief break and we'll be back with more.
Fox News and CNN call Alex McFarland, a religion and culture expert. Stay tuned for more of his teaching and commentary after this. Would you like a book to help you understand the biblical prophecies, the passages about the end of time? Hi, Alex McFarland. You know, for well over a decade, Bert Harper and I have been on the nationally syndicated AFR show, Exploring the Word.
Over 3,000 shows we've done together, and Bert and I have a brand new book. As of fall 2025, 100 Bible questions and answers on prophecy and the end times. You can get it at booksellers everywhere. Our brand new book, Bert Harper, Alex McFarland, Exploring the Word, 100 Bible Questions and Answers on Prophecy and the End Times, published by our great friends at Broad Street Publishing. Check it out, and we believe it will help you understand.
how to live and thrive in these last days. He's been called trusted, truthful, and timely. Welcome back to the Alex McFarlane Show. Welcome back to the program. Alex McFarland here.
We're talking about truth. We've said it many times. What is truth? Truth is, now listen. Truth is that which corresponds to reality.
In other words, it's the way things really are. You may not know this, but you hold to the correspondence view of truth. We all do. If somebody says, hey, uh You know, uh be sure to take a jacket. It's cold outside.
And you go outside and you say, wow, it really is cold outside. I do need a jacket.
Well, that claim. It's cold outside. corresponds to reality.
Now As a an American? constitutionalist, conservative, And I'm a Christian conservative. I mean, we have a worldview that is based on many truth claims. Or propositional statements. That's what a truth claim is.
You know, Proverbs 14:34. Righteousness exalts a nation. But Sin is a reproach, a bring down, a to any people.
Okay, those are two claims. They're two complementary but opposite claims. Righteousness will lift up a nation. Unrighteousness will bring down a nation. And we're seeing that all around us.
Those claims of God's Word do correspond to the truth.
Now, let's talk about some presuppositions because here are broadly three categories: presuppositions about one's self. presuppositions about reality, presuppositions about America and the world.
Now, we're living in a time where people have even within the church, grossly Errant Presuppositions. It's something that we just assume to be true. Very often we haven't really thought about it, kind of uncritically accepted it. And I would say if there is a presupposition about one's self that is just almost universally embraced, it's let's just call it pervasive autonomy. You know?
Hey, I'm free to do what I want to do with my life.
Well, you know, we're not free to do just anything. I mean, there there are some boundaries. You know, um I think it was Clint Eastwood in one of his movies, very wise word. He said, A man's got to know his limitations.
Well, you know, I might love Major League Baseball, but I realized about. 10th grade that I was never going to make it. In baseball, I could enjoy it, it's a good hobby, but I didn't have the goods to play baseball. Certainly not pro, but definitely not even in college.
So we have to come to some honest realizations about our place. And I had the privilege of speaking in a high school assembly just recently, and I talked to kids, got to bring in the gospel, invite kids to one of our events, and they came in mass. But I talked about what is your gift? Finding what you're good at, your gift. And the good Lord gives all of us different gifts.
And here's how I define a gift. And I want you to think about this because you. Uh you have gifts. You know this. Uh One of the problems with our world right now is there are a lot of people And they were raised because of the influence of Dr.
Spock's baby book that you never, never touch a child's self-esteem. And, you know, all these people, then all their life since toddlerhood up, they've been told, oh, you're the smartest, you're brilliant, you're gifted, you're the best. No, none of us are. And that's one of the reasons that one of the most scarce but most needed commodities in our world is humility. And I don't need a lot of people that are say younger than fifty that have uh flirted much with humility.
Because they've just all been told you're good, everybody gets a trophy.
Well, your gift. And if there are areas in which you are gifted, then conversely there are areas where you're not gifted. It's not a bad thing, it's just we have to be honest about what we can and can't do.
Okay, here is a gif. This is the definition. A gift is that thing that you can do With excellence nearly effortlessly, on a consistent basis. Let me say that again. Your gift is that thing you can do.
with excellence. nearly effortlessly, on a consistent basis.
Now there are some things that you think you're good at, but you're not. And there's some things that you might one time out of ten. B. Adequate. Maybe even excellent.
But when you're gifted, you can hit the Point every time, and it doesn't deplete you. And we're living in a time where people think. They are good at all things. They're always right. Their opinion is infallible.
And so we need to call out some presuppositions about ourselves. I'm going to coin a phrase if I may. It's like the worldview of so many people is what I would call militant autonomy.
Now autonomous means you're just free to do whatever. And we tell people: if you want to see human nature in its ugliest forms, just watch American Idol. Where one of the reasons I love Simon Cowell is because he tells people some much-needed truth, and you watch, I mean, they'll people that. Are horrid. They cannot sing to save their life.
And he tells them. And they have a meltdown. And some of the outtakes are just, they're kind of cringy to watch. But I mean, people will curse and lose their temper. And Simon Cowell, he spent three and a half decades in the music industry.
He's a hit maker. And he'll tell people, Look, I'm sure you've got a great life, but you're not going to be a singer. Goodbye. And people freak out because they have never been told the truth.
So there are assumptions about our identity. And our purpose is and here is the thing where we I believe the Gospel is so needed. our presuppositions about our worth. and in the Christian world view, It's not performance, but identity. you might be the greatest singer in the world.
That that is not why God loves you. and that is not where your worth comes from. you might be wealthy, you might be the prettiest, you might be the most handsome, you might be the best athlete. And that doesn't make God love you more. On the flip side, listen folks, you might think that you have no talent and you're not attractive and you've not done anything, but yet that doesn't make God love you less.
And so the presuppositions about our identity, we need to be honest and frankly humble. before God, that were humans, and were fallen, and were sinners. and were not the prettiest And we're not the smartest? And we're not the fastest or most skillful, but the God that made us. loves us, and our worth, our value, our identity, Comes from the fact that God made us and Christ gave His life for us.
I want to say to everybody listening: you have worth and value. in the eyes of God. Because you're made in God's image. You're a human being. See, one of the reasons I think that the woke secular left has so attacked.
What it means to be a human? It's because humans are made in God's image. And if we affirm Our humanity, what we're actually affirming the one whose image we bear and the one who made us. and our presuppositions about our identity. They shape our motivations are priorities.
our behaviors. We've got to take a break. We're going to come back and talk more about presuppositions. What we believe. Is it true?
Is it false? More after this brief break. Fox News and CNN call Alex McFarland, a religion and culture expert. Stay tuned for more of his teaching and commentary after this. Christian author and speaker Alex McFarland is an advocate for Christian apologetics.
Teaching in more than 2,200 churches around the world, schools, and college campuses. Alex is driven by a desire to help people grow in relationship with God. He arms his audiences with the tools they need to defend their faith while also empowering the unchurched to find out the truth for themselves. In the midst of a culture obsessed with relativism, Alex is a sound voice who speaks timeless truths of Christianity in a timely way. With 18 published books to his name, it's no surprise that CNN, Fox, The Wall Street Journal, and other media outlets have described Alex as a religion and culture expert.
To learn more about Alex and to book him as a speaker at your next event. Visit alexmacfarlane.com. Or you can contact us directly by emailing booking at alexmacfarland.com. Would you invest a financial contribution to see young people saved, people give their lives to Christ, and people care about God and country? If you would please make a donation securely online, you can give at alexmacfarlane.com or please mail a check to To TNG, P.O.
Box 485, Pleasant Garden, North Carolina, 27313. Your gift will be faithfully handled, fruitfully used, and we thank you in Jesus' name. He's been called trusted, truthful, and timely. Welcome back to the Alex McFarlane Show. Welcome back to the program.
Alex McFarland here. We're going to resume our talk about presuppositions in just a moment. But I want to remind everybody, we have a brand new book out. one hundred Bible questions and answers on prophecy and the end times. And Bert Harper, my co host on Exploring the Word, which is our live show that we do Monday through Friday on the American Family Radio Network.
By the way, the website for AFR is AFR.net. This is our third book in the series of 100 Questions. We did one about five or six years ago on 100 Bible questions. We thought it might be the only book we would do. But then we did a follow-up: 100 Bible Questions and Answers for.
families. And then we were asked to do yet another book, which came out October 7th, just days ago. And please, if you would buy it on either Amazon or BarnesandNoble.com. If you would go to your local Barnes Noble bookstore and ask for it. And, you know, God has really blessed these books.
Many, many people have emailed us and indicated that they've prayed to accept Christ. The gospel is in there. But the 100 Bible questions and answers on prophecy and the end times, fresh research. There's a big section about AI. Does AI Play a role in Bible prophecy?
What about Israel? What about the Middle East? Will China and Russia attack Israel? And if so, when? And what about the wiring of the world?
I mean, we are living truly in a global police state. I mean, every move we make online or on our mobile devices, and you're on camera more than you realize everywhere you go. I mean, unless you are in your home. You're on surveillance. You really are.
So. The book. It's published by the incredible people at Broad Street Publishing. We love working with that publisher. And please pray that the book will make a big difference.
And then I'm going to be in Pennsylvania at the end of October. We've got a great youth rally at Fort Caswell, the North Carolina Baptist down on the coast. I'm told there'll be maybe 800, 900 teenagers that I'll be doing a biblical worldview weekend.
So please keep us in prayer. My website, with all of our information, it's alexmcfarlane.com. AlexMcFarland.com. We just finished a big summer speaker series. We're already working on 26.
I'm going to be at the Cove, the Billy Graham Training Center in Western North Carolina. Also, the website for that is thecove.org. In addition to my annual summer, 22 summers already, to God be the glory. But we also have a week. called IBT Intensive Bible Training, and I'll be there with Gary Habermas, the world expert on the resurrection of Christ.
It's all at alexmacfarlane.com and we appreciate your prayers and financial support.
Well, we are talking about presuppositions because we're living in a time where so many people believe things that just simply aren't true. You know, Ronald Reagan said about Democrats many years ago. Reagan said, it's not that Democrats aren't intelligent, but they just believe so many things that are false. And even within the church, oh my goodness, do you know Ligonier Ministries, R. C.
Sproll, the late R. C. Sproll, whom we've interviewed, he did a survey. They released this, it's called The State of Theology. A nationwide survey revealing how people view key doctrines of the Christian faith.
And they a few weeks ago released the 2025 State of Theology, What Americans Believe About God, the Bible, and Salvation. I could do the whole show on some of these conclusions, but they all right, think about this. These are church folk. By the way. These are people in church.
Everyone sins a little, but most people by nature are good, Fifty three per cent of church members agree with that.
Well, the Bible says we're all sinners. Everyone is born innocent in the eyes of God. 64% of church members agree with that statement. And yet the Bible says we're sinners, we must be born again. Here's a statement.
Think about this: God accepts the worship of all religions, including Christianity. Judaism and Islam. Forty-seven percent of church members agree with that. And yet the Word of God tells us, Acts 4 verse 12, there is no other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved. Only through Jesus Christ.
And so, as much as we love Jewish people and we. I mean, as much as any evangelical broadcasting, we routinely condemn, categorically on the record, condemn anti-Semitism. When we affirm the state of Israel. and the Jewish people. And we affirm the rights of Arabic people, but yet the worldview, Judaism, Islam.
and Hinduism, Buddhism. The non-Christian religions, they do not have salvation. Why do we say this? Because we want to believe what the Bible says. I want to be on the affirmative with what Christ himself said.
So we're living in a time where the church must proclaim. True statements, the presuppositions about one's self. the presuppositions about reality, the presuppositions about America and the world, Okay, we were talking as we began the show about these presuppositional positions people hold. We have to be willing to speak truth. truth Let me talk about some presuppositions and how we got where we are.
And I've shared this continuum many, many times after the Protestant Reformation in fifteen seventeen. And by the way, October 31. The world might Observe Halloween, not me. That's Reformation Day, because that was the day that Martin Luther nailed the document to the door of the church in Wittenberg, Germany. The 95 Theses and the gospel spread throughout Europe.
We are today still living on the ripple effects of the courage of Luther. And the other reformers. But within about 200 years after that great move of God's Holy Spirit, the Reformation, out of that same Germany was coming what we might call theological liberalism. And throughout Europe there was not only a denial of the accuracy and the authority of God's Word. There was Darwin and Charles Lyell and others that denied God as Creator.
And there was this narrative that began to be built. It's a narrative enforced on secular School children today. That there is no God, we evolved. And then, by the early twentieth century, not only was there moral relativism. The idea that there are no objective moral boundaries that we must live within, but there was what we call postmodernism.
That was a term that began to be used about 1920. And the postmodern world, you don't hear that term as much as you did, say, a decade ago, but postmodernism. says that, look, we make our own truth Truth is fluid, not fixed. Part of the reason that I love to, in my worldview weekends, do these deep dives into history is this. That it's like what Churchill said.
I'm a huge fan of Winston Churchill, and he said, quote, the longer you can look back, The farther you can look. Forward. End of quote. What does that mean? means that understanding history Past events, along with current patterns of thought and behavior.
All of these lend insights and knowledge that predict certain outcomes. And these should shape our choices and behaviours. Because our cultural problems today are based on problematic doggedly defended and flat out false Presuppositions. That's why Second Corinthians four four, speaking of the father of lies. Satan says the God of this world, Has blinded the minds of unbelievers, keeping them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.
The God of this world has blinded the minds of unbelievers. And so These basic, foundational, closely held beliefs, mostly unquestioned, assumed to be true. that shape how people see reality. How they interpret evidence, how they make decisions, and that ultimately shape our lives. You and I have got to go out and call.
call these things out. and what God has called us to do. We are to critique expose, even dismantle The secular form Yeah. that has ruled out God moral truth and personal accountability. We're out of time for today.
This is Alex McFarland. A lot on my website, over 200 articles that we've written.
So go to alexmacfarlane.com. In the meantime, remember John 17. seventeen that we are sanctified by truth. And remember what Jesus said, God's word is truth. Alex McFarlane Ministries are made possible through the prayers and financial support of partners like you.
For over 20 years, this ministry has been bringing individuals into a personal relationship with Christ and has been equipping people to stand strong for truth. Learn more and donate securely online at alexmacfarland.com. You may also reach us by calling 1-877-YESGOD and the number 1. That's 1-877-Y-E-S-G-O-D-1. Thanks for joining us.
We'll see you again on the next edition of the Alex McFarlane Show.
