Monday, January 22th | The Stonewall Brigade

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A healthier, happier you is just a click away. That said, let's start the show. Send us a text to 252-582-5028, or you can email us at contact at ClearviewTodayShow.com. That's right, and you guys can help us keep the conversation going by supporting the show. You can share it online with your friends and your family. You can leave us a good five-star view on iTunes or Spotify and where you get your podcasting content from.

We leave a couple of links in the description, so you can do just that. The verse of the day today comes from Ruth, chapter 1, verse 16. Entreat me not to leave you or to turn back from following after you, for wherever you go, I will go, and wherever you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people and your God my God.

That's the attitude that as Christians we should have with God. There's a Leland song that I really love. I think it's just called Where You Are, but it's literally, that's the chorus. I just want to be where you are. I just want to be near your heart. It's so simple. It's such a simple desire. God, I just want to be with you. It kind of reminds me of my son.

My son is in that phase now that people tell me to hang on to, because once they're teenagers, they're not going to feel this way. But right now, wherever I am, my son just wants to be there. All up underneath you.

Yeah, all up underneath me, crawling around and laughing and doing, climbing all over top of people. But it's such a simple desire. I just want to be near you. I don't care what we do. We can look at anything on TV.

We can play whatever you want. I just want to be where you are. I'm like, man, what a childlike innocence. Ruth understood, even in the depths of her despair, that her mother-in-law, Naomi, had the path to God. Had the path to life. And so she said, your people are not my people by birth, but I will cling to you. You are my family.

You are all I have left. And more importantly, I have seen your faith in God, and that's what I want for myself. And may we live lives that inspire that same kind of response in other people.

They're like, hey, I want what you have. And you can have it here on earth. That's the thing. You can have a walk with Jesus Christ here on earth in this life that God wants you to have.

It's not all about just waiting for heaven. Right. And you know, a lot of you guys know that's the focus of our album, our Clearview worship, the worship team here at Clearview Church where the Clearview Today show is produced. We're actually recording our very first ever full-length album through an external produce, something that's not produced here in-house.

And we actually, this is kind of crazy, but the last week was our, I think, second to last session. And I took Elizabeth, I took Ryan's wife, up to do her harmonies and stuff. We're doing all backing vocals now, so it's really getting into the very last things for us to be doing.

That's awesome. It's kind of dawning on me like this album is going to be out soon. We're going to take a couple of more sessions to get everything right, but man, I can't wait for you guys to hear it. Heaven Here and Now is the title. And we probably will, as we get closer at least, we'll probably start dedicating episodes to talking about that concept of heaven right here on the earth. But for right now, why don't we take a break? I'm kind of tired. Shift gears a little bit, but like Jon said, stay on the lookout for Heaven Here and Now, an original album by Clearview Worship available very soon.

At a music store near you. That's right. Stay tuned after this ad. We're going to grab Dr. Sean and we'll be right back. Hey! Hey, you! Me?

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Amen. Let's hop back into the show. Welcome back to Clearview Today with Dr. Abbadon Shah, the daily show that engages mind and heart for the gospel of Jesus Christ.

You can visit us online at ClearviewTodayShow.com or if you have any questions or suggestions for new topics, send us a text to 252-582-5028. That's right. We're here once again in the Clearview Today studio with Dr. Abbadon Shah, who is a PhD in New Testament textual criticism. Dr. Shah doing it up in the Maroon pullover, my friend. Do you like this? I've always loved that pullover.

Love it. And Maroon, listen, thank you. Maroon is your color.

Oh, that is your color. Oh, thank you. We're talking a little bit earlier today about the Clearview Worship album, which is coming out hopefully this summer.

That's right. And I don't know. Yeah, I think we've talked about it already, but you know, we're almost two sessions away from completion. And altogether, there's how many songs? Ten songs.

So it's a lot. And I was able to be there and hear Nicole, my wife, sing on several songs. And then she's going back again to sing one of the songs.

Going back, I think, in a couple of days. Then I heard David sing. And then, of course, Ryan sing as well.

So it was a lot. But what I want our listeners, viewers to understand is that it didn't just happen overnight. People don't realize that we sit down with our pastor and we write the songs together. Right. And so there's ownership over the songs that you're listening to. And there's just something that comes over you when your leader is there with you. It's like, man, I want to make this as absolutely productive and as great and excellent as I can.

And I think it really comes through on the recordings, especially even the ones you and Nicole did. Yeah. It comes through. Absolutely.

I mean, there's that idea of everything coming down to leadership. And it's, you know, Dr. Shaw, your heart is to capture. Your heart is to advance the gospel and to take ground. Use every available Christ-honoring means to reach the lost. That's right. And, you know, that spirit makes us want to do that as well.

In following you, we want to go and we want to capture ground, whether it's in music, whether it's in student ministry, whatever it is. Even here on the Clearview Today show, we want to capture ground because of who the leader is. And that's what we're talking about today. Today, actually yesterday, is the anniversary of Stonewall Jackson's birthday. May go down as one of the coolest nicknames in all of history. That is a great name, Stonewall. I'm trying to think of other names. I don't think, I can't think of any other that has a nickname like that. Yeah, he was born Thomas, which is a great name. It's fine. But it's not Stonewall.

It's not, yeah, yeah. If you can go between Thomas or, your son is named Thomas. That's right. I'm going to text him and ask if you could be called Thomas or Stonewall, which would you choose? I'm sure he would probably go with Stonewall. Guarantee you're going with Stonewall Jackson. Absolutely.

We didn't talk about it, of course, because we don't have a Sunday show. But you know, Dr. Shaw, I know that Stonewall Jackson is one of your heroes. And it's just one of the coolest things to be able to have a radio show where you can talk about his birth and his legacy.

That's right. Well, for me, he became more of a hero because of his Christian convictions. So that's where I feel like I can talk about it more than just what his work was in the Confederate Army or what kind of a general he was.

And there are mixed reviews on that. You know, some people say, he was okay. Others say, well, he was exceptional.

So there's a lot that can be discussed. But one thing we can give him is that he was a West Point graduate. So he was not just any old.

He was like a country boy that just plucked out of the military. Right. No, no, no, no. He was more than that. That's right. So that's what we're talking about today. Very cool.

Yeah. So you actually have been to, where did you go to visit, you visited his grave, his hometown? This is in Lexington, where his house was at one time. And then, of course, also went by his grave site. And if you ever go towards D.C. or Baltimore, you'll go by a place where, there was a place called the Shrine of, I think, Stonewall Jackson's Arm or something like that.

Kind of weird. But that's where he was shot, a friendly fire. Yeah.

And then his arm had to be amputated. And, of course, it was buried there. Interesting. So now, you know, that's, you can see that. Yeah.

That'll come up later in the show about how he died. But I do think it's kind of fun because I've noticed, and I think our listeners are noticing, too, that the people that you admire, you take the time to actually go and travel to where they're either from or where they're buried. That's right. But it just shows that there's an acknowledgement of, like you said, this impact of leadership. Right.

Yeah. Well, to back up a little bit, he lost his mom and dad at an early age, and his uncle raised him. So you can imagine, right there, there was some impact on his life, losing dad and then losing mom. I'm sure made a big impact on his life.

Right. And then as he grew up, he was not necessarily an exceptional student. In fact, he was very shy. He was, he did well. And when he went to VMI, Virginia Military Institute, he was not necessarily the top of the class. In fact, he struggled a little bit. But then he was able to work his way up and do well.

He did well. And so that's what we know about him, and I'm sure there's more. My introduction to him came in one of my classes on early American history, Civil War history, where I heard about this guy, and he had strong biblical convictions, and he was in the Confederate Army. And so, you know, you have this mindset like, oh, if you're in the Confederate Army, how could you be a Christian?

Yeah, you're the bad guy. Right. So I was like, okay, let me study this guy and see what are his Christian convictions. Because, of course, I don't agree with holding slaves.

I don't agree at all with that. So how can I now justify this person is a Christian and worthy of admiration, but at the same time he was? So that took me on a journey where I read a couple of books on his life.

One I read by a man by the name of Ariel Dabney, who was a professor. He was a writer from that time period. Now, Dabney has a way of sort of glorifying Jackson a little too much. So after the war, it was just like Jackson is just this person. He's like the Messiah walking around on earth. Right, larger than life.

And that's not correct either. So yes, there is a humanity to him, and yes, there are some weaknesses in his life. But then I purposely went looking for his spiritual side of things, and I found several places.

Of course, Dabney talks about his spiritual life, and it would kind of surprise our viewers, his spiritual legacy. And then there are a couple other books out there that are now sort of over 100 years old. One was by James Power Smith, called The Religious Character of Stonewall Jackson. So you can see I found it on archive.org and printed it out.

It's a little paper. And then there's another book called The Character of Stonewall Jackson by John Warwick Daniel. And this is a great book because it gets into the nitty-gritty of Stonewall Jackson's spiritual life. Right, his Christian faith, his practices.

And of course, Dabney talks about his spiritual life as well. And that may surprise people that he was the kind of person he was. And so when today's world of revisionist history is like, if you're in the Confederate war, that's it, you're done. Well, nobody's saying you need to gloss over their faults and failures or where they were wrong. But at the same time, could we not then say there are things in their life that we can go, okay, so these people were really conflicted over some of the stance they had to take. Well, something that you've said on the show and you've said from the pulpit is like, think about how messy and complicated one person's individual life is.

Like, take a look at your own life and see how complicated and jumbled everything gets. Now take something as complex as war and try to oversimplify it to the point of these people are good, these people are bad. Like, if it doesn't work for one person's life, why would we attribute that to a national conflict? I think that's a good point because it feels like a lot of times people are quick to paint with broad strokes. I mean, they'll say all people in the Confederate army were this, or all people in the South during the Civil War believed this. When really, people are people. There's a gray area, there's nuances to what a person believes, and you've got to take that into account. Yeah, we don't want to ever say, well, that they were right for that. No, of course not.

But at the same time, we can say, well, this was right about them. All you have to do is look at your own life. Would you say that 100% of your life is perfect? No, not at all. Would you ever say that all the views you've ever held were right next to Jesus? No.

No, none of us. So, we have to be objective, and as a historian you have to go, okay, this I cannot agree with, but this, wow, that's pretty admirable. That's right, and something that makes some, like, characteristics that make someone a great leader. Sometimes they have characteristics that don't make them, you know, a great person in that area, but they can still be an impactful leader, and I think Stonewall kind of exhibits that where his legacy and his impact is still, we're still talking about it today, especially when, like you said, it comes to his Christian faith.

Right, right. So, to give a quick biographical information on Stonewall Jackson, as I mentioned, he went to West Point, kind of struggled a little bit. I know I said VMI, no, VMI is where he taught later on, but he struggled a little bit, but then he definitely proved himself, and he graduated. He fought in the Mexican War. He did very well there, and so, and then, of course, he got married, and his wife died, so he remarried for four years later, I believe, and during this time period of living in that area of Lexington that he grew in his Christian faith.

He attended a Presbyterian church there. In fact, I have a book in my library, very interesting. I haven't read it yet, but it's called Stonewall Jackson's Pastor. Oh, wow.

I feel kind of bad because everybody's like, hey, I knew the guy. Let me write a book on myself and call it Stonewall Jackson's Pastor. Wait, wait, wait. The pastor wrote the book about himself? About himself. And using Stonewall Jackson's fame?

That's pretty funny. Stonewall Jackson's Mailman. Stonewall Jackson's Milk Delivery Person. They're like, I'm the guy.

I'm the one. But the thing that made me go from, okay, I get it why you did that is because he helped him grow in his spiritual life. Yeah, true. So he became known as a person people would turn to to say, well, so what was he like? And Reverend William S. White would sort of talk about his interactions with Stonewall Jackson and how he was and during the war, how he turned towards him for advice and things like that. So he is justified. He was not just a freeloader.

Fair enough. You get a pass, Pastor White. So what is the I mean, for the benefit of our listening audience, the big thing that Stonewall Jackson is known for, obviously, he's a leader in the Confederate Army, but he has an unfortunate turn of events at the end of his life. Well, the name Stonewall Jackson, just talk about that for a few moments, that happened at the first battle of Manassas in 1861. And when a fellow general saw him out there fighting, I mean, he's holding the line, he says, there is Jackson standing like a Stonewall.

Rally behind the Virginians. I mean, that's what he said. So from there, Stonewall Jackson just kind of stuck. Not ceding even an inch of ground. Right.

Now, let's talk about the man, Stonewall Jackson. Did his troops like, oh my gosh, they're loved and willing to die for him? No. They complained. Really?

Yes. They said he pushed him too hard. He was unreasonable. Sometimes they didn't understand the commands. They were like, what do you want us to do? Why are you mad at us? But you said this. Oh, now you want this?

OK, but you didn't say that. Because he was kind of awkward person. He was shy. He was awkward.

So there are times he would tell them to do things that they were like, just like, you understand what he said? Because I don't know what's going on. Just wave the gun around and say bang bang a lot. Bang bang bang bang bang. It's not going to work, Fred.

But not Fred. But when they began to win. OK, when they began to really do well, that's when it was like, hey, we're Stonewall Brigade. Hey, that's dude. That's an even better name.

Yes. The Stonewall Brigade. Yeah, I steal that.

I use that somewhere. Funny how they didn't rally behind him until the proof was there. And I'm not saying that none of them did, but I think there were many who complained.

That's a good, you know, I think we've talked about this on the show before. But Moses, like when people complained under him, you always feel like kind of a failure of a leader when your people complain. But I guess, I mean, it really happens to the best of them. Even the best leaders, their people will complain and grumble. And then in his own personal life, I mean, there were times that he was a little bit hard to deal with. At one time, he even went over Lee's head, Robert E. Lee's head, to try to get something done.

Don't do that. And they didn't side with him. They didn't side with Stonewall? No.

Yes. So Stonewall Jackson, I think, reached out to Jefferson Davis to get something done because Lee was going the other way. So they said, we're going with Mr. Davis.

Yeah, that's a bad look. You go over your general's head. Right. So again, we're trying to be balanced in our understanding of Jackson. It's especially, I think, like if you watch a lot of TV dramas, that works really well when it works. Like if you go over your boss's head. It better pay off. Yeah, it's like a great victory. It's like, oh man, that dude's cunning and he's, but if it doesn't work, oh dude. Not a good look.

Bad place to be. But if you want to talk about his spiritual life, because I want to focus on that, and we'll talk about how he died. Maybe we can quickly mention this happened at the Battle of Chancellorsville, which is 1863, where this is nighttime. He's moving among his troops, kind of going from one side to the other. And his own people sort of did not realize that was their own general.

And they shot him. You can just imagine they're struggling. When you realize what you've done, like you're just sitting there and you're like, oh my goodness. What's going to happen?

The pit of your stomach falls out and you're like, what? What have we done? But at this point, he was no longer just the awkward general who we don't know what's going on with him. He pushes us too hard. He's sort of like a hypochondriac. He was.

He was all those kind of things. By now, he is like right there with Lee's right hand. Like he has made his fame in the Confederate. They are the Stonewall Brigade at this point. Yeah, they moved up.

So they're no longer like, huh? No, he is pretty strong. He's like the Confederate celebrity. Right, he is. So imagine, golly, dude.

It's not like, oh man, I forgot to put the attachment on the email. It's like, yo, I just shot the general, man. Yes, but that you said that was why his arm was amputated. So that didn't kill him. No, but he died with pneumonia about eight days later. Gotcha. Because of because of the wound.

Yeah. If you see this knife right here, this is about it. And I think I bought it in Lexington or Richmond. I don't know for sure.

And it's a Stonewall Jackson knife and that's a little Stonewall Jackson statue. And if you still ain't caught onto the video podcast, like, what are you waiting for? We got all these props just for y'all. Yeah, show and tell. You're missing out. Watch the video podcast, man. So let's talk about his spiritual life, because that's what attracted me far more than his military career.

Although that's great. I've read Dabney's book. Also, if you're really interested in that, Stonewall Jackson, by the way, these are all the maps from all the battlefields that we went to following. My kids will just follow me around as I'm looking for Jackson's battlefields. This is called Stonewall Jackson, the American Civil War by G.F.R.

Henderson. It's a great book. I mean, it's a lot of information, probably more than you ever wanted to know, unless you're big on Civil War stuff. Here's another map. This map is of Lexington. This is actually the map we walked around.

We're trying to find his grave site. Oh, wow. That's insane. When did y'all go? This is 2010. Okay. That's like 14 years ago.

I was graduating high school. But spiritual life-wise, what is amazing about this guy is that, yes, he had slaves. But he was very passionate about teaching them the word of God. Wow. Is that unusual, do you think? I don't think so. I don't think it was. And again, we're living in the world of revisionist history and all that, so people prefer to just hate people. But let's look at the truth. And this was verified through various sources. He had a Sunday school class that he would go around and ask his neighbors, whoever had slaves or whatever, if they can let their people go so they can come and study the Bible.

This was Sunday afternoon. That's insane. You don't hear about it. That's something you just don't hear about.

No, you don't. And he would enlist some of his white friends who went to church to come and help him do these Sunday schools. That's right. And here's the funny thing.

And if I can find that page where it talks about that, I think this one is coming from Dabney's work. And I wish I had already pulled these things out by the time I talked to you guys. But anyways, one time it happened where he got his friends to come and help. And these guys were like, eh, we don't care.

Yeah, we'll show up when we can. And they were late. Oh yes, you've told us this story.

Not all the podcasts, but... They were late and showing up. And so what he did was...

Here, I found it. Sorry, guys. No, you're good. I'm ruffling through these things when I should have pulled them out already. This is our show, man.

There ain't nobody going to worry about you ruffling. Right. So anyways, so he...

I know the story by heart. So he tells the people who are there with him, the slaves. And he said, look, we're going to walk out.

And all these people are standing outside who should have been here on time. Do not say a word to them. You walk behind me and we're going to walk out and let them know we don't need them. Wow. Wow.

That's gutsy, man. So he actually walks out and imagine a string of black people behind him. Nobody says a word to all these white people standing there, showing up late. Kind of like, oh, it's just the slaves. They don't care.

We'll get there when we get there. And he was sending them the message that you don't disrespect people. That's right. This is about the word of God. And if this is the word of God that you're teaching, you should have enough respect for the word and for those people that you show up on time.

And that's the conviction of a true leader to be able to make a call like that and actually follow through. Yes. Love that. What an unusual perspective. I mean, I think that's intentionally downplayed because he is advocating for respecting people. Right. When, you know, there's often that caricature of the people in the South that they didn't view the slaves as people. Right.

They viewed them as property. Right. And certainly that was true for some people. Of course. Of course. But, I mean, here you see Stonewall Jackson's convictions coming through. Right. And then, of course, he was very strong on keeping the Sunday set apart for worshiping God and spending time with family.

He was very big on that. There was also, during the war, there were revivals going on, and there were revivals happening in the Confederate Army, not in the Union Army. Right. Which is also, seems very odd because here you say, no, slaves should be set free. This is wrong. Slavery is evil. It's not a good thing at all.

You cannot justify it. Right. At the same time, there's revival taking place, guess what, in the Confederate Army.

In the Confederate Army. So it's kind of really odd. I've done some reading and studying on that, and it's like, wow. Yeah. And then Stonewall Jackson would get chaplains to come in and lead services.

Wow. Maybe it's one of those things, like you talk about where God uses his grace to balance out. So the Union Army is fighting for this moral right, and yet God is using spiritual revival.

I'm just kind of talking, but maybe in a sense to sort of keep that unity, that balance between the nation. Could be. Could be.

I would say men are less spiritual than women, but God has called them to lead. Maybe it's that he's bringing revival happening in the South and in the Confederacy in order that unity is still possible. Could be. Yeah.

Yeah. And when these services or these chapels would go on, sometimes they were outdoors, and he would not just stand up there in the front or anything. He would find his way and sit next to one of the soldiers. Wow.

Or sit between them. And they were, you know, I mean, this is General Jackson sitting next to you so that everybody's straightened up, but he was just like, hey, just listen. I love you. So there are a couple very interesting things about him that are worth mentioning here. One is after his victory at Harpers Ferry, and Lee bragged on him, General Lee, and said God has given us a brilliant victory at Harpers Ferry today.

Our Heavenly Father blesses us exceedingly. And when they read this note to Jackson, Jackson said, General Lee is very kind to me, but he should give the glory to God. Wow. Wow. I think that's so awesome. Another time, a friend in Lexington asked him whether he would obey if God told him to leave his home that he loved very much, and all that was there, and go on some mission to Africa. And his response was, I would go without my hat. Wow.

I would not wait for a second, and I would go as a missionary to Africa. Wow. Now, you know, in our revisionistic world, this is lost forever. And so as a historian myself, I'm like, bring it back and let history stand. That's right. Give us the full picture of who Stonewall Jackson was.

That's right. Amen. John, what's coming up on tomorrow's episode? With everything going on with the state of Israel right now, we want to talk a little bit more tomorrow about just how they became a nation.

January 23rd is when the Knesset actually, in 1950, actually voted to make Jerusalem the capital of Israel. So we're going to talk about that a little bit, see what God still has in store for his people, make sure that we here in America are standing, and the listeners of the Clearview Today show are standing with God's people at all times. Amen. Love you guys. We'll see you tomorrow on Clearview Today.