Fighting the Cancel Culture

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Get ready. It's one of America's most important, influential, and respected voices on cultural and political issues. An apologist, Christian political advocate, and author, here is the founder and chairman of the Citizens for America Foundation, Dr. Chris Hughes. For the last 60 years, believers have abdicated their responsibility in the political arena.

The result's been a massive cultural decline. You know, we talk about that every day on this show. There's persecution of families, there's attack on traditional family marriage, attack on Christian businesses and religious freedoms, and for those of you who are just tired of talking about problems and want to learn more about being part of the solution, my guest today is starting an organization that you're going to want to know about.

So buckle up, get down, get ready to take some notes. This is going to be a great, great show with application of how you can engage the culture for Jesus. Welcome to Christian Perspective. My name's Chris Hughes, and my guest today, I've never met him, but we are brothers already. I love what he's doing.

He is in our lane. He does what we talk about every single day, you know, here on the Christian Perspective. We're trying to encourage Christians to develop a biblical worldview, to get educated on the issues of the day, to know what they believe and why they believe in.

What does the Bible say on social issues like homosexuality, transgenderism, traditional family marriage, and so much more. Learn what we believe and then develop a biblical worldview and then take that biblical worldview specifically, not just into the world, but you know what I encourage you every day to do is to take that specifically into the arena of public policy and politics, and our guest is going to be right in that lane. Before we jump in and start talking to him, I want to thank Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary for being the home of Christian Perspective Studios in beautiful Memphis, Tennessee.

If you're looking for a college for your child or grandchild or maybe you, where you can go to school and not worry about being indoctrinated with transgenderism or critical race theory or all the crazy things going on in college campuses today, check out the college at Mid-America, and maybe you'd like to further your education with a master's degree. Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary is one of the best seminaries in the country. They are biblically founded.

They talk about the sufficiency of scripture, the inherency of God's word. It is a place where you get a strong theological biblical education, and they teach biblical worldview each and every day and want you to take that into the culture. You can learn more about Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary at mabts.edu, and of course we want to thank the main sponsor of this show, the Citizens of America Foundation. Citizens for America is committed to helping you get educated and develop that biblical worldview that we talked about and engage in the arena of public policy and politics. Citizens for America has got their great annual event coming up, the 2022 Culture Engagement Summit, a national event, the only event of its kind and the biggest of its kind in the country is going to be in Memphis, Tennessee on April 30th. That's April 30th, the Culture Engagement Summit.

You can learn more at citizensforamericafoundation.com. We have a lot of great speakers that day. Mark Meadows, who is a super strong Christian, former Congressman, former Chief of Staff to President Trump, Senator Jim DeMitt, Senator Marsha Blackburn, Todd Stars, nationally syndicated radio host, Rick Green of the Apatric Academy. So many great Christian and political speakers are going to be there that day to encourage you to engage as a Christian in the arena of public policy and politics. So tickets only start at $15 and includes lunch. Goodness, you can't eat lunch in Memphis for $15.

So that's a great deal. You get to hear all these other wonderful speakers. Go to citizensforamericafoundation.com today to register for the 2022 Culture Engagement Summit. Well, there's somebody who's engaging the culture every single day. His name is Eamonn Ross. And Eamonn, you are doing what we are living to teach people to do. You're telling people to get engaged in politics.

And Christians have shot away from that so long. I'm so excited you're on the show today. Eamonn, welcome to The Christian Perspective. Well, thank you, Chris. Excited to be here. Love the work that you're doing, both with this show and Citizens United for America.

It's just so powerful and it's what we need more people like you out there preaching this message. So thanks for having me. We're growing, brother.

We're getting bigger and bigger. Eamonn, we're going to talk about your ministry work, and it really is ministry with what you're doing, and talk about your podcast. But before we do that, I always like to invite my guests to kind of just share their life so our audience can get to know you on a personal level. You know, aside from the work we do in politics, tell us a little bit about you.

Yeah, absolutely. Husband to an amazing woman, father of three incredible daughters. I grew up in Colorado, then moved to Southern California to go to undergraduate school, and then left there, moved to Tulsa, Oklahoma to go and get my master's in business at Oral Roberts University. Had a great time there.

Met my wife on a blind date, and kind of, as they say, the rest is history. And then we moved about two years ago to Northern California, and we can talk a little bit more about the motivation behind that. God just kind of called us out here to work on a campaign that we knew was probably going to be unsuccessful, but, you know, He was kind of pointing in that direction, so we did it. And so we've been out in what many people call the People's Republic of California. I call it the mission field, brother.

You were sent to a dark land. Hey, I've got a question about that. You said you have three daughters. How old are your girls?

Yeah, so 14, 13, and 10. Whoo, okay. Well, we need to have a special type of prayer for you.

Oh, I got it. Your daughters are a blessing. It is the most fun I've ever had. I mean, I have been blessed with just three incredible girls, and, you know, they're so talented and gifted. They love the Lord, and, you know, they just bring light everywhere they go, and I got to tell you, it's the best part of my day. I have a son and a daughter, and being a parent is, to me, it's just what a great gift from God.

I mean, I don't know anybody could ever feel burden about being a parent. It's such a blessing, but, you know, when those boys start, and if it hasn't started already with your oldest, it's going to start soon. I'll just be praying for you during that time when the boys come, and, you know, maybe we need to pray they're not California boys. I'm going to get trouble for that statement when they come.

I'll be praying for you. Well, Eamon, tell us a little bit. So you went to Oral Roberts. What a great school. How did you come to know the Lord? You know, I grew up in an incredible family. Both my parents were first-generation believers, so they came out of homes that, you know, really there was no God, and, you know, they really wanted to invest in us. They were both public educators and knew what public education had to offer at the time, and so they invested in us, sent us to an incredible Christian school. I graduated high school from a Jesuit school, which was an incredible experience as well, an all-boys Jesuit high school, and then, you know, went to a secular university for undergrad, and look, and then went to an amazing, you know, school at Oral Roberts. So people kind of asked me, you know, well, what's your, you know, what's your theological background? And I just call it kind of cross-denominational, you know. I feel like I've seen God show up in a lot of different places, and I, you know, I feel like if somebody feels like they got a lock on all the right answers, you know, we're probably worshiping too small of a God. Yeah, but what a change to go from a Jesuit school to Oral Roberts. I mean, that was a big difference, but we're all believers and love the Lord.

What a great opportunity and a super story. Well, Eamon, I mean, you don't really know anything about me, but like you, I have a heart for Jesus and a heart for politics. I just love it, and it's almost, for me at least, it's like a drug.

I don't know if it's like that. That's probably get us in trouble for saying that, but there's just something about being involved in the political process that drives me, and I've been elected to public office six times and worked as a political consultant, done a lot of things in the political arena. For you, how and why in the world did you want to get involved in this crazy world of politics? You know, my journey started about seven years ago.

I was in the business world for 20 years and on a half-mission, half-business trip to China with a group of business leaders, and we decided to take a day and go out and sight-see, and so we're walking along the Great Wall, and I'm just kind of walking by myself quietly praying. And Chris, I got to tell you, I don't even know how to explain this really. You know, it's kind of like when you were reading the Bible about those thunder and lightning bolt moments when, you know, God speaks, and you know, he spoke to me and he said, Eamon, you think too small, you don't think generationally. And frankly, Chris, I was scared to death. I don't know what, I didn't know what just hit me.

I was instantly in tears, just really overwhelmed with that. And so I came back to Tulsa and was getting coffee with one of my best friends, and I shared that story, and he said, well, what do you think it means? And I said, you know, Kevin, I've been praying about it, and for some reason, I feel like God wants you and me to put our heads together and put godly leaders in positions of authority at the state and national level. And he just stares at me, and he says, Eamon, don't tell anybody this, but I think God's calling me to run for governor. And he says, be my campaign manager.

And I started laughing and I said, Kevin, that's the dumbest idea I've ever heard. I don't like politics. I don't care about politics.

I've never done anything but vote. And he says, me neither. So fast forward a few months, I walked away from the business world, which is, you know, look, it was amazing, it was easy, it was incredibly profitable, and just took this step of faith into this space that I had no experience. And, you know, as you know, God doesn't, you know, call the equipped.

He equips the called. And, you know, we can talk more about that story, but it was a 10-person primary in Oklahoma, and Kevin had no political experience at all. He was, he had built his own company and the CEO of that, and we made it to the top two in the primary, and then we won the runoff and won the general, and now he's the governor of Oklahoma. What an amazing story. So neither one of you had any political background at all, but just felt like God was calling you to do it, and you won.

That's exactly right. We were just saying yes, you know, what we felt the Lord was calling us to do. And look, I, my secret weapon is that I have the gift of being able to hire people much smarter than myself, and so I started off, you know, doing nationwide interviews. I interviewed over 150 consultants in every specialty of a campaign, and just took copious notes. I mean, by the end of that process, I had 20 binders of information and hired my team. And, you know, when you take a step of faith into a space that you know nothing about, you really have to be true to who you are.

And so I knew I could lead well, and I knew how to set the vision, and I knew how to hold people accountable, and so I found the best people I could, and then I did those three things. What a tremendous, tremendous story. Folks, we're talking to Amon Ross, and he's sharing his testimony of how God has blessed him with a wonderful family, and how he entered the world of politics.

Very few people start off just being a campaign manager for a governor. We'll come back after the commercial break. We're going to talk about how God's using him today.

Stick around. We'll be right back with more of The Christian Perspective. This show is brought to you by Generous Joe's, the coffee company with the Christian perspective. This is the answer that Christians and conservatives have been looking for, a coffee company that gives back to causes you care about.

Order your coffee today at shopgenerousjoes.org, and even subscribe to a subscription coffee plan and never forget the coffee you love or the causes you care about. Walk in the footsteps of Jesus and see the Bible come to life. This December, join nationally syndicated radio host and founder of the Citizens for America Foundation, Dr. Chris Hughes, on a life-changing trip to Israel. It's one of the world's oldest and most fascinating travel destinations. Learn the faithful from all over the world for thousands of years. Visit Jerusalem's religious quarters and explore Christianity's most treasured religious sites like the Wailing Wall, the Dome of the Rock, and the Via Dolorosa. Walk with Chris through the winding alleyways of Nazareth's old city and visit ancient Bethlehem, the place of our Savior's birth. Float in the Dead Sea, visit the Sea of Galilee and the Jewish fortress of Masada. See firsthand where the events of the Bible took place. Touring Israel with Dr. Chris Hughes is a travel odyssey like no other.

Visit citizensforamericafoundation.com and get ready for an unforgettable trip and memories that will last a lifetime. Do you desire to build family relationships that stand the test of time? Does creating a godly family seem like a daunting challenge?

You're not alone. I'm Connie Alpers, author of Parenting Beyond the Rules and host of Equipped to Be. As a mother of five, I understand your struggles. For 35 years, I have been helping families just like yours build lasting relationships.

I'd like to invite you to tune in to Equipped to Be and visit ConnieAlpers.com where I share useful tips and proven strategies to help you navigate the seasons of motherhood, faith, and life with confidence and joy. History was made on today's date. Stay tuned for an American Minute with Bill Federer. May 5th, 1988, President Ronald Reagan signed an act of Congress designating the first Thursday in May as a National Day of Prayer. This has always been part of American life. Indeed, President Washington declared a National Day of Prayer during his first year in office.

President Madison did during the War of 1812, Lincoln during the Civil War, and President Woodrow Wilson during World War I. It was President Harry S. Truman, though, who made it an annual event, saying, In times of national crises when we are striving to strengthen the foundations of peace, we stand in special need of divine support. This has been an American Minute with Bill Federer.

For a free transcript, call American Minute at 1-888-USA-WITH. Welcome back to Christian Perspective. My guest today is Eamonn Ross, and Eamonn has a company that God is using today.

We're going to lead in and tell you about in a few minutes. It's kingdom politics. He was just sharing the story before the commercial break of how he and his best friend were just talking about what God wanted to do one day, and his friend said, Hey, you may think I'm crazy, but I want to run for governor. I want you to be a campaign manager.

That might not sound like that big a deal to those of you who are not involved in the political world, but that just doesn't really happen every day. Usually, people work for years to get known in the political world and business world and their states or communities where they're running, and particularly when you're running for governor, you usually hire all these big fancy campaign consultants that think they know everything, but that just shows what God can do when he gets involved. Eamonn, before the commercial break, you were talking about how you interviewed just hundreds of people to put together your team for the governor's race and how God gave you the ability to do that and how you hire people better than yourself.

We'll do a whole show with this maybe sometime if you want to, but that's a true mark of a great leader. So many people today are afraid to hire people and surround themselves with people who are smarter and better at things than they are, so I want to commend you on having the courage to know. We don't know everything about every subject, and for those of you that want to be a leader out there, Eamonn's example is a great one. You need to surround yourself with people that are smarter, stronger, better than you, and they will make you better in the process. Thank you for having the humility to do that. Well, you know, I always find that if I'm the smartest person in the room, I start to get nervous, and it's just showing me that I'm hanging out with the wrong people.

That's true. I have a friend, Andy Andrews. He writes a lot of books on leadership, and he talks a lot about how you need to really, like the 10 people closest to you, need to be rich or smarter, more successful, and the people you surround yourself with are the people that you're going to become like. So you ran this campaign for governor, and you won. Did you work in his administration?

A lot of times campaign managers become chief of staff. What did you do after that? After the campaign, Kevin asked me to be the chief strategy officer for Oklahoma, which I was really excited about because that is right in my wheelhouse, and I was praying about it, and I just kind of felt the Lord kind of whispering sabbatical to me. And so I went back to Kevin. I sat down with him, and look, we've been friends a long time.

We coached our daughter's basketball teams together, you know, lots of cookouts and camp outs. And I said, Kevin, I said, I just worked 80 hours a week for the last two years, and the only time I've seen my family is if they come to a meet and greet or a fundraiser or my kids are on one of the door knocking teams on the weekends. And so I just felt like I needed to take a step back, and he totally understood. He knows how much family means to me, and I finished out the campaign. We finished out the transition from the one administration to his administration. We put a thousand-day plan and a hundred-day plan in place, and then I took a sabbatical. And so what I did is, you know, during the campaign, Kevin and I traveled all over Oklahoma and all the surrounding states, meeting with groups of people in the church, pastors, all over that kind of six, seven-state region. And we realized how disengaged and uninvolved and frankly ignorant the body of Christ was when it came to the world of politics.

And here's the deal. These are the people that are making the decisions that affect your everyday life, what your kids are learning in school, what you're paying in taxes, you know, everything that happens to you, the world of politics is touching it every day. And so during my time off, I took all of the stuff that I had learned during the campaign, and I have a team of about 20 subject matter experts. And so they all provided content for this program as well, and I wrote out the curriculum for what we're about to talk about for Kingdom and Politics.

This is just amazing. So Kingdom and Politics, you've led up, so how did it start and tell us what Kingdom Politics is? Right, so thank Dave Ramsey for politics, okay?

And so what we have, it's kind of funny, as we travel the country and, you know, we're speaking all over the place, when we use that phrase, people instantly get a good visual of kind of what we do. And so we have an online video training program that teaches people how to run for office, but it also teaches people how to work on a campaign. And so the whole goal there is we want a handful of people in a church that want to run for school board, county commissioner, state representative, maybe Congress.

You know, you never know, right? You could be sitting every Sunday next to the next senator or governor. And so we want those people, we want to raise up those leaders in the church and teach them how to run for office, but then there's all those other people in your church, right, that want to help. They want to be part of the solution. They're tired of just talking about the problems and politics. And so we want to teach them how to come alongside those people in that church that want to run for office and support them with their God-given gifts on their campaign. I know you've seen this in churches. It just amazes me how when you tell somebody you're running for office, in many cases, it's like you got the plague in the church. You know, they see politics as nasty and dirty.

And just a few weeks ago, a dear friend of mine just kind of laid into me because of what I'm doing right now, like what you're doing. And they just don't get it. This is not about politics. This is, as your ministry says, this is kingdom work. We want the right to share the gospel.

And if we don't take a stand, we're going to lose the right to share the gospel in the United States of America. And that's why what you're doing is so important. Well, you mentioned you have online training. And we're going to dig deeper into that. But is there in-person training, too?

Or are you pretty much as focused on online training? So what we do is we have them go through the online training, and then afterwards, we do Zoom coaching for them and their team, so that they can get their campaigns launched on a trajectory to victory. You know, our mission at Kingdom in Politics is to raise up 100,000 believers to run for office in 10 years. And we don't just need them running for office.

We need them winning, okay? And then bringing a biblical worldview to that office. And you know, you mentioned something, and I don't want to miss this because I think you nailed it right on the head when you talked about your friend who was giving you a hard time for what you're doing. And here's the deal. And so everybody listening right now, if you only take one thing away from what I'm about to say in this hour, the church and the body of Christ has created an environment where apathy is clean and engagement is dirty. Let me say that again. Apathy is clean and engagement is dirty.

Just let that sink in, you know, Chris. It's unbelievable that for us to engage in leading and raising up Kingdom-minded leaders, that that's become a dirty thing, right? That's how far gone we are. The church has abdicated its responsibility for the last 60 years to lead in the political space. And look, people are like, oh, well, it's such a dark space.

It's, you know, it's so crooked. Well, yeah, guess what? We haven't been involved. You know, we're salt and light. We're the ones supposed to bring the light.

And so if we're not engaging in a space, how's there supposed to be light there? And so I love what you said. And, you know, that's something I'm really passionate about is addressing this issue. And, you know, I used to lay this all at the seat of pastors. And, you know, I speak all over the country, work with a lot of amazing organizations, like Family Research Council.

It's so fascinating because at the end of the day, what we've learned is it's a lot of the seminaries across the country aren't preparing or teaching these pastors how to talk about this stuff from the pulpit in a nonpartisan manner. And our program is completely nonpartisan. We never talk about any political party. We don't even talk about conservative or liberal. We do. All we focus on is Kingdom. I mean, in the How to Run for Office course, we have a devotional at the beginning of each chapter based on somebody that was in the Bible and in politics.

And let me give you a couple examples. So Daniel and Joseph are literally called governors, right? We have Deborah, she was a judge. Moses, he led the Israelites out of slavery after 400 years, and they had no form of government, and he created a judicial system for them. The Bible is filled with political activities by believers.

And at the end of the day, we live in a republic. And so the only people that God raises up are the people that say, yes, I'll do it, Lord. I'll take a step forward and a step of faith to lead in this space. Boy, I tell you what, you got my blood pressure going.

I didn't mean to get you, I'll get off my stool. No, this is good. I want you to preach it. This is what people need to hear.

Amen. The church, as you said, has abdicated their duty for more than 60 years now. We wonder why our four or five-year-olds in school are being asked behind the parents' back, well, are you a boy, are you really a girl, or did God make a mistake in what you are? We wonder about why there's so much sexual promiscuity and child abuse and things going on in our country and around our world. We wonder why more than 63 million babies have been brutally murdered in this country, and it's because, as you said, the church, I mean, it's like a vacuum.

We stepped back. We got out of it completely, and Satan just, voom, went right into that arena, and now we're having to try to play catch-up, and it's not an easy job to do. Unfortunately, too many Christians don't see this as a mission field and as our responsibility.

Amen, you know this, you know, God created us in His image, and He gave man dominion over this earth for him to take care of the creation God made, and we've stepped back and not done it. God created politics. Politics is not a dirty work. You know, everything, it affects everything that we do, and I don't even like calling it politics. I mean, if someone's been elected six times, it's public service, and it offends me when people act like you got the plague. I mean, goodness, I mean, you know the same in working with Governor Kevin. You know, you sacrificed tremendously to serve others.

I mean, I'm not saying that to get sympathy for me, but you're, like you said, 80 hours a week, you probably worked more than 80 hours a week for most of those two years. It is hard work. It consumes your time, and now people attack you, and they attack your family.

It is a rough business. It's not easy to serve, and instead of Christians criticizing those of us who are in this arena, we need to step up and love our brothers and sisters in Christ who have the courage to take a stand. Now I'm preaching, so I'm sorry.

You know, I love everything you just said, and you know what? You just reminded me of something, and you know, it's because pastors and the body of Christ, our perspective is so flawed. So Kevin right now, he's the Governor of Oklahoma, but when Kevin and I are talking, you know, we don't look at him as the Governor of Oklahoma. We look at him as the pastor of a church of four million people, and now he's taking Christ into agency head meetings and cabinet meetings where he's never been welcomed before. And so if we have the right perspective, okay, and we're looking at the world of politics as the next big mission field, I mean, we get so excited to send missionaries to China or Africa, right?

We need to start raising up kingdom-minded leaders in our congregations across the country and sending them into the world of politics. Amen. Well, let's take a commercial break here. We're going to have to have you on numerous times, Eamon. This is good stuff. This is really what we're all about. This is our mission. When we come back, we're going to talk more about your ministry, kingdom, and politics, and how God's using you and how people can learn from what you're doing. Folks, stick around.

We'll be right back. Discover much of America's forgotten Christian heritage. Your tour will include an up-close and personal look at the nation's establishment and how it's evolved over the centuries. Learn about the government and the men who helped forge this new kind of republic, one that acknowledged the creator from its very inception.

Know the truth about the creation of the United States of America, about the faith of the founding fathers and how Christian principles were used to establish this form of government. Visit citizensforamericafoundation.com today and secure your spot to join Chris Hughes in Washington, DC this June. This show is brought to you by Generous Joe's, the coffee company with the Christian perspective. This is the answer that Christians and conservatives have been looking for, a coffee company that gives back to causes you care about.

Order your coffee today at shopgenerousjoes.org and even subscribe to a subscription coffee plan and never forget the coffee you love or the causes you care about. conservativebaptistnetwork.com to learn how you and your church can join and support this exciting movement. Welcome back to Christian Perspective.

This is Chris Hughes. My guest today is talking about kingdom and politics. Amon Ross was just a regular guy like you and God placed him a unique opportunity to help the governor of Oklahoma get elected and now he is the governor of Oklahoma and it is great to have godly men and women that serve in public office.

We were talking about before the break, Amon, I'm going to really get in trouble here. I'm not going to name names, but they're going to know who they are and I'm going to step on some toes. It's not just Christians that attack other Christians who are in the political arena, but a lot of pastors too.

It's amazing to me. I can talk about abortion and all kinds of other stuff on Facebook or social media or Twitter and pastors will never say a word, but dare I say anything about being involved in the political process and they go crazy. I had a guest about a month ago on my radio show talking about missions and a pastor in my area made a comment. He didn't know I saw on social media that, well, I'm glad that Chris Hughes is finally talking about something other than politics.

I'm like, do you listen to the show? It's not about politics. It's about evangelizing people for Jesus. I mean, I talk every day, Amon, about impacting the culture for Jesus and there is no better way to impact the culture for Jesus than to lead people to Jesus. But if we don't gain back our political arena, we're going to lose the right to tell other people about Jesus. And I know you're in California and you've met pastors as I have all across the country that COVID was shut down and threatened to go to jail and lose everything they had because they refused to shut the church and they continued to meet because they believed that God commanded them to do that.

And I'm sure you know about the mayor in Houston a few years ago who she was a lesbian and she didn't like when preachers were preaching the homosexuality to sin and she was demanding that they turn over their sermons to her. And this is just the beginning, Amon. This isn't in some foreign country. This is happening here and we've got to take a stand.

You're exactly right. You know, here's the deal. It's how much longer before the name of Jesus is going to be hate speech or your church can't take online donations and you've got to close your doors.

Pastors need to wake up and I will say COVID has been an incredible blessing in this aspect because I have so many pastors that are eyes wide open right now. Do you mind if I share a quick story? No, please do.

Please do. I was at a conference in Southern California and there were 700 pastors and a friend of mine, she's the California Senate Minority Leader, she gets up there and they had asked her to speak for a few minutes. And so she grabbed the microphone and you have to picture this lady. She's a 5'5 ball of dynamite and so she grabbed the microphone and she's on stage and she just stands there quietly for about 10 seconds just looking at the audience. And you can kind of tell it's a little, you know, it's a little uncomfortable. It's just dead silent.

You could hear a pin drop and she holds the mic up close to her mouth and she says, stop calling me. Stop emailing me. Get off your butt and come down to the state capitol. You're the only group of people that never come down here. The abortion lobby comes down here. The atheists of America come down here. She lists five or six other groups. She said, you're the only group that never comes down here to pray with us, to build relationship with us.

You only freak out when, you know, you start getting lots of calls from your people in the congregation. You guys haven't been at the table and now you're on the menu. And that's the world that we've created because we've decided to actively disengage in the world of politics. That's a great quote.

You've not been at the table, but now you're on the menu. What a tremendous story. And that's true. We don't get involved. You know, I used to lobby for an organization, but you never see Christians at state capitals or the national capital like we should. I mean, maybe on days like, you know, like the March for Life or something, people might show up, but we need to engage.

And I'll go down a little rabbit trail here with you, Eamon. You know, we need to know who our elected officials are. I wonder how many people listening to the show today have ever met a county commissioner or school board member.

You know, we get all excited about who's running for president or who's running for governor, but you can have a tremendous impact in your local elections if you'll just engage. And you need to know, pastors, goodness, pastors, do you know who your elected officials are? Or more importantly, do they know who you are? What kind of minister are you in the community if your county commissioners and school board members don't know who you are, pastor? I hope I'm stepping on your toes. They need to know you. And you know what?

Go ahead, I'm sorry, Eamon. No, you're exactly right. You know, I had a pastor, you know, I was speaking at a conference in North Carolina this weekend to a group of pastors, and one of the pastors was talking about, you know, how they have shifted, how they're going to choose to influence their city. Because he said, you know, I was praying about it, and the Lord told me, do you think that the city would notice or care if you just disappeared, if your church just disappeared? And look, we have to carry love into these places. I mean, we work with candidates, we have tons of school boards, city council, state reps, we have six congressional candidates, you know, we have attorney general candidates we work with, and we got tons of different candidates. But here's what we talk to them about.

You've got to make sure that your heart is in the right position, and you need to come from everything from a position of love. And look, go to your school board meetings or your city council meetings, bake these people a cake or a pie, take them something, love on them, and tell them, hey look, how can we serve you? Thank you for being willing to step up and lead. And these are people that you may agree with and you may not agree with, but I tell you what, if you're out there just blasting them on social media or you're protesting or you show up at one of the meetings and you're yelling at them, well, I don't know how we're going to bring the kingdom into that space. We do not get, we do not have any influence in this arena if we don't come in and love and build relationships. I mean, I had a pastor... And do it before me, Damon.

That's right, before you need it. And look, here, I have a pastor in Bend, Oregon, and they went, there was a, Bend, Oregon, was having a lot of little earthquakes. And so the city brought together the USGS, the Geological Society, and a bunch of the sheriff departments, and they had a huge meeting. And they're in this meeting, and then at the end they said, are there any questions? And this pastor raised his hand and said, you know, how do you see the church helping, you know, should something like this happen? And, you know, how can we serve?

And the head of the city's event said, irrelevant and disengaged. He just said those two words from the microphone. And the pastor said he was so humiliated, and he and his wife went home and prayed about it, and they're like, you know what, we need to repent for how we have chosen to engage in this space. So they did that, and then they went back to the sheriff's office and said, listen, you know, how can we serve you? And the pastor's like, yeah, there's nothing you can do. He's like, no, really, like, what's something you need? So the pastor said, or the sheriff said, well, we need gas masks for 60 of these, 60 of these sheriffs, and so, you know, whatever. And so he goes, well, thanks for sharing that. So they go back, they raise the money, show up, ring the gas mask, and all of a sudden the sheriff's like, you got to be kidding me, you guys actually did something? And then now the sheriff's department goes to this church whenever they're struggling with something in the community in order to, hey, can you guys help us?

Can you help provide some solutions? Can you bring other leaders of faith together to bring kingdom-minded solutions? You know, I have a friend in Destin, Florida. He's a business guy, never been in, small business owner, never been in politics, ran for mayor of Destin. Well, ended up winning, and it was tough.

It was a hard race, but guess what? A few months after we won, a strip club from the East Coast, the chain of strip clubs, wanted to put one of their strip clubs in Destin, Florida. Well, the city, we didn't want it, you know, all the pastors didn't want it, so he was able, as a man of faith, was able to bring together all of the churches, and they put together a plan, and they bought the building that the strip club was going to go into, and they turned it absolutely, isn't that great?

And then they turned it into a facility to give backpacks to kids and to provide food to the underserved community. That's what can happen when believers get involved in politics. That is a tremendous testimony. Well, you know, this is a problem around the country where we're not engaged, so if you're listening, I would just encourage you, not just pastors, but Christians, you know, you could all, you can go to the Dollar Tree and buy 10 little note cards for a dollar, and just write a note, their addresses, even if you have to send it to the county office or on the county website usually, and send a little note to your county commissioner or school board members letting them know you're praying for them. Like you, Eamon, I'm not in town very often, but when I am at home, if I'm in town on the day that the county commissioner or school board meets, I try to go, you know, just maybe if it's just five or ten minutes before and you shake their hands, and I like to let them know that I'm praying for them.

And, you know, I've gotten, I go to lunch with some of them, I'm really close with the chairman of our county commission where I live, and he's not a Republican, but we're friendly, and, you know, we know where each other stands, we don't argue about stuff, because as you said, we can't wait until something happens. I have an old pastor mentor of mine that says you have to build friendship bridges, and you have to earn the right to share the gospel with people, but because of these friendships, there's been times when some of these people need a prayer. I don't know if some of them have ever darkened the door of a church, but when they needed something, they reach out and ask me to pray for something, it opens the door for me to share the gospel. You know, we spend, and I'm big in foreign missions, okay, so don't twist those of you listening what I'm saying, and I've spent much of my life working in the foreign mission field and planted churches all over the world, so I'm not saying don't do it, but a lot of churches go on these little token mission trips somewhere and don't really do anything, and they're ignoring their own community.

You need to be involved in your own community, too, where you can make a huge impact and let these people love them. Before we take the commercial break, Eamon, I want to share an idea for people who may be in your church. I would encourage you to have, I call it a God in church Sunday, but you can call it whatever, but how about once a year, all the churches out there, you guys invite all your elected officials and all your candidates to come to your church and let them come, and then after church, have like an ice cream social or dinner on the grounds. I don't care, it doesn't have to be full-blown dinner, cake and ice cream or whatever, and what that does is, one, many of them have never probably stepped foot in a church before, and you get the chance to preach a soul-winning message. Be intentional with sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ, but then what that does is it lets your members meet them, and it lets them meet your members, and guess what?

They'll come because they got to get it reelected. I like to tell people, if there's a room with warm bodies in it, I'm going to be there because I need their votes. You got to take a commercial break, Eamon. I preach too much. When we get back, we're going to focus solely on your ministry of what you're doing, and I'm going to zip it up. So stick around, we'll be right back. Connect with Diggs Design on social media. In a world crowded with viewpoints and voices.

Critical condition after a... I believe the message of this... Financial problems. Only one voice matters, God's. At the College at Mid-America and Mid-America Seminary, we equip leaders to think from a biblical worldview, online or on our Memphis campus. Check out the College at Mid-America and Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary at mabts.edu and be equipped to light the way. And never forget the coffee you love or the causes you care about.

Where I share useful tips and proven strategies to help you navigate the seasons of motherhood, faith and life with confidence and joy. And rediscover much of America's forgotten Christian heritage. Your tour will include an up-close and personal look at the nation's establishment and how it's evolved over the centuries. Learn about the government and the men who helped forge this new kind of republic, one that acknowledged the creator from its very inception. Know the truth about the creation of the United States of America, about the faith of the founding fathers and how Christian principles were used to establish this form of government. Visit CitizensForAmericaFoundation.com today and secure your spot to join Chris Hughes in Washington, DC this June. Folks, welcome back to Christian perspective. My guest today, boy, I'm falling in love with him because he is right in my lane of what I believe in. Eamonn Ross is here today and he's talking about his ministry, Kingdom and Politics.

And Eamonn, you haven't shared your website. Share that and you were talking about online classes a while ago. How do people sign up for these classes and where do they go to learn more? They can go to KingdomInPolitics.com and you know, we have the training program on there. You can learn more about it and we are more than happy to help serve. We don't want you to do this alone. That's why we created an environment where, you know, they have the online training, we have the group training, we create a community and then we mentor you so that you don't feel like you're saying yes to something God's calling you to and then you go on this journey alone.

So is that your three-level system, what you just described? I know you talk about on your website how you have a kind of a trademarked approach to training people. Do people have to pay for this? Is it a free service?

How does it work? A group plan where you can get 10 licenses for one price or an individual plan if you just want to do it for yourself and go through it. You get the how to run for office course, how to run a campaign course. You know, we also provide you with a short course. It's 35 minutes called the Art of the Pivot and Message Discipline and the whole point of that course is look, if you're a believer going into this space, just know that lots of people don't like you already, okay? And so we want to give them some tools to be able to defend against or get out of hard situations where people are trying to sabotage your campaign.

And then we also give you a digital starter kit with a bunch of templates, you know, how the best practices for how to host a fundraiser or how to schedule your day. There's like 70 different documents in that kit so that we're giving you an entire package that, you know, we really want to break down the four obstacles that stop believers from running for office, right? It's the fear of the unknown. It's the fear of failure, the fear of success. So we count fear as number one and then the lack of training, the lack of mentorship, and the lack of community.

We solve all four of those obstacles. You know, and one thing you mentioned earlier that I just want to touch on real quick is, you know, people are like, how am I supposed to go work in this space? You know, I don't agree with so-and-so, or how am I going to invite them to my church to speak? I couldn't disagree more with this or that. Listen, do you think God doesn't know that?

It's okay. Do you think that Daniel, who was a eunuch, he was a slave, he was hated, he was hated because, you know, of how he, of his beliefs, do you think that Daniel agreed with everything that was going on in Babylon at the time, or agreed with everything that was being said or done? Absolutely not. But guess what? He worked with excellence and his enemies could find no fault in him. And guess what?

God raised him up to be the second most powerful person in all of the world at that time. And God could do the same thing through the people that you are training right now. So if they go on and they get these classes, Eamon, and let's say they decide they do want to run for office or want to dig deeper or learn more, are there opportunities for someone like you or on your team to come along beside them and offer more consulting help, or do you connect them with people that do that? Yeah, we do both. So we have a team of about 20 subject matter experts. They're all believers. They've all been in this space for 15 to 30 years.

And we make sure that we connect you to people. Look, everyone knows that there's a lot of shady stuff that goes on in this space, right? We heard the stories about where they raised a hundred million dollars and only 70 million of it, you know, actually got spent.

And so 30 million evaporated. That stuff happens in this space. And so we try to work with people that we know are ethical, we know that they're kingdom-minded, and we know that they're going to do the right thing for the candidates that we connect them with. And so, yeah, we help provide all of those resources. Something else that we do, for those of you that win, don't feel like, you know, don't have that fear of success, okay?

Because once you win, we connect you to a couple of other organizations that we're not trying to recreate the wheel here. There's already kingdom-minded legislation being enacted from school board and city council and state rep all the way to Congress and governor. And these organizations will help provide you with what that looks like.

So you don't have to feel like, okay, I don't even know where to start now. So your ministry really comes alongside, I had no idea that this organization existed until about 48 hours ago. And this is so needed, Ayman, where you're helping people because so many, not just Christians, but others, particularly in the Christian world, even if they wanted to run for office. And like we've talked about, there's so few Christians in the realm of politics and the church today, people don't know where to go or what to do.

Right now, there's so many parents across the country looking at school board races. And I assume you help with local races too, that are wondering where to go. So you need to check this out. This is not some secular organization helping you out. These are Christians in a ministry that are really coming along beside you to train you how to run for office and not leave you alone once you get there. Tell the website again, please. www.kingdominpolitics.com.

Well, I was just gonna say, as a gift to all your listeners, we have something that we'd like to give them that can download it. It's at go.kingdominpolitics.com. It's a really in-depth look at all of the four obstacles that stop believers from running for office and what those solutions look like. And again, that's go.kingdominpolitics.com.

Thank you so much. What a blessing. So you get rewarded for listening to the Christian perspective today. Eamon, I know you said you have training both for candidates and people that want to run campaigns. Do you have a program set up, let's say, where you've trained somebody to be a campaign manager or whatever different positions you can train them in, but they might not have a candidate yet. Do you connect those two groups together as well? You know, that's a really good question, and we've actually started getting that question more and more. There's a group in Virginia and a group in California that have asked that same question just recently. And yeah, so what we try to do, it's tough just because some of those races, it just depends on your geography, right?

But we do have access to thousands and thousands of races across the country that we can help try and connect you to, just depending on what it is you really want to do. I mean, I will tell you, running for office or working on campaigns, for people that have never done it, it can be the most fun, most exciting. I mean, you hear the most amazing testimonies from both campaign workers and people running for office on how much fun they have serving.

And they just never really knew that they were going to enjoy it this much. And it's so encouraging. I mean, even in North, I think, you know, your viewership, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, we're helping in a number of races there, from school ward all the way to Congress. And it's just really neat to see the work that God's doing, raising up these incredible leaders. So, Amy, if a pastor's listening today and he's encouraged by what you say and agrees and the Holy Spirit convicts him, how can someone inspire their congregation to run for political office?

What advice would you give them? You know, so I love that you asked that question. I was at a church just outside the Bay Area, and I'm sitting in the green room with the pastor, and we're just having a conversation, and he's an amazing guy. And, you know, I said, let me ask you, how many people in your congregation have ever been interested in or possibly called to run for office? And he just looked at me kind of with a blank look, and he said, well, I have no idea. And I said, what do you think about this? I said, why don't you go out there when you're on stage and just say, hey, you know, from 10 years old until today, how many of you have ever had the nudging of the Holy Spirit or just the interest or desire to run for office, whether it's from school board to president?

He's like, all right, so he goes out there and does this. Thirty percent of the people raise their hands. I mean, we do this in a lot of churches. Pastors are, they're blown away by the amount of people that, you know, that even have this interest. And here's the thing, you know, if you're a pastor listening, like, you're called to steward the hearts and minds of your congregation. And so, you know, whether it's raising them up in the business world or, you know, the media world, whatever it is, you know, you can easily, and in a non-partisan manner, raise up leaders in your church to run for office. And I got to tell you, it's so interesting because I have a lot of pastors that are a little leery at first, but then, you know, once they do it and they kind of see, oh, well, this kind of group's doing it on their own as a small group or whatever, they realize the kind of impact and influence that their church can make, you know, outside the four walls of the building.

And you're exactly right. They don't, they think the votes don't matter. And there are example after example across the country, particularly in local elections, where if just there are churches that have more members than people actually voted on election day. That case I mentioned with the mayor in Houston, there are three churches in the Houston area that have a larger membership than people that turned out to vote.

And that's how she got in office. If Christians would, I think, well, the statistic I saw a while back with like 40 million Christians that are eligible to vote are not registered to vote. And pastors, it's time to take a stand. We're running out of time today, but it's not illegal to have voter registration drives in your church.

It's not illegal and does not endanger your 501c3 status to encourage people in your church to run for office and to even have training for them to do so. And Eamon, I know, would be happy to connect with you and show you how he can help you more. Eamon, tell them again, because we've run out of time, how to get to your website and how they can learn more.

Absolutely. And you can email us at info at kingdom and politics dot com. That's info at kingdom and politics dot com.

And again, the website is kingdom in politics dot com. Eamon, thank you so much for being with us today. This has been great. Yeah, Chris, thank you for having me.

Appreciate all the work that you're doing. And God bless. Well, folks, remember, he gave us a special deal that's go dot kingdom and politics dot com, go dot kingdom and politics dot com. Or check out Eamon's website, kingdom and politics dot com, and be praying for Eamon Ross and his team as they're raising up a generation of leaders to serve in public office with a biblical perspective. Well, tune here every day on your local radio station wherever you are across the country at the same time. And remember, these shows are released on a podcast later today.

And this is one of the ones you're going to want to share. Send it to your pastor, your Sunday school teacher, your deacons, and encourage your church to engage in the political process so we can go impact the culture for Jesus. Thank you for listening. The Christian Perspective with Chris Hughes. Learn more about impacting the culture for Jesus. Visit CitizensForAmericaFoundation.com. This is the Truth Network.