Interview with Richard Harris

Best-selling author, speaker, and advocate for Christian apologetics, Dr. Alex McFarland, bringing you truth for a new generation.

This is TNG Radio. The Word of God has a lot to say about government. In fact, the Bible says that God sanctioned human government for the blessing of humanity. And on today's show, we're going to talk about some of the institutions that God has ordained. We know that God ordained marriage and the family. We know that God ordained the church for worship, instruction, fellowship, evangelism. The church is often called the wife, the bride of Christ, W-I-F-E. That's the church. Worship, instruction, fellowship, evangelism.

But we don't often think about this, but God instituted civil government. And so on today's show, on Truth for a New Generation Radio, we're going to talk about this. And I'm so excited, I've got with me a dear colleague and friend, Richard Harris, I've known for several years. He is an attorney. He's from Oklahoma. But he is also the Dean of the School of Practical Government at Caris Bible College. Many of you have heard me mention Caris many times, and my dear friend Andrew Wommack. Caris, besides being very, very relevant and cutting edge, they also happen to be in just about the most beautiful part of the entire planet, right at the top of Pike's Peak in Woodland Park, Colorado. But Richard is a leader, an educator, and a dear friend.

He is also General Counsel for the university and for the ministries. But Richard, thanks for taking a few minutes to be with us on Truth for a New Generation Radio. Thanks, Alex. It's great to be here. Great to be with you. First of all, tell everybody what you do here at Caris Bible College.

Well, sure, Alex. So I wear a number of hats, but one of the things I do is lead the government school, so the official title is Coordinator of the Practical Government School. The school was founded in, now Caris Bible College is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year, but the Practical Government School is a program in the third year here at Caris founded three years ago with the help of David Barton. And so our mission is to equip believers to restore God's purpose for government at every level.

So I head that program. I also am the General Counsel for Andrew Wommack Ministries and the Executive Director of the Truth and Liberty Coalition. Well, you're a lawyer in the ministry. How did God lead you to where you are in your journey, brother?

Yeah, some people think that's kind of contradictory, right? I know a lot of very godly attorneys, by the way. Well, the passion for the law and the passion for the gospel, they do come together at times. You know, Martin Luther was a lawyer, and several others were, but my life is kind of marked by two desires, one being a passion for government and the other one being a passion for the gospel and for ministry. And I've always had this back and forth of, God, are you calling me to the ministry? God, are you calling me to government? And never quite sure how those would come together until the last year or so here at Caris and Andrew's ministry where they have perfectly dovetailed into the Truth and Liberty Coalition and leading the school of government and equipping believers to take their place in the field of government as ambassadors for Christ and standing for truth and for righteousness. At what point did you see the culture drifting and you realized the overlap of the church and the government? And you, as a lawyer, begin to say, okay, look, this is not just a spiritual problem. This is cultural.

This is our nation unraveling. Right. Well, you know, I've been aware of that larger issue and problem for a long time.

In fact, when I was a brand new lawyer, I sent an application to what was still somewhat new but was the American Center for Law and Justice with Jay Sekula. I didn't get a response back then, but yeah, this is something where the culture war has been going on for a long time and directly overlaps with the gospel and our calling to be salt and light. What do you see are some of the—let's take the top three challenges to the gospel that are operative in our culture right now.

Oh, very good. Well, the first one that comes to mind to me is freedom of religion slash freedom of speech. In other words, just the First Amendment, it seems as if the church and the culture has lost the philosophical underpinning for the First Amendment.

We don't know. People don't understand why it's important anymore. And I hear people claiming, oh, freedom of speech, oh, freedom of religion. But what you do not hear in the public sphere very often is really an articulate defense of the reason why it is so important. And as Christians and those who are standing for truth are coming under more and more attack, even outright bans and prohibitions on speech in America, something that you and I probably never thought we would see.

Exactly. Yeah, so that would be number one is the importance of the First Amendment and a need for a defense of it and a reaffirmation of it. The second is going to be the concept of truth and that there is absolute truth and how do we know absolute truth and a defense of that and to push back against moral relativism is the second thing. And I don't know, jest me for three things, but those are the top two.

Well, let me ask you this before we take our first break here. Truth, why would truth matter? What are the implications if there is no ultimate objective truth? Well, to me the ultimate ramification or implication of there being no objective truth is anarchy. If there's no truth, then there is no foundation for Republican government.

There's no foundation for justice in society. It would become simply he who has the might has the right. Because if truth is what I say it is, then the person who holds the power can invoke that same idea and say truth is what I say it is.

And who cares what you think? And so without a belief in truth, larger truth, absolute truth, we have no ultimate backstop for determining right and wrong, good and evil. When we come back, we're going to continue our conversation with Richard Harris of the School of Practical Government at Harris Bible College. And we're going to ask Richard Harris, attorney Harris, what is really meant by the phrase separation of church and state?

We'll unpack that and more when TNG radio continues. From I am a Watchman Ministries, here's today's I am a Watchman Minute. The story of the prodigal is familiar and loved, but as wonderful as that story is, it falls short of communicating the love God has for you. In the story of the prodigal, the father waited for the son, but for you and me, God sent his son. In the story, the father showed his love by welcoming his son with open arms, but Jesus demonstrated his love by stretching out his arms on the cross. In the story, the father gives his son a ring, but believers today are promised the crown of eternal life.

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I am a watchman dot com. First Peter 3.15 tells us to be ready always to give an answer for the hope we have. We're instructed to be prepared to defend our faith. This is Alex McFarland for the Life Answers Teams, students we train at North Greenville University, a leading Christian college in South Carolina. The Life Answers Teams are made up of students who will inspire and equip your congregation. These apologetics teams we train speak in churches to youth groups and train Christians of all ages to address key issues of our times from a biblical perspective. Like is there a God?

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Welcome back to Truth For A New Generation Radio. Alex McFarland here talking with Richard Harrison. We're going to resume our conversation, but I do want to remind you about our upcoming Youth Apologetics Camp. It's July 29th through August 2nd this summer.

July 29th through August 2nd. We're going to have Will and Miki Addison from the American Family Association. Andy Laurenson, one of the great youth pastors in America, really one of the experts on youth culture. Daniel Ritchie, one of the most inspiring speakers you will ever hear.

Brilliant young man Daniel Ritchie. I'll be there. And we're going to do all the fun camp stuff.

Ropes, course, kayaking, all that good stuff. Great food, great friends, great memories. But fifteen sessions on apologetics and biblical worldview. And I want to say to the leaders listening, so often young people, they go to school, they graduate from high school, they fall away very often because of intellectual skepticism. So look, in all of your activities this summer, invest a week that will count for the entire life of a young person. Let's get equipped to stand strong, defend our faith.

We don't want the young people in your life to fall away. So go to the website, which is truthforanewgeneration.com. That's truth, F-O-R, truthforanewgeneration.com. And you can find our events, our tour schedule, speaking, and yes, info for the camp. It's coming up quickly. Register today.

Space is limited. And we thank you for being a part of what God has called us to do, to equip and commission the next generation. Well, somebody who's really being used by God to do that is my friend and brother and colleague, Richard Harris. He is the Dean of the School of Practical Government, an attorney, an insightful thinker, and a devout follower of Jesus Christ. And Richard, before the break we were talking about some of the challenges, the challenge to the freedom of religious expression in the First Amendment.

Why does this matter? Richard Harris Well, the First Amendment to the Constitution contains five rights, and the first right of the First Amendment is freedom of religion, saying that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or infringing the free exercise thereof. So religious freedom is the first of the first of the first. That's because it is the most important right. All other rights come from freedom of religion and are dependent upon freedom of religion. So our founders acknowledged and realized that our rights are unalienable.

They come from God, and we need to acknowledge that. And the First Amendment is designed to protect that freedom foremost above all things. Darrell Bock You know, I was thinking about JFK in 1961. Shortly after he was inaugurated, he said that the rights of man come not from the government but from the hand of God. The government can't legitimately take our rights away, but the government can't really even give us rights, can it? Richard Harris That's right.

That's right. Our rights come from God. They pre-exist the formation of the government. They're unalienable, meaning they're part of who we are as human beings.

God gave them to us, and man can't take them away. So we don't depend on the government for those rights. The government is obligated under the divine law of God not to infringe those rights.

And when it does, then it's in violation of God's law, a higher law than even the law of man. Darrell Bock Have we in our lifetime – and this is a little bit of a loaded question, Richard – but have we seen the government invent rights that are not really legitimate rights? Richard Harris Oh, absolutely, yeah. The government invents a right to health care, invents a right to – now the latest right is the right to a free college education. In fact, people use the word right so freely today, but it's really – when you understand this subject, you realize that they really don't understand what a right is and where that comes from. Darrell Bock The right to abortion.

Richard Harris Ah, there you go. You can't have a right to sin. There's no right to do something that God says is immoral or wrong. And so that is an aberration, too. Darrell Bock The right to gay marriage.

I think about this. Am I correct in saying that the Founding Fathers believed in absolute moral truth? Richard Harris They did believe there was absolute truth and that it was something that could be discerned by man through, as they referred in the Declaration of Independence, to the laws of nature and nature as God. So truth could be discerned through the Holy Scriptures, the revelation of God there, as well as our own reason applying to observing nature around us and the laws of God that are evident through nature.

So yes, absolutely, they believed in it. Darrell Bock What would they have thought about the manufacture of rights that undermine the Constitution? I mean, where are we when we're trying to use the Constitution to do things that really ultimately endanger the Constitution? Richard Harris Well, yeah, you know the best modern example of that, I think, is the homosexual marriage decision in Obergefell, where suddenly after 240 years, the Supreme Court finally realizes that, oh, the Founding Fathers intended to grant an unalienable right for homosexuals to marry and lesbians to marry. Kind of crazy when you think about it that way, but thankfully now the light of reason has dawned upon us and we've discovered this new right. But in reality, it's contrary to the law of God and it undermines the fabric of society and civilization, and in that sense, it does undermine the Constitution.

So it's an inherent contradiction. Darrell Bock Is there any hope? And I'm asking you this as a Christian and as an educator, but also as an attorney, is there any hope that our legal system and government will come back to the solid ground of belief in moral truth?

Richard Harris I think there is hope. It's not probably going to happen overnight. It's going to be a process that happens over time. And the only way for that to happen, first of all, is for the Church to be Reformed in America, because the Church has got to be the instrument of God to reform society, reform the morals, if you will.

I think, who was it that used that phrase? But by teaching and educating the youth and raising up generations here who will stand in the political process, who will put officials into office who believe in truth, who will then turn around and put judges on the bench who believe in truth. And that's going to be critical, and then it will be a process over time of those judges announcing new decisions, perhaps undoing old decisions that are contrary to truth, and thereby reforming the law. Darrell Bock So what will they do, though, when there's the inevitable pushback from society and Hollywood? I mean, look at the border situation now. Securing America's borders is only responsible, and yet there is this apocalypse that comes out of the left, it seems like, when the government wants to do anything that is actually sensible.

Mark Yarhouse Yeah, it's kind of incredible. It's like an insanity that has taken hold of a large part of our culture and our society now, self-destructive behavior on a societal scale. But what's going to happen was your question, I think, Alex, and the answer is there's going to be conflict. We are going to have to take a stand, and I think the church and those who believe in truth and traditional values are going to have to be willing to endure a protracted conflict in order for this change to take place.

Darrell Bock Stay tuned, folks. We're going to continue our conversation with attorney Richard Harris when TNG Radio continues. Christians don't necessarily agree with one another when it comes to questions of religious pluralism, homosexuality, the role of government, abortion, and war. Too often we manage these disagreements by ignoring them. Yet we're called to engage the world for the sake of Christ. How can we be effective if we avoid society's most pressing questions? In Ten Issues that Divide Christians, Alex McFarland challenges us to drill down to the biblical core of ten current issues, such as social justice, evil and suffering, pornography, and environmentalism, as he echoes the biblical invitation, Come, let us reason together. Only by engaging the scriptures deeply, thinking clearly, and speaking truthfully can we and God's family address our differences and discover the peace that comes with unity of purpose. Ten Issues that Divide Christians.

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That's liberty.edu backslash explore to learn more. Welcome back to Truth For A New Generation radio. We're talking with attorney Richard Harris about the change that really must be if our nation is to continue. Is there a biblical reason that Christians actually should be informed and involved in the electoral process?

Oh, 100%. Just beginning with the words of Jesus that we are the salt of the earth and the light of the world. There is a great conflict taking place in western society now between two basic worldviews, one being that which believes in absolute truth and in God and in a creator and in accountability and these kind of things, and the other which says there is no God, or if there is, you can't discern him, so it's up to all of us to decide what we think is right, and that's going to depend on what's best for us. And moral relativism is the result of it, and so these great conflicts. So if the Christians believe we don't have a role in government, then we are basically abandoning the field to those who do not know God and do not know truth. In the first part of the show, we were talking about the absence of truth and these rights.

Let me ask you this. In the opening of the Declaration, when Jefferson said, we hold these truths to be self-evident, he names life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness. How is it self-evidently true that we have the right to life? Every human being has some kind of inherent worth, right? Worth and value.

Worth and value. Just the fact that you're a human being makes you special. And there is no way for you, as a human being, to achieve your potential without life. All other rights become meaningless. What's the point of that special creation of humanity if they don't have the right to life?

So that's the foundation of it. Life and liberty. Well, in order for you to accomplish what you were made for, to experience life, to know God, to everything else, you have to have liberty. You have to have the freedom to make those choices for yourself. And pursuit of happiness, which was classically phrased as the right to property, so life, liberty, and property, means you have a right to appropriate resources in this life in order to maximize your potential and to become a blessing to other people.

So those three things are obvious just from looking at human culture, society, and the world around us. But what if somebody says, well, if I have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, what makes me happy is, you know, stealing your stuff. Where do we draw a line and we say, well, the pedophile is not allowed to pursue happiness in that way?

Yeah, great question. Well, there's a phrase that my rights end at your nose. So no one has a right to harm another person, okay, except for the right of self-defense, which is just defending yourself against the other person's breach of their obligations. So the moral law, the universal, inherent moral law of God is a limitation on all people at all times in all places. The governments are instituted by God. The Founders recognize this. Romans 13 recognizes this, that government is instituted in order to restrain evil, or in other words, to protect rights.

It's the same thing to make sure that people don't go beyond what their rights are and hurt somebody else or infringe on another person's rights. Darrell Bock And this is so needful, and folks, if you're just tuning in, we're talking with Richard Harris, who leads the School of Practical Government at CARIS. Give the website for the school, and just in a nutshell tell listeners – I know there are many degrees – but why this is important, and maybe they might even consider coming here to earn a degree. Richard Harris Oh, thanks, Alex.

Thank you so much for that opportunity. Yeah, the website is carisbiblecollege.org. So CARIS is C-H-A-R-I-S. It's the Greek word for grace, but carisbiblecollege.org. And CARIS is a three-year Bible college.

The first two years are spent in study of the Word of God and obtaining a solid foundation in God's Word for discipleship, for successful living, and preparing you to take the next step into whatever field it might be that God's calling you to. And here at CARIS, we prepare people for traditional ministry, but we also prepare believers to step into fields of other callings such as business. We have a school of business. We have a school of media, and we have a school of worship and a school of creative arts. But my favorite one is the School of Practical Government, where we're equipping students to engage in the field of government in whatever capacity that might be – elected representative, elected official, maybe on a school board, maybe just working as an administrator or as a technician of some kind in government – but a basic understanding of government, its importance, its biblical foundation, right, wrong, and so forth, and various skills.

So I could go on all day about the courses and what we offer, but I think it's a fantastic program. Darrell Bock Well, it is, and it's been my honor for several years to teach apologetics here. And I was thinking about a story you've probably heard in the Roman era, the gladiator games, when Christians were being thrown to the lions and there was a man – I think his name was Talmachus – who finally he was sufficiently moved and ran onto the field and said, this has to stop.

These are human beings. And isn't it time again, whether it's the egregious national sin of abortion or our just loss of morality and the growing lawlessness, that we, for the love of God and country and for the sake of humanity, we have to become morally motivated to make a difference in our prodigal nation. Dr. Jim Carr You couldn't have said that better.

That's so amazing. Sixty-five million innocent human beings have been sacrificed on the altar of convenience in the United States alone since Roe versus Wade. That's ten times the number of people that were killed in the Nazi Holocaust. That's more than have been killed by Soviet Russia, more than were killed by Mao Zedong. So it's an incredible genocide.

I think without question the worst in the history of mankind. Last year alone, 48 million people, 48 million were killed by abortion. Now with modern technology, we can see and hear the beating heart. We can see the baby moving inside the womb. Even at as young as eight weeks old, the human heart is beating. And when a heart stops beating, does that mean a person is dead? That seems to be the measure.

So when the heart starts beating, doesn't that mean the human being is alive? And the church must rise up and be the voice to this generation to bring an end to that Holocaust. Dr. Darrell Bock You know, I wrote a book called Ten Issues That Divide Christians. Folks, this book deals with these and other political issues, things like national defense, self-defense, the scourge of pornography, the environment.

What is the Christian position on these issues? And there are more than 400 footnotes. Probably worked harder on this book than any other book I wrote. But for your support gift to TNG radio, because our events, broadcasting, publishing, all that we're doing depends on the faithful parish and support of friends like you. For your gift of at least $30, tax-deductible, we'll send you the book, Ten Issues That Divide Christians, and you can get up to speed to speak intelligently, factually on these and other issues.

God bless you, and thanks for listening. Narrator Truth for a New Generation, in association with Alex McFarland Evangelistic Ministries, exists to equip Christians with a biblical world view through conferences and camps. For information about upcoming events, visit truthforanewgeneration.com or give us a call at 877-YES-GOD-1. That's 877-YES-GOD and number one. TNG radio is made possible by the friends of Alex McFarland Evangelistic Ministries, P.O. Box 10231, Greensboro, North Carolina 27404. That's P.O. Box 10231, Greensboro, North Carolina 27404. Or give online at alexmcfarland.com or truthforanewgeneration.com. Thanks for listening and join us again next time as we bring you more truth for a new generation on TNG radio.