When ICE Protesters Come to Church?

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And now, here's today's Truth Talk Live host. There's an ice storm across. Minnesota.

Some say it's an ice bath. Either way, it is. Ugly. You've seen the mobs, you've seen the protesters. But what happens?

When Protesters Radical protesters, angry protesters, protesters using profanity. What happens when they come into your church, your place of worship? The pastor's preaching from the word. People are focused in. Maybe taking notes.

They were there with their family. singing hymns, Praising God, the worship team's up, and all of a sudden the doors bust open, and all these people run in, screaming, yelling, cussing. And condemning ICE and condemning law enforcement. For their brutality. For their actions to arrest illegal immigrants and take them back to their countries.

What do you do?

So, the question today on Truth Talk Live: Stu Efferson here is: how should Christians respond? What should churches do? How would your church react if this happened? If There you are. Having your service, and the doors busted open, and all these protesters came in and started yelling and screaming.

And Mm. making their case in front in the middle of your service. What do you do?

What's the law say? And what is What about compassion? I mean, should you say, come on in, you need the gospel too. We all do. And.

Bring them in. But they're not there to hear the truth. They're not there to hear the word. They're here, they're in your church because they found out that one of your members or leaders. Is an ICE agent, and they're very upset about it.

And they're there to scream and yell and shout down the preacher and all that.

So, this happened in a church in Minnesota. This past weekend? It's been all over the news.

Some folks are defending it, saying, hey, they're just being Christian too because they're showing compassion. for the illegal immigrant. And you know Maybe Jesus loves the immigrant too. I don't think anyone ever questions that. But is this going too far?

And how would your church react? That's the question. All hour long. The phone number is 866-348-7884. How would you respond?

How would you react? We're going to throw some scenarios out here that are going to make everyone uncomfortable. One of which is What if a Pro-life. Group of protesters who were mad that millions of babies, thousands of babies in Minnesota had been executed. There are lives that have been zapped out.

What if pro-life protesters busted in to a progressive church? A church that was totally pro-death or pro-abortion? What would the outcry be? Think about that. I mean, how many of them would be in jail right now or maybe executed on the spot?

It'd be all over the media. But ironically, the media didn't cover this church thing that much. You didn't see it very much in the media. Fascinating. And there are people that are so mad at ICE, Christian people.

that they could just put their fists through the wall. Should they be? Is this wrong? Is this cruelty? And then I saw an ICE agent.

Oh, roll his window down. at all these ladies protesting and blocking and laying on their horns and says Ma'am, I'm on my way to arrest a sex predator. Here is his record. And you are impeding in obstructing Law enforcement. By this nonsense, please let us do our job.

Now how do you respond to that?

So of course there's some good Well meaning Folks that have been here, legal or illegal, for a long time contributing. We're not negating that. But then suddenly The protests aren't out there on the ball field or aren't out there on the paradeway or aren't out there where law enforcement's trying to get to someone. They're in your church, in your face, where you're there with your grandkids worshiping. What do you do?

How do you respond? 866-348-7884. We're talking about it. Right here, right now. On Truth Talk Live.

Ryan Heffelbein is the head of the Freedom Center, Liberty University. Ryan Can you bring some sense into this? I mean, why not let these protesters in? and preach the gospel to them and give them water and food. And have them just join in.

I mean, they need God too. What do you think, man? How did you respond to this when you saw it?

Well, I great question, Stu. And I'm so glad you're covering this, and we need to do so responsibly. And I think you're doing so on this program. I think it's really important that we critically engage. We think through what were the circumstances that brought them in What was the situation on the ground?

What was the context? And we have to, first of all, approach this with a healthy dose of realism. A biblical, you know, biblical reality. We need to not be Pollyannish about the situation. There was clearly.

A motivation of this group not to listen to anyone, but to shout, to yell, to disrupt. Uh these were professionally paid agitators. These were people that were trying to stop what was happening. They were highly organized, well trained. And I actually believe that part of the motivation was to incite physical violence against them.

And thankfully, praise God, no one took the bait.

Now, let me just say this. every private house of worship is Private. Property. It may be open to the public in terms of you're welcome to come in, but you're not welcome to come in with the purposes of disrupting and then holding a public dis demonstration inside of a private space any more than you're in than breaking into someone's home. and trying to protest in their living room.

The law is very clear about those things, and I actually believe they could have been physically and forcibly removed. By the congregants of that church. They're well within their constitutional means of doing so. They decided to be kind in the way they responded, but they absolutely could have responded with physical force. In order to remove them out of that sanctuary.

Well, what if deacons had been armed? I mean, you know, we got to contextualize this, Ryan. You have covered yourself the church shootings, you know, in Dallas. You know, we have mutual friends in ministry in Dallas, Texas, where people have busted into the church and started shooting people. And you've had this.

So, how do you know if you're in there and you're trying to protect your pastor, you're trying to protect the families? And the doors are unlocked because everyone's welcome. How do you know someone's not going to come in with a knife or come in with a bomb? Here you have these people coming in with profanity and coming in in the middle of worship.

So, this could have been a real ugly, this could have been a bloodbath. And so, wow. Yes, I believe that every many churches across the country have security teams, they provide. A team that responds in those situations. If it, God forbid, becomes an active sugar situation.

Every church bears a responsibility before God to protect and defend the innocent. Starting with children, starting with innocent life in that congregation, women, children, the elderly, they have every right to be there, to not be harassed. To not be intimidated, to not be terrorized in any way.

So federal law re protects that, and it should be applied fully in the middle of the market.

Now there's some law called there's some face, FACE. Tell us what that is real quick in terms of on the legal side. The FACE Act, I don't have the full spelling of FAICE, FACE, but the FACE Act was a federal act that was enacted several years ago. It's already been prosecuted. It's prosecuted under the Biden administration.

There are a number of pro life Advocates praying on the sidewalk, for example, who were actually prosecuted under the FACE Act, including a Lauren Handy that was sentenced to 50 years. The little old lady in Tennessee, she's praying across the area from a church, praying for God to save the unborn, and they throw her in jail. And here you have these protesters in there screaming, cussing, following people to their cars. in the middle of church And nothing so let's put the shoe on the other foot. Ryan, if a pro-life group Had burst it into a progressive church.

And started doing the same thing, what would have happened?

So that's exactly right. I mean, and in a place like that, I can most assure you and anyone listening that. They absolutely would have been arrested. They probably would have been booked. Oh, wow.

And then incarcerated and then have to post bond or bail. They might be in prison right now. Hold that thought. We come back. What's the fine line between compassion?

On folks that are here, maybe that should be here, honestly. They'll bring the law down on some of the folks that have criminally hurt people, killed people. 86634-TRUTH, we got Jamal and a couple others on the line when we come back with Ryan Heffelbein, our special guest from the Freedom Center. Don't touch that dial. You're listening to the Truth Network and TruthNetwork.com.

So, the faith community in America is a very important thing to do with the United States. Is struggling right now. It's a difficult day because When I came into the end of my week. last week, Ryan Helfenwein. I didn't expect to be doing a show On the front of the week.

The day after MLK Day, which by the way, MLK won't be a good thing. Would he not be aghast? I mean, would MLK burst into a church? and start screaming and cussing. and hollering and and that sort of thing.

What would he think, Ryan Heffelbein, about ICE protesters just busting into a church and screaming and hollering and cussing and yelling to protest in the middle of someone's worship service. I mean, doesn't this seem to go against everything MLK taught, lived, and spoke about, sir? Absolutely. And in fact, and I'm glad you mentioned this because historically, we actually have a legal precedent. for this very thing.

This goes all the way back to Uh right after the Civil War. right after the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendment were passed, right after the slaves were freed and right after voting rights were extended to African Americans. The Klu Klux Klan was basically Committing acts of domestic terror. They were intimidating black churches. They were organizing in such a way to suppress their civil liberties.

And so it was actually under President Grant that the Klan Act was passed into law. And then federally, it became a federal crime. for any domestic terrorist group To sort of demonize, to physically intimidate or use violence against any group, including African Americans in this country. And so, you know, this is the very thing the MLK stood against in the civil rights movement. The Klan Act has even been mentioned recently by the Deputy Assistant Attorney General Hermit Dylan, that she might invoke that in addition to the FACE Act, because what this Bolshevik Marxist group, what this BLM group did, was exactly that.

They organized, they conspired together for the purposes of disrupting a religious event, a religious Exercise, free exercise of religion. And so they violated the constitutional rights of cities church in St. Paul, Minnesota. And that even includes. He's been put on notice.

Don Lemon, disgraced journalist, 17 years at CNN, too radical for CNN. He went with them and he knew this was premeditated. He knew that they had gone with the intent of breaking the law, and he participated and embedded himself within that group. And so you asked in the beginning, and it's so well stated. How would MLK have stood up against this?

He absolutely would have been against it because this was the very thing in his plight. uh in the civil rights movement is that For far too long. Many African Americans in this country, including lynch mobs, were terrorized in this country by Klan activity. And that was a domestic terrorist group. And so we need equal protection under the law today, just as we needed it back then.

If this is not prosecuted under the law, I fully believe it will. But if for some reason it just is, you know, words that are given at a press conference that we're going to do something about it, if it doesn't end up with people in jail, and I would even dare to say, Don Lemon, if he ultimately is prosecuted under the law for the crimes committed allegedly, he needs to face jail time. He needs to go to prison as well. This cannot be tolerated in America. I mean, he walks into a church.

He's got this strong political view, which he has a. A thousand percent, by the way. He has a 100% Right to hold the views he holds. You can hold views in America. That's the beauty of our country.

That's the beauty of a talk show like this. I'm asking you if you disagree. To call in. Maybe you're an immigrant who's been mistreated. Please call the show.

Let's hear your side of the story. I had a passionate conversation. With a couple earlier who has, they've got a dear friend who's here legally, but because their ethnicity is different, they get stopped all the time. They get ID'd all the time. And it's sad to hear that.

So, I mean, there's a compassionate side we need to acknowledge here. There's people struggling right now, there's people struggling with the ICE thing. But that's why we have the conversation. You hold those views. But does that mean if I'm really strong on this one side?

supporting ICE 'cause they're they are arresting sex predators. who are rapists and murderers, they are doing that. That is what they're here to do.

So, do I go bust into a church and push the pastor out of the way to start preaching and start yelling with all my crowd and all my muscle and yell at these people and protest because I believe that? Do I do the same thing because I believe that ICE has gone too far and they're hurting innocent people and they're brutal and they're bullies? And then, so then do I bust into a church? And, well, is that the forum? And Ryan Heffelbein, you're citing important laws.

Going way, way back.

Now, I want to hear what our listeners think. Maybe they disagree. With you, Ryan, and this is you have every right to call in at 866-34 TRUTH. 866. 348 7884.

We even pay for the call. It's a toll-free call nationwide to join the conversation. The question of the day: how, two questions, really, how should Christians respond? The protesters that bust into the church and did this, how would your church, what would your church do? And just tell us, you don't have to use your name if you don't want.

Tell us how your church, maybe a pastor out there. What was your reaction, Pastor? Would you welcome this kind of thing in the middle of worship? You've spent weeks, months planning your service? You've got uh A whole sequence of events from the offering to the communion.

It looked like they were having communion there at some point. Did you see those communion trays, Ryan, in the videos? I saw some communion trays up there. Maybe. That could have been decorum or they could have been planning for Holy Communion.

What if you're in the middle. the the uh body and blood of Jesus. And all of a sudden You hear horrible language, and people are right in your face screaming at you. in the middle of church 86634 TRUTH 866348. 7884.

Ryan, talk about while we're while while folks are calling in. Talk about the balance. Because the the people that I had lunch with Uh they they were they were a little upset. Because they have personally seen Some I guess ICE discrimination. They have a close friend who keeps getting pulled over, keeps getting ID'd, even though they're here legally, but they don't look like, you know, that sort of thing.

I mean, How do you balance that with these guys doing their job as law enforcement? Go ahead. Yeah, so I want to be very, very clear going back to the Very beginning of the realism under which we're living. We have hundreds of thousands of Americans dead by fentanyl, illegally trafficked. We have hundreds of thousands of unaccompanied minors who have been trafficked across the southern border.

I don't want to suddenly. compare that with the potential of viewpoint discrimination, whatever that might be, or the perceived discrimination of why did that guy stop me or pull me over. There is real violence being committed. There are Mexican cartels here. There's Venezuelan cartels.

We saw the violence in Aurora, Colorado. We had a number of people, girls, college-age girls, dead, raped and murdered. There is no equivocation between that and a dirty look at a traffic scop that a cop gives somebody. I'm all for compassion, but we need a healthy dose of reality. We need to wake up.

Meanness, people being unkind. There are people fighting for their lives in this country. And I will say that ICE is. enforcing federal law enacted by Congress. has already been voted on and passed.

We just need to enforce the law in the books. And the truth be told, and I and I and I know this is a concern of everyone, including you. Look, these are they are going they are triaging. They are going after the most violent offenders first. The first law that anyone breaks it when it comes to illegal immigration is immigration law itself.

Yeah, just just getting in here. Yeah. Just getting in here is breaking the law. But but add to that Uh Committing crimes. I mean, violent crimes, violent offenders.

Right, we're coming here to commit those crimes.

Now, Jay just had to go, but he commented: Dylan Roof came into a church and shot eight or ten people. You know, there's there is, you know, so you have to think.

Some churches might be a little bit up in arms. Chaplin is on the line from Virginia. We're going to take his call when we get back. Hang on, sir. And we got one line open at 866-34TRUTH.

How would your church react, respond to ICE protesters or protesters of any kind coming in, shouting, screaming, making a lot of noise in the middle of worship? It happened this past Sunday. What would you do? What should your pastor do? We'll come back and answer that question with Ryan Hevelmane, our special guest, after this on Truth Talk Live.

You're listening to the Truth Network and TruthNetwork.com.

What happens when those protests and that violence you see on the streets? The chaos That's erupting, what happens when it walks right into your church. Your place of worship, your sanctuary. That's what we're talking about all hour long. Today on Truth Talk Live.

I'm Stu Upperson.

So glad you are with us, Ryan. Healthland Binds with us from the Standing for Freedom Center. At Liberty University. Also, right there, close to 93.7 FM. We got Chaplin on the line.

Sir, jump on here. You're on with Stu and Ryan. What are your thoughts? How would your church react? to such a to such a show of violence or Vocal protesting within the church walls there.

Well, thank you, Stu. Thank you for making this a conversation that's needed to be heard. And also for us to have that time to really reflect on what's causing this. But ultimately, as executive director at oi6.org, we work with numerous churches. planted churches here in Virginia, and we train all of our community to ensure that they maintain a protected environment.

And This type of environment is not protected for our churchgoers or for those who are trying to create and stir up. this type of obscenities within the body of Christ. And at the time of worship, when we are Intently communing with our Father in heaven, we want to ensure that the fellowship is protected, and we would not abstand for this. We would expel them immediately. And we're trained to do so.

Uh I think of my friend Stephen Wolford, who You know, he lost numerous friends that day in the church building and the shootings that occurred. And what he had to do to get back and stand up as a hero in his community. Many of us are willing to do so and been trained to do so as a counter-terrorism, counter-narcoterrorism. combat veteran myself. And as chaplain, we would stand up and so would many others in the community who have been trained to do so and even train our sheriffs in protecting our backyard.

Wow. This is not something that we would just stand for and let idle idly happen in our community.

So you actually train, equip, you actually put security at a high Level of importance. And when you see, when you saw this happen in that church, like what went through your mind? It's like, is this really happening? Like, this dude's up there sticking a microphone in this preacher's face. The preacher's trying to bring sermons.

He's trying to preach God's word. He's trying to minister grace to his people there. And this might be the only hour a week he has with them. Correct. And I think we all are understanding the persecutions will come.

We know that they created this powder keg. in an environment on purpose In order to blow up in our face when they're the ones lighting it. But praise God, we have the dudamous power that the Holy Spirit gives us to take away that power that the enemy tries to bring upon us. And if they do step into our doors, they will find out r very quickly that you don't you don't practice that here. That doesn't happen in our doorstep.

Okay, let's ask Ryan. Yeah, Ryan, now what do you say to the chaplain calling in? I'm really glad it's fascinating that he would be listening and calling in on this particular episode. The Lord just had him tune in, and I'm glad he did.

Now, you may disagree, and if you want to call in, we have a line open at 866-348. 7884-866-34 Truth. I'm Stu Eppers and this is Truth Talk Live talking about the chaos that happened. There's an ice storm. Or you could say an ice bath, whatever you want to call it, up in Minnesota, Minneapolis, to be specific.

It's crazy up there.

Well, the protest came really close to home when it came to church. An evangelical church got bombarded with these protesters Sunday morning. A chaplain is now called in. Stay on the line, sir. I want to hear Ryan reply to you, and we can take another call here, too, in a bit.

But go ahead, Ryan. Yeah. So I first of all, thank you for all you do. And I think we need to see more deacons of justice and deacons of safety out there. And let me just say this, too.

It it would be easy for me to armchair quarterback even Cis City's Church.

So I don't know the situation there in terms of their security team. I was so grateful for the response of Jonathan Parnell. I thought he gave a masterclass in how to respond with poise, with grace. He brought it back to the gospel. But let me just say this too.

That could have gone very differently, very, very differently, if that group. Had come in with weapons and committed an act of violence. I hope that they were prepared for that. I hope that they had a security team in that church. I hope that they were just kind of ready, standing at attention to do something had it turned violent.

But I don't know that to be the case or know that to be true. I think every church has a responsibility. to do all that they can to protect their flock to ensure That the houses of worship are protected, that the sacred hour is not disrupted, and that when children, women and children in particular, who we know as men we're responsible for. When they come in, that we can we can as much as we can, we can assure their safety. That they're coming and they're going from that house of worship is is it is as safe Space because we've secured that space.

We owe it to them to do that. I think one of the problems that we see in the Western world is a demi-fied Christianity. And what I mean by that is. in the Muslim sense of the word. that we we treat Christianity as though it is a second class Face Or that we are second-class citizens.

Christians built this nation. Our laws are enshrined in the Constitution. It came from Christian thought, and we need to enforce those laws. I am the executive director of the Standing for Freedom Center. The founder of Liberty University said long ago that the idea that politics and religion don't mix is an idea, a lie that the devil came up with to keep Christians from running their own country.

And so, in many places where you see blue cities and blue states and secularism and humanism reign supreme, Marxism, you're seeing a hollowing out of the cultural memory of Christianity and any semblance of civility or normalcy. And because of that, that's where you're seeing sacred houses and sacred places denigrated in the name of Marxism. And so, Christians do need to stand up by being lawful. And I think it's important that we have sworn peace officers in our church to keep the peace and to protect the flock.

Well, but let me just escalate this higher, guys. And let me tell you, by the way, if you have been A victim of violence at a church, or you want to call in or respond to any of this, or you have an opinion on how a church should reply or respond to ICE protesters and just coming in and doing their thing. In the middle of the service, you can call us at 866-34 TRUTH, 866-348-7884 is our phone in number nationwide. You're welcome to call in. I've got a chaplain on the line who wasn't a planned guest, but is a refreshing guest.

He actually equips churches to be first responders and to handle the security properly. I've got Ryan Heffelbein with the Standing for Freedom Center at Liberty University, who puts the cross before the flag there, but he's very much a champion of religious liberty and freedom, which has made our country great. Gentlemen, here's the situation. Supposing someone, and I'm sure they did, picks up the phone, chaplain. And calls 911 in the middle of the service.

They got a man in front of them, a large man cussing them out. you know, spewing profanities and angry at ICE and decides to use this church as his platform and they're full of all these people. Supposing it does turn violent, they call nine one one and the police officer dispatcher says, Oh, I'm sorry, ma'am. But the governor and the mayor has told law enforcement to stand down. Because that's what's happened up there.

So, I mean, what do you do then? And I was thinking about that, like, what in the world? What's your recourse?

Well, as a thank you very much, by the way, what you were just sharing before and right on board with Lead Freedom. And Liberty University, great mindsets. We're a one, one mind.

So mine, thank you for that. I think the misnomer here is constitutional rights that each and every one of us carry. Our First Amendment, our freedom to assemble, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, and let none of our freedoms be infringed upon, nor liberty. And thank you, Lord Jesus, for giving us an example of how to lead with life and liberty as one free from sin. And what an example he gave to us, and why in Project 1607, we were so excited that here in Virginia Beach is where first landing occurred.

To dedicate our country and to the Lord. And praise God for that. What a prosperous time we've had, and what a prosperous time to be alive. knowing that we were bedrocked in Judeo-Christian principles. And so our freedoms of liberty, our First Amendment right, also gives us a Second Amendment right to protect ourselves in an environment which we would then deem necessary to do so.

And it has nothing to do with those Liberties being infringed upon us, but should your life be in jeopardy, you are capable of protecting it. At the same time, our Fourth Amendment rights to need I go on. But all of our rights that were inalienable truths that we found within our Constitution, our rights, the Bill of Rights and what is built upon is all based upon our freedom in Christ. And here, when we're having the chance to be free, For someone else to infringe upon that freedom, they're going to be expelled and they will be bound and removed. accordingly and necessarily and been trained to do so and ensure that they are unharmed necess beyond what's necessary to expel them from the premises, which could put the not only our own freedoms but life in jeopardy.

And our children, far be it that you will walk into my house break into my home and then dictate to me how you're going to respond. in my living room. That would no one would put up with that. Nor will we. What do you say to the chaplain about that, Ryan?

What do you think about that? I wholeheartedly agree. And so let me just very quickly just say. that there could have been two scenarios. And one was the one you saw, and I agree with how Jonathan Parnell responded, the pastor of Cities Church, but let's say he responded differently.

And let's say he called a security team and said, you will be removed right now. Either going to walk out or we're going to carry you out and throw you out. That too, let me just say this very clearly for all your listeners. That too would have been an appropriate response. just as lawful, just as Christian, just as ethical, moral and spiritual, there would have been no problem had he reacted that way.

And that's that that would be perfectly fine. Because There is a concern for every shepherd. for every pastor of any church, and that is to protect the flock. And that's not just to protect them theologically, protect them spiritually, but to protect them also physically from harm in that church. If you have a predator in there, you you remove the predator.

And so I think that scenario, had it played out that way too, I would be just. As supportive, I would have applauded that action as well. Wow. So, here's a couple bigger questions. We're about to go to a break here, our final break, and we have one more segment.

And, Chaplain, thanks so much for calling in. God bless you. Thank you for your service. We appreciate you, man. You are a frontline warrior.

God bless you. Yes, sir. A couple questions. There's an interesting. Scenario here where we have You know, we always are, we're always telling, and Jesus said in the Great Commission, Ryan, he said, go into all the world.

The church Isn't Primarily a place of evangelism. The church is to be mobilized, to be built up, to equip Ephesians 4:12 to go into the world, right, Ryan? You know, so here you have the world. coming into the church. Like in a powerful way.

Like in a... In an aggressive way. And so What message is the church hearing from this, how should the church respond? And let's talk about the important elephant in the room, the elephant, the other E-word, evangelism. How can we leverage this as a greater witness in our culture, but also have that compassion, but also have the justice and the security?

We'll take more calls. We got one more segment: 866-34-TRUTH. Hang on. Bye. You're listening to the Truth Network and TruthNetwork.com.

It may be cold as ice in Minnesota, but this state is on fire. The city, particularly with all of these protests, these agents are up there. I heard one roll his window down in deep frustration, shouting out at the rioters, hey, I'm on my way literally to arrest a sex predator, and y'all are honking and blocking and doing all this stuff. Please cut it out. This is this guy's heart.

And he looked genuine. I mean, he really did. But then you have other people like, well, no, man, the guy ran, the guy shot that lady, you know? And these ICE guys are bullies, and it's awful. And.

Ryan Heffelbein has been a great guest this hour from the Standing for Freedom Center, Liberty University. Here's the sports analogy. Tell me if I'm wrong. And by the way, all hour long we're asking the question: how would your church, how should your church react? to protesters if just you're in the middle of your service.

In your church and you're worshiping with your family. And the pastor's bringing a great message, and all of a sudden, the doors bust open, and all these people pour in screaming. Profanity-laced shouts and just awful stuff about how evil ICE is. Protesters, they've been on the streets. They've been attacking officers.

They've been doing all this stuff.

Now they're in your church. And suddenly you're like, oh, wow.

So that's what we've been asking: how should you respond? What's the compassion response? What's the biblical response? What about security? What about our Constitution, religious liberty?

We brought a lot of that. Hope you'll listen to this podcast. It's going to go hot in about an hour after the show. Be sure you listen. And be sure you form a biblical worldview on this.

Just don't give the emotions. There's gonna be sob stories on either side, but Ryan, here's what I liken it to. I liken it to You see these intense football games. Which when a when a player on another team takes a real bad cheap shot.

Okay, say they're battling at the line, and he gives this horrible uppercut, breaks the nose of another lineman, horrible cheap shot. That lineman who he hurts Responds by shoving the guy as hard as he can.

Now, which altercation does the ref see, Ryan Heffelbein? This is always the case almost. Which one does he see?

Well, hopefully they're not blind like SEC raps and they see the whole I knew you'd go there. You but this this illustrates a point. And that is in any kind of athletic contest, you have teams who have agreed upon rules and referees who have agreed upon rules. That is what equal protection under the law looks like Where at the end of the day, regardless of what jersey you wear, regardless of what team you play for, the same rules apply to both. The problem that we have right now, our constitutional crisis right now, is we have a sitting president.

There were two failed assassination attempts on his life. He has a mug shot. For what? Being booked for a crime he didn't commit. We do not have equal protection under the law right now.

We have people that were prosecuted. Under the FAICE Act for praying outside of an abortion clinic, and we have Bolsheviks who run free. You can run over an ICE agent with your car. If he dares to shoot you in self-defense, you are not held responsible in the eyes of Marxists.

Well, yeah, but so this rule of law, but on a deeper point. The previous administration, Obama and Biden, allowed two plus million people in here. They allowed Venezuela to empty out their. This is not. This is not a rhetoric.

They allowed Venezuela to empty out their insane asylums and all their prisons, their worst prisons, to send all their people over here. And so here you have that's the first cheap shot. That's illegal. That is immoral. Just look at Obama from 10 years ago, 12 years ago.

He said, we will not allow illegals in this country. There is a process you go through to become an immigrant in this country. Obama's own words. And then he orchestrates with Biden, his guy, you know, in Kamala, to allow millions to come through.

So now, so that's the first cheap shot.

Now Trump's being tough, saying, okay, let's try to collect these guys and send them back to prison in their own country. And so now he looks bad. The ref is just seeing his response. The ref doesn't care about what happened. They're blind to that.

And so it's kind of, but then ultimately, what's truth, what's real? How should Christians reply? And when it comes to your church, Jimmy in Jacksonville, Florida, I know he's got an opinion about that. Jimmy, what if protesters, you're sitting there, they knock the Bible off your lap and they start screaming in you and your wife's face? You're in there trying to have a worship service.

What would you do, sir? Jimmy? Yeah, Jimmy, jump on in here. What would you do? How would you respond to that?

Album. We well, we have a security team at our church that's um police trained. Oh, wow. It's a no-win situation, though, for a church. That's tough.

No matter how you respond, you're going to lose. Yep. But um well preacher might be a preacher might be preaching a sermon, Love Your Enemy. And here comes someone in there, you know, right? Hey, bless those that curse you.

Here comes someone cursing you. Maybe, hey, Jimmy, maybe you're an ICE agent. Maybe you're out there part of the team, and they say that there was an ICE agent or someone in that church that they were in that church to protest. And so here they're throwing the whole place onto the bus.

So, Jimmy, you have a security team. And so they they're pretty quick at responding and trying to nip something like that in the bud. Yeah. if they I would ask them to sit down first. You know, you want to give everybody a an opportunity.

So I'd ask him to sit down And if they didn't, then our security team would remove the. Yeah, now these are trained professional riders. I mean, Ryan, everyone thinks, well, these are sweet volunteer, you know, little old ladies and guys, just, you know, that are compassionate. But, Brian, there's money coming from Soros and other people. This is documented, right, Ryan Heffelbein?

To pay these products. I mean, how would you like, hey, here's your job. We're going to pay you a lot of money, Jimmy. We're going to pay your transportation to go wherever the law is being enforced. And wherever sex predators are being arrested and rounded up, we're going to pay for you to go.

and throw things at law enforcement, weaponize your vehicles and make a lot of noise and try to impede law enforcement. That's that's the gig these guys are getting paid, Ryan. Hypothetical, or is that really going on? No, that's really going on. You're exactly right.

And the goal is to rise beyond. Yeah. Thanks. The purpose of all of this is if you're ever detained, you're arrested, know this, that you're that we will postpone. We will pay to bail you out.

And in some instances, it's cashless bail anyway.

So you're going to postpone and you don't even have to pay to be released. And in many blue cities, that's already been enacted because already you have the chief of police or you have the attorney general, Keith Ellison of the state of Minnesota, was being interviewed earlier in the same day by Don Limon. Almost immediately. And they're doing nothing. Yeah.

The governor is encouraging this. The mayor is encouraging this.

Now it's in a place of worship. And we saw what happened with George Floyd. Kamala Harris spent a lot of money. Criminals that literally beat cops to a pulp. She's up there bailing them out of jail.

So, I mean, folks, we're just laying the facts out here. But here's the thing. Jesus loves the protester. Jesus loves the immigrant, legal or illegal. Jesus loves the little children.

So, how do we get to compassion? It's so important. But we also don't want compassion that tramples on justice, which seems to be happening a lot. Ryan, I'm going to give you the closing word in a second, but we got a guy for him to call in. And by the way, thank you, Jimmy, for your call for that word.

Jimmy, listening to us on 91.7 FM in Jacksonville, all across that great area, Jacksonville, Florida. Mike Zwick, he's a regular host on this show. He has called in.

So something's got his blood boiling. Mike, what would you do? Maybe you're preaching, Mike. And all these guys come running in, protesting, screaming, and yelling and cussing you down in the middle of the worship service. Zwick, how would you handle that, man?

Well, and I agree with the last caller. It's a difficult situation to have to deal with. And no matter what you do, there's going to be problems. And so for me, the first thing that I always try to do is I would try to disuse the situation. I would try to use grace.

I would try to talk them down this, that and the other. But You gotta realize after you've done that, if they're still yelling, if they're still in your face, You know, depending on where you are, you may have to call law enforcement. You may have to remove them from the service. And if you feel some sort of a threat, I don't know what that would look like. You know, you just have to pray about it.

And these are things that I'm glad that you're talking about this today, Stu, because these are things that we're going to have to start really thinking about. Because as we get closer and closer to the return of the Lord Jesus Christ, I think that things are going to get worse, not better. And more of these things are going to happen.

So, yes, we always try love, we always try grace, but at the same time, if we let people walk all over us, They're going to continue to do it again and again and again. And a lot of times, these people will not stop. Until they are stopped. Yeah, well, and so you have an interesting statement there. Ryan Heffelbein, Mike said it very well.

And he alluded to this idea that there's never been a guarantee for people of faith to be completely free of persecution. In fact, Jesus said, all those who live godly in Christ Jesus, Paul said in Timothy 3, will suffer persecution. Jesus said, Blessed are you. When people malign you, when people persecute you. Great is your word in heaven.

So, Ryan, we shouldn't be shocked. But it is interesting when this comes right in the church because this is forcing the church. To be the church. Ryan Heffelbein, am I wrong about that? And to think about: hey, how can we be more missional?

I mean, yes, security, all that, but how can we have an even greater broken heart for the lost? How can we pray for law enforcement? Who law enforcement, by the way, ICE has been dragged into this because the previous administration violated the law. Did everyone hear what I just said? They violated the law.

by allowing people into our country illegally. That is a violation of the law, Ryan Heffelwein. Am I wrong about that?

So these ICE guys, they're trying to sort through millions of people, and guess what's happening?

Some nice, good, wonderful people who should be here. Are getting, you know, they're getting hit. They're getting tagged. No one likes that. But then the protesters are overreacting and they're invading The church.

Ryan Heffelmine, how should the church of the living God respond? Mike Zwick, thank you for your call. All the amazing callers this hour. Ryan, I got to give you the last word. You've been an amazing.

Guest, everyone Google him standing for Freedom Center. Ryan, give us the final word. You got 10 seconds. Go, bro.

Well, Jesus Christ is full of grace, full of truth. Love does not delight in wrongdoing or evil. Love ultimately delights in the truth. We need the truth, and that means standing up for justice and not allowing evil to go unpunished. I think that's the most important thing for our churches today.

Amen. Thank you, brother. Everyone, hey, go out and reach your world and pray for everyone involved, wherever you come down. Download this podcast later.