Leave Demonic Status Alone

0:02 Looking at our world from a theological perspective. This is the Theology Central podcast, making Theology Central. Christians leave the demonic statues alone. Let me say it again, Christians leave the demonic statues alone. Now, if you are a new listener, you probably thinking I'm telling Christians, hey, stay away from demonic statues. Don't get near them, because you know you could get I don't know, a demon could then impact you or oppress you, or just stay away from demonic statues.

0:46 Don't look at them, don't walk by them, stay far away from them. And I can understand if you are a new listener why you would think that, because most Christian podcasters, if they're talking about demonic statues, that's probably how they're going to approach the subject. Right. They are horrible, they shouldn't exist, they should be torn down, there should be a law against it. Don't get near them, don't look at them. But I can understand why you would think that that's what I would be implying. But well, if you listen to this podcast for a long time, you know I'm not saying that. You know I'm not saying anything like that. If I'm telling Christians to leave demonic statues alone. If you've been listening for a long time, you'll know that I'm saying something completely different. What I am saying is this, Christians, keep your hands off demonic statues.

1:42 They're not your property. You have no right to destroy them. You have no right to knock them over, you have no right to tear them down. They are not your property. Keep your hands off of them. Now. I know immediately Christians are gonna get mad. Me going, how dare you? You're supporting demonic statues? What is wrong with you? This podcast is evil? Well, are you willing to at least listen to a discussion? Are you willing to at least talk about this? Because once again we have another story another demonic statues. Someone tears it down and the Christians are like yay, And I'm like, yeah, go figure, because I guess we can't. I don't know, take five seconds to think about this logically, philologically, philosophically, biblically, legally, okay, Like there's a lot of issues here. So are you willing to talk about I hope you are, but I guess first I should do this. Good morning everyone. It is Thursday, December the twelfth, twenty twenty four. It is currently ten forty five am Central Time, and I'm coming to you live from the Theology Central Studio located right here in Abilene, Texas. Do you like me making this just like unnecessary pauses for no particular reason? Is it for dramatic effect? Does it make it more dramatic if I say good morning everyone, welcome. It is Thursday, December

3:16 the twelfth, twenty twenty four, and I'm coming to you live from If I know it probably sounds irritating, probably irritating, it probably is, all right, So so no delays, no pauses. Let's jump right in. First, Let's go to the story the hot off the press, Hot off the press. It's not that hot off the press, so the pages are not that hot. I know I've got the paper here. I don't actually have a printed copy of the article. This is just sound effect. But it was hot off the press yesterday, December the eleventh, twenty twenty four. Right. It was published at the Christianpost dot com. You can go look at it for yourself, the Christian Post. Do They're currently sixty seven comments underneath the article, and about sixty two of them drive me to the point of screaming my head off. Okay, maybe that's a little exaggeration.

4:11 I don't know how many I have to go look at all of them now, but some of the early comments were really irritating, and some of the comments I've seen on other websites about this, well, that's what's led me to do this. So hot off the press. All right, about twenty four hours ago, maybe less than twenty four hours ago, the Christian Post published an article with this headline, Demonic statue destroyed within forty eight hours and then they haven't quotes Santa wouldn't do this now. I don't know where the Santa wouldn't do this comes from, but we have an idea. Now, this demonic statue, let's get a little bit of context. Here. There's a picture of it right here, there's a picture of it. The the the statue was at the New Hampshire State House in Concord, New Hampshire. It is adorned in a purple kind of stole what they call stole, emblazoned or with an inverted pentagram and goatshead as the T S T logo, as well as two inverted crosses. Now tst means the Satanic Temple.

5:29 All right. It has an inverted pentagram, it has inverted crosses. Okay, Uh, the statue is of Baffo May if you want to say it that way. Now in English you can say at Baffo May or Baffomet right. I think I think, i've, I think i've. I don't can't remember how we've talked about this statue countless times, because it gets torn down anytime someone puts it up. I think I I think I have told everyone the correct way to say it is Baffo May, which it is. But but it is actually okay to say Baffomet if you want to see it that way. But the statue of Bafome I'm gonna go with that was put outside the New Hampshire State House, all right. It's adorned in a purple stole emblazoned with an inverted pentagram and a goat's head a TST which is a TST logo that's the Satanic temple, and it has two inverted crosses. So in other words, if you're outside the New Hampshire State House, you would look over and go, oh, now you may know that that's the statue of Baffome. You may know, but you would see the pentagram and the inverted crosses and go, that's satanic.

6:44 All right, now you see it there, you're out with your kids. Let's go. Let's kids, let's go drive to the new Hampshire State House and let's walk around it. Okay, kid, Oh, there's a satanic statue. There's a demonic statue. What should we do, kids, Well, let's see what happens. The demonic statue erected near a Nativity scene. And just note the fact they call it a demonic statue. A clearly obviously knows that the Christian Post is publishing this article, not so much as a journalist, but they're publishing it obviously with a specific agenda. Mine they refer to it as demonic. I mean, that's obviously then they're coming at it from a Christian perspective and just saying this statue of Baffomey, No, it's the demonic one. Okay, but let's go with the idea that from a Christian perspective, we believe it's demonic, we believe it's satanic, we believe it's ungodly. All right, we'll go with that idea again. The article the demonic statue erected near a nativity scene. Please note there's a Nativity scene outside the New Hampshire State House. Hmm, there's a Nativity scene. Now, let me do a quick let me do a quick study. I bet you that most Christians are all cool with the Nativity scene being right there in front of the New Hampshire State House. They're probably all for it. They have no problem. If the Nativity scene is inside the state House, they have no problem.

8:17 If the Nativity is in any public building, political building, they they're all for it. Put a Nativity scene everywhere because we want the message of Christ, We want the story of the birth of Christ to be seen everywhere. We are all for it. We want it everywhere. We don't want it and if anyone was to say no, it's prohibited, if someone was to tear it down, we would be like, this is taking away our religious freedom, this is persecution. How dare this? Oh no, what are we going to do? So? As Christians, we want the Nativity scene everywhere, and if anyone prohibits it, forbids it, or tears it down, we immediately perceive its attack upon our religious freedom. And we want religious freedom. Okay, we don't even need to do an extensive study. I know that's how most Christians think. So there's a Nativity scene, and somewhere near, as they said, near a Nativity scene, is the statue of Bafomet, again adorn in a purple stole, emblazoned with an inverted pentagram, a goat's head, which is the TST logo, as well as an inverted cross. All right, and the TST is the Satanic teple. I'm just gonna describe it multiple times. I have a picture of it right here before. Well, what happens happens to it? So they put it outside near the Nativity scene. I'm gonna continue to stress that they did so last Saturday, and it was destroyed Monday night, prompting an ongoing police investigation.

9:49 Less than forty eight hours after it was put up. It was poor put up. Forty eight hours later, someone tore it down. Oh but the Nativity scene was okay. No tore that one down. No no, no, no no. The Nativity scene was okay. But they tore down the statue of Bafome. It had to go. So the Concord deputy police chief, he said, Santa wouldn't do this. Santa loves everybody. Okay, that's just a ridiculous statement. I don't even know why the sheriff is seeing something so foolish. What he should say is, whoever did this? It was wrong? But okay, well, immediately underneath that, I don't know who they got someone's social media account. I don't know who this person is.

10:34 They got the little blue check that they pay why eight dollars, nine dollars a month, whatever they pay for. I don't know who this person is, but I guess there's someone important. And it says today's photos of the Satanic Temple's holiday display and concord and it's all broken into pieces, and they have all these laughing, crying emojis like, oh, isn't it funny? They tore it down? Ha ha. And if you follow that social media account, everybody's like, yeah, about that's good. I would tear it down. I would destroy it. And everyone seems to be celebrating that someone's property was destroyed and it's a great thing because they don't like it. Oh wow, you gotta love this mentality. Now you can already hear from my tone. I told you I don't have the typical take that most Christian pastors, churches or podcasts are going to take on this. I think it's utterly ridiculous that small minded people who live with fear and superstition tore down a statue because they disagree with it.

11:38 The Satanic Temple continued its annual holiday tradition of erecting Satanic displays near Nativity scenes on government government property last weekend by unveiling a statue of the of the demon Betholmet at the New Hampshire State House. According to a live feed of the ceremony that aired on Facebook. Now, guess what the Satanic Temple's doing. Oh, you put a Nativity scene on government property. Well, then if there's if you can put a religious scene on government property, then you have to allow all religions. I mean, that's that just makes sense logically, That just makes sense legally. And guess who should be the most supportive of this. It should be Christians, not supportive of demons or Satan or the Satanic Temple, but supporting the freedom of other religions to be able to display things they want, because guess what if you don't support their freedom, you're not supporting your freedom. And this is I know This is so complicated for some Christian minds, But if you take away their freedom, you're ultimately taking away your freedom. If you want freedom, give freedom. If you want to lose freedom, restrict freedom. It's not that complicated. The statue depicted a black clad statue of baffle May with glowing eyes, clutching

13:09 a bouquet of purple flowers in its right hand, symbolizing the state flower of New Hampshire. It was also adorned with a purple stole emblazoned with the inverted pentagram goat's head of the TST logo and two inverted crosses. Okay, I've already now described it now multiple times, but the article describes it multiple times. At the base of the statue was a tablet listing the seven tenants of the Satanic Temple, and to its left was a black and white Satanic flag, right, okay, which would make sense. They're going to have the basic tenets of Satan or of the Satanic Temple, and yeah, okay, but just remember it's it's it's just it's near the Nativity scene. Now, the minister of the tst's New Hampshire and Vermont Congregation, that's the uh the uh, what's the Satanic Temple? Right? The Satanic Temple? The New Hampshire and Vermont Congregation said during the life that the apple and the figures left hand symbolized our quest for knowledge, defiance in the face of arbitrary authority, and our commitment to self determination. Nice. In other words, it has symbols of different things that would be important to the overall tenets of the Satanic Temple.

14:20 The Statue of Bafomey first appeared in writings during the eleventh century and featured in rituals of prominent occultists such as Alistair Crowley. It was destroyed Monday night, according to the The nh Journal or the New Hampshire Journal. The state Representative Ellen Reed, a Democrat from Newmarket who invited the display, claimed that symbols of Christianity were left at the scene. According to The Friendly Atheist, a sub stack maintained by the atheist. Hermit maintained by an atheist, and they give the name of the atheist. Sorry, so the so guess what so what they're trying to say there? I know I didn't read that correctly, But what are attempting to say? Is this the statue of Bafomet was torn down, the Nativity scene was left alone. No one touched the Nativity scene all right, And that was according to state Representative Ellen Reed, who's a Democrat who invited the display. Claimed that the symbols of Christianity were left at the scene, and this was also according to The Friendly Atheist, a sub stack maintained by an atheist by I don't know how to say their name. I'm not even going to attempt to do so. Someone left a Santa hat, a cross and as a Christmas ornament on the statue, according to the New Hampshire Public Radio. So when they tore down the statue, someone left a Santa hat, a cross and a Christmas ornament. Oh boy. So Reid,

15:52 who introduced legislation to strip God from the state oath of office and to ban circumcision from state medicaid coverage, appeared to be emotional as she was photographed picking up the remains of betho May and placing its legs and a car, according to photos published by New Age Journal. Now, I may not agree with all of what Reid wants to believe or what she's attempting to do. My point is this, the Christians who are celebrating the tearing down of this statue seem to be completely just not even thinking about this logically. Uh. They go on to say Reid, who described herself as agnostic, suggested that religious people were behind the vandalism and attacked them in comments to I guess that atheist and that sub set. She reportedly expressed sadness that whoever destroyed the statue couldnot tolerate a simple expression of belief by a group that doesn't believe as they do. The city of Concord released a statement last week noting that they approved the permit for the statue to avoid litigation. Of course, you can't say, hey, we can have this religious symbol, but we can't have that religious symbol. You can't do that.

17:13 Okay. They go on, they talk a lot more here, and they talk about another Bafflemete statue being torn down somewhere else, and then we go on here. All right, So so yeah, I'm reading all of these comments underneath of this, and basically it's a lot of people who are celebrating that it got torn down, and yay, yay, yay. Some of them quote Old Testament scriptures, of course, demonstrating a poor hermeneutic. So you get the idea. So here's what we're going to do. Let's just talk about this from a couple of different perspectives, right, this is not something that should take a long time. I think most I think most listeners to this podcast know my perspective on this, know my position. Right. I think this is just I think it's just childish. It's ridiculous, it's closed minded, it's it's superstitious, it's just foolish all the way around, and it just makes no sense. So let's just try to talk about this, all right. So the destruction of the beatho May statue near a Nativity scene outside the New Hampshire State House has elicited This is how one reported it, celebratory reactions from some Christians. Now that's how some people describe it.

18:38 I say that endorsing such acts, endorsing celebrating the destruction of the Bafomet statue represents to me, it presents. Maybe not the word represents it presents, and it should present to everyone concerns from a logical, philosophical and philological perspective. Let's just look at it from a perspective. When Christians celebrate this, support this, or engage in the tearing down of Bafome or any other statue or religious symbol from another religion, you're basically being inconsistent and upholding free expression. See when you advocate for the removal of religious symbols, you're contradicting the principle of free expression. If Christians support the destruction of symbols from other beliefs, it undermines their position when defending the public display of their own Christian symbols.

19:34 If you're going to argue the freedom of expression, and so Christians have a right to put a Nativity scene or put across or put the Ten Commandments, and you're going to defend that and defend that, defend that, then you'd better defend every other religion who wants to put up their symbols. If you want the freedom, give the freedom. If you don't want the freedom, take the freedom away. It's just simple, it's logical. It's not that complicated. Christians want to be able to like no to everyone else, yes to us. We do not live under a theocracy, nor should you want to. This is a Christian nationalistic idea that has become so prevalent in the minds of some Christians, and it's sickening and it's ridiculous. You think it's all great, Oh, we want a theocracy. Yeah, as long as your particular brand of Christianity is in charge.

20:31 What happens if Catholics are in charge and decide that all Protestant churches need to close down. What happens? Of Mormons or Jovah's witnesses take over. What happens? Oh, if Christians lose power and then Muslims take over and they want to an Islamic theocracy, it never works. Well. Whenever there's any attempt to do that, people die and guess what, So, not only is it inconsistent, then you just set up an end higher scene for a potential of people retaliating and doing the same thing. So if you endorse the destruction of a non Christian symbol, you just set up a precedent leading to similar actions against Christian symbols. So this goes back and forth. We do it to them, they do it to us, and it just escalates tensions and it results in just a cycle of a back and forth. And what are you accomplishing that that way?

21:26 Nobody is hearing the message of Christ. Or just seeing religious people fighting and tearing each other symbols down. That's a better argument for atheism than it is for anything else. So from a legal perspective, it's just an in it's inconsistent in the upholding of free expression, and it just leads to the potential of just retaliation and going back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, and it's just nobody is going to gain anything. But from a philosophical perspective, this becomes an erosion of pluralism. Celebrating the destruction of symbols from other belief systems undermines the values of pluralistic society, which thrives on the coexistence of diverse beliefs and practices. Now we may not look, we may not want pluralism from a like a purely theological perspective, a theological perspective, we believe there is one truth, one God, there's right and there's wrong. But for a society, you should embrace pluralism. As far as this is concerned, you want them to have freedom, you want them to have rights because you want to have freedom and rights. And unless you're going to try to force everyone to be Christian by some law or demand but you cannot force people to be Christian. You can force them to be Christian as some national identity, but you don't force conversion, you don't force salvation. We don't want the erosional pluralism.

23:00 We went to a society where we understand that we hey that we're in a pluralistic society, different beliefs, different backgrounds. Not only that from a philosophical not only is in an erosion of pluralism, it's a promotion of intolerance. Such actions foster and environment of intolerance where different viewpoints are not respected, leading to societal fragmentation and conflict. You just start fighting and fighting and fighting and fighting. Look, I can condemn your belief, I can speak against it, I can preach a counter belief, but at the same time I can be say we are to be tolerant of those we disagree with. And see, I think there was some person by the name of Jesus. Yeah, I think he's important in the Christian story. I don't know. Maybe I could be wrong, but I think the Jesus in the Bible says something about love your enemies, and from a theological perspective, it contradicts. It's a contradiction to Christian teaching on love and tolerance. Christianity emphasizes love, tolerance, and understanding.

24:11 Celebrating the destruction of others religious symbols contradicts this very core teaching. Now if we look on it, if we look at it from a historical perspective, it is true that Christians have engaged in the destruction of pagan images, often viewing them as demonic. However, such actions have been reevaluated over time, recognizing the importance of respecting cultural and religious artifacts. It's a major problem now now for many Christians. So there's my basic take from just a logical legal perspective. It is ridiculous for Christians to celebrate and support the destruction of other people's property, other people's religious symbols, simply because we disagree with it and we think it's wrong.

25:00 That is look you're setting if you if you support the destruction of Bafomet in front of a state house in New Hampshire, if you support that, well, then guess what, ladies and gentlemen, Then I support the destruction of Nativity scenes and tearing down of crosses and anything else that's Christian because you can't. You can't support one and then get mad when someone tears down our symbols. If you want your symbol on public property, and then guess what, other people have the same right, and you have to defend their right. If you want freedom, give freedom. If you want to take away freedom, lose your freedom. It's that simple. But for some weird reason, as soon as you say this, there's probably already emails showing up on my inbox. You need to read your Bible. You need to read your Bible. You're right. I've never read my Bible.

25:57 I don't even know how to read. I can't stand that's Christian's always the go to if you disagree with them is because you haven't read your Bible, or maybe just maybe I have read my Bible countless times, and I understand that there's a major difference between the Old Testament and the New Testament for a lot of very logical reasons. So let's consider this. When we look at the Old Testament and we see them tearing down statues and killing people and all the things that occurred, we have to remember it was operating under really two governmental systems, a theocracy which we do not operate under, and they weren't even operating under it in the New Testament and a theocratic monarchy, and the Old Testament, Israel was a theocracy where God directly governed the nation and the people were bound to a covenant that demanded exclusive worship to Yahweh.

26:51 Idolatry was seen as a direct violation of this covenant Exodus twenty three through four, Deuteronomy six thirteen through fifteen. Thus, tearing down idols and pagan altars were not only a spiritual act, but was a civic and national requirement. No one can deny that. But they were operating under a first a covenant that God made directly with the nation. All right, that's already unique. That's not the way it is for the United States of America, even though Americans want to pretend that it's not the case. God made a covenant with Israel and they were operating under a theocracy, and then they were operating under a theocratic monarchy. Leaders like Hazekiah Josiah were commanded or commended, i should say, for removing idols and pagan altars from the land. You see this a Second King's Chapter eighteen, Second King's Chapter twenty three. These actions were part of purging the nation to ensure covenantal faithfulness. This is all about the covenant.

27:50 The covenant, the covenant God made with the nation. The land itself was considered holy and set apart for God. Allowing idols to rein was viewed as defiling the land Deuteronomy seven five through six. The destruction of idols was about maintaining the sactty the sanctity of a theocratic kingdom. But when you get to the New Testament, I know this is going to come as a shock, you know, but you know, maybe only people who don't read see this. The New Testament is a completely different context. It's no longer a theocracy, not even a theocratic monarchy. Now you're very much in a pluralistic society. By the New Testament era, the Church existed within a pluralistic society. Under Roman rule.

28:40 Christians were not called to establish a theocratic state, but to live as citizens of Heaven while engaging in the world. We are in it, but we are not of it. Our citizenship is in heaven a or we are strangers, we are pilgrims, We're just passing through. That's the New Testament. The New Testament approach wasn't no, no, no go and tear down statues and tear down temples and set up a theocracy. That was never the New Testament rule. Jesus didn't call for that, the Apostles did not call for that. And if you look at the New Testament, there was an acknowledgment of idols, but no call to destroy them. Idols and pagan temples were everywhere in the Roman world, yet there is no record of Jesus or the Apostles calling for their destruction. Paul encountered idols and athens, but he did not seek to tear them down. He said he used them as an opportunity for dialogue preaching about the unknown God. We see this in Acts, chapter seventeen, verses twenty two to thirty one. He didn't say, tear this down, push it over, destroy it, and then take a selfie standing next to it. Oh, look at me. I knocked down someone else's property. I'm so godly. No, he didn't do that. He used it as an opportunity. Hey, everyone, see this statue of Bethome, Well, Befomet shows up in like the eleventh century. It was it's a false god.

30:07 Someone made it, someone create put this together with their own hands. It can do nothing. It is it, it's it, it's it's powerless. But let me tell you about the God who created the heavens and the earth. You use it as an opportunity to preach, don't use it as an opportunity for vandalism and destruction and then act like you're somehow godly. The early Church was instructed to avoid idolatry, but not to destroy idols physically. Christians were called to spiritual separation, but not physical destruction. Spiritual separation, not physical destruction.

30:49 See Christians, they want they want to ban it, they want to they want to burn it, they want to silence it. That's not the way it's supposed to work. Now, if you have an idol of your own and you come out of Christianity, then you may want to destroy it to show your separation from it. But that's you destroying your property. That's not you destroying someone else's property. The New Testament places emphasis on spiritual transformation and the tearing down of internal strongholds such as false beliefs and idolatrous desires. The battle against idolatry shifts from a physical to a spiritual one in the New Testament. It's not the physical idolist what's inside of us. And if the Old Testament teaches you anything that's the case, Israel would tear this down, destroy this, kill this person, do this, and they still continue to send over and over and over because the issue never was the external things, that was the thing inside their heart. I don't know how Christians can't catch onto that lesson. And then if you go to the New Testament, Christians are instructed to respect God authorities, even those that maintain pagan temples and rituals.

32:04 We see this in Romans thirteen and one Peter two. The Old Testament's destruction of idols were tied to Israel's unique covenant relationship with God and its identity as a holy nation under a theocratic monarchy or just a pure theocracy. The New Testament reflects the Church within a pluralistic and secular society, emphasizing spiritual transformation over physical confrontation. The Old Testament demanded a physical removal of idols, well, the New Testament calls Christians to focus on proclaiming the Gospel and addressing the idolatry of the heart. The distinction highlights the shift in God's covenant relationship with this people, and how the Church's role is fundamentally different from that of Israel in the Old Testament. You know why the Church's role is fundamentally different than Israel in the Old Testament, because the Church isn't Israel. Shot King. I know. There you have it. I don't know what else to say, what else can be said? Now? In some ways I believe this is a her or hermoneutical issue more than anything. Now, if I was to go to the comments underneath.

33:22 This, uh, let's see you see here, I'm looking here. There's just a lot of things here. Okay, there's a lot of people who've added all kinds of other stuff here. Oh, there are some people who stepped up saying this is ridiculous. Okay, man, there's a lot of craziness stuff here. Okay, there's just a lot of back and forth. See here, I'm looking. Okay, some people are just laughing about it. Some people quote first Samuel five one through four, where there's a there's a idol setup that falls down. Okay, so yeah, they

34:54 So there's a bunch of comments here. I'm not going to read all of them. Like I said, there's like over probably getting close to set No. But so for the most part, there's a lot of people just sing a lot of ridiculous things. But if you follow the link, if you follow the link from the social media thing that they have here, you go to that, you almost all you get, just like like the very first comment praise God. Someone praises God for the destruction of someone else's property. Someone said, was meant for the trash anyway? Some person said indeed, someone said, the devil made me do it. Definitely. Uh so everyone's just mocking it, mocking it.

35:40 You're happy, so amazing. Someone said, yeah, it definitely sends a message that we don't support hailing Satan. Oh yeah, woa. So like it's all like yay, it's a good thing. So the Christian post now their articles are I don't know, their comments are filled with all kinds of other stuff. But under the social media it's straight like, hey, this is awesome. There's nothing awesome about it. You destroyed someone else's property. What would you do if someone came in your property and tore down your cross, your Nativity scene? What would you do? Go to your church? Like you would be furious vandalism? This is wrong, call the cobs investigate, Oh, I'm being persecuted, but you support the persecution and destruction of someone else's religious symbols. It's ridiculous that Christians cannot see be on their own blind. I don't understand, They're just blind and to it. The good thing is there are some Christians who do understand, all right, but I get furious at the ones who don't. And then there's support.

36:43 As always, they quote some Old Testament passage so far out of context, no concept what they're doing. And it goes back to should Christians in the Bible? You know I can find a verse? Okay, well, great, congratulations, you have any idea what you're doing with the verse? Any idea? So please, Christians, leave the demonic statues alone. Just leave them alone. And if you're the one who wants to argue and find that you want Christian symbols on public property and public buildings, you want Nativity seeds, you want the Cross, you want the ten Commandment, you want it everywhere. You want the Bible in your public school, you want Christian symbols in your public school, then you better be prepared that the Satanic temple, Muslims and other religions have the same right and the same freedom, and you better defend their right, and you better defend their freedom because we don't control the world, and we should not even want to. This is not our home. We're supposed to be in it, but not of it. We're not supposed to be trying to take control of it. Preach Christ, don't be trying to control and censor everyone else. All right, there you go. I think I handled that really good.

38:08 Hang on, let me I think there was one thing. Did I say one thing incorrect? Here? I kept using the word emblazoned. That's it, okay, it's emblazoned, all right. And when I was describing the uh, the baffo ma the statue, yeah, adorned in a purple stole and emblazoned right with an inverted pentagram and goat's head of the t ST logo, as well as two inverted crosses. It is emblazoned, all right. The word just wasn't emblazoned. That's the way. It doesn't sound like the right word, but it's that's the word, okay. I just like it would I kiss. Maybe that's the right word. I don't know if that's the word I would use but okay. So I kept throwing me off, but I kept re reading it, and that's the only way I knew to say it.

38:57 So but like I said, Baffo May, it is okay to stay baffle met. I may have said before that it wasn't okay, but I was listening. I was trying to make sure I had the pronunciation right, and it was like baffle May, but it could be baffle met, so it's not necessarily wrong, right, So all right, there you have it. I think I've corrected any mistakes I may have made. Well, I know this. Whatever mistakes I have made in this broadcast, at least I'm not tearing down other people's property. That's I know. I'm really spiritual. Ladies and gentlemen. If I go out today and I see someone having a religious display that I don't like, I can assure you I will not tear that down.

39:46 I may commit fifteen other sins today, but I have no desire to tear anybody else's property down. And you know what I would do. If I was outside the New Hampshire State House and I saw someone trying to tear down the staff to a baffle May, I would defend it. I would defend it and say, no, you're not. You better call the cops because we're getting ready to have a confrontation. You're not going to touch someone else's property. You're not going to tear it down. Back off. I don't care if you're a Christian. We're gonna be at odds with one another. It's not yours. Keep your stinking hands off of it. And he said, oh, you're defending Satan. No, I'm defending people's rights to have displays of something I disagree with. I would want I would hope an atheist, an agnostic, or someone from the Satanic temple would not allow someone to tear down a Nativity scene because they want freedom. They support my freedom. I want freedom. I support their freedom. That's not controversial, that's not radical. That's not like some wow, you have to go to seminary.

40:59 That's like, I don't know, what is that old saying treat others the way you want to be treated? Is that really that complicated? Hey man, look someone's trying to tear down your statue. I'm standing here defending it. You probably should come out here. I want you to know I disagree with the entire thing. I disagree with Satanism. I'm a Christian. I believe that there's one God, the True God, and I believe that there's a heaven and there's a Hell. I believe satan has been defeated by the work of Jesus Christ on the christ. I got no problems to stating what Christians believe and saying that's what I believe. But at the same time, man, I'm gonna I'm not gonna let anyone tear down your statue because what didn't Paul say, what is an idol? It's useless, It's meaningless. Now I know someone saying, oh, oh a demon.

41:50 If you get near it, a demon will jump out and get on you. I'm not so into that approach, but you know what, then don't go look at it, don't walk by it. It's amazing how sometimes Christians can't just say, well, I just won't watch that, I just won't read that. But now we want to control what other people watch, what other people listen to, what other people read. I'll never understand that. But at the same time, we want them to be able to read the Bible in our Christian book. It's so weird. I'll never understand sometimes the Christian mentality some Christians, not all Christians. All right, thank you for listening. Everyone, have a great day. God bless