Is America Drifting Apart? – with George Barna:Today George Barna is on with us to discuss some new polling data regarding the growing disparity between the right and the left. How do people respond when asked, “Should the other side be divorced from the union?” The answer may surprise you!

Air Date: 3/21/2023

On-air Personalities: David Barton, Tim Barton and Rick Green

Guest: George Barna

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Transcription:

Rick Green
Welcome to the intersection of faith and the culture. Thanks so much for joining us today on WallBuilders. I’m Rick Green America’s constitution coach, and a former Texas legislator. And I’m here with Tim Barton. He’s a national speaker and pastor and president of WallBuilders. And David Barton is with us. He’s, of course, America’s premier historian and our founder here at WallBuilders. honored to work with both these guys. And to have you here as the audience, thank you so much for listening, thanks for being a part of the solution. You know, when you listen to WallBuilders, you’re going to get encouraged, you’re going to get inspired, we’re going to equip you, educate you. We’re going to learn together, sharpen each other’s countenance, and then go out there and make a difference in the culture. And we challenge you to do that today, as well. A couple of ways you can make a difference right off the bat today, one of those is making a contribution to WallBuilders. And yes, I’m asking for your fortune. Yeah, I don’t mind asking. I don’t mind being blunt about it. Lives, fortunes, sacred honor, that’s what it takes not only to birth a nation, but to keep a nation free. And so every one of us need to be giving of our time, that’s our lives giving of our fortune. Yes, that’s our money. Doesn’t mean all of it. Just means some small percentage, you decide for you what it is, 2%, 5%, 20%. Finding candidates to give that to, causes to give that to, organizations that are making a difference in the culture. And of course, WallBuilders is doing that in a big, big way. So check out WallBuilders.com and WallBuildersLive.com, today. Make those contributions, check out some of those archives and other materials there at the website. Alright, David and Tim, a little later in the program, we got George Barna joining us, and of course another great research effort. And it’s going to identify for us the real disparities in America, the differences, kind of where the major sides, if you will, in America, where they are, what the values are, that are driving them to choose the position they’re on. And in some ways, it’s bad news because it shows just how far apart we are. But it’s also good news in that it’s, you know, it’s identifying those issues, and gives us a chance to engage the other side and have conversations and hopefully reach some common ground and even win people over to the truth. So it’s going to be very interesting.

Tim Barton
Yeah, guys, we’ve talked about it before some on the program that we are seeing some positive trends and results, which of course, is why we said we need to talk to Barna. Let’s get him on here and find out really how deep this goes and what some of these details are. Because, as we’ve talked about, where we’ve seen positive trends, that things that we would consider traditional values, that being pro family, those are things that the majority of America agrees on. But it might be important to ask, well, how do they define family? Right, as… are they defining it as a mother and a father is this part of the dynamic? Nonetheless, we’re seeing positive trends. We’ve talked about it so often that over the last several weeks, maybe in the last year that we’re seeing God opened people’s eyes, and people are beginning to identify that truth does exist. Truth is something that they should pursue, and they want to see it restored in culture. So again, such good news. And if we’re going to really understand part of what we’re seeing reported, we thought, let’s go to the guy who does the most polling on this, and can give us probably the deepest dive, best explanation. And that’s where we thought we just need to talk to George Barna. And let’s let him explain some of this to us, so we can have a more thorough understanding, to help us navigate, as we’re trying to engage with people in culture and pull more people in the truth and a biblical perspective.

Rick Green
George Barna, our special guest. Stay with us folks, we’ll be right back on WallBuilders.

Tim Barton
This is Tim Barton from WallBuilders with another moment from American history. Too often today history education excludes great black heroes from the American founding, such as Limuel Haynes. Haynes, abandoned as a baby pioneered churches across upper New England. He became the first black American to pastor a white congregation, to receive an honorary master’s degree and to be ordained by a mainstream Christian denomination, the Congregationalists. He was a soldier during the American Revolution and in his churches on George Washington’s birthday, he regularly preached sermons, honoring George Washington. Even late in his life, he expressed his willingness to go back to battle if necessary to protect America, which he called a sacred Ark. American history is filled with numerous examples of black heroes who are largely ignored by mainstream education today. For more information about Pastor Limuel Haynes and other colonial patriots, go to WallBuilders.com .

Rick Green
We’re back here at WallBuilders. Thanks for staying with us. Always good to have George Barna with us. You need to be following George and the research at the Cultural Research Center. George, thanks for some time today, man.

George Barna
Good to be with you, Rick

Rick Green
Hey, of course we’re, you know, we’re optimistic folks around here, despite a lot of the negative that’s going on. So we don’t like to emphasize the negative necessarily, but we got to know the landscape, we got to know what’s happening out there. And one of your latest studies shows really the disparity in America. Just how far apart the two sides, if you will, have become, those that are, we would call progressive or leftist, or, you know, whatever the right terminology is, I’m sure you’ll tell me that, and those who, you know, tend to lean more towards a conservative traditional value system. Tell us how far apart we are? And what issues did you use to identify that?

George Barna
You know, Rick, what we do is we looked at 48 different values that people possess. And what we found is that there are some that we all have in common, things like family, personal independence, and justice. No matter which side of the political fence you’re on, people of all stripes and ideologies, in America at least, believe that those are critically important, and they hold those core values. Now, of course, the problem comes when you have to define what those things mean.

Rick Green
Now, I was thinking the same thing, especially when you said justice, because that means something very different. Yeah.

George Barna
Yeah, very much so. And even family, I mean, if you think about it, on the conservative side of the fence, we would say, you know, that’s one man, one woman, you know, heterosexuality, having children, raising them up to be spiritual champions. I mean, that’s our highest calling. On the other side of the fence, it’s like, faith is up to the individual, you can have intimacy with whoever you want, whatever gender they are, however many there are. So yeah, I mean, even though we will call all of those configurations, family, we define them differently. And then when we dug deeper into the other values, where people don’t necessarily agree, that’s where you see huge differences, particularly between those who do not have a biblical worldview. And those who do. So very dramatic differences.

Rick Green
That… and because it’s different, does that cause people to, you know, not just argue about the difference, but live different? And I know this is off topic from from the study itself. But I mean, is that underlying what you found in this study? Is that what is under… you know, driving people to move from state to state or to, you know, a symbol with a different group? I mean, is that part of why we’re so you know, divided in the in the nation, not just philosophically, but in our actions?

George Barna
Yeah, very much, Rick. And that’s why it’s important to understand these things, because everybody has a worldview. Your worldview are your core beliefs. And they produce things such as core values, based on what you believe matters, then you’ll identify what has value in your eyes. But the other thing about a worldview is it’s not just beliefs, it’s also behaviors, because you do what you believe. And therefore, when we look at these values, it’s the stepping stone to people doing what they believe. So if you look at a group of people, and you disagree vehemently with what they believe, you’re probably also going to disagree vehemently with their values. And the way America is, today, we’re being taught that you are the center of everything. That’s part of the dominant worldview in America, is life revolves around me, not around the One who created me, and who’s given me my purpose, and who gives me the gifts to carry out that purpose. But instead, it’s all about me. And so if you disagree with me, you’re wrong, you’re bad, I don’t want to be around you. I want to go be with my own tribe. And that’s what’s dividing America today. It’s this self centeredness.

Rick Green
Okay, so if we’re divided like that, then how do we bridge the gap? I don’t… you know, we obviously don’t want to just tell everybody, hey, just move to a state with only your people, we got to live among people that are different from us, which they’ve always been, there’s always been diversity in the country. And we used to be able to sit down and have that discussion. And whether it was, you know, at the tavern in the Revolutionary War over a pint or, you know, it was, you know, just sitting around over lunch today to discuss things, how do we get back to civil discourse, so we can actually discuss these things together and live together even when we disagree?

George Barna
Well, I think part of it, Rick, comes down to recognizing that the only way we can change things is if we relate to each other. And so recognizing that my job here is to build a bridge to you, emotionally and intellectually. I’m not going to do that by calling you names, by consistently pointing out you’re an idiot, you’re thinking wrong. Why don’t you do the things I do, believe the things I believe? You know, so much of that is based not only on selfishness, self centeredness, but it’s also about insecurity. And so if we recognize that in other people, then a softer way of approaching the differences is to take a Socratic approach, where I’m not telling you that you’re wrong and why you’re wrong. I’m asking you what you believe, why you believe it, what that winds up looking like in reality, what the alternatives are, why those alternatives may or may not be better, having that kind of a softer conversation, a dialogue with people, where we’re not only trying to understand them, honestly, by asking these questions, because that’s how you begin to build that relationship, but then once that trust begins to be established, that I’m not out to get you, then we can actually discuss the tougher things maybe more deeply. You know, as Christians, we have to understand that I cannot force somebody to believe that the Bible is right. I cannot force somebody to buy into all the principles of scripture. But I can encourage them in that direction. And I can model it for them in such a way that they’ll look at it say, oh, that looks kind of interesting. I need to think about that. Or maybe I’m going to try that. Or I’m going to talk to them about why they do that, and what it feels like, what it looks like, what it produces in their life. So maybe that’s the approach that we need to be taking, even when people are tough and mean and ugly against us. Remember, our job is to love people. That’s what Jesus did. He’s our model. We follow that model. And we have those conversations. Are we going to convert everybody? No, ultimately, there’s free will. That’s their choice. But we want to be able to have the relationship that gives us the opportunity to have those conversations.

Rick Green
Alright, George, I got to be transparent and honest with you here, man. And this is just between you and me and a few hundred thousand of our closest friends. Okay, so don’t tell anybody I said this, but I, you know, I agree intellectually with everything you just said. And I even teach that at Patriot Academy, you know, that this is important. I teach parents to do this with their kids when they’re coming home from school and saying crazy stuff, you know, but man, I’m telling you, I, like a lot of people, I’ve reached a frustration level with the left and this canceling and everything has made it so much harder for me to do what you just described, because I do want to lash out and I’m just at this point where I’m like, you know, like you said, you can’t just call them idiots, but sometimes I want to, right?

George Barna
Sure.

Rick Green
So help me as a believer, how do I get a hold of that? And now I’m almost like asking you to be a psychologist instead of a pollster. But or maybe a spiritual adviser instead of a pollster. But I know I’m not alone in that. And that’s why I’m asking you that, is balancing that righteous anger at all that’s going on in the country right now, having joy, as we’re told in James, when we face these trials, and being able to lovingly ask those questions and genuinely be curious how this person came to think like that.

George Barna
Yeah, I think part of it, Rick, has to do with the fact that we have to go back to the Scriptures, and understand that Jesus put up with this too. So did the apostles, the early disciples throughout church history and what’s been the result? Persecution. Persecution is part of our calling. I mean, we don’t like to think about that. But I mean, we’re not going to be loved and accepted and revered by everybody. A lot of people are going to want to throw us in jail, they’re going to want to cancel us, they’re going to want to destroy our reputation. But you know, I keep going back to, okay, but what constitutes success in our life? And biblically, what it tells us is success is consistent obedience to God. What God called me to do? To be faithful, to be loving, to be predictable, in my willingness and my capacity to do what he’s made me and called me to do. And so the joy that I get is not from, haha! I converted that community. It’s from, I’m living the life that God is pleased by. I’m doing things that honor and glorify Him. Everything I’m doing is done toward advancing his kingdom. But his is a kingdom of love. And so when I encounter these people, and I’m like you, I mean, there are days when I just want to rip the head off of some people. You know, it’s like, aren’t you listening, dimwit! You know, and yet, then I’ve got to stop myself. And simply recognize, you know what, it’s a spiritual battle. And praise God that he won over my heart. I know that sometimes he has the ability, he has the desire to win over their heart, but they’ve got to take the first step. And if they’re not willing to do that, you know, is my heart broken for them? It is. Am I frustrated by where they’re at? I am. But do I believe that God ultimately is in control, He’s in charge, He’s going to do what’s best, He knows what’s right? I absolutely do.

Rick Green
So good, George. I mean, now I feel better just knowing I’m not the only one fighting my flesh on this, that George Barna deals with this as well. And you know what, as soon as you started your answer, as soon as you said Jesus faces stuff, too, I started feeling convicted because then I thought about Paul. And I’m like, here I’m a whiner, man. I’m over here whining because of things people are saying. He’s thrown off cliffs. He’s beaten… you know, all these things that happen to him. And yet he’s still willing to, you know, lovingly speak to people. So yeah, I, I needed to hear that brother, I needed to hear that. I mean, it’s and what I’m hearing from you overall, for the interview, today, I… We are divided. There is a true disparity in values. And the only way to bridge that gap, which is needed, and not that… we don’t know that it’s going to happen, but we have a duty to make that effort, is through that relationship and taking that, as you said, Socratic method of asking the questions. I know I’m repeating what you said. But just so I can hear this, again, asking the questions, genuinely being curious how they got to that point, because as you walk through that, they’re lord willing, going to see the holes in the logic, and you’re going to be able to ask questions that take them to the right place. That’s… it’s essential, we’ve got to get back to civil discourse, if we’re going to save the country or save liberty.

George Barna
Well, and the other thing related to that, of course, there’s the preceding step before you build that relationship, is you got to have the scriptures figured out. You got to have your worldview together. So that when you have these conversations, you’ve got the goods to give. It’s part of who you are. It’s not just an act. It’s not something you’ve memorized, that you’re repeating. It’s who you are, you embody God’s truth. That’s our goal. And when we’re in that place, then yeah, let’s go out and interact with other people, because who we are, can’t help but spill out. And if we get persecuted, hey, you know what, 12 of the 13 disciples were crucified, right? Jesus was crucified. Maybe that’s what I have to look forward to. But if I’m doing it for the right reasons, if it happens because I’m in the process of glorifying God, by sharing his truth with others, so be it.

Rick Green
Wow, that’s so good. That’s so good. Yeah, you can’t defend or spread truth if you don’t know truth and it’s not, like you said, it’s, you know, it’s part of our literally, you know, it’s like, when you’re kneading out the dough, I mean, we’ve we’ve worked God’s Word into our hearts and souls and minds. And that only happens if we’re in His Word, which comes back to, we’re not going to save liberty or do any of these things if we don’t get into God’s word. That’s the number one thing everybody can do. Make it a part of literally how you’re thinking, renewing our minds. So that we can, when that conversation comes up, experience a chance to, you know, really build a relationship and reach out to them. George so good, man, so good. God bless you for all you’re doing. I mean, the study is everything is great. Just the way you helped me think through this stuff, and engage in the culture even better, what a blessing. I really appreciate you coming on today, man.

George Barna
Thanks, buddy. Good to be with you.

Rick Green
You too. That’s George Barna folks. Stay with us. We’ll be right back with David and Tim Barton.

Tim Barton
Hi, Friends, this is Tim Barton of WallBuilders. This is a time when most Americans don’t know much about American history or even heroes of the faith. And I know oftentimes for parents, we’re trying to find good content for our kids to read. And if you remember back to the Bible, to the book of Hebrews, it has the faith hall of fame, where they outline the leaders have faith that had gone before them. Well, this is something that as Americans, we really want to go back and outline some of these heroes not just of American history, but heroes of Christianity and our faith as well. I want to let you know about some biographical sketches we have available on our website. One is called the courageous leaders collection. And this collection includes people like Abigail Adams, Abraham Lincoln, Francis Scott Key, George Washington Carver, Susanna Wesley, even the Wright brothers, and there’s a second collection called Heroes of History. In this collection, you’ll read about people like Benjamin Franklin or Christopher Columbus, Daniel Boone, George Washington, Harriet Tubman, friends, the list goes on and on. This is a great collection for your young person to have and read and to providential view of American and Christian history. This is available at WallBuilders.com . That’s www.WallBuilders.com .

Rick Green
We’re back here on WallBuilders. Thanks for staying with us. Special thanks to George Barna for the interview. And for, I don’t know how he… for the research for the… I don’t know how he turns this stuff out so much as I just picture you know the cartoon and the little minions. He’s got like millions of little minions out in the, you know, down in the basement with phones or whatever to figure this out. Anyway, the data’s fantastic guys, and I’m admitting, I have a hard time taking the approach that he reminded me today that that’s the approach we need to take. And just think of all the people we can win over If believers will be strategic and smart in the way we approach those who don’t necessarily agree with us on these core values.

Tim Barton
Yeah, I thought he said something that, Rick, as you mentioned, challenging to us, but profound in a way that our job is to build a bridge to relate to each other, that in this polarizing culture, it’s so much easier at times to just tell people they’re stupid for having dumb opinions. That’s not productive. It’s not helpful, and it’s not what Jesus would have done. And there is an interesting correlation, I think, when we read in Scripture, that the Bible tells us that God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble. There were times that Jesus oppose people and blatantly oppose people. But he never opposed the ones who were humble, the ones who were sincere, the broken that came to him, it was always those that were prideful. And so there is a time that we do need to stand up and say, no, that’s wrong, we’re not doing it. We should tell, right, that Joe Biden as he’s making some his claims like, no, that’s not right, we’re not going to do that. However, when we’re engaging in conversation with those around us, we should be trying to build bridges. And this is one of the things that we talk to young people about during the summer, is we also want to be wise enough to recognize the kind of people that we’re interacting with. Because you will deal with, we call it, primarily two kinds of people, the intentional and the ignorant. And the intentional, they’re the ones, they don’t care what’s true, they’re going to promote their idea. They’re intentional about what they’re doing. They might know, socialism, and communism has never worked, they might know, it’s going to destroy America, and they want to do it anyway. But then you have the ignorant, and they’re the people that are repeating what they’ve been told, but they don’t necessarily know why they’re doing it and they might not really even know the definition of these words, they have bad information. And so they’ve drawn bad conclusions, therefore, they’re being bad actors in that extent. And those are the people we want to be strategic to build a bridge with. And George was right, as we’re looking at even some of the polling, how do we navigate that? The most important takeaway is that there is common ground, and we should work to build those bridges so we can help bring people to truth, ultimately, the truth of Christ, the truth of the gospel, but certainly, in a pragmatic sense for where we are, the truth to what works in a nation and the things we should be doing in America.

David Barton
You know, it’s kind of interesting that we all kind of triggered on the same phrase, I wrote it down. What George says, he says, my job is to build a bridge to you emotionally and intellectually. Now, that kind of building a bridge doesn’t mean you give up your core values, in any sense. But how do you build a bridge to people to communicate with them? And I was reading in scripture this week, and I’m going to take this as a commercial do this again, I encourage everybody to read the bible cover to cover at least once a year. That’s 3.2 chapters a day, it’s 15 minutes, it’s an easy thing to do. There’s lots of apps that will help you. But as I was going through the daily reading this week, I was in the book of Acts. In Acts, there’s Paul out there trying to deliver a message to a people who haven’t heard it before. They don’t really agree with it, because they don’t know what it is, or some of them have heard it and they disagree with it. And it really struck me. It said that Paul went into the synagogue, every Sabbath day for two years, disputing with the leaders over the scriptures. Now, here’s the guy that every Sabbath day, he knows he’s going in for an intellectual debate, a fight. I don’t mean a fight and physical way, because it went on for two years. So you’re having these intellectual disputes. It he was disputing with them for two years. And dispute is not like having a knockdown fight. It’s like having back and forth on conversation. So here’s a guy building a bridge for two years with people who disagree with him. And every Sabbath, he’s going in and saying, okay, here’s some more evidence for you to consider, here’s some more scriptures. Look at it this way. And I thought, you know, that’s really bridge building, where you’re willing to go in and say, I’m going to keep coming back to you and keep coming back to you. And you didn’t agree with me last week, but maybe you will this week. And you know, it’s been a year and a half. You haven’t agreed with me, but maybe you will. And he still tried to build bridges. And I thought that’s significant. If we can get into that mentality, of being willing to go dispute and not in the negative sense, but in the sense of have a conversation, and bring information and bring facts and challenge their thinking and that’s what George is talking about. And that’s what it takes relationally. And that kind of a two year commitment from Paul was just amazing to me. And it really spoke to me about how sometimes we don’t try very hard to try to get people brought to our side. And it takes a relationship and bridge building to do that. So maybe if we invest in that, it’ll have that positive impact that we want. And then, at the end, George said, you know persecution is part of our calling. And so people don’t like being rejected, but that’s part of it. Scripture says they that live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution. Jesus says you’re going to be persecuted for a name. So people aren’t going to necessarily agree with you. They’ll reject you. Nobody likes rejection. This is just part of our calling. And we can’t let what’s comfortable with us, keep us from telling the truth to others. And that bridge building is super, super important.

Rick Green
Alright folks, we want you to take action on the things that you’ve heard today, you know, engage someone in your life that you can have these kinds of conversations with and do it just like George Barna was talking about, you can have an impact you can gain a rapport with them, an influence with them, if you ask questions, if you do that Socratic method. Find out genuinely, be curious about how they came to those conclusions and then have a genuine conversation that sometimes, you know, we find out we’re wrong. We find out that there’s something about our data or our information or where we got it that may be wrong. And that’s the beauty of iron sharpening iron, sharpening the countenance of each other, and genuinely caring about the other person that we’re having those conversations with. And as I admitted today, a couple of times, that’s not easy for me sometimes, you know, and maybe not for you either. But we all need to be engaged, so encourage you to do that. And then of course, as always, asking you to become a constitution coach and hosting classes there in your home or at your church and then join us for the big kickoff of the Patriot Academy campus, April 22nd, 2:00 in the afternoon, Congresswoman Lauren Boebert will be with us, John Rich going to be doing some music and talking about the need for Patriot Academy and the influence on the culture and all the different things that we’re doing and you can be there and be part of it. It’s going to take place in Fredericksburg, Texas that’s right outside of San Antonio. So you can fly into San Antonio airport and be a part of this amazing weekend. After the groundbreaking on Saturday the 22nd. The next day on the 23rd, we’ll have the very first constitutional defense of your family and freedom course on the Patriot Academy campus. If you’ve been listening long, you know we’ve had a lot of our WallBuilders audience go with us to some other location around the country whether when we were doing them in Nevada or New Mexico or across the nation. Now we’re going to be doing them at the Patriot Academy campus. This is the course where you do a handgun defense course during the day. Whether you’d ever shot in your life or not you will be way beyond any capability you thought you could have. I promise you the instructors are amazing. But you get your handgun defense and your constitutional literacy, your constitution training, all combined. It’s incredible fellowship. What a great weekend. Check it out at PatriotAcademy.com . It’s PatriotAcademy.com . Thanks so much for listening today. You’ve been listening to WallBuilders.