America Needs a Few Good Men – With Everett Piper: Is it Biblical to avoid conflict? Why is it important to change the narrative that male leadership is negative? What is a true man? What do the statistics tell us about fatherlessness? Tune in to hear Dr. Everett Piper explain why masculinity may be the cure for what ails America, rather than the cause!

Air Date: 12/01/2021

Guest: Everett Piper

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

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Transcription note:  As a courtesy for our listeners’ enjoyment, we are providing a transcription of this podcast. Transcription will be released shortly. However, as this is transcribed from a live talk show, words and sentence structure were not altered to fit grammatical, written norms in order to preserve the integrity of the actual dialogue between the speakers. Additionally, names may be misspelled or we might use an asterisk to indicate a missing word because of the difficulty in understanding the speaker at times. We apologize in advance.

Faith and the Culture

Rick:

Welcome to WallBuilders Live. Thanks for joining us today, whether you’re listening on a podcast somewhere, your podcast app, or you’re listening on our website, or one of the many stations across the country that were blessed to partner with and bring this programming to you, thank you. Thank you for being a part of the solution.

WallBuilders is all about rebuilding the walls, rebuilding the walls, why so that we are no longer approach. Just like it talks about in Nehemiah, the walls, I’m talking about the foundations actually, I’m talking about bringing back the principles that made America the greatest, most powerful, most free, most benevolent nation in the history of the world. The principles work, as Bob McEwen says, every time they’re tried.

But we got to know what those principles are. What is the secret sauce? What produces a good society, a good community? What produces prosperity and freedom and all the things we say we want? What is the secret sauce that produces that? That’s what we talk about here at WallBuilders Live. 

And we talk about action steps on how to bring that formula back, not just what is the formula, but how do you implement it in your community, how do you make this the thing that people seek that they want to be a part of. And that’s what’s happening right now all across the nation as more and more people getting engaged. And we’re asking you to do the exact same thing.

Visit our website today at wallbuilderslive.com.com. Make that one-time or monthly contribution, that allows us to reach more people. But most importantly, take the program and share it with your friends and family and consider becoming one of our Constitution coaches and actually hosting in your home the Biblical Citizenship in Modern America course. Learn more about all of that at wallbuilderslive.com.

Alright, guys, later in the program, Dr. Everett Piper will be back with us. It’s been too long since we’ve had him on the program. But he had a great article recently on a few good men and so we’re going to be talking to him about that. And guys, as we talk about manhood, that’s actually considered toxic, right? If you have masculinity and manhood, which tends to make you have a soft culture, and we have definitely become a soft culture.

David:

We really have become a soft culture. And I was thinking about why this is, and why it is that if people now were to stand up the way that people in every previous generation have stood against things, they would be shouted down. And I think that’s part of we’ve become soft because we don’t like the conflict, we don’t like people yelling at us, we don’t like the loudmouths, and the bullies doing that. So we just kind of become soft and quiet, and we don’t stand.

And so we really have become a little more invertebrate, if I can use that, lack of a backbone like a jellyfish. We have been talked out of having a backbone because when we stand up, it creates conflict. Even pastors are being taught that look, if you want a successful church, you don’t want to offend people, you don’t want conflict, you got to avoid conflict. You know, that’s not biblical. That’s not even historical. You have to have convictions that you’re willing to stand for.

And so we have become so soft in our culture. And I think part of it is because our life is so easy. We have never had, and America is unique in this, we’ve never had so much technology easily at our disposal to do everything for us. The concept of having to work hard way is not something we really know anymore now. Some people still do physical labor. I’m not talking about that. We do it on the ranch. 

But we don’t have to work the sunup to sundown or what we call it on the ranch “can see to can’t see”. We don’t follow the 10 commandments mandate of on six days thou shalt work. We’re looking to get out with 40 hours or 37, or maybe 35 or 34.

And America is becoming softer because we’re not in the position that Americans have to work 50, 60, 70, 80 hours a week to make ends meet, at least most Americans are not there. So we become very prosperous. We’re getting a little more like Rome, where it was so lavish, and they got so self-indulgent and so focused on themselves. And we now have so many ways to entertain ourselves and to take ourselves out of reality and not be able to see what’s around us.

And so I think we’re becoming soft in our mentality, we’re becoming soft in our lifestyle. But even our attitudes, we just don’t want to argue with somebody, even if they’re wrong. We don’t want to point out the truth even if we know we’re right, and they’re wrong. We don’t want to talk to them. We just don’t want to offend people or get into conflict. 

So many Americans and so many, even Christians, we’re into a mentality and we see it taught in the church in seminary that you don’t want to offend people because you can’t have a good ministry if you offend people. And so we’re not saying what they need to hear. They need to hear the truth, and Jesus would call out his disciples point blank and often angered His disciples, upset His disciples and we’re saying well, that’s not Christian today.

So Americans, really and Christians particularly are not learning to stand. Some reason Americans and Christians think that having any kind of conflict is ungodly, that taking a stand, I mean, what would the prophets do in America today? We would say you don’t have a ministry of God, Elijah, you’re making everybody mad, you’re calling the king names. And I mean we’ve got to get out of this soft culture and it’s really leading to some bad stuff that I think we haven’t thought about before.

And so, we saw an article done by Everett Piper, former president, Oklahoma Wesleyan University, where he was talking about the need for men. And we thought, you know, this is probably worth having a conversation over because I think a lot of people intuitively recognize we’re getting really soft, but not quite sure what to do about it. So Dr. Piper has some good guidance from the article.

Rick:

Dr. Everett Piper, our special guest today. Stay with us, folks, you’re listening to WallBuilders Live.

AMERICAN HISTORY

This is Tim Barton, from WallBuilders with another moment from American history. Meaning today wrongly claimed our Founding Fathers were largely atheists, agnostics, and deist. Certainly, some Founders were less religious than others, but even they were not irreligious. Consider Benjamin Franklin, definitely one of the least religious among them.

Yet, when the delegates at the Constitutional Convention hit an impasse in their deliberations, it was Franklin who called them to prayer, invoking numerous scriptures to make his point. As he reminded them, “God governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without his aid? We have been assured in the sacred writings that except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it. I firmly believe this.

So, even the least religious of America’s founders urge public prayer and dependence on God. For more information about the faith of the Founding Fathers, go to wallbuilders.com.

THIS PRECARIOUS MOMENT

Hi, this is David Barton. I want to let you know about a brand new book we have out called “This Precarious Moment: Six Urgent Steps that Will Save You, Your Family, and Our Country”. Jim Garlow and I have coauthored this book. And we take six issues that are hot in the culture right now, issues that we’re dealing with, issues such as immigration, and race relations, and our relationship with Israel and the rising generation millennials and the absence of the church and the culture wars, and where American heritage is our godly heritage.

We look at all six of those issues right now that are under attack and we give you both biblical and historical perspective on those issues that provide solutions on what each of us can do right now to make a difference. These are all problems that are solvable if we’ll get involved. So you can grab the book, “This Precarious Moment” and find out what you can do to make a difference. “This Precarious Moment” is available at wallbuilders.com.

Rick:

Welcome back to WallBuilders Live. Thanks for staying with us. Good to have Dr. Everett Piper back with us. You can go to Dreverettpiper.com, and you’ll see all of his things there. In fact, we’ll have an easy link to get there at wallbuilderslive.com today. But just in case, it’s Dreverettpiper.com. Again, easy link at our website today. Dr. Piper, always good to have you, brother. Thanks for coming back on the program.

Everett:

Oh, it’s been a while. I’m honored to be back on.

Rick:

I love your article in the Washington Times. I guess it’s just been a few days ago. I mean, this is spot on exactly what’s needed. “America needs a few good men, masculinity just might be the cure for all that ails us rather than the cause.” And I love the fact that they put John Wayne’s picture on your article. Anyway, great article. You’ve talked about this for a long time, the need for men to be men. But why now, why is it so important for us to change this narrative?

Everett:

Well, as we were discussing in the pre-show this conversation, we just had a couple of seconds ago, you can’t beat Rooster Cogburn for the graphic for an article, can you?

Rick:

That’s right.

Everett:

People need to go check out the article just to see that. But no, the context for my article is I’m commenting on Josh Hawley, the Republican senator from Missouri who had the audacity to go down to a conservative conference in Orlando, Florida recently. And oh, shame for shame, what did he say? He actually extolled the virtues of manhood, and called upon men to act like men, and stop spending all of their waking hours in their basement playing video games and looking at porn.

In other words, Josh Hawley did exactly what any common sense father or any common sense human being would do, and he’s recognized that a culture is in crisis, a culture is in collapse when it loses the positive aspect of male leadership and masculinity. So I wrote on that article, I thank Josh Hawley for doing what he did because he’s being excoriated by the left for somehow being a misogynist when indeed, it’s the left.

I mean, Rick, it’s the left that proves every day that they are the folks who hate women. I mean they won’t grant them their own sports, they won’t grant them their own restrooms, they won’t grant them their own shower. They won’t even allow women to be real. They blackface women by creating these grotesque caricatures of them via the trans movement. 

They dress up in makeup and costume themselves as caricatures of what they think a woman should be. But yet they turn around and they accuse a man like Josh Holley of being the misogynist. But that’s a different path. That’s a rabbit trail. The bottom line is masculinity actually might be the cure for our culture, rather than the disease. And I cite some statistics to prove that.

Rick:

The fact that they would claim the first female Admiral and it’s a man and take that for man instead of for an actual woman, just that one example alone, you layout so many good stats in the article as well. You know, as Dennis Prager says the Left destroys everything they touch, and you point out the numbers of how the Left has absolutely destroyed the family by emasculating men, and by taking men out of the home, by making it easy for men to recede in the community rather than step up and lead. 

I wanted to ask you this, you don’t really address this in the article necessarily. But this is not just like an inner-city problem. I mean, this is in the burbs now, I mean, men are stepping back instead of forward throughout the culture because of this shaming of masculinity from the Left. Would you agree with that?

Everett:

Oh, absolutely. And I don’t speak to it directly in the article, but I do think the statistics that I provide prove your point. And by the way, when Holly was asked by Axios, and a couple other media interviewers will tell us what you think a man is? He said a man is a father. A man is a provider. A man is somebody who takes care of his family. A man is somebody who takes care of the women he claims to love. Well, that shouldn’t be controversial. And we hope that everybody would say amen.

But back to the statistics that prove your point that you just made. In 1960, only 10% of children were raised without a father in the home. The number today, wait for it, wait for it, it’s 40% and climbing, and it’s 70% within the black community. Most people have heard that statistic. But here’s a sobering one that is kind of buried underneath those two stats.

Half of last year’s births among millennials were to unwed mothers; half, 50%. And it’s just shy of 50% of the same group millennials now report that they don’t think it’s necessary for a child to have both a father and a mother in the home for the child to grow up happy. So, back to your point about suburbia. You have all these millennials who want to pay $5 for their cup of coffee who don’t think it’s necessary to have a father in the home, and then they’re surprised when they look at Kenosha or whatnot, and see violence and chaos and mayhem in the streets. 

You think maybe just maybe the fact that there wasn’t a father to teach those young men how to behave is the cause of that problem. That is endemic in our culture. And it’s not just in the poor black community per se any longer. It’s everywhere. It’s pervasive.

Rick:

It is. It is. What is the answer to their narrative? How do we convince them? Or is there even a percentage of that generation that’s had to live with the negative results of not having a father in the community? They just knows it innately. And I mean, I’ve talked to people who say, I don’t want to make the same mistake my dad did, or my family did–

I want to be a good dad; I want to make sure I stay with my family. Do you think that’s anecdotal? Or do you think there’s a large percentage out there that had to live with the negative consequences, and so now, they want to do it the right way?

Everett:

Well, I guess we can only hope that we can trust the scriptures on this one. We’re told in the Bible, that of the virtue and the value of having a father in the home and having a father that behaves in a godly fashion. And I think that’s written into every human heart to understand that they need a father, they need a masculine character in the home. Masculinity, defined as a godly man who honors the principles of God. So, I don’t think we can wave a magic wand over this thing and expect it to go away overnight politically because we’ve indoctrinated several generations of children to not understand the value of having a parent in the home.

Rick:

This is maybe not a subject you plan to talk about. But is there any almost geographical in the split, in the country way for parents to say, you know what, maybe I need to move to an area where they still support manhood and masculinity? I mean, is it going to come down to that in our country where all of these crazy ideas have been adopted by so many people that you’re essentially going to have to move to areas where we can restore values like masculinity? 

I know that’s off-topic. I just wondered if you had any thoughts on that. Can we change the whole narrative in the country? How many generations would that take? Or do we start focusing in on particular areas and try to get people to restore biblical values in those areas?

Everett:

Rick, I think our country is at the point where people are going to have to decide to live in places that are sane. You need to get your kids out of schools that are insane. You need to get your kids out of churches that aren’t preaching the truth. 

You need to get out of communities that are celebrating Black Lives Matter and the destruction of the nuclear family, rather than living in a neighborhood that actually honors the fact that a man is somebody who works hard, doesn’t spend his time playing videos, doesn’t engage in porn, actually loves the mother, loves his kid, and teaches his children to actually do something with their life rather than just vegetate behind the screen.

There’s a Catholic priest down in Tulsa I just listened to yesterday. He has an excellent, excellent presentation on masculinity versus the effeminate. And he quotes Thomas Aquinas in his definition of what an effeminate person is. And you think it well, it might be the homosexual, it might be the stereotype of the effeminate man that we have today. 

And Thomas Aquinas, no, that’s not his definition. Aquinas definition of the effeminate is this, “The person who avoids the arduous, the person that want comfort, the person who’s soft, the person who wants safety, the person who worships pleasure rather than hard work.”

Now, isn’t that interesting? If you contrast that with masculinity, the masculine, the male role model is somebody who actually says it’s time to roll up your sleeves to get to work. Pull yourself up by your bootstraps, get back on the horse. These are all masculine lessons because it involves doing something that isn’t comfortable. It involves doing something that isn’t safe.

Rick:

Man, that’s powerful, Everett. I mean, because too often we think of effeminate just in terms of mannerisms, or sexual actions, whereas what you’re saying is it’s actually life decisions that Thomas Aquinas defined in some of those areas as revealing or being effeminate.

Everett:

Exactly. In fact, I didn’t know this. I learned a lot listening to this priest down in Tulsa because I thought, aha. I mean, it’s even a critique of how we’ve reacted to the COVID pandemic. We’ve sought the comfort of safety rather than fought vigorously for the hard thing, the hard edges, the arduous task of freedom. Freedom isn’t necessarily comfortable and easy and pleasurable. Freedom is something that you have to work hard to get and work hard to preserve. That is masculinity, and the opposite of it is being effeminate.

Rick:

We need that masculinity. Oh, folks, you got to go read this article. It’s in the Washington Times, we’re going to have a real easy link for you to get there today over at wallbuilderslive.com or you go direct to Dreverettpiper.com. Dr. Piper, always, not just a pleasure to have you on the program, but invigorating and intellectually stimulating. This is what we need. 

We need to be thinking about what it’s going to take to save the country. And it’s our individual decisions as husbands and fathers and mothers, and wives and how we raise our kids, it’s what we’re doing in our local communities. And that’s what you’re hitting on the heart of, is how do we build strong families, and it takes strong men, it takes masculinity. And I know some people don’t like that term.

I don’t know if you’ve ever seen my friend Doug Giles’s book, it’s called “If Masculinity is ‘Toxic’ Call Jesus Radioactive”. So I thought you might agree with that phrase. But God bless you, brother. Keep up the great work in what you’re doing. And I just appreciate you coming on the program. Let’s do it again soon.

Everett:

Alright, blessings. Thank you. Stay with us, folks. We’ll be right back with David and Tim Barton.

THE AMERICAN STORY

Hey, guys, we want to let you know about a new resource we have here at WallBuilders called The American Story. For years, people have been asking us to do a history book, and we finally done it. We start with Christopher Columbus and go roughly through Abraham Lincoln. And one of the things that so often we hear today are about the imperfections of America, or how so many people in America that used to be celebrated or honored really aren’t good or honorable people.

One of the things we acknowledge quickly in the book is that the entire world is full of people who are sinful and need a savior because the Bible even tells us that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. And yet what we see through history, and certainly is evident in America is how a perfect God uses imperfect people and does great things through them. 

The story of America is not the story of perfect people. But you see time and time again how God got involved in the process and use these imperfect people to do great things that impacted the entire world from America. To find out more, go to wallbuilders.com and check out The American Story.

Rick:

We’re back here on WallBuilders Live. Thanks for staying with us. And thanks to Dr. Everett Piper for joining us once again here on WallBuilders Live. Back with David and Tim Barton. And of course, guys, I mean, obviously, manhood is also, you know, we say biblical, historical, constitutional perspective, it’s also a biblical concept and not being effeminate and not backing down, not being willing to stand up for the innocent. So it’s more than just muscle, is basically what we’re saying here.

David:

Yeah, I thought it was interesting that Aquinas all the way back thousands, what, 1600, 1700 years ago took the biblical verse about not being effeminate and said, that means soft. And that’s exactly right. I mean, you’re not to be soft. That is an ungodly characteristic that it means you’re seeking the comfortable, you want the easy way out.

And then as Dr. Piper mentioned that passage out of First Corinthians 6:13 and 14, I looked it up while he was talking. In the King James, it says, watch ye, steadfast in the faith, quit you like men. And so quit you like men, what’s that mean? Well, other versions, to quit means to conduct yourself in a specified way, but it’s like act like a man. So the King James says, quit you like man, the Moffat Translation says ‘play the man’, the Revised Standard says ‘be courageous’, the Amplified Bible says ‘act like a man’, the Phillip’s translation says, ‘live like men, be strong’.

And just thinking about that, the Bible struck me. You know, there really are two genders. God did that specifically. He made a big deal out of the two genders. And he told men to act like men. And there’s this thing of we’re trying to hit more in the middle, so we see women becoming more masculine and men becoming softer. 

And in the Bible, he says, hey, you don’t mix linen and wool. You don’t take two things that are different, put them together. It says that that creates confusion. And I think that’s what we’re doing to genders. We’re trying to find a middle ground on it rather than recognizing manhood and being strong.

Tim:

Well, and I would say that I don’t think we’re trying to find a middle ground, I think we’re trying to swap sides of the road.

David:

There you go.

Tim:

Right. Because there is something to be said that, I mean, Rick, we’ve talked about it before on the program, I think and I know you’ve talked highly of this book. I think Stu Weber is the guy who wrote Tender Warrior. And there’s something to be said. I mean, King David was one of the most incredible warriors in Bible history, killed so many people. The old song that that saw had killed his thousands, and David his tens of thousands. David was an amazing warrior. And you don’t want to cross David on a lot of levels. Right?

He had his accolades for all the people who get killed. Well, if you kill that many people, you got to have a tough and a rough and that there’s something to you. In the midst of that, David also is the one who writes the majority of the book of Psalms. David’s also the guy that when the Ark comes into Jerusalem, he’s the one who strips down and he’s dancing, basically naked, praising God and people. I mean, his own wife was like, that’s embarrassing. What are you doing? Don’t do that. Because it didn’t come across as in her mind masculine or not.

And I think there’s something to be said that this notion of being a tender warrior, that, I think every husband and every father knows this, there’s times that’s called for that you need to be the protector of your home, that you stand up and you’re going to defend your family and your wife and your kids. And there’s times that if one of your kids falls down and scrapes their knee, and they’re bleeding real big, they don’t need a really big macho man with a gun right now, they need the tender side of that what’s going on.

But what culture is saying is not that we need more tender men, they’re saying we need men who are masculine. And this is where you have a bigger conflict of the issue where we’re saying, we need to de-masculate men, and when you de-masculate men, then all that you have left is that evil can thrive and triumph because there are no good men there to put the evil and put the bad down. In our culture right now is a reflection of the fact that we have an absence of men, an absence of masculinity.

And you know that the fact that one of our friends, Senator James Lankford of Oklahoma, would get slammed by people for saying that, men should be able to provide for their family, and they should be fathers and they should be good husbands. And they would go oh, how dare you say that? That is exactly right. That is exactly true. And we have a culture that wants to cancel what is true. It doesn’t change what is true. It doesn’t change what is good or what is right.

And what is true, good, and right is that God made men to be men to be leaders, to stand up and lead in their home. And by lead, we’re not talking about bossing people around, we’re not talking about being a bully, but lead in the biblical sense and tradition the way that God leads us. He leads in love, but He leads encouraging strength as well. 

Our culture is in need of more men. And we encourage everybody listening if you are a man, I’m not telling every woman to be the man, right, but if you are a man listening, our culture is in desperate need of you to stand up, pick up the mantle that God has given you as a man and lead. We need you in this culture.

David:

Yeah, we really do need people with backbone. And that’s something we have not seen. We’ve not seen people standing up and saying no, you’re not going to run over me and do this. I’m going to stand in your way. And I hate to call it confrontational. 

America Needs a Few Good Men – With Everett Piper

But I mean we need people who will have that backbone and stand and that’s what you see with so many of the biblical heroes, whether it’s a Daniel or whether it’s the three Hebrew children, or whether it is David or whoever it is, especially the prophets. I mean, these are guys that were noted God people who had a tender heart toward God, and toward what was right, but they also had a very strong backbone. And we need that kind of identity back in the culture.

Rick:

Well, friends, we really appreciate you joining us today on WallBuilders Live. We also want to challenge you to become a force multiplier, not just to listen, but to act on what you’ve heard, to share it with other people to be a part of the solution. There’s a lot of ways you can do that.

The easiest is to go to wallbuilderslive.com today, click on the contribute button, and just make a one-time or monthly contribution. That literally fuels the ability for us to reach more people, train more pastors, train more leaders, legislators, young people, you name it, it allows us to reach more people. So, that contribution goes a long way when you make that at wallbuilderslive.com.

But you can also make your home your church the place that people come together and share these ideas and discuss these things, and not only learn these things, but then take action on what they’ve learned. You can be a part of that by going to biblicalcitizens.com, biblicalcitizens.com. It’s completely free. 

The course is free. Becoming a coach is free. We want to equip you to be the catalyst for a restoration of biblical values and constitutional principles right there in your community. Check it out today at biblicalcitizens.com. Thanks so much for listening. You’ve been listening to WallBuilders Live.