Discerning Truth In Our Times With Pastor Rob McCoy – As Christians, we need to be wise as serpents but gentle as doves. How do we discern truth in the age we live in? Everything you hear in the news is not truth! Join us on discerning truth, with Pastor Rob McCoy.

Air Date: 02/01/2021

Guest: Pastor Rob McCoy

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.

 

Rick:

Well, happy Monday to you, friends. Yes, let the torch of freedom burn. My name is Rick Green. I’m a former Texas legislator and America’s Constitution coach. And I am honored to be here with David Barton. He’s America’s premier historian. He’s our founder here at WallBuilders, which is all about rebuilding the walls, just like in Nehemiah, arise and rebuild the walls that we may no longer be a reproach. And then we’re also with Tim Barton, national speaker and pastor and president of WallBuilders.

Check us out at wallbuilderslive.com. That’s the website where you can get archives of the program if you’ve missed some shows over the last few weeks. It’s also a great place to make a donation. If you want truth to be spoken, fought for, if you want truth to be expanded across our country deeply needed in our nation right now, then a donation to WallBuilders Live helps make that happen and it helps us to get this message in the hands of as many people as we possibly can.

Here’s what we do here at WallBuilders. We take a biblical, historical, and constitutional perspective to whatever the hot topic of the day is. So whatever is going on in the culture, we say, okay, how does the Bible apply? What can history teaches about this? And how do we as citizens in America under a constitutional republic, how do we do this appropriately? How do we do this correctly under our Constitution? So biblical, historical and constitutional perspective everyday right here on WallBuilders Live, and we’re glad you’re here and a part of it.

Alright, David, Tim, we got Rob McCoy coming in later today for our special interview. Rob is a pastor in California and so important to have voices of truth speaking to us right now with these echo chambers, with so much disinformation out there and distortion of what’s going on. Rob is one of the guys I try to listen to his sermon every week, specifically for that, for truth. He’s just got great discernment and perspective on what’s happening out there. And we need more, not just pastors, but people in every sphere, speaking truth and helping to guide us on where we put our action when we want to be involved in the process.

David:

Yeah, we really saw that through the last election cycle, the last political combat that went on, was, you know, we certainly saw on the left things that we thought were out of bounds on truth. But I got to say, I also saw a lot of stuff on the right that I think was out of bounds on truth. And it really got to the point where people were judging truth by outcome. Well, it didn’t turn out my way, so the other side lied about it. And that’s not necessarily the case.

I mean, quite frankly, there were so many Christians praying before the election, praying, and Jesus told us how to pray. He said, here’s what we call the Lord’s Prayer, model your prayer after this, and part of it is that kingdom come, thy will be done. And that prayer was being prayed all over the nation. So here’s my question. We prayed that prayer, and the outcome wasn’t what we wanted, so does that mean God didn’t answer our prayer? Or that we missed the mark on how to interpret that prayer? Because I’ll just say, how do we know that the way this turned out what and his kingdom come, his will be done? What we’ve already seen in this landslide of nearly 50 executive orders have come down, we’re already seeing a big pushback from people saying, oh, wait a minute, that wasn’t what I thought was going to happen. How do we know that this isn’t going to be Ezekiel 30:9 where God regard says, I’m going to shock you out of your complacency? How do we know? So what happens is conservatives saying, well, this was all a fraud, it was all fake because it didn’t come out the way I wanted it. That’s not the basis of truth. You have to have actual factual basis for truth.

Tim:

When even speaking of truth, one of the things that was common for all of us as we were getting texts and calls on almost a daily basis and for sure, on texts, people would send us videos, and hey, watch this video, what do you think? Well, this guy just came out and he’s known Trump for years, or he’s part of this organization, whatever. And all these so called conservative Christian, whatever, people were coming out and kind of given their prophetic take on what was going on. And some of we were looking at going, okay, this isn’t right at all, some of what was being said to be accurate information.

And so one of the things that that certainly even as we navigate going forward as Christians, is we have to be better critical thinkers and strategic thinkers. And just because we see it online doesn’t mean it’s true. And this is something, like how long has this been said right? Just because it’s online, doesn’t mean it’s true. And just because someone says they’re a Christian, or a prophet, and they post this video online doesn’t mean what they’re saying necessarily is true or accurate.

But even now, where we are, how do we navigate going forward? What is really our role as Christians? Has our job changed? Of course, we have some thoughts and opinions on that. But we also have a very good friend who is a very bold, courageous pastor, who is so good at being on the frontlines taking on a stand, being a culture warrior in the best sense possible, standing up for truth and promoting God’s kingdom and that’s Pastor Rob McCoy.

Rick:

Rob McCoy with us when we come back. Stay with us, folks, you’re listening to WallBuilders Live.

BREAK

This is Tim Barton from WallBuilders with another moment from American history. The year after the American war for independence ended, we begin addressing the issue of Muslim terrorists in North Africa, who were attacking American ships and killing and enslaving American seamen. Congress dispatched John Adams and Thomas Jefferson to negotiate peace. And when they asked the Muslim Ambassador the reason for the unprovoked attacks, he told them that it was written in their Quran that it was their right and duty to make war upon them whenever they can be found.

16 years of negotiations failed, and in 1801, America sentence military to crush the terrorists. When that war ended in 1805, the first American edition of the Qur’an was published, urging Americans to read the Quran to see for themselves that his teachings were incompatible with the safety and peace of non-Muslims.

To see the first American Qur’an, and to get more information about America’s first war on Islamic terror, go to wallbuilders.com.

Rick:

Welcome back to the intersection of faith and the culture. This is WallBuilders Live. Thanks for staying with us today. Rob McCoy, pastor from Thousand Oaks, California, back with us. Always good to have you. Rob, miss you, man, and thank you for some time.

Rob:

Oh, thank you, Rick, you guys blessed me. I tell you, you’re putting a spotlight on what we’re dealing with. And you’ve been such an encouragement to us all. Thank you.

Rick:

Well, you are an encouragement to pastors all over the country and Christians all over the country. I mean, you exemplify the black robe regiment from the founding era, patriot pastors that are willing to speak truths, apply the Bible to everything in life, regardless of what the government might say about it, and you have stood firm there in Thousand Oaks. So thanks for what you guys are doing and Godspeed. You all are setting a great example. And I know, pastors and others are actually flocking to you guys from all over that area. Because you have been open, you’ve approached this scientifically, you’ve approached it biblically, just been fantastic.

And I would encourage people to watch your Fireside Chats  and watch you on Sunday. A lot of folks don’t have a church they can go to and I tell them, watch Rob McCoy, that ought to be your Sunday morning service, what we do here at our house when we’re not able to attend. So anyway, bless you, brother. Thanks for all you’re doing.

Let’s catch up. I mean, just kind of catch me up on first of all, your attitude, and your mindset post-election, post-Biden inaugurated, all of those things. You had a fantastic message on this, at the point, it was obvious it was inevitable. Just kind of tell us how you’re approaching things now.

Rob:

Well, are you referring to the message of good Sunday following the election where I talked about hopium, where I combine the word hope with opium?

Rick:

And I’ve borrowed that, by the way, and I did give you credit, the first time I used it. After that, you know, it’s all mine. But yeah…

Rick:

Well, take it, it’s all yours, you never have to give me credit. You know, the Right and the Left are guilty of, of deception. You know, a rumor is just a lie with legs on it. And our scriptures declare that whatever things are true, we have to be people of truth, and you can’t forward a meme or an email or some sort of statement that you haven’t tested. And we get inundated with that.

And we were dealing with that during the election that all these things were, you know, President Trump’s playing three dimensional chess, and he’s got this amazing thing, and you’ll see it happening. And it just paralyzed people as opposed to participating. What they wanted is they wanted something to end up the way that they were hoping as opposed to participating in the process. And, you know, people use it to generate traffic to their website and it’s deception. And we have to rise above that.

And the landscape, I have all people, some of the stuff that came across my desk. I would love if it were true. But the reality is, it wasn’t. I mean, I was sitting on a podcast with Charlie and the comment was President Trump is flying at this moment to Texas, and he’s got, and we were in communication with somebody who is sitting right next to the president when that came out and we knew it wasn’t true.

Rick:

You mean, at that moment, he wasn’t in a helicopter about to descend with a bazooka on one shoulder and a tank on the other and save the day, that wasn’t what was happening?

Rob:

Yeah, wasn’t happening. And as pastors were left to pick up the pieces of lives that have been inundated with hopium.

Rick:

Yeah, then they crash.

Rob:

Right. And that takes people and crushes them and brings discouragement. Discouragement is the absence of courage because you no longer believe in the process, nor do you feel like you have a voice in the process. And I say to people, yeah, look, we got ripped off in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia, Nevada, Arizona. You know, the election, just in those four counties, you look in Detroit, you look in the counties in Pennsylvania, and it was unscrupulous, it was evil, it was dirty. But nobody’s complaining about the election in Florida. And Florida has Dade County and the President one by over 400,000 votes, and that’s leadership. You have to Santas who comes in and turns an entire state because they worked hard. And everybody wanted to be okay.

And I’ve always said, Rick, that people love liberty and it’s intrinsic to the human heart. But I’ve changed my mind on that. Because when you see in the Scriptures, 3-5 million Jews and slaves crying out to God for freedom, and he sends Moses as a deliverer, and Moses confronts Pharaoh, and says, let my people go, and Pharaoh says, who is God that I should obey Him, and then doubles the brick output and reduces the materials. The people complained to Moses.

And what that showed me is people want liberty, they just don’t want it to come at a cost. They don’t want have to suffer to obtain it. And people are thinking, well, I bought my pillow and I watch Fox News, why didn’t the president win? And you look at Lincoln’s second inaugural address, where he said, both people read the same scriptures and prayed to the same God, both desiring different outcomes. But he went further in that inaugural address when he said, the idea is to look at the heart of the Lord, that what’s God doing in the seasons?

And what the Lord was doing in the season was simply to say, look, this is about slavery. And you think in 1860, there were 4 million slaves, and 2% of our nation’s population died on a field of battle, 650,000 men to lift that horror from the fabric of our nation. Well, God’s not going to turn a blind eye to the death, and destruction of a million babies in the womb. And we talked about Black Lives Matter, 320,000 of those million a year are black children. And the birth rate for the black community is flatline because of the Holocaust, the black community, and God’s not turning a blind eye. The churches don’t want to talk about abortion, because it’s not popular when you have an ROI or return on investment, and you treat the church like a business model. It doesn’t keep butts in the seat.

But we’re supposed to be the conscience of the nation. And you can’t use sage, you know, God’s first or anger towards the death of the innocent, by putting up a black tile and thinking somehow you’re culturally relevant when the reality is, God, this is critical to him. As God’s people, we need to reevaluate what our priorities are. It’s not about a return on investment, or how relevant your church is, or how hip you are, or how big your building is, or your budgets. It boils down to what is dear to the heart of the Lord.

And I’ll leave you this last thought, Rick, that when Joshua confronted the commander of the Lord’s army, he said, are you for us or against us? And this Christophe, in the disappearance of Christ in the Old Testament, the commander of the Lord’s army, he said, neither. This isn’t about me being on your side, or on their side. This is about are you on my side? And I think, as the church we have to stop and say, Lord, what have we failed to do that is precious to you? And that has to be an awakening to the things that break the heart of the Lord and return to that, even if it’s difficult. Because if my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray, and then turn from their wicked ways, only then will hear from heaven, and heal our land. So it’s time to wake up and to address these things.

Rick:

You know, and you said, even if it’s difficult, and that seems to be, you know, going back to your first comments about the hopium, and almost easy way out where everybody was kind of hoping that the day would just suddenly get saved. And they didn’t want to accept the fact that we’ve got a lot of hard work to do here in the coming years to save the culture, both in the church with exactly what you’re talking about, and then taking those truths outside the walls of the church.

So what do we say to people that both are kind of feeling this, what’s the point, nothing works, but also even those that realize, okay, you know, yeah, the other side won because of a lot of shenanigans but also because they’ve been working hard? I mean, let’s face it, they’ve been at it for years, they’ve been relentless, and we haven’t. So what do we do to get people to say, you know, look, I’m going to work hard every day to serve the Lord in all these arenas, and that doesn’t mean just enjoying the blessings of liberty, it includes some of the burden?

Rob:

Yeah. And because, you know, this is a government of the people by the people and for the people and it requires participation. And the systems that were put in place to allow the opposition to steal the election in the states happened because of the absence of moral and godly people who would provide a check and balance in regards to that. And our salvation isn’t coming on Air Force One. The President of the United States, President Trump, prior to Biden taking the office, he did more for the unborn than the church did. And he stood in opposition to the destruction of children more than the church did. And the church has to stand up and say we’re responsible for this, now own that.

And I would also add, that when it says to pray for kings and those in authority that we would live quiet and peaceful lives in all godliness, and reverence in Timothy, which is a pastoral epistle, most pastors when you ask them, who’s your city councilman and your school board members, and by name and the issues you’re dealing with it allow your community to live quiet and peaceable lives in all godliness and reverence? They don’t know because we stepped out of local politics. And we deprive the existence of the swamp in DC, which, physically it is a swamp, just like Sacramento, and figuratively, it is as well.

And if you want to change what ends up in the swamp, you got to go upstream to the source and the source is always local. And if churches start to own their communities, and participate in the public square, the Ecclesia, which is where you see in Matthew when Jesus says to Peter, upon this rock, I will build my Ecclesia, he didn’t say church. The word “Ecclesia” was a secular term that Jesus coopted. He didn’t say synagogue, gay, he didn’t say temple, which was a religious term. He said Ecclesia, Ecclesia is existed hundreds of years before Jesus had used the term, and it literally means public square.

And Tyndale was hung, and then burned at the stake for translating that from the Greek into English and contending with a hierarchical, tyrannical system. He was murdered for that. But the idea of an Ecclesia public square in the Greek culture, when they would gather in their communities, and these Ecclesia to design laws to allow their people to live together in community, above the door of every Ecclesia was two words, isonomia and eleutheria, which is liberty and equality. And the church advocated the public square under the excuse that, hey, I preach the gospel.

Well, the gospel is good news, yes, and we preach the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ and that we’re sinners needing to be saved by grace through faith. And I do that every Sunday. But Jesus didn’t say make converts, he said, make disciples. And those disciples are people that understand the public square that the Scriptures speak on capitalism, and immigration, and transportation, and all the issues that we deal with in government. Government is not man’s idea. It’s God’s idea, the noetic covenant. So we have to get back to the local politics, participating in the public square, for the sake of our community. And this last thought.

You commented about our Fireside Chats, we did a Fireside chat, you can go back and look at it. And it’s an update on some of the legal issues that our small businesses are dealing with in our county. And you’ll be blown away by this, Rick. We had the owner of the pizza cookery, she’s a secular Jew, and then we had, I can’t remember the name of it, it’s another company. But the man who oversees it, his name is Mat. He, by his own admission, was an agnostic at best, an atheist at worst. And because we opened up the doors of our church and stood on behalf of liberty, and the right for people to, not have their Fifth Amendment violated, these people started coming to church, and they haven’t stopped and they’ve given their heart to the Lord because we’ve been contending on their behalf. And Galatians 3 says that the law is our school teacher, guard, and to point us to Christ until faith comes. And when they see us participating in the Ecclesia, they want to come to church.

Rick:

Wow. Rob, so powerful right there. I mean, so much of that. And the whole idea of the public square and the Ecclesia of being the place we should be leaning into, not running from, I mean, that is the opposite of what we’ve done for 50 years and it is the answer to turning this thing around, the church being the accuracy again, once again, leaning into the culture. Godspeak.com is the website. Godspeak.com and you can link from there to the Fireside Chats. And you’re still doing those almost nightly, right?

Rob:

Yeah, we do Monday through Friday. I finally started taking weekends off just to get some sanity, but we are up every Monday through Friday.

Rick:

Alright, good stuff, brother. God bless you, man. You are truly feeding not just your flock right there in Thousand Oaks but the flock across the nation and around the world. We love you, brother. We appreciate you. Come back soon, would you?

Rob:

I will. And Rick, I’m going to leave you with this that God make firemen so that police officers could have heroes too. God made us that I could have a hero. You bless me. You are wonderful. And I thank the Lord for you and all that you guys do.

Rick:

Oh, man right back at you. That’s Rob McCoy. Godspeed.com, by the way, featured a lot in our new biblical citizenship and modern America, filmed right there in Rob’s church with a fantastic Ecclesia in that church, so much enjoyed doing that. Folks, you can get that in our website as well. Start hosting those classes in your living rooms and at your church and let’s be that Ecclesia again. Rob, appreciate you, brother. Have a good one.

Rob:

Thank you. Bless you.

Rick:

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

BREAK

Hey guys, we want to let you know about our 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. Thanks Rob McCoy for joining us as well. Be sure and watch his weekly sermons, I’m telling you, you’ll be blessed Godspeak Calvary Chapel in Thousand Oaks, California and you can catch their Sunday services or on their YouTube channel, and then also their Fireside Chats that Rob was talking about Monday through Friday.

David, Tim, as usual, you know, he’s just got a good balance perspective on what’s going on out there. Just like you said before we went to him, Tim, it’s truthful, but it’s good discernment and a good focus and a good attitude on how to stay in the fight and continue to influence what what’s going on around us.

Tim:

Yeah, and I love the point he made. You joked about the hopium right from the sermon he had. And I think it’s such an interesting thought that it’s easy at times for Christians to become complacent, because we thought well, we prayed, and now we’re just going to wait and see for God to do something.

And as he pointed out, this was one of the challenges that we saw in Christians leading up to the election is they were content to let God work a miracle and they were going to sit back and watch God do something, instead of recognizing that the vast majority of the time throughout human history and certainly even throughout Scripture, is God required people to roll up their sleeves and get involved in the process and then God would use them through that process to do something. Very few occasions where people sat back and just watch the miracles happen. Although certainly, I mean, there’s the Red Sea. But even then God told Moses, right, do something, raise this rod, walk forward, there were things that were still being told to be done in the midst of this. But I really appreciate his perspective that as Christians, we can’t sit back and just wait and watch. Now it’s time to roll up our sleeves and get the job done.

David:

You know, Tim, that was the same point that struck me about what Rob said. He pointed out that we got ripped off in four states and I think we did. And we’ve always made the distinction in this program. There’s a big difference between the legal aspect of the election and the fraud aspect of the election. The fraud is where we kept saying, alright, where’s the proof, where’s the truth, all these claims, you got to prove it in court. But what is not controversial, is that a number of states violated their own state law.

So that’s, I think, the strongest thing to point to, but as Rob pointed out, Florida did not. Florida’s were used to be kind of a battleground state and this time, Florida was not even close to a battleground state. Why? Because they got in and they worked on their state laws, and they cleaned up things, and they elected people at the state level that institutionally made a major change. This was a clean election in Florida.

And so I was reminded of the scripture in Proverbs 24:27, where it talks about how you prepare your fields first, and then you build your house. And I think we’ve been neglecting the preparing of the fields. I mean, even in Texas, we’ve got something over 20,000 elected officials in Texas from school board, city council all the way on up. We’ve not been building a farm team. We keep wanting a president. We keep wanting a congress with backbone. Where’s our farm team to provide that? We’ve got to get off the national level and start looking to the local level, start preparing the fields, doing that at the state level.

Rick:

Man, I’m so glad you mentioned the local level. It’s so important for us to be engaged there. You know, it’s the place that has the most impact on our lives anyway, whether it’s our family or our business, our backyard, our schools, all of those things. And it also happens to be the place where it’s the easiest, not that it’s easy, but it’s easier to make a difference, to have an impact, to get elected to a local office or to influence those local leaders or to lead a cause in a local area. So it’s designed that way. It’s what the founders wanted. That’s why it’s so important for us to pull power back from the federal government into the states where it’s easier to impact the state than it is the national government, and then from the state level, back to the local level, because it’s easier to impact the local level. So don’t ever think you can’t make a difference. Know that you can.

We’re all about equipping you, inspiring you, giving you the tools that you need to be engaged. That’s why we want to challenge you to be a Constitution coach, host classes in your living room, in your home, host them at your church, wherever you can, but get people in the room, get them sitting around talking about these topics of the day, and use our materials because it’s a Joshua-Caleb approach. It will encourage people. It’ll give them hope for the future. They’ll realize they’re not alone. And that there are things you really can do to make a difference and that the system does work if we will work the system.

So be sure to become one of our Constitution coaches, our new program, Biblical Citizenship in Modern America is now available. You can go to Biblicalcitizens.com to sign up there. It’s totally free. Host the class for free at your church and in your home. Digital workbooks for everybody, free, totally available to you right now. Use that as the tool so that you can be the catalyst for a restoration of biblical values and constitutional principles right there in your community.

Thanks so much for listening today. You’ve been listening to WallBuilders Live.