Faith in Action: Igniting the Christian Vote and Building Christian Networks for Positive Change

Air Date: 11/20/2023

Guest: Chad Connelly

Faith Wins

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Transcription:

Rick Green: 0:00
This is the intersection of faith and the culture. It’s WallBuilders. We’re taking on the hot topics of the day from a biblical, historical and constitutional perspective, and we’re glad you’re here with us. I encourage you to visit our website, as always, WallBuilders.com and WallBuildersLive.com. And then, of course, if you want to sign up to be a coach and be a part of you know, basically being a force multiplier, being a part of spreading the good news, teaching truth on the Constitution and what the Bible says about how to be a good citizen. We’ve got a lot of great courses for you there Biblical Citizenship in modern America, foundations of freedom. We’ve got constitutional life, Constitutional Defense of your family and freedom, and even Kurt Cameron’s American Campfire Revival and all of it available to you. If you go to constitutioncoach.com today and get signed up, you can be a coach for free. Your students can take the class for free. Everybody gets a digital workbook Lots of great tools in there. What a great way for you to show some thankfulness this week. Right? We all need to be more thankful for what we have, and I’m trying to do everything I can to be thankful for this country that we’ve been given, for the amazing freedom that God has entrusted to us and to make sure that we’re passing it on to our kids and grandkids. So I encourage you to do the same. Become a coach today and make that sort of your Thanksgiving proclamation, if you will, and we’ll have a lot of good programming later this week for you on Thanksgiving. For today, though, we’re going to bring you one of our pro family legislators conference talks. You’ll get to hear several of these over the next couple of months and a little bit right after the first of the year, as we try to bring you as many of these as we can. This was a power packed weekend, I’m telling you. We loaded up the legislators. This is the biggest one we’ve ever had. It was phenomenal, just absolutely incredible, and the talks were just off the charts, and there’s so many good ones, so it’s going to be difficult to pick which ones to bring to you, but this one fits perfect for today. It’s going to be a one episode talk. This is Chad Connelly talking about effective Christian engagement, and Chad knows of what he speaks. Listen Faith Wins is doing an incredible job getting David Barton in front of a lot of folks around the country, getting pastors engaged, getting churches involved. They just do a great job, and Chad is a terrific strategist. There’s a lot of people in this space that say they’re engaging Christians and they have things going on, and there’s some out there that are doing a fantastic job. And I just got to say, though, chad does a phenomenal job, so we’re thrilled to have him, thrilled to have had him at the Pro Famic Legislators Conference, and we’re going to let you hear that one right now. I’m Rick Green, America’s Constitution Coach. Here’s Chad Connelly at the Pro Famic Legislators Conference.

Chad Connelly: 2:49
It is such an honor to be here. I’m just, I’m just beyond honored David and Cheryl are. They’ve been friends and mentors and really heroes, and getting to travel the country with them the last three or four years has been honestly one of the great honors of my life. And having a guy like George Barnett here, brad Dacus, others leaders in the legislature thank y’all for what you do. Deep bow of appreciation, because now’s our time and I just want to share a little bit with you, and I’m going to start with scripture, obviously in salt and light and one of my devotionals. This morning I got up early reading about salt and light. We know what that means. To be salt and light is to be a difference maker. We taste the flavor, we keep it from rotting and decaying and the light shines the light. We’re a beacon of hope for people. We know the scripture, we know what Jesus told you to do, but let’s face it, a lot of Christians have missed out on this and give you a little bit of context on how God brought me here. Is it what my idea? I grew up in a little town called Prosperity, south Carolina. I’m going to do this pretty fast. So sipping through a fire hose. So I’m going to go through the Prosperity, south Carolina. You probably got your speeding ticket there. Prosperity is a big place, home of about 400 or 500 count of the animals, but we got traffic, like now Sometimes there’s cars there. And so I grew up, had a drug problem. My Dad drugged me to church and drugged me to youth group. What my idea? We were ready to go and so I never questioned my faith or my patriotism until I got in the army and I was confronted with do I believe what I believe? And so I went in the army. After I got my degree in Clemson, got in the army. I was a tank officer. Love blowing stuff out. Very cool. I mean, all our military veterans raise your hand. Y’all need to give them a hand. Very good, freedom’s not free, and I never had to be shot at, thank the Lord. But it made me appreciate this thing called America. Think about how great this country is. We’re so awesome that even people that hate it won’t leave. Isn’t that great? I think that’s fantastic. I’ve been places I didn’t enjoy. I just left. You know why I complain about it and tell people how bad it is, but yet there’s a long line of people waiting and we have a video we’re going to show to you right now. I’m positive. Here it comes. Goals really simple. We’re laser beam focused on maximizing Christian vote. Jesus ain’t running. Therefore, you always vote for the lesser two evils. You’re voting for imperfect people. We don’t tell them we’re going to vote for or how to vote, but we tell them to vote biblically.

David Barton: 5:08
See, this is where local races make a difference. We keep looking at national news and we’re not even aware of what’s happening at the local level. And this is where victories are correct. How can you possibly claim to be a leader for Christ if you are too afraid? We have a problem in America right now. People say they’re Christians and I hear this all the time when they’ll say to me you know what do we do? Get on your knees and pray like you’ve never prayed before. Bring your own life up and speak only the truth and prepare to stand.

Guest speaker: 5:43
Here’s what we are good at. We are good at coming to events and going. Wasn’t that a good event? And then we go and we forget about it. I’m asking you to take some time to pray about what God would have you do. This now would be an event, but it would be a lifestyle of change for the church to step into her destiny. Do you hear what I’m saying? This is our hour. You know what to do. We wish, maybe, that we could be a part of the founding. Well, this is it.

Chad Connelly: 6:10
We’re in a unique spot, maybe of once every generational time, where people are just man. They’re hungry. I’m going to tell you, something’s going on out there. We love the Lord and we want to take our nation back, and that’s my challenge to you is go be the iron. So we’re here because iron does sharpen iron. We know what the scripture says and I came out of the army wondering do I believe what I believe? I started reading biblical worldview books. That’s how I ran into David’s stuff and devoured his material and working on that biblical worldview. That’s just how do I see things through a god lens, not through a chat lens, not through the political experts of the pundits. I got involved in politics, not officially. I knocked doors, I waved signs, I made phone calls, the boys came along. A real short version of this, but I want to put this in because it’s so important. My wife and I just felt compelled to be involved. In 05, her mom died, put her into a depression. In 06, my wife, 18 and a half years, committed suicide, left me a single Dad with two little boys. But here’s what I learned out of that. I met a girl who was also with her by suicide. Her husband killed himself almost two years to the day before my wife she had two little girls had two little boys. We’re an odd story, but six months after we met we were married. That’s 16 years ago and here’s what the message I think the Lord showed me was he wasn’t done with me. He wasn’t done with me. I had no confidence and belief. I would stand anywhere encouraging anybody about anything and to watch God pull me up. I was lowering a whale’s belly on the bottom of the ocean. To watch him pull me up, told me he wasn’t done with me and therefore he’s not done with you either. He’s not done with your state. He’s not done with our nation. He doesn’t need any of that stuff. So I got back involved in politics. I ran for state party chairman in South Carolina. Y’all know we’re the first in the South State. I know Diane and Representative Richie Yauer here. They understand this. South Carolina gets a big, bright spotlight. So I had a front row seat to the 2012 election. I got to see just how many of our Republican friends treated us, and one of my common themes other than laser being focused on getting Christians to be involved was why does the party ignore the most reliable, most trustworthy, biggest voting block on our side and I said it on national television. I was on, I did every political show on television and don’t believe that they’re all liberal. All the media is not liberal. I did 57 national TV interviews and I can testify they’re not all liberal. It’s like 94% of them. That’s all. It’s not all of them. But I was doing Al Sharpton’s show on MSNBC not promoting MSNBC, but it was Al Sharpton’s show. He keeps whispering my earbud call me Reverend Al, and I’m thinking I got far too much respect for Reverend and I’m just like, oh, you are Reverend and so. But I was staying on that theme and I was beating up and you know you shouldn’t use people’s names but the initials. The guy called Rove and he had taught us how to successfully lose twice and ignoring the faith vote. And I would. I said this all the time, thousands of times. Look, our people don’t care if they’re going to be D’s R’s, they do want to vote values. They care about the values. Life is not a political issue, it’s a spiritual issue. Biblical marriage and religious liberty and the defense of Israel those aren’t political issues, they’re spiritual ones. Yes, they’ve been politicized, but it doesn’t remove my responsibility as a father or husband, a Sunday school teacher, a deacon, a little Baptist church, to tell the truth. So I said it over and over and over again we’re politics 101, we’re dummies. We’re not even reaching out to the biggest base 52% of the primary vote and the Republican side and 32% of the general election vote and they treat us like we don’t even belong there. And so I kept on that theme. I walked off the set and the guy named Rites Prevus I don’t know the guy with the funny name was Trump’s first chief of staff. He texted me.

Tim Barton: 9:50
This is Tim Barton from WallBuilders with another moment from American history. American patriot Paul Revere wrote to alert Americans of the impending arrival of the British. But he also sought patriot leaders Samuel Adams and John Hancock to warn them that the British were seeking their execution. Adams and Hancock were staying with the Reverend Jonas Clark in Lexington. When they asked Pastor Clark if his church was ready for the approaching British, he replied I’ve trained them for this very hour. They will fight and if need be die under the shadow of the house of God. Later that morning, 70 men from his church, a several hundred British, in the first battle of the war for independence. As Pastor Clark affirmed, the militia that morning were the same who filled the pews of the church meeting house on the Sunday morning before. The American church was regularly at the forefront of the fight for liberty. For more information on this pastor and other colonial patriots, go to WallBuilders.com.

Chad Connelly: 10:49
And I knew right, I was one of those 50 chairman. If I had no relationship, didn’t know. We had my cell phone number and he said hey, I’m a believer too. You did a really good job in a tough environment. It was hostile. Thanks for standing for the faith. Let’s talk Just like that. Well, a few months goes by and we lose again. I’d sit on CNN. I thought that Obama administration would be the biggest train wreck of a disaster for religious liberty and American history. And I’m no prophet. But I was right and I said this over and over again. We got beat up in those years. A lot of this stuff we’re putting up with, that y’all are fighting in the legislature right now, came from those years. Reince and I got together. After the election we created a thing called GOP faith. David mentioned this. I got to be the first ever national director. I went to 43 states and spoke to some 80,000 pastors between 13 and 17. And in that timeframe I learned something really valuable Relationships are the difference maker. Relationships are the difference maker. I think God let me do that so that it would open doors to multiple denominations. You know a lot of our ministry groups. I love them, I support them. I appreciate them. We get siloed into a denomination or two or three. Last year, David and I spoke in 24 different denominational churches in 24 different states. We did 132 pastor meetings all over the place. Well, I think I’m the only senior staffer for rights not to go work in the Trump White House, which means I’m the only one not fired from the Trump White House. They all got fired and it was a God thing. I started. Faith wins. So from since then, we’ve been running around the country doing small meetings with pastors, asking, just like I did brother Neil Jackson back there. You know five or 10 pastors who I don’t know need to hear this. Let’s meet with them, let’s have coffee, let’s have breakfast, let’s have lunch, and then that’ll create a big meeting of a lot more pastors. It’ll create some more small meetings. That’ll create some big meetings and then all we’re going to do is do that over and over. No-transcript. I think this is important. You know some 82 million people sitting in churches. I know that number’s weird. A lot of people have different definitions. 31 million is like the high water mark of people who are self-identified. I’m an evangelical Christian and I voted in the election. That leaves some 40 to 50 million people sitting in churches who allegedly profess the name of Jesus, who don’t want to be salt and light, who aren’t even being salt and light by going out and voting their values. They don’t think it’s worth it. They’re too busy, they don’t have nothing to do. But in 2016, I told Reinsen, july 2013, if our side ever hits 80%, go back and work the numbers. I’m sure George can do this way better than me. Go back and look at numbers for elections in your district. If 80% of the self-identified evangelicals vote for the more conservative candidate, the left can’t win. They can’t win Don’t Catcher. They can’t win President. They can’t win Congress. They can’t win School Board. They can’t win City Council. If you get 80% of the self-identified evangelicals to come out and vote biblical values, the left can’t win. I’ve done numbers. I was an engineer. I do this over and over in my head. I put it on paper and in 2016, I wrote that to Reinsen, 2013, before I knew who the candidate was, and I said Reinsen, I’m not going to push a candidate, I’m not going to push a party, but I’m going to tell them to vote biblically. Y’all heard that on the video and that’s what I say on laser beam focused on maximizing Christian vote. Jesus ain’t running. You always vote for lesser or two equals, no matter what you’re doing. They are human beings. Therefore, don’t vote on personality or party or glitz or the best ads. What do they stand for Now, if they’re wrong in life? I’ve never voted. I wrote we have a local election. Yesterday, before I flew out, I wrote in Mickey Mouse because the guy who’s running it’ll make our local paper. It’s always a big number. How do we need the Mickey Mouse kit? They know it’s the Connelly family. I’ve never voted for somebody who would take a baby’s life from a mommy’s tummy Never in my life. And I’m not going to start now. I will fall on that sword and I’ll tell you what you find out. If they’re wrong in life, they’re wrong. If they won’t protect your life, they won’t protect your liberty. 81% our goal was 80 and a guy named Trump hit 81% and we never told them to vote for it. Never told them to vote for it. Modern day record. They got rid of the faith program. I started to faith the winds. They did not duplicate that in 2020. They haven’t duplicated it since. From the party standpoint, we’re trying to duplicate ourselves. I want y’all to understand this. You need a pastor network. You need a pastor network and all you’ve gotta be is authentic. You gotta be yourself and maybe you need to have somebody’s help Build a relationship with a pastor who has a biblical worldview and understands. They can’t be salt and light and act like they’re making a difference if they’re not even telling their people out of vote. I remember the first time a pastor told me I was in Durango, colorado. There’s some Colorado people here. This young pastor comes up after I speak and he says you know, chad, I appreciate what you’re saying, but you know, we just don’t do the political stuff in the pulpit. And I didn’t know what to say. I should have been prepared, but I wasn’t. I did what I always do. When I know the answer, I ask a question what do you mean? And that gives me time to think and time to pray. And, lord, you better give me something quick. And he said well, we just don’t do the controversial stuff. And here’s what the Lord gave me. I said do y’all preach the Bible, the whole counsel of God? Well, yeah, I said, because life isn’t political, and I gave you that line a little bit ago. Biblical marriage isn’t political. Those are spiritual issues. They’ve been politicized, but it doesn’t remove my responsibility as a believer to tell the truth about them. So, yes, you’re going to run into those kind of people, that’s okay. Steam right through it and ask them questions. What is political about telling your people to vote biblical? Where does politics begin? Your Bible and your spiritual life stop? I’ll let you know that chapter in verse. Y’all can look that up for me, because in a biblical worldview, my God’s being able to be everywhere and everything all the time, and I ought to be involved too. We have let people who hate our Lord talk us into how we engage. You know when they say, oh, you Christians, you’re great at the soup kitchens and the vacation Bible school. You shouldn’t be in politics. And we put on our turn to the other cheek, jesus, because we don’t want to offend them, we want to reach them for the Lord right. I think we better find our turn to tables over Jesus, because this is the time. This is the time, and here’s the key part Don’t treat pastors like a data point. They’re multipliers. They don’t treat them like just any other constituent. I tell you, I talk to political people all the time Our team so far has done. We did our 64th meeting with a presidential candidate in the early four states yesterday. We’ve done it with nine different candidates. Some of them even on our side don’t want to be around a bunch of preachers, but we’ve invited them. We’ve invited the other side. Please come meet with some preachers. We’re going to ask you hard questions. There’s no media there. We’re going to hand pick them. We’re going to ask a hard question. We’re going to pray over you. If you don’t like that, don’t come. So far, nine have been biting into that and we tell them this because all the political people will tell you we want to have 11th e-cabillion at our meeting. Now, that’s my number. I invented that, but I’m an engineer. How you can they find it? People invite stuff. 11th e -cabillion, that’s big numbers and what they’re too narrow-minded to understand. And if they don’t really have a real faith, what they’re going to do is think 10 people in a room is not enough for the time. I’ve heard this from every presidential campaign and I’m like that’s because you’re counting the 10, and anybody can count the seeds of an apple, but nobody can count. Only God can count the apples and the seed. Don’t treat them like another. Constituent Relationships matter. Take the time, invest in building relationships with pastors, you will not go wrong. And I want to get this quick Pastors and faith leaders are the difference maker. They cannot be ignored. If you and a lot of y’all are going to hire because some of y’all go run for Congress and you’re going to hire people are going to come in and tell you they’re smarter than the people who got you here. They are, and if you doubt it, just ask them again. They’ll tell you they’re smarter than the people who got you here. I got here without you, but now I got to hire somebody and pay them a whole lot more money. Well, we’re smarter and you know we’ve done this. And yada, yada, yada. They will ignore pastors quicker than anything. And I’ll tell you, I’ve never been in a. I sat in the White House, I sat in the RNC, I was a state party chairman, been involved over 100 races, intimately involved. There’s always a time when somebody sits there and I won’t use the bad words they use but who’s got the blanking Christians? Who’s going to talk to the Christians? I mean, I’ll tell you, I’ve been in the White House and heard that come from these political expert bozos that want to discount and diminish the effect of the Christian vote. And I know the math on it. If we will win One of those who call evil good and good evil, isaiah 520.

Tim Barton: 19:02
Hey, this is Tim Barton, with WallBuilders, and, as you’ve had the opportunity to listen to WallBuilders Live, you’ve probably heard the wealth of information about our nation, about our spiritual heritage, about the religious liberties, about all the things that makes America exceptional, and you might be thinking, as incredible as this information is, I wish there was a way that I could get one of the WallBuilders guys to come to my area and share with my group whether it be a church, whether it be a Christian school or public school or some political event or activity. If you’re interested in having a WallBuilders speaker come to your area, you can get on our website At www.WallBuilders.com and there’s a tab for scheduling and if you’ll click on that tab, you’ll notice there’s a list of information from speakers bios to events that are already going on, and there’s a section where you can request an event to bring this information about who we are, where we came from, our religious liberties and freedoms. Go to the WallBuilders website and bring a speaker to your area.

Chad Connelly: 20:02
If Christians don’t engage in politics, we are in a problem. I want to put this up to you next slide, please, alinsky, only if y’all have read the book Rules for Radicals. I just went back and reread this. Go to the forward. And this is what the left, the progressive left, has based their entire approach on. Lest we forget at least an over-the-shoulder acknowledgement to the very first radical, they edify this y’all from all our legends, mythology and history, and who’s to know when mythology leaves off and history begins, or which is which. The very first radical, no demand who rebelled against the establishment and did it so effectively? He at least won his own kingdom, lucifer. That’s the Hillary thinking. That’s the Biden thinking. That’s the Obama thinking. The Rules for Radicals from Saul Alinsky is the Bible and the playbook. One of their numbers is name it and claim it. Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it and polarize it. That’s what they’re doing to us. That’s exactly what they’re doing to the Christian right. Look at how the Jews are being treated right now. They pick the target out and they work you over, they wear you out and you just get tired, you get burned out. You’re like I don’t want to put it with this nonsense. You know once you’ve been around this and you’ve lifted your head above the crowd. I’ve been sued so many times. It’s just a joke. David and Cheryl have been riding the car in 20-something different states, hearing from my attorney about some nut job this soon and about some that doesn’t have any consequence, and I’ve spent good kids college funds trying to defend myself against people who are only there to target you and take you out and ultimately make you put your head down and don’t bring that stuff up again. The goals of the Left are pretty simple. Communism abolishes eternal truths. It abolishes all religion, all morality, and the abolition of the family is a main target of what the Communist Manifesto is all about. You need to go back and read it. Our effort has been to the evangelical church. If it’s a church that denies the inercerity of Scripture, I’m probably not going to look for them. I don’t spend a lot of time with people who are arguing over the virgin birth or over whether or not Jesus was sinless. You know George Barnard does in his books the six things that define biblical worldview. Those are the churches we go after. There’s some 380,000 pastors churches in America and maybe a third of those have a biblical worldview or at least teach from a biblical worldview. Those are the targets, but we use pastor relationships to reach those people. So far, we’ve now registered in those churches in the last five since 2020, 1.6 million new evangelical voters. We go right at the pastor and we tell him here’s what two things I need, and just two. I don’t need you to charge the beach at D-Day. I don’t need you to march to Trenton on Christmas with no shoes on your feet to attack the Hessians at daybreak and win the war at the Continental Army. I don’t need that. Can you register by devote and you teach them to vote biblical values? That’s it. Can you register 100% in your church to vote and can you teach them to vote biblical values? That is it. We picked out this little state called Virginia I talked about and we did it through 1,500 personal meetings, but we targeted Virginia. I had one donor come to me and said do you think your methodology will work in a place like Virginia? Some of y’all may be from Virginia. It had become the hotbed of social engineering and the legislature. It was California East and all we did. I started with seven pastors in a room in Virginia Beach in January 2021. All my political expert buddies laughed at me, mocked me. Why are you putting money into Virginia? That’s a waste of time. And then they about knocked you over to get to the TV cameras to take credit when they came in and spend a little money right at the end. It’s not based on that. And listen, I think all the things we do we can rap buses, we can have rallies, we can do TV ads and over the top and digital, that’s fine. We work down here underneath the radar with pastors, building relationships. You know we’re working against medical marijuana in four states right now using pastor networks. We’re working for conservative judges in five states right now using pastor networks. There’s some people in here. We worked on under the radar didn’t make a big deal about it against casino gambling. The left is using the marijuana issue and casino gambling to come take your state over. That’s exactly what they’re doing. They’re funding that to get out the youth vote In Virginia, though this was some action, so it just didn’t translate real big. It shows the increase in the vote and I think y’all will get a copy of this. What we did was we picked 10 house districts that the left had won by less than three points and we decided we’re going to run up the score. We’re going to run up the score and so I had pastors in all those house districts that said I want you to find 25 churches who do number one. Register everybody to vote, give them vote, bill the values, that’s it. We didn’t go to the cities, we didn’t try to compete in the big cities where it was all polluted and convoluted in so many TV ads. We went to those 10 house districts and said let’s run up the score. They got out of hand and we found 312 instead of 250 and they registered 77,000 new Christians. It has been fun. I know there’s no voter fraud, but when you sick little old people, miss Bessie, we called it the Miss Bessie program that David mentioned. I’m telling you those elation officials are terrified of Miss Bessie. She’s probably not 92 pounds, soaking wet, but she walked into an election office and you know three of the people that we called. And I know there’s no voter fraud. I heard that the president said it, I believe it. When Miss Bessie walked in and asked for those voter rolls and we started doing the comparison. Just two things over six in a household, right, or over 100, come on, they can vote over 100, but would y’all agree that’s a flag when they three of them are in jail? Now the new attorney general, jason Yarez, captured them, took evidence from. It’s not political people. These are the sunny school classes. Next slide, please, we’d love to have your help. I gotta get off here. Hit our QR code. Look, if you’re with David and Cheryl, you just can’t do no better and they’re just the finest human beings. I think David Barton’s a national treasure. I think he’s a gem and in as much I can drag him around America and let people hear the truth. I can show him how God showed me all these rooms. I can show him how David Bart teaches them why. David and Tim, what they’re doing with WallBuilders is unprecedented. It is awesome. Let’s go play offense and take our country back. God bless y’all.

Rick Green: 26:07
Alright, folks, that’s all the time for today. That was Chad Connelly speaking at the Pro Family Legislators Conference. You can send your legislator to that conference next year, or if you’re a legislator and you would like to come to the conference, please check it out at WallBuilders.com today, and we’ll have some more of those for you in the coming weeks. The rest of this week, though, we’re going to bring you some cool Thanksgiving programming as you get ready to celebrate with your family. Thanks so much for listening today. You’ve been listening to WallBuilders.