Save America Ministries

Guest (Male): This is Viewpoint with attorney and author, Chuck Crismier. Viewpoint, a one-hour talk show confronting the issues of America's heart and home. And now, with today's edition of Viewpoint, here is Chuck Crismier.

Chuck Crismier: You hide that very well. Those are the words of Mike Huckabee, the Ambassador of the United States to Israel, in and following an interview with Tucker Carlson. He was telling Mr. Carlson that notwithstanding all that you're saying, you hide your real truth very well.

Today on Viewpoint, we're going to talk about how a lot of people hide their real truth very well. This is going to touch on perhaps a lot of people's feelings here today on Viewpoint, and I'm glad that you've joined us. It's conversation, as always, with ever-increasing conviction, talk that transforms. Yes, we're going to talk about Tucker Carlson, but that's not all we're going to talk about.

We're going to talk also about maybe some of the kind of music you listen to and what you are hiding very well. Or the very ones that you're listening to, what are they hiding very well? You see, there's a sense in which there's a lot of hiding going on. You may recall right after Adam and Eve received the words of Satan, the Lucifer, the serpent there in the Garden of Eden.

She began to munch on the delicious fruit that she had been forbidden to eat, then offered the same to her husband, Adam. The very first thing they did was what? They hid from God. That's the very, very first thing they did. They didn't have a big argument. They didn't argue with God. They hid from him.

In fact, they hid very well. When God went looking for them, he said, "Adam, where are you?" He said, "We're over here, God. We're hiding." "Why are you hiding, Adam?" "Because we're naked." God said, "How did you know you were naked? How did you know you were naked?"

Well, there are a lot of naked people running about today, not naked against the law, but naked against God's law. In fact, they're playing games. They're hiding and hiding seemingly very well, at least they think they are. The problem with it all is you can't hide from God. You can run, as they say, but you can't hide.

You can run for all your worth. You can run until you're weary and drop dead, but you can't hide from God. You can put on all kinds of clothes. You can put on kings' clothes, you can put on poppers' clothes, you can put on royal clothes, you can put on pastoral clothes. You can put on all kinds of clothes, even musicians' clothes, but you can't hide from God.

So Mike Huckabee said to Tucker Carlson, "You can't hide that very well." Before we go back to Tucker Carlson, I want to share with you an interchange that I had with one of the prominent CEOs of America's movies today. Yes, Christian movies. I had an interchange with that individual. I’m not going to disclose who it is and share with you a bit of that interchange without naming names because my purpose here is not to name names in that regard, but to help reveal the issue before us.

The issue before us is so great, and we don't even realize how great it really is because it's become so normative to hide from God. We hide our true thoughts, our true meaning, our true intentions, our true goals because in reality, we didn't much want to seek first the kingdom of God, but we'd rather seek a lot of other things. They make us happier, they make us feel better for a while, they make us richer, they do this, that, or the other.

So we change. We think we haven't really changed inside, but it's the very inside thoughts that we had that cause us to change in the first place, and so we deceive ourselves. So I welcome you to Viewpoint. I'm Chuck Crismier. It's conversation, as always, with ever-increasing conviction, talk that transforms, and I hope you'll stay tuned, friends, because what we talk about here today is extremely relevant, more relevant than you might possibly imagine.

I received an email from the CEO of one of the movie companies, and he said, "From time to time, I think it's important to remind you exactly what our particular company stands for and why the choices we make about entertainment matter." He said there are very few entertainment platforms today attempting to serve audiences looking for alternatives to mainstream Hollywood. He said, "I'm genuinely pleased that more people recognize the enormous demand for that kind of entertainment built around faith and family values, but that doesn't mean we all make the same choices."

Then he begins to reveal some incidents where the choices that were made were not good. They were diversionary in order to gain a PG-13 rating. Well, some might say, what's the big deal with PG-13? Well, what did you have to do to achieve it? Well, you had to go over some lines. What kind of lines did you have to cross over? Well, you had to cross over some lines that really probably wouldn't be identified as pleasing to God, but they were pleasing to the people and would allow you to gain a bigger audience.

So we did what we had to do. Get some language in there, some attitudes in there, some sexual activity, whatever it is to gain a PG-13 rating. Now, this CEO of a movie company says, "I'm not here to criticize the filmmakers or to tell anyone what they should or should not watch. But what I'm writing about here is the reality of what we're trying to do and what they are allowing themselves to do and why they do it."

He's concerned about what your children are going to hear, what the values that you bring into your home are going to look like. He says that doesn't mean that the stories that we have on movies and so on cannot have conflict or flawed people or difficult relationships, characters who make mistakes and so on because storytelling often involves those. In fact, if we read the Bible, we find that immensely.

Some might say, and have already said, the Bible should be R-rated and not allowed in the public schools. You've heard that said. Why? Because the Bible actually is quite honest about fornication and adultery. So there are going to be different approaches to faith and family entertainment in the marketplace. Whether that's positive and treated thoughtfully is debatable. But I want you to know where we stand, what I stand for.

So viewers looking for faith and family-based content, well, what are you looking for? What are you looking for? I want you to trust me and trust us. Well, I wrote a response to this email that he sent me. Again, I want to be very careful here. I said, "I'm concerned that there's so many actresses and actors and singers of the past who it seems wanted to be in the world but also of it, and so they compromise the name of Christ." I'd like to read to you what he said in response. We'll be back. This is Viewpoint.

Guest (Male): Once upon a time, children could pray and read their Bibles in school. Divorces were practically unknown, as was child abuse. In our once-great America, virginity and chastity were popular virtues and homosexuality was an abomination. So what happened in just one generation? Hi, I'm Chuck Crismier, and I urge you to join me daily on Viewpoint, where we discuss the most challenging issues touching our hearts and homes. Could America's moral slide relate to the Fourth Commandment? Listen to Viewpoint on this radio station or anytime at saveus.org.

Chuck Crismier: Welcome back to Viewpoint, friends. We hide things very well, so says Mike Huckabee, and it's true. We hide things very well, but there are different ways that we hide things. A lot of it reveals in what we choose to pursue, how we choose to voice certain things, why we do it, the motivations of our minds and our hearts.

It reveals so much about our character, but also, even the more so, it reveals which kingdom we really are serving or which kingdom we really seem to want to serve, notwithstanding what our words say. You see, words are cheap. So the question is, what does my life show? What do I want my life to show?

I wrote back to this CEO of a movie company in America, pretty well known. I said, "You know, I'm concerned about a particular actress who has a renowned reputation, and rightly so, for being a wonderful Christian woman and just a delightful Christian lady. She's gained her position, her understanding, her place, her name in our country, and particularly among Christians, because of her Christian witness, even wrote a book."

Beautiful person, seemed to be very respected in the industry. But I said, "What happened to her? It seems she's dropped out of the Christian realm in moviemaking." He wrote back to me—and I'm not going to give the name of that individual. He says, "Hi Chuck, one of the many disturbing things is when actors or actresses get bad advice or sometimes let success go to their heads."

"This person that you are concerned about, although her move makes my sense that she's a very principled person look foolish, I'm trusting that well, maybe she's not intentionally straddling the fence." Because I asked that specific question. It seems that she's straddling the fence, wants to be in the kingdom but not of it, or wants to be in the kingdom but of another kingdom as well.

So this CEO says, "I think she felt or was told by her agents that she was worth a lot more than others in our talent family thought and could pay for." He said, "She's one of my favorites, so it was really disappointing, really disappointing." Now, that could go for a lot of people, not just the particular individual that I had in mind, but a lot of other people.

So don't try to figure out who it is because you probably aren't going to be able to figure out who it is because I didn't give you enough information to do so and don't want to. This conversation reveals and reflects a spirit that has been taking place for a very, very long time, not only in our country as a whole but particularly among Christians. The desire to be, shall we say, in Christ but of the world. In Christ but of the world.

You say, well, what in the world would that have to do with Tucker Carlson? Well, here's what it would have to do with Tucker Carlson because once he made a name for himself—and by the way, he's very, very wealthy, not just from his own work, but from other things that I believe he inherited, very wealthy. But that's not the point. The point isn't how wealthy you are or how unwealthy you are.

You can be a wealthy Christian and still pursue the kingdom of God with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul, and all your strength and your neighbors as yourself. What concerns me, though, is when a man who has gained his name and reputation by clearly setting forth seemingly very principled statements in his prior role on Fox News, left Fox News and now trying to develop his own big name and make it bigger.

Ostensibly setting himself up to be the President of the United States, many believe. And now is going to, shall we say, amplify his message in such a way not to speak truth but to exaggerate things in such a way as to make him look particularly good and particularly powerful among a particular audience out there that likes his genre. Now, friends, that is not integrity.

It's not integrity. I don't care how serious he looks on his face. I don't care how passionately he may express it. It's not integrity. So when he comes out this last weekend and declares that President Trump should immediately be removed from office, he is bordering on some very dangerous ground.

Now, yes, he gives a reason for it. He says if he supports, immediately supports nuclear power in the Iranian situation or so on, then he should be immediately removed from office. Well, Mr. Trump never said anything like that. So Carlson is extrapolating or taking up a position that he got onto his own podcast site by a previous Trump employee who's also trying to make a name for himself, saying that well, there was mention sometime in the Trump administration, somebody said something about well, maybe there should be at least consideration of nuclear power, depending on what was going to happen in the Iranian and other world situations.

In other words, there was no statement that the Trump administration was even seriously considering such a thing. But Tucker Carlson spun that way out of control in order to gain attention for himself. That's why he did it. I know how this works, friends. I have to be very careful about that kind of stuff here on this program. Why do I do what I do? Why do I say what I say?

Am I going to go way out on a limb and say certain kinds of things to try to get attention here so that we can get a big audience coming in here from all, from certainly from the realm of those that are in conspiratorial theorists out there and get their attention? No, I'm not going to do that. I'm here to try to speak with integrity and not go beyond truth.

So what happened here with Tucker Carlson is he went beyond truth and tried to usher in words from an otherwise compromised person that he brought on, a former director of the National Counterterrorism Center, who resigned earlier due to his opposition to the Iranian conflict, which Tucker Carlson also opposed. He's free to oppose that. "I don't agree with it," he says. "I don't like it." That's fine to say that.

But when you use that as a lever to catapult these bombs, verbal bombs that are designed to stir up animosity, to stir up passions of people beyond the truth, my friend, you have gone way beyond integrity. You've got your own situation in line. You're just trying to promote yourself and come as close as you can to almost being a traitor to do so.

So he's very careful not to do that, but he comes very close. I don't have a problem if Tucker Carlson is opposed to the Iranian war. Many people were opposed to the Vietnam War. I don't have a problem with that. What I have a problem with is people that exaggerate and try to manipulate their view into a much bigger and almost a cry of fire in a theater to stir up the people toward themselves, to bring focus to themselves rather than the truth.

That's my concern. That's my problem. And what Tucker Carlson has been doing of late, he has been intentionally voicing ideas that are designed to bring the focus to him, to stir up an audience to favor him for further power. And anybody on the inside sees it. So then we have a situation where he interviewed US Ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee.

Former Christian pastor, Christian man, most everybody believes that whether or not we agree with all of the things that Mike Huckabee might agree with theologically, that he is a true Christian brother. So he brings Mike Huckabee on his podcast and begins to attack him with regard to Israel and throw out questions that are baiting questions.

Trying to make Huckabee's representation of Israel out to be a mockery. Like, how can you do that? So Huckabee says, "I wasn't anticipating a lengthy series of questions where he seemed to be insinuating that the Jews of today aren't really the same people as the Jews of the Bible." But Huckabee said, "They're not. Tucker said they're not." Well, what does he mean by that?

What he's saying is that I don't like Israel and I don't like how Israel has dealt with Gaza. Therefore, I'm going to oppose Israel, and I'm going to oppose what they do, how they think, what their deal is. And he's forgotten God in the whole mix while at the same time using so-called Christian leverage as an Episcopal, professing Christian who's only read the Bible twice and didn't read it at all until about three or four years ago.

So he comes across as this expert because he carries this serious-minded look to himself. Friends, that doesn't make you an expert. It doesn't even make you a Christian. And if he wants to say, "I don't agree with Israel and I don't agree with how they dealt in Gaza," that's fine. But he doesn't just do that. He amplifies it so as to bring all the focus back to him because he's the guy now who is standing in the gap for Palestine or is standing in the gap against Israel.

And come and look at me, friends, because I'm your man. And that's what he's done. And that's why he brought on this Nazi sympathizer Nick Fuentes. The guy who thought Hitler was a good guy and Churchill the bad guy. So he brought him on and didn't take him to task, but he takes Mike Huckabee to task as ambassador to Israel. There's no integrity in that.

It's designed to get gotcha messages out there in the name while hiding your motivation. He's hiding his motivation. And it's not good. It's not good for America. It's not good for the Christian community. Let's be honest about it. If you disagree what Israel does, that's okay. I don't agree with everything that Israel does. But here's the problem that we have, and so many people have this problem.

We are not the judges of Israel. You and I are not the judges of Israel. God is the judge of Israel because he called them. They were called by God as his elect. Believe it or not, Israel was God's elect. They didn't all get to the promised land, but they were all part of the elect until they unelected themselves by not obeying God.

How about you? Are you unelecting yourself from your relationship with God by not obeying him just like Israel did? Then you're worthy of just as much criticism as Israel. Are you beginning to see the problem? Here's the deal. God is the judge of Israel. We're to bless Israel, not to bless everything they do, but we're to bless them and then trust God to be their corrector and disciplinarian. If we choose to do that, then we will be judged severely by God for doing it. It's a very dangerous thing that we do, and we better run for hiding. We'll be right back.

Guest (Male): For more about Chuck Crismier and Save America Ministries, visit our website, saveus.org. For example, under the marriage section, Chuck has some great resources to strengthen your marriage. First off, a fact sheet on the state of the marital union, a fact sheet on the state of ministry, marriage, and morals. saveus.org. Marriage, divorce, and remarriage. What does the Bible really teach about this? Find all of this at saveus.org. Also, a letter to pastors, the Hosea Project. saveus.org. And many more resources to strengthen your marriage. It's all on Chuck's website, saveus.org. Again, you can listen to Chuck's Viewpoint broadcasts live and archived at saveus.org.

Chuck Crismier: And now, friends, here on Viewpoint, we switch back to the entertainment world. In a certain sense, Tucker Carlson is operating in the entertainment world. So is Candace. So are some others. They are trying to gain attraction for themselves and build an audience focused on their willingness to say extravagant things. It gets them attention. That's why they do it.

No matter how seriously they come across, that's the reason they do it. They do it because they have ulterior motives. Their motives of the flesh and not of the spirit. That's troubling. So let's go back and take a look at what's happened in so-called Christian entertainment. We opened the program with just such a thing in the movie realm. I shared with you some letters and so on, interchange back and forth, to demonstrate and reveal my concerns there.

I have seen this with quite a number of other people, and I remember a dear friend, one of my dearest friends who was in our wedding 60 years ago, who a Christian brother, but his family was so overly impressed with the entertainment world and particularly with Christians in entertainment. It really bothered me. It was as if if you can sidle up to a Christian who's well known in entertainment, you've really arrived.

Very painful to see that situation, but he's not the only one like that. It was an expression of what was happening in the 1970s and began to materialize big time in the 1980s. You see, we want to find out the root of what has taken place in our country, the root of what has taken place in the church, and how the church has defamed itself intentionally.

When I say intentionally, carefully, because the original intent was not to defame yourself, it was just to gain more attention for yourself. But in doing so, you defamed yourself as a Christian and defamed the body of Christ. Yet the people in the culture, because we in the church have extremely valued those things, have lifted them up as somehow they are the models of Christian virtue and that our children should emulate them.

So pastors would bring on and pay thousands and thousands of dollars to bring a Christian celebrity singer or whatever into their congregation for a special night, and the reason was the pastor wanted to, shall we say, sidle up to this famous person in order to build his church. That was the whole purpose. I know how this worked. I was right inside when that was happening in the particular church of which I was a volunteer pastor, and I hated that stuff.

When a singer or some other person in entertainment would be paid beaucoup thousands of dollars out of people's tithe money to bring them in for one night of two hours for the express purpose of trying to sidle up to this name, a big name, to build Christ's church while diminishing Christ's name to build up the pastor's church. Just abominable, utterly abominable.

But that's what has been happening, and it's not just out there on the radio or the television, it's in our congregations and has been for a very, very long time. If we go back to the early 1980s, there was a name, and I'm going to mention some names here because these are some of the key names that reveal this particular issue. The first is Amy Grant. Known as the Queen of Christian Pop, she became the ultimate blueprint for crossing over into mainstream radio in the 1980s and 1990s with major pop hits.

Now, here's the question. Why did she do it? Was she not happy that God had brought her out and given her an audience and an opportunity to not just entertain but to bless Christian people and their families with good or godly music? No, she wasn't satisfied with that. So it was like the Rolling Stones: I can't get no satisfaction. But I tried and I tried and I tried. I couldn't get no satisfaction, so I had to go crossover and make my debut with the world.

There was another emerging out of the Christian rock scene called Switchfoot. The alternative band achieved mainstream success in the early 2000s with certain tracks that were played on both Christian and secular radio. Then there was Jars of Clay, launching with their massive mainstream and Christian hit "Flood" in 1995. The alternative rock band successfully bridged both radio formats, secular and Christian. In other words, they straddled the fence.

Do you understand what really was happening there? They were straddling the fence. Most of these started as Christians. They started in the church, but they weren't satisfied. They weren't satisfied with serving God. They wanted fame and attention that only the world could give. And there was Katy Perry. Before becoming a global pop superstar, she started her music career as a Christian gospel artist under the birth name Katy Hudson, releasing a Christian album in 2001. Look at her now. Basically completely rejected the faith.

And on and on it goes. It's not necessary for me to go over name after name after name after name because that's not the purpose of our discussing this. Our purpose in discussing this issue is why have people done this? And is there any way in which you yourself have participated in this kind of charade? It's a charade. It's a pretense of following Christ while really trying to follow the world.

You know what happens if a man straddles a fence? He castrates himself. And that's what we're doing to the Christian witness. We're castrating the Christian witness by doing these things. It is not pretty. It is not pleasing to God. And you might say to yourself, well, look, isn't this glorious how this person can sing these Christian songs here, can go out here and make tons of money and do this, that, or the other in the secular world? Look what they have to do in the secular world to do it. They're compromising with every word that they sing. That's how they get the attention.

The same way Tucker Carlson is trying to get attention. Exactly the same way. Friends, we need to adopt the attitude of John the Baptist when the people came to him and said, "You're the great guy." And he said, "No, there's one coming after me whose shoelace I'm not able to even untie. He must increase and I must decrease." That should be our attitudes. That should be the attitudes of Christian singers. That should be the attitudes of Christian actors or actresses, if indeed they are following Christ in the first place and not just using Christ as a moniker to elevate their own position.

Are you listening? You may think, well, my goodness, you're passionate about this, Chuck. You better believe it, friends, because it goes to the very heart of the integrity of our witness as Christians. The church has so compromised its witness in these fashions as to make ourselves—we use Jesus as a mascot while the world is our master. In other words, we're pimping Jesus.

Clearly, how can we put it more clearly? We're using Jesus to elevate ourselves. Jesus said, "Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, then all these other things will added to you." We're not satisfied with that. We want to seek first the kingdoms of this world. And that's what Jesus was offered on the mount of temptation there right after his baptism. Satan offered him these things.

And Satan is offering professing Christians, musicians and so on that God has given talents that could be used for his glory and protected and preserved for his glory, and we decided that wasn't enough. I was always blessed when Steve Green, gorgeous voice, tenor voice that he had, would sing "God and God alone is fit to take the universe's throne. Let everything that breathes reserve its truest praise for God and God alone." Not for Steve Green, but for God and God alone.

That's not the spirit of Christian music today. The spirit of Christian music today is for me and me alone. Look at me. And so we have to have an agent. We're not satisfied to have God promote us. We want to get a secular agent to promote us into the secular world. Where what? Why is that? To get more attention for me in the me-me-me generation so I can get more selfies with more people who are interested in self-interest rather than the interest of the kingdom of God.

So again, we have to ask ourselves the question: Why did Christian artists go secular? Why did they do it? The answer is so simple. We don't even have to know, we don't have to hear their testimonies, we know why they did it. Everybody knows why they did it for themselves. More money, more fame, more attention, and in doing that, gradually, whether they intended it to happen or not, they gradually compromised their faith and gradually slid away from their sincere and direct pursuit of the kingdom of God. Very dangerous, my friends. We'll be right back.

Guest (Male): Have you ever considered what the early church was like? Many people are developing a heart longing for a greater fulfillment in our practices as Christians. A recent study showed 53,000 people a week are leaving the back door of America's churches in frustration. What is going on? Why has there not been even a 1% gain among followers of Christ in the last 25 years? Could it be that God is seeking to restore first-century Christianity for the 21st century? Jesus said, "I'll build my church." Is Christ by his spirit stirring to prepare the church for the 21st century? The early church prayed together and broke bread from house to house. They were family, and it was said by all who observed, "Behold how they love one another." Incredible. But the same can be found right now. Go to saveus.org and click Cell Church. We can revive first-century Christianity for the 21st century. It's about people, not programs. It's about a body, not a building. That's saveus.org. Click Cell Church.

Chuck Crismier: Again, I welcome you back to Viewpoint. Today we're talking about something that very few people are willing to talk about, if at all, because it comes so close to home. Where we're hiding as Christians in the shadows of the culture. Professing the name of Christ but hiding in the shadows of the culture so as not to be too open or plain about it. Unfortunately, that's what happened with so-called Christian artists. They decided to go secular and that began their problems.

And we can learn from their examples. We should learn from their examples, but we don't. They started singing in the church and then they began singing for themselves and for the world. Not for Christ, but for the world. Whether you're talking about Amy Grant, whether you're talking about Jessica Simpson, whether you're talking about BJ Thomas, whether you're talking about Whitney Houston.

Man, Whitney Houston, what a gorgeous voice. She destroyed herself. She grew up in the church, friends. She sang in the church. She would bring glory to God in that regard, but she chose to be famous. She chose to go another way and died as a result. She couldn't get any satisfaction no matter how she tried, and she died drowning in her own tub. Wow. How sad.

How many so-called Christians who were talented by God to bring the message of truth and the gospel and love through their music abandoned that foundation and decided it wasn't enough. Do you know that in many respects, friends, we all have this problem. We're tempted. We hide God and we hide from God by getting into the shadows of the culture.

It seems more comfortable there. At least there we can't be accused of being goody two-shoes. At least there we can't be accused of being, well, for God and God alone. No, I really fit in. I want to be accepted. I want this. You see the problem? It's every one of our problems. Kids in school, we call it peer pressure. It's not just peer pressure, it's culture pressure. The pressure to conform.

And it's not just our kids in school. It's we the adults. It's we the adults. And then we pressure our kids to do the same thing because we want to live out our life vicariously in them, so we pressure them to do what we weren't able to achieve perhaps, so that they can achieve the same fame or some glory in the world rather than for the Lord.

I think of a classic case. You may be familiar with the film Chariots of Fire that came out in the very same period of time that Amy Grant went secular. Crossover. And here he was, Eric Liddell, the key figure in that film and famous. He didn't strive to be famous, though. He just was because he was Scotland's fastest wing. And so his nation lifted him up to be in the Olympics.

But even there he humbled himself and he said, "No, I'm not going to lift up my name against God's name. I'm not going to run on the Sabbath. I'm going to do what God asked me to do. I'm not going to do what my nation asked me to do to get my name out there." And they couldn't understand how somebody could take that kind of a stand. But ultimately, the way God worked it out was it brought glory to him, and he did get to run but not on the Sabbath. And he set a mark for the whole world that became one of the most famous movies of all time, Chariots of Fire.

And then what did he do? Did he use that to amplify his self-importance and create a selfie world for himself? No. He went to Japan as a missionary where he ultimately lost his life because, as John the Baptist said, "He, that is the Lord, must increase and I must decrease." Have you ever had that choice to make? How did you make the choice?

Is there a time that you can remember where you had to make such a choice? I have, many times. Many times. I'm thinking right now after four years in a law firm, a small law firm in Los Angeles that had a reputation of being a Christian law firm, where only two of the people that were then—actually only one of the persons then there when I went in there was a professing Christian. Only one, and there were four of us.

After about four years, a young lady who was a secretary came to me and she said, "Chuck, you're not considering becoming a partner here, are you?" Now, the easiest thing for me to do would have been to become a partner. That would be the easiest way. After all, I had put in four years there and I was thankful for the opportunity they gave me to be ushered in and trained there as a lawyer, a fledgling lawyer. I wasn't ungrateful, but I had a choice to make.

Was I going to do things God's way or my way? Frank Sinatra said, "I'll do it my way," but I couldn't do that because I realized that God would not want me to be in partnership with unbelievers. He warns against that in his word: Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. That's not just about marriage, friends. That's about business partnerships. It's about any kind of partnership.

And so in response to that young lady's question, I was presented with a choice. I hadn't been thinking about it that much at that point because the issue of partnership had not been specifically brought to my attention, but she saw that it was coming. And God used her to bring me to attention. At the same time, the Christian Business Men's Committee magazine came out of wherever the headquarters was, and I was a member of CBMC and had spoken there at the local group in Pasadena for 10 years.

I was one of the leaders there. And here comes this paper that goes to all of the membership across the country and asks this question: If you had the opportunity to become a partner with a non-Christian and you checked out all of the due diligence, you did all your due diligence and so on, what would you do? Would you become a partner or not?

For three months, the answers poured in, and every single one of them said something like this: I'd pray about it and then I'd do it. Well, since when can you pray yourself out from under the will of God? You can't pray yourself out from under the will of God and say, "Well, the Lord wants me out there into the world. He wants me to cavort with the world out there." That's what he really wants me to do. And back in the deepest recesses of your mind, you know why you really were doing it. Because you wanted more fame, you wanted more money, and your agents told you that would make you really great.

Are you listening? So I had a choice to make, and 30 days later, I was so sick in my heart with what I saw my Christian brothers doing, saying they didn't give a rip what God had to say about partnerships, about their lives. They were going to do what they wanted to do because they thought they could make more money. I said no, and 30 days later, I resigned from that law office and started my own.

30 days later. It shocked everybody. Why did I do that? Because God spoke and said, "Be not unequally yoked together with unbelievers." We have a choice to make. Life is made up of choices, friends, and those choices are formed by our viewpoints. And as we say here every single day, viewpoint determines destiny. It just does.

So it was tough. It was tough to start out on my own. Didn't have hardly any money. I remember the part-time secretary I had. She was a pastor's wife at that time and she knew how what the struggle was and how difficult it was. She said, "Chuck, just be patient. God's going to work it out." Within two years, my practice was more successful than those guys that I had previously worked for.

People wanted me to get more lawyers, build up a law firm. I said no. God is going to be my partner. I had an associate, but I never had a partner. Why? Because God would be my partner. And as a result of that, he blessed us immensely in ways that we could have never, ever expected. But we don't trust him. That's our problem. We just don't trust God, and we want to elevate ourselves rather than allow God to lift us up.

One of the things that I ask our guests to do here before we go on the air is I said please do not promote your book. I'll promote it for you because, as Abraham Lincoln said, "He who represents himself has a fool for a client." Don't be self-promoting. So when I bring before you books that I have written, the purpose is not to promote myself, friends. These books do not make me one dime of money. All the resources go to Save America Ministries or to reprint new books. They do not come into my pocket. It's not about that. It's about a message.

And these are serious messages to prepare God's people for these times. The latest one, "The Power to Overcome: How to Triumph in Troubled Times". Friends, this book speaks specifically to this issue that we're talking about. You say, "Really? You talk about people crossing over and so on?" No, I don't have to talk about that. That's an application.

The issue is: Am I serving the world and the culture around it, or am I serving Christ? That's the issue. And we've confused it terribly. And we've justified so much of serving the world in order to sort of win the world for Christ, and the world has won us. Look at what's happened to so many of these people. Even the Queen of Pop, divorced her husband, married another guy. Even that was a disgrace to the body of Christ. It's just over and over and over again.

Look at Katy Perry, whose father was a Pentecostal minister and look at the disaster of her life as she decided to go secular, to cross over. "How much harm could there be to cross over?" Friends, when you crossover Jordan going backwards, you're making a very serious decision to avoid the promised land. When the children of Israel crossed over Jordan from Moab coming out of Egypt, they were going into the promised land.

They could not go backward. If they did, they were making a decision to leave the promised land. That's what crossover thinking does. Whether we believe it or not, whether we realize what we're doing, that's what we're doing. And that's why God judges the motivations of our hearts. He doesn't just judge certain activities. He judges the motivations of our hearts, and there's no place to hide because he sees it all.

And his word discerns the thoughts and intents of our hearts like a surgeon's scalpel. Get a copy of the book, "The Power to Overcome", friends, because it will change your life. It will help you to be strong in the Lord in the midst of these troubled times. You can triumph. But this is spiritual warfare, this is real spiritual warfare, not battling demons in the neverland.

$25 will put the book in your hands. It's on our website, saveus.org. Give us a call, 1-800-SAVE-USA. Write to us. $6 for postage and handling. "The Power to Overcome". We need that power today. You need the power. I need the power. We need it together. God bless, and be a blessing.

Guest (Male): You've been listening to Viewpoint with Chuck Crismier. Viewpoint is supported by the faithful gifts of our listeners. Let me urge you to become a partner with Chuck as a voice to the church, declaring vision for the nation. Join us again next time on Viewpoint as we confront the issues of America's heart and home.