FM Talk 1065 Podcasts
Pathways Church Pastor Travis Johnson - Jeff Poor Show - Thursday 7-18-24
♪ My heroes have always been cowboy ♪ ♪ And they still are the same ♪ ♪ Sadness or job ♪ - Welcome back to the Jet Force Show, we're up for talk. 106-5, they're staying with us on this Thursday morning. We'll be touching the show 2513-4-3-0-1-0-6. Code up in about an hour from now. Congressman Dale Strong, who's in Milwaukee right now, as I speak to you, he has sent him images and photos and videos, so stay tuned for that. He's making the rounds, but another gentleman who is also in Wisconsin this morning just wrapped up in an event with JD Vance, but pleased to bring on Pastor of the Pathway Church of Westmobile, but Travis Johnson joins us. Pastor, good morning, aren't ya? - Hey Jeff, I'm doing great. It's always great to talk to you. - Hey, thanks for coming on. Well, just your impressions, you're there. I mean, I don't know how many of these you've been to before, but I'm watching on TV and it feels optimistic, but somber, it's a much different environment, probably than what a lot of people would be used to in an RNC, but what are your impressions? - Well, first of all, I'd like to say that it's important for all of us, especially my pastor and love talking to people about Jesus, especially love to talk to the church, love the church. And I think all of us, it would be so good if we were all involved in our local government, our state, our national elections. I think sometimes there's this feeling that the church and Christians ought not be involved in politics, but what a terrible thing of Christians didn't show up and vote. We didn't pray for our leaders. And so kind of in that flow, it's just really good to be here. It's great to be involved and I'm thankful for it. - Well, and then go ahead. - No, the environment's been great. Of course, coming out, Ralph Reed is pretty incredible. His work for so long on the sanctity of life on family. So important, the nuclear family is really under attack in our world, which is crazy to me. It's a building block of society and, you know, a child that grows up with a mom and dad is such a competitive advantage in life. And having somebody like Ralph Reed really championing that and then hearing so many great voices this morning, speaking on behalf of the family and faith and the unborn life, it's been great. But yeah, it's been wonderful, especially, you know, coming out of Saturday and the assassination attempt on President Trump and just thinking that, you know, our world could be a lot different right now had that gone a different way. There's a real sense of gratitude, I would say. - And I want to get to that in a moment, but just as far as the RNC goes, and I think it's important that there is some kind of component to this event at the RNC, dealing with faith, dealing because, I mean, you know, and recently, if it's like things that get a little watered down, especially with the platform and the pro-life stuff, but are you, do you feel pretty good about at least having a say in kind of the process there, a role, a presence, if you will? - I do, you know, and I think also it's important, you know, for the church to recognize, you know, Christians, we don't, and, you know, pastors, faith leaders, you know, we're not wearing a hat. We're not wearing a hat for a party. We have a king, he's Jesus, and it's important that we show up and we speak to issues that are so important. And so, yeah, it's absolutely important that we're engaged and involved, and as far as watering down, you know, the watering down is, it's not just a political problem, it's a problem in our churches. Yeah, so it really feels like over the last three decades, you know, a lot of our churches have rounded off the corners of the gospel so that we could preach something a little more palatable, maybe grow our congregations a little bit bigger. And, but we have to preach the gospel for people to be saved, and actually what I've noticed is that, you know, when you have people that are speaking truth, good things happen, the churches I see right now that are growing, you know, the gospel faithful churches where, you know, unapologetic truth of the gospels being preached, and I think people are hungry for that right now, you know, in the church and outside of it, the truth speakers would stand up and show up, speak up. And I think so much of this, I talk about this all the time on my show, do you have a component of the public? It tends to dwell the left side of the spectrum, but where they've replaced government with God, like it is, it's not that they worship government, but they do seek answers, they seek out human beings are just predisposed to seek something greater than themselves, and spiritually, I mean, that is typically historically, especially this country been the church, but like here in the last 10, 15 years, it feels like it's kind of gone like, well, the government, I expect some kind of answer from my government, my authority figures, and they're forgetting about faith. - No, I would agree with that. In fact that, you know, I hear some people say, well, the Christians need to pray for the government, and we should, first Timothy two tells us to do that, Paul tells us to do that. The interesting thing is in America, we are the government, and we are, it's our voice. Our government is accountable to our people. My prayer is second chronicles, 714, that if my people who are called by my name will humble themselves, it will repent, it will seek his face, and we will hear from heaven, and God will heal our land, and it's important. You know, we've grasped so many things, they're just detrimental, detrimental to our country, to our communities. Things that are, things that are moral, things that are good are in oftentimes right now, in the last 15 years that you speak of are called evil. The things that are evil are being called good, and so it's so important for us to stand and speak, and, you know, if we do show up, and we do speak, people listen, if we cower back in the back, you know, there are people who listen to other voices, the wrong people will step to the stage, and so it's so important for us to be true. I had someone recently that point out a particular church that had embraced some of the ideologies that have been really kind of on the, you know, hot topic lately as a good example, and I just had to point out, but that church is completely falling apart now, it's a failed institution. And so, you know, you look at this, so many ideologies that are conquering different institutions in our country right now, it's deconstructing, it does great, a great deal of harm. - Yeah, and I know you're looking to attack any sort of domination, but the United Methodist Church is having this, well, they had it, the last few years, right? And they tried to kind of water down some of it, I think, and it's only resulted in turmoil. I don't know where they go from here, but that's what it looks like to be, you know? - No, the United Methodist Church is looking off the assets of previous faithful generations. We have some really courageous United Methodist, former United Methodist Church pastors in our community that have disaffiliated, you know, have some former United Methodist elders that are a part of our church and not part of the global Methodist Church. This is a faithful denomination. So you had, you know, in the United Methodist Church, some one million members left in this last month, thousands of churches have disaffiliated. It's no longer a church. When you discredit the Bible, then, you know, let's just talk from a very practical standpoint. If you say that the Bible is not true, and you say it on marriage, or you say it on, you know, any number of issues, then how in the world will that church even support itself? - Because the people won't tithe, they won't give. And, you know, it's terrible. You know, John Wesley, this great, great minister that founded the Methodist Church, and it's so far away from him. But, I mean, I guess that's a little bit of a different discussion, but the same thing is true. You know, it's true. We've got to stand, we've got to speak truth. I'm thankful for our leaders. I wish the church would be more engaged politically. I wish every single church, every single pastor, every single Christian in our communities, would show up and vote. There's, you know, tens of millions. There's more evangelical Christians that don't vote than do. - Well, I just, and I see that, you know, people are busy, people have, but they don't. It's just, it is a heavy lift to keep up with a lot of this, I find for a lot of votes. And I don't know what the answer to that is. I mean, they are doing the right thing. I think they put their Bible study, their scripture, their church life first. And then you've got all the rigors of life beyond that. And then politics and current affairs and things like that kind of get put on the back burner. - Well, I mean, we're on social media so much. Most of our news consumption right now is happening online. And, you know, algorithm feeds what we're looking at. So, whatever we look at, we get more of. You know, I'm interested in the health and my kids and next generation. There's some great things happening in our community. Incredible things. And there's so much to celebrate. We have some real great next generation champions that are coming up in our schools. But it takes, it takes involved parents. You know, it takes, you think about it from the church standpoint. Let's say I have, I don't have on a Sunday with my church, but you know, kids are being indoctrinated on TikTok, Instagram 24/7. So there has to be intentionality. You know, it's kind of like you send your kids to Rome. Don't be surprised when they come back Romans. You know, we've got to engage and shape. And it's a real privilege. It's such a privilege. You have to be a father, you know, to be a parent. We live in an incredible community. And so we need to be engaged. We have to be initiated people. - Joined by Travis Johnson, a pathway church in Westboro, Bill Pastor, the, one of the things you're hearing a lot and Mike, some of my colleagues are on the ground in Milwaukee talking about what happened Saturday, divine providence. The, you know, God, it worked there that he, you know, the hand of God made Donald Trump turn his head at the last minute to keep something very, very tragic from happening. I mean, what do you make of all that talk? What is, what is a kind of a reasonable discussion point there to have about all of that? - Well, you know, I don't think anybody's saying that the secret service stopped it. And nobody's saying that the police stopped it. And it looks like, you know, multiple failures along the way and, you know, challenges along the way. And, you know, I don't know how else you do describe it. You know, it was providential. Maybe some would say it's totally coincidence, but man, it's a great coincidence. You look at it, head turned. You know, it doesn't matter what your political party is, if you think about it, if President Trump had been shot and killed on Saturday, we'd be living in a very different world right now. I'm so thankful, I'm thankful that he's safe. You know, I'm concerned for President Biden as well. It is a critical time for our republic. We don't settle our differences like that in America. We have a few times. That's not how that supposed to happen. It's a great tragedy for a country when something like that happens. And I'm so thankful that President Trump is safe. He looks different to me. He sounds a little bit different to me. - Well, what is the mood? I mean, I don't know if you were there for, he's kind of made us cameos and he's walked out. He doesn't walk through. I mean, like I said, just watching it on TV, it feels very, very different. And maybe there's a time for reflection and what could have been? What would the country look like today, Pastor, if Donald Trump had been assassinated? What would we be talking about? I mean, just think about how stark the contrast is, but I mean, thinking people are kind of thinking about these things right now. - I'm sitting about four rows behind President Trump. That environment is celebratory. There's no question. Of course you get into a convention like this and that's going to be the case. But there is a very real sense that great tragedy was averted. And by his voice, his tenor, it sounds different. Of course, we've always heard, you know, President Trump didn't very open to Christians. I'm a member of the National Faith Advisory Board. You know, we've had really great access to President Trump. I prayed with him the night before the debate. You know, I was in Bedminster with him and some of the other National Faith Advisory Board members tonight that he was arrested in D.C. He's always given access to the Christians and to faith leaders. I'm thankful for that. My prayer is that he would see what happened on Saturday's providential hand of God. And the truth is for all of us. You know, let's talk about a bigger issue for all of us. Every one of us are so blessed that we breathe and we have life. And life is a gift from the Lord. I think we can all be a little more thankful for God's grace and providence in our life. We have a great community, even in the political discourse. People have different persuasions, people that have different opinions, which is almost all of us. There's hardly any two people that agree on everything. They don't. If they do it, one of them is unnecessary. But our discourse has become so rough and we make enemies of one another. And, you know, maybe this is an opportunity for all of us to step back and value one another regardless of our political opinions or, you know, opinions that happen in our communities. We're, this is the calling of Christians, you know, to love the Lord of God with all our heart, our soul, our mind, our strength, and the second. So love our neighbors, ourself. We can use some more of that. Pastor, we got to leave it there a little short on time, but stay safe. And I guess when you're coming back tomorrow, I would assume safe travels. - Man, I appreciate it, Jeff. Thank you for everything you do. And thank you for having me on, always. - Hey, thanks for making time for us. Pastor Travis Johnson there of the pathway church of West Mobile. 25134301, zero six. We'll be in touch with the show. All you got to do is text me. We'll be right back. This is the Jeff Porte Show, what I'm talking about, zero six. Five. (upbeat music) ♪ Hard to say ♪ ♪ Would you please just go away ♪ ♪ I've thrown away the blues ♪