Hey folks, this is Jesse Cope, back with another episode of the American Soul Podcast. Hope y'all are doing well, wherever y'all are, whatever part of the day you're in. I sure do appreciate you joining me, giving me a little bit of your time and attention, a little piece of your day. I will try and use it wisely. For those of y'all who continue to share the podcast with others and tell others about it, thank you. For those of y'all who continue to pray for me and for the podcast, thank you very, very much. Father, thank you for today. Thank you for you, Father, and your Son Jesus Christ and your Holy Spirit. Thank you for your love and your mercy, your grace and your forgiveness of sins. Through the merit of your son Jesus Christ alone. Help us to remember that, Father. That there is no other way to you besides Jesus Christ alone. We don't need more than him, and we can't have less than him. Be with those who are hurting, Father. Be with our veterans who are struggling. Be with those across the nation here in America and around the world who struggle with mental illness, anxiety, fear, who feel alone and abandoned. And help us to remember, Father, that at the end of the day your goal is that that none should perish. Or at least one of your goals, Father. And help us to work as long as we can, as hard as we can, to save as many as we can, to bring as many as we can to you, Father, through your Son Jesus Christ. Be with our leaders, Father, in the state, and in the pulpit, our pastors, priests, governors, mayors, council members, admirals, generals, senators, representatives, presidents, vice president, judges, prime ministers in countries where they are. Be with their wives and their children if they have them. Keep them safe. Comfort them. Help us to follow the commands of your son Jesus Christ, Father, to love you with our whole heart, mind, soul, and strength, to love our neighbors as ourselves. And please, please be with those listening to the podcast wherever they are. Comfort them. Guide them. Bless them. Strengthen their faith, strengthen their families. Thank you for them, Father. And guide my word, take your place. In your Son's name we pray. Amen. Have you made time for God and Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit today? Have you made time to read his word? Have you made time to pray? I didn't do a very good job with that today. At least not so far. So hopefully I'll do a little bit better. And if you're married, have you made time for your spouse? Do they know that you are their top priority before anything else save God and Jesus Christ? One of the ladies that I follow online that talks about marriage a lot, social media. She made that comment that a lot of us, we really we're a lot more comfortable with excuses than we are results. And it's not even that the results are that hard, it's just that we're that lazy. We would rather make excuses about why we uh are overweight or you know don't have a great marriage, or our faith is weak, or our children are not well behaved. We we don't actually want to put the time and the effort in to do those things, even if it's not hard, even if it just takes you know daily repetition. We're much more comfortable, a lot of us, with excuses. And I wonder how often I'm like that. You know, and you you think about yourself, how often are you like that? How often do you really you don't even really want the results, you'd rather just complain to somebody. We got a lot to get through today. I I so our pastor was on fire this last weekend, and my whole little uh program, whatever you want to call it, that we get in when we go to church is just chalk full of little notes. I'm just gonna kind of run through some today, maybe a few tomorrow. Uh these are either comments that he said or that kind of spurred these thoughts. You can't truly repent if you do not actually acknowledge your sin, failure, rebellion, and do not change your actions, right? No matter what we say, if we don't really change our actions or at least strive to do that each day, we we don't really care. We're not really repenting. Uh the children's message from our the man that shared with our children was great. He said, you know, what do you, how do you get right with God? What do you need to do? You know, we we acknowledge our sin to God. In prayer, we resolve not to repeat those actions, but we're gonna fail. And that's okay. We just keep on trying, keep on getting back up, keep on going back to God and Jesus Christ and confessing. Right? It reminds me of a quote I can't remember. I think it was by General Nathaniel Green in the Revolutionary War. It was something along the lines of we fight, we get beat, we get back up and fight again. Right? Anyway. I hope, I think. The bridegroom praises the bride, the beloved. Behold, you are fair, my love. Behold, you are fair. You have doved eyes behind your veil, your hair is like a flock of goats going down from Mount Gilead, your teeth are like a flock of shorn sheep which have come up from the washing, every one of which bears twins, and none is barren among them. Your lips are like a strand of scarlet and your mouth is lovely. Your temples behind your veil are like a piece of pomegranate, your neck is like the tower of David, built for an armory, on which a thousand bucklers hang, all shields of mighty men. Your two breasts are like two fawns, twins of a gazelle which feed among the lilies, until the day breaks and the shadows flee away. I will go my way to the mountain of myrrh, and to the hill of frankincense. You are all fair, my love, and there is no spot in you. Come with me from Lebanon, my spouse, with me from Lebanon. Look from the top of Amana, from the top of Seneer and Hermon, from the lion's dens, from the mountains of the leopards. You have ravished my heart, my sister, my spouse, you have ravished my heart, with one look of your eyes, with one link of your necklace. How fair is your love, my sister, my spouse? How much better than wine is your love, and the scent of your perfumes and all spices? Your lips, O my spouse, drip as the honeycomb, honey and milk are under your tongue, and the fragrance of your garments is like the fragrance of Lebanon. A garden enclosed is my sister, my spouse, a spring shut up, a fountain sealed. Your plants are an orchard of pomegranates with pleasant fruits, fragrant henna with spikenard, spiknard and saffron, calamus and cinnamon, with all trees of frankincense, myrrh and aloes, with all the chief spices, a fountain of gardens, a well of living waters, and streams from Lebanon. The Shulamite, awake, O North Wind, and come, O south, blow upon my garden that its spices may flow out. Let my beloved come to his garden and eat its pleasant fruits. You know, we may not understand all the comparisons here in Song of Solomon today, but that doesn't make them any less true. And one of the points that really strikes me, I was talking again to somebody on social media about this, is I think one thing today, probably true for husbands, but definitely I think talking to men is very true for wives. A lot of women don't understand that what makes a woman beautiful to a man is actions. And and women, if you're out there and the same is true for men, you know, good on you. I I think it probably is, based on what I I've heard, but but actions are really what define beauty. The world can look at a woman, for example, and see uh what they kind of derogatorily call a mid, right? A quote unquote mid. But if that woman desires and strives to please her husband each day, to her husband, she's a ten. Guaranteed, no doubt. In his eyes, she's a ten. By the same token, you can have a woman that looks like what the world would call a tenth, supermodel, you know, perfection. And if she's lukewarm or indifferent to her husband each day, disrespectful, I mean, maybe a two at best, maybe, in the eyes of that man. All right. Bible verses for today. Let's see. We're gonna start with Hebrews. I was gonna say chapter seven, but I think we did chapter seven last time. Yes, we did. So we're gonna start with Hebrews chapter eight. There we go. Here is the main point. We have a high priest who sat down in the place of honor beside the throne of the majestic God in heaven. There he ministers in the heavenly tabernacle, the true place of worship that was built by the Lord and not by human hands. And since every high priest is required to offer gifts and sacrifices, our high priest must make an offering too. If he were here on earth he would not even be a priest, since there already are priests who offer the gifts required by the law. They serve in a system of worship that is only a copy, a shadow of the real one in heaven. For when Moses was getting ready to build the tabernacle, God gave him this warning Be sure that you make everything according to the pattern I have shown you here on the mount. But now Jesus, our high priest, has been given a ministry that is far superior to the old priesthood, for he is the one who meditates for us. No, mediates, sorry, for us a far better covenant with God based on better promises. If the first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no need for a second covenant to replace it. But when God found fault with the people, he said, The day is coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and Judah. This covenant will not be like the one I made with their ancestors, when I took them by the hand and led them out of the land of Egypt. They did not remain faithful to my covenant, so I turned my back on them, says the Lord. But this is the new covenant I will make with the people of Israel on that day, says the Lord. I will put my laws in their minds, and I will write them on their hearts, I will be their God, and they will be my people. And they will not need to teach their neighbors, nor will they need to teach their relatives, saying, You should know the Lord, for everyone, from the least to the greatest, will know me already, and I will forgive their wickedness, and I will never again remember their sins. When God speaks of a new covenant, it means He has made the first one obsolete. It is now out of date and will soon disappear. Psalm one oh six verse thirteen through thirty one. Yet how quickly they, the Israelites, forgot what he had done. They wouldn't wait for his counsel. In the wilderness their desires ran wild, testing God's patience in that dry wasteland. So he gave them what they asked for, but he sent a plague along with it. The people in the camp were jealous of Moses and envious of Aaron, the Lord's holy priest. Because of this the earth opened up. It swallowed Dathan, and buried Abra, Abram, and the other rebels. Fire fell upon their followers, a flame consumed the wicked. The people made a calf at Mount Sinai, they bowed before an image made of gold. They traded their glorious God for a statue of a grass eating bull. They forgot God their Savior, who had done such great things in Egypt, such wonderful things in the land of Ham, such awesome deeds at the Red Sea. So he declared he would destroy them, but Moses, his chosen one, stepped between the Lord and the people. He begged him to turn from his anger and not destroy them. The people refused to enter the pleasant land, for they wouldn't believe his promise to care for them. Instead they grumbled in their tents, and refused to obey the Lord. Therefore he solemnly swore that he would kill them in the wilderness, that he would scatter their descendants among the nations, exiling them to distant lands. Then our ancestors joined in the worship of Biel at Peor. They even ate sacrifices offered to the dead. They angered the Lord with all these things, so a plague broke out among them. But Phineas had the courage to intervene and the plague was stopped, so he has been regarded as a righteous man ever since that time. Proverbs twenty seven, seven through nine. A person who is full refuses honey, but even bitter food tastes sweet to the hungry. A person who strays from home is like a bird that strays from its nest. The heartfelt counsel of a friend is as sweet as perfume and incense. Hebrews eight, you go back to verse twelve, and I will forgive their wickedness and I will never again remember their sins. That's that's encouraging, folks. Very encouraging. And I don't know why really, but the thought occurred to me as I was reading this. If you have somebody in your life, folks, that you're really concerned about knowing God and Jesus, especially if you feel like that person is a little smarter than you are, just give them the Bible. You don't have to try and defend God. You don't have to defend try and convince them. Just show them through your actions your faith and just give them the Bible. Any really, the more intelligent a person is, right, if they're really seeking the truth, they're gonna become a Christian reading the Bible. That's why you can tell whether any of these AI generators that are being created today, if they're really unbiased or not, because if an AI is truly unbiased, right, if they're just turned loose to find the truth, that AI is going to become Christian. And if it's not, you're gonna immediately know that there's a basis, a bias that the creators of that AI put in there. Because again, if that AI is truly free to seek the truth, and that's what they want, it's gonna become a Christian AI, right? So for our medal of honor today, I've got one I stole from my father. We're gonna get a little out of order right now, and I'll tell you why at the end of it. This is William John Crawford, private high-strank master sergeant, World War II, 3rd Platoon, India Company, 3rd Battalion, 142nd Infantry, 36th Infantry Division, U.S. Army, September 13th, 1943, near Altavilla, Italy. For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of life above and beyond the call of duty in action with the enemy near Alta Villa, Italy, 13th September 1943. When India Company attacked an enemy-held position on Hill 424, the third platoon, in which Private Crawford was a squad scout, attacked as base platoon for the company. After reaching the crest of a hill, the platoon was pinned down by intense enemy machine gun and small arms fire. Locating one of these guns, which was dug in on a terrace on his immediate front, Private Crawford without orders and on his own initiative moved over the hill under enemy fire to a point within a few yards of the gun emplacement and single-handedly destroyed the machine gun and killed three of the crew with a hand grenade, thus enabling his platoon to continue its advance. When the platoon, after reaching the crest, was once more delayed by enemy fire, Private Crawford again in the face of intense fire advanced directly to the front, midway between two hostile machine gun nets located on a higher terrace and emplaced in a small ravine. Moving first to the left with a grenade, he destroyed one gun emplacement and killed the crew. He then worked his way under continuous fire to the other, and with one grenade and the use of his rifle killed one enemy and forced the remainder to flee. Seizing the machine gun, he fired on the withdrawing Germans and facilitated his company's advance. Accredited to Pueblo County, Colorado, not awarded posttubously, presented May 30, 1984. The medal was originally presented to his father in 1944 at Camp Carson, Colorado by Major General Terry Allen, as Crawford was erroneously presumed to be killed in action. On May 30th, 1984, another presentation ceremony was held by President Ronald Reagan at the U.S. Air Force Academy, Colorado Springs, Colorado, to present the medal to William J. Crawford. Born May 19, 1918, Pueblo, Pueblo County, Colorado, United States. Died March 15, 2000, Palmer Lake, Colorado, United States. Buried U.S. Air Force Academy Cemetery, 3 TAC D, TAC 68, Colorado Springs, Colorado, United States. Okay, so the reason we went over that one today is the little snippet that I got from my father through his Marine Corps channels was that a U.S. Air Force cadet was reading about World War II when he stumbled upon the name of this janitor who worked at the Air Force Academy. And that turned about discovering that this janitor had actually been awarded the medal, was a Medal of Honor recipient. Now, I don't know, you know, I don't know how all that went down, but you had this Medal of Honor that had, you know, finished his career, obviously, in the Army. And he's just a humble janitor there working at the Air Force with all these cadets. And they didn't know. You want to talk about humility. And then the other part of the story, you know, they thought he was dead. They gave the medal to his parents, uh, to his father, I think. Yeah. At Camp Carson in Colorado. And they didn't discover until later that he was alive. It's just a fascinating little story. I don't even know all of it, but I wanted to share the little part that I did with y'all today. All right. I we're going to go over folks, and I'm sorry. So maybe you can listen to it at another time as your day allows. I wanted to spend one more day on Pennsylvania. This comes out of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania in 1815, the case of the Commonwealth versus Jesse Sharpless and others. This is the grand jury indictment. Jesse Sharpless, John Haynes, George Haynes, John Steele, Ethram Martin, and Mayo designing, contriving, and intending the morals as well of youth as of diverse other citizens of this Commonwealth to debauch and corrupt, and to raise and create in their minds inordinate and lustful desires, and a certain house there scandalously did exhibit and show for money, a certain lewd, obscene painting representing a man in an obscene and indecent posture with a woman, to the manifest corruption and subversion of youth and other citizens of this Commonwealth, offending the dignity of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. I want you to keep that in mind. These men pulled kids into, and adults, I assume, into this house, and they showed them this painting, right? That was an obscene painting. This is the court's verdict read by Judge Duncan. The defendants have been convicted upon their own confession of conduct indicative of a great moral depravity. The court is invested with power to punish not only open violations of decency and morality, but also whatever secretly tends to undermine the principles of society. Whatever tends to the destruction of morality in general may be punishable criminally. Crimes are public offenses, not because they are perpetrated publicly, but because their effect is to injure the public. Burglary, though done in secret, is a public offense, and secretly destroying fences is indictable. Hence it follows that an offense may be punishable if in its nature and by its example it tends to the corruption of morals, although it may be done it not be committed in public. The defendants are charged with exhibiting and showing for money a lewd and obscene painting. A picture tends to excite lust as strongly as writing, and the showing of a picture is as much a publication as the selling of a book. If the privacy of a room was a protection, all the youth of the city might be corrupted by taking them one by one into a chamber, and there inflaming their passions by the exhibition of Lashibus pictures. In the eye of the law, this would be a publication and a most pernicious one. Lord have mercy on what we're doing today, 200 years later, with pornography on the internet and everywhere else. And then you've got to remember, folks, this whole live and let live mentality that we've touted for so long, particularly on the conservative side. Look at what's done to the children that are twisted into LGBTQ lifestyles or all sorts of sexual dysfunction through pornography and so many other things. That is absolutely corrupting morals and a public offense, right? Destroying our nation. It doesn't matter if it's done in secret, folks. It doesn't matter if you steal something in secret. That doesn't matter. That doesn't make you suddenly non-punishable. We we don't do a very good job of applying the law, the standards equally today. One more little bit about this. A second justice by the name of Judge Yeats. They were so upset about this that he added another comment. Although every immoral act, such as lying, etc., is not indictable, yet where the offense charged is destructive of morality in general, it is punishable at common law. The destruction of morality renders the power of the government invalid. The corruption of the public mind in general and debauching the manners of youth in particular by lewd and obscene pictures exhibited to view must necessarily be attended with the most injurious consequences. No man is permitted to corrupt the morals of the people. Secret poison cannot be thus disseminated. Again, the point here, folks, is just because you do something in secret, every immoral act is not indictable, right? Lying is not necessarily indictable. You lie to your neighbor or something. But if the action is destructive of morality, pornography destroys morality, LGBTQ relationships destroy morality, right? The sexual perversion that we have so prevalent in our nation destroys morality. Right? Those things, the people that promote those, they're not talking about the people that the kids that went in or the adults that went in and looked, they're talking about the people that promoted that morality. That is punishable. So since I've already kept you a little long, and I apologize, folks, maybe a lot long. I wanted to recommend something again from the Epic Times. Great newspaper. I recommend it a lot if you like newspapers, especially old-style newspaper. The last couple issues have had two articles that I thought were just kind of interesting for our family. One was on Mill Prep, and the other was on shopping early for Christmas to say both were kind of saving money. I know we're all pinching pennies these days, and so they they were really good articles. At any rate, it's just another reason I like to recommend this newspaper because they have a really well-rounded paper with a lot of fascinating articles in it. If you are looking for a middle-grade fantasy family-friendly, I would humbly recommend Countryside. There's two books in the series so far, working on the third one. And if you enjoy it, if you would leave a review somewhere, that helps immensely. Also, if you're getting something out of the podcast and you feel like you can support for$3 a month,$5 a month, there's a website on Buzz Sprout where you can donate each month. And if you don't have a copy of Founders Bible, Patriots Bible, or America's Guide and Country Encyclopedia of Quotations, highly recommend that. I think that's it. Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us, and lead us not to temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory forever and ever. Amen. God bless y'all, God bless your families, God bless your marriages if you're married. God bless America, God bless your nation, wherever you are around the world. Listen, folks, we'll talk to you all again real soon. Looking forward to it.