I have that song on my playlist. So this coffee cup, hold on, ready, three, two, one. There we go. So this coffee cup was gifted to us by the boys of Mercy Me. You really got, you got that directly from, no way. Okay. Yeah. That's cool. Quick story. They reached out to me, John Schuser. He's the lead guitar player. One of them. There's two, two lead guitar players. He reaches out
through Facebook of all places. He goes, Hey, I know, I know you don't know me, Pastor Jimmy, but, Darren Tyler up at Conduit Church in Nashville is my pastor. I know Darren. That church is growing big time out there. Great guy. And he said, I'm one of the guitar players for Mercy Me. I was like, oh, that's cool. And he said, hey. So he was trying to get to Adam. So he knew I baptized him. Well, Adam was telling me that they were fans of Adam's, that they watched his No Agenda
voice. No way. So anyway, that's how that happened. So we ended up with these cups. In fact, I'll just show it around here. Nice. I actually like it. I like what it says. Wake up and do my happy dance. We should make happy dance the theme song. Come on now. Oh, man, they rocked that out. So you'll notice over there, too. Got the tavern mug on set with us. Excellent. Excellent. I have the props. Yes. And, of course, one of my favorites. Nice. That has become something that is so important
to me. Somebody reached out to Adam Curry recently, and he forwarded me the email. She lives right around the corner from the monument. No kidding. And she wrote the book on the monument. Oh, wow. And she had heard Adam on. Oh, is she the one that did the book? We carry that book. Okay.
In the Patriot Academy. story yeah she's actually sending me and adam both a copy of it because he was talking about it she saw him on rogan and said i actually wrote the book on that i'm going to send you a couple of copies of that nice and maybe someday we could meet up because we want to go back there at some point you know well go you can't go with us easter because you got to be here for easter but we're gonna know yeah we're gonna go for the shot heard around
the world 250th birthday right there in lexington and then drive over to Plymouth and do a little Easter service at the monument. Powerful, powerful. So let's say a word of prayer as we get started.
I'd like to kick off right. Father, in Jesus' name, what a privilege it is to be here with Rick, just a man who's so influenced my life on so many levels and so thankful for his friendship, but also thankful for his coaching and his mentorship in regards to all things constitutional, all things about loving our nation well, and also pulling this nation back to where it needs to
be. And so thank you for Rick and the Patriot Academy, for Kara, the kids, and the interns out there, just an amazing team doing amazing work. And so bless him, encourage him. And today we just put before you what we're doing here. We give it to you, consecrate ourselves, our thoughts, our conversation. You take it where you want it to go, and we'll riff on it as you bring it to us. We trust you in it. And Father,
for our hearers. And for those who are watching and joining us, Father, would you encourage them, give them the grace to live up in a down world. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. This is our first inaugural video version. Uh -oh. We've never done it before. You should have picked somebody better for that. It's going to be the first. Man, we just went downhill. We're going down, not up. We're supposed to be living up. We're supposed to be living up in a down world, right?
So I want to welcome you to the inaugural video version of this. And we're stepping into a new space with this on YouTube and others. And just super excited to have you today, brother. You bet, man. We're getting to do life together. You hear me say this a million times. We get to do this. Well, right now we're in a season where we're getting to do life together in this season. So excited about having you and Kara and the kids and the whole Patriot Academy crew
and team here in Fredericksburg, Texas. You guys moved from Dripping Springs. So I want you to just kick this off by telling us a little bit about your background. I'll probably ask some pointed questions. If I interrupt you, just flow with me. Just for people who are watching or listening, because we'll have this both audio and video, I want them to get to know who you are, and I really want them to connect with the
Patriot Academy. So tell us how it started. Just give us a quick background on that, and then why you ended up in Fredericksburg instead of Dripping Springs. I think you and Annette are a big reason. I think God was bringing us together, man. This church, this whole environment, this whole group, I've never felt more at home. I mean, there's no way to tell all the different times you have said something that my family looks, we all look around and look at each other
and go, we've been saying that for years. He said it exactly like we say it, you know, and just over and over and over again. I mean, even the title of your show, you know, we re -produce or re - I guess, did Zig Ziglar's Raising Positive Kids in a Negative World. It's just like the same kind of theme, right? It's like all this other stuff's going on in the world that's bad. We'll show you how God's going to make good out of it. It's just that same attitude. So anyway,
it's like brother from another mother, man. I mean, that's all the time. Even the other day, there was one of your sermons. It was probably three weeks ago. You said something about your mom being a teller and talking about the whole... you know, fake, uh, not, you don't handle fake money. You handle the real thing. So you recognize the fake money, exact same thing with my mom, bro. Exact same thing. I even tell that story
in one of my constitution classes. Cause I use the example of study the actual constitution, not the Supreme court opinions that are not the real thing. And I tell, and I'm like, you're telling that story and cameras looking back at
me going. that's gaga too that's gaga story it is just amazing it happens all the time and so yes i'm telling you man and it's just a holy spirit thing adam and i were talking about the other day it's like all these things where the holy spirit just brought so many of us together for such a time as this and it's almost like it it saves time it's i don't know it's like we're starting in the same place we don't have to try to figure out how to work together It's
just been a natural dovetail. Oh, good way to put that. My word for this year is convergence. That's it. And it literally is this merging, this converging of people, place, things, time, season, culture, what God's doing in the earth right now. It's like this convergence of streams, and I'm just catching the waves. I always say I don't generate the waves, just catch them when they come by. And then when you ride that one out, you paddle back out and catch another one.
And that's really what we're in right now. not having to fight it you know you've ever been in a season where it's like you're trying to make it happen trying to make it it's just not working it just won't come together it's the opposite of that It's like everywhere we're turning, it's just smooth. It's hitting that wave exactly right. It's so natural as breathing because we're not trying to generate or make things happen. It's just God is putting these things in front
of us. I always have called it, for years, the favor factor. He's putting these things in front of us. We simply step into them. And the door opens, you step through it. It's like when he got Peter out of jail, right? Or Paul, Paul and Silas, when they were in jail. And the door's open. What do you do? You walk through the door.
door that's open right no effort they weren't having to bang on the wall they weren't they didn't have a file trying to right right they had bars back there i don't know how they did it back in the first century but but they were able to just walk out because the doors open and i feel like that's what we're doing right now on every level amen well that's uh that's the way we feel being here you know we've been over in dripping springs for 30 years my wife
grew up there i grew up in the dallas area and wiley and um you know when i came down here for law school and we met got married it was only three years in that I ran for the legislature. And so we ended up in the state house at a very young age. And so all of a sudden we're thrust into this political world and trying to figure
it out. And what really shocked us was how many people in that arena We're just constantly finger to the wind, kind of blown by whatever was going on with no real conviction, no plumb line of this is what I'm here for. This is what I'm fighting for. And so we decided, you know what, we need to raise up a generation that has a conviction oriented compass of what right and wrong is and how to walk that out in the political arena. That was where our passion was. And so that's
when we started Patriot Academy. So it's been 25 years of training young people. And just a few years ago, we started. training old people too. So all of us, every age, you know, yeah, that's right. That's right. It was because people our age were saying, where's our program? You know, we're watching these kids get this foundation. What can we do to come participate? So now we've
got the coach program. We got the youth leadership program and we'd always wanted to have a campus, but we, you know, we'd, cause we'd bounce around to state capitals. We do the programs in state capitals around the country. And we always wanted to have a campus cause we knew we've had the, we get the kids for one week at a time and you can only do so much. And a lot of the kids would come back three, four or five years in a row. So we could build. on it, but we always dreamed
of having them for a year. Our kids went through a program like that over the last, I guess, five years. We were sending them to Hot Springs, to Tim Brooks' church there. Paul Kern had them for a year. What I saw him do with them when he had that year, and we think we're pretty decent parents. We're not the best, but we're not terrible. Like I was saying with Zig Ziglar's Raising Positive Kids in a Negative World, we did all of that.
But by sending them to Paul and what they call Leaders Academy up there in Hot Springs and watching their growth over that year, the interaction they had with other kids, the iron sharpening, the grounding, the focus on the Lord. I call CBI's casual but intentional meetings. Yes. Those are the ones you have after class. Yeah, around the fire or just at lunch or whatever it might be. Yeah, in the dorm or whatever, or in your case, the mini home. Yeah. To me, that's where
a lot of life happens. I always say a lot of what we do in church is an excuse to get us together. Exactly. I mean, all the programming, all that is all great, and it's important. It has good content, but it's really the interaction and the conversation to happen after you've been in an environment where you've been taught, where you're learning something, where your mind gets pumped, and you're like, I've got to talk to somebody about this. Even our Constitution classes
are like that. I tell everybody the magic happens after the video. Play the video. That's the excuse to come together, kind of like what you're talking
about, but then it's the fellowship. afterwards where the iron sharpening iron happens and and even we tell people at the campus you know we're building independence hall we're doing all this stuff but the buildings are the carrot man that's just getting them there so that you can do exactly what you're talking about do life together and have those moments of inspiration so we saw that in our own kids saw the result of what happened when they did that one year program said we've
got to do this for these patriot academy kids that are coming through the program so that's the reason we ultimately wanted to have a campus And Kara said Fredericksburg from the beginning. I mean, even when we first started looking, she's like, Fredericksburg, I mean, the Holy Spirit was just drawing us here. I was going to ask, is it something she felt like the Lord was leading?
We hadn't even been here that much. I think we had visited here maybe once or twice over 30 years, but she just knew this was the place. And, of course, my reaction was, too expensive, there's no way, you know, it's not going to work. And so we looked all over the state. She looked at 200 different places, ranches, you know, and we did a whole tour of Comedy and Constitution every night, 17 nights all around Texas, and every night I'd say, Somebody wants their ranch
to be the legacy of Patriot. We got a couple offers, like down at the border, no thanks. Midland, we love Midland, Odessa, but not that much. And then the Lord opened up Fredericksburg and gave us this place. And man, it's been fast and furious for the last, it's only been 26 months now. But, man, it's been amazing. I literally live two miles past you. So you've seen us every step of the way. I've seen it every step of the way, driving by there. At first, it was like, what
is going on over there? I mean, because when you drive a road every day, you notice everything. Right, right. Especially if it's something different. And we were like, man, something's going on there. And we watched and watched. I actually remember hearing you the first time, Rick, was at the Lincoln Reagan dinner. Oh, yeah. That's three years ago. That's right, before we even had the land. Yeah, the first time you spoke there, I think it was the first one they had here, it
was an inaugural. And I remember, of course, I love Laura and everybody else, but I was like... That guy, I don't know what he does, but I need to be in his proximity. And I look for that. That's something all my life. I always look for people that had something I wanted. Then I just go after it. You know, whatever. I look them up online nowadays. You can do a lot of things digitally. I got mentors all over the world. They don't even know they're my mentor. Right,
right. But that's the beauty of the digital world. There's negative and positive. There's positive a lot if you use it right. But I just remember when you all were talking about coming to Fredericksburg. Yeah, yeah. That night, I mean, we literally threw it out there. You threw the carrot out. Yeah, so we'd love to be. In fact, one of the guys came up that night, Steve Morosevich lives here, and he came up and said, if you come to Fredericksburg. I'll write the first $10 ,000
check. So I have that piece of paper. He wrote it on a piece of paper, and I texted him the other day, and he did. As soon as we got the place, he donated. And I told him the other day, I said, man, I found that piece of paper where you wrote that down. I said, we're going to frame it and put it at the campus. But anyway, so that night we didn't have the place yet. I think it's interesting, though, that you felt that draw. I think we might have met briefly that night.
I can't remember. I know you did the prayer that night because I was the same way. I was like, man, that guy's on fire. So think about that. That would have been another year and a half. before we came and visited the bridge. And I remember that first Sunday in November of 2020. That would have been November of 2023. And we sat there. It was Cameron and Kara and me. We were the only three out of the family that was there. And they were on both sides of me. And
your sermon, man. I'm telling you, they're elbowing me, bruising every rib. Every five minutes you're saying something, they're like, did you hear that? Did you hear that? And I'm looking around for a camera going, is this Candy Camera? What's going on? Who is this guy? Everything you said. And then you put John Cooper's book up, Wimpy, Weak, and Woke. I took a picture, sent it to him, and I'm like, this guy's preaching from your book. And it was just, I mean, it was so
obvious. I mean, we knew that Sunday. It took that one sermon. We said, this is done now. We waited. We were like, okay, let's just make sure. Yeah, we'll make sure he's for real. Yeah, make sure he's for real. He didn't just do that for us. Right, right. And you didn't even know who I was. I mean, you wouldn't have known. Well, think about it. In a real sense, and I say this a lot, I say, if you come to this church, you're
jumping on a moving train. Exactly. I mean, so you kind of got to get up to speed a little bit to jump on it, right, or rip your arms off. So you guys came in as we were really moving down the street. track. Um, God had just so arrested my heart about what's going on in culture, not just politics, culture in general. Politics is a part of a much, you know, it's a cog in a big wheel, right? Or a spoke in a big wheel. And, um, but it just so happens that was more in the
line with what you were doing. And so I can't not talk about that thing. The Lord really convicted me of a number of years ago. We were in Abilene,
Texas. I i called up the mayor of abilene texas back then it was mayor grady barr and i asked his the gatekeeper his secretary and she was the gatekeeper i said i'm a pastor at you know a church in town just moved here and i would like to meet with the mayor and she's like well what would this be about i mean she just was like a total gatekeeper and it was interesting because i got a sense of pushback like I got the feeling that when pastors called the mayor,
it was probably for a negative thing. Yeah, just chewing him out for something. It was a complaint. Yeah. And I just told her, I said, I just want to meet with him and just be a blessing to him and encourage him and thank him for his leadership in the city. She said, oh, well, we got an opening this week. And I mean, it happened that quick. The defenses came down. Oh, totally. And I walked into the office. She was super sweet. I met her. I sat down with Mayor Barr. And I was a little
nervous. I'm younger. I was a lot younger. And I'm like, I felt really led by the Lord to go be a blessing. How can we support instead of always tear down, right? And so I stepped into his office. He has a guard up a little bit because he's like, what's this guy want? And I just sat in his chair. And by the way, the chair like set me a foot lower than him. It was really bizarre because he's a short man of stature. So he had this tall chair. He arranged the room so he could
feel. His chair popped up and everything. And I'm sitting there looking up at him like a little kid. Alice in Wonderland. Totally weird. But I was much younger than him. I would have done that anyway. Posturing is sit below him to honor him. But I just said, I'm just here. I'm a new pastor in town and I want you to know our church, we've been praying for you and praying for our
city, praying for our city council. And we want to know how, I'd like to take back to our church just some prayer points so that we can remember to be lifting you up. And I said, because I don't think that government and churches should be at odds. I think we can work together to make this a better place. And I sang his song apparently because he invited me. Wow, man. Met with him for the next year, every month, at least once a month to go pray. in his office. I gave him
the scripture that first day. It was a Proverbs 11, 11. It says, by the blessing of the upright, the city is exalted, but by the blessing of the upright, the city is exalted, but by the mouth of the wicked, it is torn apart. Man, you were way ahead of the game. Oh, wow. He said, do you have that on a piece of paper? And he took out a sticky note, and I wrote it down for him. He stuck it on his desk. And I didn't even know
if he's a believer or not, a Christian. He said he sometimes prays, but, you know, you just don't know. Is it God fear or what? So we built this relationship together. And what he did, he started, I'd go, I'm coming to his office. He's ready for me next time. He had blueprints of the city, city plats and rolling them out saying, here's our flood issues. And here's where we got issues. We got to fix these creeks. And we've got a no smoking ban coming up, being placed before city
council. It's going to be a war. I mean, so he started laying out everything. Well, that was my first step into engaging culture outside the four walls of the church. And that did something in me. The day that he resigned, he was going to resign. He was getting older. He was ready to take. take his leave. He called me. He said, you're the first. I haven't even told my wife. He said, I'm calling you, Jimmy, because you've walked with me this last year and a half, two
years. And he said, I want you to be the first to know, and I want to invite you. I'm going to make it public tomorrow. I'm going to do a press conference, and you'll be the only non -press in the room. Would you come with me? And so I stepped in there, and I realized all that did for me as a young man is it ignited something in my heart to say, You know, we had a small church. We didn't have a big footprint, but we
had, because of this, we had big influence. And I realized if you can influence the influencers, it doesn't matter how big your footprint is. Yeah. And that's being salt and light. If you can get their ear, get their heart, you can influence the world, right? Amen. So that started me down that track. So that's my background. That's a totally different mindset than most. what most are taught in seminary, right? It's like that separation is truly a separation. We don't even
go in that arena. We stay inside the four walls of the church. Yeah, you're going to run off your tithers. You're going to run off people. And I just remember... And that was before I did this, obviously. I did go to seminary, and I heard those kind of things. Fortunately, my undergrad was with the Doug MacArthur Academy of Freedom at Howard Payne University. They were all poli -sci, and they were pro get involved, get your hands dirty. So I think that was probably
where that seed was planted in me. So anyway, good things. I love it, man. So why Patriot Academy? I want to ask you this question. I was a youth pastor for 15 years. I'm still one. I don't tell
anybody. I'm totally still that mindset. older now helps to be a guitar player you know the whole package right total total youth pastor guy all these a clipboard and a whistle and i'm good to go but uh so so the next generation generational transfer is a big thing in my heart always has been uh i remember we had a saying touch the camp touch the campus touch the world yeah Or touch the campus, reach the world. One of those. Reach the campus, touch the world. I think that's
what it was. There it is. And that was one of our mottos. And so we did a lot of campus ministry back in the day, whether it was junior high, middle school, junior high back then, middle school and high school. But then we went on college campuses all over the place. And so I'm curious about what led you to begin to think about the next generation. You know, it really was frustration at the Capitol and realizing. I'm probably not going to change hearts and minds here. They're
already dug in. They're already kind of in their way. So how do we raise up the next generation better? And Psalm 78 started kind of being a
guidebook. It was like, okay, that whole chapter is essentially how to pass the torch of freedom and not... fumble the baton as you're as you're passing it and what what the negative effects are if you don't pass it well and how you can get the positive if you do and so we even named we're called Patriot Academy today but the foundation's actually called the Torch of Freedom Foundation because it's literally about passing the torch and then Patriot Academy is just a DBA of of
that so that that image in my mind was there of okay how do we do this well how do we pass the torch intact so we got to preserve it to do that And then how do we teach them how to receive the torch and then inspire them to preserve it? So that sort of became the whole idea. And that's why initially it was with the youth. But then there was this quote by John Jay. He was the first chief justice of the U .S. Supreme Court. And he said that you've got to have every
generation know. And if they know their rights, then they'll perceive when they're violated and be the better prepared to defend and assert them. But he had this phrase. He said, teach the rising generation to be free. And I thought that was always, for the first 10, 15 years of what we were doing, I thought, well, that's the youth.
And then I started realizing, actually, every generation, there's a rising generation in our generation, in every generation, and just how civically ignorant we were and how the church had become civically ignorant too. Well, biblically ignorant too, right? You got 9 % reading the Bible, but very civically ignorant and going, okay, we can change that. Ignorance is curable. We just have to... be willing to take the time
to dive in, study these things. And when we do, and that civic literacy goes up and biblical literacy goes up, then truth, actually people, you know, we always say truth will set you free, but you got to know the truth. So finding that truth, raising that literacy just became a total
mantra for us. Wow. I love that. When I met you, well, actually the first time I heard you speak, and you were talking about Patriot Academy, I was like, this was exactly my mentality for so many years is we've got to continue to raise up. Of course, being in the church world, I'm a professional Christian, as Alan Jackson says. Being in the church world, we've watched churches grow old, not so into the next generation, not raise up the next generation, train them in the
way they should go, right? And when you're old, you won't depart. They didn't do that. And so what happened was these churches grew old, and then their light went out. Yeah. They were gone. They started to literally die, die off. And you saw that generation getting essentially stolen by the enemy because they weren't taught those things. So when they go into the college or wherever and all of the negative about the church, negative
about God, and they're challenged. I mean, a lot of those professors, they literally set that out as their goal to basically rob you of your faith. I'm going to show you why you've been lied to. And then if you're not ready to give an answer like we're supposed to be. You feel stupid, you feel unequipped, you know, and then you're mad at your parents and your pastor and everybody else for not equipping you, so you
walk away. So that's why you ended up with... I mean, I saw studies that said 80 % of Christians were walking away from the faith in college, and it's because we failed to prepare them to be ready to give an answer. Wow. You know, I've always heard this statement, because that's so spot on. You know, we're one generation away from whatever. That's right. Paganism. That's
right. Loss of our freedoms. We're one generation away, which means if we're not willing to, as those forefathers had these great... vivid imagery of laying down in the mud so that the next generation can walk over them. And so we've got to be, and I've always said it this way, we can't be the ceiling for the next generation. We got to be the floor. We got to be the launching pad. So we hand them the baton. And at this level where
they continue to rise and run. And so I brought on Pastor Brian, as you know, a year and a half ago. And everybody's goo -goo over him. And here's the deal. It's so exciting to me is I saw the call of ministry on his life 20 -plus years ago and invited him to come aboard. And he became our youth pastor and just took off. And he's one of those guys that I've been willing to lay down in the mud for because I see this greatness in him. Him and others like him. We've got others
in ministry all over the place. But to be able to have him here close now, you know, I've hired him three times. I said, dude, you cannot leave three times. This is it, man. This is it. But it's because we've walked together. Anytime he left, he left with blessing. He left with honor. And he's returned with honor. There were seasons probably that he needed. Absolutely. That convergence you were talking about, all those things he went and did, I bet I have no idea what he was doing.
Nine years of business. There's no doubt. In the business world. And military and all of that. All of it came back together. And so I just see that. That's so important that we continue to raise up the next generation and pour into them. So thank you. Too much of ministry dies because we don't, right? You get these personality types, and God does great things through them, but then when they're gone, that whole thing dies because they didn't pass the torch well. They hang on
to it. Yeah. They're not willing to let go. And that's where I'm at with Pastor Brian. I'm just giving him more and letting him run with WWJD, our discipleship core class. Dude, those Wednesday nights, man, I've been bragging about on y 'all all over the country because it's exactly what the church needs. Because that depth that y 'all are going into is preparing us as the congregation to be able to go be ready to answer whenever these things come up and to just be better disciples
to go live that stuff out. So y 'all are doing a phenomenal job. know I've told you this in front of other people at church, but... It always seems like everywhere I've been before, if the pastor's not there and the second guy gets up, you're like, but not here, man. It could be either one of y 'all walking up on Sunday morning. You know you're going to be fed well. You're just blessed to have him as your assistant pastor. What's his official title? I don't even know.
Executive pastor. Executive pastor. Okay, got it. Yeah, yeah. No B team here, brother. No B team. That's exactly right. And that's it, empowering people to rise up and lead. I was taught by good leaders that the best thing you can do is bring smarter. better people around you. Exactly. And then that'll elevate you as well. So iron sharpens iron, right? Amen. Amen. So let's continue. Let's get back on with you because, man, just super excited to have you. And this won't be the first
time, brother. We're going to have you on as a regular because I think it's important. So you've been called America's constitutional coach. How did that title come about and where did that come out of? We just, man, we made it fun actually to study the constitution. So more people were willing to, which was a boring topic to me in high school. in college. I hated history. I hated government. I slept through that. Then I found David Barton. Somebody gave me a cassette tape
of David Barton. I'm going to show my age here, cassette tape. All of a sudden, I was looking at history through the eyes of the people that experienced it. He was so good at telling the stories, making you feel like you were going in a time machine. I adopted that from him. Then being raised on Zig Ziglar and him being one of my mentors, more his style of teaching. David was so good at this. When I first went to work for David, Wow, 2001, so 24 years ago. He said,
Rick, you don't need to be me. Don't try to just duplicate exactly what I'm doing. Take what I've got and then put your style on it, right? Go be you. Just use the content, but do it in your style, which my style is very different. I'm more of a Zig Ziglar type, motivational exhorter. David's more professor -like, right? And so we had two totally different styles, which ended up for wall builders being great because it made
our radio show alive. And then I'd go talk to these Amway groups and big conventions and sales groups and people that wanted it to be more of a motivational thing. Anyway, so that turned out to be a really good combination for what... made the Constitution classes entertaining and exciting. And then we went to the historical sites and brought it to life. And so we put, man, we put so many people through the Constitution
classes. And then it became during COVID, that's when we got the moniker America's Constitution Coach because all these people were going, okay. Can they do this to us? You know, does government have the power to do this? What's constitutional? What's not? People, for the first time, really start asking questions. You know, they actually, instead of trying to get them to pay attention, it was at their front door. This is why I say we don't chase politics. It showed up at our
front door. It showed up at our front door. Exactly like you said. So that really opened the door. We went from, I think right before COVID, we had about 200 Constitution coaches. Oh, my. We now have 30 ,000. Oh, my. So it just exploded because of. The first time that most people had experienced the Buddha government on their neck in America and became so close to seeing everything crumble that all of a sudden people woke up and
said, you know what? Like you said, it's one generation away, and I haven't done a good job of learning this myself, and I certainly haven't done a good job of teaching my kids. Where can I go to learn it? And so that's where Patriot Academy was. I think God had been preparing us, obviously, for 20 years to be ready for that moment and step into that gap and teach that. And it's been fun, honestly, to see those light bulbs come on, see people get excited. People
hungry for it. Yeah, yeah. It's one thing to teach a crowd that's not really hungry. You're working. Oh, yeah, man. But when you teach people who are hungry, it pulls it out of you. I'm telling you. That's when a teacher, a coach. You're in the sweet spot. Because normally, and you probably like this too, when I go speak at a group, I always have to tell myself, okay, if just one person gets it. If one person gets it, that's why I'm here. Get yourself going. Yeah, and that's
enough for me to do it. But now it's like. I mean, everybody's really into it. Well, listen, we did biblical citizenship here, and, bro, that's one of the best things we ever did. By the way, I don't know if I even told you this, but we actually leveraged the energy from biblical citizenship. We did eight weeks here at the church, had phenomenal turnout for that. Yeah, that was awesome. Nearly 200 people every night. And that's when we were like, this is the time to drop the WWJD because
we've got people in the habit of coming. So you just segued right off. Springboard from that. We call that movement in church world where you want to move from one thing to another and not let this gap happen because people lose momentum, get out of the habit. But that class was so... For me, this is where I learned about the National Monument to the Forefathers. Kirk Cameron did a phenomenal job teaching around that thing. I had not seen the movie Monumental. I've seen
it now since. But he basically took what he learned from that and compressed it into a phenomenal teaching on this amazing monument. He's such a gifted teacher, too. He really is. Again, making it fun, making it entertaining. applicable to our lives right instead of just this old monument it's like what do these things mean and then he takes it and goes okay here's what we need to do with it i love kirk man he's so good at that So good. So I do have some paraphernalia
on here for a reason. Awesome. And one is because when I started really reengaging culture and stepping into the space, I realized how much I didn't know or had just forgotten from college and high school. It's been a minute. So at my age, and I was like, I need resources. I need help. And with you coming along, so I'm going to show some things. First of all, I like this book pretty good. I might recommend this. You better stay away from that guy, man. You'll be
on Right Wing Watch's most hated list. I read this on the airplane. I thought we were going down. So this is a great book by Rick. What moved you to write this book, by the way? Because everyone needs to read this book, literally. If you're stepping into this space for the first time and you're beginning to relearn and re -remind yourself, this is one of the best books out of everything I've read. Thank you, man. I'm not just blowing smoke. I really mean that. It helped Lee. actually
turned me on to this and lit him up. And I said, if it's lighting Lee up, I got to read this book. And I did. In fact, I read most of it on an airplane. And so what, what inspired you to, to get this? Well, two, two things. First of all, Newt Gingrich gave a talk on the declaration of independence that just lit me up. Like that made me want to break down. what I call in the book, the frame, freedom's frame, and really understand how to
apply the Declaration to today. And then David Barton's book, Original Intent, is so good, but it's so big and so thick and so scholarly that I knew that most people like me... would not get through it. Which that would be me. Yeah, so I was like, I need a dumbed -down version of Barton's original intent. Remember those yellow books? Yeah, it was like the Cliff Notes, right? For dummies. Constitution for dummies. That's what I should have called it. Declaration for
dummies. Put a little cover on it. Yeah, so those two things converged to write that book. And I had actually kind of, you know, we talked about Zig. I had sent Zig back in... I don't know, 93, 94. I had sent him a book that I had written, and I sent him the book, and I asked him to do the foreword on it. And he calls me, and he says, he said, Rick, I know three things. There is a God, I'm not him, and neither are you. Burn the book. I was like, what? I was like 25 years
old, and it was such an arrogant book. Honestly, I'd gotten into Tony Robbins and a lot of this stuff, and a lot of it was humanist, almost new age. I had my scripture in there, but it was very clear I was leaning too far into that stuff, and Zig knew. He instantly recognized it, and he was like, Rick, I'm telling you, when you get a little older, you're going to wish you hadn't written this book. Of course, I hang up the phone, and I'm thinking, oh, the old man
just doesn't get it. Jimmy, it wasn't six months. I was trying to get every copy and burn it. I'm not kidding you, man. And so 10 years later. No, it would have been longer than that. It would have been almost 13 years later. I had been seeing Zig on the circuit. Like, I got to open for him at this event. And I'm doing all these. And when I opened for him at this big event in Houston. Well, I was nervous because it was a big crowd. It was like 7 ,500 people. I'd never spoken in
front of that many people. And I'm going on right before Zig Ziglar. And so I'm backstage, nervous as I can be, and Zig could tell. And so he comes over and he prays for me. And so I go out and give the speech. I get a standing ovation. I come back, and he comes over to me, and he goes, now you're ready to write that book. Wow. And so I'm in tears, you know. Oh, my gosh. I write
Freedom's Frame. I send it to him. And actually, it was a couple years later because every time I'd see him, he'd be like, how's that book coming, Rick? How's that book coming? I'm working on it. I'm working on it. We need people to go to us. Don't we? Yes, no doubt. And I, and I probably, I don't know if I would have actually finished if it hadn't been for him continuing. Cause he's my hero. You know what I mean? This is like the guy that I was raised on. Yes. I mean all of
that. And so anyway, when I sent him the book and he sent me back the forward. Bro, I don't remember where I was in the country, but I remember being in a hotel room, and I was bawling like a baby. It was just like that. For him to write that forward 15 years later, after he had told me with that first book I wasn't ready, it was a big deal. Anyway, so that all led to writing that book so that people would rediscover these
principles and declaration. And like Zig says in the foreword, it's basically for every citizen. just to understand the principles that made America great. It's very much like the monument. And then what can you do about it? So a lot of it's action steps too. It's beautiful. And tell us where anybody's watching or listening. PatriotAcademy .com. There you go. PatriotAcademy .com, easiest place to get it. And in fact, we've got a new
course coming out later this summer. We're going to launch it on July 4th, of course, because we're... As of today, while we're recording, we're 411 days from the 250th birthday of the nation. So it's the countdown is there. Yeah. And so we want to launch this new course. We're going to call it a blueprint for rebuilding liberty with truth, justice, and the biblical way. So I'm a Superman fan, right? Truth, justice, and the American way. But the American way is essentially
the biblical way. That's how the nation was built. And so it'll basically be an upgrade to Freedom's Frame, but in a video course that'll kind of like biblical citizenship, but a shorter one, like a four -week one. Something you can do online, too. I mean, that's beautiful. And the goal is to just talk about for the next year the Declaration so that on the 250th, July 4th, everybody can
revive those principles of the Declaration. Some of the most inspirational words for me stepping back into this world after being... out of it for so long and then when the lord totally brought me back in where the declaration of independence is that preamble i mean that opening is like it's genius i've it's one of those beautiful pieces of literature i've ever read to where when i read it i get emotional yeah i can barely read i think i think jefferson was absolutely
god inspired to do it i was at a rotary club this morning and i had forgotten that their first thing that they you know they do their little their four step thing that they put and the first one is first Is it true? And so after they did that, I just springboarded off that, and I was like, you guys realize we're about to celebrate the Declaration of Independence. We hold these truths. And if you don't build on truth, the
whole culture falls apart. And that's what happened to us as we started buying into moral relativism. There is no truth. Anything goes. Everybody has their own truth. Now, wait a minute. UBU. Yeah, UBU, whatever that is. Whatever, it's okay. So getting back to we hold these truths. truths to be self -evident is critical. Not my truth. Not my truth. These truths. The truth. Oh, brother. Oh, get me going on that. Here's another good one. I want to get some resources to people.
This was recommended to me by another pastor friend. America's God and Country by William Federer. Bill Federer is a national treasure. That guy, when I have him on radio, you ought to get him on your show, man. When I have him on, I just ask one question, and 30 minutes later, the show is full of incredible information. I'm telling you. You've got to be intimidating. He's like Barton, walking encyclopedia, man. I'd be
like a little kid, you know. He's great, but great guy, and he has the most random stuff. Like, you want to know about St. Nick and how Christmas and all that? He will just, he's got it all, man. He just gives that whole history. He's got some good Instagram shorts right now where he does these little shorts like that. He's great. Totally awesome. Now, here's another great one. David and Tim Barton. Yeah, man. This one is, man. I got to get you the volume two.
So they've got volume two out. I knew that. And they're working on volume three. But, man, that's gold right there, the American story. I mean, what I do, they're doing it in sections. They're doing it in sections of time. And, again, so good, so rich, chock full. I mean, you can't go wrong on this. It responds to so many of the lies about who we are as a people and our history. It's just really good. Here's one. This is by
Gary DeMar. Yeah, Gary's great. Another great book, America's Christian History, The Untold Story. Love is Approach. Actually, this was one that Kurt Cameron was recommending. And it's so unusual for Gary to have a book that's less than six inches thick. So that's a great one to have because most of his are anchor weights. And there's pictures. And there's pictures. For guys like us. So the country boy, I can get through
it, yeah. And I have to tell you, one of my favorites that is my go -to ongoing, and this thing is a beast, it's the Founder's Bible. Oh, man. And this was, I mean, it's the New American Standard text of the Bible, but interspersed throughout it are vignettes and short articles on all things founding fathers, all things original documents. Biblical application. I mean, it really is based.
Basically, I think it's the best thing David Barton... has put out in his whole life because when I read that and I read through it every year and I'm able to read the scripture and then read about somebody in history using that scripture in life, then it makes me start thinking, okay, how can I use this scripture in life? So it just gets us in the right mindset. The Bible's practical for everyday life. I love his treatment of the monuments too. He has some great things on the
monuments. If you've ever been to DC, which I've been many times. And even the artwork, there's such good, the artwork in there is incredible. highly recommend how can people get this patriot
academy .com or wallbuilders .com you get it either place and there's a digital version too so you can get it on your you know like when i'm on the plane i read it on because that thing's heavy because it's mine's hardback too so it's even heavier uh but the yeah so you can do the app or you can um get that at patriot academy .com and it's a great present, too, to just give to people. Just like Adam giving it to Rogan. That was huge, man. This was a gift from Jonathan
Edwards gave this to me. Did he really? Oh, I love it. Such a blessing. And he did a great job with Biblical Citizenship, man. He did. He did. So, man, we're talking about a lot. You guys, we had you here to do the Comedy and Constitution show. That was fun, yeah. That was amazing. Brad's a master. He's a master communicator. Brad Stein, he knows how to, he's a master of rhetoric, and he's so good at having you laugh in one minute and then just, oh. Punching you in the gut with
some truth. Love Brad. Twice I was on my guard. I was like, something's coming. Right, right. He is that good, and he is brilliant. He is a great thinker. You should have seen him with the Moms for Liberty. We had 150 of them out at the campus a couple weeks ago. Oh, my God. That was the week we were out. You know how he picks on everybody? It was just hilarious, man. Just imagine him and 150 Moms for Liberty. I was going to say, in that environment, I can
imagine. I've got thoughts. We love them, though. We're so thankful that their leaders come to our church. And God has done something really unique in this convergence thing we were talking about. The Lord brought you guys here, and we just knit together. We knit hearts. But he also brought the Moms for Liberty here. He's brought the J6ers here. A lot of the J6ers here, yes. And I got to meet Luke Cooper. Coffee or Cooper?
Coffee or Cooper. Yeah, coffee. But Luke and we're going to go get coffee and get some time together. He's doing a podcast now with Laura Logan. I didn't know that. Yeah, they just started this. He's moved here. That's awesome. Yeah, he lives here now. When you stop and look at who God has brought here, Justice Devine, he pops in and out of here. Yeah, great guy. He loves coming over here. He comes out and hangs out. My favorite judge in the whole country.
Even more than, well, Clarence Thomas and Justice Devine are close, but he's on our Texas Supreme Court. We need him. Stay in the course. Even the body of church, even the church here, I don't think there's a profession. or a background not represented in this church. I agree. You know what I mean? I agree. It's just a wealth of experience. We've got an international arms dealer. I mean, we've got a guy who sells jets to Nicaragua and
Brazil. It's mind -bending. Every Sunday I stand up there and, first of all, I think, I get to do this. This is such a privilege. Well, I think that, too, is going to be part of the next chapter, is those people within our church that have so much to give and so much wisdom. And the reason Patriot Academy is here is to bring the kids here for those people to mentor. And I don't know how it's all going to work out or exactly how it's going to play out, but I just see that,
man. Because you can see the... it's almost like they're pregnant with purpose that they that not not for themselves right like i i tell kids sometimes you're pregnant with purpose but That's for what God's going to do in their life. These people are pregnant with purpose to pour into those kids. You know what I'm saying? It's like, anyway, I don't know how that's all going to play out. In our men's breakfast, our legacy men's breakfast, we had like 127 at the last
one. And then of all people, Pastor Leon Benjamin from the White House Office of Faith shows up randomly because he had done a podcast. He was here with Laura, right? Yeah, he was with Laura. So Joe Burkett and David Young. Drag him to a men's break. Poor guy was probably wiped out. And who are these people you're going to take me to? Yeah. And then he shows up, and he kept turning me. I brought him up on the platform, let him share a thing. He kept turning me, going,
there's fire in this room. There's fire. There's fire. Revivals. I mean, he got it. He got what we know. And I'm telling you, those guys, he and Paula White and all those on that faith council. In fact, Barton and I were just talking last night. He was just at the White House yesterday with all of them. And he said, Rick, I've never seen people of faith have this much access and direct work with the president of the United States. So that's not just some figurehead. It's
not like President Trump said. which is what I'm cynical about some of that stuff. It's like, oh, he's just giving them lip service. He's giving them a little name, a little office way over there in the West Wing or whatever. No, man, they are literally in the middle of everything. So that whole thing that's happening right now is being bathed in prayer. It's phenomenal. I mean, I haven't seen it in my lifetime, so I don't know what God's plan is for all of this.
But he's moving, bro. Conversions, brother. It's all coming together. These streams are merging and becoming a force. Amen. A force. Force multiplies, you say. I love that term. Love that term. Tell us what's the best way for us to see you. I mean, you've got a great podcast called The Tavern. Thank you, thank you. Which has been huge. We're working on getting it onto our Godcast. Yeah, we've got to get that and Wall Builders. You
know, Wall Builders radio is daily. It's only about 30 minutes, and it's David Barton, Tim Barton, and myself, and every day is some sort of biblical, basically what we always say is biblical, historical, constitutional perspective. So whatever's going on, whatever the hot take is that's going on in the world. We'll break it down and say, here's the biblical perspective on it. Here's what's happening in history. So we know what works, doesn't work. And here's
how it plays out constitutionally. Because with this administration, there's a lot of, Trump's moving so fast with so many of these things. There's a lot of questions about what's constitutional, what's not. And so for us to be able to come in and bring that history, and especially with some of these judges that are trying to stop what the president's doing. Perfect example would be taking these 250 gang members, put them on a plane, sending them back where they came from.
And this judge is trying to stop it. And there's very clear constitutional authority for the president. And there's even a congressional act, the Alien Act, where the Congress gave that power to the president and said the courts can't even review it. We call it positive exception in Article 3. And so the court doesn't even get to say whether or not the president can take them out. Anyway, that kind of education. I love that, too, the way President Trump said, oh, sorry, they're
already out of U .S. airspace. Anyway, there's a lot of takes like that. That's called The Wall Builders Show, and you can get that at wallbuilders .show or at wallbuilders .com. And then The Tavern you can get on patriotu .com or hopefully soon on Hello Fred. And then American Family Association, they've got about 300 stations around the country, and I do a live call -in show for them twice a week. Tuesdays and Thursdays, 1 to 2. So that's AFR .org. But also Flashpoint. Oh, yeah, and
then Flashpoint. Yeah, huge. Bro, 10 to 1, people will tell me. And I used to do Newsmax and Just the News, and I'd just do all these shows, and I'd get worn out. But 10 to 1, people say, I saw you on Flashpoint. So Carrie and I were like, let's stop doing all the other shows and let's just do Flashpoint. And so I do that one Monday and Tuesday nights, so 7 to 8. I love that. We try to keep up with it. There's so many of them. There's so much. The Lord's blessed that big
time. It was kind of that convergence thing because it was a lot of different. You got prophet -type guys and other guys, and then here I come with a kind of constitutional country boy coming in. It's just been an interesting mix that people love. And I love that, too. At first, I was taken aback by it. little bit. And then I watched it a few times. I thought, Oh, I get it, man. I see what God's doing here. It's a tapestry. He's pulling it all together. So I've really, really
dug in and enjoyed that. So, um, last thing I want to do before we land the plane, cause I'm glad we, I wanted to get your information out there, but, um, Man, you know, they just dropped 80 ,000 -plus documents on JFK. Yeah. And social media is going berserk. I spent a little bit—I try not to, but I spent a little time last night. Yeah, I tried to last night, too. We just sat and watched—got on and reading stuff back and
forth. And what's your hot take on that? Because, I mean, already people are already pointing the finger at Israel, saying, you know, Mossad was involved. You know, I mean, LBJ. I mean, you go down the list. Bush. I mean, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. All these dominoes are starting to tip and fall. So what's your hot take on just what's happening? You know, I don't know what the specifics are going to be that come out,
but I love the transparency. I mean, I am so excited about what Elon Musk is doing and what Trump is willing to do, what RFK has been pushing for. I think we've been hungry for that for a long time. Part of the reason there's been this lack of patriotism and cynicism is because of all the cover -ups and because of this kind of stuff that they've hidden from us. So I don't
know what's actually going to come out. I remember Anna Paulina, whatever her name is, from Florida, the first thing she said was, this evidence will prove there was a second shooter. So that, right off the bat, was like, okay, this is going to rock everybody's world a little bit because it just proves there was a cover -up. So whatever was there that wasn't let out. We'll see. Second shooter, was it all backed by LBJ? I mean, LBJ,
he was a nasty character. I mean, even the church today is impacted by his 1954 Johnson Amendment when he was a senator, and his whole reason he did that was retaliation against pastors in Texas, because they had campaigned against him in the Senate race, they knew he was not an ethical guy, and so he was doing that to hurt the church. And we're, what, 70 years later, man, and it's still hurting the church? Anyway, he was a nasty character. Wouldn't shock me a bit if he was
involved in that. One of those recordings is already out that this guy's at least, he's talking to this Billy Saul Estes guy, and he's literally saying that. that Johnson wanted to hit on. Anyway, so I don't know how much of that's going to end up getting proven, but I remember one of my other mentors was a guy named Dr. Charles Jarvis. He was kind of a comedy after dinner speaker, actually lived right over here in San Marcos, Texas. And I grew up listening to him with my dad when we'd
be driving on the road. And so half my comedy, I stole from him, jokes that I even use today. But he used to joke about the Billy Saw Estes case and the most motivated suicide in history. Because there was a guy that literally had five gunshot wounds and a wound to the head, and they ruled it a suicide. Right. That's a motivated suicide right there, brother. Of course it's a suicide. But it was something to do with Johnson. Wow. I don't know what's going to come out, man,
but I love the fact that it's coming out. And I think the Epstein stuff, all of that, I try not to go too far down the rabbit hole and get too caught up in a lot of that stuff because you can live there. Yes. But I want people to be able to have that. at their fingertips. And I get national security, and the Constitution even has a clause in there about it doesn't have to go in the journal if there's national... So
I understand that, but... 70 years? I mean, the MLK stuff, the JFK stuff, the RFK stuff, all of that should have been released a long time ago. And it's now history, and it needs to be a part of our history, good or bad. Yeah, that's right. Good or bad needs to be there. We can handle it. I mean, the American people are mature enough to handle the good, the bad, and the ugly. And if we would teach it like that, that's one of the things David taught me early on. Don't
run from the bad. We're not these Pollyanna wave the flag just to feel good people. We're going to tell the good, the bad, and the ugly because we know on... On par, when you compare the American story to any other nation in history, it is the greatest nation that has ever been. And so we don't mind telling the ugly. Because we can tell the good with that. That's so good. I'm going to steal this from you. Where are people trying to come? Where are they trying to get in? That's
right. There's no tunnels trying to get into North Korea. There ain't no Cuban dream. There ain't no North Korean dream. It's the American dream. And they're not going the other way. There's a reason for that. American exceptionalism is alive and well. I think we're in for some of our best days. I really am. Six months ago, I heard you stand in front of a crowd at a Remnant Alliance meeting and say, we could be looking
at... the end. of an empire yeah and i remember that day we were over in lano texas and i and i i felt i felt your weight yeah and because it was resonating because we were all starting to wonder it's probably seven eight months ago now yeah and we were all starting to wonder because it was looking real bad there for a minute oh but god oh but god man we were we were bible suddenly yeah immediately yeah i love those yeah they're still possible we've just seen one walked
out and he's doing he's doing it beyond anything i would have dreamed i mean i when i was giving that speech i was thinking okay, we're teetering between liberty and tyranny, and if we put our shoulder in, we can hopefully save this thing and push it back into liberty. He's done... Far more. I mean, God has moved in such a mighty
way. He's changing hearts. The harvest you were talking about Sunday, I mean, these kids that are coming to the Lord, these college campuses, all this stuff, this interest in the Bible, you just go down the list. I mean, God is moving in a powerful, powerful way. And I think what you said, I think America's best days are ahead
because of that. And if we will restore, and we see it in the Old Testament over and over again, when they came back to God, when they came back to the truth, they were blessed, and they experienced a season of prosperity. and all those things. And I think we're in for that, man. I think we're rediscovering those truths and falling in love with them again. And as a result, our kids are going to live in a better place. Beautiful, Rick. Thank you. One last thing
before we go. This is what I want you to end with. There are people who are going to watch this or listen, and they're going to say, where do I start? The resources are overwhelming. And it's kind of like going to eat at, what's that one place? Cheesecake Factory. You got a 30 page menu. Right. You get frozen. You're doing headlights because it's too much. That happens to this. Yeah, absolutely. Go to In -N -Out Burger and it's like. Simple. I'll take it. I'll take that.
You know, just add some grilled onions. Yeah, that's it. I mean, it's that simple. But so what would you tell people who are like. I want to be informed, but I don't know where to go. There's so many news outlets. I don't know who to believe. What's a good kind of just a real simple step in? Give them an on -ramp into getting resourced. Well, it sounds very self -serving, but no kidding. Go to patriotacademy .com. Start with that book, Freedom's Frame. It's the simplest, easiest place
to go. And if you don't want to get together with a group to do biblical citizenship, at least walk through those videos by yourself, but I highly recommend doing it with friends and family because, again, it's when the video's over and you can talk about it. So make that commitment of two hours a week to just get with some friends once a week, have some coffee and cake or whatever in the living room, watch the video, and then
sit around and talk about it. That's a great on -ramp because there's so much there and there's a lot of depth, but you'll figure out when you go through that class. Which direction do I want to go with this? What's God putting on my heart? So that's the two things I start with, freedom's frame and biblical citizenship. Great. Fantastic, Rick. Rick, thank you, brother. Love you, man. Amen. Good to be with you. Yes. At least once before we go out of here. Listen, go to Living
Up in a Down World. We want to get you connected. Go to livingupinadownworld .com and you can subscribe there. And that way we'll get our newsletter out to you. You can always know when to get a heads up when a new podcast is going to drop. And we'll also be converting our carnivore rev,
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