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Well, I want to welcome you to the Out of Zion Show with Susan Michael, and I am very excited to have with me today a very special friend and special guest, Dean Michelle Bachmann, former Member of Congress and now she is the dean of the Robertson School of Government at Regent University, and she is doing such an amazing work reaching the next generation of Christian leaders and educating them, preparing them, training them, mentoring them for leadership.
Let's take a break and hear a message from one of our sponsors. Welcome to the Israel Answer Series Connecting Israel the Bible, and you join Susan Michael as she explores timely issues and current events from a scriptural perspective to equip the Christian world with a balance and biblical response. Be sure to subscribe for future episodes which will ignite your faith and bring the Bible to life in your everyday world. Now, let's join Susan with your Israel answers.
And so it's our real honor and privilege to have you with us today.
Susan, thank you, I love being here with.
Yeah, well, we have a great partnership. Yes, we do, and we've been working together. But first I would like for you to share with our audience a little bit about how you became dean. I know you knew Pat Robertson and you say there would tell that story before we share and talk'd be happy to.
Well. The background is that I was in the very first law school class at Regent University. This goes back to nineteen seventy nine, the very first year they had the law school. So I was completely sold on the university because they combined both high academics with high biblical worldview and that was exactly where I wanted to be and it was probably the best legal education I could even imagine. So I'm very proud of the school. And
then from there I went on. I practiced as a lawyer and went into government and that kind of was the track that God put me on. And then later Pat Robertson called me and kind of closed the circle and he asked me if I would come and be dean at the University of the law school or i'm sorry, of the government school. And I told him, you know, I highly recommend you don't hire me. I don't even know what a dean does. I haven't spent ten seconds in higher ed since I graduated. And he said, no,
you're the one. You're the one we want, and so I went by faith, and it's been just wonderful because the university is so open to new ideas and so open to the new relevant things that are happening. So on my heart was to start a PhD program, and I had learned that about thirty thirty five years before the university wanted to start one, and they hadn't, so we launched one. You were one of the first people who came to my office, doctor Susan Michaels, and you
already had curriculum. You so encouraged my soul. My soul just saying when you came in and sat on the college in my office. So we began the PhD program, and we've now welcomed four classes of PhD students, fifteen students each year. We've already had our first pH PhD student graduated from the school. And now we also launched the Israel Institute, so we have five master's degree programs to teach about a biblical worldview perspective on government. We
have our PhD program on government. But now we've launched the Israel Institute because we've seen so many young people don't have the basic understanding of Israel that maybe we did when we were younger, and so now we're bringing those students in. We want to get to everyone, and not just people at region. We want to get the knowledge of Israel every word, to other universities, to other students, to churches, to high school groups, college groups. So that's
our vision. It's a big vision. And I want to thank you for your participation early on in the school.
It's so critical and so strategic. I just want to share the story with the audience. You know, I absolutely love Pat Robertson and what an honor for you to have known hill.
I have been a part of the.
Initial class, but everything he started has been such a strategic and very impactful work, from CBN to Operation Blessing shar Regate University and so I went to Regent University. This is two and a half years ago now, I think, and I said, you need to raise the Israel flag. Yes, you need to have an Israel study program and take the leads because we're losing a lot of our Christian college as we are, and their support of Israel and their understanding of Israel. And you said, we want to,
we want to. We've been talking about it, and I said, well, here, here's here's the first curriculum.
An actually you helped with the first Seed money as well. Yes, because you can't you can't fly a rocket ship without fuel, and that's what you got put that and we're very great. That was a good thing. But you know, it's interesting. Pat Robertson, he was a tremendous student of the Bible, and you can't read the Bible and not see that Israel permeates Genesis to Revelation, and so he understood that
and he saw that. As a matter of fact, the very first CBN broadcast, God put it in Pat Robertson's mind to launch the first satellite into space to bring the Gospel around the world twenty four to seven, and he launched that satellite from Jerusalem, Israel. The very first program was in nineteen seventy nine, and so Israel has
always been on his heart. And so really, when we launch this PhD in the Israel Institute, this is just the next step in the line of what Pat Robertson in the ministry has done from the very beginning with the seven one hundred Club and the Christian Broadcasting Network and now of course his son Gordon Robertson is continuing that legacy. Everything is about Israel, and we now have CB and Israel. So you'll love this, Susan. We're taking our first trunch of students to Israel in about two
weeks time. We're taking them over and we're taking them on the Ambassador of Israel's tour, Danny Dennan. We're taking them to Auschwitz first, the death Camp, and then we're taking them to Israel. And for your audience who've been to Israel, they know once you go to Israel you are forever changed because there's two things happen. For one, you feel like you're home. If you're a believer, you just feel like you're at home. And the second thing
is you know that the Bible is true. You knew the Bible was true before, but you really have it in your heart the Bible is true, and you're never the same again. So if you haven't gone to Israel, it's not too late go. This is the time to go.
And this is why I find it so exciting because I was one of those I was a nineteen year old student when I got to go to Israel for a study program. It's exactly the lately to treat with life and it affected the rest of my life. I'm so glad I went when I was so young. Yes, how my parents let me, I'm not sure because I kind of went alone and met up with a group over there.
So what it was worth doing? And I did a broadcast together. You and I did a podcast together, and my story was like yours. I went at age eighteen and lived and worked at Kiwitzpery and then was back in nineteen seventy four. I thank God for that baseline experience. It turned and directed the course of my entire life, just like your story. That's why it's so important to get our young people. It changes their life for the better.
Yes, and so you know, I just want to share that if anybody wants to seed money into the next generation of Christian leaders. Recent university, the Robertson School of Government, they are preparing Christians getting a PhD in government with an emphasis in Israel. We've set up a scholarship fund there and if you're interested in seeding, please contact us. We'll have links in the show notes for today.
We would love to do it because we have undergrad masters, the PhD, the Israel Institute to reach everyone. And I know Susan has been extremely generous to seed that money, but we need more because I'll tell you one reason why students choose to go to another school is because they don't have scholarship money. And here's the big, little dirty secret. Katar is out there funding scholarships at universities
all across America for students. We need scholarship money for our students too, and when they come to our school, you can be assured they will have a biblical background that is pro Israel with high academics. That's what we offer the students. And when they go to these other schools that are maybe funded by Qatar, they're getting a pro Islamic view that is anti Biblical. And so there's a real divide here, and so thank you for bringing that up. A lot of people don't realize that suits
the universities. They are being funded by Islamic nations that don't have American interests at heart, much less Israel's. So that's why we're here Regent to advance the pro biblical view of Israel and Pat.
Robertson would be so, he'd be thrill, he would be through he said it. I'm so blessed I have been a part of that story. Oh, and to be partnering with you. So let's talk a little bit about current events, like in the young people regent, your students and all. Do you see a certain trend or a lack of knowledge or do you see something that's influencing them that you could share with us for prayer and for greater understanding of the next generation.
Yeah, I'd be happy to. There is a real difference. The students are still sweet, wonderful, you know, they profess Jesus Christ. But the difference is they lack discipleship. They lack a basic knowledge of the Bible. And the more Bible knowledge you have, the more pro Israel you are. And so if you don't have that background, basic discipleship,
you tend to not have Israel, that understanding of Israel. So, for instance, when October seventh occurred, we just assumed all the students would know what's going on, But they didn't know what's going on. They didn't really understand. In fact, their world is TikTok, and so on their phone. It's seventeen anti Israel messages for every pro Israel message. So
we immediately started showing pro Israel movies. We do one pro Israel event a week on average during the school year, not just one event a year on average, almost every week. So we movies, uh plays, books, speakers, authors, zoom, we zoom people and because we have we give us a regular diet to our students of reality because they're hearing lies on their social media. So that's the difference that we see. We are very intentional now, and so we're
intentional not only with our region students. We have a wonderful cooperation with the local Jewish community, and Pat Robertson is the one who is wise enough to see that. So we cooperate with them, and so we let them know we're here because we want to support you. So we'll take students and we'll go to the local passover or the local feast dinner, and we're trying to foster those relationships between Jews and Christians because we serve the God of the Bible, the God of Israel.
Let's take a break and hear a message from one of our sponsors. Welcome back to the Out of Zion podcast with Susan Michael.
Well, it's so interesting you're mentioning movies and plays and this kind of thing, because one of the difficulties for us reaching the young generation is that it's actually your professor, doctor A. J. Neltik. Do I heard say this. He's the director of the Israel Institute. He said that we are now in a post literate generation, not that they can't.
Read, but that they don't read. They take in their information, images.
And videos and all on their phone. So that has to be very challenging for you at the university.
Well, that is because there's an adaptation on teaching people, and yet we have standards. We have very high standards, and so we have to push people toward reading, and we do. We do very effectively. Doctor aj Nolty, he's completely blind and he's the director of our Israel Institute. Just an absolutely fabulous person. We have an incredible faculty, a faculty that understands Israel and gets Israel. I used to be in Congress, and what I saw when I was in Congress, Susan, is that a lot of the
top credential people didn't understand Israel. What they understood was a very biased view they got during their PhD training. And if you're pro Isra, a lot of times you're blacklisted from even getting in these programs. And so that's
why we need people to come in. We need to train them, we need to get them credential so that they can get out and work in the intelligence community, the Pentagon, the entire bureaucracy of the United States, because the reason why you have anti Israel policies in our government is because you have people who have been trained to be anti Israel through their education and then they go into government. So we're trying to be a part of the solution, just like you are with your organization.
We're partnering together to be pro Israel. Pope to be pro Israel's to be pro Biblical. God is pro Israel. Jesus was pro Israel. So we're just trying to be in alignment with the word of God.
Yes, a man, Well, it's got to be very fulfilling to it is that I wonder to know that you are mentoring the next generation.
It is and we're taking our first tronch of students now over to Israel, and I can't wait. I'm praying already into that trip because I know, just like you when you were nineteen and me when I was eighteen, our eyes were open and forever change. And I'm asking God to be present and open their eyes of their part so they will see what we saw. And he will. He will to every generation. Yes, you know he will.
So what is something else, like major misunderstanding that you encounter a lot with the students that you're working with.
Well, I think a major misunderstanding is they are very sympathetic to the terrorists who killed Jews. They're very sympathetic, and they see that the terrorists are victims. Now, this is almost impossible to believe, but this shows how twisted and how Satan has gotten into the messaging to show that the people who seek actually the extermination of Jews,
the death of Jews. We can't even believe that people would think that, but they've actually gotten Christians to be sympathetic to the point of view of those who want to kill Christians. And so we have to go into that world and that understanding and explain that the true victims have been the Jews since twenty twenty three. Well, does mean that.
They got that in high school? And in in the school before they actually end well.
Absolutely. Oh and at the youngest ages now today, it's since they got their phones. People got their phones in about what two thousand and nine, So for students that are in college right now, that's only ten years ago. So they've you know, they grew up on their phone. That's right. They've had phones, i'd say, in their possession for about ten years, that's what I mean to say, usually their parents, but some parents give phones to their
children when they're five. I think it's a terrible mistake, but they their entire life. They don't know their life without phones, so they're getting lies. That's what we need to understand. But the good thing is truth prevails over lies. So it's nothing to be discouraged about or despair over. It's just a challenge. And so at the university level, Veritas Truth. That's what we teach, Regent, and so the truth does overcome lies. And so but we have to
be intentional. We can't assume they're going to get it, or we can't assume that they come in knowing truth. And that's the partnership that we've had with you. Because your curriculum is excellent. It teaches truth.
Well, you know, I say always say Pat Robertson was a man of destiny and what he built there at Regent University is just so.
It's it's incredible. You're over thirteen thousand students now in many, many, many degrees, and what people have accomplished, the alumni of our school are phenomenal. With they've accompliled.
I want to say, you also are a woman of destiny, and he knew it and that's why he chose you. And no one is more perfect than you with your background in Israel from young age to your of course that you were of that first law class there at Regent, and your time in Congress, and now you're able to bring all of that experience and knowledge and expertise to these young people. And I just want to honor you
for your life's work and what you're doing. And do you pray the Lord bless you and use you there and really cross for may you have many more tens of thousands of students, and may we be able to have a full scholarship fund Amy scholars Man that is we Ehd's there at Regents cells our number one need. Michelle, thank you so much for joining us today, and I know that our audience has really enjoyed getting to know you and your work there at Regents.
So with that, I.
Encourage you to do a search in our files and find our first interview with Dean Michelle Bachman, which we did about a year ago, where she tells more of her story at that eighteen years old when she went to Israel, lived there in that Gaza border area in Israeli kibbutz that became the center of the October seventh attack. And so get to know her and her work there and get behind our partnership between the ICEJ and Regent University. We'll have links in today's show notes or on our website.
Please get involved and support this amazing work.
Thank you, what a blessing. Thank you. Hey, just give me one more minute. I want to offer you one of our free resources.
We have wonderful resources in our show notes, and if you go to our website at ICEJUSA dot org slash show notes, you'll find links for a number of our free offers. We have downloadables to help root you in scripture, help you to understand the issues surrounding Israel and the importance be of Christian support for Israel and don't forget. Please follow us on Facebook, YouTube, and LinkedIn and stay connected. Thank you and God bless We.
Hope you have enjoyed this episod episode of Out of Zion with Susan Michael. Be sure to subscribe to out of Zion now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, Pray dot com, Salem Oneplace, Salem Like Audio. Out of Zion with Susan Michael is a production of ic EJUSA. All rights reserved. This podcast is presented in partnership with Life Audio to explore a wide range of faith centered podcasts on prayer, Bible study, parenting, and more. Visit lifeaudio dot com.