ARE YOU A GOOD GUY?

The other day, in a courtroom in Provo, Utah, a young widow finished her fifth day of listening to prosecutors describe the single rifle round that tore through her husband's neck and killed him in front of nearly 3,000 college students. In the courtroom, the young widow and mother sat in the front row between her mother and her mother-in-law for nearly 30 hours. She's only 30-something years old. Imagine. She has two babies. And today, somewhere in this country, some heartless nut job that looks normal. Has maybe even a professional career. Maybe they're a school teacher. Maybe yeah, maybe they're a school teacher. Or a doctor. Or a nurse or a lawyer. And they're typing out a death threat against Erica Kirk. Against a widow and a mother of little ones now without a father. Against her children. A mom and her little kids who've done nothing wrong. And here's what should terrify you. Whoever's typing it, they believe they're one of the good guys. Welcome to True Word Faith for Life with Dr. Sean. I'm Dr. Sean. Today isn't a normal episode. Today we're going to talk about how ordinary people, people with real jobs and families of their own and opinions of their own, arrive at the conclusion that murder is acceptable. I'm naming names. I'm citing 17 sources and reading numbers from published research because I refuse to give you my feelings when I can provide you with tested facts. And before we're finished, I'll turn the same searchlight on, at least what I think is our own camp. Mine and whatever yours is. Let's start with the mechanism. Because you can't fight what you can't name. You can't change what you don't acknowledge. Psychologists call it confirmation bias, the human tendency to seek out, believe, and remember only the information that confirms what we already think, and to reject everything that doesn't. Three thousand years before the psychologists, Proverbs 18, 17 said it better. The one who states his case first seems right until another comes and examines him. Confirmation bias isn't a left problem or a right problem, it's a human flesh sin problem. But right now, all it's producing are corpses. Here's how the machine works. Step one, you sort humanity into two boxes, the righteous and the wicked, the oppressed and the oppressor. Step two, you consume only voices that confirm your conclusions. Step three, the people in the wicked box slowly stop being people. They become fascists or vermin or Nazi demons. And step four, the step nobody admits is coming. Once a man is no longer a man, killing him no longer feels like murder. It now feels like justice. It feels God help us. Righteous. Utah Valley University in Oram, Utah. Charlie Kirk, 31 years old. Husband of Erica, father of two, co-founder of Turning Point USA, was doing the thing he always did, sitting under a basic little Costco tent, taking questions from anyone. Especially people who hated everything he stood for. Well, even though they they most often have no idea what they believe, let alone what Charlie believed. His entire model was debate me, prove me wrong. Words instead of weapons. And yet a rifle round fired from a rooftop ended his life mid-sentence. He wasn't killed in spite of being a talker. I'm convinced he was killed because his speech was effective. The hearing. He is accused. He still is not, still has not yet entered a plea. And yes, he's entitled to due process because we aren't the mob. But CNN and Deseret News and Utah's ABC 4 all reported from the courtroom. And the devastating, incontrovertible evidence prosecutors presented deserves your unflinching attention because it shows you exactly what marinated ideology looks like when it's loaded into the chamber of a rifle. Utah's ABC 4 reported that investigators recovered the rifle wrapped in a towel in a wooded area near campus, and that the cartridge casings carried engravings. One read, quote, hey fascist. Another referenced, Bella Chow, an anthem beloved of leftist and anti-fascist movements. Hear what that engraving confesses. Before a single shot was fired, the shooter had already run the machine I described, sorted a husband and a father into the fascist Nazi box. Dehumanized him, pre-justified the kill. The bullet was well, the bullet was engraved with confirmation bias. CNN reported that prosecutors displayed messages in which the accused allegedly texted his roommate, quote, I had the opportunity to take out Charlie Kirk and I took it. The Deseret News reported that he faces multiple felony charges, including aggravated murder, a capital offense, plus a misdemeanor with a name that should stop your heart. Committing a violent offense in the presence of a child. Before we go one step further, I need to take off the preacher's hat for a few minutes and put on a hat I used to wear. The old hat. Some of you may know I spent some years in law enforcement before I ever stood behind a pulpit, gave speeches, or authored books. So let me tell you what a preliminary hearing actually is. Because the term sounds bigger than it is. It isn't a trial. It is not a trial. It answers one narrow question. One, is there probable cause meaning enough evidence that a reasonable person would say this should go to trial? That's it. It's one of the lowest bars in American law. In my ears wearing a badge, prelimination, prelims is what we used to call them. Happen within days of the arrest. And most of the time, the defense simply waived them. Now, run this math on this case with me. Run the math, you're probably better at it than me. Arrested September twelfth, twenty twenty-five. Preliminary hearing, July sixth, twenty twenty six. That's roughly 300 days, ten months, to answer the lowest evidentiary question our system asks. I'll be fair. This is a capital case. The discovery is massive, and death penalty litigation carries heightened process, as it should when a man's life is at stake. But hear this documented fact. MS now reported that Erica Kirk's own attorney had already argued motions before the court, including invoking her right to a speedy trial. The victim's family asked for speed. Ten months later, we're just now reaching the starting line. The prosecution was ready for the preliminary hearing by the second week after the murder and arrest. And then Friday happened. Fox 32, carrying associated press reporting, laid out the mechanics plainly. Prosecutors wanted to proceed straight to closing arguments and an immediate ruling. The defense asked instead to wait for transcripts and submit written briefs. That is exceptionally irregular. Judge Tony Groff, he granted that request and scheduled oral arguments for September 1st. Understand what that means. After five days, dozens of exhibits, DNA on the rifle, surveillance footage. And let me address the surveillance footage. Oh, it's so grainy you can't even make it out. In the courtroom, it's crystal clear. You're watching video of video. And anytime you watch a video of a video or screenshot of video, it's gonna be grainy. An alleged confession they heard. The court chose paper over a bench ruling on the lowest standard in the building. The Daily Wire reported legal commentators calling the delay, quote, mind-blowing. In my law enforcement years, a judge who just absorbed five days of that kind of evidence would rule from the bench before lunchtime. Because probable cause either leaps off that record or it doesn't, and it did. So I'll say it straight: the pace of this case is an irregularity worth calling out and calling out loudly, not because the accused deserves less process. Because Justice Delay doesn't sit in a vacuum. Every empty month gets filled, and I'm about to show you exactly what it gets filled with. To the family's enormous credit, they called the hearing an important step forward. They're showing more grace than the system is showing the speed that is constitutionally guaranteed but denied. Because here's who pays for every one, every one of those 300 days. The Deseret News reported that Erica Kirk sat through nearly 30 hours of that hearing, and that Charlie's parents at times had to leave the room when the evidence became too graphic. And the threats against her didn't pause for the proceedings. Last November on National Television, Erica revealed, and the FBI confirmed that her family receives on a regular basis death threats and kidnapping threats and more. And I quote her exactly: We get death threats we always have. She was talking about threats against her children, toddlers, little innocent kids receiving death threats. And it's not just idle threats. This May, San Antonio's KENS 5 reported that a 26-year-old man was arrested on felony, terroristic, threatening charges after allegedly emailing, quote, death to Erica Kirk and every single speaker there. And threatening bombings at turning point events. He allegedly promised that every Christian nationalist shall perish. Hear the sorting machine again. It's sorting again. Christian equals nationalist equals scum equals kill them all. And that's not politics anymore, smart people. Smart people, that's not politics anymore. That's the oldest spirit in the book, the one Yeshua called a murderer from the beginning. Now comes the part of this episode that some of you will want to turn off, but stay with me anyway. Because if I only aim this sermon leftward, I'm committing the very sin I'm preaching against. The National Contagion Research Institute, a nonprofit that studies online radicalization, identified roughly 1,000 violent threats against Erica Kirk on X after her husband's death. And their research found that a measurable, statistically significant surge in those threats was driven not by socialists, but by a conservative commentator's conspiracy ecosystem from inside what we thought was our own house. Candace Owens. Conspiracists. Many claiming the conservative or even Christian label have accused this bereaved and aggrieved widow, Erica Kirk, of complicity in her own husband's murder. They called her marriage a scheme and a scam and her children props. NCRI, researchers described it as a building permission structure. It's building a permission structure for violence. And catch this. Catch this, don't miss it. That 10-month delay we just examined, that's the oxygen this machine breathes. Every month without an actual trial, without actual evidence, and an actual verdict is a month the theorists sell as proof of a cover-up. Yeshua warned us in Matthew 16, beware the leaven. Leaven works silently through the whole lump, and no camp is unleavened. Now, I'll do what scripture never flinched from doing. I'm naming the name again. So you can be sure I'm not, I didn't stumble. I didn't slip. Candace Owens and her acolytes. Perhaps you're one of them. She's spent and they've spent since the months since Charlie Kirk's murder, spinning wild, nonsensical conspiracy theories around his death. And Candace Owens' followers have multiplied them into a relentless torrent aimed straight at this widow. Whatever Erica does, no matter what she does, they find guilt in it. If she weeps, it's a performance. If she stands tall, it's ambition. If she leads his ministry and organization, it's evidence of bad intent. They've publicly accused her, publicly and repeatedly, of having a hand in the murder of the love of her life. And they call themselves conservative Christians. You know what? I don't believe there's a court in the land that could, if they were accused of being a Christian, I don't think there's a court in the land that would convict them. The case would be thrown out summarily due to lack of evidence. Does the Bible have anything to say to them? Exodus 22 says, You shall not mistreat any widow or fatherless child. If you do, and they cry out to me, I will surely hear their cry, and my wrath will burn. That's not my temper talking, although I've got plenty of it. That's God's own recorded oath. Deuteronomy 19 commanded that a false witness receive the very penalty he sought to bring down on the innocent. And in the world of Yeshua, a mourner was sacred. The community's entire duty was to sit with her, feed her, and shield her. So I ask you, what kind of people are you that you hunt a widow instead? So, hear my verdict plainly. When this trial ends and the actual facts established under oath bury these nonsensical fantasies. The people who did this, they don't get to delete their posts and lower their voices, lower the temperature, and quietly resume life as normal, decent, moral people. They are nothing of the sort. And if that's you, you heard me. I will never forget what you're doing to her. Job's comforters tormented a grieving man with confident theories. And God refused them until there was a sacrifice and the intercession of the very man they wounded. The door back is real. It's called repentance and it's public. It's costly and it's narrow. They didn't whisper their accusations. They will not be permitted to whisper their repentance. We will remember. I will remember. I will see to it that you don't ever forget. Proverbs 6 says, The Lord hates hands that shed innocent blood, a lying tongue, and one who sows discord among brothers. Notice those sins share a list. The tongue that spreads unverified accusations against a widow. It sits in the very same catalog as the hands that shed blood and commit murder because one feeds the other. James 1.27 defines religion that is pure and undefiled before God as this to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, not to conspiracy theorize about widows, not to monetize their affliction with podcast clips, to defend them. Now the numbers. And I warn you, they are. Worse than you think. In April 2025, months before Charlie Kirk was murdered, and may I say Charlie Kirk was one of one. He was one of the best people to ever walk the planet. He was a genius, undoubtedly. He was a kind and gentle man. He was long-suffering. And he was humble. Months before Charlie was murdered, the Network Contagion Research Institute and Rutgers University Social Perception Lab, they published a report titled Assassination Culture. Surveying over 1,200 American adults, they found 38% of all respondents said it would be at least somewhat justified to murder Donald Trump. Among self-identified left-of-center respondents, that number climbed to roughly 55%. Read that again. Read it again. Hear it again. Write it down. 55%. A majority. Of one political wing. They say, oh, oh, that's a fringe. That's not what we're about. Yes, it is. It's absolutely what you're about. At least somewhat justifying assassination. 55%. I've created a blog post and a study guide. It's live right now at true wordfaithforlife.com. It's free. There's nothing's gonna take your information. There's none of that crap there. You can go and you can read for yourself. It's fully footnoted, Turabian style bibliography. Everything is copyrighted. If you copy it, copy it in full, and make sure the copyright's attached. True word faithforlife.com. It's easy. If you want facts. Charlie Kirk read he read that report. He was moved by it. In April 2025, Newsweek records he publicly warned, Charlie Kirk publicly warned that the political left was normalizing violence and even political assassination as a legitimate tool. Five months later, he was assassinated on a Utah college campus. Charlie saw the danger. And he saw the data. And he named the danger. And he became its most famous victim. And after his death, UGO polling, reported by multiple outlets, found that 24% of very liberal very liberal respondents said it's acceptable to be happy about a public figure's death against 3% of very conservative respondents. You might ask, reasonably, did the assassination shock the nation back to sanity? Fox News reported this January on NCRI's report on their follow-up study that they did. And the trend line runs the wrong direction. 67% of left-of-center respondents now register some justification for political murder, up from 56 a year, Briar. But before anyone on my side of the aisle, before you stand up and applaud, hear the other number in the same study, 54 per 54% on the right registered the same sentiment. Two-thirds of one camp, more than half of another. Eleven is now through the whole lump. Church. Every ideology that divides humanity into oppressor and oppressed classes, whether it wears the label Nazi, Marxist, Socialist, Communist, or the softer costume of radical activism, it carries the same birth defect. It locates evil in a category of people rather than every human heart. And once evil lives in a category of people, the solution stops being repentance and it starts being removal. The twentieth century wrote that lesson in a hundred million graves. That hundred million figure. That just that's not just my rhetoric. It's the documented estimate of the black book of communism compiled by European scholars and published by Harvard University Press. Roughly one hundred million dead under communist regimes in a single century. Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, all fluent in the same grammar. Name the class. Name the class enemy. Dehumanize the class. Dehumanize the class enemy. Liquidate the class enemy. What American survey data shows majorities of any faction justifying assassination. We aren't watching something new. We're watching something old learn English. And that ideology has a special ancient hatred it keeps returning to. Antisemitic physical assaults are at the highest level ever recorded since tracking began in 1979, with assaults involving deadly weapons up 39% in a single year. In America, not in Europe, not Europe of 1938. America, right here, right now. Never again is now. In 2025. 2025. It crossed a line no year should ever cross. The ADL. It documented that Jewish people were murdered in anti-Semitic attacks on American soil for the first time since 2019. Two young people shot dead outside the Capitol Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C. in May. A victim who died after a firebombing attack on elderly marchers in Boulder, Colorado. People walking to remember hostages. My friends, we said never again. We built museums that say never again. Never again isn't a memorial slogan anymore. Never again is a present tense assignment. Never again is now. You might ask, why does a Bible teacher care so fiercely? I care because my Messiah is Jewish, because Yeshua of Nazareth was circumcised on the eighth day, taught in synagogues, wept over Jerusalem, because Romans 11 warns, Romans 11 in the New Testament warns wild branches like me against arrogance toward the natural branches. Every Christian who shrugs at Jew hatred is shrugging at the family tree of his own salvation. When they threaten the synagogue, they're rehearsing for the church. And history has zero exceptions to that pattern. Zero. The people of the book stand together or fall separately. And now the president. And now three times. Before it ever reached Utah. July 13th, 2024. A rooftop gunman in Butler, Pennsylvania fires on a presidential candidate, wounds Donald Trump's ear, and murders a firefighter named Corey Comparator. He died shielding his family. Two months later, September 15th, 2024, NPR and the Department of Justice record a man named Ryan Ruth concealed himself with a rifle in the tree line of President Trump's West Palm Beach golf course. He sat for nearly 10 hours in a sniper's hide. This February, the Department of Justice announced Ruth's sentence, life in prison plus 84 months, after a jury convicted him on all counts. Federal judge Eileen Cannon called it premeditated, calculated plot. It was a premeditated, this is what she called it. A premeditated, calculated plot to take a human life. Listen, whatever you think of Donald Trump and this podcast, we have viewers who love him and we have viewers who don't. Mark this when a nation's argument with a candidate is conducted through rifle scopes, the nation has already lost something no election returns. And his family lives under that shadow every single day. Now, open your Bible because everything I've cited, every study, every courtroom, every casing engraving, scripture diagnosed it all first, Genesis 4. Cain is angry at Abel. Does God say Abel is your oppressor? No. God says sin is crouching at your door, and its desire is for you, and you must rule over it. The first murder in all of history began with a man convinced his brother was the problem. Every murder since has required the same conviction. The line between good and evil doesn't run between camps, it runs through every heart. Genesis 1 27 declares every human being is made in Bitzelem Elohim, in the image of God. The Hebrew Zelim. It means image, representation, the visible stamp of the invisible king. The word, that word is different. That word. Oh, I need you to understand this. Please don't zone out now. That word is why murder is different from all other violence. Genesis 9:6 grounds its horror precisely in the image. And hear me, the progressive activist bears the tzelim, the MAGA voter bears the Zelim. The Jew bears the tzelim. Erica Kirk bears the Zelim. Even Tyler Robinson sitting in that Provo courtroom without any remorse at all. Bears the tzelim. Defaced the image, and you've assaulted the king. What about the tongue? The rabbis called it Leshonhara, Le Shonhara, the evil tongue, and taught that it kills three: the speaker, the listener, and the one spoken of. Yeshua went further in Matthew 5. You've heard it said, do not murder. But he says, whoever burns with contempt and calls his brother worthless is already standing in murderer's courtroom. Every retweeted slander, every gleeful rumor about a widow, every dehumanizing meme is murder's minor league. Nobody wakes up an assassin, their disciple into it. One confirmed bias at a time. So what do we do? Not feel. Do. First, verify before you amplify. If you can't name the primary source, your share button is a slander distribution system. Proverbs 18, 13, he who answers before listening, it's folly and shame. Second, subscribe to at least one serious voice you disagree with and read it to understand, not to ambush. That's Proverbs 18:17 applied. Third, when your own camp spreads unverified, unverified filth, even about opponents, especially about widows, expose it out loud. Loyalty to truth outranks loyalty to team every time. Let me say it again. Loyalty to truth outranks loyalty to team every time. Fourth. And this one you're probably not gonna do. Pray by name. Pray by name for someone you're tempted to hate. Yeshua's command in Matthew 5.4. It's not a suggestion. It's Matthew 544. It's Yeshua's command. And it's not a suggestion for advanced believers. It's the family resemblance of the Father. You cannot simultaneously intercede for a man and dehumanize him. The prayer kills the contempt, or contempt kills the prayer. Fifth, guard the widow and the orphan. If you see Erica Kirk slandered in your feed, defend her. Whatever your politics are, defend her. And sixth, stand visibly with the Jewish people. Attend, support, speak. Silence in this hour is a vote. And if you say to me, Well, they're they're committing genocide and all of these things, I have done five episodes. I laid the truth out. I don't have time to go into it here. All you have to do is go back in, you'll find them. And they're very clear, and they're very footnoted. And there are blog and study guides with annotated footnotes, um, Turabian-style bibliography. Extensive. If you're willing to know the truth, if you want to know the truth, or if you just want to hate, keep going the way that you go. But don't call yourself Christian. Here's today's hard question, and I want you to sit in its discomfort. Where has confirmation bias discipled you? What's the story you've swallowed whole because it flattened your, because it flattered your side? It fluffed up your side, made you look better. Who lives in your wicked box? Because I promise you, the man who allegedly engraved, hey fascist on a bullet didn't think he was the villain. He's not sitting there thinking that he's the villain. He thought he was you. He thought, oh, they're the I'm the clear-eyed one. I see what other people don't see. Just like all of you conspiracy theorists that run wild. Already you're saying it about Senator Graham. Senator Graham has the same thing, had the same thing in his chest that I have in mine. They say, Well, he flew back and forth from Ukraine, and and uh, oh, I think Russians got him. Maybe Ukraine got him. Somebody got him. He had a dissected aneurysm. One minute it's fine. You say, well, then why was he able to fly back and forth? All of that flying up and down, pressure, relief of pressure, pressure, relief, it's not good. And a guy who only slept four hours a day and worked the rest, it's not good. It's how you get dead. I'm not saying it was his fault. And already. We demand, we demand an autopsy. We demand it. Good, you're gonna get one. Will you shut up at the end? No, you won't. Same way if you work your way through this trial, if you actually watch it, you won't. You'll throw rocks at the evidence. You'll throw rocks at every aspect of it. Erica Kirk bought out the jury. Erica Kirk bought out the judge. Doesn't matter what it how it's going to turn out, you will land on it every time because your bias is confirmed. You're not the clear-eyed one, you're not the righteous one, you're not the one who finally saw through it all. The moment you're certain your enemy has no soul is the moment you've lost your soul. Hey, look, maybe tonight you've realized the poison isn't just out there. Maybe you've nursed a hatred that felt righteous. You shared words that wounded, you sorted image bearers into boxes God never built. Friend, the answer to a divided nation was never a party. It was never a movement. It's a person, the Jewish Messiah who prayed for his executioners while they gambled for his clothes. He isn't asking you to clean up first, he's asking you to come. And if that's you, pray this with me right now and mean it. Yeshua, Jesus, I need you. I believe you died for me and rose from the grave. I surrender my life to you today. Forgive me, fill me, lead me. I'm yours. In your heavenly name. Amen. If you prayed that prayer and you meant it, heaven is louder than this broadcast right now. If you want help, I'm happy to help you. Reach me at true wordfaithforlife.com slash contact or hit the little contact button up top or the little voicemail button on the side. It's two minutes. Use your two minutes wisely. You didn't join a side. You joined a family. Pray for Erica Kirk and her children. Pray for the Robinson family, whose son awaits trial. I don't know if you know, but they identified their son in the videos. They said, Yes, that's him. His boyfriend and roommate identified him and said, That's him. I want you to pray for the president and his family, no matter what you think of him. You don't have to like them. Pray for the Jewish community of this nation, 17 incidents a day. Pray for a court and provost to move with the speed justice deserves and examine your own heart before you examine your enemies. If this word shared tonight mattered, share it. Someone in your feed is halfway down the wrong road today. Until tomorrow morning at 7 a.m., we do Monday through Friday at 7 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, and then Sundays at 6:30 p.m. Eastern Standard Time live. Until then, I want you to receive this in his heavenly name. May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you. May the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. Shalom Bishem Yeshua. Shalom, shalom.