Point of View February 6, 2025 – Hour 1 : Ministry of Valor Vets

[00:00:04] Across America, Live, this is Point of View, Kirby Anderson. Thank you for joining me. It is the Thursday edition of Point of View. We're so grateful that you could join us. We're going to be talking about the military, the first hour, and of course we mentioned yesterday that Ted Edwards will be with us, and we'll be talking with him in just a minute.

[00:00:31] Let me give you a preview about the rest of the program though. Next hour we will be talking with Katie Daniel. She is with the Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America. We'll be talking about what is kind of the future of the pro-life movement, especially under a Trump administration. Then we'll get back to some of the issues in the news. We have now a new Attorney General, Pam Bondi. Did not let grass grow under her feet either. She has hit with lightning speed already beginning to speak out about the sanctuary cities and talking about some kind of investigations.

[00:01:00] He might actually engage in that regard. Wanted to release the list of those people that have been interacting with Epstein, and we'll talk about that a little bit later. Also, we were yesterday talking about USAID. And there were a number of people that said, why in the world would you actually think that this was a hill to die on? Matter of fact, David Axelrod, who is of course a very prominent Democrat, said the same thing.

[00:01:26] Well, maybe now we know. We found out that USAID has been funding various news organizations. We found out that some of that money has been going through Ukraine. Some of that maybe even goes back to the Russia collusion. So we really know a lot more about why that is the case. And so if we don't get to all of that today, tomorrow we will have, of course, our weekend edition. Liberty McCarter will be with us, Dr. Merrill Matthews, and we'll do a roundtable.

[00:01:51] But it is my privilege to welcome to the microphone here Ted Edwards, who was raised, as it says in our bio here, in a somewhat dysfunctional family and had to address some real issues in North Carolina. And it joined the Marines is an individual that has served as a student pastor, as well as he and his wife Christine joined with crew and developed and managed a volunteer program for Navy chaplains and United States Marine Corps individuals at Parris Island. We were just talking about that a minute ago where we have a radio station just down the road.

[00:02:21] And, of course, has also been involved now in Valor Vets. I encourage you to go to the website, but if you click on his picture and scroll down, you will see that that will take you to Valor Vets and all the things that you would need to know about that. And so, first of all, Ted, welcome to Point of View. Well, thank you, brother. I'm so thankful to be here and join you in the studio. Well, thank you for your, first of all, your military service.

[00:02:47] But give us your background, because I only mentioned in passing this, but whether it's J.D. Vance or Ted Edwards, some had some difficulty in their families, went in the Marines. And look at the success that all of you are now. Yeah, the success is all by God's grace, first of all. I'm also a corporal from the Marine Corps and now the vice president was a corporal. You have a lot in common, really. We really do. You do? We really do.

[00:03:13] I've never read his book, but it's on my list of many books to read. But yeah, my home life was pretty tragic. You know, I tell veterans that I talk to that I've never seen combat, but my life was like combat. My life was combat. When I was, my dad had six children with his first wife. Goodness. My mother was married to a Marine, her first marriage. She had two boys. My dad had six children. He put those six children in an orphanage.

[00:03:44] And he went out sowing his wild oats and they met. And I don't know which came first, me or the marriage. But here I am on this planet by God's grace. But he tried to force my mother to abort me. And he abandoned us when I was two months old. And so I met him when I was 18, right before I left to go to boot camp. And again, we're next hour going to be talking about the issue of abortion, pro-life issues and the rest. But much of what we're going to talk about has to do with the Marines.

[00:04:11] And it is, again, something we always like to do at Point of View. We really want to honor all of you that have served, whether you served in combat or not, whether you served just for a few years or whether you were in there for the duration. And it does seem to me that you identified, I think, early on there's some things that you could and should do to really help individuals to really grow in Christ. Yeah. I mean, you know, I was one of those guys that you would want you would not want your children playing with.

[00:04:41] And, you know, coming from such a dysfunctional home, my mom is married five times and all those things. And we I didn't realize that how important faith was in life until I got in the Marine Corps. Yes. And I gave my life to Christ because of a bar fight. The Jesus freak in our unit, Sergeant Ferris, he found me, you know, unconscious in my barracks. Wow.

[00:05:09] And he carried me to the hospital. And I went to church with him on Sunday morning. And I tell people that's when God began the heart surgery on me, cracked open my chest and showed me who I was. I thought I was a good Marine and I was a good Marine. I did everything right. I PT, you know, all the things that Marines do. But as an individual, as a human, I was I was God showing me. God showed me how disgusting I was and what my life was like apart from Christ Jesus.

[00:05:38] And I wanted to share that with others. Yes. Well, again, a lot of people would just simply say, well, I'll just do that. I'll just try to be a good witness. But you decided that instead you were going to provide a structure for some of that. So talk about that, because as people go to the website, there are a variety of ways in which they can plug in in terms of training, in terms of upcoming events and things of that nature. Of course, if you go there, you'll see you have integrity, faith, all sorts of resources and those kinds of things.

[00:06:07] And that's really what I want to focus on for the rest of the time, what we can do to help individuals in the military or even if they're outside the military to actually grow in Christ. That's really what you're all about, isn't it? It is. It is. And I became the national director for Valor Veterans in November. But I've been working with the team and our Valor team is amazing guys and gals all over the United States. We all have some type of touch point with veterans. And Valor specifically works with ROTC cadets and veterans.

[00:06:37] So my role is to help the veteran program along. So, you know, the veterans, it's a unique bunch of people. We don't trust people all that much. You've got to earn the trust and you've got to break through some of the hard shells and the walls that you can't always see, but you know they're there. And, you know, that's just part of the dynamic of doing ministry with veterans.

[00:07:03] I'm going to take a break and we'll come back and I want to break out into a couple areas because, first of all, ROTC, I know we have some listeners that might have young people that are going to be involved in that regard. And even though that's not your primary area of expertise, I thought we might talk about that for a minute. But then we're going to focus on the veterans because we are dealing with all sorts of issues, whether it's PTSD, whether it's various forms of addiction, deaths of despair, just all the things that veterans have had to address.

[00:07:31] So we are certainly going to make a point of really trying to educate you about this today. Ted happens to be in town, so I am thrilled that we can also open up the phones. I'd like to hear from some of you that are in military families. Maybe you came back from your deployment and there were some real issues you had to address. Maybe you'd like to know more about how to set up a chapter in your community. So, again, let's open up the phones. Anywhere along the line, you are free to give us a phone call.

[00:07:58] That number is 800-351-1212. You know how much we want to honor those of you that have served. And certainly we want to serve you if you can be served in any particular way. You might also want to go to the website. It is valorvets.us. Don't have to remember all that. Just simply scroll down and see the picture there that we have of Ted Edwards. And everything you will need is right there.

[00:08:24] Of course, some of the conversation we're going to have in the next hour, we have material there. But there are featured resources. We're going to talk about some of those different ways in which you can begin to address those on campus and out in the culture. And we'll come back. And, Megan, even to take your phone calls if you'd like to join us. 1-800-351-1212. We'll be right back.

[00:08:57] This is Viewpoints with Kirby Anderson. Should parents be allowed to opt their children out of readings of LGBTQ-themed storybooks? This is the question before the Supreme Court. The case comes from Maryland where a coalition of parents from Montgomery County contend that requiring their children to participate in instruction that violates their religious beliefs violates their First Amendment rights to freely exercise their religion.

[00:09:22] Activists have been working for decades to promote gay and lesbian views to young children in the public school system. Some of these materials have the obvious goal of indoctrinating students into this ideology. That is why the Beckett Fund is representing families of Muslim, Jewish, and Christian faiths in this case. Eric Baxter of Beckett explains, Cramming down controversial gender ideology on three-year-olds without their parents' permission is an affront to our nation's traditions, parental rights, and basic human decency.

[00:09:51] He argues the court must make it clear that parents, not the state, should be the ones deciding how and when to introduce their children to sensitive issues about gender and sexuality. This case once again puts the high court in the center of the culture wars. The justices earlier heard oral arguments in a challenge to Tennessee's ban on transgender surgery for minors. Now, critics argue that the Supreme Court should stay out of the culture wars.

[00:10:16] My response is they would be more than glad to avoid such cases if it weren't for activists trying to inject their gay and transsexual ideologies into grade school classrooms. We can hope and pray the Supreme Court will prevent these attempts to indoctrinate young minds and allow parents to raise their children without such interference. The justices need to bring some common sense back into the public schools of America. I'm Kirby Anderson, and that's my point of view.

[00:10:45] For a free booklet on a biblical view on big data, go to viewpoints.info.com. That's viewpoints.info.com. You're listening to Point of View, your listener-supported source for truth. Our topic is Valor Vets, and if you want to know more about that, simply go to the website pointofview.net, or you can type in valorvets.us. Either way, we'll get you there.

[00:11:11] Ted Edwards is in studio with us, and Ted, if we could, let's talk about your goal, your mission, kind of your mission statement and all the rest, because it seems to me that this is somewhat unique, and I want our listeners to know more about what you're doing. Yeah, so our mission is to transform campus veterans into Christ-centered, lifelong, multiplying disciples. We want to share the gospel with veterans. That's what makes us unique.

[00:11:34] There's a lot of great programs out there, but our program, we start with the gospel of Jesus Christ. We want to care for every single veteran, no matter what, and what their background does and what experiences they had, but we want to share the gospel. I mean, that's biblical, and it's crew's mission. One of the things that makes us unique is the DNA, we call it, is the win, build, and send. Right.

[00:12:01] Win people to Christ, build them up in Christ, which is the discipleship piece, and then send them out to make more disciples. I mean, that's the gospel. That's Matthew 28, 19 and 20. Well, again, I'm very familiar with some different aspects of the ministry of crew, including the military ministry, but this is kind of interesting because one of the articles you have here was entitled, The Veteran Steps Onto Campus, with the question, what am I doing here? That's right.

[00:12:29] And I'm thinking that the transition from being in the military, very regulated, you know exactly who you salute, you know exactly where you're going to be at any point in time, you know where you're going to sleep, you know when you're going to be exercising, you know when you're going to eat, to go into a campus where it's just as wide open as it can be, and you're still bringing with you some of the baggage of being in the military. Can you talk that through a little bit? Yeah.

[00:12:56] Because I'd like to know kind of what happens when an individual gets on campus. Yeah, I mean, they've been a part of a mission for four years or sometimes 20 plus years. They might be a veteran who's getting their master's degree, you know, things like that. And so they've been on this mission for X number of years, and now there's not really a mission. So we help them find that mission in Christ and discover this new mission. There is a mission. The mission is in Christ.

[00:13:24] The mission is evangelism, making disciples. And it is a very difficult transition because there's, you know, you take a guy's weapon away, you know, or a young person's weapon away, and you get on campus and you're experiencing freedom, you're experiencing some good things, but you're experiencing some things like, I don't fit. Where do I fit? Why am I here? Why am I here? And they're working through not just the past issues, but current issues. And it's a pretty heavy load that they carry.

[00:13:52] Again, you think about what it's like to be, say, a Campus Crusade, Navigators, InterVarsity staff member, discipling an 18-year-old who's just kind of a blank slate and open to just about anything. And then we talk about your ministry where you're dealing with somebody that's maybe battle-hardened, maybe has maybe almost a full generation older than some of the other students.

[00:14:17] And you can see why they're just saying, I'm not sure what I'm doing here, where I'm going, and I really need some grounding and some direction and some encouragement, maybe even accountability. That's right. That's right. And, you know, military people are always goal-oriented. They're very disciplined. But when you're thrown into a new environment, some of those things you have to work through. You have to figure it out. And we're there to help. We're there to, you know, help them get focused on that next mission.

[00:14:47] And we're doing it through the gospel. We're doing it through, you know, introducing them to Jesus Christ. We want to, you know, have fellowship. We want to build camaraderie, like not quite like they had in the military. But, you know, the camaraderie among veterans, it's good. And it doesn't matter what branch you come from. We've had fellowships at our house, and there's Marines, there's sailors, there's Elmer, and there's Coast Guard. It doesn't matter. Once you're a veteran, it's like a big family. It really is.

[00:15:13] Well, again, one of the questions I think people would have is, well, do you do a Bible study? Do you discipleship? Do you have evangelistic outreaches? What does that all look like? Yeah, so I call it the snapshot is a weekly Bible study with veterans. This is the ideal. And we want to work through local churches. I mean, part of our vision, our strategic plan is working through local churches. And this is for anyone that's out there. Maybe you're a veteran in your church, and you're trying to figure out where do I fit? What's my mission?

[00:15:43] Well, talk to us. Send me a message through our website because we could use more people. We could use more people in the fight and in the mission. But it's weekly Bible studies. We have, of course, mission trips. They can go on international mission trips or local mission trips. We have one coming to my hometown of Hendersonville, North Carolina, to help out with the hurricane relief and Helene disaster there that I've experienced personally and my family has.

[00:16:12] So there's great needs there. So there's those kinds of things. We have an opportunity for veterans to go to Filter of Hope in the Dominican Republic. So there's lots of opportunities, lots of things to build their faith, build their fellowship, you know, and the camaraderie again among other veterans and ROTC kids. Build family. So really they're just with themselves. They're not necessarily interacting with other college students, or how does that work out? I mean, we would, you know, like for projects and things like that.

[00:16:39] But for Bible studies and stuff, veterans are kind of, it's a unique bunch. It's better to sometimes just have them together by themselves. And I was just curious about that. Some people might even be in a situation. Of course, you were at Parris Island, and we've talked about our radio station just down the road. You've been on the church there. There are sometimes churches located very close to some kind of military base. It could be Army, Navy, Marines, whatever it might be.

[00:17:07] And they might say, well, if I really want to have an outreach to people in the military, the kind of Bible study I would do would probably be different than the kind I would have for others. So can you give us some ideas about that? Yeah, to some degree, I would say that's true. But for the most part, you know, my heart is to be, first of all, biblical. Yes. You know, to be sound doctrine. And then, you know, the other stuff kind of falls in place. Let's be sound doctrinally.

[00:17:36] But, you know, we have things on our website that's tailored to veterans. And even for our ROTC website, we can fill your inbox up with resources to reach the military, to communicate, to teach you how to do evangelism, train your church how to reach out to the military community. I mean, there's a – yeah, we have a ton of materials out there. A lot of good people write. I do want to talk about those resources a bit since you mentioned ROTC. I did promise we'd talk about that.

[00:18:05] For young people that are thinking of going off and getting an ROTC, they probably just figure that that's something I do on the side and I will just get involved with other campus activities. But it sounds like you have even a plan for them as well, don't you? Yeah, and that's how Valor was founded. It was founded at Texas A&M. Oh, how about that? Dr. David Preston, he was in the court of cadets at that time.

[00:18:30] You know, and two guys really started a Bible study in their dorm or whatever it was called back at Texas A&M. And it's grown from there. It's been over 20 years. I don't know how many years it's been exactly. But God has just grown this ministry. So it started out with ROTC cadets. And then it's grown to now veterans. But the ROTC ministry, we're on 140 different campuses. That's great. The goal is to be on 300 campuses in the United States.

[00:19:00] And we also have the international part. We just, we have a great young man. He's an Army reservist. So if there are any chaplains out there, reserve chaplains or retired chaplains wanting to figure out what's my next mission, well, we would love to have, talk with you about that as well. But this young man, it lives in Houston. He's South Korean. And so he's helped us develop some ministry in South Korea. Lord willing, Lord willing, I'll be going to South Korea in the fall to see if,

[00:19:29] because every South Korean male serves in the military. Yes. And so there's a, it's a target rich environment as we call it. So there's a lot of veterans over there that we can reach out to and help them know Christ. That is really encouraging. We're going to take a break. But when we come back, if you'd like to join us, 1-800-351-1212. We're going to talk about how to, first of all, find out what is available in your community. And as you go to the website, this would be a good time. There's a section on training, on communities, on some of the events. Of course, the whole section here on knowing God.

[00:19:59] And of course, if you would want to support this organization, that's another idea. So there are some ways in which you can be involved with this. And I would encourage those of you that maybe are located near some kind of military facility to begin to think about an outreach. And certainly, if you are involved on a campus ministry of some sort, think about knowing that this is another resource that you would have access to as well. So lots of opportunities. Ted Edwards with us.

[00:20:28] We have, of course, a link to valorvets.us. And, again, there's some great resources that you can find out there on training, community, and also the possibility that you might want to start something in your own community. So, again, since we broadcast all over the country, that would be the case. And if you, by the way, happen to be in North Carolina, it sounds like you've got an opportunity coming up right there, don't you? We sure do. Yeah. Yes, sir. That's a good way. You can hit that button that says contact and find out more about that as well.

[00:20:57] If you'd like to have Ted come and speak for your group, that's something else I would highly recommend. So, again, you can click on that contact button and find that as well. Let's take a break, though. As we go to the break, let me mention that next hour we'll be getting into some other issues, the pro-life issues. We've also posted quite a bit of material about how do we evaluate executive power and what about the concerns about having such a narrow margin in the house. We've got a lot to cover.

[00:21:25] We'll do that right after this. It almost seems like we live in a different world from many people in positions of authority. They say men can be women and women men. People are prosecuted differently or not at all depending on their politics. Criminals are more valued and rewarded than law-abiding citizens. It's so overwhelming, so demoralizing. You feel like giving up. But we can't.

[00:21:54] We shouldn't. We must not. As Winston Churchill said to Britain in the darkest days of World War II, never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy. And that's what we say to you today. This is not a time to give in, but to step up and join Point of View in providing clarity in the chaos.

[00:22:21] We can't do it alone, but together, with God's help, we will overcome the darkness. Invest in biblical clarity today at pointofview.net or call 1-800-347-5151. Point of View will continue after this.

[00:22:50] You are listening to Point of View. Point of View. The opinions expressed on Point of View do not necessarily reflect the views of the management or staff of this station. And now, here again, is Kirby Anderson. Continue your conversation today as we talk about Valor Vets. And again, Ted Edwards is the National Director for Valor Vets.

[00:23:18] And if you would like to join us, 1-800-351-1212. Or just sit back and take some notes and maybe begin to think about what you might want to do in your community. You gave us, Ted, a pretty good idea of how you've spread to a lot of campuses. But first of all, how does an individual listening to this right now know if there's a resource like this on a campus? Maybe I'm sending a grandson or a granddaughter or a daughter, son, niece, nephew, something like that.

[00:23:45] And I would wonder, well, if they could connect up, how would they do so? And how do they find that? Yeah, they can go on our website, first of all, and send me an email. There's a link there in the drop down. You can send me an email, and I'll respond, you know, whatever campus it is. I can – the good thing about being in ministry for the last 27 years and 10 with crew military and then now this with eight years, you know, you get to know a lot of people.

[00:24:12] And by God's grace, you know, we can link them up to the right location. If we've got crew, if we've got navigators or OCF, Officers of Christian Fellowship, we'll get them plugged in somewhere. I've always felt like that a lot of us have high school ministries. We send them off to college, but we don't make the connection to the campus ministry. And I remember even – and this goes back a long way – when I made my way to campus for the first time, fortunately, I met somebody from Navigators pretty early.

[00:24:40] And then within the next year, I met people with Campus Crusade. But you could flounder on a campus for a long period of time before you even realize there are ministries like that. Sometimes they have an orientation opportunity. But it does seem to me that if you have some young person heading off, especially if they're going to be an ROTC, you just want to get them plugged in right away. Yeah, you really do need to.

[00:25:04] I mean, it's an experience like when I was in the Marines and I came to Faith in Christ, one of the first things my pastor in Japan at the time, he taught me how to find a good church. And there are resources out there. Now with the technology that we have, you can go online. You can put in, you know, Ole Miss crew, you know, and Facebook or Instagram or things like that. And you can find a group.

[00:25:32] And it goes for any campus that anybody's on in the United States. You can put in something like that, you know, Clemson Crew, which is right near my home, my town where I live. You know, you can find the location. Thank God for some technology that helps us find and get people plugged into the right locations. And again, that is one of the differences because, you know, I was back there in the pre-days before we had all that technology.

[00:25:55] And you really, it would take a while to find out even which churches were there and then which ones were really Bible teaching and all the other kind of issues there as well. So if they are wanting to contact you about something that exists, what if we have somebody in ministry that's saying, I don't think we have anything on our campus, but what would it take to start something like that? Can you help us with that? Well, I'm a Marine and most of our veterans, you know, we poke fun at each other, but I keep things real simple.

[00:26:21] So, you know, I keep it as simple as possible so it can be transferable. I think that was one of the things that Bill Bright and his writings and his, you know, the core part of crew, keep it simple so it's transferable to other people. So we can get, we can help you get that started. Go on our website, you know, send me an email or, you know, go on the website and we actually have a link there that tells you get started. How do I get started? And you can contact us.

[00:26:51] We'll talk to you, you know, over the phone. We'll Zoom. We'll come to your location and train your church in how to do ministry to that campus community, the ROTC cadets and those kind of people. Yeah. If God calls us and raises up something, we will go. The Lord will provide for us. Again, Valor Vets and Ted Edwards with us. And since you did mention the fact that you were starting to grow in Japan, I'd love to hear the rest of your testimony. I kind of cut it short because I wanted to get to the organization.

[00:27:19] But I wanted to get to know you a little bit better because it is a massive, really a massive transformation from where you were to where you are. Now, 2 Corinthians 5.17 says we're a new creation. But we also recognize that all justification takes place immediately. Sanctification takes a long time. And I'd love to know a little bit more about your own testimony. Yeah. I mean, you know, it's quite painful. You know, sometimes I don't like sharing it. But it's all God's grace. It's his story.

[00:27:49] It's not Ted's story. It's not about Ted. It's about God. And it's about God's mercy and grace that is so good and so sufficient for all of us, for anyone that is out there. I mean, I was the kid and my two older brothers. We were the kids you probably didn't want to let your kids play with. Yes. I mean, we were pretty rough. Pretty rough. My mother was married five times. I had a sister that was murdered. My brother committed suicide. Oh, man.

[00:28:16] And my dad, you know, like I said, abandoned us when I was just two months old. He tried to force my mother to abort me. They put his first six children in an orphanage. And just so much mess. So much mess. Violence that I grew up with. Watching my, you know, just one story. I watched my grandmother get dragged through a barbed wire fence by a family member. And I was a little boy.

[00:28:44] And the only thing I knew to do was shoot him with a BB gun. You know, I mean, I'm I had to deal with way too much stuff. And and then I joined the Marines. And that's, you know, it did save me. It did save me. Um, and that's where, you know, things escalated for a period of time. Uh, and and intensified the sinfulness and the and the lifestyle of being apart from Christ

[00:29:13] intensified so much that, you know, I was almost beat to death in a bar fight by four Marines. And, uh, you know, I tell people if, you know, if we can't fight a war, sometimes we'll fight ourselves. And that's unfortunate. But that's what God would use to bring me to faith in Christ. We had a Jesus. God places a Jesus freak in every unit, at least one. And Sergeant Matthew Ferris was was that guy. And it's always reading his Bible. He was always going to church. He was always witnessing to us, you know, and I didn't like him.

[00:29:44] I didn't like him. But he's the only Marine the night I was beat up that carried me to the hospital. And so I went to church with him on Sunday. I went to church with him. And that's where God, I, when I share my testimony, I, I, it was as if God cracked open my chest cavity and he put a mirror in front of my face and he showed me, Ted, here's, here's your heart. Here's your heart. And it is apart from me, it's dark, it's nasty.

[00:30:10] And I remember reading one time that, um, after I came to faith, I was reading my Bible, bought my first Bible. And, um, and I was reading in the Bible that God is a father to the fatherless and Marines don't cry. We leak a little bit when God squeezes our heart. Um, but God squeezed my heart pretty hard. And I, I, I started bawling and I shared, I shed so many tears over that passage. That's amazing. That he's my daddy and he's never going to leave me.

[00:30:39] He will never, ever abandon me. Yes. And, uh, so that's, that's part of my testimony. And the part of ministry is even crazier. Um, because I, I was, I had to go to summer school to join the Marines. I'm not a very educated guy. I've just been, I'm a grunt for Jesus. And that's what I like to tell people is I'm a grunt for Jesus. And, um, you know, I just want to tell people about Christ and how much he loves them and

[00:31:06] help them help people, uh, like in the Henry Blackaby studies that love relationship. There's a, you know, in Christianity, there's nominal Christianity where I'm just going to church. I'm going through the motions. Man, my passion is, is to help Christians and non-Christians have that abundant life in Christ Jesus. That's what he wants. He wants us to have that intimacy with him. That is the gospel. That is the eternal life.

[00:31:35] Jesus said in John 17 three, you know, he's praying for us to know him. And that is a, that's an intimate knowledge. It's not just churchianity. It's all about Jesus. It's all about Christ. So, yeah, I was just thinking, you know, you said you haven't had a chance to read hillbilly elegy. I need to go out and buy you one and hand it to you and say, first of all, read it because you're going to go, okay, the parallels between me and J.D. Events are significant.

[00:32:01] And your story is even more tragic if people really dig deeply into it than even his. And so I think there's some encouragement people would get from that particular story. And I appreciate you sharing that, even though I don't want to make you leak any more than me. That's right here at the moment. When we come back from the break, though, I would get maybe just a few other comments from you about how we can minister to veterans because you are doing that. And it does seem to me that we run into them in different ways. You run into them, of course, on campus.

[00:32:31] But we have them in our churches. We have them in our businesses. We have them sometimes in our communities. And we sometimes say, well, thank you for your service. And then we don't know what else to say. And maybe you can give us some ideas about that. So if you're looking for ideas, first of all, Ted offered, and I think he is very honest about that, that if you want to contact him, first of all, we have a link to his X file. We have a link to his Facebook page.

[00:32:59] So you already can, just by clicking on the picture, contact him. And so there's a contact button. And I just clicked on it there. And up pops information that you can begin to use so that you can meet individuals and find out a little bit more. Of course, there's also material there about training some of the communities. Maybe you want to know if there's one of these outreaches in your community. Maybe you would like to know more about how to start one. And then there's a section there called Know God.

[00:33:28] And if you are going to be listening today and you've never had a close and personal relationship with Jesus Christ through Jesus to the Father, four symbols that represent the message of the gospel. And you might even be able to lead yourself to the Lord right there. Let's take a break. We'll be right back.

[00:33:54] You're listening to Point of View, your listener-supported source for truth. Ted Edwards with us for just a little bit longer. Again, we're talking about Valor Vets. But I thought, again, whether people involved in your ministry or not, I think for just a minute I'd love to have you talk about what it would be like and what we can know and think about in order to minister to veterans. Because in some respects, we certainly value their service to the country.

[00:34:20] But now I'd love to maybe have you talk about how can we serve them. Do you have any ideas? Oh, yes, sir. One of the things I think that is challenging for, let's say, civilians is for them to think that I've never served in the military, so how can I minister to them? I've never had their experiences. Well, I've never been shot. I don't have to be shot to know it hurts.

[00:34:46] And veterans don't need to know, or they need to know the primary thing, do you care? Yes. Do you care about me? I don't, you know, they want to know how much you care about them. And when you earn their trust, you'll see the walls come down. And it's intentionality, first of all. You know, and it's not necessarily, well, it is a calling, you know, is God calling you to minister to veterans or, you know, these men and women?

[00:35:14] But there's an intentionality about it. Open your home. Open your home and just have a meal with a group of veterans. And, you know, it's not difficult. It can get messy. And sometimes when we opened our home, you know, to veterans, you need to be prepared to listen to some language that's not necessarily, especially if they're not believers, that you don't normally listen to in your home.

[00:35:43] And so you need to be able to overcome those things. But usually there's a veteran about the language issue. I've always seen this, that someone might slip up and say, you know, a bad word. Another Marine goes, oh, you know, don't do that here. You know, so we're always, you know, accountability. But it's, you know, there's an intentionality.

[00:36:06] There's a, you know, create a plan that you want to reach out to them if it's a church or if it's an individual wanting to have them in their home and make it periodic. Make it, you know, once a month you want to have a meal or you want to have, you know, maybe you like guns, maybe you like shooting, you know, all military people kind of like guns. So, you know, maybe take a group of veterans. I never thought of that. That's a good idea. Yeah, to a skeet shoot, you know, go shooting, target shooting with them or, you know,

[00:36:35] shooting skeet and things like that. There's all kinds of things. And I think most, for the most part, veterans, they don't want to be treated differently. No. But they, you know, it's just a different experience that they've had. And even for me, you know, with talking with combat veterans, I've never had those experiences. I know it's painful. I know they're dealing with things that is hard to process and there's pain there and

[00:37:04] those kind of things. I just let them know that I care. They know I care. They look in my eyes and they hear my heart. They hear my voice. And I show it to them. You know, God demonstrated his love for us. And while we were yet sinners, Christ said, God put his love on display for us. And we, if we truly love our veterans, we care about our veterans, display it. Show it.

[00:37:34] Prove it. Prove it, you know. And it is, yeah, like I said, it's going to be messy. But it's necessary. It's something that the church, I think they're, you know, and I was telling some gentlemen, you know, some folks, some of our staff earlier, once you get a veteran, and this is what I love about it, they're disciplined people. Yes, they are. And great to have in a business. Great to have in a ministry. Absolutely. Yeah, great to have in your community. Yeah, you don't have to prod them along. You don't have to say, you know, get to work. They're going to work.

[00:38:03] You probably have to tell them to slow down. They're going to take a break. So they're disciplined. They're focused people. And they're passionate. So once you light a veteran's fire for Christ Jesus, oh man, look at Chuck Swindoll. We were just talking about him. Marine veteran. I've known a lot of veterans out there that are in ministry. They're on fire. And they're on fire for the rest of their lives. Not that other men are not. But there's a fire in the belly.

[00:38:30] You know, and that's what my story is part of the fire in the belly for me to do what I do. I don't want another veteran to mess up like my dad did. Mm-hmm. And like I did. And like others did. You know, let's mitigate the pain that we're causing and introduce veterans to Christ Jesus. You know, that's where the, that's the best part. Yes.

[00:38:59] You know, of what we do. And again, we look at a lot of young men. We talk about this so often. We have millions of young men that are not working, not looking for work, and really just are struggling. We have a generation where we see these deaths of despair, and whether it's from OxyContin or whether it's from fentanyl or whatever it might be, and the suicide ideation is going up. It does seem to me that we really need to come alongside a number of individuals, even if they're not veterans.

[00:39:28] But then if they've gone in the military, that almost adds to some of the stresses we're dealing with right now. And like you said, it gets kind of messy. So somewhere along the line, maybe you even need to say, let me put my arm around you. Let me kind of walk with you. But we also might, if you won't be offended, need to maybe get you some counseling because you're really struggling with some bigger issues, and that's kind of outside of my pay grade. Absolutely.

[00:39:52] And I think that's a great point is we need to know, the church needs to know, when is it time to turn someone over to a professional? Yes. A little quick story. When I was a youth pastor, I had a young man, and it was always the fear of being a Marine veteran. And I didn't treat my youth like they were recruits or anything, but I would say zero, and they'd all have to.

[00:40:20] But one young man joined the Marine Corps. How about that? And he saw combat. He saw multiple combat tours. He ended up shot, a young purple heart, and a lot of stuff, saw a lot of stuff. And right around, I think it was 18, almost two years ago, he ended up taking his life. Wow. And I carry that. Yes. I don't. Yes, yes, yes.

[00:40:46] I don't want another veteran, another Marine, anyone to take their lives. Yes. This is part of what I do. Yes. Why I do what I do. It's. I'm passionate about it. And I want to help the church minister to these folks. It's vital. It's vital. Again, if you say, I don't know what to do, I don't even know what the first step is. Well, the first step is to go to the website, pointofview.net. Click on that button that says, see more.

[00:41:15] Strike a pin. You'll see a picture of Ted Edwards there. And as you've heard, an incredible story. And then you'll maybe want to just click on the button that says contact or give. I would hope that some people might want to even support this ministry. There's training. There's communities. There's all sorts of things. And I think you might even want to bring, or Ted's got a great story here. You might want to bring him and come and speak at your church and talk about this ministry as well. So I know you've had a busy week, but I appreciate you scheduling an hour with us today here on Point of View. It's been a privilege.

[00:41:45] I so very much appreciate it. But I've listened to the radio program for quite a long time. And, yeah, like I said, I have to pinch myself that I'm sitting right here. Well, we're glad you're sitting there as well. Again, you've got one of your colleagues here as well, so I'll let you join him in just a minute. But let me just mention that, again, we have all sorts of information that you will probably want to follow up on. And, again, the first step is, of course, to go to valorvets.us. And that is the case.

[00:42:13] We will next hour be talking with Katie Glenn Daniel. We're going to talk about what's going on right now in the Trump administration. What's the future for the pro-life movement? Then we're going to get into some other things. We, of course, have a new attorney general, and she has hit the ground running, so we'll talk about that. Also, we've learned a little bit more about why such a protest about USAID. It turns out that has been a place to funnel all sorts of leftist programs. We'll be talking about that and many other topics we will get into in the second hour.

[00:42:41] Of course, my commentary is up there today, and it has to do with a Supreme Court case right now about whether or not parents should opt out their children of reading storybooks with an LGBTQ theme. And I think the Supreme Court is going to rule rightly on that, but that's on the agenda there as well. So we're going to take a break. We'll come back with more right after these important messages.

[00:43:06] The Bible tells us not to worry, and yet there is a lot of worrying stuff in our world today. Thankfully, the Bible doesn't stop at telling us not to worry. God gives us a next step. He says we need to pray. But sometimes even knowing what to pray can be difficult,

[00:43:31] And that is why Point of View has relaunched our Pray for America movement, a series of weekly emails to guide you in prayer for our nation. Each week, you'll receive a brief update about a current issue affecting Americans, along with a written prayer that you can easily share with others. We'll also include a short free resource for you in each email so you can learn more about the issue at hand.

[00:44:00] Will you commit to pray for America? Go to pointofview.net. Click on the Pray for America banner at the top of the page to subscribe. Again, that's pointofview.net. Click on the Pray for America banner. Let's pray together for God to make a difference in America. Point of View will continue after this.

[00:44:30] Thank you.