UNITY Like You Have Not Heard

An important message in our day that we must consider.

Trey Gowdy Speaking at Second Baptist Woodway Church

August 12, 2018

Christianity Is Hard

Contrast Is Good

Bring Change, Large and Small, By Living An Authentic, Consistent Life Reflective Of The Teachings Of Christ

This is a formatted transcript of the message that was given by Senator Trey Gowdy at Baptist Woodway Church on August 12, 2018. The video is found at this link on YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPgmCANKbKk&t=0s&list=PL5lZGsw4pfEyxK0YEo8MGEzavaM8I5-if&index=3

In this day of divisiveness on all sides, this is a message that should be heard and considered by all who engage in the debate over current events. A house divided cannot stand. The United States of America is a house divided. How long can it stand with such divisiveness? We must make a change towards discourse that is unifying rather than dividing.

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT

Thank you. Thank y'all. Thank you all.

I may move here.

Y'all are a lot nicer than the reception I get back home.

It is great to be back in Texas.

Spent four years here in college and had it not been for the most beautiful, kind, sweet, Christ-like person I had ever met in my life, who was my then girlfriend, now wife, I’m that and some difficulties with the law enforcement, I may have stayed in Texas. But, I went back home to get married and my wife and I celebrated our 29th wedding anniversary last week. So, honestly, you don't have to clap. She's not been that tough to live with. She's, she is the most Christ-like person I have ever been around. And the Young family has been incredible to me for over 30 years. Ben and I were talking about that last night. Time goes so quickly.

I remember, I guess it's the second loneliest feeling of my life. The loneliest feeling was last week when I forgot it was our anniversary. The loneliest feeling was when my father dropped me off as a 17 year old in Waco, Texas and I did not know a soul. All of my earthly possessions were in a wooden, green army box and my dad had a 14 hour drive ahead of him. I said, “Dad you go ahead and head on back.” The dorm had not opened yet and the Lord has a sense of humor. Within a couple of hours, I had met a guy named Ben Young and we have been friends since then. His father, Dr. Ed Young, Sr., has been, depending on what stage in life I’m in, a voice of accountability and discipline, a voice of encouragement, a model for enthusiasm and energy, which I find exhausting.

Ed, Jr. is living proof that older brothers can be nice, because I was unaware that that was possible until I had met little Ed and Cliff. Ordinarily, I do not like talented people, but, I have made an exception for Cliff. But the person in the Young family, as a cynic and a skeptic and someone who is always doubting and always questioning, I had no defense for the authenticity of the life that Jo Beth lived.

I have. There is no defense that any skeptic or cynic has for a credible, consistent, authentically lived life and her humility from the time I met her until the last time I saw her, spoke to me more than a thousand of the best sermons I could ever hear.

So thank you for welcoming back and thank you for giving me a chance to reconnect with the Young family.

Tim Scott and I wrote a book together. I guess it's a start. I wish we had a picture of Tim Scott. I don't know how many of you know, there he is. He's the one, depending on where you're sitting. Well, he's bald-headed, if that helps. Stars say the one on the left or right, but this circular thing has me all messed up. He's the one that’s bald-headed.

We eat dinner together every night that we're in Washington and I guess it was about two years ago, we sat down to dinner and Tim said, “Sure, I want to do something shocking. I want to do something surprising”. And I thought, “Well, great. He's gonna buy dinner tonight.” He said, “I want to do something that shocks every teacher I ever had.” He said, “I want to write a book.” “That's it?"  with him, if you read a book, it would shock every teacher you ever had. You don't have to write one. He said, “Now I want to write one.”

So then, the challenge becomes what do you write a book about. And I wanted to write a book about how miserable it is to run for public office and all the terrible, mean things that are said about you, some of which, by the way, are not true, not all of them are not true, but nonetheless, how difficult it is to run for public office in our current political environment. I said, “That's what I want to write about.” And I started thinking when I first ran in 2000 for District Attorney. I remembered our then young daughter, Abigail, walking into my home office holding the local newspaper, tears streaming down her face, saying, “Please tell me it's not true, Daddy. Please tell me it's not true.” I said, “Abigail, let me see it. I mean let me see what they said.” “Oh daddy, please, tell me it's not true. Please tell me, you're not a lawyer.” “That's only partially true.”

We wrote a book about unity. And I get the joke. This is a crazy political environment for anyone to be talking about the need for unity. But, Tim and I have been there for the last eight years. I love contrast. Contrast is exactly what we need in a pluralistic society. I appreciate the fact that we're not all going to eat at the same restaurant when we leave church. I appreciate the fact that everybody doesn't pull for the Cowboys if there is another team, I think, in Texas. I appreciate the fact that people have different views on the size and scope of government and people have different views on every political issue. I think it's great that we have contrast. It's exactly what you would expect in a pluralistic, melting pot society. But, when that contrast morphs into conflict, when you can no longer have a conversation with someone, when you begin to challenge motives, when you begin to question people's patriotism, because they happen to have a different political belief structure, that's when I get worried.

You know, when Tim and I say, “We're writing a book on unity” - I love the media. The media said, “Well y'all are both Republicans from South Carolina. You almost have everything in common.”

Look at the picture. You have, you have a black man and a white man from the state where the civil war began. Writing a book together, I guess we should celebrate the fact that that's no longer newsworthy. I mean that I guess we should celebrate the fact that that alone is no big deal and I do celebrate that. Because when Timmy and I were born, we could not go to school together. We now teach a class together at a school. So the progress has been phenomenal in our lifetime. But don't think for a second, just because we're from the same state, and we have roughly the same political views, that we are the same. Tim and I have a lot of differences. We have differences with respect to our relationship with law enforcement. I was a prosecutor for 20 years. Every time I’ve ever been stopped was because I deserve to be stopped. In a few times, I have not been stopped, I should have been stopped. I've never had a negative experience with law enforcement. If anything, I would be biased towards law enforcement and I confess that bias. Tim Scott was stopped 7 times in the course of 1 year, as an elected official.

I don't wear the house pen. I have a colleague here, John Culbertson, who's also a friend. I don't know whether he's got it on. We're supposed to wear a house pen. I don't wear one. I've never been stopped trying to seek entry into a capital building. Tim Scott does where the Senate pin he's got it on in the picture. He's been stopped. He's been physically stopped.

So we have different experiences with law enforcement. We have different faith experiences. He's an optimist. He's always looking for the good and any factor. He's hopeful. He thinks tomorrow's gonna be better than today. And I’m a former prosecutor, which means, I have a really low opinion of mankind, which the good news is, is a rarely disappointed. And I’m even more rarely surprised.

But we come at life, I mean, I am a skeptic and a cynic and he is an optimist. And do not minimize the different narratives that that presents you for life.

Tim has never been married. I've been married for 29 years. Tim has no children. I have two, which means, Tim has never had a child asks for money 20 minutes after you gave them some money.

And Tim does not know what it's like to have a child major in philosophy - I wish I were kidding – to then go to law school - then graduate law school and tell his mom and dad that he would like to pursue a career as a professional golfer, all of which has happened in the last 4 weeks. I think I have a better idea now of why Tim does not have children.

Tim grew up in a single-parent household. His mom worked at the hospital, changing bedpans, 18 hours a day. I had a parent that worked at hospital too. Mom was a doctor.

I think, the moment I knew, that despite the fact that we're from the same state, and we may have the same initial after our name, that our lives were very, very different, was about 4 years ago with that same table at that same restaurant in Washington and Tim was telling me a story by his grandfather who was the only male figure in his life, Mr. Artemus Weir, lived to be 94 years of age. And Tim was telling me how his grandfather would hold up the Charleston Post and Courier at breakfast. He wanted Tim to appreciate education, wanted Tim to value current events, what's going on in the world, got to stay informed, got to stay educated. So rather than telling him that, he modeled it, read the newspaper every morning at breakfast.

And I couldn't help but interrupt and, said, “Well, we got that in common, Tim. My father did the exact same thing. My dad held up a different paper, the Spartanburg Herald. But, he held it up every morning, and, if one of my 3 sisters would deign to ask him a question, he would lure it, answer it maybe, and then raise it back up. I said, “We got that in common too. Ain't that neat.”

Said the difference Trey is, my grandfather couldn't read, died not being able to read, faked it, faked it because he wanted a grandson to pick out a seat in the United States Congress instead of picking cotton for a living.

So, yeah, you can look at that and see the similarities, but even people you think are similar have differences, and even people you think are different and they got nothing in common, you'd be surprised, you'd be surprised.

So we decided to write a book on being more unified, and aren't we lucky that as believers, we had such an incredible model for that.

I don't know how closely you follow current events, and maybe it's the cynicism and the skepticism in me, but it just feels like it's getting worse. It just feels like we can't have a conversation with people that have a different belief structure. It feels like every day is election day. It feels like when we go home at night, we vote, depending on what channel we want to watch, depending on what radio station we want to listen to. Every day is election day.

And then I have that validated with the polling that indicates, if you are a Democrat, two-thirds of all self-identified Democrats do not have a Republican friend, two-thirds of all self-identified Republicans do not have a Democrat friend.

So, if you are trying to figure out what motivates the thinking of someone that you disagree with, who better to ask than someone that you disagree with. But, if you don't know that person, if there's no one in your life, I don't know who you're supposed to ask. I'm lucky. I don't have to walk very far to find somebody that disagrees with me, and I’m not talking about in the House. I'm talking about, in my house.

I live with a 21 year old socialist. That is not my wife my wife. My wife looks 21. My wife is not 21. That is our daughter. Our daughter has very different positions on issues than her father. We don't argue about it. Our voices aren't raised. I don't challenge. I don't view myself as a failure like some other family members do, view me as being a failure for raising a 21 year old socialist Here's the way I look at it. Abigail, can you tell me why you believe what you believe? Is there a factual basis for it? And then I think back to when I was 21 and how much I have changed in the intervening 30-something years. But I am NOT, I am NOT gonna have a fractured relationship with my daughter. And if that means I got to sit there and listen to something that I'm not a hundred percent crazy by hearing, then I'm gonna do it.

If you are a believer, then I want to, I want you to eavesdrop. I'm not asking you this question. I'm gonna ask myself this question. I want you to eavesdrop in on it. Giving you permission to listen in as I have a conversation with myself. Are you a believer who happens to be interested in the political process? Or are you a Republican or Democrat who happens to attend church? Are you a believer who happens to want to be civically engaged? Or are you a Republican or a Democrat who happens to attend church? What is the source of your identity?

There was a British theologian, politician, statesman, controversial writings on the one hand, but had a quote that I cannot get out of my head, a man named G. K. Chesterton. He said, “It's not the Christianity has been tried and found wanting or lacking or insufficient. It is that Christianity is hard and therefore has rarely been tried.” And I can't get that out of my head, because it is hard. It is counterintuitive to what we are told to do and what we watch. It is counterintuitive to love your enemies. It is counterintuitive to pray for those who persecute you. It is counterintuitive if someone asks for your shirt to give them your cloak as well. And it is, most assuredly, counterintuitive to live in this current environment and know that Jesus said, “Blessed are the peace makers”. It is hard. But, if you want to see the kind of unity that Senator Scott and I want to see, then the change will come from you. It will not come from your elected officials and it will not come from Washington, DC.

And I'm not, I'm not, I'm leaving, but I am NOT bashing people as I walk out the door. It's been an honor to be there for 8 years and I’ve met a lot of really wonderful people. But, it is not the way to change our culture. Politics reflects. It does not lead.

And so, I hear this word “people” and I think, well, it's in our foundational document, “We the People”. And it's also in the foundational document for your life, which is the Bible where it says, “If My people”.

Christianity is hard. It is hard to follow the teachings of Christ. But, if you want a model for unity, then you need to find someone who broke every barrier you can possibly imagine. Gender barrier, not just the woman at the well. That was radical. That was radical, the fact that He would speak to her in public. But, it's more than that. Some of the very first people to recognize His deity were women. The last people to leave Him at the cross were women. The first people to embrace the fact that He had been resurrected were women. So, He broke gender barriers. He broke racial barriers.

You familiar with the story of the Good Samaritan. It's not about a rich dude who footed somebody else's hospital bill. That's part of it. It's about crossing religious and racial barriers. Socio-economic barriers - That's a big one in our country. I have looked and looked and looked to find nice things that Jesus said about rich people. Because I am leaving government work and I'm going into the private sector, so, I have really been looking for nice things that He might possibly have said about rich people. And I might try it anyway, but I'm having a really hard time finding a lot of complementary things. I find something about a needle and an eye and a camel. Every barrier you can imagine, He broke down.

So, when you think about, do I want to live in a society that embraces contrast but rejects the conflict? Do I want to be able to have a conversation and listen without prejudice and have other people listen to me without prejudice? Do I want to live in a society where we don't immediately rush to what we don't have in common?

That's the beautiful thing that I have found as I have travelled the country for the last 8 years, is most of us want most of the same things. We may have very different ways of acquiring it, but at least start with the fact that we want the same things.

How many of you have ever sat beside someone on a plane that can't read body language and cannot figure out that you do not want to talk for the next 4 hours? And you put the headphones on and you got the book out and you're not making eye contact, but none of that's working. They're gonna talk. How do you start?

Do you start by saying, “Ah, tell me about your deeply held religious views. Tell me who you voted for in the last presidential election.  No. We don't. Start, “Where are you going? You're gonna see family? You got children? You got grandchildren? What do you do for a living?”  We do that in almost every facet of life. we look for that common ground.

Where Tim and I eat dinner, we are in the minority. And when I say, we're in the minority, most of the folks who work at the restaurant were not born in the United States. They got here as quick as they could, but they were not born in the United States. So, where do we go? “Tell us about your country. Tell us about your family.” And then it morphs into sports. There are lots of things that are not divisive that we can talk about. And I don't understand why as we as a culture have figured out that that's where we want to run to first.

You can have those complicated conversations after you have a relationship with someone. Tim and I hav,e had some very frank conversations about law enforcement. After almost every officer-involved shooting I get a call from him. “Tell me what happened. Tell me how you're seeing this.”

Race is tough. Race is tough to talk about. But when you have a relationship and you care about each other . . . . I'm married to a public school teacher. Tim has a very different perspective on education. He's a, he's a straight choice guy. I'm somewhere in the middle.

If we wanted to argue about things there's plenty of things we could find to argue about. We don't want to. We want to discuss them and then we want to come back to stuff we have in common. And if you are a believer, that should be enough in common with someone else to overcome any conflict that you have.

So, I guess our first question is, “Do we want to live in a less divisive country? Do we want to live in a country where the contrast remains, but the conflict is gone?” And if we do, “Who's going to lead that movement and how is it going to be led?” And it will be led by the church. And it has been modeled for you by the greatest barrier breaker who ever lived and the best bridge builder who ever lived. Think about the bridges that He built for you and your life. He bridged the chasm between you and God. He bridged the chasm between death and life. He bridged the chasm between the temporal and the eternal.

And the reason I talk about bridges is, if you're all on the same side of the river, you don't need a bridge. You don't need a bridge. You only need a bridge if you're willing to talk or interact with someone that's not exactly like you.

I don't want anyone to surrender a deeply held conviction. I don't even want you to surrender a not deeply held conviction. I just want to live in a country where we can have a robust conversation about issues that are important to us without fracturing the relationship and making us wonder, what do we have in common? What do we all do that we have in common? Which brings me back to the quote from GK Chesterton, “Christianity is hard”.

I knew that Tim and I had a different relationship when I heard the story about his grandfather. But that would not be the night that he would tell you he knew something was different. That was one of the most tragic nights in history of our country.

There were believers gathered at a church called Mother Emanuel in Charleston. The church where Tim's uncle attended for more than 50 years. A church where his friend and former colleague, Clemente Pinckney, was the pastor. It's an African American church. And they were meeting during the week doing exactly what God told them to do - study the word, seek My face, and if a stranger comes in, welcome the stranger. And the stranger came in. A stranger came in that had driven more than a hundred miles from Lexington, South Carolina, passing mile marker after mile marker after mile marker, knowing full well what he was about to do. So, they welcomed him. They prayed with him. They prayed for him. And then, he killed 9 of our fellow believers because they happened to be black. And he wanted to start a race war in a state with a very provocative history when it comes to race, in a city where the Civil War began. And what those family members did, in the hours after that shooting, to the person - they looked him in the eye when he was arraigned and said, “We forgive you. We forgive you.”

And then, Tim had to give a speech on the floor of the Senate. So, we call the family members and said, “What would you like me to communicate to the country”. And the answer was, “God is in control. And even out of something like this, something positive will come.”

When I say Christianity is hard, I could not do what they did. I would not do what they did. I could not and I would not. But they did, because their faith was the most important thing in their lives.

So what is your identity. Spiritual identities, and political identity, a geographic identity. I think, if we are going to have the community, state - I'll speak for mine and not yours - I'm more familiar with South Carolina - The country that we want to have, it will not come from a political platform. It will not come from a series of political beliefs. It will come from you living out what are very difficult Commandments to live out. And for you to trust the ways of a God that does not do things in a conventional way. That uses the bone from an animal as a weapon. That decided to pick a stutterer as a spokesperson. They used trumpets and lanterns to win a battle. And my personal favorite, my personal favorite, allowed His own Son to lose a voice vote to a guy named Barabbas.

If you're a believer, you serve the ultimate barrier breaker, the ultimate bridge builder, you have a God that does things in unconventional ways.

Unity is biblical. There's a reason there's a verse in the New Testament in Christ. There is no male, no female, no Jew, no Gentile, no rich, no poor, and I'm gonna paraphrase, because I think, if Jesus were here, He would say, “no black, no white, no brown, no Republican, no Independent, no Libertarian, no Democrat”. If He were here, if He were here, I think that is what He would tell us. That He alone is sufficient and in Him there is nothing other than, do you believe, do you not believe. And if you believe, you are called to do some very difficult things.

One more, one more thing that I could not and would not do. And I hope at some point you all have a chance to hear from Senator Tim Scott. Culberson will tell you, “He's the best person I know in public service. There are lots of good ones on both sides. He's the best.”

We were freshmen. Something terrible had been written about him. Not only terrible, can be terrible and true, this was terrible and not true. It was actually defamatory, libelous, actionable. I was tired of it, sick of it. And it's already one thing to be in the world's least popular body. It's another thing to have people piling on with stuff that's not true. So, I got sick of it. I had that article in my hand. This is before I got the memo about not sharing all negative articles with your friends. I have since gotten that memo and would like to send it to some of my friends. But, this is before I knew, I don't have to go tell him every bad thing I’ve read.

I march into his office, right past his receptionist. And I said, “Tim, I'm sick of this, sick of it. I'm . do something about it.” He said, “Well, let me see it.” Showed it to him.  He said, “Come on in. We're gonna do something about that”. I said, “Good, got a United States Congressman, got a former prosecutor, and we got a closed door. We're gonna finally get some place”. He said, “Sit with me.” “Okay.” “We're gonna pray for him.” I said “Tim, I'm not, I'm not.” And I didn't. But he asked me to sit with him while he did.

Christianity is hard. There are very few other facets of life where you would be called to pray for someone who just did that. It's hard.

If you want to change even your own family, something as small, but important as that. Or you want to change something as large and important as your country.

Politics hasn't worked.

Sports won't work.

Geography won't work.

Living an authentic, consistent life reflective of the teachings of Christ is what will work.

God bless you.

Thank you for letting me be with you.

END TRANSCRIPT

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