Tim Wildmon: Good morning, everybody, and welcome to Today's Issues here on the American Family Radio Network. Today is Thursday, October 1, 2026. Hard to believe it is already October.
Tim Wildmon: Joining me in the studio is Fred Jackson. Good morning, Fred.
Fred Jackson: Good morning to you.
Tim Wildmon: Chris Woodford.
Chris Woodford: Hello.
Tim Wildmon: And in Florida is Ray Pritchard. Good morning, Ray.
Ray Pritchard: Hey, Tim. How are you doing this morning?
Tim Wildmon: For you, probably more than anybody, I feel like the year has flown by, hasn't it? I mean, you have been busy. Anyway, this is the beginning of the tenth month.
Ray Pritchard: Yeah. Boy, it seems like it was January.
Tim Wildmon: Where have you been, man? Can you name five states you have been to and spoken in? You have been to Oregon and...
Ray Pritchard: I have been to Oregon, Michigan, New Jersey.
Tim Wildmon: New York?
Ray Pritchard: Yeah, New York and Florida, Kansas City, and Mississippi. You can count Hungary and South Korea, too. We did those in the spring.
Tim Wildmon: Wow. And then you drove from Kansas City to Florida, too, didn't you?
Ray Pritchard: Yeah, we did. We made two trips down here to get all our stuff down here, then up to New Jersey and Chicago, and back down here.
Tim Wildmon: Oh, you drove all those places?
Ray Pritchard: Well, I did not drive to Oregon. That is too far away.
Tim Wildmon: But you drove to New Jersey from Tampa, or the Tampa area?
Ray Pritchard: Yeah.
Tim Wildmon: You got on I-95, which is referred to as the world's largest parking lot, and it does exactly what it is called. Going through the Carolinas, you had some extra time on your hands.
Fred Jackson: I-95 runs from Miami to Maine. That would be a good trivia question tomorrow. We may have had it before.
Tim Wildmon: I think I-95 runs from Miami to Maine.
Fred Jackson: Right to the border of Canada. I have driven I-95 many times.
Tim Wildmon: Right up to the border, past Bangor, or as they say, Bangor, Maine.
Fred Jackson: All the way to Woodstock, New Brunswick, on the other side.
Ray Pritchard: And Houlton, Maine.
Fred Jackson: Houlton, Maine. I have been through there on the way to New Brunswick.
Tim Wildmon: Ray should just tell us where he has yet to be. We will narrow it down to the five places on Earth he has not visited.
Ray Pritchard: On Earth, yes. I have not been there yet.
Tim Wildmon: Ray travels a lot. Alex McFarland travels a lot, too. They do not tell us how many points Alex McFarland has on Delta.
Fred Jackson: Alex says the people who work for Delta know him by first name.
Tim Wildmon: They know him by first name. One time, Alex co-hosted Exploring the Word from the airport, from an office there. They let him have some kind of space.
Fred Jackson: I tell you, another guy here on staff who has done the Johnny Cash song, "I've Been Everywhere," is J.J. Jasper.
Tim Wildmon: Yes, talk to J.J. He has been everywhere. One time, he had a joke in his stand-up routine, and it was not really a joke. It actually happened to him. He was invited somewhere in Kansas to speak. This was 25 years ago, and the town was so small that they did not have a hotel. So they put him up in a nursing home.
Fred Jackson: I am not kidding. They had an extra room at the nursing home, so they gave it to him.
Tim Wildmon: Better than staying in your car.
Fred Jackson: It was a small town. Maybe the one hotel they had was full or something like that.
Tim Wildmon: Again, welcome to the program, everybody. Thanks for listening. Today is October 1. It is hard to believe we are already in the last quarter of the year: October, November, and December. Chris, what is our first news story?
Chris Woodford: There is a lot to go over today. A lot of things could be the top story, and we have a lot of sound bites, so listeners, do stick around. I want to begin with some breaking news that Fred posted on AFN.net just before the show.
Chris Woodford: A 40-year-old man was arrested early today on suspicion of plotting to attack the Texas Capitol. This is according to authorities. The Texas Department of Public Safety said in a statement that it had received credible information about an individual planning a violent attack for Thursday in Austin. Officials did not provide details about the alleged plot because of the ongoing investigation. Apparently, the tip came in last night, and SWAT officers made the arrest about 3 a.m. this morning at a residence in Converse, which is near San Antonio.
Chris Woodford: Quick correction on that. He was actually arrested early yesterday morning, after the tip came in on Tuesday evening.
Fred Jackson: Either way, it is a developing story.
Chris Woodford: He has been turned over to the FBI and is in FBI custody because of the threat he allegedly made that they picked up on. Who knows what would have happened there in Austin, but apparently, according to the reports we know so far, the intent was to do a lot of damage.
Tim Wildmon: A terroristic-type threat to the Capitol building?
Chris Woodford: In the Capitol building, yes.
Tim Wildmon: The next story is an international incident involving an airline in the Middle East.
Chris Woodford: That was the situation that broke yesterday. You guys talked about it at length on the show. We had sound and coverage throughout the day, and we are still talking about it because people like Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu were making television appearances to talk about it.
Chris Woodford: There was an unfortunate situation yesterday on an Arab airline, where a co-pilot stabbed the pilot on a plane full of Israelis. It resulted in a heroic situation where people helped land the plane.
Tim Wildmon: Just real quickly, it was Air Dubai, which is an airline.
Chris Woodford: Flydubai.
Tim Wildmon: Flydubai, yes.
Chris Woodford: They were going from Dubai to Tel Aviv because there is a lot of traffic now between Israel, Dubai, Saudi Arabia, and other places in the Middle East.
Fred Jackson: Correct.
Chris Woodford: A lot of Israelis and Jews were on the plane. This man was a jihadist, unbeknownst to the airline, and he started attacking the pilot with a knife.
Tim Wildmon: This is bizarre. Bizarro World. He was the co-pilot attacking the pilot with a knife.
Chris Woodford: Somehow, the plane went into a nosedive toward the earth, dropping about 17,000 feet in a minute or so. It was just a nosedive, and miraculously, the pilot was able to open the door to the cockpit so that other people could help restrain the co-pilot, who was stabbing him.
Fred Jackson: The whole story is miraculous in terms of their ability to survive.
Tim Wildmon: It is going to be a movie.
Fred Jackson: It has to be.
Chris Woodford: The pilot, despite being stabbed, was able to open that cockpit door. One of the people being hailed as a hero is a plumber in Israel. He was the first to reach the door, and the co-pilot was standing near the center console.
Tim Wildmon: The pilot's seat is on the left and the co-pilot's seat is on the right.
Chris Woodford: The plane was in a nosedive. The plumber put the co-pilot in a headlock and hauled him out of there. Some other passengers, including a dentist who was apparently a pastor on the plane, tied him up using the cord on the headset. They tied his hands to immobilize him.
Chris Woodford: In the meantime, the plumber was in the cockpit. The plane was still in the dive. He pulled back the throttle and then pulled up on the yoke of the airplane to bring the plane out of the dive. Prime Minister Netanyahu asked this plumber, "How did you know how to do that?" He said, "I have watched videos. That is how I knew what to do."
Chris Woodford: Think about all this. Fortunately, there were a pilot and co-pilot crew who were deadheading on the airplane. They were able to go in and start flying the plane. The pilot, while he was being attacked, managed to enter a code into the transponder. That is the device on an airplane into which you enter numbers so air traffic control knows who you are. He dialed in the code 7500, which is the international transponder code for hijacking.
Chris Woodford: The people on the ground then knew that the plane was being hijacked. The pilots who took control did not get permission from Jordan to land, so they circled over the northwestern part of Saudi Arabia, which allowed them to land there.
Chris Woodford: There was structural damage to the plane because of the dive. They lost part of the rudder, which is critical to stabilizing an airplane.
Fred Jackson: It is amazing.
Chris Woodford: I have several clips from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Here he is on Hannity last night talking about the heroic civilian intervention.
Benjamin Netanyahu: I asked him, "What do you do for a living?" He said, "I am a plumber. I unclog sewage clogs." I said, "Well, you certainly unclogged a big one this time." An amazing act of heroism by him, by the Indian pilot, and by the people who helped them. They stopped a disaster that could have been global.
Tim Wildmon: Ray, did you follow this story?
Ray Pritchard: Yes. Fred, you said this is a movie waiting to be made. It is going to be made. Clearly, the bad guy here was planning to make this the Israeli 9/11.
Fred Jackson: Who knows what he was going to crash that plane into?
Ray Pritchard: It is hard enough to move around on a plane when it is level. I have done enough flying these last few months. Can you imagine the chaos when the plane is going down at an incredibly rapid speed? This plumber gets up, somehow crawls his way forward, gets in there, and drags the co-pilot out of the seat. It takes enormous strength to do that when the plane is going down.
Fred Jackson: I know.
Ray Pritchard: The man is a hero on several different levels. Good for him for watching the videos and figuring out what to do to keep the plane from crashing. It is one of the more amazing stories we have heard lately.
Chris Woodford: I look forward to hearing more from those who intervened, including the pilots who just happened to be aboard. There were about 170 people on board, according to reports. The dentist initially helped tie up the bad guy, and then he began giving medical attention to the pilot, who was bleeding badly. According to Netanyahu's interview, the dentist instructed his wife, who was also a passenger, to go back into the cabin of the airplane and calm people down.
Tim Wildmon: Quite frankly, this sounds unbelievable. If you told me all the circumstances we have just described had to happen to save this plane from crashing into the ground and killing everybody on board, or from being used as a missile to attack other people, probably in Tel Aviv, I would say it was impossible.
Fred Jackson: It was one thing after another. It was almost a miracle.
Tim Wildmon: Miracles that they all did not die. What do we know about the bad guy at this point?
Chris Woodford: Netanyahu was saying that he was radicalized, and that his family was radicalized. That is what Netanyahu was saying.
Tim Wildmon: I am surprised the airline, Flydubai, did not screen its pilots for jihadist connections to prevent something like this from happening. Maybe you cannot altogether prevent it. The pilot was Indian, and this man was from Oman.
Fred Jackson: Oman is an Arab country next to Yemen, just north of Yemen, where the Houthis are.
Tim Wildmon: Praise God that no one was seriously hurt, except the poor pilot, who was probably in shock. Think about the fact that he was able to punch in the code while being stabbed and open the cockpit door to allow somebody to help.
Tim Wildmon: Think about what was going through the plumber's mind. What is going on? We are diving here. Maybe the pilot said something like, "He is attacking me." Otherwise, you might think there was a mechanical failure, an engine failure, or something else.
Chris Woodford: Apparently, some of the passengers who were in first class, not far from the cockpit door, heard the screaming going on in the cockpit. They knew there was a fight of some kind and alerted some of the other passengers.
Tim Wildmon: You are listening to Today's Issues on American Family Radio. What do you have next, Chris?
Chris Woodford: One other thing that is terror-related is an incident from several days ago. The United Kingdom announced that five or six people had been arrested in an alleged terror plot to target a British base that the United States has been using or wants to use. I have some audio here of the British prime minister calling out Iran for what has been playing out there.
British Prime Minister: There are strong indications that Iran played a part in what happened over the weekend at RAF Fairford, but of course it remains an ongoing, complex, and serious police investigation. Of course, we are working closely with our colleagues in the United States of America.
Chris Woodford: For those who did not know or did not hear what happened, a group of men were captured while headed toward a military base in Britain that the United States was using to launch aircraft to bomb Iran. Apparently, somebody tipped off the Israelis.
Tim Wildmon: Benjamin Netanyahu says that Israel gave the United Kingdom the information.
Benjamin Netanyahu: We gave the Brits the intelligence that there was going to be an attack, and that it was an Iranian-sponsored attack. Pretty much the next day, they slapped sanctions on us.
Chris Woodford: That is wild.
Benjamin Netanyahu: The caving in and collapse before the Islamist-Marxist alliance is very dangerous for the future of the West.
Chris Woodford: That was Benjamin Netanyahu, the prime minister of Israel.
Tim Wildmon: Just think about the sequence of events. Ahead of this incident in the United Kingdom, Israel tells Britain, "We have intelligence that the Iranians are planning an attack on this base." As Netanyahu said, the next day the British issue more sanctions against Israel. Why do they do that? Who knows? Then this incident happens, and the prime minister of the United Kingdom says they found out that Iran was behind it.
Fred Jackson: They need to give credit to the Mossad and Israel, if what Netanyahu is saying is true.
Tim Wildmon: Israel has shown the world for at least a couple of years now that they know a lot of things. Israel has to, by necessity, have the best eyes and ears, spies, and intelligence in the world.
Fred Jackson: They are surrounded by people who want to wipe them off the face of the earth. The only way they can survive, humanly speaking, is to have not only top-level intelligence but the best intelligence in the world.
Tim Wildmon: It is incredible to think about. Israel tells Great Britain this is about to happen, and then, thank God, the men are caught before they do whatever they were going to do.
Tim Wildmon: I cannot prove this, but I am going to say it because it is my opinion. I suspect you guys may agree with me. The way Israel is operating today is divine protection.
Fred Jackson: Amen.
Tim Wildmon: It is hard to explain how Israel is even able to exist today as a nation and a country, given all the odds against them and all the enemies aligned against Israel and the Jewish people. Much of it is perplexing and inexplicable. We will talk about that later. Why is the Gaza situation the cause célèbre for the world's entertainers and others? There are many other atrocities, injustices, and things going on around the world that are far worse than, or at least as bad as, the living conditions of the Palestinians in Gaza. Yet all the attention is on Israel: "Free Palestine," "From the river to the sea," and getting rid of Israel.
Tim Wildmon: The way Israel has been able not only to survive but to thrive is a credit to the people of Israel. As I said, I believe God is involved here. The God of the Bible, whose chosen people are the Jewish people, is involved here.
Tim Wildmon: That is not to say that God does not favor His children, the Christians today. God has a direct relationship with all people who trust in Jesus Christ. But I am talking about the historic biblical connection between the Jewish people and Jehovah. That connection is still there.
Fred Jackson: It goes all the way back to Genesis and the calling of Abraham. God said He was going to have a special people through whom He would bring glory to Himself. That is the history of the Old Testament and what God has done for them. I think you are exactly right, Tim. What we see is God's protection.
Tim Wildmon: There is no other explanation, really.
Fred Jackson: There is a man-made explanation, which is real, but when you consider all the things that had to happen to bring them about as a country in the first place, it is extraordinary.
Tim Wildmon: When you look at biblical prophecy, Israel has to be in place as a nation when the Rapture occurs, which is the next big prophetic event. Am I right in that?
Ray Pritchard: You are 100 percent right. In Ezekiel, the dry bones prophecy asks, "Can these dry bones live?" For that prophecy to be completely fulfilled, the Jews have to be back in the Holy Land. There has to be a nation, and they are there.
Tim Wildmon: Has any other nation come back after being dead for 2,000 years?
Ray Pritchard: No other example in history that I know of. It is an absolute miracle of God.
Tim Wildmon: Wow.
Chris Woodford: I was just going to say, I talked to a tour guide I know in Israel. She said when you think about it, you would imagine that more terrorist attacks would occur. But apparently, someone is up there who does not want things to end up completely against us.
Tim Wildmon: Who could that someone be?
Fred Jackson: It would be the Almighty.
Tim Wildmon: It would be the Almighty.
Tim Wildmon: We will be back with more of Today's Issues on the American Family Radio Network.
Tim Wildmon: Welcome back, everybody, to Today's Issues. Thanks for listening to American Family Radio. Joining us now is our good friend Dr. Alex McFarland, who is the co-host of Exploring the Word, a live Bible study heard weekdays here on American Family Radio.
Tim Wildmon: If you want to listen to Alex and Bert as they study the Holy Bible live on the air, that is at 3:05 this afternoon, Central Time, right here on American Family Radio. Good morning, Alex.
Alex McFarland: Good morning, everybody.
Tim Wildmon: Where are you today?
Alex McFarland: I am in South Carolina, out beating the bushes and raising awareness for a conference we are doing Saturday.
Tim Wildmon: Tell us about it.
Alex McFarland: We have been doing apologetics and biblical worldview conferences for 28 years. We have a series now in its third year called Conversations That Matter, and we have had a lot of good speakers, including Jenna Ellis, Eric Metaxas, Charlie Kirk, and others.
Alex McFarland: Saturday night, October 3, we have two former Muslims who are now devout followers of Jesus Christ. The event is at 7 p.m. at the Greg Rowles Legacy Theatre in North Myrtle Beach. Myrtle Beach has a lot of theaters, somewhat like Branson, Missouri.
Alex McFarland: Kamal Saleem and Muhammad Faridi are both college professors and incredible speakers. They are going to talk about how they found Christ and why Islam and Sharia law, in their view and mine, are a grave threat not only to the United States but to the world.
Alex McFarland: They are going to help people learn how to share the gospel with Muslims effectively. They will also motivate everybody to get out and vote and try to preserve a constitutional republic where Sharia law is not permissible.
Tim Wildmon: For listeners who live within driving distance and want to attend the conference, what do they need to do?
Alex McFarland: Go to AlexMcFarland.com. It is free. God is footing the bill for this. We do ask people to register, as might be expected. We have a lot of security there, and seating is limited.
Tim Wildmon: I was just told that we are less than 100 tickets from having the place sold out. It is free, but we do ask people to register. This will probably be the biggest event we have done in several years, next to when we had Charlie Kirk two weeks before he was killed.
Tim Wildmon: Where is it?
Alex McFarland: It is at the Greg Rowles Legacy Theatre in North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, just 20 minutes from the North Carolina state line. It is easy to reach. The airport here is Myrtle Beach International Airport, and people are coming from a lot of states.
Alex McFarland: We are going to film it and, as soon as we can, within a few days, put the video out for everybody to see free of charge. These Muslims need Jesus and salvation. But our nation also cannot allow Sharia law to become a subset of American law, whether somebody is a Christian or not.
Alex McFarland: I had an article on Townhall.com last Sunday called "Sharia Law Is No Day at the Beach." The Council on American-Islamic Relations, which is listed as a terrorist organization, is boasting that more than 50 Islamic candidates are running for office a month from now. This is serious. I want to call on my fellow ministers to tell your parishioners to go vote and vote godly.
Alex McFarland: I was on the radio yesterday with David Barton. David Barton is brilliant. He says that if Christians would vote, we could preserve our elections and our constitutional republic. But so many Christians do not vote, whereas Muslims have an 80 percent voter turnout rate.
Tim Wildmon: It is not 80 percent among the general American citizenry.
Alex McFarland: No, it is not.
Tim Wildmon: You are going to speak with those two men who converted from Islam to Christianity.
Alex McFarland: Yes.
Tim Wildmon: You are listening to Today's Issues on American Family Radio. Let us change topics for a moment.
Tim Wildmon: I read the news almost every night in preparation for this show. I send 15 to 20 emails to about ten people, and their inboxes are flooded when they get to work in the morning because there are news stories I am interested in that we might talk about on this show. I do not do that for my health.
Tim Wildmon: When you scroll through these news sites, they have what they call clickbait. We all know what that is: a sensational story that makes you want to click on it and spend time reading it.
Tim Wildmon: One of them is Noah's Ark. I see stories about Noah's Ark or some other biblical artifact. They are not always clickbait. Sometimes they are legitimate news stories. But I do not need to read another story about how perhaps somebody is digging for Noah's Ark.
Tim Wildmon: The latest story got my attention. Chris, can you state the facts of this? Then I want to talk about whether something like Noah's Ark could possibly be dug up.
Chris Woodford: I posted the article Tim is talking about on the Today's Issues Facebook page. After the show ends today, go check it out.
Chris Woodford: A team in Turkey that is looking for what they believe are the remains of Noah's Ark has announced that new radar images show a large man-made structure underground, not just natural rock. The private research group is called Noah's Ark Scans, and it released a preliminary report yesterday about its work in this region of Turkey.
Chris Woodford: The group claims that a 515-foot boat-shaped mound contains a "man-made object." That is the source of the article Tim is talking about.
Tim Wildmon: So, Alex, is that Noah's Ark?
Alex McFarland: I do not know. It may be. There are people who say it is and people who say it is not. Some say it cannot be. I believe in the Bible and in the flood of Noah, absolutely. But the truth of Christianity does not hang on whether this is or is not Noah's Ark. It may be, but we simply do not know at this point.
Tim Wildmon: So I wasted my time. I fell for the clickbait when it does not even matter.
Alex McFarland: I do think it would be significant if it were conclusively shown to be the remains of Noah's Ark.
Tim Wildmon: The world is never going to believe it anyway.
Alex McFarland: Exactly. It would be very interesting, but I do not think it would change people's opinions. The Bible stands alone whether this is Noah's Ark or not, and whether they find any more artifacts supporting the Bible or not.
Tim Wildmon: The artifacts and archaeological explorations have only confirmed the Bible over the last 100 or 200 years. Every time they discover something, especially in and around Israel, Egypt, or Jordan, it supports the historical accounts found in the Holy Scriptures.
Tim Wildmon: Ray, your thoughts on Noah's Ark?
Ray Pritchard: Let me say three things because I agree 100 percent with what Alex said. Number one, the Bible is true. The Bible is the Word of God.
Tim Wildmon: You mean historically and in every other way?
Ray Pritchard: Yes. If you want to know about Noah's flood and the Ark, read Genesis 6, 7, and 8. The story is right there. Jesus clearly believed it. He said, "As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be in the days of the coming of the Son of Man." Jesus Christ said that Himself.
Ray Pritchard: When we read the Bible, we are talking about a literal historical event, a flood that covered the world and an actual Ark in which eight people were saved. That is clear.
Ray Pritchard: As to this particular discovery, I was thinking to myself while Alex was talking, what sort of proof would it take for us? Even if they dug down there and found a little note that said, "Noah was here," that would still raise questions. The truth of the Bible does not depend on what these men dig up, but I wish them all the best.
Ray Pritchard: Third, I encourage all our listeners to go up to Kentucky and check out the Ark Encounter. Go see for yourself that huge, life-size Ark. Walking inside that thing confirmed it for me.
Tim Wildmon: You have been to the Ark?
Ray Pritchard: Yes. My wife, my daughters, and I went.
Tim Wildmon: You are listening to Today's Issues on American Family Radio. Fred, do you have a question for Alex?
Fred Jackson: I am curious because I think this is going to be a great event for you on Saturday night. Talk about timing. It is coming about 48 hours after this near-disaster involving Israel, with Prime Minister Netanyahu talking about Islamization and radicalization.
Fred Jackson: I am sure your audience Saturday night will want to talk about that. How is it that a man can become so radicalized that he is willing not only to take his own life but to put the lives of many others at risk?
Alex McFarland: It is not really radicalized. I know we use that word because so few people act out on the teachings of the Quran, but the truth is that the religion of Islam and the teachings of the Quran about how followers of Muhammad are supposed to live are incompatible with Western civilization, democracy, and representative government.
Alex McFarland: Islam is a total and comprehensive merging of the private with the public. That is why Iran calls its military the Islamic Revolutionary Guard. They do not distinguish between religion and government. It is called Sharia because it is all-encompassing.
Alex McFarland: Afghanistan is run by the Taliban. What are they? They are religious. They are Islamic. They have different branches. Saudi Arabia is more open to Westerners because they like money, so the sheikhs live lavishly, although they do not eat pork. But they still impose Islamic law, Sharia law, on their citizens.
Alex McFarland: The left is always saying to Christians, "Keep your religion out of politics. Maintain separation between church and state." But you have not seen anything yet. Wait until Sharia law and Muslims who subscribe to Islamic law come over and start doing what they have done in Europe.
Alex McFarland: In France, Muslims are now 10 percent of the population. Great Britain has all kinds of problems with the Muslim population there. I have talked to people who were missionaries in Britain, and they said Muslims have taken over cities. There are no-go zones for police in Germany, France, Great Britain, and other places.
Alex McFarland: A lot of Muslims are nominal. Probably the majority are nominal. They may go to the mosque, just as nominal Christians go to church at Christmas and Easter, but they do not take it seriously. Then you get those who grow the beards and really adhere to Sharia law and the all-encompassing teachings of the Quran.
Alex McFarland: Those are the ones who do not agree with democracy or representative government, and who want to get rid of Christians and Jews, the infidels. They believe that is a mission and mandate given to them by Allah as taught in the Quran. We could cite the surahs, or verses, in the Quran.
Alex McFarland: To Tim's point, you do not want devout Muslims expanding their numbers in the United States. I am not talking about ethnicities, Arabs, or Persians. I am talking about those who truly subscribe to Islamic fundamentalist teachings, such as the September 11 terrorists. It is not radical to them. That is what they believe the Quran teaches.
Tim Wildmon: Alex, do you have any more thoughts?
Alex McFarland: This morning in Michigan, El-Sayed said that opposition to Islam is racism.
Tim Wildmon: Islam is not an ethnicity.
Alex McFarland: Right. Islam is a worldview. I would say it is probably 5 percent religious and 95 percent political. To everybody listening, when we critique Islam, the worldview of Islam, that is not racism. Do not fall for that accusation.
Alex McFarland: Even The Atlantic, which is not a conservative Christian news source, had an article about two years ago saying that Islam is not a religion of peace. It said the terrorists are not aberrant, deviant Muslims. The jihadists are the faithful Muslims.
Alex McFarland: They really subscribe to the teachings, and they are not nominal. As I said earlier, they act on their beliefs. These people need Jesus Christ. Anne Coulter was vilified 20 years ago when she said the answer to terrorism was to go in, kill the leader, stop the regime, and convert the citizens to Christianity. She was vilified for saying that, but it is really true.
Alex McFarland: The hope is Jesus Christ. I know many Christians from Iran, one of whom is one of my speakers, Muhammad Faridi. People are coming to Christ in droves in Iran, and many are instantly being martyred. We really need to pray for the knowledge of the Lord Jesus to cover the Middle East.
Tim Wildmon: Thanks, Alex. Take care. We wish you the best with your conference. Give the information again for those who might want to attend.
Alex McFarland: Saturday night, October 3, in North Myrtle Beach at the Greg Rowles Theatre, 7 p.m. It is free. Complete information is at my website, AlexMcFarland.com. Then at 3 p.m. Central, Monday through Friday, please listen to Bert Harper and me on Exploring the Word.
Tim Wildmon: Thanks, Alex.
Alex McFarland: Take care. Blessings.
Tim Wildmon: Ray, do you have anything to say about what we have discussed the last few minutes?
Ray Pritchard: I was thinking about what Alex said about there being a lot of security at the event in North Myrtle Beach. Given the world in which we are living and the dangers all around us, I am glad to hear that.
Ray Pritchard: God bless these men who have come out of Islam into the light of the gospel of Jesus Christ. They are going to shine the light into the darkness. God bless them for speaking out, and God bless Alex and all of his friends and supporters.
Ray Pritchard: Anne Coulter was right, at least on the last half of what she said. The real answer is taking the gospel and shining the light of Jesus into Oman, Yemen, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
Ray Pritchard: I hear it said that the church is growing faster in Iran than anywhere else in the world, which is amazing to think about.
Tim Wildmon: Muhammad lived in the seventh century, right?
Ray Pritchard: That is right.
Tim Wildmon: He is called the prophet. He is the main prophet.
Fred Jackson: He is the prophet.
Tim Wildmon: He is the one who wrote the Quran, is that right?
Alex McFarland: There were multiple writers, and it was added to over the years and centuries. How the Quran came to be is a subject of debate in scholarly circles. Whether Muhammad himself wrote every word of it is also debated.
Tim Wildmon: If you want to know why Muhammad is the number one name among young boys, or males, in the world, I think it is because so many Muslims want to honor the founder of their religion by naming their sons Muhammad.
Fred Jackson: I think it is the number one name for young boys in Britain now.
Tim Wildmon: Sometimes I have heard Christians say there is no difference between Allah and our God.
Ray Pritchard: You mean between the God of the Bible and Allah?
Tim Wildmon: Yes.
Ray Pritchard: They are two different gods. I have seen writings saying that Christians ought not to object to the word Allah, but Allah is not the God of the Bible.
Alex McFarland: It is true that in some countries some Christians use the word Allah to refer to the Christian God. But when Muslims talk about Allah, they are talking about a god who does not have a son. That is the dividing line. There is one god, but he does not have a son.
Tim Wildmon: We cannot water this down and say, "You have God with Jesus, and they have God without Jesus."
Alex McFarland: No. Those are two completely different religions.
Tim Wildmon: Completely different religions.
Alex McFarland: They have the Quran, and Christians have the Holy Bible. They are two completely different messages. Are they both monotheistic? Yes. Judaism is also monotheistic. Those are the three leading monotheistic religions in the world.
Tim Wildmon: That is true, but Muslims subscribe to the teachings of the Quran and whatever their mullahs and imams say, while Christians try to live out the Holy Scriptures, the Bible.
Alex McFarland: There is no sin and salvation in the Quran comparable to what we have with Jesus Christ. You do not know whether you are going to paradise unless you die in an act of jihad, which is said to assure you a place in paradise.
Tim Wildmon: We will be back momentarily. Stay with us.
Tim Wildmon: Good morning, everybody, and welcome to Today's Issues here on the American Family Radio Network. Today is Thursday, October 1, 2026. Hard to believe it is already October.
Tim Wildmon: Joining me in the studio is Fred Jackson. Good morning, Fred.
Fred Jackson: Good morning to you.
Tim Wildmon: Chris Woodford.
Chris Woodford: Hello.
Tim Wildmon: And in Florida is Ray Pritchard. Good morning, Ray.
Ray Pritchard: Hey, Tim. How are you doing this morning?
Tim Wildmon: For you, probably more than anybody, I feel like the year has flown by, hasn't it? I mean, you have been busy. Anyway, this is the beginning of the tenth month.
Ray Pritchard: Yeah. Boy, it seems like it was January.
Tim Wildmon: Where have you been, man? Can you name five states you have been to and spoken in? You have been to Oregon and...
Ray Pritchard: I have been to Oregon, Michigan, New Jersey.
Tim Wildmon: New York?
Ray Pritchard: Yeah, New York and Florida, Kansas City, and Mississippi. You can count Hungary and South Korea, too. We did those in the spring.
Tim Wildmon: Wow. And then you drove from Kansas City to Florida, too, didn't you?
Ray Pritchard: Yeah, we did. We made two trips down here to get all our stuff down here, then up to New Jersey and Chicago, and back down here.
Tim Wildmon: Oh, you drove all those places?
Ray Pritchard: Well, I did not drive to Oregon. That is too far away.
Tim Wildmon: But you drove to New Jersey from Tampa, or the Tampa area?
Ray Pritchard: Yeah.
Tim Wildmon: You got on I-95, which is referred to as the world's largest parking lot, and it does exactly what it is called. Going through the Carolinas, you had some extra time on your hands.
Fred Jackson: I-95 runs from Miami to Maine. That would be a good trivia question tomorrow. We may have had it before.
Tim Wildmon: I think I-95 runs from Miami to Maine.
Fred Jackson: Right to the border of Canada. I have driven I-95 many times.
Tim Wildmon: Right up to the border, past Bangor, or as they say, Bangor, Maine.
Fred Jackson: All the way to Woodstock, New Brunswick, on the other side.
Ray Pritchard: And Houlton, Maine.
Fred Jackson: Houlton, Maine. I have been through there on the way to New Brunswick.
Tim Wildmon: Ray should just tell us where he has yet to be. We will narrow it down to the five places on Earth he has not visited.
Ray Pritchard: On Earth, yes. I have not been there yet.
Tim Wildmon: Ray travels a lot. Alex McFarland travels a lot, too. They do not tell us how many points Alex McFarland has on Delta.
Fred Jackson: Alex says the people who work for Delta know him by first name.
Tim Wildmon: They know him by first name. One time, Alex co-hosted Exploring the Word from the airport, from an office there. They let him have some kind of space.
Fred Jackson: I tell you, another guy here on staff who has done the Johnny Cash song, "I've Been Everywhere," is J.J. Jasper.
Tim Wildmon: Yes, talk to J.J. He has been everywhere. One time, he had a joke in his stand-up routine, and it was not really a joke. It actually happened to him. He was invited somewhere in Kansas to speak. This was 25 years ago, and the town was so small that they did not have a hotel. So they put him up in a nursing home.
Fred Jackson: I am not kidding. They had an extra room at the nursing home, so they gave it to him.
Tim Wildmon: Better than staying in your car.
Fred Jackson: It was a small town. Maybe the one hotel they had was full or something like that.
Tim Wildmon: Again, welcome to the program, everybody. Thanks for listening. Today is October 1. It is hard to believe we are already in the last quarter of the year: October, November, and December. Chris, what is our first news story?
Chris Woodford: There is a lot to go over today. A lot of things could be the top story, and we have a lot of sound bites, so listeners, do stick around. I want to begin with some breaking news that Fred posted on AFN.net just before the show.
Chris Woodford: A 40-year-old man was arrested early today on suspicion of plotting to attack the Texas Capitol. This is according to authorities. The Texas Department of Public Safety said in a statement that it had received credible information about an individual planning a violent attack for Thursday in Austin. Officials did not provide details about the alleged plot because of the ongoing investigation. Apparently, the tip came in last night, and SWAT officers made the arrest about 3 a.m. this morning at a residence in Converse, which is near San Antonio.
Chris Woodford: Quick correction on that. He was actually arrested early yesterday morning, after the tip came in on Tuesday evening.
Fred Jackson: Either way, it is a developing story.
Chris Woodford: He has been turned over to the FBI and is in FBI custody because of the threat he allegedly made that they picked up on. Who knows what would have happened there in Austin, but apparently, according to the reports we know so far, the intent was to do a lot of damage.
Tim Wildmon: A terroristic-type threat to the Capitol building?
Chris Woodford: In the Capitol building, yes.
Tim Wildmon: The next story is an international incident involving an airline in the Middle East.
Chris Woodford: That was the situation that broke yesterday. You guys talked about it at length on the show. We had sound and coverage throughout the day, and we are still talking about it because people like Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu were making television appearances to talk about it.
Chris Woodford: There was an unfortunate situation yesterday on an Arab airline, where a co-pilot stabbed the pilot on a plane full of Israelis. It resulted in a heroic situation where people helped land the plane.
Tim Wildmon: Just real quickly, it was Air Dubai, which is an airline.
Chris Woodford: Flydubai.
Tim Wildmon: Flydubai, yes.
Chris Woodford: They were going from Dubai to Tel Aviv because there is a lot of traffic now between Israel, Dubai, Saudi Arabia, and other places in the Middle East.
Fred Jackson: Correct.
Chris Woodford: A lot of Israelis and Jews were on the plane. This man was a jihadist, unbeknownst to the airline, and he started attacking the pilot with a knife.
Tim Wildmon: This is bizarre. Bizarro World. He was the co-pilot attacking the pilot with a knife.
Chris Woodford: Somehow, the plane went into a nosedive toward the earth, dropping about 17,000 feet in a minute or so. It was just a nosedive, and miraculously, the pilot was able to open the door to the cockpit so that other people could help restrain the co-pilot, who was stabbing him.
Fred Jackson: The whole story is miraculous in terms of their ability to survive.
Tim Wildmon: It is going to be a movie.
Fred Jackson: It has to be.
Chris Woodford: The pilot, despite being stabbed, was able to open that cockpit door. One of the people being hailed as a hero is a plumber in Israel. He was the first to reach the door, and the co-pilot was standing near the center console.
Tim Wildmon: The pilot's seat is on the left and the co-pilot's seat is on the right.
Chris Woodford: The plane was in a nosedive. The plumber put the co-pilot in a headlock and hauled him out of there. Some other passengers, including a dentist who was apparently a pastor on the plane, tied him up using the cord on the headset. They tied his hands to immobilize him.
Chris Woodford: In the meantime, the plumber was in the cockpit. The plane was still in the dive. He pulled back the throttle and then pulled up on the yoke of the airplane to bring the plane out of the dive. Prime Minister Netanyahu asked this plumber, "How did you know how to do that?" He said, "I have watched videos. That is how I knew what to do."
Chris Woodford: Think about all this. Fortunately, there were a pilot and co-pilot crew who were deadheading on the airplane. They were able to go in and start flying the plane. The pilot, while he was being attacked, managed to enter a code into the transponder. That is the device on an airplane into which you enter numbers so air traffic control knows who you are. He dialed in the code 7500, which is the international transponder code for hijacking.
Chris Woodford: The people on the ground then knew that the plane was being hijacked. The pilots who took control did not get permission from Jordan to land, so they circled over the northwestern part of Saudi Arabia, which allowed them to land there.
Chris Woodford: There was structural damage to the plane because of the dive. They lost part of the rudder, which is critical to stabilizing an airplane.
Fred Jackson: It is amazing.
Chris Woodford: I have several clips from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Here he is on Hannity last night talking about the heroic civilian intervention.
Benjamin Netanyahu: I asked him, "What do you do for a living?" He said, "I am a plumber. I unclog sewage clogs." I said, "Well, you certainly unclogged a big one this time." An amazing act of heroism by him, by the Indian pilot, and by the people who helped them. They stopped a disaster that could have been global.
Tim Wildmon: Ray, did you follow this story?
Ray Pritchard: Yes. Fred, you said this is a movie waiting to be made. It is going to be made. Clearly, the bad guy here was planning to make this the Israeli 9/11.
Fred Jackson: Who knows what he was going to crash that plane into?
Ray Pritchard: It is hard enough to move around on a plane when it is level. I have done enough flying these last few months. Can you imagine the chaos when the plane is going down at an incredibly rapid speed? This plumber gets up, somehow crawls his way forward, gets in there, and drags the co-pilot out of the seat. It takes enormous strength to do that when the plane is going down.
Fred Jackson: I know.
Ray Pritchard: The man is a hero on several different levels. Good for him for watching the videos and figuring out what to do to keep the plane from crashing. It is one of the more amazing stories we have heard lately.
Chris Woodford: I look forward to hearing more from those who intervened, including the pilots who just happened to be aboard. There were about 170 people on board, according to reports. The dentist initially helped tie up the bad guy, and then he began giving medical attention to the pilot, who was bleeding badly. According to Netanyahu's interview, the dentist instructed his wife, who was also a passenger, to go back into the cabin of the airplane and calm people down.
Tim Wildmon: Quite frankly, this sounds unbelievable. If you told me all the circumstances we have just described had to happen to save this plane from crashing into the ground and killing everybody on board, or from being used as a missile to attack other people, probably in Tel Aviv, I would say it was impossible.
Fred Jackson: It was one thing after another. It was almost a miracle.
Tim Wildmon: Miracles that they all did not die. What do we know about the bad guy at this point?
Chris Woodford: Netanyahu was saying that he was radicalized, and that his family was radicalized. That is what Netanyahu was saying.
Tim Wildmon: I am surprised the airline, Flydubai, did not screen its pilots for jihadist connections to prevent something like this from happening. Maybe you cannot altogether prevent it. The pilot was Indian, and this man was from Oman.
Fred Jackson: Oman is an Arab country next to Yemen, just north of Yemen, where the Houthis are.
Tim Wildmon: Praise God that no one was seriously hurt, except the poor pilot, who was probably in shock. Think about the fact that he was able to punch in the code while being stabbed and open the cockpit door to allow somebody to help.
Tim Wildmon: Think about what was going through the plumber's mind. What is going on? We are diving here. Maybe the pilot said something like, "He is attacking me." Otherwise, you might think there was a mechanical failure, an engine failure, or something else.
Chris Woodford: Apparently, some of the passengers who were in first class, not far from the cockpit door, heard the screaming going on in the cockpit. They knew there was a fight of some kind and alerted some of the other passengers.
Tim Wildmon: You are listening to Today's Issues on American Family Radio. What do you have next, Chris?
Chris Woodford: One other thing that is terror-related is an incident from several days ago. The United Kingdom announced that five or six people had been arrested in an alleged terror plot to target a British base that the United States has been using or wants to use. I have some audio here of the British prime minister calling out Iran for what has been playing out there.
British Prime Minister: There are strong indications that Iran played a part in what happened over the weekend at RAF Fairford, but of course it remains an ongoing, complex, and serious police investigation. Of course, we are working closely with our colleagues in the United States of America.
Chris Woodford: For those who did not know or did not hear what happened, a group of men were captured while headed toward a military base in Britain that the United States was using to launch aircraft to bomb Iran. Apparently, somebody tipped off the Israelis.
Tim Wildmon: Benjamin Netanyahu says that Israel gave the United Kingdom the information.
Benjamin Netanyahu: We gave the Brits the intelligence that there was going to be an attack, and that it was an Iranian-sponsored attack. Pretty much the next day, they slapped sanctions on us.
Chris Woodford: That is wild.
Benjamin Netanyahu: The caving in and collapse before the Islamist-Marxist alliance is very dangerous for the future of the West.
Chris Woodford: That was Benjamin Netanyahu, the prime minister of Israel.
Tim Wildmon: Just think about the sequence of events. Ahead of this incident in the United Kingdom, Israel tells Britain, "We have intelligence that the Iranians are planning an attack on this base." As Netanyahu said, the next day the British issue more sanctions against Israel. Why do they do that? Who knows? Then this incident happens, and the prime minister of the United Kingdom says they found out that Iran was behind it.
Fred Jackson: They need to give credit to the Mossad and Israel, if what Netanyahu is saying is true.
Tim Wildmon: Israel has shown the world for at least a couple of years now that they know a lot of things. Israel has to, by necessity, have the best eyes and ears, spies, and intelligence in the world.
Fred Jackson: They are surrounded by people who want to wipe them off the face of the earth. The only way they can survive, humanly speaking, is to have not only top-level intelligence but the best intelligence in the world.
Tim Wildmon: It is incredible to think about. Israel tells Great Britain this is about to happen, and then, thank God, the men are caught before they do whatever they were going to do.
Tim Wildmon: I cannot prove this, but I am going to say it because it is my opinion. I suspect you guys may agree with me. The way Israel is operating today is divine protection.
Fred Jackson: Amen.
Tim Wildmon: It is hard to explain how Israel is even able to exist today as a nation and a country, given all the odds against them and all the enemies aligned against Israel and the Jewish people. Much of it is perplexing and inexplicable. We will talk about that later. Why is the Gaza situation the cause célèbre for the world's entertainers and others? There are many other atrocities, injustices, and things going on around the world that are far worse than, or at least as bad as, the living conditions of the Palestinians in Gaza. Yet all the attention is on Israel: "Free Palestine," "From the river to the sea," and getting rid of Israel.
Tim Wildmon: The way Israel has been able not only to survive but to thrive is a credit to the people of Israel. As I said, I believe God is involved here. The God of the Bible, whose chosen people are the Jewish people, is involved here.
Tim Wildmon: That is not to say that God does not favor His children, the Christians today. God has a direct relationship with all people who trust in Jesus Christ. But I am talking about the historic biblical connection between the Jewish people and Jehovah. That connection is still there.
Fred Jackson: It goes all the way back to Genesis and the calling of Abraham. God said He was going to have a special people through whom He would bring glory to Himself. That is the history of the Old Testament and what God has done for them. I think you are exactly right, Tim. What we see is God's protection.
Tim Wildmon: There is no other explanation, really.
Fred Jackson: There is a man-made explanation, which is real, but when you consider all the things that had to happen to bring them about as a country in the first place, it is extraordinary.
Tim Wildmon: When you look at biblical prophecy, Israel has to be in place as a nation when the Rapture occurs, which is the next big prophetic event. Am I right in that?
Ray Pritchard: You are 100 percent right. In Ezekiel, the dry bones prophecy asks, "Can these dry bones live?" For that prophecy to be completely fulfilled, the Jews have to be back in the Holy Land. There has to be a nation, and they are there.
Tim Wildmon: Has any other nation come back after being dead for 2,000 years?
Ray Pritchard: No other example in history that I know of. It is an absolute miracle of God.
Tim Wildmon: Wow.
Chris Woodford: I was just going to say, I talked to a tour guide I know in Israel. She said when you think about it, you would imagine that more terrorist attacks would occur. But apparently, someone is up there who does not want things to end up completely against us.
Tim Wildmon: Who could that someone be?
Fred Jackson: It would be the Almighty.
Tim Wildmon: It would be the Almighty.
Tim Wildmon: We will be back with more of Today's Issues on the American Family Radio Network.
Tim Wildmon: Welcome back, everybody, to Today's Issues. Thanks for listening to American Family Radio. Joining us now is our good friend Dr. Alex McFarland, who is the co-host of Exploring the Word, a live Bible study heard weekdays here on American Family Radio.
Tim Wildmon: If you want to listen to Alex and Bert as they study the Holy Bible live on the air, that is at 3:05 this afternoon, Central Time, right here on American Family Radio. Good morning, Alex.
Alex McFarland: Good morning, everybody.
Tim Wildmon: Where are you today?
Alex McFarland: I am in South Carolina, out beating the bushes and raising awareness for a conference we are doing Saturday.
Tim Wildmon: Tell us about it.
Alex McFarland: We have been doing apologetics and biblical worldview conferences for 28 years. We have a series now in its third year called Conversations That Matter, and we have had a lot of good speakers, including Jenna Ellis, Eric Metaxas, Charlie Kirk, and others.
Alex McFarland: Saturday night, October 3, we have two former Muslims who are now devout followers of Jesus Christ. The event is at 7 p.m. at the Greg Rowles Legacy Theatre in North Myrtle Beach. Myrtle Beach has a lot of theaters, somewhat like Branson, Missouri.
Alex McFarland: Kamal Saleem and Muhammad Faridi are both college professors and incredible speakers. They are going to talk about how they found Christ and why Islam and Sharia law, in their view and mine, are a grave threat not only to the United States but to the world.
Alex McFarland: They are going to help people learn how to share the gospel with Muslims effectively. They will also motivate everybody to get out and vote and try to preserve a constitutional republic where Sharia law is not permissible.
Tim Wildmon: For listeners who live within driving distance and want to attend the conference, what do they need to do?
Alex McFarland: Go to AlexMcFarland.com. It is free. God is footing the bill for this. We do ask people to register, as might be expected. We have a lot of security there, and seating is limited.
Tim Wildmon: I was just told that we are less than 100 tickets from having the place sold out. It is free, but we do ask people to register. This will probably be the biggest event we have done in several years, next to when we had Charlie Kirk two weeks before he was killed.
Tim Wildmon: Where is it?
Alex McFarland: It is at the Greg Rowles Legacy Theatre in North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, just 20 minutes from the North Carolina state line. It is easy to reach. The airport here is Myrtle Beach International Airport, and people are coming from a lot of states.
Alex McFarland: We are going to film it and, as soon as we can, within a few days, put the video out for everybody to see free of charge. These Muslims need Jesus and salvation. But our nation also cannot allow Sharia law to become a subset of American law, whether somebody is a Christian or not.
Alex McFarland: I had an article on Townhall.com last Sunday called "Sharia Law Is No Day at the Beach." The Council on American-Islamic Relations, which is listed as a terrorist organization, is boasting that more than 50 Islamic candidates are running for office a month from now. This is serious. I want to call on my fellow ministers to tell your parishioners to go vote and vote godly.
Alex McFarland: I was on the radio yesterday with David Barton. David Barton is brilliant. He says that if Christians would vote, we could preserve our elections and our constitutional republic. But so many Christians do not vote, whereas Muslims have an 80 percent voter turnout rate.
Tim Wildmon: It is not 80 percent among the general American citizenry.
Alex McFarland: No, it is not.
Tim Wildmon: You are going to speak with those two men who converted from Islam to Christianity.
Alex McFarland: Yes.
Tim Wildmon: You are listening to Today's Issues on American Family Radio. Let us change topics for a moment.
Tim Wildmon: I read the news almost every night in preparation for this show. I send 15 to 20 emails to about ten people, and their inboxes are flooded when they get to work in the morning because there are news stories I am interested in that we might talk about on this show. I do not do that for my health.
Tim Wildmon: When you scroll through these news sites, they have what they call clickbait. We all know what that is: a sensational story that makes you want to click on it and spend time reading it.
Tim Wildmon: One of them is Noah's Ark. I see stories about Noah's Ark or some other biblical artifact. They are not always clickbait. Sometimes they are legitimate news stories. But I do not need to read another story about how perhaps somebody is digging for Noah's Ark.
Tim Wildmon: The latest story got my attention. Chris, can you state the facts of this? Then I want to talk about whether something like Noah's Ark could possibly be dug up.
Chris Woodford: I posted the article Tim is talking about on the Today's Issues Facebook page. After the show ends today, go check it out.
Chris Woodford: A team in Turkey that is looking for what they believe are the remains of Noah's Ark has announced that new radar images show a large man-made structure underground, not just natural rock. The private research group is called Noah's Ark Scans, and it released a preliminary report yesterday about its work in this region of Turkey.
Chris Woodford: The group claims that a 515-foot boat-shaped mound contains a "man-made object." That is the source of the article Tim is talking about.
Tim Wildmon: So, Alex, is that Noah's Ark?
Alex McFarland: I do not know. It may be. There are people who say it is and people who say it is not. Some say it cannot be. I believe in the Bible and in the flood of Noah, absolutely. But the truth of Christianity does not hang on whether this is or is not Noah's Ark. It may be, but we simply do not know at this point.
Tim Wildmon: So I wasted my time. I fell for the clickbait when it does not even matter.
Alex McFarland: I do think it would be significant if it were conclusively shown to be the remains of Noah's Ark.
Tim Wildmon: The world is never going to believe it anyway.
Alex McFarland: Exactly. It would be very interesting, but I do not think it would change people's opinions. The Bible stands alone whether this is Noah's Ark or not, and whether they find any more artifacts supporting the Bible or not.
Tim Wildmon: The artifacts and archaeological explorations have only confirmed the Bible over the last 100 or 200 years. Every time they discover something, especially in and around Israel, Egypt, or Jordan, it supports the historical accounts found in the Holy Scriptures.
Tim Wildmon: Ray, your thoughts on Noah's Ark?
Ray Pritchard: Let me say three things because I agree 100 percent with what Alex said. Number one, the Bible is true. The Bible is the Word of God.
Tim Wildmon: You mean historically and in every other way?
Ray Pritchard: Yes. If you want to know about Noah's flood and the Ark, read Genesis 6, 7, and 8. The story is right there. Jesus clearly believed it. He said, "As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be in the days of the coming of the Son of Man." Jesus Christ said that Himself.
Ray Pritchard: When we read the Bible, we are talking about a literal historical event, a flood that covered the world and an actual Ark in which eight people were saved. That is clear.
Ray Pritchard: As to this particular discovery, I was thinking to myself while Alex was talking, what sort of proof would it take for us? Even if they dug down there and found a little note that said, "Noah was here," that would still raise questions. The truth of the Bible does not depend on what these men dig up, but I wish them all the best.
Ray Pritchard: Third, I encourage all our listeners to go up to Kentucky and check out the Ark Encounter. Go see for yourself that huge, life-size Ark. Walking inside that thing confirmed it for me.
Tim Wildmon: You have been to the Ark?
Ray Pritchard: Yes. My wife, my daughters, and I went.
Tim Wildmon: You are listening to Today's Issues on American Family Radio. Fred, do you have a question for Alex?
Fred Jackson: I am curious because I think this is going to be a great event for you on Saturday night. Talk about timing. It is coming about 48 hours after this near-disaster involving Israel, with Prime Minister Netanyahu talking about Islamization and radicalization.
Fred Jackson: I am sure your audience Saturday night will want to talk about that. How is it that a man can become so radicalized that he is willing not only to take his own life but to put the lives of many others at risk?
Alex McFarland: It is not really radicalized. I know we use that word because so few people act out on the teachings of the Quran, but the truth is that the religion of Islam and the teachings of the Quran about how followers of Muhammad are supposed to live are incompatible with Western civilization, democracy, and representative government.
Alex McFarland: Islam is a total and comprehensive merging of the private with the public. That is why Iran calls its military the Islamic Revolutionary Guard. They do not distinguish between religion and government. It is called Sharia because it is all-encompassing.
Alex McFarland: Afghanistan is run by the Taliban. What are they? They are religious. They are Islamic. They have different branches. Saudi Arabia is more open to Westerners because they like money, so the sheikhs live lavishly, although they do not eat pork. But they still impose Islamic law, Sharia law, on their citizens.
Alex McFarland: The left is always saying to Christians, "Keep your religion out of politics. Maintain separation between church and state." But you have not seen anything yet. Wait until Sharia law and Muslims who subscribe to Islamic law come over and start doing what they have done in Europe.
Alex McFarland: In France, Muslims are now 10 percent of the population. Great Britain has all kinds of problems with the Muslim population there. I have talked to people who were missionaries in Britain, and they said Muslims have taken over cities. There are no-go zones for police in Germany, France, Great Britain, and other places.
Alex McFarland: A lot of Muslims are nominal. Probably the majority are nominal. They may go to the mosque, just as nominal Christians go to church at Christmas and Easter, but they do not take it seriously. Then you get those who grow the beards and really adhere to Sharia law and the all-encompassing teachings of the Quran.
Alex McFarland: Those are the ones who do not agree with democracy or representative government, and who want to get rid of Christians and Jews, the infidels. They believe that is a mission and mandate given to them by Allah as taught in the Quran. We could cite the surahs, or verses, in the Quran.
Alex McFarland: To Tim's point, you do not want devout Muslims expanding their numbers in the United States. I am not talking about ethnicities, Arabs, or Persians. I am talking about those who truly subscribe to Islamic fundamentalist teachings, such as the September 11 terrorists. It is not radical to them. That is what they believe the Quran teaches.
Tim Wildmon: Alex, do you have any more thoughts?
Alex McFarland: This morning in Michigan, El-Sayed said that opposition to Islam is racism.
Tim Wildmon: Islam is not an ethnicity.
Alex McFarland: Right. Islam is a worldview. I would say it is probably 5 percent religious and 95 percent political. To everybody listening, when we critique Islam, the worldview of Islam, that is not racism. Do not fall for that accusation.
Alex McFarland: Even The Atlantic, which is not a conservative Christian news source, had an article about two years ago saying that Islam is not a religion of peace. It said the terrorists are not aberrant, deviant Muslims. The jihadists are the faithful Muslims.
Alex McFarland: They really subscribe to the teachings, and they are not nominal. As I said earlier, they act on their beliefs. These people need Jesus Christ. Anne Coulter was vilified 20 years ago when she said the answer to terrorism was to go in, kill the leader, stop the regime, and convert the citizens to Christianity. She was vilified for saying that, but it is really true.
Alex McFarland: The hope is Jesus Christ. I know many Christians from Iran, one of whom is one of my speakers, Muhammad Faridi. People are coming to Christ in droves in Iran, and many are instantly being martyred. We really need to pray for the knowledge of the Lord Jesus to cover the Middle East.
Tim Wildmon: Thanks, Alex. Take care. We wish you the best with your conference. Give the information again for those who might want to attend.
Alex McFarland: Saturday night, October 3, in North Myrtle Beach at the Greg Rowles Theatre, 7 p.m. It is free. Complete information is at my website, AlexMcFarland.com. Then at 3 p.m. Central, Monday through Friday, please listen to Bert Harper and me on Exploring the Word.
Tim Wildmon: Thanks, Alex.
Alex McFarland: Take care. Blessings.
Tim Wildmon: Ray, do you have anything to say about what we have discussed the last few minutes?
Ray Pritchard: I was thinking about what Alex said about there being a lot of security at the event in North Myrtle Beach. Given the world in which we are living and the dangers all around us, I am glad to hear that.
Ray Pritchard: God bless these men who have come out of Islam into the light of the gospel of Jesus Christ. They are going to shine the light into the darkness. God bless them for speaking out, and God bless Alex and all of his friends and supporters.
Ray Pritchard: Anne Coulter was right, at least on the last half of what she said. The real answer is taking the gospel and shining the light of Jesus into Oman, Yemen, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
Ray Pritchard: I hear it said that the church is growing faster in Iran than anywhere else in the world, which is amazing to think about.
Tim Wildmon: Muhammad lived in the seventh century, right?
Ray Pritchard: That is right.
Tim Wildmon: He is called the prophet. He is the main prophet.
Fred Jackson: He is the prophet.
Tim Wildmon: He is the one who wrote the Quran, is that right?
Alex McFarland: There were multiple writers, and it was added to over the years and centuries. How the Quran came to be is a subject of debate in scholarly circles. Whether Muhammad himself wrote every word of it is also debated.
Tim Wildmon: If you want to know why Muhammad is the number one name among young boys, or males, in the world, I think it is because so many Muslims want to honor the founder of their religion by naming their sons Muhammad.
Fred Jackson: I think it is the number one name for young boys in Britain now.
Tim Wildmon: Sometimes I have heard Christians say there is no difference between Allah and our God.
Ray Pritchard: You mean between the God of the Bible and Allah?
Tim Wildmon: Yes.
Ray Pritchard: They are two different gods. I have seen writings saying that Christians ought not to object to the word Allah, but Allah is not the God of the Bible.
Alex McFarland: It is true that in some countries some Christians use the word Allah to refer to the Christian God. But when Muslims talk about Allah, they are talking about a god who does not have a son. That is the dividing line. There is one god, but he does not have a son.
Tim Wildmon: We cannot water this down and say, "You have God with Jesus, and they have God without Jesus."
Alex McFarland: No. Those are two completely different religions.
Tim Wildmon: Completely different religions.
Alex McFarland: They have the Quran, and Christians have the Holy Bible. They are two completely different messages. Are they both monotheistic? Yes. Judaism is also monotheistic. Those are the three leading monotheistic religions in the world.
Tim Wildmon: That is true, but Muslims subscribe to the teachings of the Quran and whatever their mullahs and imams say, while Christians try to live out the Holy Scriptures, the Bible.
Alex McFarland: There is no sin and salvation in the Quran comparable to what we have with Jesus Christ. You do not know whether you are going to paradise unless you die in an act of jihad, which is said to assure you a place in paradise.
Tim Wildmon: We will be back momentarily. Stay with us.
Tim Wildmon, Fred Jackson, Chris Woodford, and Ray Pritchard discuss a suspected attack aboard a Flydubai flight carrying Israelis. After the co-pilot allegedly stabbed the pilot, passengers helped restrain him and assisted in preventing a potential disaster. The program also examines a suspected plot targeting RAF Fairford in the United Kingdom and claims that Iranian involvement was being investigated. Dr. Alex McFarland joins the program to discuss an upcoming apologetics conference in North Myrtle Beach featuring two former Muslims who became Christians. The conversation addresses Sharia law, Islamic theology, Christian engagement, voting, and the importance of sharing the gospel. The hosts also consider reports of possible Noah’s Ark remains in Turkey, emphasizing that the truth of Scripture does not depend on archaeological discoveries. They discuss Israel’s survival, biblical prophecy, and the distinction between the God of the Bible and Allah.
Live
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