The Charlie Kirk Memorial: Revival in America
The Firestone Files: Letters to My Grandchildren — Dr. Chris L. Firestone
October 6, 2025 · Episode 7 · 1:12:19
https://drchrisfirestone.com/episode/the-charlie-kirk-memorial-revival-in-america/

Transcript is auto-generated from YouTube captions and lightly formatted; it may contain errors.

Hey everyone, welcome to the Firestone Files. I am Dr. Chris Firestone. Today we have the long awaited fourth installment in our series or uh unexpected series really on the person and mission of Charlie Kirk. Today we will be talking about the memorial service that I attended in his honor that's coming at you today on the Firestone Files.

All right, everyone. Well, welcome back to the Firestone Files. This is the fourth installment in that series on Charlie Kirk. What an amazing guy. The first one was a tribute that I did to Charlie on the very night that he was assassinated. I called that a tribute to Charlie Kirk. I did one uh inspired by some of the coursework I was teaching here at Prep Year on Charlie Kirk and Socrates. And then last week we talked about Charlie Kirk, the apologist, where I interviewed uh Scott Polander from TurningPoint Education, formerly Turning Point Academy, now Turning Point Education. Today I want to I think conclude this series.

That's my plan is that this will conclude a four-part introjection into the Firestone Files on the person and mission of Charlie Kirk. Super excited to be able to do this. One of you wrote to me and asked me to describe the memorial service from my perspective. And that's what I'm going to do here. But I'm going to do it today both with um my own recollections of uh the the moments leading up to the memorial the memorial service itself and then some reflections at the end. And so I will be interjecting with some video that I took throughout that process.

And uh really excited to be able to present this to you and uh we'll just drop those clips every once in a while as I think they come up and uh illustrate what I'm talking about. So that's the plan today. Describe how I got to the uh memorial service and uh what it meant to me and many of the people that surrounded me while I was there.

Well, I want to open up here with a brief account of what I would call the week before Phoenix. As you uh as you guys know, Charlie Kirk was assassinated ba basically about 10 or 11 days I think prior to the memorial service. That rocked everybody's world who knew Charlie. What an amazing guy he was. What an ironic and thoughtful Christian apologist and and and builder of of of networks of people all rowing in the same direction towards a common vision of really rejuvenating our universities and bringing back into public life the importance of the Bible the western intellectual tradition and the founding documents of our great country.

And uh you one of the things that we saw along the way with Charlie's uh onampus events is that these things are have been basically lost at our universities. They're no longer upheld as standards of truth and of as things that unite us as common people in this country. But Charlie was all about trying to help us to remember that and as he put it to save Western civilization in the process. Well, that week before, you know, we were just coming to grips with I had to teach and the students had to continue learning and it was a time of grieving, but it was also a time of great resolve. Um, you know, we as we prepared for the memorial service. It was um it was it was the TP staff, many of us who would have to go, but some of us have to stay behind um to to stay with the students.

you know, we have 34 students in the program this year. Um, and we really didn't recommend that they go, but six of them on their own decided they were going to make that journey anyway. And so, they showed up in Phoenix as well. Now, in my own case, this is really the only perspective I can tell this story from. It was a super busy week. Not only did I teach all the way through Thursday morning and through noon on Thursday, but I had important meetings back at my home institution, Champion Christian College on Friday morning. So, Thursday night, I took the 5-hour drive back to Champion Christian College.

Met with um a number of people there at the university. It was a pre pre preset uh uh set of meetings and a trip that I knew I was going to take. And then Friday evening, I had a decision to make about whether or not I should drive through the night or take my chances to get up early and drive directly to the Dallas airport, which I was flying out at at uh around noon on Saturday, so I could make it in time to have plenty of time to uh be at the memorial service on Sunday. Well, um I took the drive to Hot Springs.

that worked out fine. Was able to make it back home and, you know, check in a little bit, get my mail and everything else. And then, um, Friday I was I had a great set of meetings. I met with the president there a couple of times. And then, um, had a decision to make. Really, it was around oh, I think it was around 8:00 when I was finished running my errands and doing things I needed to do and I had to decide what to do next. I decided I didn't want to I didn't want to miss the memorial service.

I didn't want to take a chance of getting up, you know, at 5:30 or 6 and then driving to the Dallas airport, which about a 5 hour drive if all goes well. So, I decided 10 p. m. having gathered all my stuff to jump in the car and drive back to uh back to Dallas. And uh that was a uh an amazing trip in itself. And um you know, I made it back to my home here in Dallas uh where where where prepar is um is is currently being taught. It was about 3:00 in the morning and I fell asleep and woke up. I think it was like 9:00 a.

m. and um had to get to the airport, which I did. I made it over to the airport and got on that plane and off to Phoenix I went. Um, I guess we all knew it was going to be a a special event. I don't know if any of us quite understood just how special it would be. And there was something inside of me that said, "Firestone, you need to be there." And uh, you know, some of our staff here were gracious enough to cover while I took off to uh, to that memorial service. landed about midday in uh I don't think I lost any time except for the two-hour uh time zone change and landed there in in um in Phoenix.

Um when I got out of the uh airplane, I I had been networking with two out of the six students. Four of the students had housing arrangements and already had things put into place to take care of them, but two of them uh didn't want to sleep on a on a on a uh hard floor with those other students. And so I was able to uh get them a place to stay uh in in Phoenix networking with a former pastor of mine. His name is Tim Anderson. Tim Anderson, believe it or not, was the pastor who married my wife and I 33 years ago up in uh up in um St. Louis Park, Minnesota.

And I knew he was down in Phoenix. He's been gracious to me in the past to allow me to if I come into town for a one offer, he has uh occasionally allowed me to stay there. And I reached out to him and he was able to do that. I mentioned the need of a couple of students to uh have some housing. He asked the church and they immediately came up with somebody who owned a couple Airbnbs and they managed to get a house for those students. So that worked out super well. And it just so happens that those students were arriving at the airport same time I was on a different plane.

So, we converge there in uh in in Phoenix midday and I've got just my carry-on and you know my my my computer bag and so forth and I walk out of the airplane and I go down to where I'm supposed to meet Tim Anderson. I think the first indication for me that this was going to be a special um a special weekend was that when I walked outside waiting for Tim Anderson to drive up, out of the corner of my eye, I hear someone yell over to me, "Chris, and it was an old friend of mine, Amanda McKay McKenna. She's a controller in Washington, the state of Washington, and uh really has been a good friend through my trek with through Turning Point.

I mean, I met her at an Amfest event a couple of years earlier and we've kept in touch over time and and uh she send me family photos and I send her family photos and we talk about our kids and um all the great things that are going on in our life. But um something about that moment when we embrace right outside the airport there told me that this was a providential thing. Man, you know, you need friends at this hour. We're all in grief and um and Amanda was there. So, um we ended up partying ways.

We thought we might see each other again at the at the memorial service, but with, you know, a couple hundred thousand people there, it wasn't going to be likely. But that's how the trip started. I then met my two students who walked out right after that and we all got in uh Pastor Tim Anderson's car and we went over to his house and his wife had prepared a nice lunch and we got caught up and uh we ended up taking the students over to the uh Airbnb that we had pre-arranged.

So, all of that went uh super well. Yeah, I was extraordinarily tired. I didn't realize how tired I was until I got into that oasis of Tim Anderson's house and his wife Meg and they had made that lunch and I was like, "Woof man, am I getting woozy." I decide to take a catnap at 3:30. It had been a really long couple of days for me and uh there was supposed to be a turning point meeting at 6:00 p. m. on Zoom uh that that evening and I thought, "Man, I better grab a couple hours while I can." Well, I lay down at 3:30 and the next thing I know, I wake up and I come crawling out of there.

Not only did I miss the Turning Point meeting, but I'd also missed dinner. Tim Anderson's wife, Meg, had gone to bed and Tim was there watching TV and I'm like, "What happened? It's 9:30. I'd slept for 6 hours." Anyway, I guess my body was trying to tell me something. The only thing I could really do is get caught up again with Tim a little bit. And then um and then I we scheduled I talked to the students and we scheduled an Uber to pick us up in the morning. Now that Uber we scheduled for around 6:00 a. m. 6:00 a. m. uh we thought because the the memorial is supposed to start at 11:00 a.

m. So we thought 6:00 a. m. ought to be plenty of time to uh to sort of get over even if we run into some crowds, we should be fine. So that's what we did. We set up for 6:00 a. m. that the Uber was supposed to pick those two up and then shoot over and pick me up. They're going to leave their bags at our place so that later on when we had to go home, we could all converge back at u uh Pastor Anderson's house and then we would be able to go home that later that evening. So, all of that was fine and good.

Um, except for the fact that um when I woke up in the morning like 5:00, 5:30 trying to pull myself together to get ready to go. Um, I uh I I was starting to get messages from Turning Point staff already on site saying the the the crowds are huge and they have been building since at least 3:00 a. m.

and probably earlier and that if you it's possible to get going earlier, please do. It's going to take some time to get inside. Well, we had scheduled an Uber. We didn't want to lose that scheduled event and it was only a half an hour away anyway at that point. We knew we were going to uh to to have to move though and we were hoping to have a pretty good driver. So the driver picks them up, comes over to our house, picks me up, and off we go. And uh well um I think maybe I'll just roll a clip at this point. Um, I call this this this is clip one and I've titled it Dirt Uber Mench.

Hey everybody, here we are heading to the State Farm Arena where the memorial service for Charlie Kirk is going to begin in 5 hours. But, uh, we're up at the crack of dawn. Our driver, Uber driver, Uche is with us along with a couple students back here, Jude and Ben. And uh we're gonna try to get as close as we can and then we're gonna uh probably abandon ship and then uh see if we can make our way to that VIP entrance. So uh super excited to get started. I'm going to shoot some videos today. Uh interviewing students, interviewing people who are going to the memorial and asking them what did the person, what did the work uh of Charlie mean to you? And so, uh, super excited to be going here to join arms with these folks and, uh, we'll see how it goes.

So, that's it for now. I'll catch you later. Well, as you can see, we're in the taxi. We're on our way. And Uch, the uh, the Uber driver, um, is taking us there. I've got a couple students in the back seat. I'm in the front seat. And I am concerned with the sheer amount of traffic that we're running into. But we had one thing on our side, and that was the Uber driver himself. He had been running these, he told us, these trips to State Farm Arena since 3:00 a. m. that morning. So he said he's done multiple trips. I don't know, it was five, six, seven trips prior to picking us up.

So he had some street smarts and he understood that which which streets were closed as you were getting closer to the arena on the highway. and he managed to just on the side there of the uh State Farm Arena. It's called the Renaissance Hotel. Now, as a philosopher u who had to in a sense abandoned ship at the Renaissance, well, you couldn't miss the symbolism of that. Here we were walking into a Christian Renaissance and he drops us off right there at the front of the Renaissance Hotel. you get out of there and um well, let's go ahead and roll clip to abandoned ship.

Well, we have abandoned ship. Got out of the car near the Renaissance Hotel. We hear that they're still letting staff in first. So, we're going to go for that entrance, wherever that is. You ready to rock and roll, pets? Do it. Fight, fight, fight. What about you, J? We are so getting in. It's going to be so good, quite frankly. All right. Uh, we'll see. As you can see, we got out of the Uber and we didn't really even see the arena at that point cuz the hotel was so big. It kind of covered the whole arena. But we saw streams of crowds going to the left and right of the Renaissance Hotel.

And so, we went with the one on the left. I said, "Follow the crowds. these people look like they know where they're going, you know. Um, and so we did. We got into that stream and we made our way around the building toward the noise and the crowds surrounding the arena. Now, what we saw next was truly jaw-dropping. We rounded that Renaissance Hotel and made our way through this, I don't know, roadway alleyway and uh we got our first glimpse of what the New York Post has estimated to be 200,000 people surrounding the arena.

The arena was being blocked by militaryra uh barricade of some kind, fence, steel, and people were thick all the way around it. So, pretty much as far as we could see, um, we can see police and soldiers standing outside that fence and inside the fencing at key locations in the fence. Um, my two students, Jude and Ben and I, we made our way toward the crowd and we were trying to figure out because there's such a mass of people where there was no obvious entry way into the arena, how are we going to breach these barricades? How are we going to get inside? We had um we had staff badges, but where's the staff entrance?

It doesn't seem to be anywhere. So, it wasn't obvious where to go or where the lines were. They were actually weaving and snaking in front of the uh in front of the fence. And we had people asking us, "Is we were volunteers. Is this the right line to get inside?" And I would like uh as far as I know it's the right line. I really don't know. Um there wasn't really any rhyme or reason to it. Let's go ahead and roll with uh clip three. I call this one the mega mass. Okay, this is my first look at the crowd at the stadium. The line looks totally insane.

Take a look here. Holy smokes. It's like the southern port. Wow. I think we should go to the front of the line. I think everyone's going to the back, but that's not going to get us in. What? I don't think going to the back is the strategy. Yeah, that's a good word. Uh, okay. Let's see what's going on here.

All right. Hey, gentlemen. How we doing? Staff is telling us to try to get to the front cuz they're only letting staff in right now and we're with those guys. Training point. Yes. Yeah. It's going to be that way. See where that barricade is? Right one. Um, this line I don't know say they can get in, but the entrance is over there. I know all you guys. Cheers. Thanks so much. Okay, we're going to the front. We'll pick this up later. So, we arrive at the appointed gate, the one that the police officer pointed us toward on the right hand side of the mob. I guess it's the MAGA mass.

I don't know what you call it. It was a a lot of people and we had to make a decision to go left or right and we had heard I think it was through um one of our people on text that there was a gate open uh on on that right hand side. So we went that way. To be honest, you know, given the sheer immensity of the crowd and my lack of knowledge of the facility, we should have gotten up earlier.

Um when we got to the other to the to the sort of end of the crowd where the gate uh was there were two um I don't know secret service guys maybe had badges hanging from their necks who were on the other side of the fence saying sorry gentlemen this gate is closed and he was kind enough to open the gate and come outside and had a map in front front of him and he he showed us on the map we wanted to be on the other side of the arena somewhere closer to gate three. And so that was a that was a tough realization at that point.

A kind of dread came over me because I remember the crowd we had to walk past in the street in order to get to this gate. Now they blocked the street off and so you couldn't do the old end around. we were going to have to plow right through the crowd if we were going to get to the other side of the arena. That was uh I don't know how to put that, a shock to the system. And so um we were struggling to figure out whether it was even worth it. But the students, two students were with me. We had a certain amount of resolve, but uh but uh yeah, we we hadn't really decided if that was the best thing to do yet. We were still contemplating that when what happened next? Well, I'm going to describe this as uh from a Lord of the Rings analogy, the return of the king.

Um out of nowhere, Vice President Hutz Herzburg appeared along with his family and uh he was going right for that gate as well. He had gotten the same information apparently. So now our band of three had turned into a band of six. And uh how do I how do I explain this? Um but to let you see it for yourself. So let's go ahead and roll clip for Return of the King. Nice to meet you. Okay, there's nothing. Does this like the front or the back?

Anybody have questions? We are newbies here was with Turning Point and staff. All right. But we're liazisoning with them to try to find out how to get to the front because they're letting all the staff in some gate, but we can't figure out where it is. I'll tell you what, I got a map and I can help you. Yes, please. This is the building just kind of orient. So, you're almost at that gate. It's gate, right? and uh right where we were. There's a big crowd. Okay. Okay. Apparently, we were very close to where we needed to be to get in, but there was such a large crowd.

Good morning. We figured out how to get in. Great to see you. All right. Or later. Here we are. Well, sorry for the quality of that video, but I wasn't with with the police officer who wasn't really happy to be on camera and then the elation of the the frustration of not being able to get in, then the elation of seeing uh Dr. Herzburg. All of that led to the kind of quality of the video that you saw there. Anyhow, I can't express the sort of internal elation or new resolve that I had when we met up with Hutz Herzburg and his family.

Whenever you find yourself in an impossible situation, having somebody who's capable of making the impossible possible is a great thing to to to be I mean to to to find yourself, you know, with there. So, my initial reaction when I bumped into Huds Herzburg was I don't care where we are in this arena or how big the crowd is, we're going to get in somewhere. That's the kind of guy he is. You know, I'm thinking, you know, if I carry on that Lord of the Rings analogy a little bit, I think of Aragorn in the movie Return of the King when he brought an army of the dead to lead the uh to lead to the saving of Minister.

And then he went on to the gates of Mordor and to deflect the evil eye, the you know, Sauron, you know, away from uh the ring that they were trying to get uh get there. And so I can't imagine um how I would have gotten along with these two students through the mega mass without the executive authority and gravity of Huts Herzburg. Seeing him at the closed gate immediately lifted our spirits and made us believe that we could get inside sooner or later. Our motto became just stick with Huts. Well, um, even us had to contend with this crowd and the position we'd found ourselves in.

I think the students felt a new hope and a new resolve as well. They immediately led the way through the crowd. And so the six of us, it was really two students in front kind of like a plow, you know, say, "Excuse us, coming through." Then we had Hutz's family after those two, and then we had Huts and then myself. Of course, I can't resist filming this as I go along. So, I followed behind that train and um and well, let's let clip number five make way for the king speak for itself.

left. So, we plowed through the crowd and it started kind of thin. We were emboldened because we had hust with us. We felt like, man, we're going to get in sooner or later. It's just a matter of time. But the reality of the crowd as it got thicker and thicker the closer we got to anything like a point of entry, it became so thick that uh well, it was almost surreal like is it even possible if they decided that they wanted to let us through for us to get through? It wasn't clear at all. The students didn't stop them. They kept kind of separating people out saying uh turning point staff executive coming through.

Um on one level we should never have been able to make it through that crowd. Um those people had been assembled there many of them overnight. We had we had the backpack wall there where just they weren't going to allow any backpacks or anything else in there just people. And so we had this sort of memorial wall with just backpacks everywhere. And then we had people who had been standing all night at least for the last like four or five hours all kind of really tightly compact there as we were trying to get through.

Um you know it was it was just a little bit of chaos and a little bit of almost an impossibility. But on another level, we had privilege access through Dr. Hutz Hutchburg. If only we could get close enough to make that pay off. Well, the Red Sea started to part. Um, not without the providence of God and a willing crowd. That willing crowd, we kept yelling out, "Hey, make way. We haven't we can't even even TP staff can't get inside. Please make way." There was a number of times where I was in the back with my with my camera just like yelling out, "We love you guys.

We're so glad you're here. Thank you for staying out, you know, and and and and and joining us in this memorial. We do need to get through and we're going to do everything in our power to get you guys with us. So, please make way make way for the king to come on through here." And so, um, they did. And there was points at which the uh the crowd just started yelling clear the way let him through.

It was a it was a a kind of kindred or a camaraderie there that is hard to really describe as it as as as is this very thick wall of people slowly separated as uh the six of us made it through and uh we finally rounded a corner. Things started moving more quickly when we rounded that corner and they were going faster and faster until we got to what I would call a secret sort of VIP entrance. So, let me go ahead and roll clip number six, the secret entrance.

All right, we're moving. Thank you. Thank you guys for being here. This is awesome. Hallelujah. Day three, gentlemen. stuff coming through. You guys got to push a little more because you're fighting against those people that have nothing. Yeah, good. Total craziness here, but we did get past the first barrier. Looks like there is a second barrier of some note.

Hey Siri, I'll call him Once we got through that secret entrance, kind of a VIP entrance, it was amazing how easy it was to get through there. You had to throw your stuff out on the, you know, for the uh for them to check out, you know, and you had to go through a metal detector and all that. But we were in and we made it through and we had early access um because of the prestigious company that we were keeping. We walked inside and uh what a relief it was. But little did we know the journey had only just begun. That was uh that was really something.

But two two things immediately stuck out to me when I walked inside the arena. The first one was that the place was beautifully decorated in honor of Charlie Kirk. His poster was set up there in the entryway. His image was on the banners that we could see as we as as we started to see out over the arena. We could see all these banners. Uh the red, white, and blue um uh well, red, white, and blue was everywhere, but there were placards laid out that were red, white, and blue. Um, the seating was all covered with the posters and everything else. And on screen you had images of Charlie uh flashing up there with Charlie and Erica sometimes flashing up there. Music was already playing in the background.

Um, so that was one thing I noticed was just the ambiance and the feel that had been created in memory of Charlie. Uh the other thing that I remember distinctly was that the arena was mostly empty. In other words, we had early and exclusive access to the arena. There may be 200,000 people outside, but inside there may have been, you know, if I were guessing, I would have said something like a thousand people maybe strewn about the stadium getting it all prepared and ready. there was essential personnel only. If we didn't have those staff badges and huts with us, well, we'd probably still be outside.

Um, we'd certainly be in trouble. Um, we I I remember seeing in my peripheral vision police and security and, you know, armed guards flashing uh in and out of my vision. But that was it. you know, after uh after talking with one another and and grouping together with the rest of our team and staff and so so forth, we began to make our way down the staircase and onto the floor. It was like walking into a, you know, having having gone through a secret entrance. We were now entering a secret garden prepared for Charlie and the faithful. It was majestic to be walking down those stairs with these people at this moment in time. So, let me go ahead and roll clip seven early access.

Okay, we're getting closer. We're right up to the stadium now. Thank you guys. Oh, yes. Hallelujah. Didn't think we were going to make it. All right. Go Charlie. So, we have hundreds of thousands of people apparently outside. And here we are inside by ourselves going down to our reserve seating. super excited about this, being here, being with the team and um looking forward to uh seeing all these people united behind the uh what Charlie believed in and giving thanks for his life. All right. Well, it was about 7 a. m. at that point.

We had managed to go from the 6 am barrel our way through the crowd in like record time and find the VIP entrance along with uh you know our entourage of people led by Hudz Herdsburg. So that was super super cool to be in there to be have having made our way down to the seating area. And uh as you got down there you couldn't help but notice that they had carefully put a poster on every single seat. anybody who was going to be down in that area. I I really didn't look up in the stands to see how many might be strewn uh uh around up there.

But down below on the floor, every single seat had a poster of one kind or another of Charlie Kurt. And that was super cool. I've got I've got uh some copies of that myself and took some home with me and uh have presented some to the students. We have it in the classroom. some of these posters put up so that uh all of us here at Prepier can remember the events uh of the memorial.

Well, the stadium um was massive. At first, it seemed like just a trickle of people uh were coming in. I think that was a function of the fact that everybody had to go through security and the place was so big. And so in that first hour, you know, basically some of the front row seating around the bowl was taken and it was beginning to make its way back. But it just seemed like I I was thinking there would be a mad rush of people in there. But uh maybe it was just the way they did. It was just uh very very well done and people started filling in those seats much, you know, up front first and then working their way back.

But as minutes turned into hours, um the empty seats began to get filled. The energy level began to transform, you know, the whole environment. I mean, you could feel the energy in the room. And uh, you know, it was no longer sort of a secret garden. It was like everybody knew about it. It was more like a, you know, a public prominade of some sort or some some sort of event. and you knew you were it at, you know, at some place special. The m the music got louder and the voices of the people throughout the stadium were like an orchestra. Um, you know, you know that how orchestras often test their instruments before the main performance begins. Seemed like that's what was happening. People were talking with one another in the energy level, the in the anticipation of 11:00 a. m.

when this was supposed to get started began to build. Um, of course I knew many of the people and I was talking with many of the people that I knew. Um, but the galvanizing moment of being down there on the floor and having the floor filling up and having the, you know, the the stadium itself filling up seemed to make everyone fast friends. Uh, I don't have a perfect clip to demonstrate this for you or even to capture that feeling. Uh, it was just such a surreal moment. But let's uh let's roll some of the footage of the crowd gathering from my vantage point. There were a number of us doing kind of pano shots and other things.

Um let's roll some footage here. I'm going to call this one. Let's let's grab clip eight. The crowd gathers. Now, we are now two weeks after the memorial, and I'm sure you've heard about it by now. If you're like a lot of my friends who weren't able to go to the memorial, they either watched it live for like the entire six hours or whatever it ended up being or they watched the speeches, you know, recorded. Um, but being there was something I would think was I mean it just seemed totally different. The the the real event was far beyond anything I think you may have read or even seen.

Uh, crowd was filled the arena. the electricity of the moment started to rise. It was like somebody was just slowly, you know, I used to run train sets and so forth and they had this dial that you could turn to to to ramp up the electricity so the train went faster and faster. It felt like someone was ramping up the electricity in the in the in the room. Now, I'm a philosopher. I'm kind of trained not to get caught up in the moment as it were in the passion, but this used critical reasoning and um academic rigor to kind of properly frame things and think things through.

It didn't take a genius, however, to figure out that this event was something more than I had ever experienced. Um, I kind of hovered somewhere between being elated by the worshipful nature of the experience and the common purpose that we all felt and deeply reflective and even sad and I came to waffle between the two go back and forth between um being being in God's presence with uh people of of kindred spirit or just deeply reflective on my own life and even a bit sad to have have had to have have gotten there. So, um I've been to big events before.

Um, yeah, I might date myself here a little bit, but back when I was at college at the University of Illinois, I went to Farm Aid. And I remember standing for about 12 straight hours while every musician that I'd ever heard of really that was still alive came through there and sang some of their favorite songs or their most popular songs. That was a great event. That was electric. That was memorable and so forth. I've been to a few Amfest events that again manufactured that kind of electricity, you know, for fits and starts, but this thing from the moment we walked in early in the morning, like 7:00 a.

m. all the way to when I left, which ended up being kind of midway through the uh President Trump's speech cuz I wanted to get out of there and catch my flight. Um it was just electric and it just seemed to ratchet up with each speech that happened. So um this event surpassed all of those events and um really kind of got to me. So I'm going to share a clip. I wasn't sure if I even wanted to share, but I'm going to share it anyway. Um it's clip nine.

Firestone in the crowd. We are still an hour away from the main event starting and the place is absolutely full. People everywhere. This place is rocking and so just give you a little picture of it behind me here. It's just wall to- wall people and um yeah, just super excited to be here at this moment in history. Something's changing and uh God's on the move. So, we'll pick it up later. So, that's a little bit of a picture of the energy of the crowd, of my place in the crowd down there on the floor. Uh, lots of energy, lots of buildup, and uh, and so I was just trying to get myself situated, take full advantage of that.

I had a a badge on me that allowed me to sit apparently in the blue section. And just to give you a sense of the layout of the place, the red section was up close to the stage. It was blocked by a barricade, not a barricade, but a a fence or a gate uh that separated those five rows from the white section. The white section had probably about 30 rows or so. And the white section then gave way to the blue section which filled the rest of the floor. So, I don't know if that was 50 or 100 additional rows there. So, we had the red, white, and the blue sections.

Now, I had a badge for the blue section. I was sitting, we had gotten there early and we had our seats set up, and we had a reasonably good blue row, blue section seats. Uh, that was exciting. It was an honor to be there, certainly. But the red section is the one with the dignitaries, right? The red section was the one with all the conservative voices of note Christians who you know people like Father Baron or um you know other you know Pastor McCoy and other uh you know noted Christian leaders were up there in the red section and so you could clearly see you know how this how this was working out.

The white section had other people of influence. Maybe not quite as much influence as the red section, which was cordoned off a bit, but the gate was low enough, the fence was low enough where the white and the red sections were able to interact with one another. And uh that was super cool. Um, so I was in the blue section on on the floor and it was uh, you know, although it was the largest of the three sections, it was pretty clear that we weren't quite where all the real action was happening. There was plenty of action going.

I was meeting people, talking with people, interacting with with friends and other people I knew already, but there was something, you know, maybe it was FOMO or something that made me think I really need to be down in that white section and talking to the people in the red section. So um if you were watch some of my previous podcasts like the one on the life of the mind I talked about you know moving forward and you know trying to get where you want to go by just uh you know by just doing it. And so I decided to make my way into the white section down all the way to the red section.

That was where the real action was and that's where I wanted to be. So, let's cut to clip 10 from blue to red. All right, Marco Rubio is speaking and I'm headed that way now. Um, it's a who's who in the conservative world, Christian world. And I'm going to try to make my way down to the fifth row in the front even though I don't yet have that badge. One of my students has spearheaded a seat for me. I remember thinking I'm going to admit to you I was a little skeptical. I said college campuses are going to do that. Why don't you start somewhere easier?

Like for example communist Cuba. You know young Americans were told that is not true. The highest calling we are called to is to be in a successful marriage and to raise productive children. Okay. Well, I spent several hours at the intersection of the of the red and the white sections. The crowd was impressive certainly and I you know you you seen already from some of the panoramas and other things that it was just an amazing place. The energy level was extremely high. The worship level was extraordinary. People were there for good reasons to honor Charlie Kirk and so forth. But the individuals uh that I met in those few hours were astounding. I already mentioned Pastor McCoy and uh whose opening speech and gospel presentation was uplifting.

I confersed with Glenn Beck and Eric Mataxis down there. I rub shoulders with Matt Walsh and Father Baron as I mentioned already. Talked at length with Senator Adam Pew, you know, from Oklahoma and a number of other people that I knew were important. I think even one or two other senators, but I couldn't quite place them. I can't even remember now their names. You know, I really should write these things down, but it was just u it was just an extraordinary place to to be.

and uh they all were interested in what was happening with Turning Point education prep year and uh was able to to to to sort of make them aware of uh of this of this endeavor of Turning Point uh in education. I was hoping to run into Amanda down there who I'd met at the airport earlier that day, but to no avail. the the connections were just happening in a kind of an organic or kinetic way and any preconceived notion of who you might meet, you had to throw out the window. You just just had to meet people. Um, you know, run with the moment.

At one point, I did manage to meet Carol Adams who was instrumental in helping us get started with our first iteration of prep year and um, we had a brief conversation and off she went. So, it was really a kind of who's who down there and uh so exhilarating, so fascinating to talk with these driven people um and uh and just to share in our common um respect for the person and work of Charlie Kirk.

Now, somewhere in the middle of my time down there, one of my students had figured out that Firestone wasn't sitting with everybody anymore. His name is Samuel. He decided to make his way down there with me. So little I'm standing there talking probably to some senator or something and taps on my shoulder. There's Samuel. Now Samuel's an interesting guy. He's one of our students at Prepier. He's like six feet 7 in tall, super personable. His dad is a pastor. We went to their church uh just a week a week or two ago now. And uh he's a quick study. I mean he started being the best sort of spokesperson for Preper we could ever have hoped to have.

He was meeting really important people. And um he saw he said he he he said he saw me up front. He said he just had to do that that kind of interacting himself. So he joined me down there. We spent a couple hours together down there meeting people. It was really a dynamic duo because here I am the, you know, the the the the lead professor and kind kind of on-site director of this first iteration of prep year. And uh here I have one of my students and I'm 6'4, 6' 3, four in that range. This guy's towering above me. But the combination of us two were really able to get the word out about this most recent uh endeavor of Turning Point that is Turning Point education prep year. And so that was super exciting to see him kind of grow in the moment and really get to meet some people.

You know, he told me he saw me up front that he wanted to do that too. He wanted to join me. So together weworked for a few hours and it was really funny to see not funny but a reminder to me about what mentor protege relations are supposed to be about because in that time that I was with Samuel up there meeting people. He was a great help to me in in in getting to meet people and telling our story and uh in sharing our memories of Charlie and and all of that. But he soon passed up his teacher. I mean, I was getting a little tired.

Not Samuel. He kept talking to people. He goes on to meet Elon Musk and then he meets Tucker Carlson and well, a host of other people. I don't know how he did that, but he did. And so, that just goes to show you um you know, never underestimate young people. Let's go ahead and roll clip 11. I'm going to call this one Superstar Montage. All right, everybody. I am down by the floor uh meeting lots of people who are galvanized towards this common cause to realize Charlie's vision. And uh just super excited to be here meeting a lot of good people and uh let's see what God does with this thing.

Well, there we have it. That's one of my students, Samuel. So excited to be here. Anyway, we'll come back when Trump or Vans or somebody else is around. Blessings everybody. So, those were some of those were some of the people that we met while we were down there. That is not a complete list. Those are ones we happen to have the cameras rolling and uh some pictures taken with them and so forth. If you remember back in my original statement in the taxi, one of the things that I had endeavored to do was interview students and how Charlie and his life and mission impacted them.

Um to be honest, I got lost in the moment. I got lost in the uh you know you know with with Samuel down there meeting people and just the camaraderie there. I guess it was therapeutic for me being able to meet these people, to be able to cry on each other's shoulder, to be able to to share how we were going to work together to accomplish Charlie's original mission. And so all of that sort of impacted me. Now, those people are impressive and from the pictures you can tell, you know, these were kinds of people we wanted to meet. But student life change, that's something that really impacts me in a and when students are impacted in a positive way, that's super exciting.

So, um, as I mentioned earlier, we had recommended that the prep students stay home and not attend the memorial services. Um, but the the crowds were going to be unimaginably difficult to navigate. The safety concerns were real because of the obvious nature of Charlie's death and the people present at the event and the Turning Point education could not guarantee that all would go well.

Nevertheless, six students, as I mentioned earlier, took it upon themselves to attend the event. Um, in the controlled chaos of the moment, I managed to briefly interview two of them about the person in mission of Charlie, but I thought it worth sharing those two interviews with you. So, let's roll clip 12 and 12 prime, I guess. Um, student thoughts on Charlie. All right. Yeah. Hey, uh, Adam, so good to see you here. You guys made it. Awesome. Um, I'm starting to ask students around here, what did Charlie the person and his mission mean to you?

I think what Charlie really focused on and what really hit me was that in any danger and in any circumstance, he was willing to tell the truth every single time, no matter what threat was apparent. And he was so strong in his faith. And I just want to echo that and mirror that so I can mirror Christ for everyone else. Amen. Thanks so much, man. So good to be here. Rolling. We are now rolling. Hey, Samuel. So good that you guys made it. Super excited to have you here with the team. And um I'm just asking all the young people, what did the person Charlie Kirk and his mission mean to you?

Yeah. So Charlie was someone who was genuine in his faith and someone in politics I could look at and say, "Hey, he loves the Lord and I can follow him." Paul talks about how uh follow me as I imitate Christ. And that's who Charlie was for me. Someone I could imitate because I knew he was following Christ. And so I still have that imitation to follow even after his death with his legacy. So I'm just wanting to carry that on and do what I can for Turning Point and for the Lord. Amen. Hey, thanks for coming, my friend. Super excited to have you here. All right. Thank you.

Bye. As you can see, the students were affected without question um by the person and mission of Charlie Kirk and by the event itself. You could almost feel the energy in the students as we were being surrounded by other people who so appreciated Charlie's work. Um the crowd itself, I think, took it to the next level. The singing was off the charts. There were like three Christian singers who sang throughout the time uh leading up to some of the speeches and that was just majestic to be able to have this kind of worshipful service with so many people. Um the one I remember most vividly was the song Worthy is the Lamb.

So memorable was the moment that I couldn't help but make a panoramic video of the moment. And as uh and and what was interesting about that panoramic video was that my student Samuel also took a panoramic video at exactly the same time. So if you look closely at these next two videos, I'm going to bump them up against each other. You'll see uh him recording his video in my panorama and then you can see me recording my video in his panorama.

The only difference is I recorded in sort of uh what you call horizontal cinematic style and he report and he recorded it up and down and maybe that's a generational thing or something but that's the only difference between the two so far as I can tell. So let's run clips 13 and 14. Worthy is the lamb number one and number two. Worthy is for you are holy. Holy are you. Oh God, oh mighty worthy are you. Worthy is worthy for you.

Come on, lift it up. It's somewhere around the time of that song and the u the the sort of holiness that we all felt of the of this moment of memory of remembering Charlie um was the moment that I realized that this is not a funeral but it's a revival. I was totally into the moment into the realization that I had lost a dear friend that we had lost a brother in Christ. It's not just any brother, however, but a warrior, an apologist, and a lamb, all wrapped up into one person. I was at once overcome with grief and emotion, elation, and a sense of mission and purpose.

It's hard to describe how all those things could be wrapped up in one experience, but there you have it. I was not recording these things because that's what a philosopher is supposed to do, but because I'd never been so resolved to change the world for Christ as I have been since Charlie was taken from us. Charlie had taught us what a little Christ, as the reformers put it, looks like in this cultural moment in the 21st century. He or she is bold, grounded in the truth, fearless in proclamation, gentle as a dove, and wise as a serpent.

All of those things were exemplified in the person of Charlie and why it was such an amazing loss. not only to us but to the whole world with his passing. I was hesitant to show some of my earlier videos. This is the most personal video of them all for me because it takes me some distance from my vocational commitment as a philosopher, dispassionate, critical, engaging. Yet, Charlie taught us not to be afraid to be men in public spaces, to pursue truth wherever it takes us, and to join with others who have met Christ for common cause, for his kingdom work. All of that kind of welled up in me in this moment. Let's roll clip 15. Not a funeral, but a revival.

We single hallelujah. This is absolutely amazing. Hallelujah. Charlie, we love you. Let's change the world. after all of that, after that experience sort of infused itself into my soul and gave me new resolve. We didn't need anything more. I didn't need anything more. I think the people around me didn't need anything more. At least we didn't know that we needed anything more. We didn't need another capstone to the event. It had reached so many climaxes that we could hardly even stand one more. But Erica came up with one anyway. Now I have purposely avoided sharing here all the amazing political speeches at the event. They were a marvel to behold and uh encouraged me for our nation's future.

I'm thinking of Tulsi Gabbard and Marco Rubio and Pete Hegv and JD Vance. People you wouldn't expect to be so transparent about their faith so as to preach the gospel. And the people applauded. I've been at events before. I've done debates before where if you mention the name of Jesus, they boo almost to the point where they throw stuff at you. But that wasn't this event at all. You have no idea how rare that is in public discourse.

Just when you thought the whole event couldn't get any more rich in terms of gospel proclamation and the embodiment of the Christian worldview and personal testimony, Erica Kurt stepped onto the stage. So, I don't have a personal video of her most climactic moment when she forgave her enemy, the murderer of her husband. I recommend you look it up on YouTube or some other source. It was moving, so deeply personal and transparent that I can hardly put it into words. I'm still amazed when I think about it.

But when she walked on the stage, and that's the clip, that's the part where I had the cameras rolling because I was so, you know, happy to see her with the kind of courage that would be able to walk out in front of a 100,000 people in this moment, having lost her husband at this memorial. I mean, what a courageous thing to do. She almost transfigured on the stage for me, rising above hate and sadness and bitterness. and offering the kind of grace that only comes from God. I have a brief clip from where I sat of her coming onto the stage and being in that moment. I'll never forget it. Let's roll clip 16. All eyes on Erica.

Heat. Heat. Well, we have arrived to the end here of my experiences at the Charlie Kirk Memorial Service. I hope that that gave you a peak into the event from the eyes of a philosopher. Um about halfway through the Trump speech, I had to be at the airport in about an hour and I knew if I stayed any longer and had to fight for an Uber um I would miss my flight. I'd be there an extra day and I had to teach in the morning um in Dallas Fort Worth. So the two students and I, we ordered an Uber for us. Interestingly, I think everybody and their brother was ordering an Uber and there was like eight different Uber categories.

All of them fully booked, no vacancy, but there was one category, Uber pet, that was available. So I took it. Uber pet. I I assume that means a kind of Uber where you can bring a dog or something. Well, the two students and I, we had to get to the airport. We make our way out of the stadium and just what an odyssey to get, I mean, the gates were blocking every We had to get to the black parking lot and uh we had to walk more than a mile.

Fortunately, I I I I ordered the Uber for about an hour away because I knew it was going to take some time to get out there and I thought, don't want them getting there early and then we miss the Uber and somebody else takes it. So, I set it for I believe if I remember the timing right, it was something like 5:45.

Anyway, I uh was it 4:45? It's one of those two. Anyway, uh we make our way out and around and we had to walk more than a mile, I think, all the way around all the fencing, around guards, around cars, and everything till we got to the black lot. And then we realized the black lot was uh blocked by by uh there was no cars coming into it. They were only allowed to leave. So even though we had a scheduled pickup point, there was no way he was going to pick us up. We had to walk another half mile or so to meet the Uber driver who was on our way to get us at that point.

The timing ended up being divine. We got to the uh Uber, we got into the car, and off we went back to Pastor Tim Anderson's house, grabbed our things, and then Pastor Anderson took us to the airport. So, that was the uh sort of culmination of that day. We shot over to the airport, I got on the plane, and I made it back home late that night. Um there's more to the story. There's a lot more to the story, but uh you know um that's all I have time to tell at this moment in time. Thank you for listening. Thank you, Lori, for recommending that I tell the story of the memorial service. I hope it was edifying. I hope it was insightful. And uh that ends our series on Charlie Kirk.

We will miss you, my friend. But uh we're committed. we're committed to your to your to your mission, one that you taught us um how to do well. So, that's it for the Firestone Files. Thank you so much for joining me and I'll see you next time. Let's remember Charlie. May his legacy never die. Thanks for stopping by to spend some time with me here on the Firestone Files. I hope today's reflections offered you some new insights and perspective on life. If you enjoyed the episode or found it valuable, I'd appreciate it if you'd take a moment to like, subscribe, and share it with someone you care about.

I'd also love to hear your thoughts. What resonated with you? What challenged you? Or what would you like to hear more about in future episodes? Drop a comment below or send in your suggestions to the email in the description. Your input helps shape where we go next. This has been Dr. Chris Firestone. Until next time, keep asking the big questions and remember the kingdom journey is always best with your friends. Further up and further in. Bye for now.