A TRIBUTE TO “ASK AN ATTORNEY”
on WTBN AM 570 Radio with Bill Bunkley Hosting
IN LOVING MEMORY OF ATTORNEY JOSEPH PIPPEN
Joe Pippen passed away on Thursday, July 29, 2021. He was a very much loved and respected member of the community and enjoyed serving the public by providing free legal advice on his show “Ask an Attorney”.
First Airing in 1984, Joe Pippen had been hosting the continuous call-in Radio Show for 37 years. We are deeply saddened with Joe’s passing and he will be greatly missed.
Just click below to hear the broadcast or read the transcript of the program further below.
Bill Bunkley:
Welcome back, Bill Bunkley here with the Buckley’s show a very special edition this afternoon from your Watchman on the wall. I want to first welcome in all of our family, this joining us on our news. Talk to answer stations this afternoon, both on am eight 60 Tampa bay, as well as am nine 30 Sarasota and Bradenton. The course our faith talk family, but with am five 70 in all of the various ways that you’re able to tune into our programming. And I’m talking about Salem radio, all of our platforms here in west central Florida that are joining us this afternoon. This is going to be a special hour of the bill Lee’s show, and it’s not going to be the type of hour that you’ll find often on our program. But when the events warrant it and there is honor to whom honor is due.
That’s when we’re going to take a timeout and we’re going to do as a Christ follower or what I believe the Lord would have us to do. First of all, today, it will be a tribute to someone that we all loved here at Salem communications, Tampa. That was our name way back. When, when Joe Pippin host of ask an attorney, he moved his radio show here to this new startup right here in the bay area. Well, that was in 1984. And that was actually not 1984, but 1984 is when Joe began his weekly radio show. And by the way, think about that. Now I call it 38, some call it 37, but nonetheless 38 years on the radio and Joe pipit with ask an attorney, it was the longest running radio show in these parts. And I tell you what that’s saying a lot.
What were you doing back in 1984, that it gave you an idea of how long and committed Joe has been to this community. And if you don’t know Thursday a week ago Joe was with his lovely wife, Bev, and they were spending some time away on a little vacation time and Joe collapsed and there were folks right there. They tried to revive him, but the Lord said, well, Hey, thanks for everybody chipping in. But as time for time for me to bring him home. And so Joe went home to be with the Lord. And I wanna tell you that when the word reached us here at the station, I mean, it was universally greeted with just stunned disbelief. And as we began to get our arms around what had happened we began to realize what an impact Joe had had.
Now, if you’ve been with us for the last few years, depending whether on news talk stations or on our answers stations, you know, when eight o’clock on Saturday morning roll around, it was your opportunity. If something popped up in your life, if there was an event that you wondered, I wonder what my legal position might be on this. You know, you know, that you could always pick up the phone and make that first call to figure out what path you needed to follow. And that was because you were going to ask an attorney and that was Joe Pippin. Now remember that Joe was recognized his expertise. Now he was expert in so many areas of the law to share with us on Saturday mornings, but his expertise was in Florida. It was in Florida estate planning. He was an estate planning attorney and he established his practice back in 1982, but in 1984, he began his weekly radio show.
And he also authored a weekly law column. Now let’s fast forward to 2001 that’s the time when we were Salem communications, but in 2001 is when the ask an attorney program became one of the first two shows here on Salem communications. And of course, today we’re all under the umbrella of this Salem media group. And there was two new stations, am five 70 WTN and am nine 10 with our transmitter plant city, w T w D then about a few years later in 2005, we had an opportunity and there were two more stations that we picked up for our platforms here in west central Florida. And then we introduced our news talk, answer stations, and one was, am eight 60 WEG UL. And of course the other one was, am nine 30 w LSS, Bradenton, Sarasota. And guess what?
The legacy that’s left here is that a ask an attorney was one of the early programs on all of those platforms. And that’s why we’re here today. So we’re going to have a special salute to Joe. And we got a special tree at the bottom of the hour that Bev has precious wife is going to be with us. And you know, Joe just didn’t give advice on the air. He really cared about the folks that were calling it, and he cared about the people in his community. He was devoted to his Lord and savior Jesus Christ, biblical principles were very important to him. In fact, you’re going to get to hear one of my favorite programs that Joe ever did, and that is his, it was known as the trial of Jesus gel Pippin walking us through. And you’re going to hear that on this afternoon’s program, you’re also going to hear a couple of conversations with senior pastor Ottawa Baptist church, Dr. Ken Whitten topics on George Washington and Andrew Johnson. But what I want to do is just to kind of get into our discussion today because Joe worked in the areas of wills and trusts and probate. We got a clip here and it was a clip having to do with what is a living trust. So we’re going to do a little education, Joe style here, as well as we give him honor and tribute. And then we come back, we got our first special guest to talk about his relationship with Joe PIP and let’s listen in
Attorney Joe Pippen:
What is it living trust? The most often asked question I get every week on my radio show is probably is what is a living trust? All a living trust is, is a fancy will. A lot of people think it’s something else, but that’s really all it is. It’s a fancy will with some special features. The first special feature of a living trust is that it avoids probate. If you have a will, it’s going to go through probate. If you have a trust, it’s not, you have chosen to avoid probate through the use of a living trust with a will your assets take often six to 14 months to go through probate with a trust. Since you’ve avoided probate, you’ve chosen a quick and very fast distribution process, very much unlike probate. If you have a will, you’ve only planned for death. Wills do not deal with if you become incapacitated. If you have a living trust, you and your attorney have designed a guardianship plan built into the document. If you have a, will, it becomes a public document upon death with a trust. It can be a private affair. So no one knows what’s going on in your state who gets what and so forth. So our living trust has four big advantages over a will. It avoids probate. It makes easy, fast and quick distribution of the estate upon death. And it gives you a guardianship plan and it arranges for privacy of your state.
Bill Bunkley
Well, before we get to someone very special, and that is Joe Weaver, my very good friend, our very good friend of everyone here at the station who is operation manager and program director. I wanted to list let you listen in, and we’ll take you back to the early nineties because wills trusts and probate. But I tell you what that was Joe Pippins bell. That is just his backyard. That was his specialty. Let’s listen into a clip on this as well. And by the way, do you have your will up to date? Have you got your trust ready to go? Let’s listen in to the great advice from ask an attorney.
Attorney Joe Pippen:
Now, if a client comes in and talking about the definition of a trust at the same time, I think you should tell them about a will and maybe some of the disadvantages of just having a, will you tell them that the cost of probate, you tell them the time in quote your fee? I think if a client came in and said, give me something in writing as to what your probate fee would be. I think that’d be a pretty sharp client actually, to get to the idea and something from you and writing about what your fees going to be to handle the estate one day, because we all know attorney fees vary from one attorney to another, a great deal on probate, Tom, how long it’s going to take to probate, tell them about the 90 day period and a notice of administration that most probates take at least six months, maybe sometimes up to a year, tell them that they need a guardianship plan.
You know, 50% of Americans become incapacitated before they die. 50% of American’s needs need someone with either a power of attorney or some other instrument to do things for them and tell them that they want to plan for that, or they want to leave it in the hands of the guardianship court to make decisions, or do they want to be the boss? Do they want to plan it? You need to discuss all of these things. You need to discuss the privacy feature of, of wills versus trust. All of these things I think are important in a state planning for the client to have a good understanding of the, of the differences that, that they have, the choices that they have. Now. I know people from the radio shows that I do. I know people are confused about wills and trusts and probate. I had a lady not too long ago, call in and wanted to know if she could probate her own will. And I went on to explain to her that probate didn’t take place until after death. And she still didn’t understand the answer. So people have misunderstandings about all these things. We had a lady in my office two weeks ago that said, well, I solved the probate problem. My Well’s not going to go through probate. I tore it up.
I mean, I had people come in and say that the last question is like that on the radio they’ll make, come in and make comments about that. There’s a big misunderstanding about estate planning. And I think your choice is to tell them what a trust is to describe how it works, to tell them the difference between having a will and having a trust and a that is basically your job. If you’re an estate planning, that’s what you need to do. That’s what I think.
Bill Bunkley:
I just had to chuckle because you may have known the answer to that question, but what I was really taking in was how gentle and how clear in layman’s language that Joe Pippin would talk to is week after week. And by the way, a lot of people knew that they could go to our website and always download the podcast to make sure they got it right. Was someone that worked very close with Joe Pippin through his years, many years here at the Salem radio here in Tampa, Salem media group, Joe Weaver is our operations manager and program director. We got about a couple of minutes left and we can come back. But your thoughts about our good friend, Joe Pippin and his service to the community and to our listeners,
Joe Weaver:
I don’t even know if he took the entirety of this hour. I could adequately my full, you know, thoughts on that question. You know, what Joe’s impact was on the community? I think he probably touched more people while, you know, he was here giving his advice over the air for all of those almost 40 years. He did this in the Tampa bay area than, than he even knew. And I, I hope that when he, when he did arrive you know, on the other side that he got maybe some insight as to how many of those people, that the work cause it was, it was, it was incredibly volumous and, and he had an impact on my life as well. He was one of the first folks that I worked with when I started working here, which I’ve been now with the company for 15 great years.
I I’ve been blessed to be a part of this company. And that whole time I’ve been blessed to be you know, knowing and working with Joe Pippin and w among so many of the things that you can say about the man is he, I mean, you, you alluded to it a moment ago. He was, he was very compassionate. He was very empathetic. He was extraordinarily patient. I can’t tell you how many times I’m listening on the air to somebody going through a problem that was complicated and where I may have, you know, lost my patients along the way he never did. He was always just as, as, as patient. And, and he also put himself in the position of the person seeking that advice and really trying to, you know, to help them figure out what they’re trying to get through. And it was sincere. That’s, that’s the biggest thing with Joe is it was always sincere. None of it was contrived. And like I say, I could go on for a long time talking about, about all of those things, but whatever, when you, what you heard on the air from him every, every Saturday morning, that’s who he was.
Bill Bunkley:
I want to tell you why Joe just really hit it on the head. What was it like working with Joe Pippin? When we come back, Brian elk will weigh in, plus the trial of Jesus I’m bill blankly. We’ll be right back
We’re back. Bill Bunkley here for a very special edition of the bill bunk show. We are talking about someone who made quite an impression all across west central Florida, and his name was Joe Pippin, and he passed away. And all the way back in 1984, he began his radio program, asked an attorney and only the Lord knows how many people got that first bit of advice from a very, quite frankly, gentle caring individual who really knew how to listen. Well about a couple of Saturdays ago was the last time that Joe was with us doing a live show. And Brian echo was the producer. And of course, Brian is in the line of many, many producers had the blessings to work with Mr. Pippin. And so could you give me an idea about your reflection, not only when you heard the news, but your thoughts to the many mornings bright and early you were working with Joe. And he had a great disposition early in the morning where some of us are just kind of grumpy.
Brian Echo:
You know, Joe has so much energy coming in on Saturday morning, more than me, you know, and I, I got up early every Saturday to get ready to do my shift here with, with all the shows that we have on Saturday. But Joe was just had so much energy. You know, I learned so much from Joe every week. You know, I didn’t go to law school, obviously I’m here producing your show, but I felt like I went to law school with Joe because every week you would hear him give out the advice. And it was sometimes it was legal advice, and sometimes it was life advice. And, and I, I treasure that. And I was shocked, you know, and saddened the cycle. All of us, all of us are, and I’m going to miss coming in on Saturday morning and seeing Joe, he was the first person I saw on Saturday mornings, and I’m going to miss that. And I just, my thoughts and prayers are with Bev and the family. And it’s going to be different tomorrow morning coming in here. But I can’t say enough good things about them
Bill Bunkley:
By the way, be sure to tune in at eight o’clock, we’ll have a special tribute more clips in the morning. And you don’t want to miss that because everything that our staff has been working on here going through what years and years, 38 years worth of material it’s more than the best of it is all great advice worth listening to now. I want to go to something that’s one of my favorites and every Easter you may have tuned in. And Joe did a special legal analysis about the trial of Jesus. And we’ve got an excerpt. And by the way, I have it from a good source. That being Joe Weaver, that as long as he’s here, we’re going to be airing this every year at Easter is very special. So just how mistreated was Jesus. You know, Joe was a Christ follower. That’s one of the reasons why he just had that, that glow of the Lord eight o’clock on Saturday mornings, but let’s just listen in, as he tried to explain all the injustices that were done against Jesus on that fateful night, in the morning,
Attorney Joe Pippen:
To do the trial of Jesus every year on the radio, you have to ask yourself, how can the most innocent person that ever walked this earth be convicted, condemned, and executed crucified? How could the, what are the set of circumstances? What are the set of facts that led to the crucifixion? Jesus Christ went through six trials. And if you count the trial before the people, as a trial, if he went through seven trials, he went through seven trials and I’m going to go through all of the trials with you, but he went through seven trials in a matter of 12 hours. And the end result, we all know he was guilty. He was crucified. Fellows are guilty of, but we’ve got to talk about that too is the most fascinating trial. It, I, as an attorney, loved Redis trial. I love to study this trial.
I usually give this talk several times around Easter time. It is the most, it’s the most enjoyable for all you could ever read a bell. Why was Jesus on trial? Whatever made them arrest him and put him on trial? Well, Jesus was a threat to the high priest. Jesus was a big threat to the high praise, to his teaching. The countryside, there were huge crowds. He was preaching wisdom. He was drawing support away from the high priest and they injured him. They couldn’t stand it. He was getting their people support in the Bible and the Matthew chapter 26 verses two and three. I’ll just tell you these. And I’ll tell you what they say. Mark 14, verse one, Luke 22 dash two. Tell you that the high priest conspired against this man named Jason was teaching wisdom, roaming the countryside. He was healing people. He was speeding.
The 4,000 prior to that, he had raised someone from the dead. He was going around saying that he was the Messiah. So the priest envied him and they had to do something about this man named Jesus was still also just prior to the Passover. Jesus cleansed the temple that, what does that mean? Jesus went into the temple. The temple had become more of a commercial adventure. The people had come from all over selling their animals, selling their goods, and they were doing this inside the temple, the high priest controlled what they called the money changers. Now what happened was that anyone who wanted to do business in the temple had to exchange their money for temple money. And the exchange rate was something else from the high priests were making a great deal of money. During the time of Passover on the exchange rate, if you will, Jesus went into the temple and chased out the moneychangers.
He chased out the vendors. He chased out the people selling things. So again, he was doing something that angered the high priest and between death and preaching and healing, raising the dead and all of these things. They conspired against him. Again, Matthew 26 verses two and three of mark 14 one Luke 22 chapter two, verse two. They say that the high priest met together to conspire against Jesus to kill him. And that’s exactly what happened. Let’s go to the arrest. Let me go through this first. There was, let me compare to the law. There’s some, there are many differences in the law back in and the law today, but a lot of the law back then is the same law today. Let me explain. The Romans had the law of the 12 tables. There were 120 sections of law in the 12 tables. 87 of those sections are the exact law we have today.
A lot of our law came from the Roman law. So what happened? There are a lot of differences though. I need to tell you about one of the things was back in those days, you had to have an airtight case and they were not accept hearsay. That would not allow any hearsay evidence before the court. At that time, they would also. Now today’s law. There’s a law. There are many, so many hearsay exceptions to the law that there’s might as well not be lost sometimes. So there’s a difference between back then, there were much stricter back then on what evidence could be presented to the court, the court back then the Jewish court said that there could be no circumstantial evidence. You had to have hard cold facts on someone to present at a trial. There could be no circumstantial evidence. There’s rarely are case in today’s law that doesn’t allow circumstantial evidence for the court then would not accept the evidence from a conspiratorial.
They would not accept it. You had to have cold, hard facts. One person conspiring against someone would, could not get anywhere in the Jewish court system. Back then, back then, as today, you have the right to have an attorney. In fact, you had to have someone represent you back in those days. Someone had to represent you. And if the Jewish court, which was made up of 23, scribes, 23, chief priests, 23 elders, and the high priest, 70 members all voted against you. All 70 people voted against you. Then you were acquitted because one of those 70 people had to represent you in a unanimous verdict was an acquittal. Believe it or not, that was a big difference in the law. The law would not accept self-testimony. You cannot make a voluntary confession back in those days. It could not be used against you. And those are the big differences in many of our laws are the same.
Bill Bunkley:
We’re going to have a Bev pivot with us in just a moment Pippin. And I got to bring in Joe real quick. We got about a minute. You know, that’s one of our favorite programs here. Speak to that because it really gains the attention, whether you’re a follower or not about this person of Jesus Christ.
Joe Weaver:
Joe came on the air every Saturday morning at eight. And for every Easter that I have been a part of what we do here at Salem. His instructions to me every, every year was on that the Easter weekend, it was always the, I’m not doing my program. I want you to play the trial of Jesus, which we just heard the version. That was a portion of it, that he was giving a speech to a church crowd. And then there’s a longer version that is kind of goes the entire 50 minutes. That as you mentioned earlier, that’s going to continue to be a tradition for us because it was, it’s very instructive. It’s also, I think the only version that I’ve ever heard done, I don’t think I’ve ever heard anybody kind of go through step-by-step and the longer version really kind of goes through everything that was done. And you could hear there that it was really something that he was passionate about. It was really in his heart as everything that he talked about was, and the one thing we haven’t even mentioned here, but I just need to say, as we kind of head into break here, he was also a great Patriots. Not necessarily left-right paradigm, but just he loved his country and he loved his countrymen that were in it. So I can’t say enough about that, but yes, trial of Jesus, very special.
Bill Bunkley:
We have a Mrs. Pippin, Bev Pippin coming up next show share. We’ll be right back.
Welcome back, Bill Bunkley here with the bill monthly show, if you’re just tuning in, it’s a, it’s a very special Friday afternoon here in the four o’clock hour. And because we are looking back at the life of a jump him, you know, Joe was on the air with his radio program, ask an attorney since way back in 1,984. And we were honored to have the program on our stations first back in 2005. And then you know, and then a little bit further 2001 and 2005 all the way until today. And I want to tell you that we were shocked, but we have been for his wife, Bev, the family and friends. And I know that this was a very sudden situation for everyone. And so to have a chance to share a little bit, we are honored to have Mrs. Pepin, whether it’s this afternoon and Bev is calling in and Bev. First of all, thank you so much for spending a few moments with us.
Bev Pippen:
I am honored to be here Bill.
Bill Bunkley:
Well, it goes without saying from our general manager Barb Yoder and Joe Weaver. And I know that you had a chance to chat with them on and all this week that our overriding thoughts and prayers are with you. And we have really been impacted by your husband’s life and of paramount this afternoon. That’s what we want you to know. And that’s what hopefully that you can feel because he was a very special guy to you. You chose him, he chose you, but very special to us. And, and just thank you for being with us at this tender.
Bev Pippen:
I’m so glad that I could, I could be here. Thank you, bill.
Bill Bunkley:
How did it all start between you and Joe? How did you guys meet?
Bev Pippen:
Oh, my gracious. He was it’s a funny story, cause he likes to tell this unreal version of it, but he came to my high school. He’d gone there the year before. And then the new school opened up that he went that year to his, in his junior year. And I had come into my high school as a freshmen. And so at the end of my freshman year, there was a yearbook signing doc cup. We had back in 1964 and I was this teen and he was 17. And he stared at me across the gym the entire night I was with my girlfriends and, and my sorority sisters or whatever. And I didn’t know who he was. And so lo and behold, the last song comes up and it’s a slow song. And I hear he comes across the gym and he asked me to dance with him and I was so rude.
I just said, no, thank you. And he turns heel and walked away because I don’t think any girl had ever done that to him. But two months later I was at the lake. He was a lifeguard. And I had heard in between that time that he was a good guy, he went to my friend’s church. He was a really good guy. He helped take care of his brother and I saw a different part of him. And I sort of eased in on, I liked his personality. And about, about a week later, he asked me out and believe it or not, our first date was the anniversary of our first date was yesterday. It was August 5th, 1960 4, 57 years ago was our first date. And we dated that last year of his senior year and then four years of college. And then we got married. We got, we got on December 20th, 1969. And he went into law school shortly thereafter. He worked a 40 hour day during the day and I was packaged lunch for his supper and he would go to law school at night. And I worked for, for lawyers as a legal secretary during that time. And he also, at the same time, he was in law school. He went through OCS and became a Lieutenant in the Virginia army national guard
Bill Bunkley:
All the way back to high school. You know a lot of those long-term relationships never certainly last all of these years, but that must be just a special, special place in your heart that you and he connected so closely and worked as a team all these years.
Bev Pippen:
It is incredible because when he started his law practice, I had not been a legal secretary in Florida, but I thought, well, who better to have your back? And I was working on interior design at the same time, and I quit that to help him open up practice. And I started being his secretary up in a spare room upstairs in our house on a, on a metal card table chair on pillows. So I could sit up high enough on a very, very old Donna Selectric, but an old IBM typewriter. And the days that we were doing four carbon copies and doing 13, 14 page trust, and I had two little boys downstairs running around and it was quite something, but we have that history that we built it from the ground up. And I’m so proud of him. He was my absolute love of my life. And he called me his dream girl.
Bill Bunkley:
Hm. I want to follow up on one thing to what you can share and if you cannot share, I understand. But how about Joe Pippin, the, the family kid just before he met you, you referenced that he took care of his brother. We don’t need to go into specifics, but I want to just share a little bit, because we’re talking about the man behind the name of ask an attorney. And so he was showing some leadership skills and responsibility skills way back then, didn’t he?
Bev Pippen:
Oh, my word. He was so much so and mature sole responsible. His brother was a special needs brother and he would feel such compassion for his parents. I remember the time that he, he slipped and fell on slick, wet grass and broke his arm. And he didn’t want to tell his mother because she was going to the YWCA and she never got out and he wasn’t going to say anything, but she finally found out that he had broken his arm. He was not going to tell her he was the most giving person. His love language is, is, was acts of service. And he, he did that across the board without any regret, any attitude. When he walked in to the house at the end of the day, he was the same person here that he was that everyone else saw just the same kindness, loving, patient person. Just an incredible role model for me, just incredible.
Bill Bunkley:
Awesome. If you’re just joining us a very special edition on this Friday afternoon, the bill bunk show attribute to Joe Pippin who went home to be with the Lord. The host of ask an attorney bright and early on Saturday mornings, only the Lord knows how many people he was able to touch, whether they called in, or, you know, when you’re talking about wills or trusts or probate, well, that’s an area of law. We’re all going to have to deal with it sometime. And just imagine all of the community Goodwill that came out of his years and years. And I call that a ministry. Well, let’s fast forward. We’re talking to Bev. And Joe’s wife doing some reflections back on some of the, the private side that many never had a chance to get to know, just because of the fact that he was a radio personality to many people listening or even right now. So we got the couple of kids he’s in law school. Things are just it’s just so many things on the plate. So tell us about those years because he still was sorta like a steady Eddie. He just, he just had to wait a sort of a balance, a lot of things, carrying a lot of things on the plate. Talk about that.
Bev Pippen:
Well, he had incredible energy. It didn’t look, even look like frenetic energy by any means. He just had this deep well of resources of energy with the same steady persona that he had. He could juggle, he would, during the early years of his practice, he did a lot of public speaking, but he always had dinner with us and he’d go out for a quick hour or two for a speaking engagement and come right back home. Very involved with his kids, even as youngsters, he bought him those little action figures and get in their room and, and play with them. And he would watch cartoons with them if he could get home early in the afternoon, but he’d go back out after dinner. He was definitely a family man, very balanced in that, but still loved, loved public speaking. He, he loved his own form of marketing. He had such a gift from the Lord. It just, just kind of fell out of his pores. Like he had ideas he loved to promote. He loved to make people happy. He loved to serve people in the type of law. He practiced. He didn’t want to have adversity. And so often law is and can be of course, but he wanted to help people. And it was truly, truly his desire and his, his passion, his passion was to help people.
Bill Bunkley:
You’ve got about three or four minutes left. How about back when he decided to go on the radio, he decided to write that weekly column. Could you tell us how that came about?
Bev Pippen:
Again, that sort of starting of the birth of the marketing thing. He thought writing articles when we were in Maryland, he liked writing articles and having, he got a few published in the, I think it was the daily record. It was the legal newspaper in Baltimore. Liked doing that and started doing and a local newspaper. I believe it was a Seminole Beacon. And we came up with a name, ask an attorney and he would do this little article. And he, I got the, I got the fun project of etiquette editor yet. And so I did that. And then he submitted and all of a sudden he had a bunch of those. And so he printed that first small book, ask an attorney and then it decided to go radio. Cause he had practiced. He he’d been, he’d been practicing the speaking because when he was a young child, he had a stammering problem or horrible and nobody ever fixed it.
God fixed it. And so he worked on speaking. And so then, so he, he did a lot of speaking and one day he went into five 70 and eight showed them the book and they said, well, yeah, we’ll give it a try. So they, I think they gave him a try and someone else hosted it. And then all of a sudden they had the big spot and they say, you want this? Do you do it on your own? And I was at home like a stage mother, nervous Nelly, and listened to him, do three hours by himself on a Sunday afternoon. And from then on, he hit the ground running and he’s been on radio ever since.
Bill Bunkley:
Well, I tell you what you being able to share sort of pulling back the curtain on your personal relationship and that just endears all of us, our audience more to your husband. And I just can’t tell you enough how all of those character tree traits and the integrity just poured forth as he was sharing on the radio. And I just want to make sure that you know how much he was beloved here and by all the members of our community I know that you’re going to have Memorial service next Wednesday at the first Baptist of Indian rocks, but it has been very, very special for you to share some of these intimate stories. And really, I know that Joe would be so pleased with your testimony. And I know that one day you’re looking forward to that opportunity for the reunion because you will see him again.
Bev Pippen:
That is our hope. That is our joy. That is what gets us through the day.
Bill Bunkley:
Bev, my sister in Christ. Thank you so much for being with us. And we’re praying for you praying for the family and God, I know he has already, but he will surround you with his presence and know that the, the saying of well done good and faithful servant was bestowed upon Joe when he was absent with the body present with the Lord and always hold on to that.
Bev Pippen:
I totally do. Thank you so much. Thank you so
Bill Bunkley:
Much. Thanks for being with us. God, bless what coming up. We’re going to have a chance to listen to a couple interactions with Joe and Dr. Ken Whitten about George Washington, Andrew Johnson, and a side of him. When he said goodbye to our former general manager, Chris goal, that’s coming up in a moment. Don’t go away.
Bill Bunkley:
All right. Let’s get right back to the final moments of the bill. Buckley’s show a special tribute to someone that we’re going to miss deeply. And that is Joe Pippin. The host of ask an attorney and a couple of final passages clips I wanted you to hear before we have to sign off on this four o’clock hour. The first is when a conversation on his show with my pastor Dr. Ken Whitten, Ottawa Baptist church, senior pastor, and I know pastor Ken and Joe were, were close and had a special relationship as well as Joe had with a lot of folks in his home church. And just all around the area, a discussion on George Washington, I thought this might be fun to listen in. Let’s go into that clip.
Dr. Ken Whitten:
So he asked me the question, do I believe George Washington was perfect? I’d say absolutely not, but do I believe that George Washington knew the Lord and savior Jesus Christ as his personal savior? And do I expect to see him in heaven? I would say absolutely so,
Attorney Joe Pippen:
But you know let’s look at something else that George Washington road, and I think this will tell everyone that he knew he wasn’t perfect. And this is from a book that Tim LaHaye rub, he quoted he says George Washington said this, or wrote this. I beseech thee. My sins remove them from the presence as far as the east is from the west. And except of me for the merits of their son, Jesus Christ. And when I come into that temple and compass their alter, my prayers may come before thee as incense. And as now was hear me calling upon and my prayers also gave me the grace to hear the calling on me in their word. That is, it may be wisdom, righteousness, reconciliation, and peace to the saving of my soul in the day of the Lord, Jesus Christ. I have sinned and have done very wickedly, be merciful to me. Oh God. And pardon me for Jesus Christ. Say that I might know my sins are forgiven by his death and passion. Now, if George Washington prayed that and said that and wrote that there’s not much doubt in my mind with everything else that I’ve read, even though it’s hard to look back and read something that people have wrote, because there are other things in here that, that weren’t of that nature, but it just, you can see it. You can see the light shining through those words right there.
Dr. Ken Whitten:
Absolutely.
Bill Bunkley:
And there’s another clip we won’t be able to get to talking about Andrew Johnson back in 2008 with his conversation with Dr. Ken Whitten. Well, the last side of Joe, I want to share with you was back in 2011, when our general manager, Chris cool, that got promoted to national vice president for programming for Faith Talk, Joe had a chance to say goodbye to him, and this really reflects the heart. Let’s listen in.
Attorney Joe Pippen:
Thank you so much. It’s a real pleasure to to be on today and just want to tell Chris from someone who’s been with Salem since day one, since they came to Tampa, and I always say BC, I was there before Chris, but, but it’s been a real pleasure to work with Chris over the years and just thank him for his great leadership. I mean, I was there when the station was being built and came from the oldest of the other station they were using. And we had a lot of growing pains in lots of different ways. And just to see Chris work his way through all that, and just turn this into a great, great success has been just a real pleasure to be along his side. And I’ve enjoyed his friendship and going out with him and Michelle once in a while, and just seeing all the things that he has done and just like what he just did. I’m getting the mayor to agree to a pass was appreciate H and H just awesome. Awesome. Awesome. But I want to thank you. It’s just really been great working with you. Happy birthday, by the way. Congratulations on your promotion. I just know you, you’re just going to do great things ahead in your life.
Chris:
Well, listen, thank you, Joe. And you, you have been so faithful. You, you were here before I arrived and, and you’ve been with us and stuck with us all the way along with your great program on Saturday mornings, asked an attorney, you know, to live the longest running radio program, I think in the, in the entire city. And you’ve blessed us with kind of using us as an anchor point. We’re grateful for that, but Mo, but more than that, Joe, I’ve gotten to know your heart and your heart for people, the services you provide to the local church and the local pastor, and, and you’ve a heart to want to help people. And that’s what I appreciate most about you is that your radio program is, is really not about generating, you know, leads per se, in terms of generating business.
You really do want to help people. And as you answer questions, and I believe me, I’ve heard all kinds of crazy questions on your program. I listen almost every week and you do such a great job of answering and helping. And that question often helps many, many other people. And so for your 25 plus years of blessing our city, let me be the one that says thank you to you for your faithfulness, to our community and you and Bev and your family. It’s been a blessing to know you, and of course, we’ll stay in touch. And I look forward to giving you a tour of the Reagan library when you, when you come out to visit us.
Attorney Joe Pippen:
And I was glad I didn’t have to follow a pastor Witten. He’s been on this show with me. We did we did a 4th of July show with him about this great Christian nation we live in, and I’ve got to meet so many pastors that have been on the show. I usually try to do a special show during the holidays, and it’s just, just been a pleasure to be able to have that platform, to tell people the story and just have ’em Salem right there with me along the way. And just, it’s been a, it’s been a great support, right? From Salem and new Christen.
Chris:
Appreciate it. Well, thanks, Joe. And thanks again, keep up the good work. And I look forward to hearing great things about your, not just your practice, but your, you know, your ministry and, and continue to lift up and help pastors and people. And I know God’s going to bless you for it. Thank you so much. Okay. God bless you, Joe.
Bill Bunkley:
Well, I’ll tell you what that was the Bill Bunkley show years ago, and you can tell the legacy lives on. I hope you’ve enjoyed our look back to the life of Joe Pippin and by the way, if he could come back and do his show one more time tomorrow, I’d like to think of being titled as this attorney about the face to face encounter with the Lord of creation. He would want you to know Jesus Christ. We’ll be right back