March 24, 2026

The Dow surged 631 points yesterday after President Trump said the US and Iran have held “very good and productive conversations regarding a complete and total resolution of our hostilities in the Middle East.” In response, the president postponed strikes on Iranian power plants for a five-day period.

However, I’m following a different story today that I believe to be enormously significant as well. I have not seen it widely reported, which points to my point.

According to the Los Angeles Times, West Hollywood’s city council has unanimously approved advancing what the article calls a “registry of multi-partner domestic relationships.” The writer explains that West Hollywood is now “the latest of a few cities in the US to pursue legal protection for groups of more than two adults living in a single household who are romantically or otherwise committed to each other.”

Advocates claim that such protections are needed for a broad group of people, such as immigrant households that depend on extended family members for child care and support. Multigenerational families living together would be another example.

And of course, the ordinance is intended to “protect” polyamorous households where multiple sexual partners live together.

Would today’s article be illegal?

Even though I strongly disagree with polyamory on biblical, moral, and practical grounds, I understand that our secularized culture does not typically legislate morality with regard to such consensual behavior. For example, though 90 percent of Americans consider “married people having an affair” to be “morally wrong,” adultery is not illegal in the US.

But here’s the part of the article that could easily be overlooked: the West Hollywood city council also “outlawed discrimination against polyamorous people and others in nontraditional family structures” and has added “family or relationship structure as a protected class in the city alongside race, religion, gender, and other categories.” The anti-discrimination law will go into effect in mid-April.

Will it mean a church or ministry would be forced to hire someone in a polyamorous relationship? What about Christians operating a business? What about believers who use their influence to defend biblical morality in this context?

Would today’s article be illegal in West Hollywood?

“The greatest danger to our future”

For several years, I have spotlighted the four-stage strategy employed by LGBTQ advocates in our society: normalize immoral behavior through popular media, legalize such behavior, stigmatize those who disagree as “homophobic” and otherwise dangerous, and criminalize such opposition. Today’s discussion is one example of the fourth stage.

Jane Goodall, the famed British primatologist and animal rights activist, once warned:

“The greatest danger to our future is apathy.”

However, as a strong advocate for LGBTQ causes, she meant her warning in precisely the opposite way that I am endorsing it today.

It is human nature to focus on issues that seem most relevant to us personally. This “fight-or-flight response” is our natural, automatic reaction to stress or danger. Whether you attribute it to evolutionary development or God’s design (I choose the latter), you can understand the need to evaluate all experiences, including this article, through a prism of personal relevance.

Consequently, unless you live in West Hollywood or in the few cities in Massachusetts or on the West Coast where polyamory “protections” have been enacted, this threat to religious liberty can seem remote and thus less relevant to you.

But that’s only because we tend to overlook how this strategy works. Statutes deemed legal in small towns can then be advanced to major cities. What starts in one part of the country can advance to others. And when such actions rise to the level of federal civil rights, they can supersede states’ rights (as occurred in 1973 when Roe v. Wade overturned abortion prohibitions in at least thirty-one states).

Three reasons to reject moral apathy

Consequently, moral apathy is indeed “the greatest danger to our future.” Consider three reasons.

The first is legal, as we have seen.

When Massachusetts legalized same-sex marriage in 2004, the response by evangelicals would likely have been much stronger if we had foreseen that the US Supreme Court would discover this “right” in the Constitution a decade later and impose it on the entire country. Why should we think the same cannot happen with polyamory?

The second is personal.

Because Satan hates us, he will never tempt us to commit sin that will pay more than it costs us. He loves to turn down the moral lights in our cultural room so gradually that our eyes adjust and we find ourselves in the dark without complaint. And he knows that sin we tolerate in others often metastasizes into sin we commit personally.

This is why God’s word warns: “Desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death” (James 1:15). Because Satan always seeks to “steal and kill and destroy” (John 10:10), “death” and nothing less is his ultimate goal. And moral apathy is one of his most effective means to this end.

The third is collective.

Because God is holy (Isaiah 6:3; Revelation 4:8), he must judge unconfessed sin. His word is clear: “I will punish the world for its evil, and the wicked for their iniquity” (Isaiah 13:11). He therefore warns us, “Repent and turn from all your transgressions, lest iniquity be your ruin” (Ezekiel 18:30).

Our Father deals with us as gently as he can or as harshly as he must. The more society chooses moral apathy, the more we force him to choose the latter. This is why “righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people” (Proverbs 14:34).

“Conscience asks the question, ‘Is it right?’”

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. observed:

Cowardice asks the question, “Is it safe?” Expediency asks the question, “Is it politic?” Vanity asks the question, “Is it popular?” But conscience asks the question, “Is it right?” And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but one must take it because one’s conscience tells one that it is right.

Where do you need to take such a position today?

Quote for the day:

“The world won’t be destroyed by those who do evil, but by those who watch them without doing anything.” —Albert Einstein

Our latest website resources:

• Why “Project Hail Mary” is a family-friendly score
• Why Christian unity matters for the global church today
• Why March Madness is for everyone: How to enjoy the NCAA tournament
• Why gas prices are rising, prediction markets exposed, Talarico’s theology, Oscars recap & March Madness
• Should we be culture warriors or cultural missionaries?

Denison Forum

We’re learning this morning that the US has sent Iran a fifteen-point plan to end the war in the Middle East. The plan was delivered by way of Pakistan, but it is unclear how widely it has been shared among Iranian officials.

However, Israeli journalist Amit Segal reports that Israeli leaders fear the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) will undermine any agreement with the West. Yesterday’s announcement that Mohammad Bagher Zolghadr, a former IRGC commander, will replace the slain Ali Larijani as head of the country’s security council reinforces their fears.

Why would the IRGC want to continue fighting a war that is so devastating to their nation?

Winning by not losing

According to an extensive report by the Middle East Institute, the IRGC has developed in recent years from a militia into a “parallel state” within Iran. Its leaders and members understand the world through the prism of Mahdism: the return of the twelfth divinely ordained Imam Mahdi, who will rid the world of evil and injustice through “one final apocalyptic battle” between the dar al-Islam (land of Muslims) and dar al-Kufr (land of infidels).

They believe that the 1979 Islamic Revolution marked the first stage in the Mahdi’s return. The IRGC now exists to “prepare the world for the emergence of Imam of the Age” by fighting the “enemies” of Islam.

In such a conflict, they win by not losing. The survival of the IRGC and the Islamic regime constitutes success, enabling them to continue their aggression against Israel and the West until they are defeated and/or the Mahdi returns. In this sense, the US and Israel are fighting a military battle against an ideological foe.

For anyone who doubts whether the spiritual is real or relevant, this conflict should be proof enough.

“The wind blows where it wishes”

A bench beside a pond in our neighborhood is my favorite place to visit. When I spend time there in the early morning, it often seems that the veil between the physical and the spiritual lifts just a bit. I sense the Creator in his creation and feel more than hear his voice in my spirit.

Sitting by the pond yesterday, my attention was drawn to a fish jumping in the water. By the time I heard the splash it made, it was too late to see it, but the ripples it created cascaded to the shoreline.

The thought came to me: like the world beneath the surface of the pond, the world of the Spirit is often most evident through the effects it produces in our fallen world.

Consider wind as an example. I’ve experienced it all my life, but never wondered why. It turns out, wind is primarily caused by the uneven heating of our planet’s surface by the sun. As air moves from areas of cooler air to warmer air, wind is produced. The earth’s rotation (known as the Coriolis force) also deflects air movement, and friction with the earth’s surface causes diverging winds as well.

All that to say, we don’t see the forces that produce the wind, but we feel what they produce. Jesus made this point to Nicodemus: “The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes” (John 3:8a).

Then our Lord added, “So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit” (v. 8b).

This is as it must be. The God who is Spirit must work in nonmaterial ways in our material world. He leads us through his inner voice, the truth of Scripture, and the circumstances of our days into obedience that manifests itself in tangible, material ways. We see what he does by the results in and through our lives.

When “we walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7), we see the effects of our faith on our walk. And so does the world.

The faith to have faith

This fact relates first to our salvation.

When a brilliant friend and I were talking the other day, he asked me how I knew with certainty that I was a child of God and that I would go to heaven when I die. I told him that I had learned over the years this fact: it takes faith today to believe God saved me, just as it did when I asked him to do so.

I still cannot prove through scientific means that God exists, much less that he loves me, his Son died to pay the penalty for my sins, and now his Spirit lives in me as his temple (1 Corinthians 3:16). These are all relational truth claims. And while objective evidence from archaeology, history, ancient manuscripts, fulfilled prophecy, and changed lives is strongly compelling, relationships cannot be proven—only experienced.

Just as I cannot prove to you that my wife loves me, I cannot prove to you that God loves you. But I can invite you to experience your Father’s love for yourself by faith.

“Though I was blind, now I see”

This conversation points to a second reality: our changed lives are often our most compelling apologetic for Christ.

I can show you through the ancient writings of Tacitus, Suetonius, Mara bar Serapion, Pliny the Younger, and Josephus that Jesus existed and was crucified, and that his early followers believed him to be raised from the dead and worshiped him as God. But you can say they were all wrong. Or you could make a postmodern move and say that’s just “their truth.”

What a skeptic cannot so easily dismiss is the change Christ makes in a life fully surrendered to his Spirit (Ephesians 5:18). Like the man born blind, we can say to the world, “One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see” (John 9:25). Others may dismiss our theology, but they cannot say that our experience is not our experience.

And when they see the difference Jesus is making in our lives (cf. John 10:10), they may be drawn to seek that difference in their lives as well.

Church baptizes four hundred in one weekend

Lead Pastor Jason Britt of Bethlehem Church in Georgia was recently teaching a series on Acts 2 and the Day of Pentecost. He felt prompted to call for spontaneous baptisms, and four hundred people were baptized across the church’s three campuses during one weekend.

He explained: “A Spirit-filled church is full of Spirit-sensitive people, and Spirit-sensitive people obey.”

How sensitive to the Spirit are you today?

Quote for the day:

“Without the Spirit of God, we can do nothing. We are as ships without wind. We are useless.” —Charles Spurgeon

Our latest website resources:

• When a letter becomes lethal: Why the gospel is uniquely suited to combat the rise of the newest evolution in narcotics
• Why “Project Hail Mary” is a family-friendly score
• Why Christian unity matters for the global church today
• Why March Madness is for everyone: How to enjoy the NCAA tournament
• Why gas prices are rising, prediction markets exposed, Talarico’s theology, Oscars recap & March Madness

Denison Forum

An Air Canada Express jet collided with a fire truck while landing at New York’s LaGuardia Airport late last night. Both pilots were killed, dozens of people were injured, and the airport will remain closed until at least 2 p.m. ET today.

Earlier in the day, I received news that my spiritual mother had passed away.

In August 1973, two men knocked on my apartment door in Houston, Texas, inviting my brother and me to ride their bus to church. When we did, I was assigned to the tenth-grade Sunday school class taught by Sharon Sewell, the pastor’s wife.

She made me her project, inviting me to youth ministry events and calling me each Saturday to encourage me to come to church the next morning. On September 9, 1973, she led me to faith in Christ. I will be grateful for her forever, literally.

Mrs. Sewell had been declining rapidly in recent weeks. Her son told me yesterday that her last words to him were, “I want to go to heaven.” She is now reunited with her husband, my first pastor, and we are celebrating her homegoing.

Some deaths, like those that occurred in NYC last night, are tragic. Others are cause for gratitude.

Chadwick Boseman’s widow on “the weight of grief”

When acclaimed actor Chadwick Boseman died from colon cancer in August 2020 at the age of forty-three, many were shocked to hear that he had cancer. His widow, Simone Ledward Boseman, told Today last Friday that his symptoms began just weeks before his diagnosis and that he chose to fight the disease privately.

When asked if grieving gets easier over time, her response was poignant and profound.

“The edges get less sharp, I think, is the best way to put it,” she said. “There are still edges and there are still a lot of painful moments. But I think it becomes easier to find the love in those moments as well. You become more accustomed to carrying the weight of grief. But it doesn’t go away.”

Most of us who have experienced significant loss would agree with her, I think.

My father died in 1979 at the age of fifty-five. To this day, my greatest grief is that he never met my sons. He would have been a wonderful grandfather. Over these many years, I have “become more accustomed to carrying the weight of grief,” but it is still there.

“People are shoved to the left side of their brains”

In the years since, however, I have come to believe that God redeems all he allows and to look for such redemption with my father’s passing. In this regard, Arthur Brooks’s latest article for the Free Press is insightful.

He writes that many of the young people he has taught at Harvard and met in other settings are “undeniably, desperately, incorrigibly unhappy.” When he started asking their stories, he discovered a common thread: their lives are busy but not meaningful.

Wealth and achievement are insufficient in this regard. In fact, Brooks reports that the wealthier and more technologically advanced the country, the greater the percentage of the population that answers “no” to the question, “Do you feel your life has an important purpose or meaning?”

He explains this paradox in a way I had not seen. Most of us are familiar with the hypothesis that the left side of our brain is logical while the right side is creative. Brooks notes that this is not accurate: both hemispheres deal with just about everything our brains do. But they do so in consistently different ways.

Brooks cites the work of the British neuroscientist and psychiatrist Iain McGilchrist, who shows that the right side of our brain is the “master,” asking big, transcendent questions such as “Why am I alive?” The left side, which McGilchrist calls the “emissary,” addresses such practical questions as “How do I get food so I can keep being alive?”

Here’s the problem, as Brooks explains:

In our increasingly complicated, technology-dominated, and endlessly distracting world, people are shoved to the left side of their brains. They are stuck in a complicated simulation where there is a lot going on, but which is bereft of mystery and meaning.

A gateway into a life of purpose

With regard to “carrying the weight of grief”: Our left-side, secularized culture processes death in practical, present-tense terms. We make arrangements for the funeral, manage the financial and practical aftermath, and seek ways to move on with our daily lives.

But the right-side, transcendent questions remain: What does my grief say about God? About me? About my purpose in life?

In my case, God has used my father’s early death to lead me into what has become my lifelong vocation: to engage the ultimate questions of life with biblical truth. I have focused on innocent suffering and other deep issues as a philosophy professor, a pastor, and now as a cultural apologist. My father’s death has become my gateway into a life of purpose as I seek to help others find purpose in their questions and challenges.

None of this makes my father’s early death any less painful. I still miss him and still wish he could know my children and now my grandchildren. But I find peace in the purpose his death has forged for me.

And I am grateful beyond words for the presence of my Father as he has grieved with me over these many years and we have walked together through “the valley of the shadow of death” (Psalm 23:4).

Why God “comforts us in all our affliction”

If you’re “carrying the weight of grief” today, could I encourage you to seek God’s purpose in your pain? To ask him to show you how you can partner with him in redeeming your loss? To look for ways to be what Henri Nouwen called a “wounded healer,” someone whose pain enables you to help others with theirs?

If you’re not carrying such weight today, do you know someone who is? Will you pray for them to find meaning in their grief and walk with them toward hope?

The Apostle Paul was no stranger to suffering (cf. 2 Corinthians 11:23–29), but he testified that our Lord is “the Father of mercies and God of all comfort” (2 Corinthians 1:3). And he discovered a purpose in such grace, adding that God “comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God” (v. 4).

How will you pay forward such grace today?

Quote for the day:

“Our infirmities become the black velvet on which the diamond of God’s love glitters all the more brightly.” —Charles Spurgeon

Our latest website resources:

• Why Christian unity matters for the global church today
• Why March Madness is for everyone: How to enjoy the NCAA tournament
• Why gas prices are rising, prediction markets exposed, Talarico’s theology, Oscars recap & March Madness
• Should filmmakers politicize the Academy Awards?
• Should we be culture warriors or cultural missionaries?

Denison Forum