Last week, a man with what appeared to be an open wound on his face walked in and casually ordered a latte in my local coffee shop. His cheek, ear, and eyebrow were flayed. It looked like skin grafts from a motorcycle accident. Looking at his wound was difficult, but looking away was equally challenging.

Also last week, we moved into a new house. At night, we opened a drawer and discovered a live cockroach amongst our Tupperware. Our sleep was troubled by the imagery of a colony living in and under our bungalow. (Thankfully, it was a one-off.)

Horror exists in real life, in the minor ways mentioned above, and in far worse ways, as in war, serial killings, and chronic illness. As Christians, we know supernatural horror, as in demon possession, also exists.

However, in recent decades, some Christians have objected to movies that instill horror. So, what does the Bible say about horror movies? Should you watch them or avoid them? In what ways might they be dangerous?

Continue reading Denison Forum – What does the Bible say about horror movies? →

A recent 60 Minutes interview highlighted the “McVay Way” as the driving force behind NFC West contender and 2021 Super Bowl Champion Los Angeles Rams. Head Coach Sean McVay believes that emphasizing relational connection, transparency, open communication, and putting people first are the vital elements in building and sustaining a culture of continuing growth, expectancy, accountability, and success.

I watched with interest because the McVay Way is far from the only way coaches and leaders have claimed to guide an organization. For example, there’s IBM executive Buck Rodgers and The IBM Way, Nick Saban and The Process, Jeff Bezos and the Day 1 Mentality, or Bill Belichick’s New England Patriots organizational mantra, Do Your Job. Through experience, observation, education, trial, and error, each of these successful coaches and leaders have developed a philosophical approach that they consider the most effective “way” to maximize individual performance and, thus, organizational outcomes.

Having an undergraduate degree in business management with a minor in marketing, and being a sports chaplain for nearly 40 years—15 of those with Texas Tech football—I have long held a keen interest in the driving forces behind successful teams, businesses, organizations, and the varied methodologies and approaches taken to create value and buy-in for every individual within any given system, especially those of sustained preeminence.

When success isn’t enough

Within every one of these “success” stories, however, lurks the underlying fallacy that achieving a desired end, such as winning the Super Bowl, the National Championship, or being regarded as an industry titan, will bring sustained gratification and fulfillment. And that’s what made Sean McVay’s interview so interesting.

Sean McVay knows otherwise. Winning the Super Bowl in 2021 didn’t have the effect he anticipated. “The lies I told myself were, ‘I won’t be happy until I…until we win one.’ Or, ‘Until I win one,’” McVay said.

Expressing embarrassment for the selfishness of those words, McVay continued, “It revealed a lot of insecurities that I had. My identity was so tied up in winning and losing games, and that was where I felt like my self-worth lied. It was very revealing how fragile I was and all the insecurities that I did have.”

McVay is not alone. Testimonials abound of those who have labored and driven themselves with unrelenting discipline and sacrifice to achieve the pinnacle of success in their respective field, only to find depression, anxiety, uncertainty, and crises at the end of their rainbow.

Astronaut Buzz Aldrin, Olympic Gold Medal winner and world record holder Michael Phelps, comedian Jim Carrey, actress Nicole Kidman, along with many others from a variety of professions, have been transparent about the mental struggles they dealt with at what we would have recognized as their finest hour.

The irony is that every way designed by man to achieve success becomes, itself, an expression of human frailty and man’s inability to attain the transcendent longings of the human heart. In other words, every man-made construct is bound to the earthly. As such, we should long for more. We are certainly designed for more.

Ambition isn’t the problem

As C.S. Lewis stated in The Weight of Glory: “Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak.”

Perhaps this is one reason why the Wisdom writer offers this counsel: “There is a way which seems right to a person, but its end is the way of death” (Proverbs 14:12).

While some would identify an ambitious drive or a competitive spirit as the culprit in these unexpected outcomes after achieving success, I would not. Whether it’s building a profitable company, winning a championship, discovering a cure, scientific advancement, parenting well, being a good friend, or being a loving spouse, even working out our salvation with fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12-13), nothing of significance is ever accomplished apart from an ambitious determination to see it done.

Even McVay stated in his interview, “We are wired to achieve.” Indeed, we are.

When the disciples were discussing which of them was the greatest (Matthew 18:1-4; Mark 9:33-37; Luke 9:46-48), Jesus didn’t condemn their ambitious nature but redefined true greatness as a humility made evident in a life of serving others and redirected their energies toward that end:

“If anyone wants to be first, he shall be last of all and servant of all” (Mark 9:35).

Kingdom objectives, then, become the greatest ambition and the highest good to which we aspire as believers, to make manifest the power and presence of Christ in all things.

Who’s “way” are you pursuing?

Jesus, certainly, wasn’t lacking in his ambition and determination to see the Father’s will accomplished, expressing the necessity of diligence in fulfilling the work of the kingdom:

“We must work the works of Him who sent Me as long as it is day; night is coming when now can work” (John 9:4).

It is a deliberate, disciplined, and determined task to work out the salvation God is accomplishing; that is, outwardly making evident the inward reality of Christ in you. As such, I find detrimental the often-recurring form of spirituality that perpetuates the notion that to be a follower of Christ is to be without drive and determination.

James Bryan Smith, professor of theology at Friends University, in his 2009 book The Good and Beautiful God: Falling in Love With the God Jesus Knows, wrote, “The number one enemy of Christian spiritual formation today is exhaustion.”

While intuitively, I would have guessed sin to be the greater factor, my question to his declarative statement would be, “Exhausted from what?”

In the history of the church, there is an insidious form of spiritual expression that, at different times, raises its head and preoccupies itself with rest and an aversion to anything associated with drivenness, and what might be called a work ethic. While normally associated with the Academy, monastic orders, and High Church traditions, it is too often co-opted by the lazy and unmotivated, and spiritualized as some noble and virtuous discipline.

Scripture makes a far more compelling argument for industry, contributing, and building, even calling on the sluggard to consider the industrious ways of the ant (Prov. 6:6-11).

Paul certainly set the standard, saying he worked harder than all the other apostles (1 Cor. 15:10).

Perhaps the exhaustion, of which so many complain, comes not from having worked too hard, but from having worked so hard on things that were never worth doing.

“Therefore,” Paul writes, “my beloved brothers and sisters, be firm, immovable, always excelling in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord” (1 Corinthians 15:58).

“No soldier in active service entangles himself in the affairs of everyday life, so that he may please the one who enlisted him” (2 Timothy 2:4).

As followers of Christ, holding to a biblical worldview, ours is a Way of unwavering resolve to do all things as unto the Lord and not man (Colossians 3:23). Instead of chasing after the outcomes that please the subjective whims, opinions, and preferences of fickle humanity, the believer’s sole ambition should be to please him (2 Corinthians 5:9), the One who will say to his faithful children, “Well done good and faithful servant” (Matthew 25:21).

In this pursuit, God’s Way has proven superior to the ways of man.

Denison Forum

Hurricane Isaias made landfall Friday night as a dangerous Category 2 storm, striking near Destin, Florida. It brought damaging winds, heavy rain, and a life-threatening storm surge to the Gulf Coast, killing at least four people and causing power outages for hundreds of thousands. Remnants of the hurricane caused flooding and landslides in the same region of North Carolina that was hit hard by Hurricane Helene in 2024; forecasters warned that flooding could stretch as far as the Appalachians.

Here’s the part of the story that surprised me: Before Isaias made landfall, Yahoo! News reported that officials were “urging coastal residents from Mississippi to the Florida Panhandle to take the season’s first Atlantic hurricane seriously.”

Why would anyone need someone to encourage them to take one of nature’s most destructive phenomena “seriously”? The answers are relevant beyond Isaias and apply to us all today.

“Alarm fatigue” and “groupthink”

One reason people in the path of the hurricane could disregard official warnings could be “recentism,” the tendency to give more weight to the most recent events and news. An unusually strong El Niño contributed to a relatively quiet Atlantic hurricane season prior to Friday; by now there are typically fourteen named storms, with the first usually making landfall in August.

If a bad thing doesn’t happen when we expect it, we can stop expecting it.

Another is “alarm fatigue,” defined in medical context as “a consequence of sensory overload due to frequent nuisance alarms from physiologic monitoring devices.” In meteorological context, it refers to past warnings of storms that turned out not to be as severe as predicted.

If a bad thing didn’t happen when we expected it, we can stop expecting it.

And there is “opinion solidarity” or “groupthink,” which occurs when people prioritize the opinions of their peers over those of outsiders. If long-time residents are convinced that a hurricane won’t be as severe as predicted, we can choose their local experience over distant “experts.”

If people we trust say a bad thing won’t happen, we can stop expecting it.

Beware an escaped boa constrictor

Some warnings are easy to heed since doing so comes with little cost. For example, when officials warned recently that a seven-foot boa constrictor was loose in a North Carolina neighborhood, all residents had to do was stay away from the area. As one person noted, such snakes “don’t range far. Meters, not miles.”

Other warnings come at a significant cost. I grew up in Houston and remember times when my parents responded to hurricane warnings by boarding up our windows and taking us to stay in hotels out of the path of the coming storm. Since they were self-employed, time away from work affected our income. They also worried that our home would be looted before we returned.

In those days, however, people tended to believe what the authorities said. Those days are not these days. Unsurprisingly, partisan politics are affecting our trust in elected officials as well.

“His tragedy, in turn, became our own”

Since less than a fifth of Americans live in areas most vulnerable to hurricanes, our conversation thus far may seem less than relevant to you. But there’s more to the story.

Yale historian Beverly Gage won the Pulitzer Prize for her brilliant 2022 biography, G Man: J. Edgar Hoover and the Making of the American Century. In it, she charts the path by which the legendary FBI director fell from widespread public acclaim to his current notoriety.

Hoover served in eight presidential administrations and championed what we call “conservative” values today. From the Hays Code governing morality in movies to juvenile delinquency, anticommunism, free markets, and the importance of marriage and family, Hoover used the weight of his office and agency to advance ideals he considered vital to the nation.

As he warned in 1948, “Whenever the American people, young or old, come to believe that there is no such thing as right or wrong, normal or abnormal, those who would destroy our civilization will applaud a major victory over our way of life.”

However, after Hoover’s death in 1972, reports began to surface regarding his personal sexuality, racist views (he denounced Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. as the country’s “most notorious liar”), and abuse of his office and its enormous power. Over the years, he has gone “from hero to villain” in public opinion. As Dr. Gage writes, “If there is a tragic element to Hoover’s story, it is that he failed to abide by his own best principles. And his tragedy, in turn, became our own.”

Our generational slide from absolute truth to subjective “post-truth” and from consensual morality to relativistic immorality illustrates her point.

“Praemonitus, praemunitus”

In a culture where you have your truth and I have mine, it’s easier than ever to equate opinion with reality to justify doing what we want to do. But reality is real, whether we recognize it or not. Hurricanes devastate those who ignore them more than those who prepare for them. The “sexual liberation” movement victimizes those who participate in it more than those who do not.

A practical way to think about this subject is to ask ourselves, What sins am I tempted to justify through the fallacy of “post-truth” tolerance today? As the Latin phrase praemonitus, praemunitus reminds us, to be “forewarned” is to be “forearmed.” If we then ask the living Lord Jesus to help us think biblically and live redemptively, he promises that his Spirit will “guide you into all the truth” (John 16:13).

The theologian Jan Hus (1369–1415) was an important forerunner of the Protestant Reformation. When he was burned at the stake for his biblical convictions, he declared, “In the truth of the gospel I have written, taught, and preached; today I will gladly die.” He therefore had the right to urge us:

“Faithful Christian, seek the truth, listen to the truth, learn the truth, love the truth, speak the truth, adhere to the truth, and defend truth to the death.”

Will you be a “faithful Christian” today?

Quote for the day:

“Everyone is entitled to his own opinions, but not to his own facts.” —Daniel Patrick Moynihan

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Denison Forum

Why changes to Aslan’s gender could be cause for concern

Empire readers got a sneak peek at Netflix’s long-awaited Narnia reboot in late September. Directed by Barbie’s Greta Gerwig, Narnia: The Magician’s Nephew brings Narnia’s origin story to the silver screen for the first time, though not without some significant departures from C.S. Lewis’s source material–including potential changes to Aslan’s gender.

Gerwig is known for her unique artistic vision, and The Magician’s Nephew is no exception. Captivated by the way Aslan sings a world to life in Lewis’s tale, Gerwig combines Narnia’s musical origins with her own foundational influences–British rock artists of the ‘60s and ‘70s. “David Bowie saved my life. Paul McCartney saved my life…when I heard their music, I had this deep sense of [thinking], ‘You’re gonna be okay,’” Gerwig told Empire.

The glam-rock style of Bowie is a particularly significant influence on the movie’s visuals, with future White Witch Jadis appearing in tinselly, costume-like armor and Aslan’s visage bearing Bowie’s trademark red stripes and multicolored eyes.

Consistent with the inspiration taken from progressive rock, Gerwig brings The Magician’s Nephew forward from Lewis’s early-twentieth-century London to the 1950s. After all, as Empire’s Ben Travis opines, “the kids of grey, muted 1950s Britain became the vibrant, ceaselessly imaginative ‘70s rock heroes that illuminated Gerwig’s world.”

The most consequential change, however, could be to the character of Aslan, Narnia’s leonine Christ-figure.

Aslan’s gender matters

Empire’s feature revealed that Meryl Streep had been cast to voice the great lion, marking a significant departure from prior cinematic portrayals, which depicted him as unmistakably male. Casting an actress to voice Aslan raises significant concerns about how Narnia’s Christ-figure will be portrayed in our gender-confused modern culture.

Many commentators have argued that casting Streep means that Gerwig’s Aslan will be female, but several indicators suggest that she may intend the character to be androgynous instead. For one thing, despite having a female voice actress, Aslan still appears to be male, and Empire’s coverage consistently refers to the lion as “he.”

David Bowie’s influence is another important clue. The late rock star was known for experimenting with androgynous style, which, in turn, “helped invent” the glam-rock movement that inspired the movie’s visuals. Lastly, Gerwig’s own discomfort with God as Father, voiced in a 2018 interview, may push her version of Aslan in a genderless (or gender-confused) direction.

There is, of course, always a chance that Streep may pitch her voice to sound male. But the casting of an actress to play a male character, particularly one serving as a depiction of Jesus himself, gives us an opportunity to articulate why gender matters as part of God’s created order, and why Jesus’ masculinity is a fundamental element of his nature.

The Lion of Judah and the Bride of Christ

At the dawn of time, God created humans “in his own image,” both “male and female” (Genesis 1:27). Men and women reflect aspects of God’s nature by virtue of their gender, which, like all things that God created, is very good (Genesis 1:31). Yet, from the 1970s onward, our culture has witnessed numerous attempts to confuse or “bend” gender in personal style and presentation.

Individuals who adopt an androgynous appearance often do so in protest, claiming that gender is a cultural construct that prevents people from embracing their true identities. However, in Lewis’s words, “Gender is a reality, and a more fundamental reality than [biological] sex.” In his essay Priestesses in the Church?, Lewis states that biological sex, as an outward sign of this inward reality, “was created” in part “to symbolize to us the hidden things of God.”

One of those hidden things is our own relationship to Christ.

Across time, God the Son has consistently revealed himself to us as male. Centuries before the Incarnation, Isaiah spoke of a promised “son” who would be called “Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace” (Isaiah 9:6). In the Incarnation, this promised Son took on human nature in a male body (Luke 2:7). And at the end of time, he will return as the Bridegroom, “King of Kings and Lord of Lords,” to rescue his Bride, the church (Revelation 19:7, 11-16).

Respecting the newest Narnia adaptation, Aslan’s gender matters because the Narnia stories are, fundamentally, retellings of the gospel–and Aslan is Jesus himself, not just an allegorical representation of him.

Pursued with an “everlasting love”

In a 1961 letter to a young fan, Lewis writes, “Supposing there really was a world like Narnia…and supposing Christ wanted to go into that world and save it (as He did ours) what might have happened?…The stories are my answer.”

In Narnia, Lewis explains, Jesus takes the form of a lion, “the king” of Narnia’s “talking beasts” and “the lion of Judah.” Aslan’s role in Narnia is no different than the role of Christ in ours, because they are the same person. In Narnia and in our world, Jesus is Lord, protector, rescuer, and redeemer.

And this is why his masculinity matters. Just as earthly husbands reflect God’s image when they care for and protect their wives (Ephesians 5:25), Jesus, as the Bridegroom, is our rescuer and protector. He loves us, delights in us, and clothes us in righteousness (Zephaniah 3:17, Isaiah 61:10). And as the Bride of Christ, we rejoice in the love that has redeemed us.

While individual men and women reflect the glory of God in our masculinity and femininity, as Christ’s Bride, to borrow a phrase from Lewis, “we are all, corporately and individually, feminine to Him.” Jesus’ male identity reveals a fundamental truth about our relationship to God–that we are treasured, and pursued with an “everlasting love” (Jeremiah 31:3).

How is Jesus’ loving pursuit transforming your life today?

Denison Forum

Avinatan Or was kidnapped by Hamas terrorists on October 7 and spent 738 days as their hostage. The Free Press is now publishing excerpts from his memoir of the horrifying experience. For anyone who doubts the cruelty of Hamas, his record is essential reading. For the rest of us, it is a testimony to the power of the human will.

Reading his words translated from the Hebrew, my thoughts turned instantly to my many friends in Israel. I have been privileged to lead over thirty study tours to the Holy Land, along the way building relationships with some of the finest people I have ever known. Jews and Arabs, Israelis and Palestinians, they share a love for their land and a passion for its people.

And they are all victims of Hamas. None was captured or killed on October 7, though most knew someone who was. But all are living in the aftermath of the invasion. Some are tour guides who have seen their ability to support their families decimated. Others work in tourist areas and have seen their businesses shrivel or close.

One of them lives in Jerusalem and told me that he is never more than thirty seconds from a bomb shelter, knowing that it takes that long from the time alarms go off until missiles land. Can you imagine living in such tension and fear?

I feel their grief and share their suffering as I can. I pray for them every day. But what I am learning is that I must do so out of solidarity not only with them but also with their enemies. Not because Hamas’ barbarities can ever be justified, but because the worst perpetrators of the worst crimes are people my Father loves.

I’ll explain.

 “The love with which you have loved me”

When I became a Christian at the age of fifteen, I somehow acquired the sense that God now loved me as he did not before. This is logical, in a way: Those who refuse faith in Christ will be consigned to hell (cf. Revelation 20:15), so it stands to reason that God must not love them or he would not permit them such a horrific eternity. If they reject his love, he would be justified in refusing to love them in turn, or so we might think.

Then I discovered Romans 5:8: “God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Jesus loved us before we loved him. In fact, he loved us twenty centuries before we were even born.

This makes sense in light of 1 John 4:8, “God is love.” This is his eternal, unchanging character. He loves us, not because we deserve his love, but because it is his nature to love us. This would mean that he loved us just as much before we trusted in Christ as after. And it would mean that he loves the lost as much as he loves the saved.

This concept was further reinforced a few years ago while reflecting on John 17:23, where Jesus prayed, “I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me” (my emphasis). The italicized words in the Greek mean literally, “to the same degree that you loved me.”

Jesus reinforces the thought a few sentences later: “I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them” (v. 26, my emphasis). The italicized words are translated literally, “the same love with which you have loved me.”

Both statements show us that the Father loves you and me as much as he loves his own perfect, sinless Son. Again, because “God is love,” this is how his love for us must be.

When I am most like Christ

With this background, I was reading Ezekiel 33 today and came upon this stirring statement by God: “As I live, declares the Lord Gᴏᴅ, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live” (v. 11). A loving father loves his children regardless of what they do. It is the same with our heavenly Father.

Now comes the practical implication: I am to love those who mistreat me just as my Father loves me when I mistreat him. Jesus was clear on this point: “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father in heaven” (Matthew 5:44–45). I knew the words prior to the comma, but had not considered those that follow. It is when I love those who hate me that I demonstrate my identity as a child of the Father who does the same.

In other words, I am most like Christ when I am as unconditional in love as he is.

This is an impossible standard for humans, of course. This is why “love” as the first “fruit” of the Spirit is so important (Galatians 5:22). I cannot love someone who does not love me apart from the love of the God who loves us both.

But the moment I ask him to express his love through me, he answers my prayer.

A Holocaust survivor and her Nazi guard

Corrie ten Boom is an example. She was a Holocaust survivor; the Nazis murdered everyone else in her family, including her sister Betsie, who died of starvation in the same camp where Corrie was imprisoned. She herself was released through a clerical error and lived to tell the story.

Some years later, she was speaking in a church on the topic of forgiveness. After the service, a man came up to her whom she recognized as one of the guards at her prison camp. He told her, “I have become a Christian. I know that God has forgiven me for the cruel things I did there, but I would like to hear it from your lips as well.” Then he asked her, “Will you forgive me?”

Corrie wrote:

I stood there—I whose sins had every day to be forgiven—and I could not. Betsie had died that place—could he erase her slow terrible death simply for the asking?

It could not have been many seconds that he stood there, hand held out, but to me it seemed hours as I wrestled with the most difficult thing I had ever had to do.

For I had to do it—I knew that. . . . I knew it not only as a commandment of God, but as a daily experience. Since the end of the war I had a home in Holland for victims of Nazi brutality. Those who were able to forgive their former enemies were able to return to the outside world and rebuild their lives, no matter what the physical scars. Those who nursed their bitterness remained invalids. It was as simple as that.

And still I stood there with the coldness clutching my heart. But forgiveness is not an emotion—I knew that too. Forgiveness is an act of the will, and the will can function regardless of the temperature of the heart.

“Jesus, help me!” I prayed silently. “I can lift my hand. I can do that much. You supply the feeling.”

And so woodenly, mechanically, I thrust my hand into the one stretched out to me. And as I did, an incredible thing took place. The current started in my shoulder, raced down my arm, sprang into our joined hands. And then this healing warmth seemed to flood my whole being, bringing tears to my eyes.

“I forgive you, brother!” I cried. “With all my heart!”

Is God waiting for you to pray what Corrie prayed?

Denison Forum

Julianne Smith is a Distinguished Nonresident Fellow in Defense and Security at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs and was US Permanent Representative to NATO from 2021 to 2024. In her new Foreign Affairs article, she warns that “Russia’s hybrid war has entered a dangerous new phase” of expansion into NATO territories.

For example:

• In late July, a Russian cruise missile crashed into Polish territory.
• Days later, three explosive-laden drones were found at and near an airport in Germany.
• Two weeks after that, Romanian F-16s scrambled to intercept three Russian drones over Romanian airspace.
• A Spanish jet shot down a fourth drone near the Moldovan border.

She states that these attacks on NATO countries “are designed to fracture the alliance’s unity, test the strength of members’ commitment to Article 5—the principle that an attack on one member is an attack on all—and raise the cost of supporting Ukraine.”

In her view, NATO should continue building defensive capabilities, make the costs of continued aggression tangible, and increase its support for Ukraine. Such geopolitical analysis and strategy is, of course, what leaders and analysts do.

But behind every story of national and international engagement, there is a larger story to tell.

The “invisible hand” of God

In his very influential book The Wealth of Nations, Scottish philosopher and economist Adam Smith introduced the metaphor of the “invisible hand” to describe how self-interested people in free markets can unintentionally benefit society by responding to supply and demand. In this way, free market economies can naturally distribute resources efficiently without external intervention.

For instance, high gas prices are spurring interest in electric vehicles, which would theoretically lower demand for gas, which would lower gas prices. “Brand trust” prompts consumers to spend more on products made by manufacturers they trust, motivating manufacturers to improve quality, which benefits consumers.

There is a similar “invisible hand” behind the geopolitics of human history, one that is described not by human economists but by divine revelation.

For example, Ezekiel 32 conveys God’s warning to “Pharaoh king of Egypt”: “You consider yourself a lion of the nations,” but he will “throw my net over you, with a host of many peoples, and they will haul you up in my dragnet” (vv. 2, 3). He will use the Babylonians to judge Egypt for its many sins (v. 11), just as he later used the Persians to judge Babylon (cf. Daniel 5:30).

Since God does not change (Malachi 3:6), what he did in the past, he is doing in the present. If it was appropriate for him to judge nations for their sins in history, we can know that he is judging nations for their sins today.

In both cases, his work is an “invisible hand” that guides and employs human agency to fulfill his providential purposes. They may not even know that they are being used by the Lord when they are, but their finitude does not frustrate his omniscience.

Culture is downstream from religion

Passages like Ezekiel 32 are in God’s word as his word to us today. The Spirit inspired and preserved them because they contain perennial value and convey perennial truth. He could warn Egypt of old, knowing that such warnings would apply to America today. We should therefore see ourselves in the pages of Scripture and expect him to deal with our nation as he has always dealt with nations.

The key is to be a people he is able to bless, not a people he is forced to judge.

Such resolve starts at home. My friend Frank Wolf, the retired Virginia congressman, often reminds us that in a democracy, politics are downstream from culture and culture is downstream from religion. When human hearts change, human activities and collective values change, and politics then reflect who the people are and what they do.

When we read about Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, and other geopolitical threats in the news, we should therefore:

1. Pray for spiritual awakening to transform these nations and their leaders (cf. Jonah 3:6–10).
2. Pray for believers in these nations to be emboldened as they share the gospel (cf. Acts 4:29–31).
3. Pray for our national leaders to be inspired and led by God’s Spirit to seek his will and thus our best (cf. 1 Timothy 2:1–4).
4. Pray for our churches to be catalysts for cultural transformation through what we preach, teach, and do (cf. Acts 2:42–47).
5. Pray for believers to be the change we wish to see by making Christ the king of our lives and service each day (cf. Romans 12:1–2).

“The darkest hour is often just before the dawn”

As we pray for such a spiritual movement, we should pray that it begins with us (2 Chronicles 7:13–14). As we seek God’s hope for our people, we should ourselves be people of hope.

Os Guinness is right:

The story of Christian reformation, revival, and renaissance underscores that the darkest hour is often just before the dawn, so we should always be people of hope and prayer, not gloom and defeatism. God the Holy Spirit can turn the situation around in five minutes.

May those “five minutes” come soon, to the glory of God.

Denison Forum

This morning’s headlines are breaking the news that well-known televangelist Jim Bakker died Monday at the age of eighty-six. His wife, Lori Bakker, announced his passing; his cause of death was not immediately clear.

“He was a pioneer of Christian television, but to me, he was my husband, my best friend, and the man I was honored to walk beside through so many seasons of life and ministry,” she said. The two hosted The Jim Bakker Show on the PTL Satellite Network Bakker had founded many years earlier.

Of course, Lori’s statement about her husband is not what is dominating the coverage of Bakker’s death. As the Associated Press reports, he “built an evangelical empire around the hugely successful The PTL Club TV show, only to lose it all over a sex scandal and financial crimes.”

Continue reading Denison Forum – Prominent televangelist Jim Bakker dies at 86 →

Hope for an uncertain future – Part 8

A Pew Research Forum headline reads, “Far more Americans say they’d like to live in the past than in the future.” According to the survey, 45 percent of US adults say they would live sometime in the past, while 40 percent said they’d live in the present. Only 14 percent said they’d live sometime in the future.

Which would you choose today? Your answer could reveal more than you think.

A cross unlike any I have seen

If you need hope for the future, I suggest you look to the past.

Picture the scene: Jesus is on his face among the olive trees of the Garden of Gethsemane, pleading with his Father, “If it be possible, let his cup pass from me” (Matthew 26:39). It was not just his physical torture, I believe, but the fact that his sinless soul would soon bear the sins of all humanity. You and I literally cannot begin to understand the suffering he would soon endure.

But it was not just his horrific pain that night. His Father refused his Son’s request, choosing to send him to the cross so he could die for your sins and mine. He chose for his Son to die that we might live eternally.

On one of the study tours I led to Israel, we stopped at an olive wood shop in Bethlehem where a friend purchased for me a gift I will always treasure. Unlike any cross I have ever seen, it depicted the Father with his arms spread on the cross, sheltering his Son as he died for us.

As the famed theologian Jürgen Moltmann wrote, he is “the crucified God.”

My night inside an execution chamber

I thought I did not understand the cross. Then my wife and I had our first son, and I knew I did not. To sentence our precious child to die a tortured death for the crimes of others was incomprehensible to me. It still is.

To shift the metaphor slightly: Some years ago I spoke at a church in Huntsville, Texas, after which I was given a tour of the Huntsville Unit, the prison that houses the execution chamber of the state of Texas. The warden was a gracious and godly man who considered his work to be his ministry to men largely abandoned by society. He especially focused his compassion on those on death row, knowing that they were closer to eternity than anyone else.

On our tour, he allowed me to enter the execution chamber itself. It was roughly the size of a large closet, its cinderblock walls painted a light green. The gurney in the middle resembled a cross with extensions to which the condemned prisoner’s arms were strapped. Behind one wall was an even smaller room where the chemicals that produced death were secured. Lines from them ran through the wall into the chamber and into the veins of the prisoner.

Standing in that chamber, I imagined one of our sons strapped to the execution gurney. In my mind, I somehow arranged at the last moment for the warden to set him free, climbed onto the table myself, placed the needle in my arm, and died in his place.

Would our son ever have reason to doubt my love for him?

Tim Keller asked, “If Jesus Christ didn’t abandon you in his darkness, the ultimate darkness, why would he abandon you now, in yours?”

Why, indeed?

A hope we’re called to share

Across this series, we’ve looked extensively at both reasons why we need hope and reasons why such hope can only be found in the Lord. At the end of the day, though, all of the logical rationale and biblical exegesis pales in comparison to the basic truth revealed through Christ’s sacrifice and God’s enduring presence in our lives.

The creator of all that exists loves you and wants to spend eternity with you. He suffered and died to make that possible. And he continues to patiently endure the sin of the world because he wants as many of us as possible to embrace that truth and find salvation in him (2 Peter 3:9).

But for all that he’s done to show his love and call the lost back home to a personal relationship with him, history shows that it’s through the personal relationships with other people that the lost are most likely to be saved.

So while we can and should find our hope in the Lord, let’s remember that we’re not meant to hoard it for ourselves. Christ’s work through us and the presence of that hope in our lives is the greatest hope that this world has for a better future, both now and in the life to come.

With whom can you share that hope today?

Denison Forum

Over the weekend, I read an article that I found deeply significant. In it, cultural commentator David Brooks focuses on finding meaning in older life, though I found his reflections relevant to all of us at any age.

He reports that Stanford, Harvard, and Notre Dame are among a number of universities now offering programs intended to help adults in their sixties transition into their next season of life. As he notes, if you’re sixty years old, there’s a 50 percent chance that you’ll live to be ninety. What will you do with what he calls the “Encore Years”?

Brooks assures us that we don’t have to enroll in such year-long programs to benefit from the research they convey. He reports: “People at all income levels derive some of their identity from how they contribute to the world and provide for those they love, and people at all income levels feel a sense of identity, and get thrown back on existential questions, when those roles change or fade away.”

At such a stage, he writes:

People will either achieve generativity—a way of serving others—or sink into stagnation. At an age when you think they’d be old enough to know the answers, they find themselves thrown back into fundamental questions: Who am I? What’s my purpose? What do I really want? Do I matter? (his italics).

Why are such questions so urgent? Brooks explains:

I’m fascinated by these programs because, among other reasons, I’m hoping they can serve as an antidote to the cultural malady that The Atlantic’s Derek Thompson calls workism. This is the modern way of thinking that, he writes, “valorizes work, career, and achievement above all else.” Many Americans, he continues, have come to assume that work can provide everything that humans once got from their religion—meaning, community, self-actualization, a sense of high calling (my italics).

Here we find the key to the issue.

 “Their core self, their visible self, and their best self”

God often uses people in their Encore Years to change history:

• Abraham was seventy-five when he left his home to follow God (Genesis 12:4).
• Moses was eighty when he led the children of Israel out of Egypt (Exodus 7:7).
• Caleb was eighty-five when he claimed his part of the Promised Land (Joshua 14:10–12).
• Zechariah and Elizabeth were “advanced in years” when they became the parents of John the Baptist (Luke 1:7).
• Anna was eighty-four when she met the infant Jesus (Luke 2:36–38).

The key is knowing and doing God’s will for our lives in every dimension of our lives. Otherwise, we are subject to the vagaries of personal subjectivity.

To illustrate: Brooks quotes Carl Jung’s observation, “What was great in the morning will be little at evening, and what in the morning was true will at evening have become a lie.” He also reports that Harry Davis, a longtime management professor at the University of Chicago, “asks his students to identify their core self, their visible self, and their best self.”

For Jesus, every moment of his life was “true” and not a “lie.” This is because his “visible self” was his “core self,” which was always his “best self.” Now he wants the same to be true for us.

How does this work?

Brooks notes: “Most of us don’t just want simple happiness; we want intensity. We want to feel that sense of existential urgency you get when you are engrossed in some meaningful project, when you know you are doing something important and good.”

Jesus was “engrossed” in the most “meaningful project” of all, the redemption of the entire human race. When our highest purpose is to know him and make him known, we join him in lives of true “intensity” and joy.

“See that there is nothing between Jesus and yourself”

I spent many years as a Christian not understanding what we’re discussing today, and fear that many believers are where I was.

Because I prayed a salvation prayer at the age of fifteen, I knew that I would go to heaven rather than hell when I died. Beyond what our youth minister called our “fire insurance,” I understood that reading the Bible and praying could be beneficial ways to find God’s wisdom and help for the challenges I faced.

In that context, I would have encouraged us to live for Jesus as the “meaningful project” of our lives. What I missed completely was the notion that the living Lord Jesus wants to live through us, that “Christ in you” is the “hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27), that our living Lord is continuing his earthly ministry through us as his “body” in the world (1 Corinthians 12:27).

Accordingly, our “line of service,” as Oswald Chambers put it, is “to see that there is nothing between Jesus and yourself.” This is not so that he can then empower us to serve our purpose, as I used to think, but so that he can then serve his purpose in and through us.

This is a 24/7 lifestyle and a foundational reason Satan tempts committed Christians with so-called “private” sins that seem to have no public consequences. The Enemy knows that the Son of God who defeated him so thoroughly in the first century can do the same in the twenty-first century. He will therefore do whatever he can to impede our intimacy with Jesus. And we must do whatever we must to maintain it.

Would you ask Jesus if there is anything between yourself and him today?

Quote for the day:

“Spirituality is not about competency; it is about intimacy. Spirituality is not about perfection; it is about connection” (Mike Yaconelli).

Denison Forum

One of the occupational hazards of my work is that I spend much of my day engaging with news and cultural issues, much of which is more discouraging than encouraging. Such “doomscrolling” is so common that it was one of the Oxford English Dictionary’s words of the year in 2020.

But constantly consuming bad news causes the amygdala in our brain to sense danger, alerting our hypothalamus to tell our sympathetic nervous system to activate our fight-or-flight response. This causes our body’s adrenal glands to release stress hormones like adrenaline and cortisol, which contribute to high blood pressure and impair cognitive abilities such as concentration, decision-making, and emotional regulation.

This reaction reinforces negative thoughts and feelings, increases anxiety and depression, leads to mental fatigue, impairs concentration, and reduces productivity. Nausea, headaches, muscle tension, neck and shoulder pain, and difficulty sleeping often result as well.

In other words, doomscrolling is bad.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Are you “doomscrolling” or “bloomscrolling”? →

The co-pilot of a flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv on Wednesday tried to crash the plane after stabbing the pilot, according to Israeli officials. He sent the jet plunging nearly fourteen thousand feet in less than thirty seconds, but the pilot fought off the attack and opened the cockpit door; his bravery “managed to prevent a 9/11 disaster,” according to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

A passenger identified as Yaniv Hayun said he then “grabbed the terrorist, put him in a hold, and first of all pulled him outside.” He called for other passengers to restrain the co-pilot, then “grabbed the controls” before another pilot onboard took over and landed the plane. The airplane had more than 170 Israelis on board.

Israel’s defense minister described the incident as a “jihadist terror attack,” though Mr. Netanyahu told Fox News Wednesday night that it was “too early to say” whether there was any indication of Iranian involvement. But if this was a terrorist attack against Israelis and Israel, it would join a long list of such attacks over the years. Each was motivated by a belief that attacking Jews is a defense of Islam required by the Qur’an.

Such attacks illustrate John Stonestreet’s observation that ideas have consequences and bad ideas have victims. Let’s explore this fact in light of what has been called “the single most consequential invention in human history.”

“Some shared notion of goodness”

In an important recent article for the New York Times, national religion correspondent Elizabeth Dias reports that AI developer Anthropic has been hosting a variety of meetings with religious leaders to seek their help with Claude, their cutting-edge AI model. Christopher Olah, who leads the company’s team responsible for understanding why AI systems like Claude act the way they do, wants to persuade the models to abide by a moral code that will protect humanity.

Consequently, he has met with a wide range of religious scholars and leaders, from Pope Leo XIV and other Catholics to Jewish, Sikh, Mormon, and evangelical thinkers. Halfway through her extensive article, Dias asks the key question: “Even if AI models can be taught to behave morally, whose morals should they reflect?”

In response, she quotes Olah: “We do think that there’s some shared notion of goodness that cuts across society in some very broad way, and it seems like these models understand a lot of virtues. So I think there’s something there that is a shared thing that we can all engage with.”

Without such a “shared thing,” Pope Leo warned in his encyclical on the subject, “Those who control AI will impose their own moral vision, which will become the invisible infrastructure of these systems.” And this “vision” will be as subjective as the people who frame it.

Here we find the central problem of our secularized society: by abandoning biblical morality, we are left with the “morality” of our own choosing. With no true north on our compass, we will go wherever our personal “will to power” takes us.

Every day, crimes and tragedies in the headlines show us how that’s going for us.

Playing tennis with a professional tennis player

I played tennis for many years, won some intramural matches in college, and thought I was pretty good. Then a friend in the church I was pastoring invited me to play with him. He had competed professionally years earlier, but he had not played in a long time and was just starting to get back into the game.

As we warmed up, it seemed to me that he was in fact rusty, so I resolved to go easy on him lest I discourage him. Then he asked if we wanted to play a few games. I agreed and graciously suggested that he serve first. When he hit his first serve, I watched him toss the ball in the air, heard his racket hit it, and saw a blur streak past me. There was no way I could respond quickly enough to get my racket on it.

In that moment, I learned the difference between an amateur and a professional—at least in regard to tennis.

I say that to say this: we don’t really know how good we are at something until we compare ourselves to someone better than us. Of all the people with whom we can make such a comparison, God is obviously at the top of the list.

“I fell at his feet as though dead”

Isaiah was a priest in Israel and a good friend and counselor to King Uzziah. By any human measure, he was a success at what he did. But when he met God on his throne, he cried out, “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lᴏʀᴅ of hosts!” (Isaiah 6:5).

Peter had a similar experience in Luke 5. He had been a successful fisherman and businessman and a faithful follower of Jesus. But when he encountered the full divinity and omnipotence of Christ on the Sea of Galilee, “he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, ‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord’” (v. 8).

John was Jesus’ “beloved” disciple and best friend. But when he met the risen Christ on the prison island of Patmos, he wrote that “I fell at his feet as though dead” (Revelation 1:17).

Louie Giglio is right: God is the great I Am, and I am the little I Am Not.

“The one sovereign remedy against temptation”

The English novelist Dorothy L. Sayers remarked, “Hell is the enjoyment of one’s way forever.” The French theologian François Fénelon (1651–1715) was therefore right: “To realize God’s presence is the one sovereign remedy against temptation.”

How do we “realize” his presence today?

Dwight Moody said of the Bible, “This book will keep you from sin, or sin will keep you from this book.” This is because the Bible is intended to lead us into a personal encounter with its Author (John 20:31). And, as John Calvin noted, “All God’s promises depend upon Christ alone.”

So I’ll ask: When last did you meet the living Lord Jesus in a transforming way?

Asked differently: When last were you awed by God?

Quote for the day:

“Jesus, the very thought of Thee, with sweetness fills my breast; but sweeter far Thy face to see, and in Thy presence rest.” —Bernard of Clairvaux (1090–1153)

Our latest website resources:

• Tim Tebow steps back from Life Surge as controversy grows: A hard lesson on the danger of unwise associations
• Leverage suffering for greater good: Hope for an uncertain future—Part 7
• How Christians should approach the midterm elections
• Were American soldiers targeted outside an English airbase?
• Can unsafe questions lead the broken to God? A review of “Can I Say That” by Brenna Blain

Denison Forum

A hard lesson on the danger of unwise associations

Life Surge, a traveling conference series focused on faith-centered financial stewardship, is under fire following allegations of running a scam-like operation and pressuring Christians into extreme debt. Its alleged predatory practices were outlined by investigative reporter Kiera Butler in her recent appearance on the “Pablo Torre Finds Out” podcast.

Butler detailed the history of Life Surge and spoke with both people who have been harmed and with concerned employees. At the center of Butler and Torre’s interest in this case is Life Surge’s association with ESPN personality and former NFL quarterback Tim Tebow, who they deem “one of the most trusted voices in America.”

Pablo Torre’s platform was amplified after his recent investigation into the Los Angeles Clippers salary cap scandal led the NBA to issue the largest team punishment in its history this Summer. Torre’s award-winning work certainly brought extra eyes and ears to his channel for this Life Surge debacle.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Tim Tebow steps back from Life Surge as controversy grows →

President Trump signed an executive order Tuesday creating America.gov, an AI-powered government portal that can enable users to access public services and search federal databases. He then gathered with top administration officials and AI executives at a lunch meeting in the White House, where they signed a voluntary accord including internal and external AI reviews. The president also directed government agencies to use the term “super intelligence” rather than “artificial intelligence” when referring to the technology.

In related news, OpenAI says it is scrapping the release of its next-generation AI model over safety concerns raised by researchers during internal testing. And when the AI developer Anthropic becomes a publicly traded company in a few weeks, it plans to caution potential investors that advanced AI could pose “catastrophic or existential risks to humanity,” including attempts to “resist shutdown,” “conceal or manipulate information,” and exhibit behavior “resembling blackmail.”

Apparently, some AI “doomers” (those warning of the technology’s risk to humanity) are taking such threats personally. They are considering buying remote islands on which to live, stockpiling iodine pills, moving to electromagnetically shielded bunkers in the desert, or buying land in remote regions of the country.

So far, this article is probably not helping you very much. You may disagree that AI poses such existential threats to you and the rest of us. You may believe that the US government, world leaders, and/or AI companies will find ways to mitigate the threat before it goes too far. And whatever you think about such danger, you likely don’t have the means to buy a remote island.

You may also be facing challenges that are more present-tense and real than such perceived future threats, wishing I would help you face them. I’m in the same camp this morning.

In response, I’d like to offer us both hope from a surprising source.

Swinging on the pendulum of life

In The World as Will and Representation, German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) claims that the world we believe to exist is just a mental projection of this belief. We think the physical universe exists, so it exists for us. What is really behind what we think we see is the “Will,” an irrational, blind, and unceasing urge that drives all things. It powers gravity, animal instincts, plant growth, and human desires.

Because the Will is both blind and insatiable, we can never permanently satisfy it. Getting what we want leads only to temporary relief, which is followed by boredom and the quest for something new. We therefore swing back and forth on a pendulum between the pain of unmet desire and the boredom of having what we want.

Now aren’t you glad you’re reading today’s article?

Because I believe Genesis 1:1, I don’t agree with Schopenhauer that the physical universe is merely the projection of my personal experience. But I do agree that I too often live in the tension between the pain of what I want and the boredom of what I have.

And I agree with Schopenhauer’s “solution,” which is to find something to occupy my mind that does not lead either to idleness or to unsatisfiable desires. However, the atheistic philosopher would very much disagree with my solution to his solution.

Following a map we drew ourselves

Science fiction writer Ursula K. Le Guin claimed, “It is good to have an end to journey towards; but it is the journey that matters, in the end.”

At first, I agreed with her. I know that the Christian faith is a journey, a “race” to keep (2 Timothy 4:7) and to “run with endurance” (Hebrews 12:1). But then I realized: Without the proper end, how do we know what journey to take?

If I’m a Daoist like Le Guin, someone who focuses on the present world without the need for a supreme deity, I would agree that “it is the journey that matters” because, in my view, that’s all there is. But all journeys are not the same.

Osama bin Laden’s journey was driven by his belief that the West has been attacking Islam since the Crusades and that attacking the West would unify the Muslim world and establish a global caliphate. Adolf Hitler’s journey in building the Third Reich led to the murder of six million Jews, a fourth of them children. Vladimir Putin’s journey in Ukraine seeks a world in which Ukraine has no journey of its own.

Seeking to live without purpose is its own purpose. And choosing our purpose without seeking the wisdom of an authority beyond ourselves is pure subjectivism. It’s like following a map we drew ourselves with no reference to true north or objective fact.

“The race that is set before us”

By contrast, Hebrews 12 exhorts us to “run with endurance the race that is set before us” (v. 1). The syntax indicates that this is not a race we choose but one that is chosen for us.

How do we find it?

The writer continues: “looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith” (v. 2). “Looking” could be translated as “continually focusing as a daily lifestyle.” Our focus is to be on Jesus himself, the living Lord who is with us always (Matthew 28:20) and who abides in us by his Spirit (1 Corinthians 3:16). The more we seek him in prayer, Scripture, and worship, the more he leads us in the way that is best for us (John 10:10).

In Alice in Wonderland, Alice says to the Cat, “Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?” The Cat replies, “That depends a good deal on where you want to get to.” Alice answers, “I don’t much care where,” to which the Cat responds, “Then it doesn’t matter which way you go.”

Do you care “which way you go” today?

Quote for the day:

“Success demands singleness of purpose.” —Vince Lombardi

Our latest website resources:

• Were American soldiers targeted outside an English airbase?
• Prepare today for disaster tomorrow: Hope for an uncertain future—Part 6
• Can unsafe questions lead the broken to God? A review of “Can I Say That” by Brenna Blain
• A trip to the zoo that changed eternity: The life, faith, and legacy of CS Lewis
• Scottie Scheffler and the power of doing the right thing

Denison Forum

When I can, I prefer to begin the week by highlighting good news from recent days. So, we’ll start with such news from three unlikely sources:

• A spiritual revival is making headlines in Sweden, long considered one of the most secular nations on earth. Swedish youth even named Jesus “influencer of the year” for 2025.
• A three-fold surge in adult baptisms in France is sparking hope of revival in the highly secular country. Pope Leo discussed this phenomenon during his weekend visit to the country, where he received what the Wall Street Journal is calling a “rockstar welcome.”
• Philosophy students at Princeton made headlines by reasoning their way from atheism to Christian faith. We should be unsurprised: even AI agrees that Christianity is the most reasonable religion.

Any movement toward Christian faith is good news for any secular nation, including ours, for reasons that might surprise many of us.

“Out of many, one”?

Over the weekend, I read This Land is Your Land, a creative and engaging history of America by the Pulitzer Prize-winning Yale historian Beverly Gage. In it, she quotes Theodore Roosevelt’s admonition to “do what you can, with what you’ve got, where you are,” a maxim that could be America’s definitional motto.

Concerning our nation’s founding creed, Dr. Gage writes, “the Declaration was not self-executing. It required generations of conflict to turn the tools and ideas it provided into new realities.” In fact, as she reports, not even half of the colonial residents actively supported the rebellion against England that birthed our nation. When George Washington took the oath of office as our first president, two states—Rhode Island and North Carolina—had not yet approved the Constitution that created his office.

From then until now, America has been on a quest to invent itself, to create one nation out of widely disparate peoples and cultures. E pluribus unum, it says on our money—“Out of many, one.”

But I’m not sure we agree with what our currency says. In truth, Americans are more “many” than we have ever been.

A melting pot, a salad bowl, or chocolate fondue?

Electoral maps we’ll see in the run-up to the midterm elections feature only two colors: red for Republicans and blue for Democrats. But these colors became identified with the two parties by the media for purely arbitrary reasons.

And they are largely a fiction: Americans are far more diverse politically than two colors can represent. As Dr. Ryan Denison reported in the Daily Article last Friday, three-fourths of Americans are neither conservative nor liberal but hold a wide variety of positions across the ideological spectrum.

Clearly, politics are not making one—or even two—out of many. Nor are languages: the Census Bureau reports that at least 350 languages are spoken in American homes, more than ever before. Nor are ethnicities: the Census Bureau estimates that there are nearly 1,500 different race and ethnicity groups in our nation, also more than ever before.

Some would say that America is or should be a “melting pot” in which our differences meld together to make a sum greater than its parts. Others believe us to be a “salad bowl” where we retain our individual differences but work together for the common good. Still others compare us to chocolate fondue, a culture in which we are individually strawberries, pineapple, and so on, all “coated” with the “chocolate” of our commonality as Americans.

I would suggest a fourth metaphor, one I believe to be critical to our cultural flourishing.

A fourth metaphor for our nation

From the beginning, the creation of our nation was not an end but a means. Thirteen very disparate colonies united to cast off the oppressive yoke of Britain, cooperating out of necessity more than out of design. As soon as independence was won, our pluribus became more important than our unum.

Voters elected leaders based on what those leaders could do for their supporters. Slave states sought to remain slave states; new states joined the nation less to benefit the nation than to benefit themselves. Even today, personal issues such as the cost of living, data centers, and gas prices are expected to dominate the midterm elections more than national or international concerns.

This is unsurprising: humans typically seek unity when we do as a means to personal ends. Here we find yet another reason the Christian worldview is so vital to our national future.

Rather than seeing America as a melting pot, a salad bowl, or chocolate fondue, I suggest a room with a throne in the middle. The closer we draw to the throne, the closer we draw to each other.

When the risen Lord Jesus is our personal King, his Spirit molds us into the character of Christ, manifesting a selfless commitment to God and neighbor that motivates true altruism and unconditional love. The closer we draw to his throne in worship and service, the closer we draw to our fellow worshipers and servants.

“From all tribes and peoples and languages”

In his vision of heaven, John saw “a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb” (Revelation 7:9). Like them, when we center our lives on Jesus, what unites us becomes greater than what divides us. We function as a holistic “body” with Christ as our head (1 Corinthians 12:27; Colossians 1:18) and serve as the salt and light that transforms our broken culture into a family of faith (Matthew 5:13–16).

What is true of our nation is true of our souls as well. The more we center our lives on Jesus, the more holistic and unified our lives become. The more we are empowered by a single purpose that gives direction and significance to our days. And the more our culture will want the Christ they see in us.

Are you closer to Jesus’ throne today than you were yesterday?

If not, why not?

Quote for the day:

“The man who walks with God always gets to his destination.” —Henrietta Mears

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Denison Forum

Have you tried assembling a puzzle without looking at the picture on the box? An individual piece might be colorful, but it’s not meant to stand on its own. Corner and edge pieces give you clues about their location, but others require study and comparison to get them into the right spot.

Individual stories from Scripture are like these single puzzle pieces. They look interesting, but their purpose may not be immediately clear. Only when we see them in their rightful place can we better see and understand God’s big picture.

The Bible tells a unified story

While working as the kids’ curriculum coordinator at a church in Dallas, I led the team in creating a Bible timeline to help kids see how the smaller stories fit into God’s one big, true story. It also helped us, as teachers, to remember how the whole story fits together and point those we taught to the main character of even the smallest stories: God.

Scripture is not an anthology of disjointed myths. Rather, as the Bible Project says, the Bible is “a unified story that leads to Jesus.”

God set each story in its place for a particular reason: the fun, exciting ones, like the parting of the Red Sea in Exodus 14, as well as the tragic ones, like David’s sin involving Bathsheba and Uriah in 2 Samuel 11. Skipping over stories just because they might be difficult for us to teach leaves kids with an incomplete picture of the Bible, like a puzzle with a missing piece.

God’s Word is not PG-rated, but that does not mean we must give kids every gory detail in adult-rated stories. When teaching complicated passages, the level of detail given to different age groups will vary. You can share Scripture with kids in a way that is simple but not watered down. Core truths can still be taught to any audience.

Teaching kids an idealized version of David’s life, that he killed Goliath as a boy who went on to rule as Israel’s favorite king, makes him sound like a superhero. However, he was a sinner like the rest of us and needed God just as much. God is the hero of David’s story, not David.

Seeing God’s heart through flawed people

As we teach the full story of Scripture to kids, they get to know the God of the Bible, his character, and his unconditional love. Imperfect people fill the pages of the biblical narrative, like Abraham, Judah, Rahab, Jeremiah, and Esther, but God chose to include them in his unfolding story. Jesus’ own disciples repeatedly misunderstood him, but he still used them to start his church and spread the gospel.

God’s interactions with these men and women reveal his heart for us, too. Grounding kids in this truth at a young age gives them a foundation to stand on when their lives hit storms and their own flesh fights against them. No one is too far gone for God to use.

Moses killed a man and struggled with anger, but God used him to shepherd Israel. Despite Samson’s womanizing and irreverence, God gave him the strength to destroy his enemies and preserved his name in the “Hall of Faith” of Hebrews 11. Mary Magdalene was possessed by demons, but she became the first witness to Jesus’ resurrection and was given the task of telling the others.

If we shy away from the dark parts of these people’s stories, we risk giving kids the impression that people who follow God never make mistakes. It might cause them to question if God loves them or if he will reject them because of something they did.

However, the big, true story we see in Scripture highlights God’s mercy and grace while not shying away from the severity of sin. Learning how God moves through flawed humans offers kids the freedom to rest in his works rather than their own. Obedience becomes a response to his love, not a way to try and earn it.

Equipping kids for future trials

The God revealed in the Bible is the very same God active in world events today. Teaching kids the full story of Scripture shows how he works in and through the events that seem chaotic to us but are really part of his plan. He is bigger than anything that happens and remains securely in charge of it all.

Ecclesiastes 1:9 states that there is nothing new under the sun… and that was written over 2,500 years ago! Injustice, ungodly leaders, wars, natural disasters, cultural conflicts, and interpersonal strife run throughout human history.

The story of Scripture shows how God remains sovereign over poor leadership, like Saul and Caesar. He used international conflicts, such as the Babylonian conquest, for his purposes.

We may not understand his reasons for current events, but we can trust the God of the Bible who remains forever faithful to his people.

The biblical narrative also reveals God’s longing for his people to stand out and be a light to the world that opposes them. Jesus promised his followers they would experience suffering in this world, but reminded them that he had overcome it (John 16:33). The leaders, parents, and culture creators of tomorrow are looking up to you today, and Scripture offers stories that speak to what they might encounter in the future.

The Lord comforted Elijah when he thought he was the only faithful follower of God left in Israel. The Holy Spirit empowered Peter and John to speak truth to an antagonistic audience and strengthened Paul in prison. That very same Spirit remains alive and active in believers today!

When God says “Remember”

Throughout his story, God repeatedly tells his people to remember:

• “Remember how God redeemed you from slavery” (Deut 24:18).
• “Remember the wonders he has done” (1 Chron 16:12).
• “Remember what I told you” (John 15:20).
• “Remember who you were before Christ” (Eph 2:11-13).

Teaching the full story of Scripture reminds us who God is, what he has done, what he is doing, and what he will do, while passing those truths on to the next generation. Ask the Lord for discernment to know how you might help put the puzzle pieces together for the kids under your care so they can better see God and his one big, true story.

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If you’ve ever stared at your ballot on election day and come away thinking, “None of these people represent me,” you’re not alone. It turns out that more than three-quarters of Americans do not fit neatly under either the conservative or the liberal label. As a recent study from Searchlight found, “Only 14 percent of the electorate can be classified as completely ideologically conservative and 10 percent as ideologically liberal.”

They’re quick to add, “This doesn’t mean the rest of the electorate doesn’t care about the issues. Quite the opposite. It’s just that the vast majority of voters hold a heterodox collection of beliefs that range across the ideological spectrum.”

Most of those who run for office, though, fit far more neatly into one of those two ideological poles. And the same is often true for the most vocal parts of their base. As a result, it’s easy for the national discussion to paint a much more homogeneous picture of the nation than reality represents.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Three-quarters of Americans are not conservative or liberal →

A District of Columbia judge has ordered the Trump administration to immediately reinstate access to the White House for three news outlets banned from the building last week by the president. The temporary restraining order means CNN, MS NOW, and Politico must have their access restored for fourteen days as the legal process over this issue continues.

However, according to the Washington Post, it remains unclear when the reporters will have their access restored. Reporters from all three outlets were still blocked from entering the White House at this writing.

President Trump is only the latest in a string of presidents who were frustrated by the media. Thomas Jefferson complained, “Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle.” Bill Clinton condemned “purveyors of hatred and division” on the public airwaves. The Obama administration tried to block Fox News from a joint interview in 2009.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Judge temporarily blocks White House media ban →

The landscape of youth sports has changed dramatically over the last three to four decades. Youth sports once revolved around neighborhood teams, school programs, and local leagues. Today, it is a $40 billion industry. And it’s rapid growth is attracting increasing attention from private equity.

A growing scholarship and elite-development mindset has helped fuel travel teams, sport specialization, and private coaching at younger ages and with greater intensity. No sport seems immune. And for better or worse, the big business of youth sports is changing our society and appears here to stay.

So how should a Christian respond? What should we be aware of as our world changes in this area?

See your community (Matthew 22:39)

Sports were once a great vehicle for creating connections within your local neighborhood. Practices and games were a chance to build shared history with families whose lives you already had some overlap with. For the believer, it gave us opportunities to see how other families were doing and what their needs were. It also gave us natural opportunities to model our faith and serve as salt and light among people already woven into our lives.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Youth sports and the things that matter most →

What happened: President Trump addressed the United Nations annual summit this morning. The meetings are scheduled to go until Monday, but the first few days are by far the most important.

Why it matters: The official theme of this year’s summit is “Restoring trust, managing transformation.” The UN’s approach has many doubtful about whether it can reach that goal. Let’s take a closer look at why that is, and how their concerns compare with the more pressing conflicts around the world.

The backstory: What did President Trump tell the UN?

President Trump spoke earlier this morning at the annual UN summit in New York. The meetings will run through next Monday, though this morning’s speech was the only time he is expected to appear before the gathering of world leaders. I’ve included a brief overview of the president’s main points, and will follow that up in the next section by taking a look at how they compare with the UN’s stated priorities and what’s going on in the world:

• The president’s address began by outlining the accomplishments of his administration in immigration, the economy, and the military before pivoting to the peace agreements he’s helped negotiate. It didn’t take long, though, for his talk to turn to Iran, which he called “the bully of the Middle East” before noting that “they are the bully no more.”

Continue reading Denison Forum – Trump’s UN speech questions where the world’s focus belongs →

We could start the week with bad news from the weekend, such as North Korea’s ballistic missile tests or the Houthis’ missile attack that targeted the capital of Saudi Arabia. But I’d rather not.

Instead, let’s begin the week with some good news in the news:

• New FBI data shows that violent crime fell 9.3 percent in 2025, marking the largest year-to-year decline since the bureau began estimating such trends in 1936.
• According to new Census Bureau data, the nation’s poverty rate fell in 2025 to a historic low and inflation-adjusted median household income reached a record high. Harvard University economist and professor Daniel Shoag said the data “represents continued economic growth.”
• Reuters reports that the number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits unexpectedly fell, “with the underlying trend pointing to continued labor market stability.”
• Surveying all the good news of late, Wall Street Journal opinion writer James Freeman asked, “Has there ever been a better time and a better place to be alive?”

But there’s a but. The Washington Post headlines, “Retail sales rebound strongly in August, even as people are wary over economy.” Why are they “wary”? Consumers were less optimistic in August than in July about future business conditions, the labor market outlook, and their income prospects. Only 24 percent of Americans rate the economy “excellent or good,” while 76 percent say it is “only fair or poor.”

Such negativity can become a self-fulfilling prophecy, as the Post noted: “Consumer spending is a main economic driver, making up about two-thirds of the US economy. If consumers pull back, it can spell danger for economic growth.” I’m reminded of the toilet paper shortage during the COVID-19 pandemic: people became afraid that there would be such a shortage, so they bought up all they could find, which created the shortage they feared.

This pattern is especially relevant for those of us who follow Jesus, for reasons worth exploring today.

Do half of all marriages end in divorce?

You’ve probably heard that “half of all marriages end in divorce.” This is categorically false. That erroneous number is derived by dividing the number of marriages in a given year by the number of divorces. For example, in 2003, 7.5 people got married per 1,000 people, while 3.8 got divorced, so the “divorce rate” was 50 percent.

However, if you (properly) compare the number of divorces in a year to the total number of marriages (not just those in a particular year), the percentage is far lower. The actual number peaked in the 1970s around 40 percent and has been declining ever since.

Years ago, I was discussing this issue with the counseling minister at the church I pastored, and he explained why the falsehood is more damaging than I realized: if people believe that half of all marriages end in divorce, they are far more likely to believe that divorce is more likely and acceptable for their own marriage.

The same pattern pertains to claims over recent years that Americans are abandoning the church to become “nones” (those who have no religious affiliation). As scholars Byron R. Johnson and Thomas S. Kidd write in the Washington Post, there’s no question that the decline in mainline denominations is real: Episcopalians dropped from about 3.4 million members in the late 1950s to about 1.6 million in 2022, for example.

However, they report that young men are attending church more than they did in previous generations; high-profile intellectuals such as Ayaan Hirsi Ali have publicly announced their conversion to Christianity; and the “nones” have plateaued at less than 30 percent of respondents. The total number of congregations in metropolitan Boston doubled between the 1960s and the early 2000s. Johnson and Kidd also note that millions of people, most of whom are nondenominational, evangelical, or Pentecostal, attend church faithfully but never appear on the media’s radar.

Becoming who Jesus would be if he were you

Here’s my point: Jesus is conducting his ministry in the world today just as he conducted it when he visited our planet twenty centuries ago.

Christians are now the “body” of Christ (1 Corinthians 12:27). In and through us, Jesus goes where he’s wanted, meets felt needs to meet spiritual needs, and works by the power of his Spirit to build followers who manifest his character wherever they go.

Our problem in the West is that many have turned his movement into an institution and his lordship into a hobby. If we make Jesus our adviser rather than our king and serve him so he will serve us, we turn Christianity into a religion and ourselves into consumers rather than disciples.

We should therefore not be surprised that the Lord is leading many in places that were once America’s mission fields to become missionaries to us. As Dr. Ryan Denison noted in his Friday Daily Article, the West is now “the world’s newest mission field.” Jesus is as much at work today as he has ever been; the key is joining him by becoming like him.

The great philosopher and theologian Dallas Willard taught that discipleship is the process of becoming who Jesus would be if he were you. He suggested that we should imagine how Jesus would do your job. How would he be a pastor, or lawyer, or doctor, or plumber? The good news is that we don’t have to wonder and then try to do what we presume he would—he wants to do our job in and through us today.

In The Spirit of the Disciplines, Dr. Willard writes,

“True Christlikeness, true companionship with Christ, comes at the point where it is hard not to respond as he would.”

Will you seek “true Christlikeness” today?

Quote for the day:

“‘That Christ be formed in you’ is the eternal watchword of Christian spiritual formation.” —Dallas Willard

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