President Trump announced yesterday the White House’s three-phase plan for easing social distancing measures, a subject I intend to discuss in this afternoon’s Special Edition. For this morning, however, let’s shift from news about the coronavirus pandemic to focus on a surprising way to respond to news about the pandemic.

I’m reading Edward Achorn’s Every Drop of Blood, which masterfully sets Abraham Lincoln’s second inaugural address in its historical context. I have long been a student of Civil War history, but I did not realize the depth of personal rejection and suffering our sixteenth president endured as he tried to lead the nation through her most perilous days.

And yet, Lincoln was famous during the war for his quips and down-home humor. He would often respond to criticism and anger with a story that changed the entire tone of the moment. He once explained his strategy: “With the fearful strain that is on me night and day, if I did not laugh I should die.”

On another occasion Lincoln said he felt “like the boy that stumped his toe: it hurt too bad to laugh, and he was too big to cry.” He summarized his spirit in crisis this way: “I laugh because I must not cry.”

“The world has turned upside down” 

Now let’s try an experiment. A dear friend sent me some “humor while in quarantine” yesterday:

• “Quarantine has turned us into dogs. We roam the house all day looking for food. We are told ‘no’ if we get too close to strangers. And we get really excited about car rides.”
• “The world has turned upside down. Old folks are sneaking out of the house, and their kids are yelling at them to stay indoors.”
• “2019: Stay away from negative people. 2020: Stay away from positive people.”
• “Tomorrow is the National Homeschool Tornado Drill. Lock your kids in the basement until you give the all clear. You’re welcome!”
• “Day seven at home and the dog is looking at me like, ‘See? This is why I chew the furniture!'”

Continue reading Denison Forum – My favorite coronavirus humor: Finding ‘signals of transcendence’ in a pandemic →

Dr. Anthony Fauci is not only America’s top infectious disease doctor, he has also become one of the most trusted people in the US. So, when he suggested a way to bring back sports during the coronavirus pandemic, his opinion made national news.

“There’s a way of doing that,” he said in an interview. “Nobody comes to the stadium. Put [athletes] in big hotels, wherever you want to play. Keep them very well surveilled . . . and have them tested like every week and make sure they don’t wind up infecting each other or their family and just let them play the season out.”

Of course, some will complain that sports without spectators is not sports. Dr. Fauci disagrees: “I think you’ll probably get enough buy-in from people who are dying to see a baseball game. Particularly me. I’m living in Washington—we have the world champion in the Washington Nationals. I want to see them play again.”

The latest on when we’ll have a vaccine 

As the coronavirus pandemic passed two million cases yesterday, Dr. Fauci’s comments point to one aspect of the topic on everyone’s mind these days: How do we return to “normal,” whatever that looks like?

President Trump said this week he is close to completing a plan to end the COVID-19 shutdown and reopen the battered US economy. He believes that some parts of the country may be ready to go before May 1.

According to the president, roughly twenty states have avoided the crippling outbreaks that affected others and could be opened “very quickly.” He plans to work with the various governors to implement “a very powerful reopening plan” at a specific time and date for each state.

For instance, the Texas governor announced that he will release details Friday on his plan to jumpstart his state’s economy. By contrast, California’s governor expects to ban mass gatherings of hundreds or thousands of people in his state at least through summer.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Dr. Fauci on how to bring back sports: The path to God’s ‘perfect peace’ →

April 15 is an auspicious day for many reasons.

On this day in 1783, the US Congress ratified articles of peace ending the Revolutionary War with Great Britain. On this morning in 1865, Abraham Lincoln was pronounced dead.

On April 15, 1912, the RMS Titanic sank. On this day in 1947, Jackie Robinson became the first African American to play in Major League Baseball. On April 15, 1955, Ray Croc opened the first McDonalds. The Boston Marathon was attacked by bombers on this day in 2013.

And on this day in 1957, my parents were married, a fact for which I am obviously and personally grateful.

“The most important silver lining in this crisis” 

April 15 is best known to most Americans as the day when our income taxes are due, a deadline that was moved to this date in 1955. However, because of the coronavirus pandemic, the deadline has been postponed ninety days to July 15.

This is just one change caused by the most disruptive event of my lifetime.

As catastrophic as the coronavirus pandemic has been for the world medically, financially, and socially, God has been at work using this tragedy for spiritual good as well. For example, well-known pastor Greg Laurie posted an article to Christianity Today describing some of the ways people are searching for God in these days of crisis.

He points to a Pew survey in which 55 percent of Americans stated they had “prayed for an end to the spread of coronavirus.” He notes another report that Google searches about prayer skyrocketed when coronavirus went global. In yet another poll, nearly half of respondents called the pandemic a “wake-up call” from God.

Bestselling author Joel C. Rosenberg notes: “Americans in near full lockdown are anxious, and understandably so. Yet millions are turning to God, the Bible, and Christian sermons for answers, some of them for the first time. That may be the most important silver lining in this crisis so far.”

Learning from The Good Doctor 

God will do his part in redeeming this crisis, but we must do ours.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Why April 15 is so important to me personally: ‘Hope has a name’ →

Astronomers say they have discovered the largest and brightest supernova ever seen.

A supernova is defined as an extremely bright and powerful explosion of a dying, massive star at least five times the mass of our sun. A study published yesterday reports that the mass of this supernova, labeled SN2016aps, was between fifty and one hundred times greater than our sun.

For a sense of scale: our sun could contain 1.3 million Earths and is about 333,000 times the mass of our planet. It contains 99.8 percent of the mass of the entire solar system. While it has burned off material that is more than 100 times the mass of the Earth, this is only about 0.05 percent of the sun’s total mass.

But our sun is only 1 to 2 percent the size of the supernova now being reported. And there are estimated to be 100 billion such stars in the Milky Way galaxy, and ten trillion such galaxies in the universe.

And our God made all of that.

A path to triumphant courage 

Nearly half the people in the US feel the coronavirus pandemic is harming their mental health. As the Washington Post notes, “If you’re scared, anxious, depressed, struggling to sleep through the night, or just on edge, you’re not alone.”

While COVID-19 is now the number one cause of death per day in the US, heart disease still kills 1,773 people every day and cancer causes 1,641 deaths a day.

In other words, there’s a lot to worry about. But there’s a way of dealing courageously and triumphantly with life on this broken planet, a source of strength and hope that is available to every child of God.

And we celebrated it just two days ago.

“Eternal life is the gift of God”  Continue reading Denison Forum – The brightest supernova ever discovered: How to experience omnipotence today →

A church in Florida appeared to be full yesterday, but this is because members of the congregation emailed photos of themselves to the staff, who then printed the images and taped them to the backs of seats in the sanctuary.

Welcome to Easter Sunday 2020.

A church in South Carolina had Easter services in their parking lot as members watched on large outdoor screens while listening to the broadcast over local radio. A youth pastor in Arlington, Texas, created an Easter egg hunt for children using the online video game Minecraft, a strategy which gained national attention.

A church in North Carolina has held a sunrise Easter service for 250 years, even through the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, and two World Wars. But for the pandemic, the celebration was replaced by an online service.

Archbishop José Horacio Gómez of the Los Angeles diocese was right: “Our churches may be closed but Christ is not quarantined and his Gospel is not in chains.”

Boris Johnson is home from the hospital 

Now it’s the Monday after Easter. What difference did yesterday make today?

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was released from the hospital Sunday morning to continue his recovery from COVID-19 at home. In a video tribute, he thanked healthcare workers who “saved my life, no question.” Scientists are trying to determine whether patients such as the prime minister now have an acquired immunity that protects them from reinfection or at least lessens the severity of future infections.

If so, doctors who recover from COVID-19 could care for coronavirus patients in the place of those who are still at risk. The same could be true for grocery workers, delivery drivers, and anyone else performing an essential service at the risk of infecting themselves (and then their families).

Let’s consider this possibility as a post-Easter parable.

The practical path to happiness 

I have long been grateful for the work of Arthur C. Brooks, the former president of the American Enterprise Institute and now faculty member at Harvard Kennedy School and Harvard Business School. A committed Christian, he is one of the most thoughtful interpreters of culture today. His keynote address at this year’s National Prayer Breakfast was just one example of his practical wisdom.

Continue reading Denison Forum – A church fills its empty pews with pictures of its members: How the joy of Easter Sunday can change the world on Monday →

This is the first Good Friday in Christian history to be observed primarily online. Millions of Christians are attending worship services through digital means.

Unless they have their own chapel, that is.

The Christ family (pronounced “Crist”) lives on a slice of pastureland an hour southeast of Oklahoma City. They usually worship with the Wewoka Church of Christ. But three years ago, Ryan Christ constructed a tiny chapel, about twelve feet wide and twenty-five feet long, on their property. It has six small pews and can hold about a dozen non-social-distancing adults.

As the Christian Chronicle article notes, “That’s more than enough for a family of four, stuck at home in the midst of a pandemic.”

According to his wife, Ryan is always looking for ways to share his faith. His last name helps. When people ask him if he’s related to Jesus Christ, “he always comes back with, ‘I’m not him, but I know him,’” she says.

“The symbol of Christianity is an instrument of death” 

So can we, because of what happened on this day twenty centuries ago.

Karl Barth is often considered the most important theologian of the twentieth century. In 1962, on his one visit to America, he was asked how he would summarize the millions of words he had published. Barth replied, “Jesus loves me, this I know; for the Bible tells me so.”

And what the Bible tells us is that Jesus loves us enough to die for us.

Frederick Buechner observed: “A six-pointed star, a crescent moon, a lotus—the symbols of other religions suggest beauty and light. The symbol of Christianity is an instrument of death.”

Continue reading Denison Forum – Meet the Christ family, who worship in a prairie chapel: A Good Friday meditation →

One of the most famous couples in the world went online this week to speak with school children whose parents are working on the front lines of the COVID-19 pandemic. Prince William and Kate Middleton, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, made a video call to pupils and staff from Casterton Primary Academy in Lancashire, in northwestern England.

The students wore Easter-themed bunny ears and presented them with a virtual bouquet of paper flowers. Their parents are working in the National Health Service and social care, as well as serving in supermarkets and making deliveries.

One of them told the duke that the “first William was called William the Conqueror.” The children then wanted to know, “What do you want to be called in a thousand years’ time?” He laughed and said he didn’t think he could answer that.

Your title is your towel 

On this Maundy Thursday, Jesus redefined greatness when he washed the dirty, smelly, mud-caked feet of men who would soon abandon, deny, and betray him. He then taught us, “I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you” (John 13:15).

And he added a “new commandment”: “Just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another” (v. 34). “Just as” means “in the same way” or “to the same degree.”

Here’s why obedience to his commandment is so crucial: “By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (v. 35). Not because we preach sermons or write Daily Articles. Not because we attend church services or work as elders or deacons. Not because we earn and donate large sums of money.

Continue reading Denison Forum – William and Kate made a video call to children of frontline workers: The best way to measure greatness →

This is the first Holy Week in Christian history to be observed primarily online.

From livestreamed services at the Vatican to video sermons recorded and shared on cell phones, Christians and Christian churches all over the world are meeting virtually these days.

This is a controversial subject. Some claim that governmental restrictions on worship services are an infringement of religious liberty and a violation of the separation of church and state. Others disagree, noting that such prohibitions do not single out religious gatherings but include all events at which people could become infected with coronavirus. Still others claim that church services should be classified as “essential” functions and allowed to continue under social distancing guidelines.

I agree with Dr. Albert Mohler and Kelly Shackelford’s statement in the Washington Post: “Asking houses of worship to briefly suspend large gatherings is neither hostile toward religion nor unreasonable in light of the threat. Rather, this is a time for all of us to exercise prudence over defiance. Love for God and neighbor demands nothing less.”

However, my purpose today is not to litigate this issue. Rather, it is to encourage us to reframe social distancing in a way that aligns with this day in Holy Week.

You might respond by noting that the Gospels do not record any activities of our Lord on the Wednesday before he died. I agree.

“God goes where he’s wanted” 

Jesus spent the first four nights of Holy Week in Bethany, a suburb east of Jerusalem, at the home of his friends Mary, Martha, and Lazarus (cf. Matthew 21:17).

Making the homes of others his own was customary for our Lord. He stayed with Peter and his family when in Capernaum (cf. Matthew 8:14; Mark 1:29). He once said, “the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head” (Matthew 8:20).

But as Philip Yancey noted, “God goes where he’s wanted.”

Continue reading Denison Forum – Is the government violating religious freedom by restricting church services? A Holy Wednesday invitation to solitude →

Many of us are praying for British Prime Minister Boris Johnson to recover from COVID-19 after he was moved to intensive care yesterday. As of this morning, he is not yet on a ventilator but is receiving oxygen support.

Meanwhile, the “biggest, brightest supermoon of 2020” is rising tonight. April’s full moon is a supermoon, meaning that it is full while also in perigee (its closest approach to us). During a supermoon, the moon is about 14 percent larger and 30 percent brighter than a normal full moon.

The April full moon is called the “pink moon” because it coincides with the blooming of the moss pink wildflower. The best time to view it will be tonight after the sun goes down.

A trick question and a transforming answer 

On Holy Tuesday, Jesus returns to the now-cleansed temple to teach the people. His enemies cannot find a way to arrest him due to his popularity, so they try to lure him into committing blasphemy and defaming himself before the crowds.

Among their attempts is this question asked by a lawyer: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” (Matthew 22:36). If Jesus names one of their 613 laws, they will accuse him of rejecting the others.

Our Lord replies: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets” (vv. 37–40).

Focusing our moon on the Son 

What does Jesus’ answer on Holy Tuesday have to do with the “biggest, brightest supermoon of 2020” that will appear tonight?

Continue reading Denison Forum – The brightest supermoon of the year: A Holy Tuesday invitation to risk-taking faith that changes eternity →

There is nothing like being in the Holy Land during the Easter season. After leading more than thirty study tours to Israel, I can tell you that each time feels like the first time. There is something miraculous and transforming about this ancient land, especially during this season.

This year, April is not only the month of Easter for Christians, but of Passover for the Jewish people and the beginning of Ramadan for Muslims. Because of the pandemic, however, the streets of Jerusalem are virtually empty. Churches and other religious sites are closed. Even burials are different.

In Israel, Jewish dead are typically laid to rest in a cloth smock and shroud without a coffin. Now, the bodies of COVID-19 victims are taken for ritual washing, which is performed in full protective gear, wrapped in impermeable plastic, and wrapped again in plastic before interment. Muslim bodies are not washed or shrouded but buried in a plastic body bag. Funerals can be attended by no more than twenty people in an open space. The bereaved are not embraced.

Here’s some good news, however: Israel’s Tower of David Museum is using virtual reality to allow us to visit the Western Wall during Passover, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre during Easter, and the Dome of the Rock and the Al Aqsa Mosque during Ramadan.

The museum has created an immersive 360-degree virtual reality experience for anyone with internet access. We will be able to see the Holy City as it is today and as it looked twenty centuries ago. The link will be available free of charge from the first day of Passover to the first day of Ramadan (April 9–24).

“Our routine is the scaffolding of life”

The philosopher Walter Benjamin noted, “History is made up of images, not stories.” The images coming out of the coronavirus pandemic, like empty streets in Jerusalem, tell the story of this unfolding tragedy.

In addition to the escalating numbers of victims and patients and its devastation of our economy, the pandemic is disrupting our daily lives in unprecedented ways. Adrienne Heinz, a clinical research psychologist at the Veterans Affairs National Center for PTSD, notes: “Our routine is the scaffolding of life. It’s how we organize information and our time. And without it, we can feel really lost.”

As a result, she says, “I’m . . . really worried about families. I’m worried about increases in alcohol use. I’m worried about domestic violence. I’m worried about child abuse, because parents are under-resourced.”

Psychologist Susan Clayton adds: “Most of us have not faced a situation like this. So we have no previous experience that we can use to interpret it. We have no guidance about how we should be responding.”

Continue reading Denison Forum – Funerals in the Holy Land and a virtual tour of Jerusalem: Using the pandemic for eternal good →

Joe Buck has one of the best-known voices in America. He has called twenty-two World Series and six Super Bowls. The son of legendary announcer Jack Buck, he is ubiquitous in the world of sports broadcasting.

Now you can have his voice on your home videos.

People are sending him videos of dogs chasing each other in an empty field, chickens on a seesaw, and an airline employee guiding a plane to its gate. For each, Buck provides his very funny personal analysis.

This is his way of helping people deal with the anxiety and loneliness of these days.

Advice from “the world’s foremost expert on grief” 

One of the most-read articles ever on Harvard Business Review is an interview with David Kessler on the grief we are feeling in response to the coronavirus pandemic. The article describes Kessler as “the world’s foremost expert on grief.”

He notes that “we’re feeling a number of different griefs. We feel the world has changed, and it has. We know this is temporary, but it doesn’t feel that way, and we realize things will be different. . . . The loss of normalcy; the fear of economic toll; the loss of connection. This is hitting us and we’re grieving. Collectively. We are not used to this kind of collective grief in the air.”

In addition, we’re feeling what Kessler calls “anticipatory grief,” which he defines as “that feeling we get about what the future holds when we’re uncertain. . . . There is a storm coming. There’s something bad out there. . . . I don’t think we’ve collectively lost our sense of general safety like this. Individually or as small groups, people have felt this. But all together, this is new. We are grieving on a micro and a macro level.”

When asked what we can do to manage such grief, Kessler applies the well-known stages of grief: “There’s denial, which we say a lot of early on: This virus won’t affect us. There’s anger: You’re making me stay home and taking away my activities. There’s bargaining: Okay, if I social distance for two weeks everything will be better, right? There’s sadness: I don’t know when this will end. And finally there’s acceptance: This is happening; I have to figure out how to proceed.”

Kessler adds a sixth stage: meaning. He explains: “I did not want to stop at acceptance when I experienced some personal grief. I wanted meaning in those darkest hours. And I do believe we find light in those times.”

What it means to seek God’s “face” 

The US topped one thousand coronavirus deaths in a single day for the first time yesterday. Officials say the daily death toll could more than double by mid-April.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Joe Buck will make your home movie: Finding meaning in crisis through solitude with God →

April Fool’s Day has seldom seemed less appropriate than in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic. But in the spirit of the day, let’s begin with the story of a woman in New Jersey who violated her state’s stay-at-home order when she allegedly tossed a Molotov cocktail at a boyfriend’s residence.

She has been charged with a disorderly persons offense for violating the governor’s order. As you might expect, she also faces arson and weapons charges. Fortunately, as the Attorney General’s office noted, her weapon “did not detonate.”

An asteroid the width of Manhattan Island 

For some more good news on this April 1: a giant, “potentially hazardous” asteroid will miss us this month. NASA has named the asteroid 1998 OR2. It is about the width of Manhattan Island and could wreak havoc if it crashed into Earth.

However, at its closest it will be 3.9 million miles from us (more than sixteen times the average distance between us and the moon). We won’t see it again until May 18, 2031. It will return again in 2048, 2062, and 2079, when it will only be 1.1 million miles away.

When I read about 1998 OR2, here was my thought: How do NASA’s experts know how far it will be from us? Or when it will return?

I had a similar question while walking early yesterday morning. Saturn, Mars, and Jupiter were all visible in the predawn sky. Or so a website told me. I would have otherwise been unable to name them or to know that they are planets in our solar system.

As I continued walking, I realized that I don’t know how to make anything that I saw. I don’t know how to make bricks, much less a brick house. I don’t know how to make a car’s fender, much less the entire car. I couldn’t make the concrete on which I was walking or the clothes I was wearing.

Nearly everything we take for granted is something some group of people didn’t take for granted. Rather, they pooled their experience and expertise to do what none of them could have done alone.

“The main business of their lives” 

I am taking us down this road to make a point that relates directly to our spiritual awakening series this week.

President Trump told Americans yesterday to brace for “a very painful two weeks” as public health officials warn that the coronavirus pandemic could leave 100,000 to 240,000 people in the US dead. We are responding to a crisis that is unprecedented in my lifetime by seeking a spiritual awakening that is also unprecedented in my lifetime.

We’re focusing on this familiar text: “If my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land” (2 Chronicles 7:14).

Yesterday, we discussed the foundational urgency of humility, noting that God cannot give what we will not admit we need. Today we’ll consider God’s call to pray. The Hebrew word means to “entreat, supplicate, beg.” It is also collective, meaning to pray as a nation for the nation.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Woman allegedly tosses Molotov cocktail at boyfriend’s residence: April Fools and the urgency of collective prayer →

Vin Scully is a legendary baseball broadcaster, the voice of the Los Angeles Dodgers from 1950 to 2016. Now ninety-two years old, he joined Fox News on Monday to discuss the delayed start to this year’s Major League Baseball season.

Scully, a devout Christian, said, “Now that I have some leisure time and we’re all locked in at home, I read an article and it was talking about what happened to Americans in World War II. It was such a terrible time.”

He added, “Three-quarters of Americans belonged to a house of worship. Today . . . half of Americans are involved in a house of worship, prior to this pandemic. So there’s your answer . . . Although they might not be able to go to a house of worship, probably more Americans will be praying since World War II.”

“More people will be coming back to the faith,” Scully went on. “And now that this terrible thing is upon us, people might very well get back to the center. And it’s a better world. We’ll see . . .”

“With the humble is wisdom” 

I referenced the same Wall Street Journal column in yesterday morning’s Daily Article. Scully is right: the anxiety of this crisis may well be a catalyst for the spiritual renewal we need so urgently.

As the saying goes, sometimes we need to get so far down that we have nowhere to look but up. Such humility is the foundational step to the spiritual awakening we need so urgently today.

As we noted yesterday, God’s promise to his people that he would “heal their land” is tied directly to their response to his call: “If my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turned from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sins and heal their land” (2 Chronicles 7:14).

First, they must “humble” themselves. The Hebrew word means “to bow the knee” or “to submit with humility.”

Continue reading Vin Scully predicts more Americans will respond to COVID crisis with faith: An atheist doctor comes to faith through a dying priest →

Madison Prewett is a contestant on The Bachelor. For those of us who don’t know how the show works (myself included until I did research for this article), a single bachelor meets a pool of eligible women. He then eliminates candidates, culminating in a marriage proposal to his final selection.

During the process, a one-on-one date with a candidate is a significant step forward for her. Thus, when Madison secured such a date with Peter Weber (this season’s bachelor) in last Monday’s show, she needed things to go well in order to stay in the competition.

This is what she told him: “Faith is more than just this passed-down thing to me, it’s literally my whole life and all of who I am. I want, in a marriage, someone who also has that relationship with the Lord and loves that about me and wants to raise a family in that way.”

Of course, ABC cut out her spiritual confession.

In the network’s preview for the next episode, Prewett also says she is saving sex for marriage. “If he sleeps with anybody else, it’s gonna be hard for me to continue to move forward,” she added.

Let’s hope Prewett keeps embracing her faith as the show continues.

Did Geoffrey Chaucer invent today’s holiday? 

Valentine’s Day, as everyone knows, is named for St. Valentine. Except we’re not sure which one.

Valentine of Rome and Valentine of Terni were both early Christians who died for their faith.  However, according to legend, St. Valentine of Rome signed a letter “from your Valentine” to his jailer’s daughter, whom he had befriended and healed from blindness. Another legend says he defied the emperor’s orders and secretly married couples to spare husbands from war.

Continue reading Denison Forum – ‘Bachelor’ contestant makes her faith public: A Valentine’s Day call to courageous love →

David Brooks is one of the best-known public intellectuals in America. A longtime columnist for the New York Times and a contributing writer at the Atlantic, he is also the author of several best-selling books. I have found him gracious and humble in person and have followed his writing with appreciation over the years.

However, I was more than surprised by the headline of his latest Atlantic essay: “The Nuclear Family Was a Mistake.” His article is receiving so much attention this week that I’ve chosen to summarize it and then respond to it biblically. Given the significance of this issue, today’s Daily Article is a little longer than usual.

From farms to factories 

Continue reading Denison Forum – ‘The Nuclear Family Was a Mistake’: My response to an article of seismic significance →

New Hampshire, with a population of 1,359,711, is smaller than forty-one other American states. Manchester is its largest city, with a population of 111,196. It would be the thirteenth-largest city in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, smaller than Denton but larger than Richardson.

And yet, all eyes today are on this state after yesterday’s Democratic Party primary won by Bernie Sanders. Although Pete Buttigieg finished a close second and Amy Klobuchar surged to third place, today’s New York Times is calling Sanders “the new front-runner of the 2020 Democratic primary.”

However, some caveats are worth noting.

Since 1976, only five of the nine Democratic candidates who won in New Hampshire eventually won their party’s nomination. And only one (Jimmy Carter) went on to become president. However, no modern Democrat has won the party’s nomination without finishing first or second in the state.

Whatever the future significance of yesterday’s primary, one lesson is that the anti-Sanders vote splintered, leading to his victory. Democrats who consider Bernie Sanders unelectable are going to have to find a way to consolidate around candidates who were not their first choices.

Such compromise, however, is at the heart of American democracy. Here we can learn a surprising lesson from history with strategic significance for Christians today.

The surprising sources of our republic 

What source did the writers of the Constitution quote more than any other? The Bible. Who came in second? Charles de Montesquieu (1689–1755).

Historian William Federer notes that the French political philosopher was a favorite of Thomas Jefferson (who translated a commentary on his thought from the French). His ideas about governance were formative for Jefferson and others who formed our nation.

Montesquieu divided governments into three categories: republics, which rely on moral virtue; monarchs, which rely on honor and shame; and despots, which rely on pleasure and fear. In his view, citizens in a republic typically act as co-kings in society, remembering that they will be held individually accountable to God and behaving morally and virtuously as a result.

Monarchs working within a Christian worldview (such as the British monarchy in Montesquieu’s day) exercise unilateral authority but remember that they are accountable to the King of kings in the next life. Despots, however, rule without reference to the biblical worldview and thus reward their supporters with pleasure while dominating their other subjects through fear.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Bernie Sanders wins New Hampshire: The fallacy of generic compassion and healing power of grace →

If you’re looking for a Valentine’s Day gift your loved one will remember, you might consider a handwritten note from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Sometime in the mid-1960s, he was asked to define the meaning of love. Dr. King wrote: “Love is the greatest force in the universe. It is the heartbeat of the moral cosmos. He who loves is a participant in the being of God.”

Then he signed the note, “Best Wishes, Martin L. King Jr.” The rare note is for sale for $42,000.

If only everyone agreed with Dr. King.

How Hollywood sees the world 

One way our culture rejects Dr. King’s ethic of love is by rejecting those who most deeply share his faith.

A Penn State study found that “American society is in a downward spiral of interreligious intolerance.” “Highly religious Protestants” are among the groups that feel most targeted for their religious group membership and beliefs. The lead investigator noted: “When people see their religion or religious beliefs mocked in the public domain or criticized by political leaders, these experiences signal to members of entire religious groups that they don’t belong.”

A case in point: the Academy Awards.

The 2020 Oscars were watched by their smallest audience ever. According to Variety, 23.6 million viewers tuned in Sunday night. The show had six million fewer viewers than last year.

However, an audience of 23.6 million is still larger than the population of 177 of the world’s countries. The cultural popularity of the Academy Awards, together with the credibility they bestow on actors, directors, and films, can make it difficult to resist the worldview Hollywood promotes.

If we are to believe the movie and television industry, gender is fluid, same-sex relationships are to be celebrated, LGBTQ people are to be accorded protected status, marriage is optional and divorce is nearly inevitable, and life begins and ends whenever we say it does. I could cite popular movies and TV shows that proclaim each of these “values.” If we disagree, we are branded as homophobic, bigoted, and even dangerous.

And we haven’t even discussed the sexualized Super Bowl halftime show. If my grandchildren had been watching the game with us, we would have been forced to change the channel.

One solution for biblical Christians is to avoid all popular media. But even if that were possible, is it biblical?

Eating with tax collectors and “sinners” 

Joseph took an Egyptian name and wife when he became the second-most powerful ruler in Egypt (Genesis 41:45). Esther became queen of the Persian Empire; her uncle Mordecai ascended to “second in rank to King Ahasuerus” (Esther 2:17; 10:3).

Daniel served the rulers of Babylon and Persia from 605 BC to at least 522 BC. Jewish Christians continued following Jewish tradition (cf. Acts 3:1; 13:5) until they were forced from their synagogues toward the end of the first century.

Jesus set the example of cultural engagement by building relationships with Jews (Matthew 4:23), Samaritans (John 4), Gentiles (Mark 7:24–37), and tax collectors and “sinners” (Matthew 9:9–10; Luke 19:1–10). He called us to make disciples of all “nations” (Matthew 28:19), literally ethnos, meaning ethnicities or people groups.

Our Lord described us as “salt” and “light,” both of which must contact that which they are to transform (Matthew 5:13–16). To retreat from culture means that we lose all opportunity to change culture.

Living as a “guest” in this world 

At the same time, we are to be in the world but not of it. A ship is supposed to be in the ocean, but the ocean is not supposed to be in the ship.

Jesus prayed for his disciples, “I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one” (John 17:15). Scripture is clear: “Do not love the world or the things in the world” (1 John 2:15).

God calls us to “flee from sexual immorality” and to “resist the devil” (1 Corinthians 6:18; James 4:7b). To do this, we must first “submit yourselves therefore to God” (v. 7a). In his power we can defeat any temptation we face (1 Corinthians 10:13), knowing that “because [Jesus] himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted” (Hebrews 2:18).

The key is to see ourselves as “guests” in this world (Psalm 39:12). We care for our fellow guests, but we know that this world is not our home or theirs.

“God never stops loving” 

When our culture violates Dr. King’s ethic of love, Jesus calls us to respond in love. David Vryhof of the Society of St. John the Evangelist: “Why would we choose to love our enemies and do good to those who hate us? Because this is the way of God.

“God never stops loving, never stops caring, never stops blessing. Yes, it’s outrageous. It’s impractical. It’s unrealistic. It’s beyond us. Which is why we need God and why we need each other. Only God’s love abiding in us can love in this way.”

Who was the last person to love you “in this way”?

With whom will you pay such grace forward today?

Denison Forum

Brad Pitt won an Academy Award last night for Best Supporting Actor. (He won an Oscar in 2014 as a producer.) In his acceptance speech, he said, “They told me I only had forty-five seconds up here, which is forty-five seconds more than the Senate gave John Bolton this week.” Thus began a night of awards juxtaposed with politics and surprises.

Joaquin Phoenix won the Best Lead Actor award for Joker and spoke out against artificially inseminating cows. Parasite became the first non-English-language film to win the best picture award. Presenter Natalie Portman wore a cape on which were written the names of women who weren’t nominated for an Academy Award for best director.

The Oscars felt to me like an evening of cultural commentary interspersed with occasional awards. The popularity of many of the actors and presenters can delude us into thinking Hollywood speaks for us.

The opposite is actually more the case.

What percentage of women have been nominated for Best Director? 

Of the nine movies nominated for Best Picture, Joker made the most money, ranking ninth in box office sales for 2019. Avengers: Endgame grossed more than twice that much.

Women make up 50.8 percent of the American population, but they have received .01 percent of Best Director nominations in Oscars history (five out of 447 official nominations in ninety-two years). People of color comprised nearly 37 percent of the American population in the 2010 census, but only one person of color was nominated in the four major acting categories (actress Cynthia Erivo for her lead performance in Harriet).

Of the nine movies nominated for best picture, seven are set in the past. Eight are about white people; six of the eight are about white men.

In 1940, Hattie McDaniel became the first black actor to win an Academy Award. That year, the Oscars were held in a “no blacks” hotel. After accepting her award, she was made to sit at a segregated table away from the rest of the Gone With the Wind cast.

We would like to think that the Academy Awards have become more representative of our society since then, but of the 276 acting Oscars given since 1940, only sixteen went to black actors (5.8 percent). Seven went to Latin American and Asian American actors (2.54 percent).

What percentage of Americans are gay or lesbian? 

Some demographics are woefully underrepresented by Hollywood, while others are hugely overrepresented.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Brad Pitt wins first acting Oscar: Movies, culture, and the wisdom of Frederick Douglass →

Kirk Douglas died Wednesday at the age of 103. He was born Issur Danielovitch on December 9, 1916, in Amsterdam, New York. He changed his name to Kirk Douglas before entering the US Navy during World War II.

He was the only son of seven children born to illiterate Russian immigrants. In his autobiography, he reported that his father was a “ragman,” trading in old rags, pieces of metal, and other junk. As a child, Douglas sold snacks to mill workers and had more than forty jobs in his youth. As a young adult, he once spent the night in jail because he had no place to sleep.

He recited the poem “The Red Robin of Spring” in kindergarten and received applause, an experience that caused him to aspire to become an actor. After graduating from college and studying at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City, he joined the Navy in 1941 and was medically discharged three years later for war injuries.

He then returned to New York City, where he found work in radio, theater, and commercials. He became one of America’s biggest box-office stars in the 1950s and ’60s, eventually appearing in more than ninety movies. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1981, an honorary Academy Award in 1996, and the National Medal of Arts in 2002.

Douglas and his wife of sixty-five years donated multiplied millions of dollars to various schools and up to $55 million to an Alzheimer’s treatment facility in California. After a near-fatal helicopter crash in 1991 that took the lives of two other men, he returned to the Judaism of his roots and even celebrated a second Bar-Mitzvah in 1999 at the age of eighty-three.

President Trump and Speaker Pelosi were together again 

Media attention has been focused on Douglas, the growing coronavirus epidemic, and the continued controversy surrounding the Iowa caucuses. Meanwhile, a less-reported event was held yesterday in Washington, DC, that deserves our attention today.

Continue reading Denison Forum – ‘I am Spartacus!’: The death of Kirk Douglas and three steps to national healing →

Mitt Romney voted yesterday to convict President Trump of abusing his power. (He voted to acquit the president on the charge of obstructing Congress.) While the president was acquitted on both charges, Romney became the first senator in US history to vote to convict a president from the same party in an impeachment trial.

In 1999, no Democratic senator voted to convict President Bill Clinton on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice. In 1868, no Democrat voted to convict President Andrew Johnson.

My purpose today is not to respond personally or politically to the senator’s decision. Rather, it is to think biblically about the reaction to his action.

Many Republicans are voicing their displeasure at a decision they consider a betrayal of the senator’s party. Democrats are praising his courage in opposing a sitting president from his own party.

If the Republicans are right, Sen. Romney was wrong. If the Democrats are right, the Republicans are wrong.

None of this should surprise us.

“We must serve God rather than men” 

The rancor on display during the president’s State of the Union address is still making news. Commentators have noted that President Trump did not shake Speaker Pelosi’s hand before the speech (he did not shake Vice President Pence’s hand, either). Speaker Pelosi’s ripping up of his speech afterwards has become a meme trending on social media.

A Washington Post columnist noted that the exterior of the House end of the Capitol was covered in plastic tarp and scaffolding for repairs, which seems symbolic of our times.

Divisions in Washington reflect deep divisions in our nation. Whether the subject is abortion, same-sex marriage, religious liberty, or a host of other issues, evangelical Christians hold very different positions from religiously unaffiliated Americans.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Mitt Romney votes for impeachment: Uniformity, courage, and spiritual awakening →