Last night, Stephen Colbert responded to CBS’s shocking announcement that The Late Show will end next May. In his monologue, he cursed President Trump, called himself a “martyr,” and asked rhetorically, “How could it be purely a financial decision if The Late Show is No. 1 in ratings?”

Many are asking the same thing.

“They’re trying to silence people”

CBS stated that it was retiring The Late Show franchise for financial reasons “not related in any way to the show’s performance, content, or other matters happening at Paramount,” the network’s parent company. Advertising revenue for the show has dropped 40 percent since 2018. Fifteen years ago, a popular late-night show could earn $100 million a year, but The Late Show has been losing $40 million a year.

However, the decision came just days after Colbert accused the network owner of bribing President Trump to approve a merger. Since Colbert has been such an outspoken critic of the president, the announcement sparked speculation that the network might have pulled the plug for political reasons.

• Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders responded, “Stephen Colbert, an extraordinary talent and the most popular late-night host, slams the deal. Days later, he’s fired. Do I think this is a coincidence? NO.”
• Actress Jamie Lee Curtis said, “They’re trying to silence people, but that won’t work. It won’t work. We will just get louder.”
• Vox theorized that Colbert’s political slant had become “too dangerous for late-night.”

For his part, President Trump responded on Truth Social, “I absolutely love that Colbert got fired. His talent was even less than his ratings.”

However, ESPN and MSNBC veteran Keith Olbermann, himself a vociferous Trump critic, noted that if the network was pulling Colbert’s show for political reasons, they would not be keeping him on air until May.

Another theory is that the cancellation is just one symptom of a broader decline in late-night TV. Several shows like Colbert’s have been pared down or canceled in recent years. However, Fox News’s Gutfeld! averages three million viewers, 50 percent more than Colbert’s 1.9 million total viewers. While other late-night talk shows are struggling, Gutfeld!’s audience grew 32 percent in the last year.

“Amusing ourselves to death”

I would think that many evangelicals, especially those who are strong supporters of President Trump, have read to this point with a visceral sense of satisfaction. “Liberals” are losing cultural influence and platforms while “conservatives” are gaining both, or so it would seem.

I’m not so sure.

Studies show that younger viewers are turning to streaming, video, and social media, while older viewers are staying with broadcast television. Younger viewers lean left while older viewers (Fox News’ largest audience) lean right. So the story could be more about demographics than cultural transformation.

Therein lies the larger point I want us to consider today.

In his 1985 book Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business, author and educator Neil Postman warned that the television age has turned us from active citizens engaging complex social issues into passive consumers of entertaining sound bites. Digital technology exacerbates this trajectory even more today, since we can watch whatever we want for however long we want to watch it.

Since there is far too much content available for anyone to consume, we filter it by our preconceived biases. If we align ourselves with the “right” and hear that our audience is growing, we must be winning. And in a zero-sum partisan conflict, if we are winning, the other side is losing.

The media business is a business

Why is this a problem?

The media business is a business. Wherever those who make a living in this business come down on the political spectrum, they exist to sell advertising or otherwise make a profit. The more effectively they identify the audience they seek to reach and then appeal to that audience, the more profitable they become.

A platform or personality may align with our values, which is always encouraging. But we need to be aware that they are selling even so. They are entertaining and/or informing us as a means to the end of increasing their audience and revenues.

There is nothing inherently wrong with this, of course. In our day, media is a product like any other, intended for its audience’s consumption and its producers’ profit.

This scenario becomes problematic, however, when Christians confuse “winning” the culture wars with winning souls.

Malcolm-Jamal Warner drowns at age 54

There was a day when media, including late-night television, was politically neutral. I watched Johnny Carson interview political figures for decades with no real idea whether he was liberal or conservative in his personal politics. But today, when our partisan views are gaining in media advocates and audience, Christians can feel that the Christian “side” is winning.

I believe this to be a deception of the enemy.

He cannot have our souls, so he seeks to steal our witness. The last thing he wants is for us to share the gospel persuasively and passionately with our friends, neighbors, and colleagues. So he encourages us to substitute culture wars for the hard but joyful work of personal evangelism.

Our calling is to “contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 3). This faith alone, not any political party or partisan position, leads to salvation in Christ. For followers of Jesus, nothing should be more urgent than helping others know our Lord.

In fact, we have not a moment to lose.

We learned yesterday that Malcolm-Jamal Warner, best known for playing Theo on The Cosby Show, drowned while swimming on a family vacation in Costa Rica at the age of fifty-four. A military jet crashed into a college in Bangladesh yesterday as well; at least nineteen people were reportedly killed and over a hundred others were injured.

Every soul on our planet is one day closer to eternity than ever before. Including every person you will meet today.

To this end, I need to ask you a personal question: When last did you pray for the salvation of a lost person you know? When last did you share the gospel with them?

Why not today?

Quote for the day:

“God forbid that I should travel with anybody a quarter of an hour without speaking of Christ to them.” —George Whitefield

Our latest website resources:

• A cultural commentary on “Superman”: From modernism, to postmodernism, to metamodernism
• Epstein backlash, Christianity is growing, Chip and Joanna Gaines controversy & Scottie Scheffler’s introspection
• President Trump diagnosed with vein condition: The mystery and privilege of praying for our leaders
• A tropical storm, the “Big One,” and a Cascadia tsunami: A paradoxical way to confront our fears in faith
• What do Cal Raleigh and Superman have in common?

Denison Forum

To no one’s surprise, Scottie Scheffler won The Open Championship yesterday in convincing fashion. His victory was so dominant that, according to CNN, it left his rivals “awestruck.”

But it’s what happened before the tournament in Northern Ireland began that made global headlines.

Often called the British Open, it is the oldest golf tournament in the world. Its winner is crowned “Champion Golfer of the Year,” a title dating to the first Open in 1860. I have watched it each year for many years.

This is the first year I can remember when news preceding the tournament overshadowed the tournament itself. But that’s what happened last Tuesday.

Scheffler, the world’s No. 1 golfer, has won more tournaments and majors than anyone over the last three years. Nonetheless, in what the Associated Press called “an amazing soliloquy,” he said, “This is not a fulfilling life. It’s fulfilling from the sense of accomplishment, but it’s not fulfilling from a sense of the deepest places of your heart.”

He added: “I love the challenge. I love being able to play this game for a living. It’s one of the greatest joys of my life. But does it fill the deepest wants and desires of my heart? Absolutely not.” Then he asked, “Why do I want to win The Open Championship so badly? I don’t know. Because, if I win, it’s going to be an awesome two minutes. Then we’re going to get to the next week.”

He often says golf doesn’t define him as a person. In fact, he said if the sport ever affected his life at home, “that’s going to be the last day that I play out here for a living.”

Scheffler’s statements regarding the ultimate value of the game he plays garnered national coverage. An article in the New York Times even called him “Nihilist Scottie.” (A “nihilist” believes life has no purpose or meaning.)

Why would someone call him that?

And why is the question relevant for you and me today?

“My identity is secure forever”

The AP article asks rhetorically, “So where does fulfillment come from if it’s not winning?” The writer then answers: “Scheffler is grounded in his faith, in a simple family life with a wife he has been with since high school, a fifteen-month-old son, three sisters, and friends that are not part of the tour community.”

I have followed Scheffler’s golf career over the years with great interest, in part because he and our sons graduated from the same high school in Dallas. But primarily because I am deeply impressed with the way his faith influences his life.

He met his caddy, Ted Scott, at a Bible study. Last December, he co-hosted an annual retreat for members of the College Golf Fellowship, a faith-based ministry. Before winning the Masters last year, he stated, “It doesn’t matter if I win this tournament or lose this tournament. My identity is secure forever.”

Scottie’s sense of self is clear: “I believe in Jesus. Ultimately, I think that’s what defines me the most.”

But such faith is not what defines achievement in our secularized culture. To deny the ultimate significance of temporal success is “nihilism” for those who measure success only in this way. A person who values his faith and family above his golf career is therefore a “nihilist.”

What does this say about our culture?

When God is your partner

In a sense, the Times writer is correct: those who make Jesus their King should be nihilists with regard to anything valued more highly than their Lord.

Jesus was clear: “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money” (Matthew 6:24, my emphasis). As Os Guinness noted, “Either we serve God and use money, or we serve money and use God.”

Here’s the paradox: When we use temporal things to serve God, temporal things take on eternal significance and acquire a joy and purpose they could never possess otherwise.

Those who play golf for God’s glory find that they have God for a partner. He guides and encourages them as they play and shares their successes and failures as if they were his own. He endows their temporal work with the joy of the Lord and power of the Spirit.

This does not guarantee that they will become the best golfer in the world, like Scottie Scheffler. But it does mean that they will become the best versions of themselves. And every day they spend in this world plants seeds of significance in the world to come.

“Where there is nothing, there is God”

To be a “nihilist” like Scottie Scheffler, let’s make his worldview our own. He testifies, “I’ve been called to come out here, do my best to compete, and glorify God. That’s pretty much it.”

• He knows the place God has assigned him: “I’ve been called to come out here.” Like Scottie, you and I have a kingdom assignment uniquely suited to our spiritual gifts, life experience, and personal capacities.
• He knows the power by which to be effective: “Do my best to compete.” As sociologist James Davison Hunter has shown, serving with excellence is the key to cultural impact.
• He knows the purpose of his work: “and glorify God.” There is room for only one person on the throne in every human heart. We must choose each day to dethrone ourselves, submit our lives to God’s Spirit (Ephesians 5:18), and “ascribe to the Lᴏʀᴅ the glory due his name” (Psalm 29:2).

If living this way is “pretty much it,” everything else becomes nothing else.

The New York Times article calling Scheffler “Nihilist Scottie” makes my point. The writer later states:

The emptiness Scheffler feels between who he is and the game he plays does, in fact, have a place in his faith. Take a look at Ecclesiastes. Or just leave it to an Irish poet to sum things up.

As W. B. Yeats put it: “Where there is nothing, there is God.”

Scottie Scheffler would agree.

Would you?

Quote for the day:

“As modern people, we have too much to live with and too little to live for.” —Os Guinness

Our latest website resources:

• President Trump diagnosed with vein condition: The mystery and privilege of praying for our leaders
• A cultural commentary on “Superman”: From modernism, to postmodernism, to metamodernism
• Epstein backlash, Christianity is growing, Chip and Joanna Gaines controversy & Scottie Scheffler’s introspection
• A tropical storm, the “Big One,” and a Cascadia tsunami: A paradoxical way to confront our fears in faith
• What do Cal Raleigh and Superman have in common?

Denison Forum

Last night, President Trump directed Attorney General Pam Bondi to ask a court for the release of all relevant grand jury testimony from the prosecution of Jeffrey Epstein. Bondi responded that she is “ready to move the court tomorrow to unseal the grand jury transcripts.”

Mr. Trump has been under intense pressure after the Department of Justice (DOJ) released a two-page memo last week stating that Epstein left no “client list” of those involved in his abuse of underage girls. The department also stated that no further evidence would be released and no additional charges would be brought against third parties.

However, only 3 percent of those surveyed are satisfied with the amount of Epstein information that has been released; in another survey, 63 percent disapprove of the Trump Administration’s handling of the issue. House Republicans agreed last night to lay the groundwork for a potential vote calling on the DOJ to release material from its investigation of Epstein.

In totalitarian countries, this wouldn’t be an issue. What people want to know about their government doesn’t affect their government.

According to a recent report, 72 percent of the world’s population—5.7 billion people—live under authoritarian rule. When I traveled in Russia and China, I was told to assume that the government was bugging my hotel room and listening to my conversations. In my many trips to Cuba, I had to be careful never to criticize the Communist Party, or the pastors and churches we served would face persecution after we left.

But America is founded on the belief that “all men are created equal” and that our government should therefore be “of the people, by the people, for the people.” As a result, we are free to criticize our leaders and seek transparency in their actions.

Why are Americans so generous?

People are responding to the Central Texas floods with a massive outpouring of financial support and personal engagement. This should not surprise us: Americans are by far the most generous people in the world. Our annual private philanthropy as a percentage of GDP is twice that of Canada, four times that of the UK, and fifty times that of China.

What explains this?

According to theologian Peter J. Leithart (PhD, University of Cambridge), the Great Awakenings and other revival movements “fundamentally shaped the shape of the church” in America. This emphasis on the individual’s relationship with God stood apart from institutional Christendom with its clergy-driven liturgical collectivism.

In Leithart’s view,

Revivalism is the main source of the uniquely vibrant social activism of American Christianity. Temperance, urban renewal, prison ministry, abolitionism, and education reform were all energized by awakenings. . . . Thanks to revivalism, Americans donate a larger portion of their money to charities than any other people on the planet. . . .

Without revivalist Christianity, America would have rolled over and succumbed to secularism long ago. Without the unchurchy American church, we’d be so much more like Europe.

Religion is still at the heart of American generosity today:

• Those who attend religious services twice a month or more give over four times more to charitable causes than those who never attend religious services.
• Among Americans who have volunteered within the last year, three-quarters belong to a religious organization.
• The US states that are the most religiously active are the most generous; some of our wealthiest but less religiously active states are the least generous.

The First Great Awakening and the birth of America

Now we have a choice to make.

The revivalism that has produced sacrificial generosity has also shaped the larger American culture. For example, the First Great Awakening of the 1730s and 1740s made a huge impact on colonial society, encouraging the notions of individual rights that became embedded in our Declaration of Independence and US Constitution.

But absent spiritual renewal, our individual rights become ends rather than means. We engage in political activism to advance political agendas but confine our service to secular outcomes. We climb the ladder of individualistic faith only to kick it out from beneath us.

The reason is simple: Our innate desire to help those in need is a reflection of our creation in the image of the God who is love (Genesis 1:27; 1 John 4:8). However, our created character is deeply at odds with our fallen nature and our quest to be our own god at the expense of others (Romans 3:23; Genesis 3:5).

The good news is that Jesus can not only forgive our sins but remake our sinful hearts (2 Corinthians 5:17) so that we are “partakers of the divine nature” (2 Peter 1:4). His Spirit will produce the selfless character of Christ in every Christian who truly wants to be like their Lord.

Then, the more we become like Christ, the more altruistically and sacrificially we serve others as he serves us. The more secularized our culture becomes, the more urgent and unique our service. And the more we attract others to the Source of our differences.

Worshipping in my high school auditorium

When I was a teenager, I joined the Christian Student Union at my very secular high school. We met before class in the balcony of the auditorium, where we would pray and sing worship choruses. One especially inspired me: “They’ll know we are Christians by our love.”

Over the decades and across the six continents I have traveled, I have yet to witness a more powerful way to change the culture.

Have you?

Quote for the day:

“It is not how much we do, but how much love we put in the doing. It is not how much we give, but how much love we put in the giving.” —Mother Teresa

Our latest website resources:

• President Trump diagnosed with vein condition: The mystery and privilege of praying for our leaders
• Why pastors are especially prone to “Toxic Stress Load” and what to do about it
• Epstein backlash, Christianity is growing, Chip and Joanna Gaines controversy & Scottie Scheffler’s introspection
• A tropical storm, the “Big One,” and a Cascadia tsunami: A paradoxical way to confront our fears in faith
• What do Cal Raleigh and Superman have in common?

Denison Forum