Last Saturday afternoon, a gunman entered the School of Engineering at Brown University and killed two students, wounding nine others. Two days later, a physics professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology named Nuno Gomes Loureiro was shot multiple times outside his home in Brookline, Massachusetts, and later died from his injuries.

Late last night, police announced that the suspect in both shootings had been found dead in a storage facility in Salem, New Hampshire.

They identified the suspect as Claudio Neves Valente, 48, a Portuguese national. According to Brown University President Christina Paxson, Valente was enrolled at the Ivy League school from the autumn of 2000 to the following spring, studying for a PhD in physics. He had “no current active affiliation” with the university, she said.

Officials said they also believe Valente killed Prof. Loureiro. Both he and the suspect had studied at the same university in Portugal in the late 1990s, police said.

Initial findings indicated that Valente died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Police were unable to comment on how long he might have been inside the storage unit. No motive in the shootings has been revealed at this writing.

“His answer was faith in faith”

Frederick Buechner taught at Harvard Divinity School one semester, where he met a student who “said once that what he believed in was faith, and when I asked him faith in what, his answer was faith in faith.”

Buechner responded:

I don’t mean to disparage him—he was doing the best he could—but it struck me that having faith in faith was as barren as being in love with love or having money that you spend only on the accumulation of more money.

At the same time, I think I understand the student’s perspective.

Having “faith in faith” brings significant benefits to those who embrace it. They are able to connect in a way with transcendence beyond themselves. They are likely to engage in religious activities proven to enhance mental health, economic well-being, self-esteem, and empathy. They may be part of a community of like-minded individuals with whom they can share the challenges and joys of life.

And yet, when tragedies such as the shootings we’re discussing occur, they are untroubled by the painful questions such suffering inevitably poses for those who hold faith in Jesus.

A suffering child anywhere in the universe

Christians say their God is all-knowing, all-loving, and all-powerful—claims which pain and grief threaten every time they strike. If you knew these shootings would happen before they did and had the power to stop them, of course you would. Any moral person would do the same.

And yet the God of Christianity did not.

Atheism is a typical response to innocent suffering. As Sam Harris stated, a suffering child anywhere in the universe calls into question the existence of God.

But if you don’t want to go so far as to claim rather audaciously that God cannot exist, you can focus your faith on faith itself. You can believe in belief and practice religion to the degree that such practices meet your needs without needing to understand how the object of your faith could allow or cause the suffering and grief of our daily lives.

In fact, this is precisely what you might be doing right now.

An article I didn’t want to write

I intended to write a very different article this morning before news regarding the Brown shooting broke overnight. I didn’t want to have to think about this tragedy and did not want to talk about it with you so close to Christmas. I wanted to focus on something more uplifting and encouraging. And the compassion fatigue resulting from so much bad news in the news made it hard to want to focus yet again on the connection and collision of tragedy and biblical faith.

If you’re like me, you would rather not try to understand how to hold onto belief in an omniscient, omnipotent, omnibenevolent God in the face of innocent suffering. It’s not that you reject such faith. You would not go as far as Buechner’s student in claiming a mere “faith in faith.”

But you would like to leave the difficult questions regarding your faith to others and focus on the positives. You would rather I talk about the joys and traditions of Christmas, the inspirational and encouraging aspects of our shared religion. So would I.

However, this is only because I happen not to be facing such questions at the moment. The next time suffering and grief find me, I will once again echo the visceral cry of our Savior, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46, quoting Psalm 22:1).

“The suffering and the love are one”

So, today is not a day to ignore the hard question of innocent suffering. It is not a day to subconsciously embrace a “faith in faith” that leaves the heartbreaking perplexities of life to the side.

It is rather a day to admit that our finite minds cannot by definition understand the mind of an infinite Supreme Being (Isaiah 55:9). It is a day to be honest about our questions and struggles but then take them to the God who urges us to “argue together” with him (a literal translation of Isaiah 1:18).

It is a day to recognize that the greater our pain, the greater our need for a Great Physician. And it is a day to remember that faith in God, like all relationships, requires a commitment that transcends the evidence and becomes self-validating. In other words, the more we trust God when we do not understand him, the more we will eventually (and eternally) come to understand the God we trust (1 Corinthians 13:12).

Above all, it is a day to do the things faith in the God of Scripture calls us to do: Pray for the victims of these horrific shootings and all affected by them (cf. 1 Timothy 2:1). Trust tragedy when it strikes to the God who walks with us through the valley of the shadow of death (Psalm 23:4). And believe that he redeems all he allows and look for ways to be the hands and feet of Jesus in serving the suffering with practical compassion (cf. Romans 8:28; 1 Corinthians 12:27).

Such responses do not explain the unexplainable. But they offer something far better: the personal help and transcendent hope of a Savior who was born into our suffering at Christmas and has never left us.

To close with another reflection from Frederick Buechner:

“When someone we love suffers, we suffer with that person, and we would not have it otherwise, because the suffering and the love are one, just as it is with God’s love for us.”

Why do you need this reminder today?

Quote for the day:

“Because of Christ, our suffering is not useless. It is part of the total plan of God, who has chosen to redeem the world through the pathway of suffering.” —R. C. Sproul

Our latest website resources:

• Australia attack, Rob Reiner, Christmas movies, Candace Owens & football updates
• Do miracles still happen? A podcast interview with Lee Strobel
• A review of Lee Strobel’s “The Case for Miracles”
• Are you SAD? How to fight against the winter blues
• The real story of Christmas: The baby who was “from the beginning”

Denison Forum

Jason Bradley DeFord is known professionally as Jelly Roll. His song “Son of a Sinner” won three Country Music Television awards in 2023. The same year, he won the award for New Artist at the Country Music Association Awards. He has also made news for his weight loss of nearly three hundred pounds and was recently inducted into the Grand Ole Opry.

But his life story is even more striking than his musical talent.

He was baptized at the age of fourteen, but says around that time he began “dabbling” in drugs and stopped attending church. From his teenage years into his twenties, he was arrested numerous times and spent time in jail for felonies. He returned to his faith when he was thirty-nine and his fourteen-year-old daughter expressed an interest in being baptized.

During his recent conversation on Joe Rogan’s podcast, Rogan said to him, “You’re a totally new human being.” He replied, “You know what’s crazy? I don’t want to get super spiritual out of the gate, but I will because I think God wants me to right now because [of] you saying that.”

The singer explained: “There’s a Scripture in the Bible that says in Christ all things are a new creation, which I thought was interesting because it didn’t talk about restoring the old. It says that in God we are a completely new creation. You know what I mean? I was looking at it at first like I’m restoring my heart. But then, when you’re saying that, I’m like, ‘No, I didn’t restore my heart. I got a whole new heart,’” he said. “This is a brand new heart, Joe. You know what I mean? It might be cloaked as the old one, but God touched it. It’s a whole new heart, baby. It’s a different heart.”

Our greatest challenge and greatest hope

When I began teaching apologetics forty years ago, the question was, “Is Christianity true?” I taught my seminary students to defend the faith using evidence for God’s existence, the veracity of Scripture, the deity of Jesus, and so on.

In today’s postmodern, post-truth culture, the question is, “Why should I make your truth my truth?” In a day when user reviews are the currency of commerce, where people want to know if a particular technology or truth worked for those who tried it, the evidence most needed today is changed lives.

Here is where Christianity faces its greatest challenge and offers its greatest hope.

Our challenge is that Christians are supposed to live like Christ. We are intended to manifest his character in our world (Galatians 5:22–23) and his light in our darkness (Matthew 5:14–16), to be holy as he is holy (1 Peter 1:16). When we fail to live up to our truth claims, secular people understandably reject the relevance of our beliefs for their lives.

But this fact also leads to our greatest hope.

As Jelly Roll said, Jesus doesn’t restore your old heart—he gives you a new heart. He takes up residence in your life by his Spirit (1 Corinthians 3:16). As Paul said, “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me” (Galatians 2:20). It is “Christ in you” that is our “hope of glory” (Colossians 1:16).

Other religions try to help us do better—Jesus empowers us to be better.

“Take every thought captive to obey Christ”

Today begins the “seven antiphons of Advent.”

From December 17^th to December 23^rd, Christians around the world will focus on seven proclamations about Jesus as the Messiah. This practice goes back at least to the eighth century and perhaps even earlier than the sixth. These antiphons (short responses sung or recited in church services) are also the basis for the beloved hymn, “O Come, O Come, Emanuel.”

The first, being recited today in worship services, prays in English:

O Wisdom, coming forth from the mouth of the Most High, reaching from one end to the other, mightily and sweetly ordering all things: Come and teach us the way of prudence.

We are right to seek such Wisdom. Apart from Christ, our finite, fallen minds are “darkened in their understanding” (Ephesians 4:18). We can be taken “captive” by “empty deceit” (Colossians 2:8) and “led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ” (2 Corinthians 11:3).

However, the good news is that you and I have “divine power to destroy strongholds” so that we can “destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ” (2 Corinthians 10:5). But this “divine power” is not within our human capacity: “Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the Lᴏʀᴅ of hosts” (Zechariah 4:6).

Jesus promised that the Spirit “will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you” (John 14:26). This is just one way he gives us a “new heart” as we are “transformed by the renewal of your mind” (Romans 12:2).

Four steps to transforming wisdom

How does this work in practical terms?

One: Trust in Christ as your personal Savior and Lord (John 1:12). I never want to assume that people who do religious things such as reading (or writing) articles like this one are therefore “born again” as God’s children. If you’re not sure about your salvation experience, I encourage you to read my article, “Why Jesus?” and speak to a pastor or Christian friend about your relationship with Christ.

Two: Submit your mind and life every day to the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 5:18). This is a conscious decision to surrender your thoughts, motives, and plans to him. Then stay connected with the Spirit as you pray through your day, seeking his wisdom and direction as you walk in his presence.

Three: Name your decision or challenge and seek the Spirit’s guidance. Partner with him by consulting Scripture, speaking with Christian friends, and reading trusted literature. Know that God wants you to know his will even more than you do: “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him” (James 1:5).

Four: Share God’s word with your world (Romans 1:16). One of the best ways to learn is to teach. When we seek and speak biblical truth to the issues of our day, we grow in wisdom as instruments of wisdom.

The Scottish scientist and evangelist Henry Drummond observed:

“Willpower does not change men. Time does not change men. Christ does.”

How will Christ change your heart today?

Quote for the day:

“No mind, no wisdom; temporary mind, temporary wisdom; eternal mind, eternal wisdom.” —Adoniram Judson

Our latest website resources:

• Do miracles still happen? A podcast interview with Lee Strobel
• A review of Lee Strobel’s “The Case for Miracles”
• Are you SAD? How to fight against the winter blues
• The real story of Christmas: The baby who was “from the beginning”
• Netflix vs. Paramount fight for Warner Bros., Hollywood’s future, Spotify wrapped and college football playoffs

Denison Forum

“Ahmed was driven by his sentiment, conscience, and humanity.” This is how the father of a “hero” who responded to the Hanukkah massacre in Australia explained his son’s actions.

Ahmed al Ahmed’s father told the BBC that his son “saw the victims, the blood, women and children lying on the street, and then acted.” Video shows Ahmed running at the gunman, seizing his weapon, turning the gun around on him, and forcing his retreat. Ahmed was then shot multiple times and has undergone surgery for his wounds.

New South Wales Premiere Chris Minns said of Ahmed, “His incredible bravery no doubt saved countless lives when he disarmed a terrorist at enormous personal risk.” He added, “There is no doubt that more lives would have been lost if not for Ahmed’s selfless courage.” President Trump agreed, calling Ahmed “a very, very brave person” who “saved a lot of lives.”

Ironically, the people saved by Ahmed’s courage will likely go the rest of their lives without knowing it. Unless they could somehow know what the shooter would have done apart from Ahmed’s intervention, they cannot know that they would have been injured or killed if he had not acted with such selfless courage.

By contrast, Larisa Kleytman will go the rest of her life knowing that she was spared by the selfless courage of her husband. Alex Kleytman was a Holocaust survivor. He and his wife of five decades were visiting Sydney’s Bondi Beach to celebrate Hanukkah when the shooting erupted, and he was shot to death as he shielded his wife. “I think he was shot because he raised himself up to protect me,” Larisa said.

A threat that threatens us all

If you’re not Jewish, you may be thinking that such heroism, while obviously commendable, is less than relevant to you personally. The rise of antisemitism in Australia, while horrific and tragic, can feel remote to non-Jews in America.

But know this: to an Islamist, every person who lives in a nation perceived to support Israel is a potential victim of Islamist terrorism.

As I explained in my book Radical Islam: What You Need to Know and on our website, jihadists believe that the West has been attacking Islam since the Crusades and especially by supporting Israel, a nation seen as “stealing” its land from its rightful Palestinian owners. They also believe that because the West is comprised of democracies where the people elect their leaders and support their military, we are all complicit in this “attack” on Islam.

Since the Qur’an requires Muslims to defend Islam (cf. Surah 2:190), jihadists believe they are required to attack those in the West in order to defend the Muslim faith and people. As a result, what happened in Israel on October 7 and in Australia on December 14 could happen where you and I live today.

The year began with jihadist terrorism when an attacker displaying an Islamic State flag rammed his vehicle into a crowd in New Orleans last New Year’s Day, killing at least fifteen people. It is ending on the same tragic theme:

• Three Moroccans, an Egyptian, and a Syrian were detained last Friday over a plan to drive a vehicle into people at a Christmas market in Germany. Authorities suspect an “Islamist motive” behind the plot.
• The shooter who ambushed US and Syrian troops last Saturday, killing two American soldiers and one civilian working as an interpreter, is believed to have been an Islamic State infiltrator working as part of a local security force.
• Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said this morning that the gunmen who perpetrated the Hanukkah massacre were “motivated by “Islamic State ideology.”

This is a threat that threatens us all.

What Christians can do that no one else can

Responding to this burgeoning danger will require courage.

You and I may not be required to attack an attacker to wrest their rifle from them or shield a loved one and die in their place. But we have platforms of influence we can use to condemn the scourge of antisemitism rising in our time. We can support our Jewish friends with our personal encouragement and engagement. We can befriend local Jewish leaders and congregations and encourage our churches and other networks to do the same.

These are all steps anyone can take who has the character and courage to do so.

In addition, however, Christians can respond to this threat as no one else can.

The Apostle Paul described his former life: “I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it” (Galatians 1:13; cf. 1 Corinthians 15:9). Specifically, he was “breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord” when he sought the authority to arrest Christians in Damascus and “bring them bound to Jerusalem” (Acts 9:1–2). In this way, being “exceedingly enraged against them” (Acts 26:11 NKJV), he said, “I persecuted this Way to the death” (Acts 22:4).

But you know what happened to him on the road to Damascus. Now we can pray for our Lord to do the same in the hearts of jihadists around the world. Such intercession is a response no one else can or will make.

The next time we hear about a jihadist attack

What Jesus did to transform Saul of Tarsus, he can do to transform any jihadist terrorist anywhere in the world.

He is already appearing to Muslims around the globe in visions and dreams, sparking a remarkable spiritual awakening in the Islamic world. As the noted author and Middle East expert Joel Rosenberg reports, more Muslims have come to faith in Christ in the last half-century than in the last fourteen centuries combined. My dear friends Tom and JoAnn Doyle have documented this movement and experience it regularly in their miraculous ministry.

So, the next time we hear about an Islamist attack, let’s intercede for the victims, of course. But let’s also stop to pray for the attacker to come to Christ. Let’s pray for Jesus to reveal himself to this person in dreams and through believers. Let’s pray for Christians in the Muslim world to use their influence to demonstrate the “fruit of the Spirit” and otherwise manifest the presence of Christ.

And let’s pray for God to redeem the global crisis of antisemitism and jihadist terrorism by bringing millions to faith in his Son.

If Jesus could come at Christmas, I believe he can come again into any heart and life.

Do you agree?

Quote for the day:

“To have courage for whatever comes in life, everything lies in that.” —St. Teresa of Avila

Our latest website resources:

• Are you SAD? How to fight against the winter blues
• The real story of Christmas: The baby who was “from the beginning”
• Netflix vs. Paramount fight for Warner Bros., Hollywood’s future, Spotify wrapped and college football playoffs
• How can Christians face anxiety without losing faith?
• A review of “2 Chairs: The Secret that Changes Everything”

Denison Forum