“A massive Armada is heading to Iran. . . . Like with Venezuela, it is ready, willing, and able to rapidly fulfill its mission, with speed and violence, if necessary. . . . As I told Iran once before, MAKE A DEAL! They didn’t and there was ‘Operation Midnight Hammer,’ a major destruction of Iran. The next attack will be far worse! Don’t make that happen again.”

That was President Trump’s message to the leaders of Iran earlier this week, though it appears to have fallen on deaf ears. To this point, Iran and the US have passed messages through intermediaries like Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey, but it does not appear that they have talked directly to one another.

Turkey has taken a leading role in those mediations, and Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, arrived earlier this morning for that purpose. So far, at least, neither side appears overly eager to budge, with Araghchi using part of his time in Turkey to decry the European Union’s decision to name Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) a terrorist organization for their role in suppressing protests earlier this month. However, those looking for a diplomatic solution may have time, as President Trump does not seem to be in too much of a hurry to act, despite the threats he’s issued.

As of this writing, he has yet to decide on an approach, and that indecision stems largely from the reality that they don’t really have a clear picture of what they hope to accomplish. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has cautioned that regime change in Iran would be “far more complex” than what they carried out in Venezuela, and even there, they appear to be making things up as they go to some extent.

But if they’re hesitant to force a change in leadership, what are their goals? After all, the fleet they’ve positioned within striking distance of Iran was not exactly cheap or easy to relocate.

Four demands, in particular, stand out.

The terms for peace

President Trump’s first demand—and the one he highlighted in his Truth Social post referenced above—is that Iran not only put an end to its nuclear program, but also give up all of its stockpiles of enriched uranium. That may prove difficult, however, since the majority of that uranium is buried underneath the facilities that collapsed following the strikes last summer.

Second, Iran must “stop killing protestors.” He later added that “they are killing them by the thousands.”

While the Human Rights Activists News Agency, a US-based group monitoring Iran, has confirmed 6,126 deaths from the protests, that number does not include the more than 17,000 that are still under investigation or the bodies that were buried by loved ones secretly to avoid government desecration. And, given that the government continues to arrest its citizens for connections to the protest, both numbers could increase over the coming days. Ultimately, we’ll never know an exact number, but something in the tens of thousands appears most likely.

The third demand is perhaps even less likely to be achieved than the first. President Trump called for Iran to limit the range and number of its ballistic missiles to such an extent that Israel would be safe from further attack. Given that those missiles are largely considered to be the primary reason that Israel hasn’t already attempted a regime change in Iran, removing the threat is likely off the table for the Supreme Leader and his government.

Iran’s unwillingness to consider this condition for peace is one of the reasons why these ballistic missile sites are thought to be high on the list of potential targets should the US engage with Iran directly. Israel would, reportedly, be willing to assist in such an attack and has encouraged President Trump to consider going this route if he chooses to engage.

Lastly, the fourth demand is perhaps the easiest for Iran to accomplish: sever all ties with proxy groups like Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis. While the regime would be loath to officially cut off all connections with these terrorist organizations, the truth is that sanctions have crippled their economy to the degree that most believe they don’t have much to offer right now anyway.

Yet, as with the others, agreeing to this demand would effectively mark the end of the regime’s influence and respect around the region, even if some of the same people technically remained in power. As such, while a deal between the United States and Iran remains possible, it’s difficult to see where they can find common ground.

So, where does that leave us?

They don’t have the cards

Hopefully cooler heads can prevail, further violence can be avoided, and—most importantly—the lives of the Iranian citizens who have already suffered so much can finally start to get a little better. However, that does not appear to be the direction in which events are heading.

While Araghchi may not have begun speaking directly with his American counterparts, he has been quite vocal about what Iran needs to see before negotiations could begin. Namely, he stated:

Our position is precisely that pursuing diplomacy through military threats cannot be effective. If they want negotiations to take place, they must set aside threats, excessive demands, and the raising of illogical issues. Negotiations have their own principles and must be conducted on equal footing and based on mutual respect (emphasis mine).

That last part about equal footing and mutual respect is essential to understanding why this situation still has a high possibility of escalating into further violence.

You see, the US and Iran are not equals, and Iran has never treated America as an equal. To ask for such treatment now, when their army is already overwhelmed, most of their people have lost all respect and fear of them, and a military force far greater than they can defend against is parked just off its southern coast, is simply foolish.

It makes sense that Iran’s leaders would be hesitant to show weakness, but pretending they are in a position of strength when they’re not is only going to make matters worse for them. Even if their legions of drones and ballistic missiles pose a greater threat than what American forces encountered in Venezuela, those factors likely represent a reason for caution rather than genuine concern.

To use one of President Trump’s favorite analogies, in the end, they just don’t have the cards, and the world knows they’re bluffing. Unfortunately, that’s not a mistake limited to Iran.

Made in whose image?

Throughout Scripture, we find examples of people who lacked the self-awareness to see their situation objectively. King Belshazzar, whose celebration was interrupted by a divine hand scrawling a message of doom as the Persian army was taking his city, seems like a fitting example (Daniel 5). However, he’s not alone.

Generations of Israelites thinking God wouldn’t care if they worshiped other gods, the religious leaders in the Gospels who were so focused on keeping the Law that they rejected its author, and Peter taking Jesus aside to scold him for talking about dying are all good examples of this mistake in action.

The truth is that when we forget who God is, it becomes far easier to forget who we are as well.

From the very beginning, we were meant to find the essence of our identity in the fact that we are made in God’s image (Genesis 1:27). When our lives are submitted to his will and we see ourselves through his eyes, we don’t have to be afraid of the areas where we’re weak or flawed, because those weaknesses do not define us.

However, when we live as if we are made in our own image instead, strength—or at least the appearance of strength—can easily become foundational to every other aspect of our lives. And when that strength is threatened, everything else becomes threatened as well. Owning our mistakes and understanding when we’re wrong are simply not outcomes we can tolerate very well.

That’s an exhausting way to live, yet it’s the path many people choose to follow.

So, as we finish for today, take a moment to ask the Lord to help you identify any areas where you lack this kind of self-awareness. Is there a part of your life that’s built on a foundation other than your identity in Christ?

If so, today is a great day to repent of that sin and find real, lasting peace in your relationship with the Lord.

Let’s start now.

Quote of the day:

“Self-awareness is indispensable to seeing the lines between what you want to be true and what is actually true.” — Jonah Goldberg

Our latest website resources:

• Alex Pretti’s death, immigration tensions & how Christians can respond with Dr. Ryan Denison | Ep. 54
• A review of “The Body Teaches the Soul” by Justin Earley
• The Challenger disaster and the providence of God
• The Focus: Reason for hope after the shooting of Alex Pretti
• Finding hope after life’s detours

Denison Forum

Does the Lord cause all that happens?

Elizabeth Angle and Gracie Brito were high school sophomores and best friends in Frisco, a suburb north of Dallas. Last Sunday, they were riding on a sled as it was pulled by a Jeep Wrangler. The sled crashed and Elizabeth was killed; Gracie was critically injured and died yesterday.

In a Facebook post, Elizabeth’s mother wrote: “She was a bright light, a fun spirit, a brave soul. We loved her so much. She just got a car and a license and had her whole life ahead of her. It was all taken away so abruptly.” Gracie’s mother called her daughter “a kind and generous soul, full of love, affection, and warmth.” Her family said the days since the tragedy have been “unimaginably difficult.”

I cannot imagine these families’ grief and am so sorry for their loss. I am praying for them, asking God to be their help and peace in these terrible days.

I’m also praying for a mother whose three young sons fell through an icy pond Monday and died. And for the loved ones of those who died in the Challenger tragedy forty years ago yesterday. (For my heartfelt reflections, please see my new website article, “The Challenger disaster and the providence of God.”)

If God is truly sovereign, did he cause their pain?

If not, how can he be truly sovereign?

Either way, how can I trust him to be the Father I hope he is?

“So this is what God’s really like”

There is no biblical doubt that God is indeed sovereign over the universe he created. Jesus taught that not even a sparrow can “fall to the ground apart from your Father” (Matthew 10:29).

It only makes sense that an omnipotent being has the power by definition to do whatever he chooses to do. It is therefore unsurprising that the psalmist would declare, “Our God is in the heavens; he does all that he pleases” (Psalm 115:3).

However, I don’t want to believe that my Father causes all tragedy and pain. But just because I don’t want to believe something doesn’t mean it’s not true. And part of me worries that because God is sovereign, he must cause all that happens, including all death and suffering.

In this sense, C. S. Lewis spoke for me when he wrote after the death of his wife,

Not that I am (I think) in much danger of ceasing to believe in God. The real danger is of coming to believe such dreadful things about him. The conclusion I dread is not “So there’s no God after all,” but “So this is what God’s really like. Deceive yourself no longer.”

God’s sovereign choice to limit his sovereignty

However:

• Did God not choose to make humans in his image (Genesis 1:27)?
• Does being made in his image not include the same freedom to choose that he possesses (cf. Joshua 24:15)?
• Does God not then need to limit his sovereignty if he is to honor the freedom he gives us (cf. Deuteronomy 30:19)?
• Is it not an expression rather than a denial of his sovereignty if he sovereignly chooses to honor our freedom in this way (cf. 1 Kings 18:21)?

Consider an example.

Paul wrote that God “desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). Peter added that God is “not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance” (2 Peter 3:9). And yet not all people are saved (cf. John 3:18). To the contrary, “If anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire” (Revelation 20:15).

This paradox only makes sense if God sovereignly chooses to limit his sovereignty to permit our free will. As a result, though he passionately wants all people to be saved, not all are.

“His mercies never come to an end”

This discussion encourages me to believe that not everything that happens is the intentional will of God. However, let me hasten to add that he has both a perfect will and a permissive will.

Because he is sovereign, he must at least permit all that happens in his creation. From the sparrow that falls to the ground, to the Challenger disaster forty years ago, to the boys who drowned in an icy pond, to the teenagers who perished in a sledding accident, nothing can take place without his permission.

This fact leads me to close with mystery more than certitude, faith more than proof.

I don’t know why the God who permits disaster doesn’t always prevent it. He permits our free will, to be sure, but as with his miraculous delivery of Peter from Herod’s prison (Acts 12:6–11), he sometimes prevents its consequences.

However, as I noted in my website article on the Challenger tragedy, as a fallen and finite creature, I should not expect to understand the perfect and infinite mind of God any better than I do (cf. Isaiah 55:8–9). And the more I need his providence, the less I am likely to understand it, since challenges that call for his help are likely to be so difficult as to call into question his love.

Conversely, if I reject my Father’s love and grace because I do not understand them, I impoverish myself and forfeit his best in my life.

So I will pray honestly, “Remember my affliction and my wanderings, the wormwood and the gall!” (Lamentations 3:19). But then I will say:

This I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lᴏʀᴅ never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. “The Lᴏʀᴅ is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I will hope in him” (vv. 21–24).

In what—or whom—is your hope today?

Quote for the day:

“Sooner shall a tender mother sit inattentive to her crying infant than Jesus be an unconcerned spectator of his suffering children.” —John Newton

Our latest website resources:

• Alex Pretti’s death, immigration tensions & how Christians can respond with Dr. Ryan Denison
• Reason for hope after the shooting of Alex Pretti
• A review of “The Body Teaches the Soul” by Justin Earley
• Finding hope after life’s detours
• What is the purpose of the Board of Peace? Trusting God when we cannot see him

Denison Forum

Let’s step away from the news today to discuss the way we consume the news. The Guardian asks, “Are we living in a golden age of stupidity?” Here are some reasons for the question:

• American high school seniors’ scores on math and reading tests have fallen to their lowest levels on record.
• Dependence on AI tools erodes critical thinking skills, harms learning and creativity, and increases isolation and loneliness.
• Research shows that overuse of social media, video games, and other digital platforms impairs executive functioning skills, including memory, planning, and decision-making.
• Short-form videos have been conclusively linked to poorer mental health and cognition.
• “Brain rot” has become such an ubiquitous term that Oxford University Press selected it as its 2024 word of the year.

Andrew Budson, a Boston University neurologist who specializes in memory disorders, explains our problem: we are using technology for the wrong purposes.

“Their brains actually shrink”

Dr. Budson reports that “our brains evolved for social interactions.” As a result, “People who become socially isolated, their brains actually shrink, even if they don’t have a disorder, and people who are socially isolated are at increased risk of developing dementia.”

I would amend his observation to say that our brains “were created for social interactions” by our triune God, who is relational by nature and made us in his image (Genesis 1:27). Nonetheless, Dr. Budson’s point stands: When we use technology in ways that isolate us from others, we misuse our brains. And this is by far the primary way we use technology.

Right now, I am sitting alone in my study as I type these words. You are likely reading or hearing what I write by yourself as well. Even if you watch television or a movie today in the company of others, you are unlikely to be discussing or experiencing it relationally. Earbuds and headphones intentionally block out everything else. Screens we can hold in our hands keep our hands from doing anything else.

And research emphatically shows that such isolation causes our brains to shrink, lose neuroplasticity, and otherwise decline in health and function.

So the answer is to engage more fully with the world around us, or so it would seem.

Not so fast.

“A dangerous network of domination”

Henri Nouwen warned in The Way of the Heart: “Our society is not a community radiant with the love of Christ, but a dangerous network of domination and manipulation in which we can easily get entangled and lose our souls.”

Nouwen then explained how we become so entangled:

“Compulsive” is indeed the best adjective for the false self. It points to the need for ongoing and increasing affirmation. Who am I? I am the one who is liked, praised, admired, disliked, hated, or despised. Whether I am a pianist, a businessman, or a minister, what matters is how I am perceived by my world.

If being busy is a good thing, then I must be busy. If having money is a sign of real freedom, then I must claim my money. If knowing many people proves my importance, I will have to make the necessary contacts. The compulsion manifests itself in the lurking fear of failing and the steady urge to prevent this by gathering more of the same—more work, more money, more friends.

If being isolated from the world harms our brains, but engaging with the world entangles us in its lostness, what is the way forward?

“Loving a holy God is beyond our moral power”

In The Holiness of God, theologian R. C. Sproul observed:

Loving a holy God is beyond our moral power. The only kind of God we can love by our sinful nature is an unholy god, an idol made by our own hands. Unless we are born of the Spirit of God, unless God sheds his holy love in our hearts, unless he stoops in his grace to change our hearts, we will not love him. . . . To love a holy God requires grace, grace strong enough to pierce our hardened hearts and awaken our moribund souls.

1. S. Lewis would have agreed. Commenting on Jesus’ sixth beatitude (Matthew 5:8), he noted: “It is safe to tell the pure in heart that they shall see God, for only the pure in heart want to.”

So, the way forward seems clear:

1. Recognize our need for the grace by which God changes our hearts and transfigures us with his love (2 Corinthians 5:17).
2. Pray for such transformation daily as we submit to the Spirit who alone can sanctify us (Ephesians 5:18; Romans 12:1).
3. Partner with God by refusing conformity to the world and seeking the “renewal of your mind” in Scripture, prayer, and worship (Romans 12:2).
4. Engage in technology and other isolating activities while in conversation with the Spirit as he guides our minds and hearts (John 14:26).
5. Engage in community while in conversation with the Spirit as he speaks through us to draw us closer to our Lord and thus to each other (cf. Matthew 10:20).

In short, “practice the presence of God,” as Brother Lawrence famously advised. What happens when we do?

“Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lᴏʀᴅ”

The Bible reports that “Enoch walked with God, and he was not, for God took him” (Genesis 5:24). The Hebrew for “walked with God” could be translated, “continually conversed and traveled together with the Lord.”

The phrase is used of only one other person: “Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generation. Noah walked with God” (Genesis 6:9). I think the latter explains the former: because he “walked” with God, he acquired God’s character and thus was “righteous” and “blameless.”

But an earlier reference explains them both: “Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lᴏʀᴅ” (v. 8). “Found favor” could be translated, “received grace.”

So we are back to our pathway to God’s best: receiving the grace of God leads to walking in the presence of God, which leads to being transformed into the character of God, which leads to (in Enoch’s case and ours one day) being taken into heaven with God.

Will you pray for such transforming grace now?

Quote for the day:

“A Christian is never in a state of completion but always in the process of becoming.” —Martin Luther

Our latest website resources:

• Reason for hope after the shooting of Alex Pretti
• Finding hope after life’s detours
• What is the purpose of the Board of Peace? Trusting God when we cannot see him
• “Owning” Greenland and other legal fictions: Why do we seek to possess what can never be truly ours?
• Greenland explained, Indiana’s championship run, Iran updates, Minnesota tensions & Epstein files

Denison Forum

President Trump announced Monday that he was dispatching his border czar, Tom Homan, to Minnesota amid outrage over the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti by federal agents. He also suggested in a phone call with Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz that he is open to reducing the number of federal immigration agents in the state, the governor said after the call.

As you know, Mr. Pretti, a US Department of Veterans Affairs ICU nurse in Minneapolis, was killed by ICE agents on Saturday. He was carrying a 9mm handgun for which he had a legal permit. The Department of Homeland Security stated, “The officers attempted to disarm the suspect but the armed suspect violently resisted. . . . Fearing for his life and the lives and safety of fellow officers, an agent fired defensive shots.”

However, according to CBS News, video from the scene and witness accounts are “at odds with official statements.” NBC News reports that “some policing experts said the shooting appeared unjustified and one said it amounted to murder.” President Trump told the Wall Street Journal that the administration is “reviewing everything and will come out with a determination.”

Whom do you blame for this tragedy?

• Mr. Pretti, whom Stephen Miller, Mr. Trump’s homeland security adviser, called a “domestic terrorist”?
• ICE agents, whom critics call “inexperienced” and “minimally trained”?
• Mr. Trump, whom Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz called upon to “end this operation”?
• Gov. Walz, whom White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt accused of encouraging “left-wing agitators to stalk and record federal officers in the middle of lawful operations”?
• Democrats who, according to Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisconsin), “supported Biden’s open border, which created the mess that now must be cleaned up”?

All of the above? None of the above?

How do you know moon rocks are from the moon?

Unless you have information unavailable to the rest of us, my guess is that you are filtering what you read, hear, and see by what you think you already know. Your prior beliefs regarding Mr. Trump, ICE activities, and Democrats are likely governing your view of the present tragedy.

I’m not accusing you of partisan bias: this is how nearly everyone knows nearly everything they know.

I know that Minneapolis exists because I have been there personally. But I had not met Mr. Pretti, have never met an ICE agent, and have no personal relationship with anyone else in this story. How, then, am I to interpret it apart from what I do know and believe?

My two great-aunts were convinced astronauts never went to the moon, that the TV coverage of Neil Armstrong and the rest of it was staged to steal money from American taxpayers. When I asked them about moon rocks I saw in a museum, they asked, “How do you know they’re from the moon?” I hadn’t thought of that.

We learn new words by associating them with our existing vocabulary. If I told you my “mumblephump” was in the shop for repairs, you wouldn’t know if I was talking about my vehicle, my son’s guitar, or my grandfather’s antique watch, among other options. But if I told you that it needed a new transmission and a brake job, you’d know that I was probably using a strange word for a car. This is because you already know what “transmission” and “brake job” mean.

If you’re an average American, you know about six hundred people. The existence, character, and activities of the other 343 million of us are known to you only through sources who know them better than you do.

Why a greenhouse becomes bright

This matters because our “post-truth” culture has abandoned objectivity for subjectivity, so we have no objective means by which to test our biases. In a media world where subscriptions have replaced advertising revenue, causing outlets to focus on producing content their customers want to purchase, our biases become even more entrenched.

As a result, when divisive tragedies such as Mr. Pretti’s death occur, whatever their actual reasons, we have no way to achieve an unbiased understanding of what happened, much less what to do about it. And so our political and cultural divisiveness continues and deepens.

But there is a way Christians can be part of the solution rather than the problem.

Secularism leaves us with no transcendent hope since we have no source of help but ourselves. Religions across human history offer the opposite: a God or gods who do what they do independent of our agency.

By contrast, the heart of Christianity is the claim that Christ can live in our hearts. As Oswald Chambers noted, “The Holy Spirit will make all that Jesus did effectual in me.” C. S. Lewis agreed, writing in Mere Christianity:

The Christian thinks any good he does comes from the Christ-life inside him. He does not think God will love us because we are good, but that God will make us good because he loves us; just as the roof of a greenhouse does not attract the sun because it is bright, but becomes bright because the sun shines on it.

As God makes us “good,” he manifests himself in our minds, hearts, and lives (Galatians 2:20). We can have his wisdom by which to interpret the events of our world if we seek and submit to his Spirit’s guidance (John 14:26). We can have his compassion by which to love those who do not love us (John 13:34). We can have his character by which to demonstrate the radical difference he makes in our lives (Romans 8:29).

Asking your father for money to buy him a present

The key is to recognize how passionately our Father loves us and then to ask his Spirit to manifest his love for our Father in our hearts in response (Galatians 5:22). It’s like a child who asks her father for money to buy him a Christmas present.

When we love our Father with his love, we love others and ourselves in the same way. We then become the change we wish to see in our broken culture. And neither we nor those we influence can ever be the same.

Diadochos of Photiki (c. 400–c. 486) noted:

Anyone who loves God in the depths of his heart has already been loved by God. In fact, the measure of a man’s love for God depends upon how deeply aware he is of God’s love for him.

How “deeply aware” of God’s love are you today?

NOTE: Dr. Ryan Denison will offer an in-depth analysis of the recent ICE shootings in his weekly newsletter, The Focus, when it is published later today. I strongly encourage you to subscribe, which you can do here.

Quote for the day:

“The greatest honor we can give Almighty God is to live gladly because of the knowledge of his love.” —Julian of Norwich (c. 1343–1416)

Our latest website resources:

• What is the purpose of the Board of Peace? Trusting God when we cannot see him
• “Owning” Greenland and other legal fictions: Why do we seek to possess what can never be truly ours?
• Greenland explained, Indiana’s championship run, Iran updates, Minnesota tensions & Epstein files
• Faith and politics, yoga and Christian practice, salvation, and hope in a divided culture
• Is Greenland worth what it will cost the United States?

Denison Forum

A “generational” winter storm and the solidarity of our souls

If you happen to live in the geographical half of the country that was not victimized by a “devastating dose of winter weather” over the weekend, please permit me to reflect on the experience on behalf of the half of the country that was.

• Trees exploded in Minnesota.
• In the coldest areas, people were warned that they could incur frostbite in five minutes.
• President Trump approved twelve federal emergency declarations yesterday.
• Nearly 820,000 are without power this morning.
• More than twelve thousand flights were canceled yesterday.
• Railroad operations were disrupted.
• Twenty-three states and Washington, DC, declared a state of emergency.
• A meteorologist warned that much of the country would be “entombed” in ice.
• A writer in Austin wrote, “If I were to run, where would I run to? The cold is everywhere, all the way up to New York City.”

His complaint points to the point I’d like us to consider today.

Why YouTube is the most popular TV platform

A “generational storm” like this is one of the few things that unites us with other people. I got a phone call Friday afternoon from a friend in Pennsylvania who was expecting thirteen inches of snow over the weekend. Like us in Texas, she assumed her kids would not be going to school on Monday.

Apart from a storm system that spanned forty states stretching from Arizona to Maine, what else unites us these days?

Media has shifted hard to the left and right as paywalls replaced advertising revenues, causing outlets to cater to “passionate subscribers who want their worldview reinforced, not marginal readers.” The United Nations no longer unites the nations. The World Health Organization no longer encompasses the world.

Our political polarization has reached an all-time high. From abortion to same-sex marriage and LGBTQ ideology to euthanasia, a record-high 80 percent of us agree that we are “greatly divided when it comes to the most important values.”

In an insightful Wall Street Journal article, Ben Fritz notes that “for most of the twentieth century, pop culture was the glue that held the US together.” He reports that an estimated 200 million tickets were sold for Gone With the Wind when the US population was 130 million. In 1983, more than 100 million people watched the finale of M*A*S*H.

From the 1940s through the 1990s, three TV networks and seven movie studios decided everything we watched, while five or six record labels determined what we heard. Nearly everyone saw Jaws and Star Wars, Jurassic Park and the Harry Potter and Marvel series, or so it seemed.

Then came the internet, enabling everyone to make and stream video content, and handheld screens on which to watch it. YouTube is now the most popular television platform. As Fritz notes, this is “not because it has the hottest handful of shows, but because there’s something on it for everyone, no matter how mainstream or obscure.”

A photo of my father and his father

Disasters and crises can still unite us. If you’re old enough to remember 9/11, you also remember what it felt like to crowd into churches along with people who were there for the first time, to watch the president of the United States throw out the first pitch at a New York Yankees game, and to grieve with hundreds of millions of fellow Americans in the face of such horrific tragedy.

Think back to the COVID-19 pandemic and, again, the solidarity we all felt. When my wife and I ordered groceries online, drove our car to the store, and opened the back hatch so the masked store employee could put our food inside, we thanked them with a level of heartfelt gratitude I had not felt for a grocery store employee before.

My parents had similar stories about surviving Pearl Harbor and World War II, and my grandfather about serving in Europe during World War I. My brother recently sent me a photograph of our father in his war uniform, standing next to his father, both of them with prideful smiles I seldom remember seeing from either.

But the exceptions prove the rule. For people made in God’s image and thus for relationship, the atomizing fragmentation of our secularized society is devastating. The US Surgeon General reported that our “epidemic of loneliness and isolation” directly impacts cardiovascular disease, hypertension, diabetes, infectious diseases, depression and anxiety, suicidality, and self-harm.

If it takes a storm that endangers thirty-five states to unite us, what is our future as a “United” States of America?

The power of “a love genuinely lived”

Behind all that divides us, there is a commonality waiting to answer my question. St. Augustine spoke for us all when he prayed, “You have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless till they find their rest in thee” (Confessions 1.1.1).

Thirteen very disparate colonies in the New World became a united nation only after the First Great Awakening drew them closer to God and therefore to each other, then an existential war for independence forged their national cohesion. The reason subsequent national crises, such as world wars, terrorist attacks, and pandemics, have not sustained the unity they sparked is that they were not preceded by such a transforming spiritual movement.

Our first president was therefore right to identify “religion and morality” as “indispensable supports” to “political prosperity.” Gen. Washington’s assertion makes sense: If we are created and intended to love our Lord and our neighbor as our highest purpose and aspiration (Mark 12:30–31), we will find unity and cohesion in doing both.

I cannot imagine that the weather crisis gripping much of our country will produce a national solidarity that endures once the ice and snow have melted. But I can respond to the personal finitude and mortality this storm revealed by seeking greater intimacy with the Lord who still calms stormy seas. And I can renew my commitment to loving my neighbor by praying earnestly for spiritual awakening to transform my nation and then by sharing my Father’s love with those I meet today.

In Meditations on the Cross, Dietrich Bonhoeffer observed:

The world is overcome not through destruction, but through reconciliation. Not ideals, nor programs, nor conscience, nor duty, nor responsibility, nor virtue, but only God’s perfect love can encounter reality and overcome it. Nor is it some universal ideal of love, but rather the love of God in Jesus Christ, a love genuinely lived, that does this.

How “genuinely” will you live such love today?

Quote for the day:

“The real love of God does not consist in tear shedding, nor in that sweetness and tenderness for which we often long just because they console us, but in serving God by serving those around us in justice, fortitude of soul, and humility.” —Teresa of Avila (1515–82)

Our latest website resources:

• What is the purpose of the Board of Peace? Trusting God when we cannot see him
• “Owning” Greenland and other legal fictions: Why do we seek to possess what can never be truly ours?
• Greenland explained, Indiana’s championship run, Iran updates, Minnesota tensions & Epstein files
• Faith and politics, yoga and Christian practice, salvation, and hope in a divided culture
• Is Greenland worth what it will cost the United States?

Denison Forum

Where I live, we are less than twenty-four hours from a major ice storm that is predicted to shut down our area for days. Roads will become impassible; power lines may come down. Everyone is stocking up on food and preparing for the worst. Since most of us remember the “Great Texas Freeze” of 2021, we’re reliving the pain of those terrible days in advance.

Our situation is by no means unique: this system could end up affecting more than two hundred million people in the US.

It’s an odd thing, really, our collective impotence in the face of nature. You and I live in the most technologically advanced age in human history. The slab of glass in my pocket can access the world’s store of information gathered across human history; these words I am typing on my laptop will soon be transmitted to hundreds of thousands of people in every nation on earth. My home is more climate-controlled and electronically equipped than any home I have ever owned.

And yet a winter storm I can neither forestall nor shorten will dominate my life for the next few days.

Is my religion a placebo effect?

Think how people felt in earlier eras, when there were no sophisticated meteorological instruments to predict the weather and no electricity to light and heat their homes. No wonder every civilization known to history has worshiped some type of deity or deities.

When you’re facing forces you cannot defeat, it only makes sense to call for help from forces greater than yourself. If worshiping a god of rain and storms can protect you and your family from the weather, this becomes a “why not?” proposition. If such worship seems to correlate over time with better outcomes, you’ll likely codify your religious beliefs into religious practices.

I have personally seen some of the altars built by Greeks and Romans across their empires to their pantheons of gods. I’ve met tribal people in Southeast Asia who worship the elemental spirits they believe inhabit and control their natural environment.

And I prayed this morning to my God, asking him not only to guide what I am writing today but to protect my family as the ice storm approaches our area.

Recent literature has documented the positive outcomes from religious practices for mental health, social stability, and overall wellness. But these outcomes are natural, not supernatural. They can be seen as a kind of placebo effect; the consequences of wish fulfillment and practices that produce benefits by virtue of the activities themselves rather than the supposed deities being worshiped.

And there’s the matter of negative outcomes. It would be one thing if religious practices always led to positive results. If people were healed every time we prayed for healing or storms were diminished every time we asked God for such protection, a skeptic would be more likely to believe that an actual God was at work. But I have prayed for healing that did not come and protection that never arrived. So have you.

The fact that I believe in Jesus doesn’t prove Christianity to be true any more than a Muslim’s or a Hindu’s beliefs persuade me to adopt Islam or Hinduism.

So I’ll continue to pray for divine protection as the ice storm approaches, but with the knowledge that my prayers may not be answered as I wish and that many in our post-Christian culture see my religious beliefs as outdated superstition akin to someone praying to Zeus.

Proving you should have children

At this point, my career-long study of Christian apologetics can be helpful. I can cite remarkable evidence from history, archaeology, science, and logic for the existence of God, the veracity of Scripture, the historical existence and resurrection of Jesus, and the continuing activity of the Creator in his creation.

But a post-truth culture will likely listen to all of that and retort, “That’s just your truth.” If all truth is personal and subjective, even objective evidence for Christianity becomes subjective as well. And even a professional apologist such as myself must admit that no faith commitment can be compelled through reason.

All relationships require a commitment that transcends the evidence and becomes self-validating. You could not prove scientifically or rationally that you should go to a school until you attend its classes, or that you should get married until you get married, or that you should have children until you have children. You could not prove that reading this article is worth your time until you read it. You examine the evidence, to be sure, but then you must make a decision that proves itself by experience.

Herein lies my point today.

Making God a “spare tire” in my car

Unlike every other religion and worldview known to human history, Christianity offers the proposition that the God we worship can and will inhabit our bodies and lives.

Jesus is not just at the “right hand” of the Father (Ephesians 1:20) akin to Zeus atop Mt. Olympus—he is also living by his Spirit in every person who trusts him as Lord (1 Corinthians 3:16). He is not just “with” us “to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20)—he is also “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27). As Paul testified, Christ “lives in me” (Galatians 2:20) and we are “filled with all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:19).

Here’s the problem: When I relate to Jesus as transactionally as the Greeks prayed to their gods, giving him what I think he wants so he will give me what I want, I miss the essence of the uniqueness of the Christian faith. When I make him primarily a “weather god” in the face of an ice storm, or a “healing god” in the face of a health crisis, or a “wisdom god” in the face of a perplexing decision, I make him a means to my ends—a genie in my bottle, a parachute in my plane, or a spare tire in my car.

This is not the heart of Christianity. The beauty of our faith is that we can experience the God of the universe personally and intimately. We can know the joy and peace of his presence. We can walk with our Father through the “valley of the shadow of death” into whatever lies on its other side (Psalm 23:4). We can know that he is “with” us as we “pass through the waters” (Isaiah 43:2) because we are in his hand and he is in our heart (John 10:29).

We can pray for his help, to be sure. In fact, he encourages us to do so (Matthew 7:7; James 4:2). But at a level far higher and deeper than any transaction, we can experience life and life eternal in a conscious, abiding experience of his presence in the depths of our being, no matter what circumstances life brings us today (cf. John 15:1–11).

“The greatest human achievement”

I cannot know what “ice storm” you are facing today. But I do know that your Father wants to redeem it by using it to draw you closer to himself. Not just for what he can do for you, but for who he can be in you.

St. Augustine, the greatest theologian after Paul, observed:

“To fall in love with God is the greatest romance; to seek him the greatest adventure; to find him the greatest human achievement.”

What will you do to experience this “romance” today?

Quote for the day:

“Nothing in or of this world measures up to the simple pleasure of experiencing the presence of God.” —A. W. Tozer

Our latest website resources:

• Greenland explained, Indiana’s championship run, Iran updates, Minnesota tensions & Epstein files
• Faith and politics, yoga and Christian practice, salvation, and hope in a divided culture
• Is Greenland worth what it will cost the United States?
• Why the Buffalo Bills were right to fire Sean McDermott
• Are you SAD? How to fight against the winter blues

Denison Forum

President Trump announced yesterday that he was canceling his planned tariffs on US allies in Europe over US control of Greenland. The announcement came after he and NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte agreed to the “framework of a future deal” on Arctic security. Earlier in the day, Mr. Trump also stated that he was ruling out military force to acquire the island.

As Dr. Ryan Denison explained in Tuesday’s edition of The Focus, missile defense systems that form a primary deterrent against attacks on the US rely heavily on Greenland’s location. Melting ice caps have opened shipping lanes that were previously closed; Russia and China have increased their presence in the region. There are also significant rare earth minerals, oil, and hydrocarbon reserves on the island.

All of this argues for Greenland’s escalating geopolitical and military significance for the US in these fraught days. Nonetheless, Mr. Trump’s statement that he would not use military force or tariffs to acquire the island was met with approval. In fact, only 17 percent of Americans support the US taking Greenland; only 8 percent support using military force to do so.

Such reticence is understandable. A basic principle undergirding the world order is that nations are sovereign and that no country has the right to impose its values on another.

Let’s apply this thesis to the most urgent moral issue of our day.

What is the leading cause of death worldwide?

January 22 is the saddest anniversary of the year. More than sixty-five million babies have lost their lives in the US since the Supreme Court discovered a “right” to abortion in the US Constitution on this day in 1973.

More than a million babies in the US were aborted in 2024. This makes abortion the leading cause of death in America, far outstripping heart disease, the second-leading cause of death, with 680,981 fatalities. Abortion is also the leading cause of death worldwide: globally, more than seventy-three million babies were aborted just last year.

According to World Health Organization estimates, abortion accounted for nearly 52 percent of total deaths worldwide. Think about that for a moment: More than one in two deaths around the world were by abortion. If a disease was causing such horrific fatalities, it would lead the news every day. As it is, I would presume that you’re only now learning this.

At the same time, the world is facing an escalating demographic crisis. The global fertility rate for 2025 was 2.2 children per woman, the lowest level in recorded history. For the fourth year in a row, China reported more deaths than births last year as its birthrate plunged to a record low.

This matters because people are living longer than ever, meaning that fewer young people will be working and contributing to the support of more retirees. Over time, there will also be fewer people to buy goods and services, so economies will shrink, further exacerbating financial pressures.

Imagine the difference millions of aborted lives would make to this burgeoning crisis. You don’t have to wonder: according to the Joint Economic Committee of the US Congress, $6.9 trillion is lost each year from work that aborted individuals would have contributed to the American economy.

And there is a worldview factor here as well. A dear friend and I were discussing this issue the other day, and he noted that when people have no children or grandchildren, they are less invested in the future and more focused on what seems best for them in the present. As a result, they mortgage the future for themselves and everyone else as well.

When my room was bugged in Russia

Despite these global consequences, it is commonplace for Americans and even many evangelical Christians to respond to the abortion epidemic with the claim, “I don’t believe in abortion, but I have no right to force my beliefs on others.” I have heard this personally in conversations, radio interviews, and responses to speaking engagements over the years.

I understand the sentiment. When I was in St. Petersburg, Russia, some years ago, we were warned that our hotel was likely bugged by the government and that my roommate and I should not discuss our religious beliefs even in the “privacy” of our room. When I was in Beijing, China, I was permitted to teach the Bible only inside an international church closed to Chinese citizens. In Cuba, I had to be very careful to say nothing negative about the Communist government—even in private conversations—on the assumption that government infiltrators were listening.

To have the government or anyone else force their beliefs on us feels like an invasion of our basic freedoms. The same sentiment is behind the pro-abortion protester’s sign, “My Body, My Choice.” And it is behind those who advocate for same-sex marriage and transgender rights. And those who champion the “right” to death by euthanasia.

What makes abortion different?

Gandhi on “the true measure of any society”

In a recent survey, 96 percent of the 5,577 biologists who responded affirmed the view that human life begins at conception. This was not a survey of evangelicals: 89 percent of the respondents also identified as liberal and 63 percent as non-religious.

Nonetheless, their scientific position aligns with the clear declaration of Scripture. David said to God, for example: “You formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb” (Psalm 139:13).

This means that an unborn baby is scientifically and biologically just as human prior to its birth as after its birth. Consequently, it has the same scientific and biological right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” as anyone else. But he or she obviously has no way to defend themselves in their mother’s womb.

This is what separates abortion logically from all other “rights.”

Abortion advocates claim that pro-life proponents are “forcing” their beliefs on them. But is a woman who chooses abortion not “forcing” her beliefs on her unborn child?

Which of the two is more vulnerable?

At their core, criminal laws “impose” societal values on would-be perpetrators to protect those who would otherwise become their victims. We do this to defend those who might not be able to defend themselves.

Can a baby in a womb defend himself or herself from abortion?

Mahatma Gandhi reportedly observed,

“The true measure of any society can be found in how it treats its most vulnerable members.”

How would the “most vulnerable members” of our society “measure” you today?

Quote for the day:

“He who accepts evil without protesting against it is really cooperating with it.” —Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Our latest website resources:

• Faith and politics, yoga and Christian practice, salvation, and hope in a divided culture
• Is Greenland worth what it will cost the United States?
• Why the Buffalo Bills were right to fire Sean McDermott
• Are you SAD? How to fight against the winter blues
• Texas A&M University removes Plato from a philosophy course

Denison Forum

When President Trump takes the stage in Davos, Switzerland, later today for his speech at this year’s World Economic Forum, it will mark the first time he’s visited the conference in person in six years. He appeared via video conference at last year’s event to call for a quick end to the war in Ukraine and to foreshadow the tariffs and other economic policies he would unleash in the months to come.

Overall, the speech set the tone for his first year in office, even if it came in contrast to the theme of “Collaboration for the Intelligent Age.” And most expect today’s speech to fall along similar lines.

The theme of this year’s conference is “A Spirit of Dialogue,” and expectations are mixed on how much genuine dialogue will occur. A White House official said the president is expected to focus on affordability while calling on Europe to fall in line on both Greenland and the policies he will argue “propelled the United States to lead the world in economic growth.”

But while the world waits to see what he will say, it’s the meetings behind the scenes that could end up being the most significant aspect of the event.

The meetings that matter

President Trump is taking some of his cabinet’s most important (and busiest) people with him. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, and special envoy Steve Witkoff are all expected to attend the conference alongside the president. Their presence has many speculating that Trump intends to accomplish far more than simply address the world during his time in Switzerland.

Among those expected endeavors, the most important are thought to be:

• A meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, where some believe they will sign new security guarantees that could pave the road for a ceasefire with Russia.
• The first meeting for the newly formed “Board of Peace,” which has grown more controversial in recent days after a draft of its charter revealed its members intend to “secure enduring peace in areas affected or threatened by conflict.” That work would require a far greater scope and scale than simply facilitating the rebuilding of Gaza, and has many concerned that Trump is attempting to start a new NATO, but under his leadership.
• An advancement of conversations concerning Greenland, with the President speculating that “things are going to work out pretty well, actually. So, I think something’s going to happen that’s going to be very good for everybody.” Most doubt such a quick resolution is possible, but as I discussed in yesterday’s edition of The Focus, the ice-covered island is shaping up to be an inflection point after which America’s relationship with its European allies is likely to change in lasting and substantial ways, regardless of which path they take.
• Other international conflicts, like the evolving situation in Iran and China’s continued efforts to convince the world that it should be allowed to take Taiwan. It’s quite possible that the manner in which the Greenland situation plays itself out could have a direct effect on China’s willingness to advance on the much-coveted island near its own borders.

Against the backdrop of these geopolitical developments, the question of just what kind of world will be waiting for global leaders this time next year remains as difficult to answer as at any point in recent history. As a result, the conference itself has seen a similarly substantial shift in its focus.

The world has more pressing issues

Across recent years, the World Economic Forum has seemed primarily concerned with “high-minded panel discussions about climate change, caring for refugees, and the future of health care.” It was essentially a venue for the world’s elites to decide on the most direct path to living on the right side of history—at least as they saw it.

This year, however, that’s all changed quite a bit.

While climate change, poverty, and other social ills still have their place in the proceedings, the largest crowds and most significant interest are centered on artificial intelligence and technological advancement. Attendees aren’t really even trying to pretend that the social and cultural aspects matter to the same degree as before.

In short, the world has more pressing issues than climate change, and the conference’s content reflects that reality.

Perhaps that shouldn’t come as much of a surprise, though. After all, civilizations have prioritized their most immediate concerns for most of human history, and the people who didn’t were rarely given the opportunity to repeat that decision.

When used well, that necessary reordering of priorities can clarify what’s truly important in ways that a general sense of peace or security cannot. In fact, many of the most important theological principles at the core of how we understand God and the nature of salvation were codified for that very same reason, and we would each do well to apply that lesson to our own lives today.

God’s redemption of our desperation

Starting in the 300s, the church embarked upon a series of councils to clarify some of the most divisive and challenging aspects of understanding our infinite God. However, the vast majority of these councils occurred in the Eastern part of the Roman Empire, especially once you get to the 400s.

While the Emperor’s proximity in Constantinople explains part of that reasoning, the barbarian tribes that routinely invaded the Western half of the Empire played a much more significant role.

As the church began to discover, it’s far easier to find the time to debate theological minutiae when there’s not a horde of traveling armies attempting to burn your villages and kill your people. Consequently, the East had the margin to debate these issues while the West was forced to rely on the teachings that they’d always considered true, and then try not to die before they could put them into practice. And heresy was often less of a problem there as a result.

In the same way, the clarity we receive while in the midst of difficult times is often part of God’s redemption of those inevitable trials. Some lessons can only be taught when our focus is forced on him out of a desperate recognition of our need for his power, presence, and peace in our lives.

Our smaller problems don’t go away, but they can be easier to put in their proper place.

So, are there any issues in your life that have risen to a far greater place of importance than they actually warrant? Is God trying to get your attention and recalibrate your priorities?

Now is the best time to ask him.

Quote of the day:

“Our greatest fear should not be of failure but of succeeding at things in life that don’t really matter.” —Francis Chan

Our latest website resources:

• Faith and politics, yoga and Christian practice, salvation, and hope in a divided culture
• Is Greenland worth what it will cost the United States?
• Why the Buffalo Bills were right to fire Sean McDermott
• Texas A&M University removes Plato from a philosophy course
• ICE shooting, Iran on edge, Golden Globes & postseason football | Ep. 52

Denison Forum

Surprising virtually no one, the University of Indiana completed one of the most dominant seasons in NCAA football history with its victory last night over the University of Miami, winning the College Football Playoff National Championship game. But what you may not know is that faith was at the center of the game for many who competed on the field and on the sidelines.

• Miami’s head coach, Mario Cristobal, and his family are members of their local St. Augustine Parish.
• So is the family of Fernando Mendoza, the Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback whose epic twelve-yard run won the game for Indiana.
• His outstanding receiver, Omar Cooper Jr., calls himself a “Follower of Christ” on his Instagram bio; many of his posts include Scripture.
• Miami’s star quarterback, Carson Beck, said recently, “I feel like God has a plan in everything he does.”
• One of his top receivers, Xavier Restrepo, is public about his faith as well.

I could go on, but you get the point. Amid news that more Protestant churches in the US closed than opened in 2024, as supernaturalism declines and secularism advances, it is gratifying to see prominent people who make their faith in Christ prominent.

However, if you’re looking for encouragement to trust Jesus with your life, you don’t need to look to sports celebrities, well-known pastors, or even apologists like me.

The evidence is everywhere—literally.

 “Both religion and science are founded on faith”

In his Discourse Against the Pagans, St. Athanasius (died AD 373) reasoned:

It is right that creation should exist as [God] has made it and as we see it happening, because this is his will, which no one would deny. For if the movement of the universe were irrational, and the world rolled on in random fashion, one would be justified in disbelieving what we say. But if the world is founded on reason, wisdom, and science, and is filled with orderly beauty, then it must owe its origin and order to none other than the Word of God.

His argument raised a point I had not considered before. I was familiar with the teleological argument that moves from the design of the world to the existence of a Great Designer. If you found a watch on the ground, you would assume that a watchmaker exists. How much more complex is the world than a watch?

I was also familiar with the anthropic principle that notes how perfectly ordered the universe is to sustain human life as we know it. But I had not thought about the existence of the “reason, wisdom, and science” by which the universe itself is “founded.”

The law of gravity, for example, predated any presumed evolutionary movements by which an atheist might seek to explain the existence of life. This force even explains and predates the formation of planets and their spinning and rotational motions.

Electrons are similarly considered “elementary particles,” meaning that they are not made of smaller parts. Science has no explanation for why they exist, but without them, the universe would not exist.

As the eminent theoretical physicist Paul Davies wrote in the New York Times, “Both religion and science are founded on faith—namely, on belief in the existence of something outside the universe, like an unexplained God or an unexplained set of physical laws.”

“Harmonious, joyful, flourishing life”

The order that made possible the universe encompasses your life today as well. It is logically contradictory for a God of reason and love to create an ordered universe but then fill it with disordered, undesigned life.

To the contrary, as Tim Keller wrote in The Reason for God:

Unique among the creation accounts, the Bible depicts a world that is brimming with dynamic, abundant forms of life that are perfectly interwoven, interdependent, and mutually enhancing and enriching. The Creator’s response to this is delight. He keeps repeating that it is good. When he creates human beings, he instructs them to continue to cultivate and draw out the vast resources of creation like a gardener does in a garden (his emphasis).

Keller then noted:

The Hebrew word for this perfect, harmonious interdependence among all parts of creation is called shalom. We translate it as “peace,” but the English word is basically negative, referring to the absence of trouble or hostility. The Hebrew word means much more than that. It means absolute wholeness—full, harmonious, joyful, flourishing life (his italics).

As just one example, take a moment to consider the design of your hand, composed of twenty-nine bones, twenty-nine joints, well more than one hundred ligaments, thirty-five muscles, and a vast array of arteries and nerves. Your fingers have no muscles—they are moved by tendons threaded through them and attached to muscles in your forearm. Approximately a quarter of the part of your brain that controls body movement is devoted to your hand.

The vein patterns and skin creases in your hand are as unique to you as your fingerprints. Your thumb is so remarkably designed that Isaac Newton could say, “In the absence of any other proof, the thumb alone would convince me of God’s existence.”

If your Father can design your hand, think how he can design your life.

“I am happy that I didn’t sneeze”

In his last speech, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. told of the time he was autographing books in New York City when a woman stabbed him in his chest. X-rays revealed that the tip of the blade was on the edge of his aorta, the main artery. The New York Times reported the next morning that if he had sneezed, he would have died.

In his address on April 3, 1968, he told his supporters, “I am happy that I didn’t sneeze.” If he had, he would not have delivered his “I Have A Dream” speech, received the Nobel Peace Prize, or seen the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 passed.

Then Dr. King closed his message the day before he was assassinated with these words:

Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And he’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over. And I’ve seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land. And I’m happy, tonight. I’m not worried about anything. I’m not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.

Have yours?

NOTE: For more on faith, providence, and life purpose, please see my latest website article, “Why the Buffalo Bills were right to fire Sean McDermott.”

Quote for the day:

“Grace makes the promise and providence the payment.” —John Flavel (1620–91)

Our latest website resources:

• Are you SAD? How to fight against the winter blues
• Texas A&M University removes Plato from a philosophy course
• Will Iran’s government fall as protests continue?
• ICE shooting, Iran on edge, Golden Globes & postseason football
• How do I study the Bible when it feels boring?

Denison Forum

The Human Rights Activists News Agency said Sunday it has verified at least 3,919 deaths during a massive wave of protests that swept Iran in recent weeks, and fears the number could be significantly higher. Other human rights groups and insiders estimate that between twelve and fifteen thousand people were killed.

Demonstrations that began in late December have reportedly subsided as “an extraordinarily violent crackdown by Iranian security forces appears to have succeeded for now in driving protesters from the streets.” Foreign Policy calls the regime’s response “the greatest massacre in modern Iranian history.”

Why would a government kill so many of its own people?

How can it do so and survive?

Fighting the “Great Satan” and the “Little Satan”

The recent protests were sparked by an economic crisis that can be fixed only if Iran gets relief from international sanctions. This would require the regime to compromise on its nuclear and missile programs. Such compromise would obviously be in the best interest of the Iranian people.

However, these programs are essential to the government’s Islamist purpose: opposing the US (the “Great Satan”) and Israel (the “Little Satan”) to establish a “true” Islamic state that will hasten the coming of the Mahdi, their messiah.

In this ideological frame, Western pressure makes Iran’s case that they are fighting for the existential survival of Islam. Protests against the government are viewed as opposition to Islam. The regime is therefore willing to kill as many of its own people as necessary to survive. Like autocrats in Cuba, China, Russia, and North Korea, they claim that such sacrifices are outweighed by the ultimate benefit of their ideology for the collective good.

By contrast, our Declaration of Independence claims that governments “are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” This is why we are ultimately governed by laws, not people, and why we elect people to represent us in making and enforcing these laws.

However, while our system provides checks and balances on unaccountable individual power, its intended secularism cannot articulate those transcendent purposes and morality that lead to ultimate flourishing. The same governmental system that abolished slavery in 1865 also produced Roe v. Wade in 1973, leading to the deaths of more than sixty-five million babies in the US.

“Sanctity of Life Sunday” was observed in churches across the nation yesterday to remind us that the battle for life continues. And to call us each to do our part.

“Life’s most persistent and urgent question”

Service is the intended theme of today’s holiday. According to the Smithsonian, Martin Luther King Jr. Day is “the only federal holiday designated as a national day of service to encourage all Americans to volunteer and improve their communities.” As Americans pause to remember the great civil rights leader, we do well to remember the ideology that inspired him.

Dr. King stated, “Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, ‘What are you doing for others?’” He added,

Everybody can be great . . . because anybody can serve. You don’t have to have a college degree to serve. You don’t have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.

Where, however, does our fallen culture find such a “heart full of grace”?

In How Christianity Changed Civilization . . . And Must Do So Again, historians Mark Aquilina and James L. Papandrea outline seven “revolutions” birthed by the Christian movement that changed the world:

1. “A revolution of the individual affirmed that all people are created equal, in the image of God, and no one is expendable.”
2. “A revolution of the home affirmed it as a place of safety and love, where women and children are not to be exploited.”
3. “A revolution of the workplace affirmed that people are not property, that they must be free to choose their work, and that they must be given free time for worship, for artistic expression, and for the enjoyment of their loved ones.”
4. “A revolution of religion taught the world that God is love.”
5. “A revolution of the community taught people to love their neighbor.”
6. “A revolution of the way people thought about life and death rejected the culture of death and affirmed a culture of life and of hope, encouraging people to stand up for human rights.”
7. “A revolution of government set up the ideal that rulers should serve those whom they rule (not the other way around), and that all people should enjoy freedom of religion.”

In other words, when Jesus began saving souls and changing lives, he produced a movement of hearts “full of grace.” And this grace changes hearts and nations still today.

When an individual has “started living”

Albert Einstein noted, “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.” But when we submit our lives daily to Jesus in the “white funeral” that dies to ourselves and ask him to remake us like himself (2 Corinthians 3:18), we experience the “amazing grace” that changed John Newton and changes all who embrace it today.

I visited Newton’s graveside in England several years ago, where I found the epitaph he wrote for himself:

John Newton, Clerk, Once an infidel and libertine, a servant of slaves in Africa, was by the rich mercy of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ preserved, restored, pardoned, and appointed to preach the faith he had long labored to destroy.

If Jesus is your Lord, you have been “preserved, restored, [and] pardoned” as well. If you have submitted your life to him as your Lord today, you will “preach the faith” as an inevitable and empowering consequence of his Spirit’s work in your life.

According to Dr. King,

“An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.”

Have you “started living” yet?

Quote for the day:

“No one really knows why they are alive until they know what they’d die for.” —Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

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• Will Iran’s government fall as protests continue?
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Denison Forum

Why their rise could be bad news for believers in Iran

Open Doors recently released its updated list of the most dangerous places in the world to be a Christian. The top ten remained largely unchanged, with North Korea, Somalia, and Yemen continuing to hold the top three spots. However, Syria broke onto the list, rising from number eighteen last year to sixth in the latest iteration.

While there are a number of factors that go into Open Doors’ rankings, the primary areas they consider are the extent to which the nation negatively affects a believer’s private life, public life, family, community, and church. Syria ranked high—meaning persecution was rampant—in all five, with the threat of imminent violence tacked on for good measure.

In short, it’s become one of the most dangerous places to live as a Christian, and there are few signs of improvement. However, that is not the case for Syrians in every part of the country. And the reason why could soon prove crucial for their fellow believers in Iran.

Why persecution is rising in Syria

Open Doors notes in their entry on Syria that the pressure Christians face varies by region, with the Northeast generally safer and the greatest pressure coming near the Northwest and in the nation’s two largest cities: Aleppo and Damascus. When the new government took over following the fall of the Assad regime in December of 2024, they met with Christian leaders and pledged to become more moderate than their predecessors. However, that has not been the case.

The government, under the leadership of Ahmad al-Sharaa, instead established Islamic law as the foundation of the transitional constitution. While that should not come as too much of a surprise, and the nation’s leaders appear to still be wrestling with all that should entail, it has opened the door for extremist groups to expand their activities in several parts of the country.

As Jayson Casper describes, Islamist actors in Damascus and Aleppo “have called for conversion to Islam through trucks laden with loudspeakers in Christian neighborhoods” and “placed posters on churches demanding payment of the sharia-mandated jizyah tax (historically levied on non-Muslims) for those who refuse.” The situation is little better in the South, where Christians face the threat of theft and violence as some Muslim groups in the region “believe they have the right to loot non-Muslim properties.”

And while one local pastor remarked that Evangelicals enjoy “ten times” more freedom than they did under Assad, he also noted that the government is not doing enough to combat the extremist elements within the country.

Syrian believers are hardly the only ones to suffer as a result of a negligent government, though. Open Doors notes that “fragile governments” are one of the leading causes of persecution around the world, and that is particularly important to note given what may be on the horizon for their neighbors in Iran.

Is Iran next?

In this week’s edition of The Focus, I discussed the ongoing protests in Iran and why they could very well result in a change of government. While, as of this writing, it’s looking less likely that America will intervene militarily to support the marches, there’s also a chance they won’t need to.

The threat of American missiles has, for the moment, put an end to the government’s attempts to suppress the protests through murder—though mass arrests have continued—and the economic situation that sparked the protests is not going to get better until the sanctions on Iran are removed and the country can once again engage with the rest of the world market.

The UN sanctions—reimposed last September—could go away if Iran allowed inspectors to monitor their nuclear facilities. That would provide some help, but far more pressure has come from the United States. President Trump has been clear for months that Iran will see no relief until it completely dismantles its nuclear and ballistic missile programs, as well as ends their financing of proxies like Hamas and Hezbollah.

Without those programs and proxies, however, the government of Iran would abdicate the vast majority of what power they have left in the region, which is why they have repeatedly stated that they will not comply. As a result, their days as a regional—much less global—power appear to be at an end, whether that end comes through the government being toppled or through agreeing to essentially topple itself to remain in power.

Either way, the country is in for a great deal of change and, as we’ve seen in Syria, that change can create an even more dangerous climate for the country’s Christians. So, how can they prepare? And what lessons can we take from their situation that might apply to our own lives as well?

Finding peace in the Father

Christ’s promise in John 16:33 is one of the most commonly cited verses in Scripture, particularly in contexts where persecution or hard times feel unavoidable. In that passage, he tells his disciples, “I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world, you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”

The “these things” Jesus mentions are in reference to the warning that an hour was coming when his followers would be scattered and abandon him. That’s not exactly something I would find peace in hearing, were I in the disciples’ place. However, the warning was accompanied by the promise that, even when the disciples deserted him, the Father would not (John 16:32).

I’m sure Jesus would have loved to be able to count on his disciples in those final moments before his arrest and crucifixion. He even asked as much of them in the Garden when he requested that they keep watch while he prayed because his soul was “very sorrowful, even to death” (Mark 14:34).

He didn’t need his disciples in those final moments, though, because he had the Father. And the same is true for each of us.

Ideally, when tough times come, you’ll be able to face them with the love and support of friends and family. That’s God’s will for the Body of Christ, but it would be naïve to think that it will always happen that way.

A time will come when people will fail you, just as there are times when you will inevitably fail other people. That’s just part of being human.

When that happens, will you focus on the shortcomings of others or on the presence and faithfulness of your heavenly Father? Jesus was clear that only the latter can grant us peace.

So, whether you find yourself facing persecution on account of your faith or simply going through a rough patch in life, remember that there’s nothing wrong with looking to others for help. It could be that God will bring people into your life or equip those already present with precisely what you need. However, no person can ever take the place of the Lord, and he is the only one who can provide the peace required to remain faithful during those times.

Where do you need that peace today?

Quote of the day:

“Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through the experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, vision cleared, ambition inspired, and success achieved.” —Helen Keller

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Denison Forum

A Free Press article published this week by geopolitical analysts Matt Pottinger and Roy Eakin begins:

If its first days are anything to go by, 2026 may end up the most pivotal year in geopolitics since 1989, a hinge point that began in a moment of geopolitical calm but ended with the collapse of the Iron Curtain.

Within a few years, the Soviet Union had fallen, the European Union had been born, and an era of hyper-globalized trade took off on the wings of NAFTA and the WTO (World Trade Organization). This year could be equally pivotal—only this time with a vaster range of possible outcomes for world order.

According to the article, a positive reading of such “outcomes” would include the fall of the Iranian regime, which “would deal a major setback to Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin’s geostrategic ambitions.” Since Iran is “the de facto proxy for Beijing and Moscow in the Middle East,” they have provided significant support to it as well as several of Iran’s proxies following the start of the war on Israel. Iran, in turn, has supplied drones that Russia uses against Ukraine and oil imports to China. The article suggests that the fall of Tehran could even trigger the destabilization of Beijing itself.

However, the writers state that a negative reading would include the destabilization of NATO over the Trump administration’s designs for Greenland, which could invite Moscow to take military action beyond Ukraine. And the article points to China’s escalating pressure against Taiwan, warning that “if Taiwan does fall, the economic and geopolitical shock to world order would be immense.”

The island nation is tied to American power in the region supporting Japan, South Korea, Australia, and much of Southeast Asia. And since “nearly all the world’s most advanced chips are made in Taiwan,” if China seized control of this supply chain, it would “effectively hold a ‘kill switch’ on American ambitions to lead the AI revolution as well as its ability to compete economically and militarily.”

“I prefer to be true to myself”

How are we to manage our emotional and relational health in a world that seems to whipsaw daily between cataclysmic crises?

According to journalist Sasha Chapin, “congruence” is essential here. Citing the famed psychologist Carl Rogers, he describes it “roughly” as “a state of unity between your experience, your self-concept, and your outward behavior.” In such a state, you “agree with what you’re doing with your time,” refuse falsehoods you attempt to project to others and yourself, and live at peace with who and what you are.

Frederick Douglass offered an example, stating: “I prefer to be true to myself, even at the hazard of incurring the ridicule of others.” Living in this way elevates us above the maelstrom of media alarmism and political fervor. According to Chapin, we center on our “inner authority” with integrity and integration.

But aspiring to such holistic health is one thing; achieving it is another.

“We must obey God rather than men”

Simon Peter of the Gospels might be the least congruent person in the New Testament.

On his good days, he is walking on the stormy sea to Jesus (Matthew 14:28–29), proclaiming him “the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Matthew 16:16), and promising that he will “never fall away” from following his Lord (Matthew 26:33). On his bad days, he is speaking when he should be silent (Matthew 17:4–5), sleeping when he should be praying (Matthew 26:40), and denying Jesus to a “servant girl” (Matthew 26:69–72).

Then came Pentecost and the gift by which Peter was “filled with the Holy Spirit” (Acts 2:4). The next thing we know, the fearful fisherman is preaching the gospel and leading thousands to Christ (vv. 14–41). He is being used to heal the lame (Acts 3:1–10) and giving the glory to Jesus (vv. 11–26). He is proclaiming the necessity of faith in Christ to the very rulers who crucified his Lord (Acts 4:12) and boldly testifying, “We must obey God rather than men” (Acts 5:29).

He ends up pastoring the church in Rome (cf. 1 Peter 5:13) and writing two letters of the New Testament. The largest cathedral of the largest church in the world stands over his traditional gravesite. His faith and life were so congruent that he chose execution over denying Jesus but asked that he be crucified upside down since he was not worthy to die in the same manner as his Lord (cf. 1 Clement and Eusebius’s Ecclesiastical History).

Now the same Spirit who transformed Peter stands ready to do the same in us.

“The instrument through which you see God”

A dear friend recently suggested that I read Living Fearless: Exchanging the Lies of the World for the Liberating Truth of God. The author, Jamie Winship, is a former police officer who spent nearly thirty years serving Christ in the Muslim world. His practical guide invites us to experience God’s best for our lives by asking our Lord to:

• Show us where we are not living in truth.
• Expose the false identity that enslaves us.
• Reveal to us our true identity in his eyes and grace.
• Ask him what he wants us to do today in relation to this identity, then pay attention as he speaks through his Spirit, his word, our circumstances, and the people around us.

His inspiring book is filled with examples of God’s miraculous responses to these prayers. As Winship shows, our Father wants to speak to his children. He wants us to walk with him as Enoch “walked” with him before God “took him” home (Genesis 5:24).

When we say to God, “With my whole heart I seek you” (Psalm 119:10), we can pray, “Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law” (v. 18).

Oswald Chambers noted, “Whether or not I hear God’s call depends upon the state of my ears; and what I hear depends upon my disposition.” C. S. Lewis similarly explained that God “shows himself” to us as we are able to receive his revelation:

In other sciences, the instruments you use are things external to yourself (things like microscopes and telescopes), [but] the instrument through which you see God is your whole self. And if a man’s self is not kept clean and bright, his glimpse of God will be blurred—like the Moon seen through a dirty telescope.

How “clean and bright” is your soul today?

Quote for the day: 

“God speaks in the silence of the heart. Listening is the beginning of prayer.” —Mother Teresa

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• How do Christians stay human in an age of AI, anxiety, and division?

Denison Forum

There is anger on both sides of the aisle this morning.

The right is angry with former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton after they refused to comply yesterday with a congressional subpoena to testify in an investigation into Jeffrey Epstein. They published a letter to House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer calling his committee’s attempts “legally invalid.” In response, Mr. Comer said he’ll begin contempt of Congress proceedings against them next week.

The left is angry with the Trump administration after the Justice Department opened a criminal investigation into Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome H. Powell. Prosecutors are looking into the central bank’s renovation of its Washington headquarters and whether Mr. Powell lied to Congress about the scope of the project. However, critics believe the action is intended by the administration to pressure the central bank to aggressively cut interest rates.

Whatever our partisan beliefs, both stories illustrate the significance of checks and balances in a democracy.

Congress must be able to investigate current and former presidents so as to hold them accountable to the law. The Federal Reserve was similarly created by Congress in 1913 as an independent agency so it could set interest rates without political interference from Congress or the White House. According to the Brookings Institution, “Central banks in nearly all major capitalist democracies are similarly insulated.” The article explains that politicians could otherwise lower interest rates now at the expense of greater inflation in the future, harming the overall economy.

“The wicked boasts of the desires of his soul”

Forging systems of accountability is not only politically wise but biblically realistic. The psalmist lamented:

The wicked boasts of the desires of his soul, and the one greedy for gain curses and renounces the Lᴏʀᴅ. In the pride of his face the wicked does not seek him; all his thoughts are, ‘There is no God.” . . . He says in his heart, “I shall not be moved; throughout all generations I shall not meet adversity” (Psalm 10:3–4, 6).

As a result,

He sits in ambush in the villages; in hiding places he murders the innocent. His eyes stealthily watch for the helpless; he lurks in ambush like a lion in his thicket; he lurks that he may seize the poor; he seizes the poor when he draws him into his net (vv. 8–9).

All the while, “He says in his heart, ‘God has forgotten, he has hidden his face, he will never see it’” (v. 11).

The psalmist therefore prayed, “Arise, O Lᴏʀᴅ; O God, lift up your hand; forget not the afflicted. . . . Break the arm of the wicked and evildoer; call his wickedness to account till you find none” (vv. 12, 15). He can ask this because “the Lᴏʀᴅ is king forever and ever” (v. 16) and will “do justice to the fatherless and the oppressed, so that man who is of the earth may strike terror no more” (v. 18).

In other words, God provides accountability for the actions of those who are otherwise unaccountable for their crimes. He often does so in this world, such as his judgments against wicked kings in the Old Testament and rulers in the New (cf. Acts 12:20–23). But he always does so in the next world, assuring us that “vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord” (Romans 12:19, quoting Deuteronomy 32:35).

“We have no reason to be angry”

Is God justified in holding us accountable for our actions in this way? After all, his word states that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).

However, as St. Basil the Great (AD 330–79) observed,

We have already received from God the ability to fulfill all his commands. We have then no reason to resent them, as if something beyond our capacity were being asked of us. We have no reason either to be angry, as if we had to pay back more than we had received. When we use this ability in a right and fitting way, we lead a life of virtue and holiness. But if we misuse it, we fall into sin.

This makes sense: God cannot be just and judge us for sins we had no ability not to commit. My voice professor in college was frustrated that I did not sing Italian arias as he wanted, but his (unjust) reprobation could not change the capacities (or lack thereof) of my voice.

At the same time, does trying harder really produce holiness?

“Far more abundantly than all that we ask or think”

John warned us, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8). From David, a man after God’s “heart” (Acts 13:22), to Paul, the greatest theologian in history, all have struggled with temptation and the sin nature of fallen humanity (cf. Romans 7:21–24).

The answer is found in the logic of grace:

• God holds us accountable to his highest intentions for us because this honors his holiness and leads to our best (1 Peter 1:15–16).
• At the same time, he knows that we are unable to achieve this standard in our fallen capacities (cf. James 3:2).
• So his Son died to pay the debt for our sins so his Spirit can now indwell us and empower us to be like Christ (Romans 8:29).

As Paul testified, God is “able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us” (Ephesians 3:20). The apostle testified that he served Jesus by “struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me” (Colossians 1:29). Struggling translates a Greek word meaning to “do one’s best to compete and win a battle.” But Paul did this with all his energy—“according to all God’s action and power”—which God powerfully works within me this very moment.

Thus, we should say with the Anglican Book of Common Prayer, “Save thy servant, that hath none / Help nor hope but thee alone.” But we should also “work heartily in all we do, as for the Lord and not for men” (Colossians 3:23).

As we work, God works. As we give our best, God gives his best.

Consequently, as I noted on Monday, you and I are as much like Jesus as we want to be today.

Imagine a world like this

Imagine a world filled with Christians living in the holiness of Jesus by the power of Jesus. Imagine the impact on evangelism and missions, war and crime, poverty, racism, and injustice.

Such a world and nothing less is what God wants for and through each of us.

Is this what you want today?

Quote for the day:

“One does not surrender a life in an instant. That which is lifelong can only be surrendered in a lifetime.” —Elisabeth Elliot

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• A review of Lee Strobel’s “The Case for Miracles”

Denison Forum

Greenland is the world’s largest island. However, until recent months, I don’t remember seeing even a single headline about it in the news.

Now it’s hard to miss them.

President Trump recently told reporters at the White House, “We are going to do something on Greenland, whether they like it or not, because if we don’t do it, Russia or China will take over Greenland, and we’re not going to have Russia or China as a neighbor.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the administration’s goal is to buy the island from Denmark. The US could also boost its military presence in Greenland. Or it could take the island by force, but since the semiautonomous region is part of NATO ally Denmark, such an invasion could imperil NATO itself.

Why such interest in a sparsely inhabited island three thousand miles from the US?

“Greenland matters because the Arctic matters”

According to the Trump administration, Greenland is now critical to Western security. Vice President JD Vance said last week, “The entire missile-defense infrastructure is partially dependent on Greenland.” Opinion columnist John Mac Ghlionn agreed, writing in the Hill:

Greenland matters because the Arctic matters. Melting ice has turned what was once a frozen buffer into a contested corridor. Shipping lanes are emerging. Subsea cables snake across the ocean floor. Missile paths shorten. Surveillance gaps narrow. Russia knows this. China knows this. Both are investing heavily in Arctic presence, infrastructure, and influence. The US can either treat Greenland as a distant curiosity or as what it actually is: a forward position in a region that will define future power balances.

Whatever our view of this issue, it highlights the fact that any nation’s first concern is and will always be with national security. But nothing we do can secure us perfectly. Government strategists thought our massive naval installation at Pearl Harbor would protect us from war, not cause us to enter it. We thought our oceans and superpower military might would protect us from homeland invasion until 9/11 proved us wrong.

There is ultimately only one answer to our perennial quest for security. I’ll warn you in advance that you may find my proposal simplistic and naïve. But as I’ll try to explain, that’s precisely the problem.

“You give help to those in peril”

Many readers of the New Testament know that Matthew wrote his Gospel to persuade the Jews that Jesus was their Messiah. What we might miss, however, is the fact that he needed to show Jesus to be their only Messiah.

False messiahs were common in the day. The New Testament refers to three of them: Theudas (Acts 5:36), Judah the Galilean (v. 37), and an unnamed Egyptian (Acts 21:38). However, in Matthew 9 alone, the writer documents five acts Jesus performed that only the true and divine Messiah could accomplish:

• He forgave a paralytic’s sins and healed his body as proof (vv. 1–8).
• He healed a woman who had been sick for twelve years and whose disease had been incurable (vv. 20–22; Mark 5:26).
• He raised a dead girl to life (Matthew 9:25).
• He healed two blind men (vv. 27–31).
• He exorcised a demon, thus healing a man who had been mute (vv. 32–33).

In other words, Jesus did what only Jesus could do. Now he wants to do the same for us and through us.

Around AD 95, Clement of Rome wrote an epistle to the Corinthians in which he included this prayer:

You are the God of all flesh. You behold what is hidden in the depths, you see all that men do. You give help to those in peril and rescue to those without hope. . . .

By your acts you made visible the everlasting structure of the universe and set the earth on its foundations. For all generations you have been faithful and just in your judgments and wonderful in your power and majesty. Wisely you have created, and wisely you have kept things in being. All that we see shows your goodness; to all who trust in you, you are faithful, kind, and merciful.

Clement therefore asked:

Come, Lord, let your face shine upon us so that we may peacefully enjoy all good things. May your powerful hand be a roof over our heads and may your strength preserve us from all wrongdoing. Free us, Lord, from those who hate us without cause. Give peace and harmony to us and to all the inhabitants of the earth, as you gave them to our fathers who called on you with trust and faith.

You alone can give us these gifts and confer these favors on us.

Why should we make Clement’s prayer ours today?

“Neither shall they learn war anymore”

Our God has the power to defeat the mightiest of armies (cf. 2 Chronicles 20:1–30) and rulers (cf. Acts 12:1–24). We can ask him for security only he can provide (Psalm 4:8), then trust him to walk with us through our gravest dangers (Isaiah 43:1–3) and redeem them for his glory and our good (cf. Romans 8:28; Philippians 1:6).

But we can also ask him to change the hearts of those who endanger our world.

What God did in Nineveh, he has the power to do in any nation (Jonah 3). If he could turn Constantine the Great to himself and the Roman Empire with him, he can turn any ruler and any empire from war to peace.

However, as John Wesley once observed, “God does nothing but in answer to prayer.” He may have had James’ admonition in mind: “You do not have, because you do not ask” (James 4:2).

Would God do more to prevent war and advance peace in our fractured world if only his people would ask him to?

Right now you may be thinking that this is too simplistic, that asking God to bring the warmongers of our time to repentance and peace to our planet is naïve. But is it? One day, God “shall decide disputes for many peoples,” and “nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore” (Isaiah 2:4).

Could our intercession bring that day one day closer to this day?

And could our prayers for peace draw our hearts closer to the Prince of Peace who still calms the storms of our souls?

The way we answer our questions will determine their answers today.

Quote for the day:

“All the peace and favor of the world cannot calm a troubled heart; but where this peace is which Christ gives, all the trouble and disquiet of the world cannot disturb it.” —Robert Leighton (1613–84)

Our latest website resources:

• Who is Nick Fuentes, and why do you need to know?
• Venezuela, 2026 culture predictions, Tim Walz & football playoffs
• How do Christians stay human in an age of AI, anxiety, and division?
• Transgender to transformed: an increasingly common story
• A review of Lee Strobel’s “The Case for Miracles”

Denison Forum

It was a busy weekend for some subsets of American society.

If you’re a college football fan, you likely watched Miami and Indiana win their playoff games (Indiana “looks like it will never lose again,” according to one of my favorite sports commentators). If you’re a pro football fan (as many seem to be these days), you had five games to watch, including the Bears’ comeback for the ages Saturday night, with one more contest tonight. If you’re a movie and TV fan, you likely watched the Golden Globes last night, where One Battle After Another and Hamnet won their categories.

If you’re none of the above, you’re wondering if you should keep reading this morning.

I understand the question. While I watched every football game I mentioned, I have not seen even one of the movies or TV shows for which Golden Globes were awarded. As a result, I am avoiding reviews of last night’s ceremony this morning. Time is too short to spend it on what is irrelevant to me today.

This fact is more relevant to our souls than many people seem to know.

The “container” and its “contents”

The Franciscan priest Richard Rohr begins Falling Upward, his meditation on the spiritual life, this way:

There is much evidence on several levels that there are at least two major tasks to human life. The first task is to build a strong “container” or identity; the second is to find the contents that the container was meant to hold.

In this first “task,” we ask the essential questions, “What makes me significant?”, “How can I support myself?”, and “Who will go with me?” However, the “container” these questions help to define “is not an end in itself, but exists for the sake of our deeper and fuller life, which we largely do not know about ourselves.”

When we focus on the “container” but not the “contents,” over time, we inevitably resign ourselves to lives without meaning, or we fixate on means as ends and commit ourselves to aims unworthy of our divine purpose. But when we learn to focus on the purpose for which our lives are intended in what Rohr calls the “second half of life,” several positive consequences occur:

We have less and less need or interest in eliminating the negative or fearful, making again these old rash judgments, holding onto old hurts, or feeling any need to punish other people. Our superiority complexes have gradually departed in all directions. We do not fight these things anymore; they have just shown themselves too many times to be useless, ego-based, counterproductive, and often entirely wrong.

So, what is the purpose for which our lives and our time are best spent?

“When we know whose we are”

I learned recently that I am a direct descendant of two of the passengers on the Mayflower voyage to the New World in 1620. In fact, my great-grandfather (times ten) was apparently the last of these passengers to die.

In the moment I learned this about myself, I viscerally felt myself to be a person of greater historical significance. It was as though I became the child of a celebrity and thus a celebrity myself. Absolutely nothing tangible changed about my life: I didn’t suddenly become richer or wiser. But knowing whose I am, in this context, enhanced my sense of who I am.

Br. Geoffrey Tristam of the Society of St. John the Evangelist in Boston claims that my impulse is more foundational and empowering than I thought: “When we know whose we are, we know who we are.” He points to Jesus’ baptism, commemorated yesterday by many Christian traditions, at which the Father proclaimed, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:17).

Then he notes that Jesus’ subsequent temptations were “precisely about doubting and denying his true identity.” The first two began, “If you are the Son of God . . .” (Matthew 4:3, 5). The third similarly tempted Jesus to abandon his identity as God’s Son and worship Satan instead (v. 9).

According to Tristam, “It is only after he has gone through this inner struggle that he could emerge and begin his public ministry.” Through the rest of that ministry, Jesus never wavered from his identity as his Father’s Son. He sought his Father’s glory, prayed for his blessing, chose his will over his own, committed his spirit to him in death, returned to him in Paradise, and intercedes at his right hand today.

Now he wants to help us embrace his identity as our own.

From “son of thunder” to “apostle of love”

As you know, when we trust in Christ as our Lord, we become “children of God” (John 1:12). Now our Father wants his children to become like his Son.

As Paul explained, “The Lord—who is the Spirit—makes us more and more like [Christ] as we are changed into his glorious image” (2 Corinthians 3:18 NLT). God’s purpose is to “sanctify you completely” so that “your whole spirit and soul and body [will] be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Thessalonians 5:23).

However, we separate clergy from laity and thus believe (though we might not say it in words) that true godliness is for the professionals. This makes sense in other realms: professional golfers and musicians perform in ways we cannot, and so on.

But Jesus wants his entire church to be “holy and without blemish” (Ephesians 5:27). Our Father’s goal is that every one of us be “guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 1:8).

Why?

God’s purpose in making us like Christ is not just that we experience the “abundant” life he intends for us (John 10:10). It is also that we become catalysts for restoring humanity to him, salt and light in a decaying and dark world, witnesses whose words and works are so compelling that multitudes are drawn to him.

The Spirit transformed a fearful fisherman into a fearless evangelist (Acts 2). He made the church’s greatest persecutor into its greatest evangelist, missionary, and theologian (cf. 1 Timothy 1:15–16). He turned a “son of thunder” (Mark 3:17) into the “apostle of love” (cf. 1 John 4:7–12).

And people changed by Jesus into the character of Jesus changed the world. They still do.

For what purpose will you spend your time and life? With what “contents” will you fill your “container”? How will you express your identity as God’s child?

God’s Spirit will make us as much like God’s Son as we choose to be.

How much like Jesus do you want to be today?

Quote for the day:

“Sanctification means being made one with Jesus so that the disposition that ruled him will rule us. It will cost everything that is not of God in us.” —Oswald Chambers

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• Venezuela, 2026 culture predictions, Tim Walz & football playoffs
• How do Christians stay human in an age of AI, anxiety, and division?
• Transgender to transformed: an increasingly common story

Denison Forum

While the circumstances surrounding the shooting of Renee Nicole Good on Wednesday are complicated and none of the narratives that came out shortly after the story went viral are entirely accurate, the basic truth is that she would still be alive if anyone involved had chosen to de-escalate the situation.

Why it matters: The speed at which officials from President Trump and DHS Secretary Kristi Noem to Governor Waltz and Mayor Frey felt the need to get their version of events out to the public meant that many people made up their minds on what happened before all the details were known. However, the truth of the situation is that there is plenty of blame to go around, and unless people take the time to learn from those mistakes, it’s far too likely to happen again.

The backstory: What happened on Wednesday?

On Wednesday afternoon, three Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers approached a vehicle blocking their way in a neighborhood in Minneapolis, Minnesota. There are conflicting reports about what happened next, but here’s what we know so far:

• Some witnesses claim that the officers told the driver—37-year-old Renee Nicole Good—to exit the vehicle, while others say they told her to leave. Audio from the recordings—at least three videos quickly went viral—seems to indicate that she may have received different instructions from the different officers. Whatever those instructions may have been, the result was tragic.
• Good put her car in reverse while agents attempted to open her door, then she turned the wheel and tried to drive away while a third officer was standing in front of her SUV. He had originally been on the opposite side of the vehicle from the other officers, but had begun to circle around as they approached.
• Whether Good was attempting to hit him or steer around him is difficult to tell from the video. Either way, the vehicle appears to make some contact with him—though not enough to knock him down—as he drew his gun and fired three times, killing Good.

The story quickly took over social media, and President Trump, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz all released statements offering conflicting explanations within hours of the shooting.

Noem said the woman committed an act of “domestic terrorism” by disobeying the officers’ commands and then weaponized her SUV in an attempt to “run a law enforcement officer over.” President Trump echoed that understanding, saying Good was “a professional agitator” who “violently, willfully and viciously ran over the ICE officer.” He then added, “Based on the attached clip, it is hard to believe he is alive, but is now recovering in the hospital.”

Conversely, Frey claimed that “This was a federal agent recklessly using power that resulted in somebody dying,” before telling ICE, “We do not want you here. Your stated purpose for being in this City is to create some kind of safety, but you are doing exactly the opposite.” Walz said much the same, arguing that “We do not need any further help from the federal government,” before issuing a “warning order” to prepare the Minnesota National Guard for deployment in case the shooting resulted in riots.

So which version of the story should we believe?

The officer’s past

In the time since the shooting took place, the narrative around what occurred has started to change from the version both sides put out in its immediate aftermath. The video clearly shows that the claims saying the officer who shot Good was lucky to be alive and did so to defend “his fellow officers,” as described in the DHS’s official statement, are overstated at best.

It’s entirely possible—and, perhaps, even probable—that the officer who pulled the trigger did fear for his life in that moment. And given that he was involved in a similar incident six months ago, where his taser proved ineffective, and he was dragged roughly 100 yards while trying to make a similar stop, it’s understandable that he would be so quick to pull his gun on Wednesday.

Vice President Vance pointed to that event, saying, “You think maybe he’s a little bit sensitive about someone ramming him with an automobile?”

But while the situations are similar, they are not the same, and the video clearly shows that his fellow officers were in no immediate danger by the time the car started to pull forward.

Good should still be alive

Ultimately, the officer’s actions may have been legal, but they also stemmed from a series of mistakes that had put him in that position to begin with. DHS officers are never supposed to stand in front of a vehicle or discharge their firearm at a moving vehicle unless they have “no other objectively reasonable means of defense.”

In both cases, Good’s death would have been avoided if the officer who shot her had taken the proper approach to the situation. That said, she would also be alive if she had simply heeded the officers’ warnings instead of attempting to drive away or had not chosen to interfere with ICE in the first place.

City leaders claim she was acting as “a legal observer” during a nearby ICE raid, though Noem stated that Good had been “stalking and impeding their work” by “blocking them in” and “shouting at them.” At this point, it’s difficult to know how much of Noem’s description is accurate, but Frey and Walz laying the blame entirely on the ICE officers also seems out of touch with the reality of the situation.

At the end of the day, this was a tragedy that could have been easily avoided if any of the principal actors had chosen a different approach. That’s not to say the blame should be assigned equally, but if anyone involved had been more interested in de-escalating the situation before it reached the point that a gun was drawn, then Good would still be alive. My prayer is that others heed that lesson before something like this happens again.

However, if I’m being honest, it’s a lesson I could stand to apply in my own life as well.

Spiritual application: Don’t be like David

While not every sin in my life is something I could see coming, far too many are the result of failing to heed the warning signs that the Holy Spirit threw in my way before I proceeded to step right over them. And I don’t think that problem is unique to me. Fortunately, God’s word has something to say on this subject.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus told his followers:

If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better to lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell. (Matthew 5:29–30)

This instruction was given originally in the context of combating lust, but the basic idea applies to sins of all kinds. The longer we allow sin to fester in our lives, the more the consequences of that sin will escalate and the harder it will be to stop.

While God is not calling us to literally maim ourselves—after all, even a blind or crippled person can be tempted—Jesus wanted to make sure we understood the importance of not letting sin linger. And lust is a perfect illustration of just how quickly sin can escalate from thought to action.

Take the story of David and Bathsheba, for example:

“It happened, late one afternoon, when David arose from his couch and was walking on the roof of the king’s house, that he saw from the roof a woman bathing; and the woman was very beautiful” (2 Samuel 11:2).

David’s sin was not noticing the woman; it was in persisting to look and dwelling on that beauty long after the first glance. Because he allowed that look to escalate into lust, he ended up taking her into his room, getting her pregnant, deceiving her husband, and then having the man carry his own death sentence back with him to the army David should have been leading.

Rarely are we able to see where our sins will lead if left unchecked. David did not plan on murdering an innocent man or essentially forcing himself on the beautiful woman he saw from his balcony. Yet, that’s precisely what happened because he attempted to manage his sin rather than stop it from escalating further.

While I hope your sins have not escalated to the precipice of sexual assault or murder, we all have areas of our lives where we’re especially prone to letting temptation fester.

So, take some time today to ask the Lord to help you identify any of those areas in your life. Then turn them over to him and take whatever measures are necessary to ensure that the temptation does not escalate into action.

God is ready to help. Are you ready to let him?

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God is good: “God’s mercy continues after the world burns”

It’s been just over a year since the first of the fires that eventually burned more than 37,000 acres and claimed thirty lives began to spread outside of Los Angeles. Yet, in that time, God has been moving in a powerful way. He has helped churches that have lost buildings and families who have lost homes learn that the church is more than just brick and mortar. As one pastor described, “God’s mercy continues after the world burns. That’s one lesson churches in Los Angeles learned this year.”

Kingdom impact:

While many of the churches lost to the fires will eventually be rebuilt, the opportunities to serve the communities of Los Angeles and to model what it means to trust God in the midst of tragedy will hopefully endure long after life has returned to some semblance of normal. Will you join me in praying that the churches in these neighborhoods will remain beacons of hope and stability for the communities in which God has placed them?

Christianity Today has more on the story.

Denison Forum

I closed yesterday’s Daily Article with Philip Yancey’s quote, “Grace, like water, flows to the lowest part.” I had no idea at the time that his statement would be so relevant to his personal life.

I have followed Yancey’s work for years and consider him one of the most thoughtful and authentic writers in the evangelical world. It was therefore devastating to learn yesterday that he engaged in an affair with a married woman for eight years and is now retiring from writing and speaking.

In an emailed statement to Christianity Today, an outlet for which he has written for decades, he confessed the affair and added:

I am now focused on rebuilding trust and restoring my marriage of fifty-five years. Having disqualified myself from Christian ministry, I am therefore retiring from writing, speaking, and social media. Instead, I need to spend my remaining years living up to the words I have already written. I pray for God’s grace and forgiveness—as well as yours—and for healing in the lives of those I’ve wounded.

His prayer highlights one side of the Christian life, the “amazing grace” about which Yancey wrote so often. In The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism, Tim Keller famously wrote, “The Christian gospel is that I am so flawed that Jesus had to die for me, yet I am so loved and valued that Jesus was glad to die for me.”

But Yancey’s confession also points to a dangerous downside of evangelical faith as many understand it.

“The one secret of a holy life”

Think of history as an hourglass lying on its side. The story begins with the cosmos, expansive beyond our imagining and created by the God who pronounced it “very good” (Genesis 1:31). It narrows to the human race, then to one nation within that race, then to one surviving part of that nation, then to one teenage girl and her newborn Child.

When this Child grows to adulthood, the story begins to expand again: to twelve disciples, to 120 believers in an Upper Room, to three thousand baptized souls, to a movement that expanded to include Samaritans (Acts 8), Gentiles (Acts 10), the West as well as the East (Acts 16), and ultimately the “ends of the earth” (Acts 28). Today, this movement numbers more than two billion believers living in virtually every nation on earth. It is a movement fueled by the divine grace that forgives all we confess and saves our souls for eternity.

For many evangelicals, this is how the story ends. Now we try our best to do our best and we confess our sins when we fail, all the while waiting for heaven and the day our struggle is done.

But God’s ultimate purpose is not just that all people might be forgiven and granted eternal life with him in heaven. It is that the flourishing and beauty with which God began our story might become our story once more.

To this end, he does not just pardon our sins—he remakes our very nature. When we are “born again” (John 3:3), we “become children of God” (John 1:12), a “new creation” as “the old has passed away; behold, the new has come” (2 Corinthians 5:17).

As God’s recreated children, we are intended to demonstrate our Father’s spiritual “genetics.” His Spirit works to manifest his “fruit,” the character of Christ, in our character (Galatians 5:22–23). It’s not that we try harder to be more like Jesus—it is that Jesus makes us like himself.

This is not a new concept. “Theosis,” the belief that Christ is working to make us like himself, has been central to some theological worldviews for centuries. Oswald Chambers gave it full and practical expression when he asserted:

Sanctification is an impartation, not an imitation. The one secret of a holy life lies not in imitating Jesus but in letting his perfections manifest themselves in my physical body. . . .

Jesus gives me his patience, his love, his holiness, his faith, his purity, and his godliness. All these are manifested in and through every sanctified soul. Sanctification isn’t drawing the power to be holy from Jesus; it’s drawing his own holiness from him. It’s having the very same holiness that was manifested in him manifested in me.

“Make me love you as I ought to love”

I recently found a hymn by the Irish Anglican priest George Croly (1780–1860) that gave me new insight:

Spirit of God, who dwells within my heart,
wean it from sin, through all its pulses move.
Stoop to my weakness, mighty as you are,
and make me love you as I ought to love.

I had not thought about asking God to “make me love you as I ought to love.” Since our Father honors the free will with which he created us in his image, how can he “make me love” him or anyone else? But then I realized: if I exercise my free will to ask him to change my free will and my heart, he does not violate my freedom in answering my prayer.

Such a prayer is not only theologically permissible—it is spiritually essential. As Henri Nouwen warned, “Anyone who wants to fight his demons with his own weapons is a fool.”

But when we ask Jesus to change our hearts, he transforms us into our best selves as we fulfill his perfect will for our lives. This is because he now lives his life in and through ours (Galatians 2:20; Colossians 1:27) as we experience the risen Christ himself (1 John 1:1–4).

Our Father wants to be as real to us in this world as he will be in the next. This is the greatest need of the human heart: to experience personally the God who made us and made us for himself. Otherwise, “our hearts are restless until they rest in him,” as St. Augustine testified personally.

More than anything else, we want and need to know that God is real. And we learn that he is real when he becomes real in us.

“My heart an altar, and your love the flame”

If Philip Yancey can fall into sin that devastates his marriage and his ministry, so can I. So can you. Let’s therefore use his confession as a call to seek the moral and spiritual transformation only Christ can effect in our lives. Let’s take time even now to pray, “Make me love you as I ought to love.” And let’s do whatever the Spirit leads us to do as we partner with him in answering our prayer and manifesting the character of our Lord.

George Croly’s prayer continues:

Teach me to feel that you are always nigh;
teach me the struggles of the soul to bear,
to check the rising doubt, the rebel sigh;
teach me the patience of unceasing prayer.

Teach me to love you as your angels love,
one holy passion filling all my frame:
the fullness of the heaven-descended Dove;
my heart an altar, and your love the flame.

Is your heart his altar yet today?

Quote for the day:

“With the goodness of God to desire our highest welfare, the wisdom of God to plan it, and the power of God to achieve it, what do we lack? Surely we are the most favored of all creatures” —A. W. Tozer

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Denison Forum

I need to begin today with a confession.

Deadly clashes have erupted in Iran as demonstrations sparked by anger over the rising cost of living entered their second week. Unlike those in past years, these protests are seeking regime change and taking down regime symbols, posters, and statues.

At least 285 locations in ninety-two cities have witnessed protest gatherings. At this writing, more than two thousand citizens have been arrested, and at least thirty-four protesters have been killed. If Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s forces fail to quell dissent, he has reportedly made plans to flee to Moscow.

I am old enough to remember the 1979 Iranian hostage crisis vividly. I have written often about Iran’s horrific jihadist ideology and have called its leaders “the world’s most dangerous regime.” It would be in the best interest of Iran, Israel, the Middle East, and the world for them to fall and flee.

But while I believe I have reacted to this news with the right analysis, I have done so in the wrong spirit. The same has been true with regard to recent events in Venezuela.

Let me explain.

The alliance of transcendence and immanence

Religions across human history have focused on transcendence or imminence, but not both. To the Greeks and Romans, the gods lived atop Mt. Olympus and used humans for their personal, often nefarious ends. To Muslims, Allah is remote and removed from the human condition. To Hindus and Buddhists, by contrast, there is no personal Ultimate Being; the focus is on personal enlightenment and oneness with reality. The mystery religions of the Greco-Roman world similarly centered on rites and rituals intended to lead to personal empowerment.

Then came the prophetic declaration fulfilled by the birth of Christ: “‘Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel’ (which means, God with us)” (Matthew 1:23, fulfilling Isaiah 7:14). This transcendent God who was with us became immanently one of us.

In one sense, his earthly life could not have been more lowly:

• He was born to a peasant teenage girl and adopted by a peasant carpenter father.
• His birth was attended by field hands so ritually unclean that they could not attend synagogue or temple services.
• He grew up in a town so obscure that it is not mentioned even once in the Old Testament.
• He was baptized among sinners.
• He experienced temptation, hunger, thirst, weariness, and pain.
• He lived in a friend’s home because he had “nowhere to lay his head” (Luke 9:58).
• He died a criminal’s death between condemned prisoners.
• He was buried in a borrowed tomb.

In another sense, however, his life could not have been more exalted:

• His birth was celebrated by angels.
• His baptism was marked by the Spirit’s descent and the Father’s affirmation (Matthew 3:16–17).
• He regularly demonstrated divine omniscience, omnibenevolence, and omnipotence.
• His death was marked by “darkness over all the land,” the rending of the temple curtain, a violent earthquake, and the opening of tombs (Matthew 27:45–53).
• His burial led to his glorious resurrection and ascension to heaven.

Across his ministry, he interacted with every dimension of the cultural spectrum:

• He befriended tax collectors and “sinners” (cf. Matthew 9:11).
• He touched lepers and healed demoniacs.
• He engaged with Gentiles, Samaritans, and Jews.
• He ministered to a Roman centurion, taught a member of the Jewish Sanhedrin, and witnessed to the highest officials in the country.

Now he continues his earthly ministry as he prays for us (Romans 8:34) while his Spirit dwells within us (1 Corinthians 3:16) and empowers us as the “body of Christ” in the world today (1 Corinthians 12:27).

No other religion in history has conceived of such an astounding combination of immanence and transcendence—all of it for us.

“Sons of your Father in heaven”

Now there is no temptation we cannot trust to our Savior, knowing that he has been “tempted as we are” and will empower our victory over our common enemy (Hebrews 4:15). There is no problem we cannot bring to him, knowing that we can “with confidence draw near to the throne of grace” where we will “receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (v. 16).

And there is no soul on earth with whom we should not stand in compassion and solidarity.

Jesus loves even Ali Khamenei and Nicolás Maduro. Our Savior would have died just for them. The more they and others like them reject God’s word and will, the more they need our intercession, witness, and ministry. And the more we pay forward the grace we have received, the more we give our broken world what it can find nowhere else.

Jesus assured us that when we “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,” we demonstrate that we are “sons of your Father in heaven” (Matthew 5:44–45). Then, though we live “in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation,” we “shine as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life” (Philippians 2:15–16).

“The goal of a materialistic Utopia”

By contrast, our broken culture can claim neither divine transcendence nor immanence. Secular society has no God who is for us, much less a God who lives in us and works through us.

George Orwell’s 1937 book The Road to Wigan Pier describes socialists in a way that is just as true of secularists today: “With their eyes glued to economic facts, [they] have proceeded on the assumption that man has no soul, and explicitly or implicitly they have set up the goal of a materialistic Utopia.”

You and I know better. We know that a “materialistic Utopia” is a contradiction in terms. We know that man not only has a soul but is a soul. We know that God’s love can change any heart in this world for the next.

But we also know that such love has to be incarnated to be believed, first in Christ and now in “Christ in you” (Colossians 1:27).

You may not have the chance to be the presence of Christ to world leaders, though you can and should pray for them to follow Jesus. But you can demonstrate the grace of Christ today to someone you are tempted to reject but called to love.

Philip Yancey noted,

“Grace, like water, flows to the lowest part.”

So should we.

Quote for the day:

“‘Tis grace has brought me safe thus far, and grace will lead me home.” —John Newton

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Denison Forum

A woman protesting against the Venezuelan government in 2021 was disfigured when military forces tossed boiling water on her. Yesterday, she took part in demonstrations in New York City, where she begged a Manhattan federal judge to lock up dictator Nicolás Maduro for as long as possible.

She identified herself only by her first name because she said she has family back in Venezuela and fears for their safety since she’s speaking out. “I was tortured for expressing myself and having an opinion,” she said. By contrast, Maduro told the judge at his court appearance, “I am innocent. I am not guilty. I am a decent man, the constitutional president of my country.”

In other headline news:

• Today is the fifth anniversary of the attack on the United States Capitol in Washington, DC.  Many blame President Trump for what happened that day, while others fault then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for allegedly refusing to deploy the National Guard.
• Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz announced yesterday that he would not seek a third term so he can focus on fraud issues plaguing his state. He blamed President Trump and Republicans for exacerbating the problem, while others blame his administration.
• And federal health officials on Monday announced what the New York Times calls “dramatic revisions to the slate of vaccines recommended for American children.” Some public health experts protested the revisions, while HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said, “We are aligning the US childhood vaccine schedule with international consensus while strengthening transparency and informed consent.”

In each case, we are left to debate who is right and who is wrong, which leads to my larger point today.

 “The indispensable pillars of modern civilization”

Klaus Schwab is the founder of the World Economic Forum and author of the new book, Thriving and Leading in the Intelligent Age. In it he states, “Our economies, our institutions, our very concept of what it means to be human are all being transformed by forces of intelligence. These changes are not abstract; they are already redefining how we learn, how we work, how we govern, and how we relate to each other and to our planet.”

This transformation is clear to anyone who follows developments with regard to artificial intelligence and technology. But in a Time article published yesterday, Dr. Schwab writes, “Beneath a surface of political volatility and technological acceleration lie two quietly deteriorating foundations: truth and trust. Their erosion is reshaping the global landscape more profoundly than the events that dominate headlines.”

He notes that “in past decades, societies could rely on a shared understanding that truth, however contested, was worth pursuing.” However, “Digital networks and algorithmic curation have fragmented public life into discrete informational universes.” Synthetic media and AI have accelerated this fragmentation. Consequently, “It is increasingly difficult for citizens to determine whether what they see and hear is authentic. As a result, the very idea of a shared reality is weakening.”

He concludes:

The warning is clear: no society, no institution, no technological system can stand for long on foundations that are no longer believed. Truth and trust remain the indispensable pillars of modern civilization—and the degree to which they can be restored or reimagined will determine the contours of our future.

Three logical assertions

Watching US politicians react to the news regarding Venezuela along such starkly partisan lines reinforces his point. A “post-truth” society cannot sustain itself, since consensual truth is essential to the consensual actions by which society functions.

In response, I’d like to suggest a brief apologetic framed around three logical assertions.

One: Objective truth exists by logical necessity. To make the postmodern claim that “there is no such thing as objective truth” is to make an objective truth claim.

Two: Objective truth must logically be grounded ultimately in a source that transcends our fallen minds and subjective opinions. We require a compass for direction, a dictionary for the meaning of words, a Constitution for framing laws, and laws for framing personal behavior. In the same way, humans require a transcendent truth that our fallen minds cannot produce. Such truth must come not from our fallen creation but from our Creator.

Three: If God is “the truth” (John 14:6), God’s “word is truth” (John 17:17), and “God is love” (1 John 4:8), his character logically requires him to make his truth available to humanity. A loving father wants his children to know what is right so they can do what is right. This impulse explains the work of God’s Spirit in inspiring, preserving, interpreting, and applying biblical truth (cf. 2 Peter 1:21). God wrote a book, and we can read, understand, and obey it today.

When “God opens his mouth”

But any book, even God’s book, must be read to accomplish its intended purpose.

According to Klaus Schwab, our future as a society depends on “the stability of the conceptual architecture that supports collective life.” The Architect of such life intends us to depend upon his word because he knows that such dependence is the only path to our highest flourishing.

The good news is that if you and I choose this path today, the Spirit will then “guide you into all the truth” (John 16:13). We will discover for ourselves that “all Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16–17).

And our changed lives will become the change we wish to see as the Spirit uses our godly character and compassionate witness as a catalyst for moral and spiritual awakening. Thus it has been across our nation’s history, and thus it will be again in our time.

Tim Keller was right: “A perfect God could have nothing less than perfect communication with his people.” Mark Batterson added: “When you open your Bible, God opens his mouth.”

And the Scottish theologian Alexander Whyte (1836–1921) observed,

“There are two ways to read Scripture: the way a lawyer reads a will and the way an heir reads a will.”

Which way will you read God’s word today?

Quote for the day:

“The Bible is not an end in itself, but a means to bring men to an intimate and satisfying knowledge of God, that they may enter into him, that they may delight in his presence, may taste and know the inner sweetness of the very God himself in the core and center of their hearts” —A. W. Tozer

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Denison Forum

President Trump announced on Truth Social early Saturday morning:

The United States of America has successfully carried out a large-scale strike against Venezuela and its leader, President Nicolas Maduro, who has been, along with his wife, captured and flown out of the Country. This operation was done in conjunction with US Law Enforcement.

Later that morning, the president held a news conference from Mar-a-Lago, his Florida residence, in which he stated that the US is “going to run” Venezuela until a “proper transition can take place.” He added that the US will rebuild the country’s oil infrastructure, “which will cost billions of dollars.”

Maduro and his wife arrived at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn late Saturday. They are expected to appear in federal court at noon today.

How did we get here?

The Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela is a country on the northern coast of South America comprising an area of 353,841 square miles (about twice the size of California) and a population of twenty-nine million. Its capital and largest city is Caracas.

In 1498, during his third voyage to the Americas, Christopher Columbus landed near the eastern shore of modern-day Venezuela and commended the region to Spain’s leaders. Spanish colonization started in 1522; the country gained its full independence in 1823 under leader Simón Bolivar. The world’s largest known oil reserves were discovered there during World War I, prompting an economic boom that lasted into the 1980s.

Economic crises then led to a political crisis, the elevation of Hugh Chávez, and the adoption of a new constitution in 1999 that created a socialist government. Chávez appointed Nicolás Maduro as vice president in 2013; Maduro won the presidential election after Chávez’s death that year. In the years since, the country has been wracked with economic crises; in 2017, Maduro barred opposition parties, essentially ruling as a dictator. He claimed reelection in 2024, but the US and many other countries consider his claim to be illegitimate.

In March 2020, Maduro was charged in the Southern District of New York for narco-terrorism, conspiracy to import cocaine, and other crimes. The US State Department has identified him as the leader of the Cartel of the Suns, a drug-trafficking organization comprised of high-ranking Venezuelan officials. He has allegedly negotiated multi-ton shipments of cocaine and facilitated large-scale drug trafficking. According to the US Justice Department, his regime has caused “tons of cocaine to enter and devastate American communities.”

How has the US responded?

In January 2025, President Trump signed an executive order paving the way for criminal organizations and drug cartels to be named “foreign terrorist organizations.” They included Tren de Araqua (“Train from Aragua”), a Venezuelan street gang.

On August 19, the US military deployed naval forces to the waters off Venezuela; on September 2, the US carried out its first strike against what the president said was a drug-carrying vessel that departed from Venezuela and was operated by Tren de Aragua. The US military carried out numerous strikes against drug boats in the weeks following and seized oil tankers involved in what Attorney General Pam Bondi called “an illicit oil shipping network supporting foreign terrorist organizations.”

President Trump stated Saturday that he had given Maduro several chances to step down in recent weeks, but that Maduro had refused. As a result, on January 3, the US conducted a “large-scale strike” across Caracas to capture Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, and fly them out of the country.

Was this legal?

Critics immediately decried these actions as illegal, since the president did not secure congressional approval beforehand. However, Yale constitutional law professor Jed Rubenfeld wrote that what Mr. Trump did in Venezuela “is almost certainly legal; in fact, the US did the very same thing in Panama four decades ago, and the courts upheld it after years of litigation and careful consideration.”

He notes that, like some fifty other countries, the US does not recognize the Maduro regime as Venezuela’s legitimate government. This matters because foreign heads of state are immune from prosecution in the US. Prof. Rubenfeld adds that there has been an outstanding arrest warrant for Maduro since 2020, based on his indictment that year. This warrant, together with the indictment, “satisfies the Constitution’s requirements for an arrest.”

However, he also writes that “Trump’s plan to ‘run’ Venezuela for the foreseeable future . . . is much murkier,” noting that “it is almost universally accepted that the president has no power to make war without Congress’s consent.” While a targeted mission to seize a fugitive is not war, and presidents across several administrations have conducted limited military missions, “a protracted boots-on-the-ground invasion and takeover of another country probably is the making of war, as a constitutional matter” (his emphasis).

As a result, he believes the War Powers Act will apply and the administration will have to obtain congressional approval if our military presence in Venezuela lasts longer than sixty days.

What comes next?

President Trump surprised many when he announced Saturday that the US would “run the country until such time as we can do a safe, proper, and judicious transition.” He stated, “We want peace, liberty, and justice for the great people of Venezuela,” adding, “We can’t take a chance that someone else takes over that doesn’t have the good of the people of Venezuela in mind.” Mr. Trump explained that US oil companies will rebuild the country’s oil infrastructure, which will generate wealth for the nation and reimburse the US for its work on Venezuela’s behalf.

The country’s vice president, Delcy Rodríguez, was named interim president by Venezuela’s Supreme Court. She later appeared on state television to demand Maduro’s release, calling him the “only president.” However, she has reportedly impressed the Trump administration with her management of Venezuela’s crucial oil industry, and officials are optimistic that they can work with her going forward. By contrast, opposition leader and 2025 Nobel Peace Prize winner María Corina Machado called for Edmundo González Urrutia, whom her party claims won the 2024 election, to assume power.

The role of the military going forward is a vital component as well. Senior and retired officers control food distribution, raw materials, and the state oil company, as well as dozens of private firms. Many profit from illicit trade, as do widespread pro-government militias.

China, Russia, and Iran have supplied Venezuela with financial, economic, and military aid in recent years. All were quick to condemn the US action, but it remains to be seen how they will otherwise respond.

As the Guardian reports, reaction in the US “has been starkly polarized along political lines,” with Republicans celebrating the enforcement of the indictment against Maduro and Democrats “decrying what they see as a violation of Venezuela’s right to self-determination.”

How should Christians respond?

Tomorrow I plan to offer several biblical responses. For today, let’s close with this reflection.

Of all the comments I have heard and read since the news broke early Saturday, one statement has especially resonated with me: a geopolitical analyst interviewed on television noted that any likely scenario would be better for the Venezuelan people than what they were experiencing under Maduro.

His observation points to this fact: while we understandably focus on geopolitics and implications for America, Jesus loves every Venezuelan as much as he loves every American. He died for them just as he died for us. He is praying for them right now just as he is praying for us (Romans 8:34). He grieves for the turmoil and suffering they have experienced in recent decades.

The closer we draw to our Savior, the more we will love them as he does.

Julian of Norwich (c. 1343-after 1416) wrote:

God is the ground and the substance, the very essence of nature;
God is the true father and mother of natures.
We are all bound to God by nature,
and we are all bound to God by grace.
And this grace is for all the world.

Do you agree?

Quote for the day:

“When you know how much God is in love with you, then you can only live your life radiating that love.” —Mother Teresa

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