In the latest Indiana Jones movie, eighty-one-year-old Harrison Ford was de-aged forty years by artificial intelligence (AI). Accordingly, Sean Connery fans might hope they’ll see a young version of the first James Bond in the next Bond film. Alas, producer Barbara Broccoli has announced that, while the next 007’s identity is currently unknown, James Bond will not be an AI-rendered actor from the past.

Fans of the Swedish rock band ABBA are suffering no such disappointment. The group is currently making $2 million a week performing as avatars (lifelike digital images projected onto a screen). The band KISS now plans to do the same. “We can be forever young and forever iconic by taking us to places we’ve never dreamed of before,” KISS bassist Gene Simmons said.

Is this a good thing? Or is it just a less ominous example of a crisis that threatens us all?

“They’re some new kind of human”

Teenage girls in New Jersey were recently victimized by such technology when it was used to generate nude images of them that were then circulated at their high school. The Department of Homeland Security is warning that “deepfake” technology is being employed to generate hundreds of thousands of pornographic images, including those of children.

Fake audio is being used to steal passwords and breach financial accounts. Deepfake videos are being used to manipulate political opinion and voters. Retired Army Gen. Mark Milley is warning that “robust space and cyber capabilities [now] allow adversaries to target critical national infrastructure” vital to our military defenses. (For more, see my website paper, “ChatGPT and artificial intelligence: What you need to know.”)

But there’s an even deeper element to this rising threat.

Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan writes:

What is most urgently disturbing to me is that if America speeds forward with AI it is putting the fate of humanity in the hands of the men and women of Silicon Valley, who invented the internet as it is, including all its sludge. And there’s something wrong with them. They’re some new kind of human, brilliant in a deep yet narrow way, prattling on about connection and compassion but cold at the core. They seem apart from the great faiths of past millennia, apart from traditional moral or ethical systems or assumptions about life.

Finding “Bethlehem” today

This is the Advent week of “hope.” I would define hope as confidence in the future that brings benefits in the present. Soldiers hope their Boot Camp training is preparing them to serve their country more effectively, and this belief sustains them in their present challenges. Students hope their years of education will lead to careers that repay their investment, and this belief enables them to stay the course.

However, the validity of our hope depends on its basis. If you have cancer but place your hope in aspirin rather than oncology, your hope is not only misplaced but dangerous.

Similarly, if we hope that humans can solve humanity’s greatest problems, our hope deters us from trusting the One whose omniscience, omnipotence, and omnibenevolence we need so desperately. As creatures of such a Creator, our most empowering hope lies in submission to his gracious sovereignty.

Like the Christmas shepherds, we need to experience personally “a Savior, who is Christ the Lord” (Luke 2:11). But we no longer must “go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened” (v. 15) because it is happening in us. Oswald Chambers noted:

Every man is meant to be the “Bethlehem” of the Son of God by the regenerative power of redemption. Just as the historic Son of God became incarnate in the Virgin Mary . . . so the Son of God is formed in the life of the individual saint by the supernatural grace of God.

“With him everything else thrown in”

Paul assured us that “Christ in you” is “the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27, my emphasis). How could it be otherwise?

“In [Christ] all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell” (v. 19). As Richard Melick notes, “Everything that God is, Jesus is.” Thus, “through him” God could “reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross” (v. 20). Because God died for us, God has the moral authority to forgive us for the sins that caused his death. He can thus make peace (the Greek word means to “make all things right”) in us, with us, and for us.

This is why the ultimate solution to every problem we face is found in daily submission to our Savior. When he is our Lord, his Spirit will guide us infallibly with regard to AI and every other challenge we face. We will love our neighbor as ourselves, whether they are Palestinian or Israeli, Chinese or American, Democrat or Republican. And our differences will lead not to cultural division and destructive animosity but to kaleidoscopic celebration.

C. S. Lewis advised us, “Look for yourself, and you will find in the long run only hatred, loneliness, despair, rage, ruin, and decay. But look for Christ, and you will find him, and with him everything else thrown in.”

For whom will you “look” today?

Denison Forum

As the whole world knows, Taylor Swift is dating Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce. She has attended four of his games this year, each of which the Chiefs won. All of Green Bay was hoping she would come to last night’s contest against the Packers; the Green Bay Press Gazette reports that “small businesses, community organizations, restaurateurs, nightlife spots, and local Swifties” across the area sought to welcome her.

She did attend the game, but Kelce’s team lost.

This might serve as consolation: the Wall Street Journal’s Peggy Noonan recently wrote that Swift should be Time magazine’s Person of the Year. According to Noonan, Swift is “the best thing that has happened in America in all of 2023,” with a concert tour that broke attendance and income records across the country and transformed the economy of every city she visited.

From pop culture to historical precedence: Sandra Day O’Connor, the first woman to serve as a Supreme Court justice, died Friday at the age of ninety-three. The New York Times noted that “during a crucial period in American law . . . she was the most powerful woman in the country.” The Times added that she “inspired a generation of women” with her rise to such significance.

Former President Barack Obama wrote after justice O’Connor’s passing, “When a young Sandra Day graduated from Stanford Law School near the top of her class—in two years instead of the usual three—she was offered just one job in the private sector. Her prospective employer asked her how well she typed and told her there might be work for her as a legal secretary.

“Fortunately for us, she set her sights a little higher.”

“The only nation in the world based on an idea”

According to a recent study, nearly 2.4 billion women around the world do not have the same economic rights as men. In 178 countries, legal barriers prevent their full economic participation; globally, they have only three-quarters of the legal rights afforded to men. In addition, the United Nations reports that nearly one in three women worldwide has been a victim of violence.

Contrast the gender discrimination that persists in our fallen world with the example set by our Lord.

Jesus regularly engaged women in his ministry (cf. Luke 8:1–3), reaching out to women marginalized by their culture (cf. John 4), and including them in his most personal relationships (cf. Luke 10:38–41). The risen Christ could have appeared first to anyone, from his lead apostle Peter to his best friend John to his other apostles or brothers. Instead, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene and commissioned her as the first evangelist of Easter (John 20:11–18). Women were among the most significant leaders in apostolic Christianity (for more, see my website paper and podcast on this subject).

Paul sounded the death knell to gender discrimination when he announced, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male or female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). America’s founders built our nation on this biblical commitment to the sanctity and equality of all life (Genesis 1:27). As President Biden noted on Women’s Equality Day this year, “America is the only nation in the world based on an idea—the idea that all people are created equal and deserve to be treated equally throughout their lives.”

If they were invited, you are invited

But there’s even more to the story: our lives are sacred not just because we are each equally created by God but because we are each created for intimate, personal relationship with our Creator.

Jesus was the only baby to choose his attendants, and he chose field hands who could not keep the laws of Jewish society and thus were considered ritually unclean. Shepherds could not sacrifice at the temple or attend services at the synagogue, but they could worship the Christ of Christmas (Luke 2:8–16).

If they were invited, we are all invited.

Yesterday was the first Sunday of Advent, celebrated by churches across the Christian world as they lit the candle of hope. We’ll discover ways this week to light that “candle” in our souls by embracing the truth that “Christ in you” is our “hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27). Let’s begin today by deciding that we want to know Christ more intimately than we do now. The more fully we experience the risen Lord Jesus, the more fully we experience his transforming hope for today and for eternity.

We know someone best, not by reading books or listening to lectures about them, but by spending time with them. So it is with our Lord, which is why Jesus commended Mary when she “sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to his teaching” (Luke 10:39).

When last did you follow her example?

“To God I would commit my cause”

Job testified: “As for me, I would seek God, and to God would I commit my cause, who does great things and unsearchable, marvelous things without number” (Job 5:8–9). When we do the same, we will say with the psalmist, “I love the Lᴏʀᴅ, because he has heard my voice and my pleas for mercy. Because he inclined his ear to me, therefore I will call on him as long as I live” (Psalm 116:1–2).

If you truly “love the Lᴏʀᴅ,” you will “call on him” all through this day and across this Advent season. He promises that “you will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart” (Jeremiah 29:13).

Will you “find” your Lord today?

Denison Forum

Last night Florida governor and presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis debated California governor Gavin Newsom in what was billed as “The Great Red vs. Blue State Debate.”

But while the given purpose was to provide both governors a platform to contrast the approaches they’ve taken to leading their respective states, the amount of bad blood that has built up between the two men over the last few years seemed to elevate the stakes beyond their respective approaches to governance.

Both governors came into office in 2018, and both were reelected in 2022 by decisive margins. More importantly, though, both were also in charge of leading their states through the Covid crisis, and much of their mutual resentment stems from that time. Their resulting rise in the national profile served to heighten their exposure on other subjects as well, and neither has been shy about pointing to the other as essentially everything that is wrong with the opposing party.

Consequently, when they met last night on Fox News for the debate, it quickly moved beyond the rivalry between their states to focus more on competing visions for the country. And, given the size and national significance of both California and Florida—the first- and third-most populous states in the nation respectively—framing the conversation in those terms made some sense.

Ultimately, the debate between Newsom and DeSantis was a chaotic and intense event that covered some important ground but also devolved into name-calling and contrasting claims that likely led to a restless night for those with the unenviable task of fact-checking the myriad statements made by both men.

However, my most enduring takeaway from the debate had less to do with their approach to any particular subject than with the general feel of the event. And, as we’ll discuss shortly, there’s an important lesson in there for us today regardless of where you fall along the political spectrum.

Revealing the wide gap in American politics

While President Biden is technically not running unopposed, his team has acted as though he is. It is unlikely he will appear on a debate stage until next September. As such, the only presidential debates that have taken place so far have been on the Republican side. Moreover, none of those have included former President Trump, who still has a large lead in the polls.

Consequently, while there have been some contentious moments, for the most part the candidates have been largely debating the best method to accomplish the same goals. With a few exceptions, their general approach to governance and their beliefs on the more significant issues are fairly aligned.

That was not the case last night.

What stood out most in the debate between DeSantis and Newsom was the vastly different ways in which each approached not only leading the country but also their vision for what the country should be in general. There was little to no agreement on any major policy throughout the evening, and seeing their views expressed in such stark contrast was a good reminder of just how wide the gap has become in politics—at least when expressed by politicians.

In contrast, the differences between candidates within either party seem—while not insignificant—relatively minor by comparison. And therein lies the lesson for us today.

Division vs. unity

When the majority of our conversations take place in contexts where everyone involved agrees on the big issues, then the little stuff starts to seem more important and divisive than it really is. And while that’s true in most areas of life, it’s especially relevant when it comes to our faith.

As Christians, it’s important to remember that what divides us is typically of far less importance than what unites us. Yet it can be easy to lose sight of that fact when most of our conversations take place with other Christians. That’s why, historically, the greatest periods of fighting amongst believers often occur in situations where most people at least claim to be Christian.

In the fourth and fifth centuries, for example, most of the debates and fights among believers occurred in the Eastern Roman Empire, where the church experienced relative peace and prosperity. However, in the western half of the Empire, where barbarians invaded and Roman society largely collapsed, a sense of community developed there even among factions of the faith that, less than a hundred years prior, thought the other side was going to hell.

And the same basic pattern plays out throughout much of Christian history.

The gravity of the issues that we allow to divide us is often directly linked to the degree to which we understand our need for other people. If Christians are in short supply and persecution seems imminent, the circle of whom we’re willing to work with gets much bigger. By contrast, if we have the option of going to church each Sunday with people who think and act like us, then that circle tends to shrink.

Are Christians “one”?

My purpose in bringing this up today is not to condemn the impulse to prefer the company of people with whom you have much in common. That’s natural, and such friendships can be greatly beneficial. Rather, my purpose is to challenge all of us—myself included—to be more intentional about stepping outside those smaller circles to engage with people who don’t share our beliefs.

That could include a lost coworker or neighbor, someone from a different denomination, or even just a person with whom you’ve never really had more than surface-level conversations.

One of Christ’s final prayers before the crucifixion was that his followers “may be one, even as we are one” (John 17:11). When we are intentional about making room in our lives for people who think differently than we do, it can help us become the answer to that prayer by reminding us of all that we have in common with our fellow Christians.

So whom can you reach out to today? Is there a person God has already brought into your life who would fit that description?

If not, will you pray right now that he would?

Denison Forum

Israel confirmed early this morning that a temporary pause in the Israel–Hamas war would extend for at least one more day, with eight more Israeli hostages reportedly set to be released. Tragically, the tenuous nature of this truce was demonstrated when two Palestinian brothers affiliated with Hamas opened fire at the main entrance to Jerusalem, killing three Israelis and wounding six other people.

Meanwhile, what we know so far from the hostages who have been released is vital to winning another conflict: the propaganda war that seeks to validate Hamas while delegitimizing Israel.

Emily Hand is an example of the Israeli children hostages. After the nine-year-old was freed by Hamas, her father described her condition: “She was just whispering, you couldn’t hear her. I had to put my ear on her lips. She’d been conditioned not to make any noise. . . . You could just see glassy-eyed terror.” He added: “Last night, she cried until her face was red and blotchy, she couldn’t stop. She didn’t want any comfort, I guess she’s forgotten how to be comforted. She went under the covers of the bed, the quilt, covered herself up, and quietly cried.”

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NOTE: Henry Kissinger, an American diplomat and Nobel winner, died yesterday at the age of one hundred. I will publish a Daily Article Special Edition this morning reflecting on his life and significant legacy.

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“The danger many Jewish people fear the most”

Anti-Israel propagandists have claimed for years that Israel “stole” and “colonized” its land from the rightful Palestinian owners. (For more, I invite you to download my free digital book, The War in Israel: What You Need to Know about This Crisis of Global Significance.) Ironically, as commentator David Rubin notes, “Billions of people around the globe are about to celebrate the birthday of a Jewish man, born in Bethlehem 2000+ years ago, but don’t think Jews lived there before 1948.”

Now apologists for Hamas are claiming that the terrorists didn’t commit atrocities on October 7 while demanding a permanent ceasefire that would empower Hamas to slaughter more Israelis in the future. But the more children kidnapped by Hamas tell their stories, the more difficult it becomes to defend such atrocities.

This ideological war is consequential far beyond the Middle East. As Jewish American and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer writes in the New York Times, “Too many Americans are exploiting arguments against Israel and leaping toward a virulent antisemitism. The normalization and intensifying of this rise in hate is the danger many Jewish people fear the most.”

Sen. Schumer documents the shocking rise in antisemitic violence in America after Hamas’s October 7 invasion and asks, “Are we still a nation that can defy the course of human history, where the Jewish people have been ostracized, expelled, and massacred over and over again?” His question is obviously crucial for the future of Jews in America.

But it is also vital for the future of America herself.

The lowest point in our nation’s history?

“Repeat a lie often enough and it becomes the truth” is a law of propaganda often attributed to Joseph Goebbels, the chief propagandist for the Nazi Party. Similarly, the first stage in changing culture is to normalize the new “truth” or behavior, then to legalize it, stigmatize those who oppose it, and criminalize their opposition.

LGBTQ advocates, for example, have followed this playbook very effectively in recent years. To illustrate: Disney’s new “family” Christmas movie portrays a family with two fathers and features a boy calling another boy a “hottie.” Evangelicals like me who disagree with such sexualization of children are stigmatized as “homophobic” and dangerous to society and may face legal and criminal penalties in the future.

However, while God loves us and wants to bless us (cf. Ephesians 2:4–5), he cannot love us and bless that which harms us.

When we abandon biblical truth and reject biblical morality, the prophet’s description becomes true of us: “Your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God” (Isaiah 59:2). Since God is the only source of spiritual life (John 15:5), “to set the mind on the flesh is death” (Romans 8:6).

We should therefore be grieved but not surprised that US suicides reached a record high last year, or that overdose fatalities have risen fivefold in the last two decades, or that 68 percent of us say this is the lowest point in our nation’s history they can remember.

“There is only one relationship that matters”

In a sermon attributed to St. Macarius (AD 300–391) we read:

Woe to the path that is not walked on, or along which the voices of men are not heard, for then it becomes the haunt of wild animals. Woe to the soul if the Lord does not walk within it to banish with his voice the spiritual beasts of sin. Woe to the house where no master dwells, to the field where no farmer works, to the pilotless ship, storm-tossed and sinking. Woe to the soul without Christ as its true pilot; drifting in the darkness, buffeted by the waves of passion, storm-tossed at the mercy of evil spirits, its end is destruction.

Woe to the soul that does not have Christ to cultivate it with care to produce the good fruit of the Holy Spirit. Left to itself, it is choked with thorns and thistles; instead of fruit it produces only what is fit for burning. Woe to the soul that does not have Christ dwelling in it; deserted and foul with the filth of its passions, it becomes a haven for all the vices.

Does his warning describe and explain the spiritual and moral condition of our culture?

Conversely, we are promised: “Walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh” (Galatians 5:16). Jesus assures us, “Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit” (John 15:5).

To this end, I will close by sharing my favorite paragraph in my favorite daily devotional, My Utmost for His Highest. I read it every year on this date and am encouraged and challenged each time by Oswald Chambers’ wisdom:

There is only one relationship that matters, and that is your personal relationship to a personal Redeemer and Lord. Let everything else go, but maintain that at all costs, and God will fulfill his purpose through your life. One individual life may be of priceless value to God’s purpose, and yours may be that life.

Will God “fulfill his purpose through your life” today?

Denison Forum

A private funeral service and interment for former First Lady Rosalynn Carter will be held today in Plains, Georgia. Yesterday, a tribute service in Atlanta made national headlines. It was attended by former President Jimmy Carter, now ninety-nine years old and in hospice care, along with President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden, former President Bill Clinton, and former First Ladies Hillary Clinton, Michelle Obama, and Melania Trump.

Mr. Carter was unable to speak at the service, so their daughter, Amy Lynn Carter, read one of his love letters on his behalf. Written seventy-five years ago when he was serving in the Navy, it said in part, “When I see you, I fall in love with you all over again. Does that seem strange to you? It doesn’t to me.”

Watching coverage of yesterday’s service, I found myself pondering all that has happened in Mrs. Carter’s ninety-six years of life. Her husband was the first US president born in a hospital. Penicillin was discovered a year after her birth. She was sixteen years old when the first dialysis machine was built, twenty-eight years of age when the polio vaccine was made available, and forty years old when the first heart transplant was performed.

Now my Apple Watch tracks my blood oxygen, heart rate, time spent asleep, respiratory rate, fitness activities, and wrist temperature. Artificial intelligence and advances in genomics are revolutionizing health care.

However, has our morality kept up with our medicine?

Anti-Israel protesters plan to disrupt Christmas tree lighting

The United Nations voted for the partition of Palestine on this day in 1947. The plan would have created an independent Jewish state and an autonomous nation of Palestine, but Arab leaders rejected the proposal. Hamas’s terrorist invasion of Israel on October 7 and the war it started are just the latest consequences of their rejection.

However, as I noted yesterday, many in the West continue to blame Israel for a conflict Hamas instigated. As postmodern relativism has deluded our culture into embracing “post-truth” subjective ethics, millions of people believe truth to be whatever they believe it to be. Consequently, protesters continue to claim that Israel’s response to Hamas’s atrocities is morally equivalent to those atrocities, if not even more “genocidal.”

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NOTE: I have written a book on the Israel–Hamas war which we are releasing as a free digital download. I invite you to get your copy here.

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For example, anti-Israel protesters calling themselves “Within Our Lifetime” glued themselves to Sixth Avenue during the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and splashed red paint all over the New York Public Library flagship, causing $75,000 in damage. Another anti-Israel group shut down the Manhattan Bridge on the holiday weekend. Now anti-Israel demonstrators plan to disrupt the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree Lighting ceremony this evening.

To those who accuse Israel of genocidal crimes against Palestinians (when it is actually Hamas that seeks the genocide of the Jews), consider the story of Yahya Sinwar. He was serving four life sentences in an Israeli prison for attempted murder when his life was saved by brain surgery, reportedly to remove a tumor. He was released in 2011, one of a thousand Palestinian prisoners exchanged for a single Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit. Twelve years later, he masterminded the October 7 invasion that slaughtered more than twelve hundred people in southern Israel.

“Inching ever closer to the abyss”

Telegraph columnist Allister Heath is right: “There is a fundamental, profound moral and legal distinction between deliberately torturing, raping, and exterminating women and children, and the accidental, tragic death of civilians used as human shields as the result of careful, considered action taken by a law-bound army engaged in self-defense.”

Because so many in Western society are rejecting this distinction, Heath warns, “The world is inching ever closer to the abyss, and Hamas’s stooges are helping to drag us into another dark age.”

The rejection of objective truth and morality typified by the current denigration of Israel and the Jewish people tragically deserves Heath’s warning. We live in a culture where 40 percent of people willfully choose to be ignorant of the negative consequences of their actions. Similarly, multitudes are choosing willful ignorance of the realities in Hamas’s war with Israel and a multitude of other consequences resulting from our escalating rejection of biblical morality.

Why is this situation so dire for our future?

“My grandmother doesn’t need a eulogy”

In his 1967 inaugural address as governor of California, Ronald Reagan quoted the French political philosopher Baron de Montesquieu (1689–1755): “The deterioration of every government begins with the decay of the principle upon which it was founded.” The “principle” upon which America was founded is the “self-evident” truth that “all men are created equal” and thus “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights” including “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

If “truth” is no longer “self-evident” and objective, the equality of all people and the rights that ensue are no longer “self-evident” and objective. And the republic built on those rights is imperiled.

I am praying daily that Americans understand the consequences of rejecting biblical truth and morality before it’s too late. If we admit our spiritual blindness, we can claim God’s promise:  “I will lead the blind in a way that they do not know, in paths that they have not known I will guide them. I will turn the darkness before them into light, the rough places into level ground” (Isaiah 42:16). If we admit our spiritual poverty, we can claim God’s provision: “My God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:19).

And when he does, we become the change our culture needs to see.

Rosalynn Carter’s grandson, Jason Carter, said at her tribute service yesterday, “My grandmother doesn’t need a eulogy, her life was a sermon.”

What sermon will your life preach today?

Denison Forum

Casey McIntyre was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2019 and died on November 12, 2023, at just thirty-eight years of age. In the days leading up to her death, she urged friends to donate to a campaign that would cancel the medical debt of strangers. By the time she died, that campaign raised nearly $200,000, enough to pay off nearly $19 million in medical debt. As of today, it has more than tripled its impact.

In all the coverage I have seen of her remarkable impact, no one has taken a contrarian view—nor should they. Just for the sake of objectivity in reporting, someone could question whether the money could be put to better use or whether medical debt should be retired in this way. But Casey’s courageous generosity of spirit was so compelling that her story should be told with the affirmation it has received.

Unfortunately, such moral clarity is in short supply in our “authentic” society.

“The job of the army is to protect the civilians”

Authentic is Merriam-Webster’s “word of the year.” This should not surprise us since it is so often used these days to connote seeking one’s “authentic voice” and “authentic self.” Our relativistic culture assures us that we are what we believe ourselves to be, whether this claim relates to our gender, sexual orientation, or nearly any other identifier. Anyone who disagrees is being intolerant, which is the cardinal sin of our culture, or so we’re told.

The same is now true of others: if you think Israel is committing “genocide” and Hamas’s terrorists are “freedom fighters,” you can join multitudes of demonstrators who agree. This despite the fact that Hamas is unambiguous in its stated desire to completely eradicate the Jews (which is what a “genocide” actually constitutes), while Israel has possessed for decades the military capacity to take Palestinian hostages and yet has never done so.

A dear friend and I were discussing over the weekend the courage of our mutual friend now serving with the Israel Defense Forces in Gaza. She said of him: “It is hard to grasp such selflessness and devotion to fellow countrymen and complete strangers, knowing that his possible loss of life is real and the impact would be devastating for his own wife and children.”

And yet our friend risks his life every day to free hostages he has never met. His latest text notes, “The most important thing right now is the release of as many hostages as possible.” He explains why: “The job of the army is to protect the civilians, not vice versa.”

Of course, Hamas clearly disagrees as it hides its terrorists behind civilian hostages and other human shields. And yet, its advocates in the West continue to claim that the murderers are the victims of a conflict their atrocities instigated. (For more, download our free ebook, The War in Israel.)

“The worst in the nation had prevailed over the best”

How have we come to such a place of moral confusion and obfuscation?

One answer was explained in an insightful article published on the sixtieth anniversary of the assassination of John F. Kennedy by R. Jordan Prescott, a private contractor working in defense and national security. He notes that many Americans reacted to the president’s tragic death by blaming America. For example, journalist James Reston wrote: “Somehow the worst in the nation had prevailed over the best . . . something in the nation itself, some strain of madness and violence.”

This reaction led to the narrative that America is itself deeply flawed and violent. According to Prescott, a new “liberalism” emerged that accused our country of “a seemingly inexhaustible list of American sins—greed, racism, xenophobia, misogyny, homophobia, slavery, genocide, environmental destruction, militarism, and imperialism.”

Their “solution” was to transmute this dogma of collective guilt and identity consciousness into what is often termed “woke” ideology today. Prescott notes that America’s educational institutions have been captured and used to advance this dogma “in direct opposition to the Judeo-Christian premises of the American Creed.”

In this version of reality, truth claims are but tools of societal transformation. Political strategist James Carville spoke for many in his profession: “Truth is relative. Truth is what you can make the voter believe is the truth. If you’re smart enough, truth is what you make the voter think it is.”

However, a relativistic “morality” that weaponizes truth for political ends and celebrates terrorists who kidnap children has its roots much further back in history than 1963.

“The further away you are from the devil”

Here are the first words spoken by the tempter to the first humans: “Did God actually say . . .” (Genesis 3:1). From then to now, Satan’s first move in his strategy to “steal and kill and destroy” (John 10:10) is to steal, kill, and destroy the truth.

He knows that when “truth is relative,” the truth that Jesus is “the way, and the truth, and the life” (John 14:6) becomes just “your” truth or “my” truth. And when we jettison biblical truth and objective morality, we have no compass or map for the journey and are, in the most basic definition of the term, lost.

What is the way forward? Jesus assured us, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (John 8:31–32). Note the order: first we must “abide” in God’s word, which means to think and live biblically. When we obey what we know from Scripture, then and only then are we “truly” Jesus’ disciples. Such holistic obedience positions us to “know the truth” as the Spirit guides us (John 16:13). As we know and live this truth, it will “set us free” (John 8:32).

Such biblical living is what Scripture means when it calls us to “submit yourselves therefore to God” (James 4:7a) so we can “resist the devil, and he will flee from you” (v. 7b). In this way we claim the promise, “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you” (v. 8).

Billy Graham summarized today’s conversation with advice everyone in America needs to hear and heed: “Don’t be deceived by Satan and his lies. Instead, stay close to Christ—because the closer you are to him, the further away you are from the devil.”

How will you “stay close to Christ” today?

Denison Forum

Hamas freed seventeen more hostages yesterday; thirty-nine Palestinians were released from Israeli prisons in exchange. Among the hostages Hamas released was Abigail Edan, a four-year-old Israeli-American citizen who witnessed her parents being murdered on October 7. President Biden said at a news conference, “What she endured is unthinkable.”

Emily Hand is another hostage released over the weekend by Hamas. She was at a sleepover at a friend’s house when Hamas invaded and was initially reported killed, but it was later announced that she was among those held hostage. She turned nine while in captivity.

Yaffa Adar is another. The eighty-five-year-old Holocaust survivor and mother of three, grandmother of seven, and great-grandmother of eight was kidnapped from her kibbutz. Her eldest grandson was also taken hostage and remains in Hamas custody.

Amid the elation over receiving some of the hostages, the Wall Street Journal editorial board reminded us that “the cost is a short-term cease-fire that Hamas will exploit, and three-quarters of the 236 hostages will remain in terrorist hands.” They added:

The deal again shows the moral gulf between the two sides. Hamas kidnapped Israeli children as young as nine months to use as hostages and spring its jihadists who have been arrested or convicted in a fair trial for their crimes. Israel takes military risks to save its citizens. Hamas risks Palestinian civilians to save itself.

This “moral gulf” is worth exploring on an even more fundamental level today.

“Solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short”

John Gray is an emeritus professor of European thought at the London School of Economics and a prolific author. His latest book, The New Leviathans, uses Thomas Hobbes’ 1651 classic Leviathan to explore the rise of totalitarianism in our generation.

In an article for Time, Gray explains Hobbes’ central thesis: humans can achieve a civilized life of peace, prosperity, and culture through a social contract that empowers a ruler whom all will obey. This sovereign power (which Hobbes called a “leviathan” after the sea monster in the book of Job), whether a king or a governing assembly, would be unbounded in its powers, but its authority would be limited to maintaining peace.

Hobbes believed that humans need such a ruler because we live in a state of nature he described as “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” However, in Gray’s view, such “leviathans” as we are seeing in Putin’s Russia, China’s Xi, and Western “woke” ideologies fail the people they are empowered to protect.

The reason is both simple and catastrophic: rulers are as subject to fallen human nature as those they rule. They are as tempted to be their own gods (Genesis 3:5) as the people they theoretically serve. More so, in fact: the “will to power” that Nietzsche so powerfully identifies becomes even more tempting as power becomes more available.

As the British historian Lord Acton observed, “Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

“Nobody should blame us for the things we do”

Gray’s analysis explains why there will be “wars and rumors of war” until the Lord returns (Matthew 24:6). The ongoing exchange of hostages for prisoners will not end the conflict between Israel and Hamas.

To the contrary: Hamas leader Ghazi Hamad, when asked if his goal was the annihilation of Israel, replied, “Yes, of course. We must remove that country.” He added: “We are the victims of the occupation. Full stop. Therefore, nobody should blame us for the things we do. On October 7, October 10, October million, everything we do is justified.” The fact that Gaza has not been “occupied” by Israel since 2005 makes no difference, apparently.

The only remedy for the sinful human heart is one illustrated by the hostages-for-prisoners exchanges over the weekend: trading the innocent for the guilty to free the latter through the suffering of the former.

Here is the solution we need: “We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:20–21). At the cross, the Father transferred your sins and mine onto his sinless Son, who then paid our debt with his life: “The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:23).

“It’s not in the stars to hold our destiny”

As the Christmas season begins, I want to urge us to remember that we were guilty prisoners exchanged for an innocent Savior. Jesus came “to set at liberty those who are oppressed” (Luke 4:18, fulfilling Isaiah 61:1). The One born in a Bethlehem manger died on a Jerusalem cross. Your cross. My cross.

One of the symptoms of human fallenness is the delusion that we can save ourselves. Our secularized society assures us that we can be our own Leviathan, that we are the customers and consumers of our culture. In this calculus, holy days become holidays; Christmas is about Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and nonstop consumption until we “ring in the New Year” not with prayer and fasting but with parties and feasting.

Maya Rudolph encouraged us to “create your own destiny.” William Faulkner similarly opined, “Man is indestructible because of his simple will to freedom.” Shakespeare was adamant: “It’s not in the stars to hold our destiny but in ourselves.”

To whom will you entrust your destiny today?

Denison Forum

Israel and Hamas have agreed to a deal by which Hamas will free fifty civilian hostages in return for the release of 150 Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails and a four-day pause in fighting. The first hostages could be freed as early as tomorrow. US officials hope this deal in Israel could lead to the release of many more hostages, including those held by Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

In all the reporting I’ve seen on this agreement, here’s a question no one has asked: Why is it that only the jihadists take hostages? Israeli forces have been inside Gaza for several weeks—why have they not taken a single Palestinian hostage to use as leverage with Hamas?

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NOTE: I have written a book on the Israel–Hamas war which we are releasing as a free digital download. I invite you to get your copy here.

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“We love death like our enemies love life!”

The answer is simple: the two have very different views regarding the sanctity of human life.

Israel’s worldview, rooted in the Hebrew Bible, believes that all people are created in God’s image and likeness (Genesis 1:27). They consider hostages to be especially valuable: their central prayer, recited three times a day, speaks of God’s compassion as one who “heals the sick and frees the captives.” The Babylonian Talmud teaches that being held captive is worse than death or famine, for it includes them both.

This is why they freed 1,027 Palestinian prisoners in exchange for a single Israeli soldier in 2011. Over the years, they have released about seven thousand Palestinian prisoners to secure the freedom of nineteen Israelis and to retrieve the bodies of eight others.

Hamas, by contrast, stated in its original charter: “Jihad is its path and death for the sake of Allah is the loftiest of its wishes.” They claim, “We love death like our enemies love life!” They view Muslims who die in war as martyrs who will be rewarded in paradise.

How we view the sanctity of human life is foundational to the society we create. Israel, as I have witnessed in more than thirty trips to the Holy Land, has built a thriving economy for the benefit of its citizens. Hamas uses Palestinian civilians as human shields and steals aid intended for them to construct tunnels and acquire weapons for killing Jews.

When we view each person as sacred, our definition of success changes dramatically.

Playing Scrabble in five languages

John F. Kennedy and C. S. Lewis both died on this day sixty years ago.

By most measures, both would be considered enormously successful. In a recent Gallup survey, Mr. Kennedy was the highest-rated former US president. He had a net worth of $300 million at the time of his death; in 2015, Forbes estimated the Kennedy family’s net worth at $1.2 billion. His presidential museum is one of my favorites and a lasting tribute to his iconic cultural status.

C. S. Lewis achieved remarkable success as well. He was a true genius, receiving three “firsts” from Oxford (the equivalent of graduating summa cum laude three times) and serving on the faculties of Oxford and Cambridge. (He also played Scrabble with his wife in five languages.) He attained national fame for his radio talks on the BBC during World War II and was featured on the cover of Time magazine in 1947. More than two hundred million copies of his books have been sold.

However, I will always remember my surprise upon visiting his home for the first time. Known as “the Kilns,” it is a modest house where he lived, wrote, and died. Lewis gave away most, if not all, of the proceeds of his books, often making his donations anonymously. He never bought a car or learned to drive and seldom traveled. He put his money in an “Agape Fund” and donated so much of it that a friend had to advise him to keep a third for taxes.

He was just as generous with his time, laboriously responding to each and every letter he received. His personal correspondence was so vast that it has been collected in three volumes.

“You have never met a mere mortal”

What explains Lewis’s extreme personal generosity? Consider this observation in The Weight of Glory:

There are no ordinary people. You have never met a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendors.

Lewis was convinced—rightly—that people are inestimably significant, far above anything the material world can give or measure. As a result, he wisely invested his resources where they would bring the greatest return.

As did his Lord. Scripture says of Jesus: “By him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible—whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him” (Colossians 1:16). And yet he chose to make humans, knowing that our sins would cost him the cross (Revelation 13:8 NIV). And then he died a tortured, excruciating death for us (Romans 5:8). He would do it all over again, just for you.

Such sacrificial love is abundant cause for gratitude this Thanksgiving week and every day of every year.

“It is not your business to succeed”

Serving people in the will of God is the highest and best definition of success. The more we obey our Father’s calling to “serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace” (1 Peter 4:10), the more successful our lives become.

C. S. Lewis was adamant on this point: “It is not your business to succeed, but to do right. When you have done so the rest lies with God.” Billy Graham likewise asked:

How does God define success? His measure is very different from the world’s measure, and it can be summed up in one sentence: Success in God’s eyes is faithfulness to his calling. Paul was a failure in the world’s eyes—but not to God. Even Jesus was a failure as far as most people were concerned, but “he was faithful to the one who appointed him” [Hebrews 3:2 NIV]—and that is all that mattered.

What is your definition of success? Is it the same as God’s—and are you pursuing it?

How would you answer his questions today?

Denison Forum

As you know, former First Lady Rosalynn Carter died Sunday afternoon at the age of ninety-six. Former President Jimmy Carter said, “Rosalynn was my equal partner in everything I ever accomplished.”

A tireless advocate for mental health services, Mrs. Carter was instrumental in passing the Mental Health Systems Act of 1980 and continued her work on this vital cause for decades after. In 1982, she and her husband founded the Carter Center, a nonprofit dedicated to a range of issues from improving global health to monitoring democratic elections to negotiating peace agreements. She could often be found volunteering with Habitat for Humanity along with her husband in building homes for those in need.

In a day when many leaders use their public platforms for personal celebrity, Rosalynn Carter used hers to serve others.

“A kind of private barn of money”

According to Guido Alfani, an economic history professor at Bocconi University in Milan, the wealthiest members of society have often in Western history been expected to use their riches “to support their societies in times of crises like plagues, famines, or wars.” For example, the Tuscan humanist Poggio Bracciolini wrote in 1428 that “many greedy individuals” should “constitute a kind of private barn of money able to be of assistance to everybody.”

Those who gave charitably were not being entirely altruistic, however. Alfani notes that they wanted to allay the unfavorable way they were viewed by others and also saw such charity as contributing to “the benefit of their souls.”

Such transactional benevolence is rooted in fallen human nature. For example, after Jesus announced his intention to go to Jerusalem where he would “be killed, and on the third day be raised” (Matthew 16:21), Peter “began to rebuke him, saying, ‘Far be it from you Lord! This shall never happen to you’” (v. 22). Jesus responded: “Get behind me, Satan! You are a hindrance to me. For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man” (v. 23).

Why did Jesus say this to Peter?

The apostle wanted Jesus to be a military messiah who would overthrow the hated Romans, not a suffering servant who would die on their cross. Even after Jesus’ resurrection, Peter and the other disciples asked him, “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” (Acts 1:6). They wanted him to do what they wanted, using him as a means to their ends. In this way, Peter was “setting his mind” not on the “things of God” but on “the things of man.” He was serving Jesus so Jesus would serve him.

This is what fuels Hamas in its drive to eradicate Israel so its Mahdi (a messianic figure) will return to rule the world for Muslims, including themselves. It fuels Christian nationalists who want God to bless America for the advancement of their communities and aspirations.

I say all of that to say this: an excellent test of character is to see how sacrificially we serve others when such service does not benefit us personally.

The paradoxical problem with our focus on evangelism

Jesus is Exhibit A of such character. He testified that he “came not to be served but to serve” (Mark 10:45a). Then he proved it when he “[gave] his life as a ransom for many” (v. 45b). This fact highlights a foundational reason for Thanksgiving this holiday week: expressing gratitude to Christ for his selfless, sacrificial love.

A practical way we can thank Jesus for his grace is by sharing that grace with others. After washing his disciples’ feet, he called them to “wash one another’s feet” (John 13:14). We demonstrate our love for our Lord by our love for our neighbor (Matthew 22:37–39). The best way you can serve me is to serve my family.

Here’s the problem: we evangelicals tend to focus more on experiencing grace in salvation (Ephesians 2:8–9) than on God’s call to “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 3:18, my emphasis). Paradoxically, this omission limits our evangelistic effectiveness since we need such intimacy with Christ that his Spirit transforms us into his character (Romans 8:29) and manifests his grace to others (Galatians 5:22–23).

Exhibiting such character is vital if we are to reach our skeptical, post-Christian culture with the good news of God’s love.

The “three worlds of evangelicalism”

Aaron Renn was a partner at Accenture and senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research before turning to a career as a writer on cultural issues. His February 2022 First Things article on the “three worlds of evangelicalism” was especially significant and urgent.

In it, he shows that American evangelicals have moved from the “positive world” (pre–1994) in which we were largely viewed as contributing to society, to the “neutral world” (1994–2014) in which we were viewed as one option among many, to the “negative world” (2014–present) in which we are seen as a threat to the public good and the new public moral order. In my book The Coming Tsunami I document this shift as well.

In such an antagonistic culture, it is even more imperative that you and I manifest our Lord’s selfless, sacrificial spirit of service:

• When skeptics reject us, we know that they especially need our intercession and we “pray for those who persecute you” (Matthew 5:44).
• When they reject our message, we know that they especially need to know God’s love and we redouble our sacrificial efforts to share our Lord with them (cf. Acts 4:8–12; 5:29–32).
• When people need resources we possess, we choose to “do good to everyone” (Galatians 6:10), remembering that we are “serving the Lord Christ” (Colossians 3:24; cf. Matthew 25:40).

To this end, let’s make time this Thanksgiving week to offer Jesus our worship and gratitude for his sacrificial love for us. Then let’s see opportunities to serve our family, friends, and others as invitations to demonstrate his selfless character in our compassion.

St. Fulgentius of Ruspe (AD 460–533) described the transformation God intends for his children: “They are enlightened and converted, thus passing from death to life, sinfulness to holiness, unbelief to faith, and evil actions to holy life.”

Will those you see this week see this transformation in you?

Denison Forum

NOTE: Former First Lady Rosalynn Carter died yesterday at the age of ninety-six. I will be reflecting on her life and legacy in tomorrow’s Daily Article.

On November 4, 1979, Iranian students seized the US embassy in Tehran and captured fifty-two Americans, holding them hostage for 444 days. I remember the “Iran Hostage Crisis” very clearly. The hostages were headline news seemingly every day. Millions of us prayed for their safety, health, and release. Ten days after they were finally freed, they were given a ticker tape parade in New York City.

On October 7, Hamas terrorists took more than 240 people hostage. Among them are babies, children, women, the elderly, and the disabled.

Unlike the Iranian hostage crisis, Hamas’s hostages have been a back-page story in this unfolding crisis. When four were released and one was rescued by Israeli special forces, their stories made the news briefly, but the world’s attention has been far more focused on Palestinian civilians in Gaza and charges of genocide and brutality leveled against Israel.

Now we are learning that negotiators are nearing an agreement with Hamas to release fifty hostages in exchange for Israel allowing more aid and fuel into Gaza, along with a limited pause in fighting.

Why have the two hostage crises been reported and viewed in such starkly different ways?

What does this question say about our culture on this Thanksgiving week?

“What is the meaning and purpose of life?”

Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a research fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institution and a former senior fellow at Harvard Kennedy School. She speaks six languages and has written numerous bestsellers. Raised a Muslim, she lived for many years as an atheist before announcing a few days ago that she is now a Christian.

She set her decision in cultural context:

Western civilization is under threat from three different but related forces: the resurgence of great-power authoritarianism and expansionism in the forms of the Chinese Communist Party and Vladimir Putin’s Russia; the rise of global Islamism, which threatens to mobilize a vast population against the West; and the viral spread of woke ideology, which is eating into the moral fiber of the next generation.

In her view, our secularized society’s response through military, economic, diplomatic, and technological means is failing. She explains why: “We can’t fight off these formidable forces unless we can answer the question: What is it that unites us?” Ali then answers her question: “The only credible answer, I believe, lies in our desire to uphold the legacy of the Judeo-Christian tradition.”

She finds in this tradition “an elaborate set of ideas and institutions designed to safeguard human life, freedom, and dignity—from the nation state and the rule of law to the institutions of science, health, and learning.” She cites Tom Holland’s book Dominion to claim that “all sorts of apparently secular freedoms—of the market, of conscience, and of the press—find their roots in  Christianity.”

She adds that she turned to Christianity because “I ultimately found life without any spiritual solace unendurable—indeed very nearly self-destructive. Atheism failed to answer a simple question: What is the meaning and purpose of life?”

“Christianity” nowhere appears in the Bible

Ali’s announcement has sparked two very different responses: while many Christians are happy for her and grateful for her endorsement of our faith, others have noted that her article focuses on Christianity as a contributor to society rather than on Christ. She says nothing about a personal experience with Jesus. Her conversion could be described as having faith in faith.

In a subsequent interview, Ali did in fact focus more on the story of Christ and its personal significance for her decision. But her article celebrating the social benefits of Christianity omits this central fact: there is no Christianity without Christ.

The word Christianity nowhere appears in the Bible. In fact, the word Christian is found only three times in Scripture: Acts 11:26; Acts 26:28; and 1 Peter 4:16. The latter two references seem to suggest that the term was used derisively.

By contrast, the word disciple appears in the Gospels and the Book of Acts 261 times. Clearly, biblical Christianity is about following Christ as a learner follows their teacher. When we do this, Jesus produces in and through us the benefits of Christianity that Ali commends. Christians do not change the culture—Christ does.

It is when we are “in Christ” that we become a “new creation” (2 Corinthians 5:17). It is “Christ in you” that is our “hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27). The Bible says of Christ, “in [him] are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Colossians 2:3). His Spirit produces the “fruit” that our secularized society so desperately lacks, the “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, [and] self-control” that we need for cultural flourishing (Galatians 5:22–23).

A vital question to begin Thanksgiving week

When we truly love our Lord, we love our neighbors as ourselves (Matthew 22:37–39). People take precedence over politics.

And, with regard to my earlier question, hostages become more important than ideologies.

Tragically, in the decades since the Iranian hostages were released, our culture has been taken hostage by the “woke ideology” Ali describes as “eating into the moral fiber of the next generation.” People have become a means to the end of political narratives and personal advancement. Even among many Christians, as Dallas Willard noted, “The idea of having faith in Jesus has come to be totally isolated from being his apprentice and learning how to do what he said.”

Consequently, across this Thanksgiving week we’ll focus in my Daily Articles on Jesus. We’ll identify reasons to give thanks for who he is every day in every circumstance.

Let’s begin today. When last did you thank Jesus, not just for what he does, but for who he is?

When last did you tell him you love him?

Why not now?

Denison Forum

This week’s economic news was unexpectedly good: inflation is down from 9.1 percent last summer to 3.2 percent now. In response, the Dow closed Wednesday at its highest level since mid-August. Observers think the Federal Reserve will not raise interest rates further, freeing up capital for new investment. Unemployment is still low. According to Forbes, financial strategists largely expect the stock market to continue rising next year as well.

Why, then, are so many Americans so unhappy with America?

In a recent CNN poll, 72 percent said things in the US are going badly. In a Gallup survey, only 19 percent said they are satisfied with the way things are going in our nation. In an ABC News/Ipsos poll, only 23 percent said the country is heading in the right direction.

Economic uncertainty is one factor: the pandemic taught us that things can change seemingly overnight. Prices remain high, and many parts of the country are still struggling in this postindustrial economy.

However, as Jude Russo writes in the American Conservative, “the dysphoria may lie deeper.”

“Economic progress is beside the point”

Russo points to the fact that affiliation with civil society—churches, charities, clubs—is at an all-time low, as are marriage rates. A plurality of Americans are not associated with any organized religion. Confidence in public institutions has declined precipitously as well—Americans trust small business and the military but little else. Crime rates remain far higher than they were in the pre-Covid era.

Then Russo sardonically draws a lesson I was surprised to read in a secular news outlet: “It’s almost as if human flourishing requires more than material prosperity.”

He adds, “In the absence of something like true religion, it’s unclear what there is besides accumulation.” And he concludes, “Until we figure it out, economic progress—if even tenable in a sustained way with declining social capital—is beside the point.”

Russo’s observations are obviously true to Scripture. Paul observed, “The love of money is a root of all kinds of evils” (1 Timothy 6:10). We might dismiss his monetary warning since he was not likely to have been a man of great wealth (read 2 Corinthians 11:23–33 the next time you feel sorry for yourself). However, King Solomon was a different story: his income has been calculated as exceeding $1.1 billion a year, and yet he observed, “He who loves money will not be satisfied with money, nor he who loves wealth with his income” (Ecclesiastes 5:10).

Russo’s conclusions are also true to life: no matter how much wealth we accumulate, we can always lose it today or gain more tomorrow. We can never have enough to have enough.

Why, then, don’t more people agree that “human flourishing requires more than material prosperity”? Why don’t they see that our problem is spiritual rather than material? Why don’t they respond to our “God-shaped emptiness” by turning to God?

Wisdom from a second-century source

My thoughts today were spurred by a homily I read from an unknown second-century pastor. Commenting on the Lord’s lament, “All day long my name is constantly blasphemed” (Isaiah 52:5 NIV), he said:

Why is the Lord’s name blasphemed? Because we say one thing and do another. When they hear the words of God on our lips, unbelievers are amazed at their beauty and power, but when they see that these words have no effect in our lives, their admiration turns to scorn, and they dismiss such words as myths and fairy tales.

They listen, for example, when we tell them that God has said: “It is no credit to you if you love those who love you, but only if you love your enemies and those who hate you.” They are full of admiration at such extraordinary virtue, but when they observe that we not only fail to love people who hate us, but even those who love us, they laugh us to scorn, and the Name is blasphemed.

My guess is that this pastor from nineteen centuries ago would answer my question today in the same way: “We say one thing and do another.” When God’s people make the news for doing ungodly things, skeptics are justified in their skepticism.

This is not true of other messages and messengers. If a physician has a gambling problem, his medical practice can continue. If the CEO of a construction company has an affair, his company can keep building skyscrapers.

But Christians claim that our message leads people to become a “new creation” (2 Corinthians 5:17). We claim that God produces “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, [and] self-control” in those who live by his Spirit (Galatians 5:22–23). As a result, when we “say one thing and do another,” people won’t care what we say.

In addition, sinners don’t like being told they’re sinners, so if they can reject the messenger, they think they can ignore the message. And Satan knows he cannot defeat the truth, so he seeks to undermine the truth-bearers, which puts Christians in his tempting crosshairs every day.

“Oft what we would we cannot do”

All this to say, the more secularized our culture becomes, the more Spirit-filled we must become. We must be the change we wish to see, but we cannot do this apart from the transforming Spirit of God. The English poet Francis Turner Palgrave’s prayer should therefore be ours:

Whilst Thy will we would pursue
Oft what we would we cannot do.
The sun may stand in zenith skies
But on the soul thick midnight lies.

O Lord of lights, ’tis Thou alone
Canst make our darkened hearts Thine own.

Would you surrender your day to God’s Spirit now (Ephesians 5:18)? Would you ask him to manifest the “fruit” of his Spirit so powerfully that others see Christ in you?

In short, would you ask your Lord to make your “darkened heart” his own today?

Denison Forum

Israeli tanks advanced yesterday to the gates of Gaza City’s main hospital. According to the World Health Organization, al-Shifa hospital is no longer functioning after three days without power. A Gaza health ministry spokesperson said thirty-two patients had died in the last three days, including three newborn babies, as a result.

President Biden stated yesterday that Gaza’s hospitals “must be protected.” While hospitals are granted special protection under international humanitarian law, the International Committee of the Red Cross notes that they can lose such protections if combatants use them to hide fighters or store weapons.

This is just what Israel says Hamas is doing in Gaza. It claims that the terrorist group operates its command headquarters beneath the al-Shifa complex; the Israeli military has released an illustrated map of the hospital marked with locations it claims are underground military installations. A US official with knowledge of American intelligence has confirmed this claim. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also states that Israel offered “to give them enough fuel to operate the hospital, operate the incubators and so on, because we (have) no battle with patients or civilians at all,” but Hamas refused the offer.

Palestinian medical workers, by contrast, accuse Israel of mounting an all-out attack on infrastructure in Gaza to punish the population and force a surrender. Accordingly, three Palestinian human rights groups have asked the International Criminal Court to investigate Israel, accusing it of perpetrating genocide in its war in Gaza.

This accusation that Israel is committing genocide is common in the press, on college campuses, and at other pro-Palestinian rallies these days.

But is it true?

“Any civilian loss is a tragedy”

In December 1948, in the aftermath of the Second World War, the United Nations adopted the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. It defines genocide as acts intended “to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial, or religious group.”

By this definition, Hamas is a genocidal group. Its founding charter, published in 1988, explicitly calls for the obliteration of Israel. As Bret Stephens writes in the New York Times, “had the Hamas terrorists been able to kill one hundred or one thousand times as many [Jews] as they did on October 7, they would have done so without hesitation.” He adds that Hamas’s goal is “homicidal: to end Israel as a state by slaughtering every Jew within it.”

By contrast, Israel wants to destroy Hamas, not the Palestinians. When Hamas uses civilians as human shields, their deaths are the fault of Hamas, according to Prime Minister Netanyahu: “I think any civilian loss is a tragedy . . . and the blame should be placed squarely on Hamas.”

Cultural commentator Andrew Sullivan noted: “If Israel were interested in the ‘genocide’ of Palestinian Arabs, it has had the means to accomplish it for a very long time. And yet, for some reason, the Arab population of Israel and the occupied territories has exploded since 1948, and the Arabs in Israel proper have voting rights and a key presence in the Knesset.”

He concludes: “The only people actively and proudly engaged in genocide are Hamas.” Those who march for Hamas are not opposing genocide but “defending its perpetrators.”

Supreme Court adopts a code of conduct

In other news, the US Supreme Court issued its first-ever code of conduct yesterday. According to the Court, the fifteen-page document “largely represents a codification of principles that we have long regarded as governing our conduct.” However, the code provides no penalties for violations of ethical standards.

This fact highlights the problem with legislating morality: if even our nation’s highest court cannot anticipate and respond to every possible ethical violation its nine members might commit, how can a nation of laws possibly legislate for every misuse of human freedom? United Nations regulations against genocide have clearly not kept Hamas from seeking and committing it. Nor have they protected Israel’s critics from falsely claiming that it is doing the same thing.

This is why the Christian gospel is so urgently needed in our post-Christian culture. Only in Christ can we become a “new creation” for whom “the old has passed away; behold, the new has come” (2 Corinthians 5:17). Only Jesus can cleanse sinners so that we are “holy and without blemish” (Ephesians 5:27).

In my latest website paper, “Are the Jews still God’s chosen people?” I relate the transforming power of the gospel to the war in the Middle East. After examining in detail the theological debate regarding Israel’s status in biblical prophecy and God’s kingdom today, I close with three biblical facts:

1. God intends all people—Jews and Gentiles—to experience his transforming love (Ezekiel 36:26; 2 Corinthians 5:17).
2. God wants to use all people—Jews and Gentiles—to bring the good news of his love to the world (Genesis 12:3; Acts 1:8).
3. We should join Paul in praying earnestly for Jews who do not know Jesus to turn to him in faith (Romans 10:1).

“Faith is like a window you look through”

In light of these facts, let’s close with this truth: God’s love in Christ can change any human heart, including the terrorists of Hamas. If we think this is impossible, we just need to remember the conversion of Saul of Tarsus. The Bible records that he “was ravaging the church, and entering house after house, he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison” (Acts 8:3; cf. 22:4). Of course, that persecutor is known to the world today as Paul the Apostle.

If God could change his heart, he can change any heart.

Will you pause now to pray for God to bring the terrorists of Hamas into conviction of their sins and salvation in Christ? Ask Jesus to reveal himself to them in visions and dreams, something he is doing across the Muslim world today. And remember: it is always too soon to give up on God.

Br. Geoffrey Tristram of the Society of St. John the Evangelist notes: “It’s not great faith that you need, but faith in a great God. Faith is like a window you look through. It doesn’t matter if the window is six feet high or six inches, or just the tiniest peephole in a telescope. What matters is the God that your faith is looking out on.”

How great is your God?

Denison Forum

South Carolina Senator Tim Scott surprised many—including some of his campaign staff—on Sunday Night when he told Trey Gowdy with Fox News that he was dropping out of the race for president. Struggles in the polls and with generating new donors made it unlikely that the senator would be able to qualify for the next Republican debate, so Sunday’s news was seen by most as an eventuality.

Still, Scott began the race with one of the most substantial war chests in the primary and ended September with $14 million remaining, a figure he recently claimed was “the most money of any candidate running for president other than Donald Trump.” The hope was that his reserves would allow him to continue after others were forced to drop out, giving him the chance to make up ground in a narrower field. However, the combination of relatively poor debate performances and fellow South Carolinian Nikki Haley emerging as the chief rival to both Trump and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis left Scott without a clear path to improvement.

So now he returns his focus to the Senate and takes his message of positivity and hope with him. That message has been somewhat lacking among the other candidates in the election, but, as one of Scott’s supporters lamented, such optimism is “not where the Republican base is right now.”

To be honest, though, it’s not where most of the country seems to be either.

A recent poll showed that 63 percent of Americans are very or somewhat pessimistic about “the moral and ethical standards in our country” while only 12 percent said they had “quite a lot” of confidence in the nation’s future.

In short, if Tim Scott’s message of positivity failed to resonate with voters, it is likely because there’s simply not much to be positive about in the views of most Americans.

But, as lamentable as that perception may be, there are far worse fates for a country than a disenchanted populace.

Are you proud to be an American?

While we should not embrace negativity to the point that we can no longer see the good in the world around us, Chris Anderson was correct in writing of America’s shifting views on national pride that we have moved past the days when “being proud of America was treated as a prerequisite for being patriotic.”

To be sure, there is much in this country of which we cannot be proud. Upticks in abortion, the continued rejection of biblical morality, and the rampant animosity on both sides of the political aisle are real problems. Moreover, the state of the economy, the threat of proxy wars pulling the country deeper into the fray, and a host of other national problems weigh heavily on many Americans as well.

And while I would still argue that the good outweighs the bad when it comes to assessing America’s present and future, that will not always be the case if we ignore the very real issues we face.

So how should we proceed?

Consider your true citizenship

First, we must embrace the fact that, as Christians, we are called to be citizens of heaven before we’re citizens of America or any other nation. In our increasingly politicized culture, maintaining that distinction can be a difficult, though essential, proposition.

As Justin Giboney noted, “Our ideological tribes come with articles of faith. The least we can do is take the time to understand which of those conflict with Christian principles. If you think ideological conservatism or progressivism is biblically sound then you’re sadly mistaken.”

At Denison Forum, we often say we’re a nonpartisan ministry. I’ve heard from enough readers to know that stance can prove irritating at times, but we take that approach because we genuinely feel it is more in keeping with God’s call for us as individual Christians and as a ministry. The reason is that there is not one single political party that aligns itself with the totality of God’s word, and there never will be.

That perspective is important because it can grant us the necessary degrees of separation to take a more objective look at the country, judging it in light of God’s word rather than through a more political lens.

“Ask what you can do for your country”

Second, we need to do our part to make the nation better. Taking responsibility for our role in the state of the country is essential because it helps us avoid the temptation of simply blaming all that’s wrong on someone else.

And, to be sure, each of us can make a difference.

Ultimately, the way you treat others and the degree to which each day of your life draws the people around you closer to the Lord will have a far greater impact on the trajectory of this nation than anything you can do in a ballot box or political forum. Voting is still important, but no politician can fix what seems broken in our country (and that’s always been the case).

Holing up and trying to wait out the storm as the culture implodes around us is not a biblical option, no matter how appealing it may seem at times (Matthew 5:13–16). Doing so implies that we believe God has either given up on our nation and its people or he is incapable of making a difference.

While there are times in Scripture when the Lord turns a people or country over to face judgment, it is never without the hope of redemption, and Jesus came to make that redemption available to everyone.

So regardless of how you feel about the trajectory of the nation or who seems to hold the most blame for its faults, remember that (this side of eternity) it’s always too soon to give up on God making a difference. And he wants to use you to help.

Will you let him?

Denison Forum

With Tuesday’s election results in Ohio and Virginia seen as a referendum on the pro-life movement from pundits across the political spectrum—a point that was reiterated in Wednesday’s Republican debate—it’s understandable that many are feeling discouraged. After all, it took nearly fifty years to overturn Roe v. Wade but abortions have actually increased since that monumental decision.

Moreover, the expansion of abortion options has won in every state that has voted on the subject, a trend that is likely to continue across the coming years. Given that roughly 69 percent of Americans support at least some access to abortion during the first trimester, perhaps we should not be surprised. However, that support wanes quickly once you get beyond those first twelve weeks. As Dr. Jim Denison discussed earlier this week, a majority actually oppose abortion in the second (55 percent) and third (70 percent) stages of a pregnancy.

If that’s the case, though, why have so many of the new laws enshrined a right to abortion that far surpasses popular opinion? And, more importantly, what can we do to reverse that trend?

The answer is, at its core, quite simple. However, it does not appear to be one that many in the pro-life movement want to hear.

Why a national prohibition against abortion will never happen

When the issue of abortion was raised in Wednesday’s Republican primary debate, Nikki Haley remarked that to change federal law, “It’s going to take 60 Senate votes, the majority of the House, and a president to sign it. We haven’t had 60 Senate votes in over a hundred years. We might have 45 pro-life senators. No Republican president can ban abortions any more than a Democratic president can ban these [more restrictive] state laws.”

And she’s right.

I believe life begins at conception and would love for there to be a national prohibition against abortion. But it’s simply not going to happen, and there is no path to making it so anytime soon. But, as Haley noted, that goes for the pro-choice side as well.

This will remain an issue for individual states to decide, and that’s for the best. It may not feel like it as we watch state after state make it permissible to kill the unborn, often even when the child could survive outside the womb. But the truth is, we should want this issue to remain with the states because that’s the level of government where we can have the greater impact. After all, in a democracy your vote is worth more in elections where fewer votes are cast.

So how can we do that?

It starts by shifting our focus from politics to people.

Choose people over politics

Saying our focus should be on people rather than politics does not mean ignoring the latter. But it is much easier to change a single mind through conversation and dialogue than it is to change the politics of an entire party.

Moreover, there is good evidence that many of those who support abortion—particularly in the second and third trimesters—have either not given the details of that position a great deal of thought or do not understand all that it truly entails.

You see, during the first trimester, the methods most often utilized in an abortion are undoubtedly tragic, but they are not necessarily barbaric. However, that ceases to be the case once you get to the second trimester and beyond. (A word of warning: The rest of this section contains graphic descriptions of abortion procedures.)

As the fetus grows to the point that it is too large to simply suck out of the womb, the most common method of terminating the child’s life is called dilation and evacuation. After the mother is put under anesthesia, abortion providers go in with “suction and gynecological instruments” to empty the uterus.

Or at least that’s how it’s described by most clinics.

The truth is that those “gynecological instruments” are used to dismember the fetus in the womb, typically while the child is still alive, and then pull him or her out piece by piece. The “fragmented fetal parts” are then rearranged to make sure none were left behind.

Roughly 95 percent of second- and third-trimester abortions—which account for approximately 11 percent of all abortions—utilize this method. Moreover, “leading authorities” have concluded that it is typically not worth the added risk to the mother to kill the child prior to beginning the procedure.

Does a fetus feel pain?

Initially, this approach was justified by arguing that a fetus cannot feel pain until after twenty-four to twenty-five weeks of development, meaning that dismembering the child while it was still alive did not cause it to suffer. That is still the official position of many abortion providers.

However, more recent studies have shown that, at the very least, there is reason to doubt those conclusions. As Dr. Bridget Thill writes, “Current neuroscientific evidence indicates the possibility of fetal pain perception during the first trimester,” with indications that a child may be able to feel some form of pain after as little as seven to eight weeks in the womb. She goes on to conclude that “denial of fetal pain capacity beginning in the first trimester, potentially as early as 8–12 weeks gestation, is no longer tenable.”

And she is hardly alone in those conclusions.

Ultimately, the possibility exists that every fetus who is killed after fifteen weeks—and possibly long before that—feels the indescribable pain of his or her abortion.

I want to believe that most people who support the availability of such abortions do not fully comprehend all that their position entails. And I want to believe that, if they did, they would stand against such barbarism.

After all, if a slaughterhouse butchered cattle the way abortion clinics kill many of these babies, they would be shut down in a day. While people may have honest disagreements about the value and humanity of an unborn child, I would hope that we could agree that a fetus has at least as much inherent worth as a cow.

The pathway to true change

The good news is that every law that has been passed to protect abortion can be changed to protect children instead. But those laws aren’t going to change until we can change the minds of the people who voted to pass them.

So if we truly want to make a difference on this issue and save the lives of unborn children, we need to focus on telling people the truth about abortion in a way that doesn’t shy away from the hard realities of all that it entails, but which also shares that message with the grace and love of Christ.

And remember that, regardless of what the laws say, every expectant mother makes her own decision about whether to keep or kill her baby, and we don’t need politicians to make a positive impact in their lives.

So let’s start by actively trying to engage with people who see differently on this issue. A great deal of common ground currently lies fallow because both sides often seem more interested in demonizing the other than working together. And while I fully understand the hesitancy to give any ground when it comes to protecting unborn lives, let’s not sacrifice those we can save in the process.

Ultimately, if we really want to make a difference in the fight to save unborn lives, we have to start with people over politics and accept the reality that there is no quick fix on a national scale.

Denison Forum

Antisemitism around the world has risen to constitute an “existential threat” in the thirty-four days since Hamas slaughtered 1,300 Israeli civilians and wounded more than 3,300. Antisemitism in the US had already escalated last year to the highest recorded level. Now CNN reports that a “new wave of antisemitism threatens to rock an already unstable world.”

At the same time, we must not forget the Palestinian civilians who are suffering in Gaza: at this writing, the Hamas-controlled health ministry reports more than 10,569 Palestinians have been killed since the invasion, including 4,324 children. The New York Times reports this morning that tens of thousands are fleeing the northern Gaza Strip. And we must remember the more than 242 soldiers and civilians who are being held hostage.

I’ve been responding nearly every day since October 7 to this unfolding tragedy and consider it one of the hinge points of recent history. Today, I want to take a step back to ask a hard question: Why does God allow such innocent suffering?

Why does God allow suffering? Five logical steps

This is how I have reasoned my way through this dilemma over the years:

One: God created us to love our Lord and our neighbor (Matthew 22:37–39). However, love requires a choice. No one can force us to love someone.

Two: Thus, God gave us freedom of will. He knew that we would misuse this freedom before he gave it, but he considered our freedom to love him and each other worth the death of his Son (Revelation 13:8; John 3:16).

Three: When we misuse our free will, the consequences are not God’s fault but ours. When I was a seminary philosophy professor, my students sometimes complained that my tests were too difficult. However, those who studied diligently made an A on the tests and in my class. When students chose not to study, by contrast, the consequences were not my fault.

Four: If God prevents the consequences of misused freedom, we are not truly free. If I am on a diet but choose to order a pizza and the delivery person brings me celery sticks, my freedom was apparent but not real. If chess players can retract every move they make that turns out to be disadvantageous to them, the game cannot be played.

Five: If God intervenes occasionally to prevent such consequences, we will ask why he does not do so every time. If we insist that he must prevent all terrorism, we will next want him to prevent all murder. Then all crime. Then all deceit, then all adultery, then all lust, and so on.

So far, so good. I understand logically why God must allow horrific atrocities as the price of our free will without which we cannot fulfill our created purpose.

But there’s a very large but . . .

We’re back to our problem

The problem with my reasoning is that God does sometimes prevent the consequences of misused freedom. He allowed Herod to execute James (Acts 12:1–2), but he sent his angel to keep Herod from executing Peter (vv. 3–11). If Peter, why not James?

He allowed Egyptian pharaohs to enslave the Jews for four hundred years, but then he sent Moses to lead them through the Red Sea to freedom. If then, why not four centuries earlier?

So, we’re back to our problem. Since God is omnipotent, he could have prevented Hamas from slaughtering Jews. Since he is omniscient, he knew about their plot before it unfolded. Since he is omnibenevolent, he must want only their best, which would obviously preclude beheading babies, massacring families, and taking hundreds of people hostage. Since he sometimes intervenes to protect the innocent from the sins of the guilty, he could have done so on October 7.

And yet, he did not.

We can substitute any other group of innocent victims in today’s discussion. The Palestinians in Gaza being used by Hamas as human shields are an obvious example. The Uyghurs being brutally repressed by China are another. The 1,403 teens and children killed in gun violence so far this year in the US are yet another.

You undoubtedly have examples in your own life of times you have been victimized by the sins of others. I have my own as well.

“When darkness seems to hide his face”

Today’s conversation leaves us with two choices.

One: We can refuse to trust God because we do not understand why he sometimes protects innocent victims but sometimes does not. We can characterize him as arbitrary and thus unworthy of our faith and devotion.

Where would this leave us? We will miss the wisdom he grants to those who follow his omniscient guidance, the power he bestows to those who seek his omnipotent care, and the “abundant” life Jesus died to give us (John 10:10). By boycotting his providential provision, we grieve our Father but we also impoverish ourselves and everyone we influence.

Two: We can choose to trust in God though we do not understand the ways he sometimes responds to innocent suffering. We can place our Father in the same category as others we trust though they sometimes disappoint us (which is everyone we trust).

God assures us that one day we will understand what we do not understand today (1 Corinthians 13:12). In the meantime, the more painful our suffering and thus the less we understand why God allows it, the more we need to trust it to his compassionate care.

The British pastor and hymnwriter Edward Mote testified:

When darkness seems to hide his face,
I rest on his unchanging grace;
In every high and stormy gale
My anchor holds within the vale.
On Christ, the solid rock, I stand;
All other ground is sinking sand,
All other ground is sinking sand.

Upon what “ground” are you standing today?

Denison Forum

Yesterday’s elections were bad news for preborn children in America. Kentucky reelected pro-choice Gov. Andy Beshear, indicating that abortion rights advocacy will be a positive issue for Democrats in next year’s national elections. Ohio voters adopted a ballot measure to enshrine the right to abortion in the state constitution. And Virginia voters rebuffed Republican candidates in favor of those who support abortion rights.

Abortion rights have won in every election since Roe v. Wade was overturned and abortions have risen nationally, even though several states have restricted or outlawed the procedure. Yesterday’s results are significant politically because Donald Trump won Kentucky by a 25.9 percent margin in 2020 and Ohio by an 8 percent margin. While Joe Biden won Virginia, Republican Glenn Youngkin won the governor’s race the next year.

Virginia’s elections are especially relevant to this issue since Gov. Youngkin has advocated an approach that many hoped would forge a cultural consensus on abortion.

Is a 15-week ban the solution?

Youngkin has been supporting a fifteen-week abortion ban with exceptions for rape, incest, and protecting the life of the mother. US Catholic bishops have endorsed a similar Senate plan sponsored by Senator Lindsey Graham (R.–SC) that would allow states to restrict abortion earlier in pregnancy but no later than fifteen weeks.

Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America also endorses a national ban on abortions after fifteen weeks of pregnancy and promises to oppose any presidential candidate who refuses to embrace this standard at a minimum.

Here’s the political reasoning behind such proposals: according to Gallup, 69 percent of Americans say abortion should be legal in the first trimester (conception to twelve weeks), while support drops to 37 percent for the second trimester (thirteen to twenty-seven weeks) and 22 percent for the third (twenty-eight to forty weeks). Majorities oppose abortion being legal in the second (55 percent) and third (70 percent) trimester.

In other words, a majority of Americans would theoretically support an abortion ban at fifteen weeks. However, since only 13 percent oppose abortion in all circumstances, it would seem that a large majority also want exceptions for rape, incest, and to save the mother’s life.

The challenges we face

Some pro-life supporters believe that since life begins at conception, permitting abortion politically at any stage is wrong. Just as we would not debate whether to legalize the killing of a newborn baby versus one who is fifteen weeks old, we should not legalize the aborting of a preborn baby at any stage in its life.

However, since only 13 percent of Americans agree, forging a political strategy to eliminate all abortions will be challenging.

This is why many pro-life advocates view a fifteen-week ban as the way to reverse pro-abortion gains after Roe was overturned. They believe this to be a way for pro-life politicians to win the political power necessary to protect as many lives as possible. But yesterday’s results in Virginia call into question the political viability of this strategy as well.

Pro-life advocates clearly must not abandon our political efforts to protect preborn children. But yesterday’s results illustrate the challenges we face and remind us that, in a post-Roe world, supporting life also requires non-political strategies that are highly commended by Scripture.

Where ministry begins in a post-Christian culture

Research indicates that women who chose abortion did so for these reasons:

• Not financially prepared: 40 percent
• Not a good time: 36 percent
• Issues with partner: 31 percent
• Need to focus on other children: 29 percent
• Interferes with future plans: 20 percent
• Not emotionally or mentally prepared: 19 percent
• Health issue: 12 percent
• Not independent or mature enough: 7 percent
• Influence from family or friends: 5 percent
• Don’t want children: 3 percent

Only 12 percent considered the preborn child, citing “unable to provide a ‘good’ life.”

Those who choose abortion obviously prioritize their personal issues over the life of their preborn child. If we are to help women considering abortion choose life instead, clearly we need to help them with these practical issues. We can provide financial assistance, health care, and counseling and resources for managing their other relationships. We can support pro-life ministries that provide such services. We can encourage adoption for those who do not think they are prepared to have another child and we can consider adopting personally.

In these ways, we can meet mothers of preborn children at the point of their personal needs, following the example of our Lord as he healed bodies to heal souls. His first followers did the same as they ministered to a man born lame (Acts 3) and “the sick and those afflicted with unclean spirits” (Acts 5:16).

In their pre-Christian culture, ministry began with personal compassion. In our post-Christian culture, the same is true today.

As a result, whenever we see this issue in the news, let’s pray for mothers considering abortion to choose life for their preborn child, then let’s look for practical ways to answer our prayers.

Would you join me in doing so right now?

Denison Forum

A month ago today, Hamas launched a barbaric attack on civilians in Israel. When the news broke, who would have guessed that such horrific atrocities would provoke rising animosity, not against the perpetrators but against the people they seek to eradicate? So why is antisemitism rising?

Cornell University canceled all classes recently after a student was arrested for allegedly threatening violent attacks against Jewish students at the college. There has been an increasing police presence on campus since the threats were made.

After Harvard alumnus and hedge fund manager Bill Ackman met with students and faculty last week, he described antisemitism on campus as “much worse” than he realized and said, “Jewish students are being bullied, physically intimidated, spat on, and in several widely-disseminated videos of one such incident, physically assaulted.” He called on Harvard’s president to take immediate steps to reduce antisemitism on campus.

The Anti-Defamation League has documented a nearly 400 percent rise in antisemitic incidents across the US since October 7. As part of this escalation, it reports fifty-four antisemitic incidents at American universities.

What explains this surge in antisemitism on our college campuses?

Two crucial factors

Protests against Israel at America’s universities are nothing new. For example, a movement to “boycott, divest from, and sanction” Israel has been popular on college campuses since it was launched in 2005. Opposition to Israel escalated after Hamas’s invasion on October 7 even before Israel began a military response. In the weeks since, such opposition has become deafening.

In response, I wrote a website white paper yesterday explaining in detail two factors involved in this complex issue.

First, I responded to the claim that Israel is an “occupying colonizer” who stole its land from its rightful Palestinian owners. I noted:

• The original owners of the land were Canaanites from whom Jews conquered the region under Joshua. Their descendants now live in Lebanon and bear no genealogical relationship to the Palestinians.
• Present-day Palestinians are descendants of the Arabs who first conquered the land in AD 640, not the Philistines for whom the region is named. These Arab Muslims took the land from the Jews and Christians who lived there prior to their conquest.
• Since the time of Joshua, there has always been a Jewish presence in the land; Jews repopulated it alongside Arab Palestinians in recent centuries.
• An autonomous nation called Palestine would have been created by the United Nations in 1947, but Arab leaders rejected it.

Thus, Israel did not steal the land from its rightful Palestinian owners. If anything, the Palestinians’ ancestors stole it from the Jews who were there prior to AD 640.

Second, I addressed the claim on college campuses that Israel is oppressing the Palestinian people with its military response to Hamas.

I noted that Hamas is using the Palestinian population as human shields, hiding its soldiers and weapons in tunnels beneath hospitals, schools, and mosques. Just one such tunnel requires enough construction supplies to build eighty-six homes, seven mosques, six schools, or nineteen medical clinics. In addition, Hamas continues to steal fuel, medical supplies, and provisions intended for the civilian population.

Israel must respond to Hamas’s atrocities in order for its citizens to be able to live in their own land. However, the cease-fire being demanded on college campuses would only enable Hamas to strengthen its position in Gaza. As the Wall Street Journal noted, “No other country on earth would agree to the terms of defensive engagement that much of the world wants to impose on Israel.”

“His dominion is an everlasting dominion”

As you can see, two simple but erroneous concepts—that Israel is an occupying colonizer and oppressor of the Palestinians—are inflaming opposition to Jews on college campuses and across America today. They illustrate the fact that ideas, whether right or wrong, change the world.

I have visited Cuba ten times over the years and grieve for the suffering of its people under the tragic ideology of Communism. I have visited Yad Vashem, the holocaust museum in Jerusalem, many times over the years and grieve each time as it explains Hitler’s claim that the Jews were to blame for Germany’s decline and must be eradicated.

I also grieve for our nation as the intellectual cancer of moral relativism continues to metastasize across our culture. C. S. Lewis warned in his 1943 work, Abolition of Man, that abandoning objective values based on unchanging principles would lead to our decline and “abolition” as humans. We are watching his prophecy come to pass more and more each day.

This is why God’s admonition is so urgent: “These are the things that you shall do: Speak the truth to one another; render in your gates judgments that are true and make for peace” (Zechariah 8:16). Said differently, we are to “contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 3).

The best way you and I can do this is to know Christ and make him known. When Jesus returns, he will be “given dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him” (Daniel 7:14a). This is because “his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed” (v. 14b).

Accordingly, let’s make these words from the Book of Common Prayer our intercession today:

Lord Jesus Christ, you stretched out your arms of love on the hard wood of the cross that everyone might come within reach of your saving embrace. So clothe us in your Spirit that we, reaching forth our hands in love, may bring those who do not know you to the knowledge and love of you, for the honor of your Name.

Amen.

Denison Forum

A White House fence was vandalized Saturday night as pro-Palestinian protesters shook the gate to one entrance to the executive mansion. Some chanted obscenities about President Biden.

This was just one of many such events across the country over the weekend as protesters rallied to demand a ceasefire in the Israel–Hamas war. They were not alone in their sentiments: US Secretary of State Antony Blinken called for “humanitarian pauses” in the fighting to allow more deliveries into Gaza of food, water, medicine, and other supplies, echoing a similar call by President Biden earlier in the week. The New York Times editorial board agreed, as have numerous US political leaders and Arab ministers in the region.

The Palestinian death toll has risen above nine thousand since the conflict began; more than 3,900 of the total, roughly 40 percent, were under the age of eighteen. A journalist, grieving the death of a fellow journalist and eleven members of his family, said, “We can’t bear this anymore. We are exhausted, we are here victims and martyrs awaiting our deaths, we are dying one after the other and no one cares about us or the large-scale catastrophe and the crime in Gaza.”

In the face of such tragic suffering, widespread calls for a ceasefire or at least a “humanitarian pause” in the fighting are understandable. But there’s more to the story.

Why the “true fight” has not yet begun

The Wall Street Journal editorial board warns that a “pause” in the conflict would only strengthen Hamas. In their view, “The way to help Palestinian civilians isn’t to slow the Israeli advance. The less control Hamas has over Gaza’s streets, the more civilians can escape the fighting and the more aid can be brought in securely.”

They note that “the ground invasion has already allowed humanitarian assistance to ramp up, with more than one hundred truckloads now arriving each day.” And they warn that “Hamas would use freedom of action to keep civilians as shields and pilfer more aid—limiting what Israel can let in.”

All this while, according to the Jerusalem Post, the “true fight” has not yet begun. It notes that most Hamas terrorists are in the southern part of Gaza, where Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldiers have not yet advanced. The IDF’s incursion into Gaza has not killed or arrested the vast majority of Hamas’s forces, which number approximately forty thousand and prepared for Israel’s invasion by creating a vast web of fortified tunnels. Nor has the IDF’s advance slowed, much less eliminated, rocket fire by Hamas on southern Israel and the Tel Aviv area.

“If we do not defeat Hamas, we cannot survive here”

Hamas officials and soldiers are known to hide in hospitals and among civilians. For example, an Israeli airstrike on Friday hit an ambulance that the IDF claims was being used by a Hamas terrorist cell.

Hamas has also spent years stockpiling enough fuel, food, and medicine in its tunnels to keep fighting for three or four months without resupply. Meanwhile, Palestinian civilians face massive shortages amid a growing humanitarian crisis.

All this to say, if Israel continues its offensive against Hamas, things are likely to get much, much worse for civilians in Gaza. However, as I noted a few days ago, if Israel does not defeat Hamas to such an extent that Jewish citizens feel they and their families are safe in their country again, many may immigrate to other countries, imperiling the future of the nation and fulfilling Hamas’s stated goal to “obliterate” Israel from the region.

This is why one Israeli commander stated, “If we do not defeat Hamas, we cannot survive here.”

So, Israel has to defeat Hamas without incurring civilian casualties to the degree that America stops supporting the war and jihadist groups in Lebanon and the West Bank join the conflict. But incurring such casualties is a central part of Hamas’s nefarious strategy to turn world opinion and Muslims in the region against Israel.

“Peace is not the mere absence of war”

My purpose today is twofold: First, to explain briefly why the conflict between Israel and Hamas is so complicated, defying simple resolution. Second, to use this crisis to illustrate our abiding need for the only true peace humans can experience in this fallen world.

In his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus declared, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied” (Matthew 5:6). He also stated, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God” (v. 9). In Gaudium et Spes (Latin for “joy and hope”), the Second Vatican Council noted:

Peace is not the mere absence of war or the simple maintenance of a balance of power between forces, nor can it be imposed at the dictate of absolute power. It is called, rightly and properly, a work of justice. It is the product of order, the order implanted in human society by its divine founder, to be realized in practice as men hunger and thirst for ever more perfect justice.

As a result, “peace” is a “fruit of the Spirit” that proceeds from “love” (Galatians 5:22). Accordingly,

If peace is to be established it is absolutely necessary to have a firm determination to respect other persons and peoples and their dignity, and to be zealous in the practice of brotherhood. Peace is therefore the fruit also of love: love goes beyond what justice can achieve.

Thus, peace ultimately depends on knowing the One who promised, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you” (John 14:27). As a result:

Peace on earth, born of love for one’s neighbor, is the sign and the effect of the peace of Christ that flows from God the Father. In his own person the incarnate Son, the Prince of Peace, reconciled all men to God through his death on the cross.

Paul greeted his readers, “Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ” (Philippians 1:2). Note the order: we must experience God’s grace to have true peace with him, others, and ourselves.

The old truism is true: No God, no peace. Know God, know peace.

What will you do to know God and make him known today?

Denison Forum

Halloween costumes began filling grocery store aisles in July and were sold out by the first week of October. The National Retail Federation estimated that Americans would spend a record $12.2 billion on yesterday’s festivities. Close to three-quarters of US adults planned to celebrate Halloween, with adults between the ages of thirty-five and forty-four leading the spending. If our experience last night was any indication, nearly half of those who knocked on doors in costumes were adults.

What is going on here?

A Wall Street Journal article explains one reason we enjoy being frightened on Halloween: “We are motivated to engage in activities that allow us to practice and prepare for dangerous activities in a safe way.” As Stephen King noted, “We make up imaginary horrors to help us deal with real ones.”

A welcome diversion for many

There are certainly “real” horrors in the news these days.

Antisemitic attacks in the US are up roughly 400 percent since October 7. Pogroms against the Jews in France are spreading across Europe and beyond, part of what the Wall Street Journal editorial board is calling “the global war on the Jews.”

Hamas is marshaling support in parts of the Muslim world, which is part of its strategy, as I noted yesterday, to force Israelis to abandon their country. The escalating war could cause shipping companies to decide Israel’s ports are too risky, in which case the country could soon find itself running out of food.

A cease-fire with Hamas would not only embolden the terrorists and those who support them, it would permanently displace tens of thousands of Israelis forced to flee their homes in southern Israel after the October 7 invasion. However, a long war could drain the economy as Israel continues to employ hundreds of thousands of reservists who are no longer doing their regular jobs.

In the midst of such news, yesterday’s holiday was undoubtedly a welcome diversion for many. However, I think another factor also explains the popularity of Halloween in these hard times.

“Every person deserves to be seen”

I’m old enough to remember when everyone on our street knew everyone on our street. Parents babysat for neighbors’ children; you could borrow anything you needed from someone next door. If a crisis came, the neighbors were quickly on your doorstep looking for ways to help.

That was then, this is now. How many of your neighbors can you even name?

In this context, knocking on our neighbors’ doors on Halloween is a small antidote to the isolation we feel, an antidote we need now more than ever.

According to Gallup, more than half of the world’s population is experiencing loneliness these days. The US Surgeon General recently issued an advisory on what he called “our epidemic of loneliness and isolation.” New York Times opinion columnist David Brooks notes that the number of people who say they have no close personal friends has quadrupled.

In his new book, How to Know a Person: The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen, he offers practical ways we can connect with each other in a time of fragmentation and hostility. His approach centers in what he calls a “humanist manifesto,” a decision to fight the “dehumanizers” of animosity and distrust by seeing others deeply and seeking to understand them and make them feel seen, heard, and understood.

Brooks is right: for our democracy to function, “we must be able to understand one another to some degree, to see one another’s viewpoints, to project respect across difference and disagreement.” All this, he claims, “requires humanistic wisdom.”

“Bleeding to be sure, but also bled for”

Brooks’ advice is biblical so far as it goes. We are taught to “have unity of mind, sympathy, brotherly love, a tender heart, and a humble mind” (1 Peter 3:8). Scripture enjoins us to “be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another” (Ephesians 4:32a).

But here’s the model that has been left out thus far: “as God in Christ forgave you” (v. 32b).

“Kindness” is a “fruit of the Spirit” (Galatians 5:22) and thus can ultimately be shared only in the power of the Spirit. Before we can offer genuine compassion and community to others, we must come to terms with the fact of our estrangement from ourselves, each other, and God.

In Telling the Truth, Frederick Buechner observed, “The gospel is bad news before it is good news. It is the news that man is a sinner, to use the old word, that he is evil in the imagination of his heart, that when he looks in the mirror all in a lather what he sees is at least eight parts chicken, phony, slob. That is the tragedy.”

Once we admit this fact to God, others, and ourselves, we are ready to confess all that is wrong in our lives and receive the forgiving grace that transforms us into “a new creation” in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17). A person for whom this happens can then experience the rest of the story, according to Buechner: the gospel “is also the news that he is loved anyway, cherished, forgiven, bleeding to be sure, but also bled for. That is the comedy.”

“We become what we think about”

Today is All Saints’ Day, that day on the Christian calendar when we are invited to remember the great heroes of the faith who have gone before us. This is so we can emulate their example and thus be heroes to those who will come after us.

Let’s embrace the invitation of this day to be the change we need to see. Let’s counter the tragic news and loneliness epidemic of our time by focusing on the greatest saint and hero of all: “Looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith” (Hebrews 12:2). Let’s seek him in his worship and word with greater depth, intimacy, and passion. Let’s make it our life purpose to know Christ and make him known.

Since “we become what we think about,” as Earl Nightingale noted, we will become more like Christ each day. Our choice is binary and simple: “Those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit” (Romans 8:5).

On what or Whom will you set your mind today?

Denison Forum

Israeli forces made a major advance overnight toward Gaza City, marking their deepest push into Palestinian territory since they entered the strip last week. An Israeli soldier who was kidnapped by Hamas on October 7 was freed overnight during ground operations as well. Meanwhile, in a rare news briefing, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ruled out a cease-fire in Israel’s conflict. He was answering calls for such action from the United Nations and Amnesty International among others.

Critics of Israel’s continuing military action against Hamas are responding to reports from the Gaza Health Ministry that the death toll among Palestinians has already passed eight thousand, mostly women and minors. Many doubt the veracity of this organization’s numbers since it is run by Hamas, but the pictures of devastation in Gaza tell a tragic story of their own.

We should all grieve the loss of life in this conflict. However, Israel’s military must contend with the fact that Hamas has hidden weapons under hospitals, schools, and mosques while disguising its fighters like civilians. Their strategy is intended to escalate Palestinian deaths and provoke an international backlash against Israel.

Hamas’s strategy appears to be working. So, should Israel seek a cease-fire with Hamas?

“The next round of war will be inevitable”

As I have followed reporting on this conflict from a wide variety of sources and viewpoints, I found a New York Times guest essay by Dennis B. Ross to be especially informative. Mr. Ross served in the State Department under President George H. W. Bush, was the special Middle East coordinator under President Bill Clinton, and has served as a special advisor for the region as well. His article is headlined, “I Might Have Once Favored a Cease-Fire With Hamas, but Not Now.”

His central thesis: “It is clear to me that peace is not going to be possible now or in the future as long as Hamas remains intact and in control of Gaza. Hamas’s power and ability to threaten Israel—and subject Gazan civilians to ever more rounds of violence—must end.”

Ross notes that if Israel agrees to a cease-fire now, Hamas’s military infrastructure, leadership, and control of Gaza will remain intact. As it did after conflicts with Israel in 2009, 2012, 2014, and 2021, the terrorist group will almost certainly rearm for the next conflict. It will be able to add to its system of tunnels running under the area as well.

As a result, he warns, “the next round of war will be inevitable, holding both Gazan citizens and much of the rest of the Middle East hostage to Hamas’s aims.”

What makes this conflict different from those in the past? While the atrocities of October 7 have understandably heightened Israel’s outrage and justify a much stronger military response than in previous conflicts, there is more to the story.

“If we do not defeat Hamas, we cannot survive here”

As I have been reporting throughout this conflict, the aim of Hamas and Hezbollah, both of which are backed by Iran, is to eradicate Israel and reclaim the area for Palestine. But these groups acting alone or in concert do not possess the military means to defeat Israel in a conventional war. Nor does Iran, even if it were to engage directly with the Israel Defense Forces.

But what they can do, as Ross notes, is to make Israel unlivable and thus drive Israelis to leave. This seems to be their clear goal now. Ross points to predictions by Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, that Israel will not survive another twenty-five years. And he quotes an Israeli commander who said after October 7, “If we do not defeat Hamas, we cannot survive here.”

I understand the commander’s sentiment in a way I would not if I had not led more than thirty study tours to Israel over nearly thirty years. Israel is a tiny country, approximately the size of New Jersey. Iran continues to arm Hamas and Hezbollah with ever more sophisticated technology now capable of launching missiles in such numbers that Israel’s Iron Dome defenses cannot protect all their civilians in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, and across the country. And the October 7 invasion has shocked the Israelis, who believed their sophisticated military intelligence and powerful defense forces would protect them from such atrocities.

Israel’s previous wars were fought by their soldiers against the soldiers of their enemies. Never before have so many civilians been slaughtered or taken hostage. All this to say, in the new world created by the October 7 invasion, if a cease-fire is declared and Hamas survives, Israelis will know that they and their families will be in danger in ways unprecedented in the nation’s seventy-five-year history.

“Be strong and courageous”

This fact is crucial to the calculus because so many Israelis live in Israel by choice. Theirs is one of the best-educated, most skilled workforces in the world. Every Israeli I have met would be imminently employable in any nation in the Western world. They have chosen to live in the State of Israel for the purpose of securing a future for the Jewish people.

If the nation can no longer defend them, its very reason for existence is in question. And the willingness of its citizens to risk their lives and their families could come into question as well, perhaps leading to an exodus of Israelis out of the nation.

As a consequence, through a combination of more advanced weaponry and brutal terrorist attacks, Hamas and its allies have raised for the first time the specter of a world without the State of Israel as we now know it. This is why my friends in Israel have said since Hamas’s horrific October 7 invasion that these terrorists must be defeated. They understand firsthand what I have attempted to explain today: the future of the nation is now in the balance.

This fact leads me to conclude this Daily Article by asking you to join me in urgent, consistent intercession for Israel and her people.

• Pray that they will heed God’s instruction to the military general who first led them into their promised land: “Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed” (Joshua 1:9a).
• Pray for Israeli forces to defeat the terrorists who threaten the future of their nation.
• Pray for the protection of Palestinian and Israeli civilians in this conflict.
• And pray that all will turn to the one and only Prince of Peace (Isaiah 9:6) so they can testify, “The Lᴏʀᴅ Gᴏᴅ is my strength and my song, and he has become my salvation” (Isaiah 12:2).

Will you join me in such intercession right now?

Denison Forum