A goat named Lincoln was recently sworn in as honorary mayor of Fair Haven, Vermont.

The town’s government does not include an actual mayor. The Town Manager says the honorary pet mayor idea was conceived to raise funds for a playground, but it became a civics lesson for kids.

On his way out of the town offices, the new mayor defecated on the floor, leaving the cleanup to the police chief and city officials.

In other news from nature, tomorrow we will be treated to a “full worm supermoon.” We understand a “full” moon. Most of us are even familiar with a “supermoon,” where the moon is so close to the earth that it appears larger and brighter in the night sky.

But why a “full worm supermoon”?

According to the Old Farmer’s Almanac, Native Americans gave the full moons of the year specific names to track the seasons. The March full moon was called the “full worm moon” because it comes at a time when the ground softens and earthworms begin appearing. They bring robins and other birds to feed, marking the start of spring.

Humans can give names to natural and celestial phenomena, but, as the mayor of Fair Haven reminds us, we cannot always control them.

Greetings from Israel

I am writing this morning from the Sea of Galilee in Israel. Leading study tours to the Holy Land is one of my favorite experiences each year. My wife and I traveled from Dallas through London into Tel Aviv over the weekend to join our group.

A few days earlier, rockets were fired from the Gaza Strip into Israel. A Palestinian is suspected in the killing of two Israelis in the West Bank last Sunday.

Continue reading Denison Forum – A goat who became mayor and the full worm supermoon: The eternal purpose of this life →

There is good news in the bad news making news today.

First, the bad news: Large parts of Nebraska and the US Central Plains were underwater over the weekend after a late-winter “bomb cyclone” storm triggered historic flooding. Forecasters warn that more rain is coming tomorrow.

A farmer named James Wilke got a call to assist a stranger during the storm and drove his tractor over a bridge that collapsed. Wilke and his tractor went into the floodwater; he did not survive.

Meanwhile, last week’s shooting in New Zealand continues to dominate headlines as authorities rush to identify the fifty victims and the prime minister promises changes to gun laws. And ceremonies were held in Kenya and Ethiopia for the 157 victims of last week’s Ethiopian Airlines plane crash.

While man-made tragedies deservedly generate headlines and global sympathy, natural disasters affect millions across the country. The global annual death rate from natural disasters has fallen significantly over the years, but such tragedies affect 218 million people each year and claim 68,000 lives.

However, there is a principle here that promises to liberate us with hope that transcends all hardships.

Theology from a crocodile

The book of Job is not usually considered an uplifting work of literature. Much of it is dominated by Job’s understandable complaints to God about the horrific suffering he endured.

Toward the end of the book, the Lord answers him—not by explaining Job’s pain, but by declaring his own omnipotence and omniscience.

For instance, God asks Job, “Can you draw out Leviathan with a fishhook or press down his tongue with a cord?” (Job 41:1). Most scholars believe that “Leviathan” in this context is a giant crocodile.

The creature’s creator warns Job: “Lay your hands on him; remember the battle—you will not do it again!” (v. 8). By comparison to this mighty beast, “The hope of a man is false; he is laid low even at the sight of him” (v. 9).

This is just one illustration of our frailty and finitude in the face of God’s creation. There are more examples everywhere we look. As the Lord reminds Job and us, “Whatever is under the whole heaven is mine” (v. 11).

When last were you awed by God?

Here’s my question: If we fear creation (and we should), should we not fear its Creator even more?

Proverbs 1:7 declares, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge.” “Fear” is our healthy response to the awesome power and might of the one true God.

When Ananias lied to God and died as a result, “great fear came upon all who heard of it” (Acts 5:5). The early church walked “in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit” and “multiplied” as a result (Acts 9:31). By contrast, Scripture says of sinners, “There is no fear of God before their eyes” (Romans 3:18, quoting Psalm 36:1).

Across Scripture, whenever people knew they were in the presence of the one true God, their response was one of awe and reverence.

When Isaiah “saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up,” he cried, “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” (Isaiah 6:1, 5).

When Peter realized our Savior’s divine power, “he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, ‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord’” (Luke 5:8). John testified that when he met the risen Christ on Patmos, “I fell at his feet as though dead” (Revelation 1:17).

When last were you awed by God?

When we trust God with our fears

What is the most fearsome natural threat you can imagine?

It might be a hurricane or a tornado, a roaring lion or an attacking shark. Now realize that the God who made what makes you afraid is infinitesimally more powerful than his most powerful creation.

When we give him the awe and reverence he deserves, we position ourselves to experience his presence and power in life-changing ways. When we acknowledge that God is more powerful than the most powerful threat in nature, we are also acknowledging that our Father is more powerful than anything that can harm us.

Indeed, he is not only all-powerful—he is all-loving as well. As a result, “we are more than conquerors through him who loved us” (Romans 8:37). Say it with Paul: “I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (vv. 38–39).

When we trust him with our fears, our fearful culture pays attention. When we serve him out of selfless gratitude for his grace, our self-centered society takes note.

A record crowdfunding campaign

Dallas Jenkins is director of The Chosen, the first multi-season television series about the life of Christ. Jenkins says the idea behind the series came after “a significant career disappointment. My previous film had done poorly at the box office, and I was uncertain of my future.”

So, Jenkins decided to create a short film about the birth of Christ “just intended for my church’s Christmas Eve service.” The response was so strong that he decided to make an entire television series about the life of Jesus through the eyes of those who encountered him.

However, his team needed funding for the project. They decided to let the body of Christ help. Roughly 16,000 people around the world responded, giving more than $10 million—a record-setting campaign.

Jenkins trusted his fear to God’s power for God’s glory. Job would encourage us to do the same.

Who or what is your Leviathan today?

Denison Forum

Forty-nine people were killed in shootings at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, this morning. Twenty more were seriously wounded.

Four people, including three men and one woman, have been taken into custody. One man in his late twenties has been charged with murder. He reportedly posted a white-nationalist manifesto on Twitter.

This tragedy was the largest massacre in New Zealand history. It reminds us that Satan “comes to steal and kill and destroy” (John 10:10). God is weeping with those who weep today and calls us to join him (Romans 12:15).

In other news, Israeli warplanes struck some one hundred Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip overnight, responding to a rocket attack on the Israeli metropolis of Tel Aviv. The fighting broke out as Egyptian mediators were in Gaza working to broker an expanded cease-fire between Israel and Hamas.

In a world filled with violence and chaos, we can learn a redemptive lesson from an unlikely source.

“The Ides of March are come”

Today is known as the “Ides of March.” In the Roman world, the “Ides” was the midpoint of their months. The date we know as March 15 was marked by several religious ceremonies and was a Roman deadline for settling debts.

This day is especially known to history as the day Julius Caesar was assassinated in 44 BC. The back story is remarkable.

According to the Roman biographer Plutarch (died AD 119), “A certain seer warned Caesar to be on his guard against a great peril on the day of the month of March which the Romans call the Ides; and when the day had come and Caesar was on his way to the senate-house, he greeted the seer with a jest and said: ‘Well, the Ides of March are come,’ and the seer said to him softly: ‘Ay, they are come, but they are not gone.’”

Later that day, Caesar was stabbed to death by as many as sixty conspirators led by Brutus and Cassius.

Most people know the story of his death. But why was Caesar murdered on this day?

And why is his death relevant to our broken world today?

An assassination and stray cats

The Roman Republic was founded in 509 BC. Governed by leaders elected by the people, their representative model influenced the founders of the American republic. Over time, however, the aristocratic leaders of the Republic became less focused on the people and more concerned for their own power and agendas.

Julius Caesar (100–44 BC) rose to power as an accomplished military conqueror. With chaos in Rome, Caesar led his army south across the Rubicon, the northern barrier of Italy, on January 10, 49 BC. By 45 BC, he had become the sole dictator of Rome.

Brutus, Cassius, and the senators who conspired to execute Caesar claimed they were liberating the people from dictatorship. He was killed in a place known as Pompey’s Theater.

The area fell into ruins over the centuries and is currently fenced off from the public and occupied by stray cats. However, the mayor of Rome announced last week that the site will undergo renovation and be opened to the public in 2021.

“We are all slaves of the laws”

What can we learn from the Ides of March?

Mortal Republic: How Rome Fell into Tyranny is a new history of the fall of the Roman Republic. Its author, Edward J. Watts, earned his PhD in history from Yale and has received numerous awards for his research and writing.

He notes that “the men who led the Republic in the third century [before Christ] also understood that their personal achievements had meaning only when they served the larger goals of Roman policy.” There was “a shared understanding that the Republic was a political system subject to no one but the community as a whole.”

To illustrate, Watts cites the famous statement by Cicero: “We are all slaves of the laws so that we might be free.”

Over time, however, Roman political life devolved into “a struggle among individuals seeking honor and power through the complete control of the city and the resources of the empire.” Eventually, Romans would have “a new sort of liberty . . . Freedom from fear, freedom from famine, and freedom from danger now all came from [Emperor] Augustus and Augustus alone.”

When churches and Christians plateau

When the Roman Republic became a means to the end of personal advancement for its leaders, its decline began. The same can happen to us.

When churches are started, they must focus on evangelism and ministry to their communities in order to grow. After a few years, many have gained so many members that some begin focusing on what the church can do for them.

Parents want better programs for their children; adults want programming focused on their needs. The church stops focusing externally on those it is called to reach and starts focusing internally on itself. And it plateaus and often declines.

The same can happen to individual Christians when we focus more on what Jesus can do for us than what we can do for him. We come to church and to God for what we can receive. And we stop fulfilling the Commission to which we are called.

How to experience the joy of Jesus

The good news is that what happened to Rome doesn’t have to happen to us. Churches can renew their commitment to serve the community they are commissioned to reach. Christians can renew our commitment to the One who came not to be served but to serve (Mark 10:45).

Every day, we must decide whether we will live for Jesus or for ourselves (Romans 12:1–2). The tragedies that fill each day’s news show us that this decision is urgent for us and for the broken world we are called to serve.

Here’s the paradox: when we serve God and others, we find a greater significance than we can ever experience by serving ourselves. The disciples received power from the Spirit so they could be witnesses for our Lord (Acts 1:8). When we share the joy of Jesus, we experience the joy of Jesus. When we bless others, we are blessed.

In terms of the Ides of March, we can be an Empire or we can be a Republic, but we cannot be both.

Which do you choose today?

Denison Forum

Felicity Huffman is an Emmy winner and Oscar-nominated actress who is best known for her role in Desperate Housewives. She is also married to acclaimed actor William H. Macy.

Lori Loughlin has been known to most Americans as “Aunt Becky,” the wholesome maternal influence on ABC’s Full House. She has also starred in numerous Hallmark movies.

On Tuesday, as the Washington Post reports, “both actresses had their reputations shattered as they were charged with fraud and conspiracy.”

Their stories will forever be linked to a scandal that has made global headlines this week.

“Operation Varsity Blues”

Huffman was reportedly met by FBI agents with their guns drawn Tuesday morning at her Los Angeles home. She was later released on a $250,000 bond. She allegedly paid $15,000 disguised as a charitable donation so her daughter could participate in a college entrance-exam cheating scam.

According to the FBI, Loughlin and her husband, fashion designer J. Mossimo Giannulli, paid bribes totaling $500,000 “in exchange for having their two daughters designated as recruits to the USC crew team—despite the fact that they did not participate in crew—thereby facilitating their admission to USC.” Giannulli was released on a $1 million bond; Loughlin surrendered to authorities yesterday and was released on a $1 million bond as well.

Continue reading Denison Forum – The college scam, Felicity Huffman, and Lori Loughlin: Two biblical responses →

I don’t know what you did last night, but I’ll bet it wasn’t more significant than the way Belinda George spent her evening.

Dr. George is the first-year principal of Homer Drive Elementary School in Beaumont, Texas. Her students’ reading scores last year were low, so she launched “Tucked-in Tuesdays” in December.

She dresses in costumes, from a onesie with a unicorn head to a Cookie Monster outfit to pajamas covered with pink hearts. When her students log on to their school’s Facebook page, she reads books to them over her iPhone. She acts out the stories as the kids type in questions.

Dr. George grew up with five sisters in a three-bedroom trailer. Her father never learned to read. She learned her love of reading from her school librarian in Louisiana. Now she is paying it forward.

3-D printed houses and robot-delivered meals

Technology affects every dimension of our lives today, from the airplanes we ride to the cars we drive, the homes we inhabit, the food we eat, and the air we breathe. The innovations of our day can be a force for tremendous good, as Dr. George’s Facebook Live reading sessions show.

Other examples: A Texas company says it has developed a way to build homes in just a few days using 3-D printing, saving 30 percent off total construction costs. Companies are testing automated cooler-sized robots that can deliver food to any address.

Technology is also helping police with crimes that have been unsolved for years, if not decades. One genealogist has predicted that suspects in hundreds of unsolved murders and rapes will be identified using public DNA databases in the near future. Last week, for instance, DNA and genetic genealogy helped police find a woman who left her newborn baby to die thirty-eight years ago.

Selfie-taker attacked by a jaguar

Continue reading Denison Forum – A principal reads to her students on Facebook Live: How technology can and can’t improve our lives →

“When I arrived, boarding was closed and I watched the last passengers in (the) tunnel go in. I screamed to put me in but they didn’t allow it.”

This is how a Greek passenger named Antonis Mavropoulos described his attempt to board Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 last Sunday morning.

He was not allowed to board the next flight to Nairobi after the airline lost contact with the flight he was supposed to take. He says that a security staff member “told me gently not to protest and say thank you to God, because I am the only passenger who did not enter the flight.”

Antonis Mavropoulos has abundant reason to “say thank you to God” today. What about those who lost someone on the airplane he tried to board?

The 157 victims of Flight 302 were a small percentage of the 153,424 people who die every day around the world. But the sudden shock of their deaths made their loss especially tragic.

Is the Christian faith truly relevant at a time like this?

Is God a clockmaker?

One of the finest pastors in America, a dear friend of mine, lost his oldest son recently. As the father of two and grandfather of four, I cannot begin to imagine his pain. Or that of the families grieving over the Ethiopian airline tragedy.

Continue reading Denison Forum – The man who was not allowed to board Flight 302: “Say thank you to God” →

Hunter Wallace is a wrestler at Northwest High School in Justin, a suburb of Fort Worth, Texas. He didn’t win a single match this year, but he is the captain of his team. His coach explains why: “Hunter’s one of those kids that leads by example. He’s always positive. I’ve never heard the kid complain.”

Hunter also has cerebral palsy.

As the reporter who told his story says, Hunter has “an upper body built like an ox, but wobbly legs.” Nonetheless, he wanted to do squats to get stronger. A video of his workout went viral.

Hunter explains: “You got the right mentality, heart, and God in front of you, nothing will stop you. You just gotta push through it.” He adds: “I’m just like a normal person. God made me who I am.”

“Enemy-occupied territory”

Affliction finds us all.

World leaders and citizens from more than thirty countries are mourning the loss of 157 people who died when their Ethiopian Airlines jet crashed yesterday morning. The victims included at least thirty-two Kenyans, eighteen Canadians, nine each from Ethiopia and France, eight each from the US, China, and Italy, and seven from the UK.

Meanwhile, the Islamic State is losing its last territorial foothold, but terrorism experts believe that jihadis will continue their activities around the world. In related news, the Wall Street Journal reports that Osama bin Laden’s son, Hamza, is an emerging leader in al Qaeda. According to the State Department, he has been calling on followers to carry out attacks on the US and has been declared a Specially Designated Global Terrorist.

1. S. Lewis explained the reason for the adversity we face every day: “This is a civil war, a rebellion, and . . . we are living in a part of the universe occupied by the rebel. Enemy-occupied territory—that is what this world is.”

The good news is that, like Hunter Wallace, when we trust God in our afflictions, our rebellious world takes note.

“The waters have come up to my neck”

David was so close to God that the Lord called him “a man after my heart” (Acts 13:22). Nonetheless, he began Psalm 69 with the cry, “Save me, O God! For the waters have come up to my neck. I sink in deep mire, where there is no foothold; I have come into deep waters, and the flood sweeps over me” (vv. 1–2).

His words are in Scripture because they tell our story as well.

When we read about Joseph’s innocent suffering (Genesis 39:19–20), or Elijah’s lonely despair (1 Kings 19:4), or Hosea’s marital pain (Hosea 3:1–3), those who face similar struggles know they are not alone.

Reading through the book of Job, I was struck by this remarkable phrase: God “delivers the afflicted by their affliction” (Job 36:15). The text does not say that God delivers the afflicted “out of” their affliction, but “by” it.

Paul agreed. In Romans 8, the apostle cited grave threats facing believers: tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, danger, and sword (v. 35). Then he declared: “In all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us” (v. 37). We are conquerors in our challenges, not despite them.

One way God redeems suffering

If Hunter Wallace did not have cerebral palsy, you would probably not know his name. Without Pharaoh, would we know of Moses? David had his Goliath, Daniel his lions, Paul his prisons, John his Patmos.

One way our Lord redeems suffering is by using it to show the world the power he provides in the midst of pain.

Rather than sparing Joseph from slavery and prison, God used his years in Egypt to save the Jewish race. Rather than keeping Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego from the fiery furnace, God protected them in its flames.

Rather than removing Paul’s “thorn in the flesh,” God taught him to “boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me” (2 Corinthians 12:9). Rather than transporting John from Patmos, Jesus visited his beloved disciple on his prison island and gave him the book of Revelation.

How to “please the Lord” today

When we face sickness, we should ask God for healing (James 5:14). When believers are imprisoned for their faith, we should pray for their release (cf. Acts 12:5). Whatever our challenges, we should ask God for help (Matthew 7:7).

Sometimes God redeems suffering by removing it. Jesus healed the sick and raised the dead; God freed Peter from Herod’s prison (Acts 12) and Paul from his Philippian jail (Acts 16).

At other times, he redeems our suffering by sustaining us in it.

If God has not yet removed your “thorn in the flesh,” look for reasons why. Look for lessons he is teaching you and ways he is glorifying himself through your courageous faith.

You may not understand this side of glory all that God is doing with your pain (1 Corinthians 13:12). But we know that our Father loves us as much as if we and our circumstances were perfect (1 John 4:8). We know that he is glorified in our rebel-occupied world when we trust him in hard places.

And we know that he is greatly pleased if we trust him when we do not understand him.

In the same psalm where David cried out to God in desperation, he later testified: “I will praise the name of God with a song; I will magnify him with thanksgiving. This will please the Lord more than an ox or a bull with horns and hoofs” (Psalm 69:30–31).

How can you please the Lord today?

Denison Forum

Alex Trebek has announced that he has stage 4 pancreatic cancer.

The legendary Jeopardy! host told his fans, “I’m going to fight this, and I’m going to keep working.” He added courageously, “With the love and support of my family and friends and with the help of your prayers also, I plan to beat the low survival rate statistics for this disease.”

On the theme of courage in the news, Martha McSally disclosed this week that she was raped in the Air Force by a superior officer. The ex-pilot and current Arizona senator told an interviewer yesterday that she made her announcement to bring attention to the problem of sexual assaults in the military.

Speaking to other sexual abuse victims, the senator said, “Don’t let your assaulter rob you of your future. Don’t do it.” She hopes that telling her story will “inspire others to get through their own dark times.”

Since the Pentagon recently reported that incidents of sexual assault at military academies are up by nearly 50 percent, Sen. McSally’s statement is even more significant and urgent.

Hailey Bieber’s life mission

Living as fallen people with other fallen people on a fallen planet requires courage.

Supermodel Hailey Bieber recently discussed her life mission, declaring that the “bigger purpose” behind her modeling career is “to be a light in this place.” She added: “I’m here to represent Jesus through me for other people—for His will to be done.”

Continue reading Denison Forum – Alex Trebek and Hailey Bieber: 2 steps to biblical courage →

Students at Rider University in New Jersey recently voted to bring Chick-fil-A to their campus.

However, administrators rejected the proposal because of the company’s perceived “opposition to the LGBTQ+ community.” Cynthia Newman, the dean of the College of Business, “felt like I had been punched in the stomach when I read that statement.”

As a “very committed Christian,” she notes that Chick-fil-A’s corporate purpose “mirrors my personal beliefs perfectly.” She asked university officials privately if they would issue an apology. They doubled down on their ban instead, even sending out another campus-wide email emphasizing inclusion.

So Dean Newman felt she had to resign. She has received great support from faculty and staff agreeing that “we should be able to respectfully disagree” with other values.

A former Marine’s experience at Yale

Hers is not the only story of discrimination against Christians in today’s news.

A former Marine and graduate of the Naval Academy and the University of Cambridge has published an article titled “I Thought I Could Be A Christian And Constitutionalist At Yale Law School. I Was Wrong.” He describes the vociferous opposition he and other Christians have faced at Yale for their conservative views.

Unsurprisingly, David French has documented the degree to which “progressives drive religious conservatives off campus—all in the name of ‘fighting extremism.’”

To be sure, Christians in America are not facing the persecution our brothers and sisters are enduring in North Korea, Afghanistan, Somalia, Pakistan, and other nations that imprison, torture, and execute followers of Jesus. But we are witnessing an escalating tide of opposition to biblical morality in our culture.

As I noted yesterday, many who support same-sex marriage see my commitment to biblical marriage as a horrendous assault on the civil rights of LGBTQ persons. They see my commitment to the rights of the unborn as an attack on women.

Continue reading Denison Forum – University dean resigns after school bans Chick-fil-A →

Joe Biden recently called Mike Pence “a decent guy.”

The outcry was immediate.

Cynthia Nixon, an actress and unsuccessful candidate for New York governor, tweeted this response: “You’ve just called America’s most anti-LGBT elected leader ‘a decent guy.’ Please consider how this falls on the ears of our community.”

Biden quickly apologized. “You’re right, Cynthia,” he wrote. “I was making a point in a foreign policy context,” he explained, “but there is nothing decent about being anti-LGBTQ rights, and that includes the Vice President.”

CNN’s Chris Cillizza explained that Biden “is a creature of a totally different political time,” his comment “a reflection of the general collegiality that reigned in politics when Biden came up in the game.” However, as Cillizza notes, “Things have changed drastically since then.”

Cillizza assumes that Biden will run for president in 2020 and calls him “a benefit-of-the-doubt guy running to lead a party who views the other side as not just dumb and incompetent, but evil.”

Is the other political party “fair”?

Cillizza has the facts on his side.

A recent survey found that 61 percent of Democrats view Republicans as “racist/bigoted/sexist”; 31 percent of Republicans feel the same way about Democrats. Fifty-four percent of Democrats consider Republicans to be “ignorant”; 49 percent of Republicans feel the same way about Democrats. And 44 percent of Democrats consider Republicans to be “spiteful”; 54 percent of Republicans feel this way about Democrats.

Continue reading Denison Forum – What happened when Joe Biden called Mike Pence ‘a decent guy’? →

Imagine a day when your grocery cart will scan and weigh items, alert you to sales, suggest items based on what you’ve already chosen, and help locate products in the store. It will then scan your credit card to check out.

Here’s an even-easier fantasy: You could download a free app, scan a QR code at the store’s entrance, grab items off the shelves, then exit through the turnstiles. By the time you’re halfway to your car, you’ll receive a receipt in the app.

Sounds like science fiction? It’s actually just science. The Wall Street Journal tells us that AI-powered shopping is already here and coming to stores nationwide this year.

Will a robot drive your next taxi?

Here’s another fiction-to-fact story: According to Bloomberg Businessweek, robot-driven taxis will soon make travel in a driverless cab much cheaper than owning our own car. Ride-hailing services such as Uber and Lyft are making personal car ownership less attractive as well.

FedEx is testing autonomous delivery robots that will bring products from Pizza Hut, Walmart, Walgreens, and other companies to your door. AutoZone, Lowe’s, and Target have also signed on to the program.

Continue reading Denison Forum – AI-powered grocery stores and Chip and Joanna Gaines: How to use the temporal for the eternal →

“We’re more popular than Jesus now.”

These words of John Lennon, published on this day in 1966, have become a famous—or infamous—part of cultural history.

Here’s the larger context: Lennon told an interviewer for the London Evening Standard that “Christianity will go.” He added: “It will vanish and shrink. I needn’t argue about that; I’m right and I will be proved right. We’re more popular than Jesus now; I don’t know which will go first—rock ‘n’ roll or Christianity. Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. It’s them twisting it that ruins it for me.”

His words sparked a furor in the United States. Radio stations invited listeners to bring their Beatles records to pickup points where they would be burned.

Lennon later apologized at a press conference in Chicago: “I’m not anti-God, anti-Christ or anti-religion. I was not saying we are greater or better. I believe in God, but not as one thing, not as an old man in the sky.”

However, Lennon began his most famous song, “Imagine,” with the lyrics, “Imagine there’s no heaven / It’s easy if you try / No hell below us / Above us only sky.” Later he asked us to imagine that there’s “no religion, too.”

Why parents are selling their children

In a world like ours, it’s easy to wonder if God is real or relevant.

Search and rescue efforts are intensifying this morning after a series of tornadoes ripped through Alabama yesterday, killing at least twenty-three people in one county. At least a dozen tornadoes touched down in Alabama and Georgia Sunday afternoon, according to the National Weather Service.

Two people were killed and seven more injured when the son of a New Orleans police officer drove his vehicle into a busy New Orleans thoroughfare Saturday night. Police are awaiting the results of a blood alcohol test.

More than 110 million people across the US are bracing for snowstorms. New York City and Boston are expected to get six to eight inches of snow.

And CNN reports that twenty thousand children in Ghana have been sold by their parents into slavery. They work on Lake Volta in the fishing industry. Authorities say extreme poverty forces parents to sell a child to traffickers to provide money for their other children to eat.

A “rapid and shocking” decline in church attendance

Five centuries before Christ, Greek philosopher Anaximander is said to have constructed the first map. It pictures the world in thirds—Europe, Asia, and what he called “Libya” (Africa). In the very center of the map stands Miletus, the city in western Turkey where he lived.

Why did Anaximander position himself in the center of the world? His decision was less reflective of ego than of experience. Look around yourself. Everywhere you turn, you’re in the middle of the world you can see.

This fact is both geographical and psychological. We measure the world by what we experience of the world. John Lennon later explained his belief that Christianity “will vanish and shrink”: “From what I’ve read, or observed, Christianity just seems to be shrinking, to be losing contact.”

The United Kingdom of 1966 was indeed experiencing a significant decline in church attendance and cultural relevance. And church attendance has fallen further in the decades since. According to a recent survey, more than half the British population now say they have no religion.

However, it’s always too soon to give up on God.

More people worship Jesus in China than in America

Our secular culture separates God from the “real world.” Our materialistic society measures truth by what we can measure. Taken together, the cultural trends of our day could lead Americans to believe Lennon was right.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

Christianity in Africa across the last century has grown from less than 10 percent of the population to nearly five hundred million today. Our faith has grown at twice the rate of the population growth in Asia.

More people worship Jesus in China today than in America. A dear friend who serves in the Middle East tells me that more Muslims have come to Christ in the last fifteen years than in the previous fifteen centuries.

“Power belongs to God”

Just because we cannot see God at work does not mean that he is not at work.

Pharaoh trusted the magicians and idols of his cultural religion more than the unseen God of Moses until the one true Lord destroyed his nation. Darius insisted that the nation pray to him until Daniel’s prayer to the unseen God spared Daniel in the lions’ den. Saul of Tarsus persecuted Christians until he met their risen Lord on the road to Damascus.

David testified: “Power belongs to God” (Psalm 62:11). The psalmist added: “Great is our Lord and mighty in power” (Psalm 147:5 NIV). Jesus assured us that “all things are possible with God” (Mark 10:27).

The greatest gift we can give

Do you believe that God can do all he has ever done? That he is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Hebrews 13:8)? If you’re lacking faith in his omnipotence, would you pray for the faith you need (Mark 9:24)?

Now, would you ask your Father to make your faith relevant to your culture? Would you pray for him to lead you, empower you, and use you to make a difference in someone’s life for the glory of God?

John Lennon was murdered on December 8, 1980. I’ve seen the spot where he was shot in the archway of the New York City residence where his widow still lives. One instant after his death, he no longer wondered if the God of Scripture is real (Hebrews 9:27).

Introducing people to Jesus before they meet him in eternity is the greatest gift we can give them.

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Words saved the world.

William Stephenson was a World War I hero, businessman, inventor, and spymaster. Ian Fleming called him the “real thing” behind his James Bond character.

A Man Called Intrepid tells Stephenson’s incredible story (“Intrepid” was his code name). The book reads more like a novel than the historical narrative it is. Here we learn that early in World War II, Stephenson created a secret network that eventually involved thirty thousand intelligence experts. They worked behind enemy lines in Europe to provide intelligence to President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill.

These operatives were able to feed false information to German authorities, convincing them that D-Day would be launched at Calais rather than Normandy. This kept Hitler from committing forces that could have defeated the Allied invasion.

When the Germans began launching rockets into London, these intelligence spies fed the Nazis false data on where their rockets actually fell, saving thousands of lives. They helped the Allies free Niels Bohr from Nazi captivity, which kept the Germans from developing atomic weapons and helped America create the bombs that ended World War II.

These secret heroes did not fire weapons or drive tanks. They risked (and many gave) their lives to communicate words that helped defeat Hitler and save the world.

When Switzerland invaded Liechtenstein

A Florida congressman made news with a tweet directed at Michael Cohen, which the congressman later took down and for which he apologized. The Florida bar has now opened an investigation into whether the congressman, a licensed attorney in the state, violated professional conduct rules with his tweet.

Even wordless events require words to record and interpret them.

You may not know that on this day in 2007, Switzerland invaded Liechtenstein. A detachment of 170 Swiss infantrymen got lost on a training mission and accidentally crossed their neighbor’s border.

Liechtenstein is seventeen times smaller than Rhode Island. Its thirty-seven thousand residents were not aware that they had been invaded. Since they have no army, they chose not to retaliate.

We know of this ironic event only because it was reported in words.

We send 6,000 tweets a second

We are the most verbal society in history.

One study concluded that women speak 16,215 words per day, while men speak 15,669 words per day. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

Six thousand tweets are sent every second, which corresponds to five hundred million tweets a day. Every sixty seconds, 510,000 comments are posted on Facebook.

Add the 1.7 billion websites on the internet and the information exchanged on social media sites such as WhatsApp (one billion users a month), WeChat (697 million users a month), Tumblr (555 million users a month), and Instagram (400 million users a month), and it becomes clear that we are exchanging more words than ever before in human history.

This can be good news for the gospel, but bad news for our souls.

Good news for the good news

Mart Green is the Chief Strategy Officer for the Green Family Businesses, board chair of Hobby Lobby, and founder of Mardel Christian Supply. At a recent conference in Washington, DC, I heard him describe the IllumiNations project he is leading. Its goal is to translate God’s word into all six-thousand-plus languages in the world. Digital technology is making this dream a reality.

Walt Wilson is a retired Marine, brilliant businessman, longtime personal friend of mine, and founder of Global Media Outreach. This online evangelism and discipleship ministry has documented more than two hundred million decisions for Christ since it began in 2004.

Digital technology is enabling us to “make disciples of all nations” more effectively than ever before in Christian history (Matthew 28:19).

The secret of the Reformation

Amid the cacophony of words in our culture, it can be hard to hear God’s voice. But human words cannot change human hearts. Only God’s words have the power to convict of sin, save souls, and transform eternities.

Explaining the Protestant Reformation, Martin Luther testified: “I simply taught, preached, and wrote God’s Word; otherwise I did nothing.”

The declaration “Thus says the Lord” appears more than four hundred times in the Bible. Each time, a human listened for God’s word before speaking or writing his truth to the world.

Now it’s our turn.

“Be still, and know that I am God.”

To speak God’s word, we must first listen for God’s word. When last in our frenzied, social-media-driven culture did you accept your Father’s invitation to “be still, and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10)? When last did you listen for the “low whisper” of God’s Spirit (1 Kings 19:12)?

Our Father speaks through his word as we study Scripture (Hebrews 4:12). He speaks through his worship as we pray and focus on him (cf. Acts 13:2). He speaks through his world as we look for the Creator in his creation (Psalm 19:1–4).

As Francis Schaeffer noted, “He is there and he is not silent.”

In fact, your Lord wants to speak to you today. When will you make time to listen?

Note: In today’s chaotic culture, we are increasingly faced with faith-related questions that can be challenging and impossible to answer. In this week’s video from our YouTube series, “Biblical Insight to Tough Questions,” we tackle the question: Why do we believe the Bible is actually the word of God? Thanks for turning to Denison Forum to discern news differently and build a movement of culture-changing Christians.

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The Vietnam summit has ended.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un insisted all US sanctions be lifted on his country, offering to dismantle his Yongbyon nuclear complex in return. President Trump said Washington wanted a deal that includes other parts of the North’s nuclear program. “I just felt it wasn’t good enough,” Mr. Trump said. “We had to have more.”

The two sides ended their meeting amicably but without producing an agreement. Whether the summit is a setback or a step toward peace is open to interpretation.

While Mr. Trump and Mr. Kim were meeting in Vietnam, Michael Cohen was testifying before Congress. The president’s former personal attorney spent more than six hours yesterday answering questions from the House Oversight Committee. Whether his statements damaged the president or not is open to interpretation.

Historical events are objective, but the way they are reported and remembered is subjective.

30 million pages headed for the moon

Israel launched its first spacecraft last week. “Beresheet” (Hebrew for Genesis) will be the smallest craft to land on the moon, but it is carrying something of great significance: the so-called Lunar Library.

This is a disc containing twenty-five thousand books, a full copy of Wikipedia, and information on understanding earthly languages—in total, a thirty-million-page tome. The “library” is intended to preserve humanity’s knowledge and history long after we’re gone.

Did your story make the Lunar Library? On the day of your salvation, you joined a faith family that will be alive in Paradise ten thousand millennia after the moon and everything on it perishes.

Here’s my point: what makes history seldom makes headlines.

News that didn’t make headlines

Continue reading Denison Forum – Vietnam summit ends early: What makes history seldom makes headlines →

The second summit between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un begins later today. The two are scheduled to meet Wednesday night in a one-on-one session (with translators) before moving to a private “social dinner” and more meetings tomorrow.

We can look for the negative as the summit unfolds. NPR reports, “While talks may hold off the immediate threat of a military conflict, they also give North Korea time to continue to develop its arsenal.”

Or we could look for the positive. One example: the two leaders are meeting in Hanoi, Vietnam. I remember when news coverage from Vietnam showed bloody images of American soldiers fighting and dying in its jungles. We could not have imagined then that the US and Vietnam would be diplomatic and economic partners today.

“God can help you, he really can.”

I told the story yesterday of Craig Coley’s thirty-nine years in prison for crimes he did not commit. Rather than focus on the negative, Coley told New York Times reporters that he often talks to people about the power of perseverance: “People that are down and out or having a hard time, my message to them is don’t give up, tell the truth about everything because the truth will always come back and support you.”

He adds: “Lies never do. And God can help you, he really can.”

We can focus on the horrendous crimes Vatican Cardinal George Pell has been found guilty of committing. But we can also be grateful for the courage of clergy abuse victims who have told their story, intensifying the spotlight on such sins today.

We should be horrified by reports of sex trafficking that have surfaced in the wake of Robert Kraft’s arrest. But we can also support International Justice Mission and other organizations working to end sex trafficking and other forms of slavery.

We should be appalled by YouTube videos that offer children instructions on how to commit suicide. But we can be grateful for Christian Parenting and other ministries that help parents raise godly children.

In short, we can decide that the world is only getting worse. But, as the Wall Street Journal reports, in significant ways it is getting much better.

“She is not dead but sleeping”

Unfortunately, many in our secular culture consider faith to be neither a cause for the good nor a solution for the bad. Young Americans are especially less inclined to identify as religious or attend regular services. Studies consistently show that religion is declining in Western Europe and North America while growing everywhere else.

As our culture becomes increasingly secularized, more and more people agree with Karl Marx that religion is “the opium of the people” which must be abolished so that “the illusory happiness of the people” can be exchanged for “their real happiness” (his italics).

According to Marx, “Religion is only the illusory Sun which revolves around man so long as he does not revolve around himself.” Of course, he learned how wrong he was the moment he died and faced the God whose existence he denied (Hebrews 9:27).

Marx was the prisoner of presuppositions that blinded him to realities he could not then see. He was not the first or the last.

In Exodus 5, Moses and Aaron said to Pharaoh, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘Let my people go’” (v. 1).

But the Egyptian ruler responded, “Who is the Lord, that I should obey his voice and let Israel go? I do not know the Lord” (v. 2). In Pharaoh’s view, what he had not experienced could not exist.

When Jesus told those mourning the death of Jairus’ daughter, “She is not dead but sleeping” (Luke 8:52), “they laughed at him, knowing that she was dead” (v. 53). Because they had not seen Jesus raise the dead, they assumed that he could not raise the dead.

Two ways to demonstrate the relevance of our faith

Before we can expect the pharaohs of our day to believe that our God is real and relevant, they must see that he is real and relevant for us. Consider two principles.

One: Do not judge your future by your past.

Exodus 6:23 tells us that Aaron, the future high priest, was married to the daughter of Amminadab. Ruth 4:18–19 tells us that Amminadab was descended from Perez. Genesis 38:29 tells us that Perez was the child of Tamar, who pretended to be a prostitute and became pregnant by her father-in-law.

Nothing that has happened in your past need determine what happens in your future. Only Jesus can forgive the past, empower the present, and redeem the future. When you seek and follow God’s “good and pleasing and perfect” will (Romans 12:2 NLT), others will be inspired to do the same.

Two: Give Monday to God.

Jesus becomes irrelevant to our lives when we separate him from our lives. A Sunday faith must be a Monday reality.

Oswald Chambers: “Abandon to God is of more value than personal holiness.” Here’s why: “When we are abandoned to God, He works through us all the time.” When he is King of every part of our lives, others will see that he is King of all of life.

According to C. S. Lewis in Mere Christianity, God desires for us “the happiness of being freely, voluntarily united to Him and to each other in an ecstasy of love and delight compared with which the most rapturous love between a man and a woman on this earth is mere milk and water.”

David echoed this joyous fact more simply: “This I know, that God is for me!” (Psalm 56:9).

Do you know that God is for you today?

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Craig Richard Coley was twenty-three years old when he moved to Simi Valley, California. A Vietnam veteran and the son of a retired Los Angeles police officer, he was newly married with no criminal record.

Coley managed several restaurants over the years. After a divorce, he dated for a time Rhonda Wicht, a twenty-four-year-old waitress who shared an apartment with her four-year-old son, Donald.

On November 11, 1978, Wicht and her son were killed in their beds. Coley, who had broken up with her, was arrested and charged with their murders. After two trials, he was convicted and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Both of his parents died while he was imprisoned.

Talking to an innocent man

Meanwhile, Michael Bender had started a career as a police officer. In 1989, he looked into the Coley case and was shocked by what he found. Coley’s alibi seemed strong; there were viable suspects who were never pursued; and hair and fingerprint evidence was not analyzed properly and then went missing.

Two years later, Bender met Coley in prison and knew he was talking to an innocent man. “In dealing with a lot of bad guys over the years, there are mannerisms and body language you come to know. He didn’t have that,” Bender explained.

In 1991, his superiors ordered him to stop pursuing Coley’s case or face termination, so he quit his job and became a theft investigator. In 2003, he moved his family to Carlsbad, California, where he continued to pursue the case in his spare time.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Christian receives $21 million after 39 years in prison →

In a surprise, Green Book won last night’s Academy Award for Best Picture. Rami Malek and Olivia Colman won for Best Actor and Best Actress in a Leading Role; Mahershala Ali and Regina King won for Best Actor and Best Actress in a Supporting Role.

For everyone who won an Oscar, last night’s ceremony was a pinnacle moment that will stay with them for the rest of their lives.

For the rest of us, however, the transience of awards like last night’s Oscars is noteworthy. Who won last year for Best Actor? Best Actress? Best Picture? Who won the year before that?

We’ve already had the Golden Globes, the Screen Actors Guild Awards, the Critics’ Choice Awards, and the Grammys. Do you remember who won what? We could ask the same question about past winners of the Super Bowl, the World Series, the Stanley Cup, and so on.

There’s a reason our culture pays so much attention to short-lived successes.

“Wealthy, successful and miserable”

Richard Rorty was one of America’s most influential thinkers. The longtime Princeton and Stanford professor was a leading voice for the relativism that has captured our culture. He claimed: “There is nothing deep down inside us except what we have put there ourselves.” He added that “truth is what your contemporaries let you get away with.”

If we reject the supernatural, the only prism by which to see the world is the natural. And the natural cannot see beyond itself. Like rose-colored glasses that turn everything rose-colored, we assume that all we see is all that exists.

Continue reading Denison Forum – What the Oscars teach us about significance →

A new study has compared America’s fifty states using forty-three indicators of immorality. The data set ranges from violent crimes to excessive drinking to gambling disorders.

Unsurprisingly, Nevada ranks first, primarily because of “greed” and “lust.” Florida comes in second because of “jealousy,” “lust,” and “vanity.” The rest of the top (or bottom) ten in order: California, Texas, Tennessee, Louisiana, Georgia, Illinois, Michigan, and Arizona. The least sinful states in order are Vermont, Maine, North Dakota, Nebraska, and Idaho.

Sin may be measured collectively, but it is committed personally. And it never stays secret.

A Minnesota man was eating a hot dog at a hockey game last month. He wiped his mouth with a napkin and tossed the remains in the trash. Authorities then used DNA on the napkin to tie him to an unsolved murder from 1993.

In similar news, DNA from a genealogical database has led authorities to arrest a Colorado man for the murder of an eleven-year-old girl in 1973. Last fall, DNA evidence led to an arrest in a 1997 murder.

Meanwhile, prosecutors in the Jussie Smollett case say they have the $3,500 check used by the actor to pay two brothers to stage his assault last month. Smollett was arrested yesterday for allegedly filing a false report about the January 29 incident. After paying a $10,000 bond, he was released and is due back in court on March 14.

Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson alleged yesterday that the brothers’ motive for helping Smollett was money. “There was never a thought in their mind that we would be able to track them down,” he added.

Scripture warns us: “Be sure your sin will find you out” (Numbers 32:23).

Why temptation is so tempting today

There’s something about temptation that causes us to think this warning doesn’t really apply to us. We will get away with it. No one will know, no one will be hurt, no consequences will follow. Or so we think.

Here’s why the temptation to yield to temptation is especially tempting in our culture.

Our post-Christian, relativistic society has jettisoned the concept of absolute truth and morality. In such a worldview, “sin” is a subjective idea rather than an objective reality.

What the Bible calls a “baby” (as when Elizabeth’s “baby leaped in her womb,” Luke 1:41), Planned Parenthood calls a “product of conception.” What the Bible calls “men committing shameless acts with men” (Romans 1:27), our culture calls “marriage equality.”

As a result, sins are no longer objectively sinful. It’s easier for Satan to tempt us to sin if we don’t believe in sin.

“There is no such thing as the devil”

It’s also easier for Satan to tempt us to sin if we don’t believe in him. A Barna survey found that nearly 60 percent of American Christians believe the devil “is not a living being but is a symbol of evil.”

An article in Psychology Today was blunt: “There is no such thing as the devil, just as there is no such thing as fairies, imps, or goblins. The two largest religions in the world–Christianity and Islam–teach that there is a devil. And they are wrong. There is no evidence for such a thing. Not a shred. It is simply something that germinated from the unscientific, irrational minds of early humans.”

Of course, that’s just what the devil wants us to think.

(For more, please watch Does Satan exist?, the most recent YouTube video from our new series, “Biblical Insight to Tough Questions.”)

The two categories of sin

The first step in defeating temptation is to admit that sin exists and the tempter is real. The second is to understand his strategy.

In essence, there are two categories of sin.

The first includes those temptations you and I can defeat in our ability. For instance, I happen not to be susceptible to illegal drugs. (I’m not boasting–there are other temptations to which I am far less immune). You can name sins that are easy for you not to commit.

The second category includes those temptations you and I cannot defeat in our ability. When we face these attacks, we need to turn immediately to God for help, knowing that “he commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey” (Mark 1:27).

Here’s the problem: Satan seeks to mask these temptations so that we think they belong to the first category. That way, we’ll try to resist them in our strength rather than turning to God for his help. Satan wants to draw us into spiritual quicksand a foot at a time until we are trapped.

The solution is for us to take all temptation immediately to God, asking for his strength to refuse. Here’s how: “Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you” (James 4:7).

Submit and you can resist. Resist and you will win. Every time.

If you think you’re getting away with sin

Let’s close with two additional life principles.

One: Satan is playing the long game.

When we defeat him with God’s help, he will bring this temptation against us again later. He wants us to think we didn’t win the victory since we’re facing the same temptation.

After Jesus defeated him in the wilderness, the devil “departed from him until an opportune time” (Luke 4:13). He does the same with us. Every time we face temptation, even the same temptation, we must “submit” and “resist.”

Two: The time to repent is now.

If you think you’re getting away with sin, you’re not. The enemy might be waiting until you climb further up the ladder so that your fall will hurt even more people as you plummet down.

“Repent therefore, and turn again, that your sins may be blotted out” (Acts 3:19) is a present-tense imperative, an ongoing command for each of us.

Is it relevant for you today?

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Michael Gerson was President George W. Bush’s chief speechwriter and senior policy advisor and is now a nationally syndicated columnist with the Washington Post. It was my privilege to meet him and to work together at a recent Dallas Baptist University event.

He has been named one of the “25 Most Influential Evangelicals in America” and is one of the most popular and respected conservative voices in American culture.

He also suffers from clinical depression.

Gerson preached last Sunday at Washington National Cathedral. His sermon was adapted into a Washington Post article titled “I was hospitalized for depression. Faith helped me remember how to live.” It is one of the most moving and illuminating articles I have ever read.

If you have time, I encourage you to stop and read it before continuing with this Daily Article. If you do not, I hope you’ll read it as soon as you can.

“Despair can grow inside you like a tumor.”

Gerson describes his disease: “The brain experiences a chemical imbalance and wraps a narrative around it. So the lack of serotonin, in the mind’s alchemy, becomes something like, ‘Everybody hates me.’ Over time, despair can grow inside you like a tumor.”

There are times when the body is incapable of healing without medical intervention. God calls medical professionals just as he calls pastors and missionaries. Faith is a key part of the solution, but depression and other clinical conditions require clinical responses as well.

That’s why Gerson offers this crucial advice: “I’d urge anyone with undiagnosed depression to seek out professional help. There is no way to will yourself out of this disease, any more than to will yourself out of tuberculosis.”

However, as he adds, “Those who hold to the wild hope of a living God” find help and grace in him.

I found myself wondering, are there resources the God of Scripture offers that no other source can?

Help for the past

Much of the despair of life comes from guilt over the past.

We know that we need forgiveness from those we have hurt. However, we don’t even know all the people we have hurt.

Nor can we ask forgiveness from everyone we know we have hurt. Some are deceased. Others might be injured further by our attempt to make amends (as Step Nine of the Alcoholics Anonymous “Twelve Steps” program notes).

But God is different.

David prayed after his affair with Bathsheba, “Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight” (Psalm 51:4). He did not mean that his adultery with Bathsheba and the death of her husband were not sins against them. He meant that his sin was ultimately against the holy God who made him and who rules the universe.

The good news is that this God can and will forgive every sin we confess (1 John 1:9). He then separates our sin from us as far as the east is from the west (Psalm 103:12), buries it in the depths of the deepest sea (Micah 7:19), and will “remember [our] sins no more” (Hebrews 8:12).

No one else can make this promise.

Help for the present

Much of our discouragement comes from struggles in the present. We carry burdens too heavy to bear and face obstacles too high to climb.

But Jesus knows what you are feeling today. He was rejected by his hometown and mocked by his own family. He experienced overwhelming stress in the Garden of Gethsemane, horrific pain and torture after he was betrayed by his friends, and abandonment beyond anything we can understand (Matthew 27:46).

Now he is praying for us with empathy and passion (Romans 8:34) and assures us, “I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20).

No one else can make this promise.

Help for the future

Much of our despair comes from fears about the future. But God testifies, “I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come” (Isaiah 46:10 NIV).

Our timeless Lord sees tomorrow better than we can see today and promises to lead us “in paths of righteousness” (Psalm 23:3).

No one else can make this promise.

“My name is Lazarus”

Let me repeat Michael Gerson’s statement: Depression is a medical condition requiring professional treatment. But for those suffering from depression–and for the rest of us on this fallen planet–there is help and hope in Jesus that we can find nowhere else.

In testifying to the transforming power of his conversion to Christ, Gerson quotes G. K. Chesterton’s poem, “The Convert”:

The sages have a hundred maps to give
That trace their crawling cosmos like a tree,
They rattle reason out through many a sieve
That stores the sand and lets the gold go free:
And all these things are less than dust to me
Because my name is Lazarus and I live.

Gerson then cites “God’s promise”: “That even when strength fails, there is perseverance. And even when perseverance fails, there is hope. And even when hope fails, there is love. And love never fails.

“So how do we know this? How can anyone be so confident?

“Because we are Lazarus, and we live.”

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While walking on the Gulf Shore near Corpus Christi, Jim and Candy Duke found an unusual bottle. It contained a note explaining that the bottle had been released in 1962 by scientists studying the role of water currents on the movement of shrimp.

Here’s the good news: if the person finding the bottle completed and mailed the enclosed postcard, they would receive “a fifty cent reward.”

The current lab director offered to pay the Dukes as promised, though it would cost the agency fifty-five cents for a stamp and three dollars to print the check.

What was the most powerful computer in 1962?

I’ve been thinking about some of the changes to our culture since 1962.

Technological advances are an obvious example. In 1962, the most powerful computer in the world was the Ferranti Atlas. It filled a room, took six months to assemble, and was difficult to keep running for ten minutes at a time.

Technology has revolutionized our lives, but its advances are a double-edged sword: they have put mobile computing in our pockets but also fueled the plague of pornography and provided a platform for terrorist recruiting.

In 1962, the Civil Rights Act was still two years away. Governmental legislation soon advanced the biblical mandate to reject racism (cf. Galatians 3:28), but other legislation has overturned centuries of biblical morality regarding marriage, gender, and the sanctity of life.

The Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1962 celebrated groundbreaking discoveries “concerning the molecular structure of nucleic acids and its significance for information transfer in living material.” This work was foundational to genetic advances that are revolutionizing medicine today. However, these advances could also enable eugenic alterations that would redefine and threaten the future of our species.

In 1962, President Kennedy announced the goal of putting a man on the moon by the end of the decade. Thomas Kuhn’s book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, was a landmark event in science, history, sociology, and philosophy. Global travel was making the world smaller for cultural exchange and educational advancement.

However, the academic rejection of absolute truth and objective morality was also gaining momentum. The “sexual revolution” was one manifestation of such relativism. As Mary Eberstadt has documented, this “massive experiment in chaos and confusion” has radically and negatively impacted our culture.

What problem is the root of our problems?

Many of the technological, legislative, medical, and academic achievements of the last fifty-seven years have clearly improved our lives. But have they improved our souls?

Are humans more moral as a species today? Would you say that the overall moral trajectory of our culture is positive or negative?

What is the problem at the root of our problems?

The answer is a reality our culture considers so outdated and Puritanical that we seldom discuss it. But ignoring something makes it no less real and can make its consequences even worse.

The Bible diagnoses our root issue: “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). The problem of sin cannot be solved by technology, legislation, medicine, or scholarship. We can regulate it through laws and meliorate some of its effects through education, medicine, and technology.

But we cannot change the underlying human condition: “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23a). The consequences of our sin nature are spiritual, emotional, relational, and–eventually–eternal death.

Here’s the solution: “But the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:23b).

How can temporal work bear eternal fruit?

If healing bodies could save souls, the apostles with their miraculous healing ministries would have gone into health care (cf. Acts 3:1-10; 5:15-16; 20:9-10). If technology could save souls, Jesus would have used his divine omniscience to revolutionize carpentry and other industries (cf. Mark 6:3).

If scholarship could save souls, Saul of Tarsus would have continued with his remarkable academic career (Acts 22:3). If laws could save souls, Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus would have sought political leadership through their roles in the Sanhedrin (Mark 15:43; John 3:1).

Let me be clear: God calls his people into medicine, technology, academics, and legislative service today. These are vital and valuable roles in our society. But they cannot save souls. Nor can the sentences I’m typing right now or the words I spoke in church last Sunday.

Only the Holy Spirit can convict of sin and save sinners (John 16:8). Only God has the miraculous power to make us a “new creation” so that “the old has passed away; behold, the new has come” (2 Corinthians 5:17).

As a result, the most valuable way to “love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22:39) is to share Jesus with them. The greatest gift you can give is the good news of God’s saving grace and transforming love. You’re not forcing your beliefs on others–you are offering them the only antidote to the deadly poison of sin, the only chemotherapy that cures spiritual cancer, the only path that leads to eternal life.

If you and I see our vocations as opportunities to model and share Jesus’ transforming love, our temporal work will bear eternal fruit. But only then.

When will the moon be destroyed?

The largest “supermoon” of the year was visible last night. At 221,734 miles from earth, it is closer to us right now than it will be at any other time this year.

However, our relationship with our closest celestial companion is not permanent. According to one scientist, the earth and moon will be destroyed in about five billion years when the Sun swells enough to incinerate them both.

When (or if) that happens, eternity will only have begun.

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