“With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26).

The national mask mandate covering airplanes and other public transportation was set to expire yesterday, but the CDC extended it until May 3, stating it needed more time to study the BA.2 omicron subvariant now responsible for the vast majority of cases in the US. Airlines countered that air filters on modern planes make transmission of the virus during a flight highly unlikely. Critics also pointed to the fact that states have rolled back rules requiring masks in restaurants, stores, and other indoor settings, yet COVID-19 cases have fallen sharply since mid-January.

Yesterday, a federal judge in Florida sided against the CDC, striking down the national mask mandate. Her ruling freed airlines, airports, and mass transit systems to make their own decisions about mask requirements.

How do you feel about her decision?

Your answer likely depends at least in part on the degree to which you trust the CDC. At the beginning of the pandemic, 69 percent of Americans believed what they heard from the agency; earlier this year, the number had fallen to 44 percent.

This aligns with a larger narrative:

• Only 40 percent of Americans say they trust the federal government to do what is right.
• Only 38 percent consider its impact on the US to be positive.
• Only 23 percent believe it to be transparent.
• And only 27 percent say it listens to the public.

The reasons behind this phenomenon are vital not just for our government but for the very future of our democracy.

“The shattering of all that had seemed solid”

Jonathan Haidt is a social psychologist and bestselling author. In a brilliant new Atlantic article, he explains the social changes we are witnessing more holistically than anyone I have seen. I’ll summarize his article briefly, then we’ll respond biblically.

Haidt discusses “the shattering of all that had seemed solid, the scattering of people who had been a community” and “what is happening not only between red and blue [states], but within the left and within the right, as well as within universities, companies, professional associations, museums, and even families” (his emphasis).

He reports that “social scientists have identified at least three major forces that collectively bind together successful democracies: social capital (extensive social networks with high levels of trust), strong institutions, and shared stories.” However, over the last ten years, social media has weakened all three.

Haidt points to “the intensification of viral dynamics” beginning in 2009 by which Facebook users can publicly “like” posts with the click of a button and Twitter users can “retweet” and thus publicly endorse a post while sharing it with all their followers. Facebook soon copied this innovation with its own “share” button; “like” and “share” buttons soon became standard features of most other platforms.

Facebook then developed algorithms to bring each user content more likely to generate a “like” or “share.” Research later showed that posts that trigger emotions—especially anger at others—are the most likely to be shared.

“When citizens lose trust in elected leaders”

By 2013, social media had become a “new game” in which creating “viral” content or demeaning content with which we disagree became the norm. Users were guided by reward and punishment dynamics that were “almost perfectly designed to bring out our most moralistic and least reflective selves.” Haidt notes that “the volume of outrage was shocking.”

This phenomenon is especially dangerous for democracy.

The Framers of the US Constitution knew democracy had an Achilles’ heel: it depended on the collective judgment of the people, but communities are subject to “the turbulency and weakness of unruly passions,” as James Madison noted. The founders created a sustainable republic in response with mechanisms requiring compromise and giving leaders insulation from the mania of the moment while holding them accountable to the people periodically through elections.

But social media is undoing what the founders intended. Haidt writes that “a democracy depends on widely internalized acceptance of the legitimacy of rules, norms, and institutions. . . . When citizens lose trust in elected leaders, health authorities, the courts, the police, universities, and the integrity of elections, then every decision becomes contested; every election becomes a life-and-death struggle to save the country from the other side.”

How to experience divine omnipotence

We will explore Haidt’s article in further detail tomorrow. For today, let’s focus on two responses: thinking biblically and acting redemptively.

Paul’s goal should be ours: “We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ” (2 Corinthians 10:5). We do this by measuring every truth claim against the unchanging truth of Scripture (Hebrews 4:12). Then we can fulfill the apostle’s mandate: “Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things” (Philippians 4:8).

As we think biblically, we should then act redemptively.

In Acts 19, the “town clerk” in Ephesus (the chief administrative officer in the city) said of Christians in their city, “these men . . . are neither sacrilegious nor blasphemers of our goddess” (v. 37). Like them, we should make “speaking the truth in love” our constant goal (Ephesians 4:15). In response to the vitriol and divisions of our day, God needs us to be not cultural warriors so much as cultural missionaries.

You might think it’s too late for Christ-followers to make a significant difference in a culture as broken as ours. But it’s always too soon to give up on an omnipotent God. Anne Graham Lotz was right: “If our lives are easy, and if all we ever attempt for God is what we know we can handle, how will we ever experience his omnipotence in our lives?”

Will you experience his omnipotence today?

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 “When they came to the place that is called The Skull, there they crucified him” (Luke 23:33).

One of the Russian Navy’s most important warships sank in the Black Sea yesterday. Ukraine claims the Moskva was hit by Ukrainian Neptune anti-ship missiles. Russia said a fire broke out on the cruiser, causing munitions aboard to explode. Whatever the cause, the results are the same: the ship is at the bottom of the ocean today.

In other maritime news, the British ocean liner Titanic sank into the North Atlantic Ocean on this day in 1912. The ship struck an iceberg on the evening of April 14 and sank at 2:20 a.m. on April 15. However, the cause of the Titanic’s sinking was less relevant than its outcome. If the ship had suffered an internal explosion or collided with another ship in a manner that caused the same damage as the iceberg it struck, the results would have been the same.

And Abraham Lincoln died on this day in 1865, a tragic event that changed the trajectory of American and world history. I have visited the theater where he was shot on the evening of April 14 and the bedroom where he died on the morning of April 15. I have even seen the derringer pistol on display in Ford’s Theater used by John Wilkes Booth to shoot the president.

However, the method of Lincoln’s assassination was less relevant to history than its outcome. If Wilkes had stabbed the president, struck him with an object, or poisoned him, the grievous results would have been the same.

“They have pierced my hands and feet”

I offer these observations to ask this question: Why was Jesus crucified on Good Friday?

I’m not asking why he died on this day. You know the answer: Jesus died in our place to pay for our sins and purchase our salvation. As Paul observed, “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 5:21).

My question is: Why did Jesus die by crucifixion? Why was he not stoned to death like Stephen or beheaded like Paul? Why did he die in the cruelest, most horrific manner of execution ever devised?

You might respond: because that is the way Rome executed its prisoners. That is true, but remember that a Jewish mob stoned Stephen to death (Acts 7:54–60) and tried to throw Jesus off a cliff (Luke 4:29).

You might also respond that Jesus had to die by crucifixion to fulfill prophecy. Once again, you’d be right: the manner of Jesus’ death was predicted centuries before it occurred. For example, David testified in Psalm 22, “They have pierced my hands and feet—I can count all my bones—they stare and gloat over me; they divide my garments among them, and for my clothing they cast lots” (vv. 16–18). Each phrase was fulfilled by Jesus’ crucifixion a thousand years later.

However, I would reply: Why did the Lord predict that Jesus would die in this way? He could have led Old Testament writers to describe the Suffering Servant’s death in ways that were much less horrific. If they could predict Jesus’ death by crucifixion, they could have predicted his death by beheading, for example.

Why, then, did the Lord arrange for his Son to die on this day in such a horrific manner?

“It is he who endured every kind of suffering”

St. Melito of Sardis was a second-century bishop and apologist for the Christian faith. In an Easter homily, he said of Jesus, “It is he who endured every kind of suffering in all those who foreshadowed him. In Abel he was slain, in Isaac bound, in Jacob exiled, in Joseph sold, in Moses exposed to die. He was sacrificed in the Passover lamb, persecuted in David, dishonored in the prophets.

“It was he who made man of the Virgin, he who was hung on the tree; it is he who was buried in the earth, raised from the dead, and taken up to the heights of heaven. He is the mute lamb, the slain lamb, the lamb born of Mary, the fair ewe. He was seized from the flock, dragged off to be slaughtered, sacrificed in the evening, and buried at night.”

In other words, Jesus endured the worst suffering a human can experience to demonstrate his solidarity with all human suffering.

You can feel no pain worse than the pain he felt when he was scourged and crucified. You can experience no shame worse than his shame when he was rejected by the crowds and ridiculed by the priests, no betrayal worse than his betrayal by Judas, no abandonment worse than his abandonment by his disciples, no horror worse than his horror when the sins of all humanity were laid on his sinless soul, no loneliness greater than the loneliness he felt when he bore our sins and his Father turned his face from him in judgment.

“Our citizenship is not of this world”

Two results follow.

One: Jesus calls us to trust our deepest pain, grief, and guilt into his crucified hands. 

Scripture assures us: “We do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin” (Hebrews 4:15). As a result, our Lord invites us: “Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (v. 16).

Why do you need such mercy and grace today?

Two: Jesus calls us to stand in solidarity with all who suffer, paying forward his compassionate grace. 

Paul explained that God “comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God” (2 Corinthians 1:4).

Br. James Koester of the Society of St. John the Evangelist in Boston notes: “We live in a world where Me is king. But our citizenship is not of this world. We are citizens of another country, whose king is a servant, whose orb is a towel, whose scepter a wash basin, whose crown is humility, and whose motto is service. As citizens and subjects of that kingdom, we cannot swear ultimate allegiance in any other way than taking up our towels, holding our basins, and getting down on our knees” (his emphases).

On this Good Friday, whose feet will you wash today?

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Gateway Church is a multisite megachurch based in Texas. They are in the news today because they have helped around four hundred Ukrainian refugees relocate and are in the process of helping to relocate hundreds more. According to the church’s spokesman, Gateway has been able to do this because of relationships with several congregations in Ukraine that predate the outbreak of war.

By contrast, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe released a 108-page document accusing Russia of illegally targeting hospitals, schools, residential buildings, and water facilities. The United Nations reports that 1.4 million Ukrainians are without running water and 4.6 million are at risk of losing their water supply. Experts are warning that the US and Europe “must be ready for Russian biological or chemical attacks.” On Tuesday, President Biden accused Vladimir Putin of perpetrating genocide against the Ukrainian people.

What explains the divergent ways Gateway Church and Vladimir Putin view Ukrainians?

The answer might surprise you.

“When men and women no longer revere God”

Wallace B. Henley is a former pastor, White House, and congressional aide. In an article published yesterday on Christian Post, he reports that a TV interviewer asked him, “Why do you think the Russians are committing atrocities in the Ukraine?

He writes: “‘Abortion,’ I answered so quickly it surprised even me.”

Here’s the connection: whether it’s Russian soldiers massacring innocent Ukrainians or Americans murdering innocent unborn babies, both are objectifying humans as a means to their ends. He is right: “Without the sense of God’s transcendence, the concept of sin is lost as well.” The result is “the loss of the secularized individual human spirit and the soul of the society of the belief in and sense of God’s transcendence and the human accountability that goes with it.”

Henley concludes: “When men and women no longer revere God, they lose reverence and respect for the life he has created in the womb as well as the lives of innocents rushing to shelters amidst a fiery war.

“The tragedies in Ukraine should appall us all, but not surprise us at all.”

“He made him to be sin who knew no sin”

On this day in Holy Week, Jesus pled three times with his Father for this “cup” to “pass” from him” (cf. Matthew 26:36–44). I believe our Savior was focused less on the physical torture he would face, as unspeakably horrific as it was, than on the spiritual agony he would experience.

On the cross, the Father placed the sins of all of humanity on his sinless Son’s soul. In that moment, for the only moment in all of eternity, the two were separated as the Son cried out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46).

Paul explained the transaction this way: “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 5:21). On this Maundy Thursday night, the Father said no to his Son so he could say yes to you and me.

Here’s the problem: we know this to be so. We’ve heard all our Christian lives that God loved us so much he sent his Son to die for us (John 3:16). As a result, we can miss the necessity of that sacrificial love for our souls today. That’s because we all too easily overlook the depth of our sins today.

A profound Yad Vashem quote

You and I don’t have to commit atrocities against Ukrainians or abort unborn babies in America to participate in a culture that objectifies others to their loss and our gain. Every relational sin we commit, from theft to deceit, gossip, slander, lust, and so on, is a variation on the same theme.

But it’s not just sins of commission that sent Jesus to the cross—it’s sins of omission as well.

When our Israel study group recently toured Yad Vashem, the Holocaust museum in Jerusalem, I stopped before a statement by the German writer Kurt Tucholsky that moves me every time I read it: “A country is not just what it does—it is also what it tolerates.”

I live in a country that has murdered ten times more unborn babies than the number of Jews murdered by the Nazis. We tolerate pornography and endorse all manner of sexual immorality. Racism is still endemic in parts of our society. Drug and alcohol abuse are epidemics. I could go on.

Maundy Thursday urgently calls us to remember this simple fact: it was my sins that put Jesus on the cross. And yours.

How to “abandon every false way of obtaining love”

We have focused this week on the work of the Holy Spirit during Holy Week. Let’s close today’s reflection with the fact that the Spirit not only convicts us of the sins for which Jesus died (John 16:8), but he also participates in our forgiveness and restoration “by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit” (Titus 3:5).

Now we as Christians have a choice. We can embrace the security of our salvation but overlook our present sins of commission and omission. Or we can make time on this Maundy Thursday to submit to the Spirit, asking him to identify our unconfessed sins and then repenting of them with genuine contrition.

If we wisely choose the latter, we will experience the transforming grace of God in ways that will make this a true Holy Week for our souls. Henri Nouwen explained the nature of such faith with his usual depth of wisdom:

“The word faith is often understood as accepting something you can’t understand. People often say, ‘Such and such can’t be explained, you simply have to believe it.’ However, when Jesus talks about faith, he means first of all to trust unreservedly that you are loved, so that you can abandon every false way of obtaining love. . . .

“When Jesus says to the people he has healed, ‘Your faith has healed you,’ he is saying that they have found new life because they have surrendered in complete trust to the love of God revealed in him.”

Will you experience this “new life” today?

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