The latest Godzilla movie is getting rave reviews and shattering box office records after a massive opening weekend. Alex Fitzpatrick reports in Axios that the film is “set in postwar Japan . . . to explore the country’s struggles in grappling with its actions and the incredible devastation levied upon it.” In other words, it’s a sign of our war-torn times.

Here’s another: “Peach Fuzz” is the Pantone Color Institute’s “color of the year,” chosen because it conjures peace and serenity. A company spokesperson explained: “We’re going through a lot of turmoil in our lives, and we have a need for a color that’s nurturing.”

In a day some are calling the “Age of Unhingement,” perhaps we should not be surprised by such news. According to columnist Rick Newman, “If America had a national mood, it would be gloom.” Responding to surveys cataloging dismal consumer attitudes, he hypothesizes that “Americans are so overwhelmed with negative news that they’re more inclined than ever to think things are terrible.”

It’s not just the seasonal depression that often comes with winter; the CDC reports that our suicide rate is the highest ever recorded. It has been consistently climbing since 2001, up nearly 50 percent over the last two decades. Unsurprisingly, just 21 percent of us are confident that life for our children’s generation will be better than it has been for us.

If we’re so spiritual, why are we unhappy?

At the same time, Pew Research Center reports that seven in ten US adults describe themselves as spiritual in some way. If we’re so spiritual, why are we so unhappy?

Perhaps a clue is found in this part of the report: 22 percent of us say we are spiritual but not religious. Of this group, 71 percent believe that “parts of nature, like mountains, rivers, or trees can have spirits or spiritual energies.” Nearly half say the same about “certain objects, like crystals, jewels, or stones.”

While only 2 percent of spiritual but not religious people say they attend religious worship services weekly or more often, 78 percent say they spend time “looking inward or centering” themselves at least a few times a month.

Such self-centered, self-defining spirituality is the hallmark of our times. According to George Barna’s latest inventory, only 4 percent of Americans embrace a “biblical worldview,” meaning that “people’s ideas about all dimensions of life and eternity are based on biblical principles and commands.”

“Nearly all that we call human history”

If humans are created by a holy God for personal relationship with him, the fact that we are living in the “age of unhingement” should not surprise our secularized, post-Christian culture. C. S. Lewis observed in Mere Christianity:

What Satan put into the heads of our remote ancestors was the idea that they could “be like gods”—could set up on their own as if they had created themselves—be their own masters—invent some sort of happiness for themselves outside God, apart from God. And out of that hopeless attempt has come nearly all that we call human history—money, poverty, ambition, war, prostitution, classes, empires, slavery—the long terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy.

He then explained why our independence from God doesn’t work:

God made us: invented us as a man invents an engine. A car is made to run on petrol, and it would not run properly on anything else. Now God designed the human machine to run on himself. He himself is the fuel our spirits were designed to burn, or the food our spirits were designed to feed on. There is no other. That is why it is just no good asking God to make us happy in our own way without bothering about religion. God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.

When Lewis wrote his book in 1952, these were the binary options: “religion” (meaning biblical Christianity) or irreligion “apart from God.” As we have seen today, however, millions of Americans are embracing a “spiritual but not religious” third option where they choose the parts they like and refuse the rest.

Beware the “most intimate souvenirs of hell”

At this point I am tempted to congratulate all of us who do embrace a biblical worldview, who attend church services regularly, study our Bibles and pray daily, and read (or write) resources like this Daily Article. But I sense the Spirit issuing this warning: you and I are just as tempted by cafeteria-style spirituality as the rest of our post-Christian culture.

Every time we choose to sin, we reject God’s word and will and grieve and quench his Spirit (Ephesians 4:30; 1 Thessalonians 5:19). To quote Lewis, we “invent some sort of happiness for [ourselves] outside of God.” But a holy God cannot bless unholiness and remain true to his holy character. To the contrary, he must withdraw his favor and, if we persist in unrepentance, invoke his judgment.

This is why this Advent week of peace is so relevant to our times. Scripture declares, “God is not a God of confusion but of peace” (1 Corinthians 14:33). As a result, the prophet could testify to him, “You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you” (Isaiah 26:3). The psalmist prayed, “Great peace have those who love your law” (Psalm 119:165). Because “peace” is a “fruit of the Spirit” (Galatians 5:22), “to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace” (Romans 8:6).

Do you have such peace?

We’ll close with one more reflection from C. S. Lewis, this time in The Great Divorce: “If we accept heaven we shall not be able to retain even the smallest and most intimate souvenirs of hell.”

Do you need to abandon such “souvenirs” today?

Denison Forum

A threat is rising to the US and global commerce from a group you’ve probably heard little about: two missiles fired from territory held by Houthi rebels in Yemen missed a commercial tanker loaded with jet fuel today. An American warship also shot down a suspected Houthi drone that was flying in its direction. This after a missile fired by Houthis struck a Norwegian-flagged tanker in the Red Sea yesterday.

Such attacks have been targeting commercial vessels for several days. US Navy ships have shot down an array of drones headed their way believed to have been launched by the militant group. Last month, the jihadists seized a transport in the Red Sea linked to Israel and are still holding the vessel.

So, who are the Houthis? How much of a threat are they to Israel and the US? The answers are troubling for the region and are contributing to the growing prospect of global war.

A worst-case scenario for the US

Yemen, the Arab world’s poorest nation, is a country of twenty-eight million people on the southern end of the Arabian peninsula. In the 1990s, the Houthi movement emerged in the northern part of the country in reaction to rising Saudi financial and religious influence. Their name comes from the surname of the movement’s early leader, Hussein al-Houthi, who died in 2004.

The Shiite group, backed by Iran, has been fighting Yemen’s Sunni-majority government for two decades. They control the capital city of Sanaa and much of the western part of the country. They have been protesting the IDF’s post-October 7 incursion into Gaza by targeting ships headed toward Israel as well as US forces in the area.

It is not difficult to imagine a scenario by which Houthis in the south combine with Hezbollah in the north, Palestinian Islamic Jihad in the West Bank, and Hamas in Gaza to form a four-front assault against Israel. All four are proxies of Iran, which has long sought Israel’s destruction. They could not realistically defeat the IDF, but their incessant attacks could discourage Israelis and prompt them to abandon their nation.

In such a scenario, the US would likely need to escalate its military support for Israel. This at a time when Ukraine is seeking additional support for its ongoing war with Russia. If China were to invade Taiwan, the US would find itself on the other side of yet a third global conflict.

According to A. Wess Mitchell, senior advisor for the United States Institute of Peace and a former assistant secretary of state for Europe and Eurasia, this is the worst-case scenario for the US. He writes in Foreign Policy that our military is not designed to fight wars against two major rivals simultaneously, much less three. We would fight such a world war as “a thinly stretched US military alongside ill-equipped allies that are mostly unable to defend themselves against large industrial powers with the resolve, resources, and ruthlessness to sustain a long conflict.”

Mitchell believes that waging such a global war “would require a scale of national unity, resource mobilization, and willingness to sacrifice that Americans and their allies have not seen in generations.”

“A situation without obvious historical parallel”

Is Mitchell correct in his assessment? A recent poll asked Americans about values they consider “very important,” contrasting responses made in 1998 with today. The results:

• Patriotism: 70 percent vs. 38 percent today
• Religion: 62 percent vs. 39 percent today
• Having children: 59 percent vs. 30 percent today

What explains this radical shift?

Carl Trueman writes in his book The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self, “The modern self is one where authenticity is achieved by acting outwardly in accordance with one’s inward feelings.” Such a worldview privileges the individual over commitments to patriotism, religion, children, or community. Trueman calls this “a situation without obvious historical parallel.”

These reflections give us even greater reason for concern regarding our nation and her future. The internal “crisis of despair” we are facing, alongside potentially the greatest external threats we have seen in decades, combine to make this Advent week of peace even more relevant for our society and for our souls.

“Not as the world gives do I give to you”

Paradoxically, the peace we need is found not in seeking it but in resolving the foundational issue that robs it from us. Yesterday, I shared Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s most famous quote from his classic, The Cost of Discipleship. Here is his statement in its context:

The cross is laid on every Christian. The first Christ-suffering which every man must experience is the call to abandon the attachments of this world. It is that dying of the old man which is the result of his encounter with Christ. As we embark upon discipleship we surrender ourselves to Christ in union with his death—we give over our lives to death. Thus it begins; the cross is not the terrible end to an otherwise God-fearing and happy life, but it meets us at the beginning of our communion with Christ. When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.

We were created to love God and each other unconditionally and sacrificially (Matthew 22:37–39). Consequently, self-centered people acting “in accordance with one’s inward feelings” are at war with God, others, and themselves.

However, when we surrender our lives, ambitions, and challenges to the Prince of Peace, his omniscience guides us, his omnipotence empowers us, and his omnibenevolence encourages us. We can claim Jesus’ promise, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you” (John 14:27a). And we can answer his invitation, “Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid” (v. 27b).

Is your heart “troubled” or “afraid” today?

Denison Forum