Stand to Reason

Rapid Fire – Part 4

Greg Koukl — Sun, 01 Mar 2026 09:00:00 GMT

In this issue of Solid Ground, I continue to offer what I’ve called “rapid-fire” critiques—brief responses as opposed to feature-length treatments—to common pushbacks to Christianity that you might face in conversations with others. Hopefully, these vignettes will clarify some issues for you and also give insight on how particular challenges misfire.

“I’m basically a good person.”

The vast majority of Americans believe in Hell, apparently, but almost no one thinks they’re going there. Their reason? “I’m basically a good person,” they say. They’re only little sinners, by their reckoning, since their good deeds vastly outweigh their bad ones. Their misplaced confidence is based on two points of confusion.

The first confusion comes from defining “basically good” according to human standards. God, on this view, is concerned with what kind of individual one is “on average.” If there’s more good than bad—if good is predominant—then God winks at the occasional moral lapse.

But justice never works that way, does it? The law demands that each person obey every law always, not most laws most of the time. No amount of good behavior can pay for bad behavior. Period. Law requires consistent compliance, and that which is already owed—obedience—cannot be used to pay for past errors.

A person may be an upstanding citizen all his life, but one single crime is still going to bring him before the court. He’ll never get a letter from the DA saying, “You’ve been a good, law-abiding citizen for five years. Go out and beat up a few innocent bystanders and rob a few gas stations—on us. You’ve got credit in your account.”

If you’re still not clear on this point, ask yourself what commandment of God—or any law of any country, for that matter—one can violate with impunity without fear of punishment.

God, like all lawgivers, requires nothing less than moral perfection. “But that’s impossible,” you say. You’re right. That is why we need a Savior. That’s the only way we can be right with God when we’re not thoroughly good.

The second confusion is tied to math. The “basically good” person simply hasn’t run the numbers and needs to do the calculus. For example, counting only the sins he’s committed from, say, his tenth birthday to his sixtieth—just fifty years—how many sins would he have committed if he’d only sinned ten times a day?

Of course, ten sins a day is a modest projection. Keep in mind we’re not only talking about rape, pillaging, murder, and theft. Sin includes the full range of human moral failings before God—heart attitudes and motives as well as actions, including failing to love God with our whole heart, mind, soul, and strength and failing to love others as ourselves.

If a person sinned just ten times a day for only 50 years, what would his rap sheet look like? He would have amassed 182,500 infractions of the law. What judge would turn anyone loose with a record like that? And that is a best-case scenario. In reality, each of us would fare much worse.

Whenever you’re tempted to trust in your own ability, take a good look at the standard, God’s Law (you’ll find it in Exodus 20), then look at your own rap sheet. To use Paul’s words, the Law “has shut up everyone under sin” (Gal. 3:22). It’s closed our mouths, and we all have become accountable to God (Rom. 3:19).

The psalmist says, “If you, Lord, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand?” (Ps. 130:3). Saved by our own goodness? Hardly. God’s Law gives us no hope.

“God is too big to fit into just one religion.”

I saw this one on a bumper sticker once. It’s clever at first glance, but on further reflection, it’s an odd objection since it treats God and religions like physical objects. Precisely what is God’s size? And how much space is there in a religion? Of course, these two questions are nonsense questions because they’re guilty of what thoughtful people call a “category error.”[1]

God can’t “fit” into every religion because religions have contradictory teachings on what God and his world are actually like. They are inconsistent with each other.

“Pro-lifers want to force women to be parents.”

One challenge to the pro-life view is that restrictions on abortion actually force women to become parents against their will. This, of course, sounds like an unconscionable intrusion of government into private life.

I agree, no woman should be forced to become a parent against her will, but this is not the situation we face in abortion. If the unborn is a human being, then pregnant women already are parents. It seems morally self-evident that no parent should escape her responsibilities by disposing of her unwanted children. The only legitimate way to escape from already being a parent is through adoption.

Clearly, the issue isn’t unwanted parenthood. If the unborn is a human being, the woman already is the child’s mother. She should not be permitted to end his life just because she doesn’t want him. She should give him to someone who does.

“If God showed me a miracle, then I’d believe.”

To many skeptics, God has “hidden” himself. If he’d just come out of hiding, they say—if he’d just work one dramatic miracle for them—then they’d believe. This kind of person overestimates himself. Even dramatic miracles can be denied or dismissed.

Just before Jesus’ passion in Jerusalem, he was called to nearby Bethany to help his friend Lazarus, who was dying. By the time Jesus arrived, though, Lazarus was gone. In a dramatic scene, Jesus called him forth from the tomb, alive yet still wrapped in burial clothes.

Lazarus’s resurrection was a spectacular miracle performed in public for all to see. Yet what was the response of the Jewish leaders? They decided they needed to kill Jesus. They said, “This man is performing many signs. If we let Him go on like this, all men will believe in Him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation” (John 11:47–48).

Jesus, however, wasn’t the only one they needed to eliminate. They also had to get rid of another piece of evidence: Lazarus. “But the chief priests planned to put Lazarus to death also; because on account of him many of the Jews were going away and were believing in Jesus” (John 12:10–11).

Instead of falling to their knees in response to this obvious display of Messianic power, Jesus’ opponents conspired to kill the very man whose public resurrection was proof positive of their error. This is unbelievable unbelief.

Some think that if God just did a miracle, that would be enough to change their rebellious heart. Don’t count on it. Jesus said, “If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead” (Luke 16:31).

As one wag put it, if the Almighty materialized in front of a skeptic, he would not seek God; he’d seek a psychiatrist.

Oh so true. The sun melts butter, but it hardens clay.

“Consciousness is an illusion.”

Consciousness is a serious problem for atheistic materialists.

Two concerns plague anyone whose worldview requires that every element of reality be reduced to something physical. One, consciousness is one of the most salient and undeniable features of reality. Two, consciousness is not something physical.

These two facts create such a difficulty for materialists that New York University philosopher—and committed atheist—Thomas Nagel stunned the establishment when he released his public lament on the dilemma. His book bears the scandalous title Mind and Cosmos: Why the Materialist Neo-Darwinian Conception of Nature Is Almost Certainly False.

Playing completely against type, Nagel argues that naturalistic approaches are utterly incapable of accounting for the central feature of human experience—human consciousness:

Consciousness is the most conspicuous obstacle to a comprehensive naturalism that relies only on the resources of physical science…. If we take this problem seriously, and follow out its implications, it threatens to unravel the entire naturalistic world picture.[2]

Thomas Nagel is refreshingly candid about the conflict. Erstwhile New Atheist Daniel Dennett,[3] though, was not so forthright. How does a dyed-in-the-wool atheistic materialist like Dennett deal with an obvious feature of reality that has no place in his worldview? He has only one refuge. He must deny that it’s real. Consciousness, he said, “is an illusion of the brain, for the brain, by the brain.”[4]

Dennett’s “solution” shows just how big of a bind materialists are in with consciousness. To make his physicalistic worldview work, Dennett must deny the reality of the most obvious feature of reality, our own self-awareness. His dismissal is surprisingly easy to dispatch since it’s self-refuting in an interesting way.

Often the first step in dealing with a challenge, though, is to get crystal clear on what is being claimed. Since consciousness is being dismissed as an illusion, we need clarity on what consciousness is and what an illusion is.

Your consciousness is your internal, first-person, subjective awareness of yourself and your mental states—your sensations, your thoughts, your beliefs, your desires, your intentions, and your acts of will (your volitions).

Notice two obvious features of consciousness. First, your conscious self is the thing you have more direct contact with than anything else in the world every waking moment of your life—and many of your sleeping moments, too. Simply put, consciousness is real—obviously.

Dennett’s first blunder, then, is dismissing the existence of something that’s unmistakably real to every other member of the human race. To save his foundering worldview, Dennett is forced to deny the most striking detail of human existence.

Second, consciousness is not physical, as Nagel grudgingly admits. The contents of our minds do not extend in space. They do not have weight. They are not beholden to the laws of physics and chemistry. Consciousness simply cannot be reduced to anything material.

Think next about exactly what an illusion is. It’s a false idea or belief or an experience of a deceptive appearance or a misleading impression. Simply put, illusions happen when a person’s conscious mind is being appeared to in a false way. They are errors of perception, conjured by your mind or fabricated by mistaken sensations distorted by your senses.

Forgive me for stating the obvious, but illusions themselves are conscious states. If consciousness is an illusion, then what is it that’s experiencing the illusion of consciousness? On Dennett’s view, our consciousness is perceiving the illusion of our consciousness. The illusion is having an illusion? Hardly.

Here is the critical question: How can consciousness be an illusion if consciousness is necessary to have an illusion to begin with? Things that lack consciousness (rocks come to mind) do not have illusions. Only conscious creatures can be “appeared to” falsely. If you cannot have an illusion unless you’re conscious, how can consciousness itself be an illusion?

Dennett’s second blunder—the self-refuting element—is beginning to become obvious. On his view, a purely physical thing that lacks real consciousness can possess a false idea or belief, or be aware of a deceptive appearance or a misleading impression, yet each of those is a feature of consciousness itself. Dennett’s dismissal of consciousness is self-defeating because he must presuppose what he’s trying to deny in order to deny it.

Consciousness is your direct, subjective experience of the contents of your own soul. Your soul is your irreducible, first-person self that is the possessor of all your mental activities—including whatever illusions and mental deceptions you may possess.

Daniel Dennett is mistaken, and Thomas Nagel is correct. Dismissing consciousness as mere illusion won’t do. Since consciousness is real, and the selves—the souls—that are conscious are real, too, the entire naturalistic picture of the world unravels.

“The Bible was written by men, and men make mistakes.”

This common criticism of Scripture misses the mark for two reasons.

First, it does not logically follow that because humans were involved in the writing process, the Bible must necessarily be in error. Mistakes may be possible, but not necessarily so. To assume error in all human communication is also self-defeating. The humanly derived statement “The Bible was written by men, and men make mistakes” would be suspect by the same standards. The fact is that human beings can and do produce writing with no errors. It happens all the time.

Further, the challenge that men make mistakes ignores the main issue—whether or not the Bible was written only by men. The Christian accepts that humans are limited, but denies that man’s limitations are significant in this case because inspiration implies that God’s power supersedes man’s liabilities.

A simple question—Columbo style—serves to illustrate this: “Are you saying that if God exists, he’s not capable of communicating what he wants through imperfect human beings?”

This seems hard to affirm. The notion of an omnipotent God not being able to accomplish such a task is ludicrous. If, on the other hand, the answer is “No, I think he is able,” then the objection vanishes. If God is capable, then man’s limitations are not a limit on God.

Of course, this doesn’t prove the Bible is inspired. It only means inspiration cannot be denied simply because humans were involved.

The divine inspiration of Scripture automatically solves the problem of human involvement. If God ensures the results, it doesn’t matter if men or monkeys do the writing. They will still write exactly what God intends. That is part of what it means for the Bible to be divinely inspired.

“Abortion protects unwanted children from becoming victims of child abuse.”

This particular defense of abortion is probably the most twisted I’ve ever encountered. It surfaced years ago in the “Letter to the Editor” section of the Ohio State University Lantern as a response to an article by a pro-life Christian student.[5]

The pro-abortion author, Shane Ahmed, spends the bulk of his article attempting to tie the horrors of abuse, molestation, and sexual slavery to the pro-life movement. Bewildered, he states, “I have never heard a pro-lifer speak on child-molestation.”

First, Ahmed’s entire approach is a red herring. I promise you, women do not choose abortion because they’re afraid they’re going to neglect, abuse, or molest their children.

Second, as far as I know, my neighbors have never spoken out against child molestation, either. Am I justified in assuming they may be a little soft on the issue? Or is it safer to presume that as civilized human beings, they abhor such behavior like the rest of us, even though they have not joined a public campaign against it?

Third, what Ahmed must actually show—and not simply insinuate—is that the children who might have been killed through abortion turn out to be the same children who parents molest, torment, or otherwise abuse. This correlation has never been demonstrated. Indeed, abuse has risen dramatically (as Ahmed vividly points out in his missive)[6] precisely when abortion has been available to anyone for any reason.

The most serious problem in Ahmed’s approach, though, is the moral equation he offers as a solution: It’s justifiable to kill human babies who we suspect might have a miserable life.

Ahmed writes, “So what does all this have to do with me thinking it’s okay to kill babies? Because I am willing to make the hard choices…. I care more about…what they will experience than the need to simply bring them into this world.”

Apparently, Ahmed actually believes it is worse to abuse children—if that actually turns out to be their lot—than to kill them. He really thinks that molestation is more evil than murder. Indeed, he offers the second as an antidote for the first. He advocates killing children to save them from any possibility of physical abuse or sexual assault.

This, Ahmed argues, is the moral high road compared to the pro-life position. Really? Is this the best solution he can come up with? Kill children now to protect them from possible harm in the future?

I would like to offer an alternative to Ahmed and anyone else tempted by this bizarre justification for abortion.

If Ahmed really believes that “every single life should experience love, enjoy fullness, happiness, and meaning,” as he writes, he should dig into his pockets and spend some of his own hard-earned money to make that a reality, like millions of pro-lifers do.

If he really cares “more about children’s ‘lives’ than their mere existence,” then he might donate his time at a care center, like thousands of pro-lifers do.

If he really is “willing to make the hard choices,” then he should make the hard choice to actually do something for those children he says he cares about rather than arguing to save them by killing them.

“If there’s so much evidence for Christianity, then where is room for faith?”

This objection never made any sense to me, though atheist and Skeptic magazine founder Michael Shermer thought it was important enough to raise during a three-hour national radio dialogue we had together.

That didn’t surprise me since the objection trades on a substandard definition of “faith” commonly held by atheists.[7] What surprises me is that an alarming number of Christians hold the same view. For most atheists—and many Christians, unfortunately—biblical faith and well-justified knowledge are inversely proportional: an increase in knowledge means a decrease in faith.

According to this view, the more evidence there is supporting a belief, the smaller the faith investment. By contrast, the more dubious, uncertain, or unsupported a claim may be, the greater the faith required. Giving reasons for faith, then, would be a contradiction by definition since convictions based on solid evidence require no real faith at all.

Here’s why this objection is biblically silly no matter who raises the concern, unbeliever or believer. Two odd conclusions follow from this kind of thinking.

First, apologetics—giving reasons and evidence to justify belief—would actually be detrimental to faith. Worse, since without faith it’s impossible to please God (Heb. 11:6), and evidence diminishes faith by providing more certainty, then making a reasonable defense for Christianity would displease God. Yet Peter tells us to always be ready to give an apologia, a defense, for the hope that is in us (1 Pet. 3:15), a task the apostle Paul says he was specifically appointed by God to accomplish (Phil. 1:16).

Second, the more evidence against Christianity, the more virtuous it would be to keep believing it. Believing in the teeth of every shred of evidence to the contrary, then, would be the greatest faith of all.

So, what kind of information would completely falsify Christianity? Finding the bones of Jesus in a grave. On this view, then, God would be most pleased with someone who knew Jesus did not rise from the dead, yet still believed he did.[8]

The apostle Paul called such a person pitiful, however: “If Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins…. If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied” (1 Cor. 15:17, 19).

Biblically, faith in Christ is not at odds with reason or evidence. Rather, reason and evidence are the basis for our confident trust in the Savior.

[1] A category error treats something as if it’s in a different category than it’s actually in—e.g., “How much does the color yellow weigh?” Weight is one category, and color is a completely different category not applicable to weight.

[2] Thomas Nagel, Mind and Cosmos: Why the Materialist Neo-Darwinian Conception of Nature Is Almost Certainly False (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2012), 35.

[3] Dennett passed away in April 2024.

[4] Daniel Dennett, “Dennett Unglues the Binding,” EvolvedAtheist, January 3, 2010, YouTube video, 2:57, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=in2FXOjq7g8.

[5] Shane Ahmed, “Pro-Choicer Claims Life Is More Than Birth,” The Lantern, May 10, 2001, https://www.thelantern.com/2001/05/pro-choicer-claims-life-is-more-than-birth/.

[6] Ibid. “Child-molestation [is] a dark disease that has become so common and accepted now that people aren’t even shocked by it anymore.”

[7] The basic definition atheists currently insist on is that faith is believing something without any reason or evidence. Otherwise, according to them, faith would not be faith. For more details, see “It’s Time to Forget ‘Faith,’” Stand to Reason, August 1, 2024, https://www.str.org/w/it-s-time-to-forget-faith-.

[8] I owe this excellent observation to J.P. Moreland.

Is God in Your Life?

Tripp Almon — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 03:00:00 GMT

Is God in your life?

I hope not. And I don’t mean that irreverently. I mean it logically. If God is in your life, then you are at the center. God becomes a supporting character—helpful, inspiring, occasionally summoned when things fall apart, but ultimately subordinate to your plans, your goals, your story. And Christianity, whatever else it is, is not a lifestyle enhancement with good moral advice.

The Christian story is not about God fitting into your life. It’s about you being invited into the life of God. That shift may sound subtle, but it reorients everything. It changes how we understand faith, obedience, suffering, joy, prayer, identity—and yes, how we relate to others. When we miss this, the Christian life quietly collapses into self-management with spiritual language.

One reason this confusion is so common is that we often look at the world, our lives, and even our faith through the wrong lens. And to be fair, this is not entirely your fault. The enemy doesn’t need to replace truth; he only needs to resize it. Hand someone the wrong end of the binoculars, and they can still see real things, but those things are distant, blurry, and strangely insignificant. Meanwhile, whatever is closest—usually the self—fills the entire field of view.

Good things shrink. The ego grows.

Comfort, freedom, technology, and success are not enemies of the Christian life. They are gifts. But quietly redirected and mixed with our pride and desires, they begin to tell a different story—one that feels perfectly reasonable: This is my story, and God is here to help me live it well.

We are already inclined in this direction because we are localized beings. We experience reality from the center of our own consciousness. Add to that a culture that constantly reinforces self-focus, and the result is predictable. Most of us have food, shelter, and a level of comfort that nearly every civilization in history could only imagine. These are tremendous blessings, but they also make it remarkably easy to believe we are kings. Not tyrants—just benevolent rulers of our own carefully managed kingdoms.

Then we place powerful devices in our pockets that amplify the illusion. With a phone in your hand, you can curate your identity, control your environment, access endless choices, and be present everywhere at once—while still feeling strangely alone. It whispers the modern creed: You are autonomous; you are in control; you can be whoever you want. No crown required.

Here’s the irony. We have never felt more powerful, and we have never been more anxious. Depression, anxiety, and suicide are at historic highs. If autonomy were the key to human flourishing, this would be difficult to explain. But the explanation is closer than we think. When you expect to be the center of the universe, reality becomes unbearable the moment it resists you. Limits begin to feel oppressive. Suffering feels unjust. Other people feel like obstacles. Even God starts to feel inconvenient.

Some have gone so far down this road that they believe reality itself must yield—not just circumstances, but even human nature. The world applauds, affirmation is offered, and yet something deeper fractures. The soul cannot survive long as its own god. We were never designed to carry that weight.

The Christian story begins with a necessary corrective. Reality is not about you. God is the author and the main character of the story. That may sound like bad news until you realize something astonishing: God wants you in the story—on purpose. Not as a prop or an extra, but as a beloved participant. Christianity does not erase the self; it places the self where it actually belongs.

So the better question is not, “Is God in my life?” The better question is, “Am I in God’s life?” And when you find your place there—when you step out of the exhausting illusion of kingship and into the reality of sonship—that is where freedom truly begins. Not the freedom to rule reality, but the freedom to live rightly, joyfully, and securely within it.

Seven Truths to Help You Prepare for Suffering

Katie Hulse — Wed, 18 Feb 2026 11:00:00 GMT

One thing we know for sure is that not one of us escapes this life without suffering—not unless we die young and suddenly, that is. Suffering is common to all mankind. So, as Clay and Jean E. Jones put it, “If the only thing we know absolutely, positively for sure about our future is that we are going to suffer and then die, we should prepare for that!” Their book, How Does God Use Suffering for Our Good?: Living with Hope While Making Sense of Life, focuses on this challenging yet deeply relevant topic.

Drawing from biblical wisdom and their personal experiences with suffering (which have not been insignificant), Clay and Jean discuss seven truths that can aid and encourage Christians in their suffering.

God Loves Us

The first truth is that God loves us. As they write,

That God loves us, that He wants the best for us, and that He has the power to accomplish what is best for us is the foundation of all the subsequent truths. In Ephesians 3:17–19, Paul writes, “I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God” (NIV). May we encourage you, dear reader, to pray Paul’s prayer before you continue reading. We all need a revelation of the love of God.

Sometimes we hear such truths as this, but we don’t take a moment to pause and reflect on them, to absorb them.

We know that one way God demonstrates his love for us is through Jesus (John 3:16). Consider for a moment that Jesus had a choice when he faced the cross. “Jesus did not have to die for our sins…. Jesus went to the cross willingly” (see John 10:17–18 and Matt. 26:51–53). He humbled himself by becoming a man, faced much sorrow, experienced betrayal and mockery, was stripped, flogged, scourged, and ultimately crucified. He did all of this for us—to show us God’s love for us.

Everyone Will Experience Suffering

Second, everyone will experience suffering. Now, to be clear, others may not go through exactly the same things we’re going through, but they will suffer.

Remembering that we are not alone helps put our problems into perspective. The Bible is filled with examples of godly people who suffer. Moses spent 40 years in the wilderness with a rebellious people; Job’s family was killed and painful boils afflicted him; Joseph’s brothers sold him into slavery; David spent ten years running from the murderous King Saul; and Paul, among many other sufferings, was stoned. So it shouldn’t surprise us when we too suffer.

We can find comfort in knowing that we are not alone, that suffering and hardship are not unique to ourselves.

Everything Will Work for Our Good

Third, God will work out everything, even suffering, for our good. This is just as Paul says in Romans 8:28. But continue a little further, and we see that our good is defined as being conformed to the image of God’s Son (v. 29). A considerable benefit of suffering is that it does this very thing. “At the beginning, our suffering may only feel painful, but later ‘it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.’ Our Father is making us like Jesus, and that’s eternally praiseworthy.” Suffering helps to prepare us for eternity in God’s kingdom. “Although we know for a fact that Christianity is objectively true,” Clay and Jean note, “nothing gives us subjective confidence in the truth of Christianity more than seeing suffering develop godly character in our lives.” And a helpful practice, since we humans are quite forgetful, is to keep a record of how God has brought about good from past hardships in our lives.

Many Have Honored God Through Worse Suffering

Fourth, many have honored God through worse suffering than we will go through. We can be encouraged when we remember this truth that others have endured greater hardships than we have yet still honored God through them. We can look to biblical figures, the saints of the past, and Christian brothers and sisters today (e.g., Joni Eareckson Tada) who have faced much hardship yet endured. “Anytime we honor God through suffering,” whatever that suffering may be, “we are testifying to the world that our faith in a loving God stands.”

We Don’t Know What Will Happen Tomorrow

Fifth, we don’t know what the future holds. We often spend our time worrying about many things that will never actually happen. But Jesus said not to worry about tomorrow (Matt. 6:34). When we find our thoughts turning to the worries of the future, we must take our thoughts captive (2 Cor. 10:5). This takes discipline, to be sure. “We shouldn’t focus on potential problems that might never happen. But the only way not to look at our potential problems is to look at something better.” This brings us to the next truth.

Focus on Jesus and the Joy to Come

Sixth, focus on Jesus and the joy to come at the end of our race. Another benefit of suffering is that it tends to shift our gaze away from the world and upward toward God and the kingdom to come. It helps us not to love the world (1 John 2:15–17).

Hebrews 12:1–2…tells us that as we run our race, we must look “to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God” (verse 2). In other words, Jesus kept His eyes on the prize. By pursuing the joy that would come at the end of His race, Jesus “endured the cross, despising the shame”.… Jesus is our example. Just as He looked to the joy to come and was thereby able to endure pain and despise earthly shame, so can we.

Jesus looked to the joy to come, and “Eternal joy and glory await us at the end of our races too.” We can run our races well knowing what lies ahead. Indeed, “The brighter our view of eternal glory, the more easily we will overcome the sufferings of this life.”

We Will Enjoy a Glorious Eternity

Seventh, we will enjoy a glorious eternity. “The best preparation [for suffering],” Clay and Jean state, “is to have a robust view of the glory that will await us throughout eternity, for heaven will be gloriously better than whatever we could ask or think (Ephesians 3:20).”

Many Christians have such an anemic view of heaven that they fear it will be dreadfully boring. Some fear that eternal rewards won’t be rewarding. That’s a problem because the New Testament encourages us to persevere through suffering and difficulties because God will reward us with eternal life. But if we don’t think the rewards will be worthwhile, persevering will be just short of impossible.

But remember, God is the one who created all the pleasures and all the beautiful things of this world. Heaven is compared to a banquet or wedding feast, a time of celebration, joy, and friendship (Is. 25:6; Matt. 22:2, 25:1–10; Rev. 19:9). We’ll be with the Creator of everything in the universe—all the colors, animals, plants, mountains, and galaxies. Heaven will hardly be boring. More than this, we’ll live without guilt and without pain, mourning, and death (Rev. 21:4). We’ll have meaningful work to do. And we’ll have close relationships with others and with God. Note that our relationship with God is described in the close, intimate terms of husband-wife and father-child relationships (Rev. 21).

So, to sum up, we can be faithful and victorious, whatever comes our way, “by keeping our eyes on eternity.”

Four Practical Steps

Four practical steps Christians can take to prepare for suffering are to abide in God’s Word, be in prayer, be in fellowship, and keep a “truth journal”—a journal that contains “truths, Scriptures, and remembrances of God’s good care.” Keeping such a record also helps us replace false beliefs with truths.

As Clay and Jean discovered, “Not shockingly, it turns out that doing what God says to do has immensely helped us.”

May these truths help you, dear Christian, in your own suffering as well.

We need to conquer, overcome, and be victorious over suffering in its various forms: sickness, accidents, temptations to compromise, and persecution, even when these things might result in our deaths. But if we do conquer, if we do overcome, if we are victorious by honoring God despite whatever this fallen world throws at us, then we’ll receive eternal blessings.

Is a Changed Life Evidence for the Truth of Christianity?

Alan Shlemon — Tue, 10 Feb 2026 11:00:00 GMT

Christians are not the only ones who experience changed lives. Other religious adherents have testimonials as well. Mormons, Hindus, and Muslims, for example, also tell stories of how devotion to their faith has changed them. Does that mean Mormonism, Hinduism, and Islam are also true religions?

Greg Koukl was recently a guest on the Diary of a CEO (DOAC) podcast, discussing the meaning of life with host Steven Bartlett, rising atheist star Alex O’Connor, and psychiatrist Alok Kanojia (Dr. K). During the episode, the panelists debated the question of whether a changed life is evidence for the truth of a religion. The three panelists opposite Koukl pointed to the changed lives of people from different religious systems as evidence that a changed life does not count as evidence towards the truth of that system.

Koukl, on the other hand, claimed that a changed life is evidence, although he clarified that it’s not a knock-down proof that the religion is true. I’m sure most Christians would agree. After all, sometimes people who convert to Mormonism experience a changed life. Sometimes people who convert to Islam also experience a changed life. Yet we don’t believe those religions to be true.

While I agree with Koukl’s assessment, what was left out of the DOAC conversation was a more relevant question: Towards what standard is the belief system changing people’s lives? In other words, what kind of change is occurring? Is it good change or bad change? You can’t answer that question until you evaluate the veracity of the standard. After all, not all change is good. A changed life presupposes some standard by which you measure the change. Determining what that standard is and whether it’s a true standard is the more pressing question.

Take a person who adopts Hinduism, for example. What might their changed life look like? The Hindu worldview includes the belief in samsara, a cycle of birth, death, and rebirth. A Hindu would believe in karma—i.e., how you live affects your future lives. They would also believe in the caste system, which is a social stratification structure that places some people in higher castes, others in lower ones, and even considers some untouchable. As a result, a consistent Hindu would ignore a lower caste person’s plight. They wouldn’t seek to help that person for fear they would undermine the principles of karma and samsara and violate the caste system.

What about a person who becomes a Muslim? They, too, would experience a changed life, but it would entail changes towards the Islamic worldview. Islam teaches that Mohammed perfectly embodied how a Muslim should live. Therefore, it’s the duty of each Muslim to change their life in accordance with how Mohammed lived. A Muslim who lives consistently with the Islamic worldview, then, would treat women with less respect than is expected in Western society. Deception (taqiyya) would be considered moral if it meant advancing the cause of Islam. Most concerningly, Muslims have a moral obligation to engage in jihad (even if not all of them live consistently with this command).

A changed life is certainly noteworthy, but it’s not necessarily noble. It depends on the standard by which the change is measured. If the change is towards a Hindu or Muslim standard, for example, then that’s not change towards a true standard. The new behavior could be bad behavior.

The more relevant question then is, what is the standard by which we’re evaluating a person’s changed life? Sure, religious adherents of every worldview can claim their lives have changed since adopting their new belief system. Among conflicting religions, though, only one could have the true standard. Therefore, only a changed life towards that religion counts as positive change.

Christians for millennia have reported changed lives. People have been rescued from failed marriages, substance abuse, criminal activity, depression, and a whole host of other examples. What’s notable about these changed lives versus the changed lives of adherents of other religions is that Christians are changing towards the true standard. They’re becoming more like Jesus. He’s the proper and good standard.

What to Say When Challenged to “Love and Accept” Like Jesus

Greg Koukl — Sun, 01 Feb 2026 11:00:00 GMT

The college student’s challenge was formed as a question: “Doesn’t Jesus teach we should love and accept one another?” The query sounded innocent at first glance, and the answer seemed obvious, at least to most people. If you’re asked this question, though, beware of naively affirming it, for two reasons.

First, there’s likely a different issue lurking behind that question, as it was in this student’s case. If Jesus taught love and acceptance, then why don’t Christians—who allegedly follow Jesus—love, accept, and affirm those who are LGBTQ? If you quickly give the nod to the first question, you’ll be skewered by the second one.

The challenge falters in part because genuine love does not require approval and acceptance of every behavior of the one loved—a point obvious to thoughtful adults and foundational to wise parenting. Indeed, in the most famous biblical passage on love—one frequently quoted even by non-Christians at weddings—Paul himself declared that love “does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth” (1 Cor. 13:6).

Note that for the apostle, homosexual practice was unrighteous. It was “contrary to sound teaching” (1 Tim. 1:10) and was, along with other vices and sinful sexual activities, a practice that disqualified partakers from entrance into the kingdom (1 Cor. 6:9–10). Plus, transgenderism runs afoul of God’s “very good” creation order: humans created by God as sexually binary, male and female, thus capable of fulfilling God’s mandate to be fruitful and multiply (Gen. 1:27–28). This point was explicitly affirmed by Jesus himself (Matt. 19:4–5).

Consequently, no biblical understanding of love—and, therefore, no characterization of Jesus’ view of love—could endorse, affirm, or approve of either homosexual behavior or transgenderism.

There’s a second problem many miss, though. Contrary to popular opinion—and surprising even to me when I checked—Jesus actually said precious little in his public preaching about love in general, and he said absolutely nothing affirming the kind of “love and acceptance” being promoted in Jesus’ name through the student’s line of questioning.

Search your Bible concordance for all of Jesus’ public admonitions to love that are recorded in the Gospels. You’ll find only three directives: Love God, love your neighbor, and love your enemies. That’s it.

The “great and foremost” commandment is “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.” It’s mentioned in some form in three exchanges—Matthew 22:37, Mark 12:30, and Luke 10:27.

Of course, loving God entails keeping his commandments. It doesn’t make sense to say to someone who has legitimate authority over us, “I love you, but I’m not going to do anything you tell me unless it suits my own desires.” That’s not love. That’s narcissism.

The second great commandment is similar to the first: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Matt. 19:19; Matt. 22:39; Mark 12:31; Luke 10:27). Loving ourselves, however, is not the same as blanket self-approval and self-affirmation. Clearly, not everything we do is ethical or good for us, so that couldn’t be what Jesus meant.

Rather, since we consistently look after our own well-being—sometimes to a fault—we ought to do the same for others. C.S. Lewis called it “a steady wish for the loved person’s ultimate good as far as it can be obtained.” It’s not an act of love, then—for others or for us—to accept, encourage, or celebrate morally self-destructive behavior.

In Jesus’ third love command, he included even our enemies as “neighbors” to be cared for and shown goodness and mercy (Matt. 5:44; Luke 6:27). Curiously, when a lawyer asked Jesus, “Who is my neighbor?” Jesus responded with a parable describing a virtuous Samaritan man caring for a wounded Jew—a person who was culturally his foe.

Jesus gave one other command to love, but it was not a public one. It was private, made to his disciples on their final night together. After washing their feet as an example to them of servant leadership, he gave them a “new commandment.” He told them that—as a witness to others that they were his disciples—they were to love one another sacrificially just as he had loved them (John 13:34–35; 15:12–13). He also added, “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments” (John 14:15).

So, don’t be distracted by any “love” challenge to your biblical morality. According to Scripture, love always has a moral dimension. Love does not rejoice in unrighteousness, and it does not counter the specific intentions of God in creation. Genuine love always entails obeying the Father and obeying the Son (1 John 5:2).

Jesus’ entire instruction on love was simple. Love God completely, love your neighbor as yourself, and show love and benevolence towards your enemies. Within the Christian community, demonstrate faithfulness as Jesus’ disciples by loving each other sacrificially. None of Jesus’ love commands is consistent with approving behavior that God clearly identifies as sinful and destructive.

Is God Really Blessing American Christians with Answers to Little Prayers While Others Suffer?

Amy K. Hall — Tue, 27 Jan 2026 11:00:00 GMT

I received an email from someone who raised a concern about comfortable, American Christians thanking God for answering little prayers while others in this world suffer without relief. Here’s an excerpt:

I grew up in a country that has made the top 10 list of humanitarian crises in 2025. And, as a U.S. citizen and Christian, I am still trying to figure out why so many American Christians believe their (American) Creator gives them a parking spot on time or makes it so there is no rain on their wedding day, and yet, isn’t able to take care of those who are starving, being bombed, being violated, being kidnapped and praying/begging him for help….

These days, I find myself no longer wanting to claim the Father did this and that for me, because I don’t understand why he isn’t doing the same for billions of people whose condition is much worse than mine. Or, should we claim that such and such blessing (peppered with some privileges) came from him to show that he still moves on earth? I am confused.

While I do have concerns about how American Christians tend to view suffering (see below), I don’t think there’s anything wrong with thanking God for good gifts he’s given to us out of his own grace. If God answers a little prayer, I think we should be thankful, just as we should be thankful for his answering big prayers. In times when I’m going through something horrendous in my life, and I see God answer a little prayer for relief in some specific way, I’m overwhelmed by thankfulness that he has comforted me in that way and imparted a small joy into my life in the midst of trauma. So, the bottom line here is that anytime God blesses us with a joy, big or small, it’s appropriate to thank him for it and feel grateful.

Second, part of the reason most people do not wrestle with survival-level traumas in this country is that our culture has been shaped by the Christian worldview for hundreds and hundreds of years. This is why our laws protect things like human dignity, free speech, property rights, etc. and why our culture values things like honesty, hard work, the rule of law, etc. This all came out of principles of justice laid out by God in the Mosaic Law. Because of this, we start off at a base level of blessings from God that isn’t enjoyed by other cultures—that is, simply because God has been shaping many things in our society, we are free to focus on little joys like no rain on a wedding day. This, too, is a blessing from God that our culture enjoys simply because of the amount of time his ideas have worked to shape our culture. This isn’t just a random “privilege.” This itself is a result of the blessing of God’s revelation of his justice and morality, and I also think it glorifies God and points to the truth of what he’s revealed to us in the Bible.

Here are just a few of the ways the Christian worldview has blessed the West:

Now, having said that, I think many Christians in this country have failed to think carefully about suffering and what it means in terms of our relationship with God. This is the downside of being in a culture that has prospered insofar as it has conformed itself to God’s morality. That is, we’ve forgotten how to suffer well! We’re even surprised by it when it comes, which is silly since so much of the New Testament is about suffering. At times God blesses us through joys, and at times God blesses us through suffering. It’s a different kind of blessing—one that shapes our character, teaches us more about who God is, helps us see his value, and helps us to reveal his value and character to others.

One of my pet peeves is when someone says God is “faithful” when he gives them a gift he never promised to give anyone. Comfort, spouses, good jobs, etc. are not a result of God’s faithfulness, as if he owed them to us! According to Romans 8:28–29, God is faithfully working everything together for the good of making us like Christ, not for making us comfortable or giving us any of those specific things. Any gift we receive is a result of his mercy and grace, not his faithfulness.

Ultimately, we need to keep God’s two greatest goals in mind—our good (i.e., making us like Christ) and his glory—and evaluate everything we go through, including big and little answered prayers, in light of those goals. If we are suffering, we trust that God is working to accomplish those two things through our suffering. We don’t look with envy on those who are receiving gracious, undeserved joys, but instead we rejoice with those who rejoice. If we receive an undeserved joy, we humbly thank God for his graciousness, enjoy his gift, and pray for those who are suffering, weeping with those who weep.

God is glorified in both prosperity and poverty, and according to Paul in Philippians 4:10–13, the secret to living well in both situations is to trust that God will be faithful to give us what we need to become more like Christ and glorify God in any and every situation. Sometimes that even involves our death, as Paul acknowledges when he prays in Philippians 1:18–20 that “Christ will even now, as always, be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death.”

Why do some end up exalting Christ by life and some by death? God is revealing many different aspects of himself as he accomplishes his plans through us, and we each receive our own path with our own part to play in his story. This doesn’t, however, mean that God favors those who suffer less. In fact, we may find that those who bear the greatest burdens for the Lord now are precisely those who will know him best and love him most in the end.

Don’t Interpret from the Trench

Greg Cash — Tue, 20 Jan 2026 11:00:00 GMT

“So the Philistines fought and Israel was defeated…. And the ark of God was taken; and the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, died.”
1 Samuel 4:10–11

The Ark was not stolen. It was sent.

Those eight words overturn the way we remember this moment in Israel’s history. The battle in 1 Samuel 4 does not look like God’s plan unfolding. It looks more like collapse.

Israel is crushed on the battlefield. Thirty thousand bodies sprawled in the dirt. The priests are dead, their blood soaking into the same ground where they carried the ark that morning. The camp is shattered. Men are running, screaming, stumbling over their own wounded as the Philistines sweep through like a wildfire.

And then, just when they think the nightmare could not get worse, the unthinkable happens. The Philistines seize the ark of the covenant—God’s throne, the place where his presence dwells among his people—and hoist it onto their shoulders like war plunder. They parade it through the carnage, roaring in savage triumph, treating the holiest object in Israel like a common trophy.

Imagine you’re standing in that field. Your hands won’t stop shaking. Your boots slip in blood-soaked mud. Your lungs burn from panic as men you grew up with fall beside you. You hear neighbors screaming, dying slow deaths in the dirt. The priests who led you in worship last Sabbath—they’re face-down in the carnage now. What do you see?

Defeat. Collapse. The end of Israel’s story.

That’s all you see—events spiraling out of control, prayers going unanswered, God’s people crushed while God’s enemies celebrate. The ground is still shaking beneath you. Your vision narrows to what’s directly in front of you. The wider strategy is invisible. The commander’s plan is out of reach. All you have is confusion, loss, that sickening sense that something has gone terribly wrong.

That’s the trench.

What You See from the Trench

The trench is not just a position on the battlefield, but a way of seeing—a vantage point that feels clear but is actually the most limited perspective possible. And it’s where many Christians live today. Close to the ground. Eyes fixed on the immediate. Interpreting Scripture through the narrow window of what’s directly in front of them, never stepping back far enough to see the larger narrative those moments belong to. From the trench, every passage stands alone, every event feels disconnected, and life itself begins to feel like fragments rather than a single unfolding plan.

Picture a soldier in the trench, his face buried in the mud, trying to stay small while the world explodes around him. Smoke from the battle burns his throat. His entire world has shrunk to inches—mud, rocks, the trench wall pressed against his face. That’s all he can see. Every sound threatens him, and every movement seems to push him back instead of forward. From where he’s crouched, the battle looks hopeless.

But what he cannot see is the ridge where his commanders watch the entire field. He cannot see the war room where the generals have already planned for this exact moment, where his chaos on the ground is one deliberate piece of a larger operation. He sees collapse. They see strategy. And without the war room of Scripture, we see no more than he does.

What God Sees from the War Room

Christian, lift up your eyes. Step out of the trench and climb to the ridge. Look again. From the ridge, what looked like chaos begins to take shape. What felt random begins to form a pattern. Now climb higher still, into the war room of Scripture itself, where the entire battlefield of history spreads out before you under the sovereign hand of God. There you see a plan so precise, so wise, so intentional that even the darkest chapters reveal sovereign design.

From the war room of Scripture, the full story comes into view. God created his image-bearers to live with him, to walk in his presence, to enjoy the nearness of the King in the garden he planted for them. But in Genesis 3, humanity rose in mutiny against their King, and the fellowship they were created for shattered under the weight of their rebellion. The result was exile. They were driven from the garden, removed from God’s presence, because a holy God cannot dwell in intimate fellowship with sin. That moment becomes the template. Exile is the consequence of rebellion. Distance from God is the judgment for covenant breaking. And that judgment reaches its final, most fearful expression in Hell, where separation from God’s presence is complete, conscious, and eternal.

When God later formed the nation Israel as his people, entering into covenant with them, he made the pattern of exile unmistakably clear. The land was not only a gift, but a new Eden—a place where God would dwell among his people once again, where his presence would rest in the midst of the camp and his blessings flow through their obedience. The terms were explicit. Through Moses, God declared that if they turned from him, if they treated his presence lightly, if they broke the bond he established, they would be expelled from the land just as Adam and Eve had been cast out of the garden. Exile was the covenant’s stated consequence, spelled out in Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28.

But in 1 Samuel 4, something unexpected happens. Israel violates the covenant, treating the ark of God like a lucky charm in battle, but they are not the ones driven out. The people who deserve exile remain in the land. Instead, the ark goes in their place. God himself steps into the judgment they earned and enters the exile they should have faced, carrying the covenant curse into enemy territory. And there, in the land of Israel’s enemies, the Warrior-King goes on the warpath. He unleashes his power and, on his own, crushes the enemy his people could not defeat. Dagon is thrown down. The Philistines are undone. Judgment tears through their strongholds. Then God returns in triumph, carrying his presence back to Israel and restoring the fellowship their sin had shattered.

This is not just a strange, disconnected episode in Israel’s history. From the trench, 1 Samuel 4 looks like nothing more than the ark being stolen and later returned. But from the war room of Scripture, you see substitution.

God himself provides a representative who steps into the place of his people to bear the covenant judgment required to bring the guilty back into fellowship. This is the pattern that begins in Eden, echoes through Israel, and reaches its fullness at the cross—where the true and greater Substitute enters the exile of death, destroys the enemies no human could conquer, and returns in resurrection victory to bring his people home to God forever. Hallelujah!

From the trench, the captured ark is tragedy—it exposes Israel’s guilt and looks like total collapse. But step into the war room, and the picture shifts. You see the truth that the ark enters enemy hands because God sends it there. What appears to be defeat becomes the unfolding story of penal substitutionary atonement. God bearing the curse. The Substitute entering the exile his people deserved. The enemy crushed without Israel lifting a sword.

God was not losing ground. He was advancing his kingdom.

Where Are You Reading From?

So, do not stay in the trench. Do not read Scripture—or your own life—from the narrow ground of the moment. The trench will try to convince you that defeat is imminent, that the story is slipping, that the battle has turned against you. It shows you noise, confusion, setbacks, and losses but rarely the sovereign design moving beneath them. The trench gives you inches when you need miles.

Christian, lift up your eyes. Read the Bible the way it was written. Read it through the whole story that begins in Eden and moves through covenant after covenant until it reaches its fulfillment in Jesus. From that vantage point, scattered pieces hold their place. Patterns emerge. Purpose takes shape. You discover that God has never taken a single step in retreat. What appears like defeat from the trench is the precision of kingdom advance.

The ark entering Philistine hands was tragedy, but it was a tragedy God wrote into the story to reveal the pattern of substitution that would reach its fullness at the cross. What looked like loss was actually the shape of victory.

The same is true for your life.

What feels like setback may be the kingdom advance you cannot yet see. What feels like silence may be God positioning pieces on the board. What feels like defeat may be the opening movement of a victory already secured in the war room of eternity.

So, get out of the trench. Climb to the ridge. Step into the war room of Scripture, where the entire battlefield of history spreads before you under the sovereign hand of God. There you will see what has always been true: God has never been caught off guard, never been outmaneuvered, never surrendered an inch of his kingdom. There you will find the Author of the story reigning on his throne—writing every chapter, orchestrating every scene, moving every piece toward the day when Christ returns to make all things new.

Read your Bible from the war room. Read your life from the war room.

And when the ground shakes beneath you, when chaos fills your vision, when you’re tempted to believe the trench—remember 1 Samuel 4. Remember that what looks like the ark being stolen is actually God bearing the curse, crushing the enemy, and bringing his people home.

The war room reveals what the trench can never see: Your King is winning. He has always been winning. And he will not stop until every enemy is under his feet and every one of his children is safe in his presence forever.

Don’t Try to Make Christianity Look Good

Amy K. Hall — Tue, 13 Jan 2026 11:00:00 GMT

I’m going to ask you a question, and I want you to think about it carefully: Do you try to make Christianity look good? By this, I don’t mean, Do you try to represent Christ well by demonstrating his character in your conversations about him? or, Do you try to correct misunderstandings about the Bible that people use to impugn God’s good character? or even, Do you try to convince people that Christianity is good?

No. I mean, Do you carefully present a kind of truncated Christianity that you think people will like? Take a moment to evaluate yourself. Do you avoid certain truths our culture dislikes because you think that will attract people to Jesus?

We probably all do this to some extent, I’m sorry to say, but it’s a mistake. It’s a mistake because it misses the point of our telling people about Jesus in the first place. The point isn’t to gain people for our tribe. The point is to bring glory to God by “proclaiming his excellencies” to others so that they see him for who he is, and so that those who are enabled to see his beauty will come to him.

Jesus’ Words Cost Him Followers

Truth matters, not numbers. Jesus himself is our model in this. He certainly didn’t hold back, even when it cost him followers. Think about when he announces, “I am the living bread that came down out of heaven; if anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread also which I will give for the life of the world is My flesh” (John 6:51).

When this statement causes a ruckus, Jesus doesn’t back away from it. Instead, he continues to explain, and the truth just gets more controversial:

Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in yourselves. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For My flesh is true food, and My blood is true drink. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him. As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who eats Me, he also will live because of Me. This is the bread which came down out of heaven; not as the fathers ate and died; he who eats this bread will live forever. (John 6:53–58)

At this point, even his disciples grumble against this, saying, “This is a difficult statement; who can listen to it?” (v. 60). And what is the end result of Jesus’ words? “As a result of this many of His disciples withdrew and were not walking with Him anymore” (v. 66).

All That the Father Gives Him Will Come to Him

Jesus didn’t shy away from the truth, even though it cost him followers, because he knew, “All that the Father gives Me will come to Me” (v. 37). As he reiterates in verse 65 as he’s being rejected, “For this reason I have said to you, that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted him from the Father.”

In other words, Jesus knew that those being called by the Father would not be repelled by his speaking the truth—rather, they would be drawn and would come. He knew he didn’t need to carefully curate his image in order to gain followers. Instead, he trusted in the Father’s power to draw his followers, and he simply spoke the truth that gives life to the world, leaving the numbers to God.

Trust in the God who can raise even the most unlikely people from spiritual death, and speak the truth.

Is the Quran’s Injil the Same as the New Testament Gospels?

Alan Shlemon — Tue, 06 Jan 2026 11:00:00 GMT

The most common Muslim objection to a Christian’s witnessing effort is almost always the same: The Bible is corrupted. That’s a problem. After all, the true identity of Jesus and his message of reconciliation are found in the New Testament Gospels. Muslims, however, reject that source of authority. If you don’t address the claim of corruption, you’ll have a hard time convincing a Muslim to believe Jesus’ message.

One of the tactics to answer this objection is to show that the Quran—the Muslim’s highest authority—teaches that the Injil (the Arabic word for “Gospel”) is the uncorrupted word of Allah. In fact, there are over a dozen verses that help establish this point. Since Muslims must affirm whatever the Quran affirms, they have no choice but to accept the Quran’s teaching that the Injil is uncorrupted.

In response, some Muslims claim that the Quran’s reference to the Injil is not to the four Gospels of the New Testament but rather to a revelation given to Jesus by an angel in the first century. That revelation, they believe, is the uncorrupted document the Quran refers to that has since been lost. Even though the four New Testament Gospels might contain some truth from the lost Injil, Muslims claim that most of what we read in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John has been distorted.

If the Muslim is correct that the Injil has been lost, then our tactic of showing that the Quran affirms the reliability of the Injil becomes irrelevant. But their claim fails for three reasons.

First, we have no historical evidence that Jesus ever received or produced any book. This is simply a claim made by only one group of people: Muslims. Claims, however, are not arguments. If you want to turn a claim into a bona fide argument, then you must produce evidence to back up that claim. Typically, Muslims don’t offer evidence that Jesus was given a book by Allah other than to point to their interpretation of the Quran. Therefore, the claim that Jesus was given a book (the Injil that has since been lost) is just that—a claim and not an argument. In fact, not only is there no historical evidence, but even the Muslim’s most authoritative source suggests that the Injil still existed in the seventh century.

Second, the Quran affirms the Injil existed in the seventh century. It turns out that there are multiple passages in the Quran that teach the Injil was a document available in Mohammed’s day (seventh century) and, therefore, not lost like Muslims claim. For example, surah 4:47 tells Christians, “O you who were given the Scripture, believe in what We have sent down [to Prophet Muḥammad], confirming that which is with you….” Notice the Quran presumes that the Scriptures given to Christians are “with you,” referring to the Injil—or “Gospel”—being available to them.

Another example is surah 7:157, which says, “Those who follow the messenger, the Prophet who can neither read nor write, whom they will find described in the Torah and the Gospel (which are) with them.” Again, the Quran affirms that the Injil in the seventh century was “with them” and, therefore, not lost.

One additional example from surah 10:94 says, “So if you are in doubt, [O Muḥammad], about that which We have revealed to you, then ask those who have been reading the Scripture before you.” In this startling verse, Muslims are told to ask Christians if they have doubts about the revelation of the Quran. They are to ask Christians who have been “reading the Scripture”—a reference to the Injil. Notice, again, the Quran indicates the Injil was a document that existed in the seventh century.

These are among many other verses that demonstrate the Quran presumes the Injil was a document available to Christians during the time the Quran was created.

Third, we know that Christians were reading the four New Testament Gospels in the seventh century. Since the second century, the four Gospels were treated as a single unit. They existed in numerous copies of the Bible. For example, Codex Sinaiticus (fourth century), Codex Vaticanus (fourth century), Codex Alexandrinus (fifth century), and the Peshitta (fifth century) are copies of the Bible that existed at the time the Quran was written and that contain the four New Testament Gospels. If you asked seventh-century Christians to read the gospel, they would turn to the first four books of the New Testament: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. It’s incredulous to think they would reply with, “We can’t read the gospel because it’s been lost for 600 years.” Therefore, when the Quran refers to the Injil or “Gospel,” it must be referring to the four New Testament Gospels. That’s the only unit of text accepted by Christians at the time the Quran was written.

All the evidence on this question points to the “Gospel” being understood to be the four Gospels that existed during the time the Quran was written. The only people to deny this are Muslims who merely assert that the Injil referred to in the Quran was a book that Jesus possessed (and that has since been lost). Not only is this unsupported by the historical record, but this Muslim claim contradicts the Quran if true. Therefore, since the Quran affirms that the Injil (that is, the four Gospels) is uncorrupted, Muslims should also affirm that the four Gospels are uncorrupted.

Rapid Fire – Part 3

Greg Koukl — Thu, 01 Jan 2026 09:00:00 GMT

In our last two issues of Solid Ground, instead of focusing on one large topic, I looked at a number of smaller ones, offering you short vignettes providing insight on common challenges you might face as a Christian ambassador. I continue that pattern here with more short treatments on a variety of topics.

“How can God hear everyone’s prayers all at once?”

Easy. God doesn’t have to “listen” to requests the way we do.

We pay careful attention to the details of a person’s appeal so we can understand it accurately and not miss something significant. Then we decide how we’re going to respond.

God doesn’t need to listen in that way, though, since when we pray to God he never learns anything he didn’t already know before we asked. Put another way, there never was a time when God didn’t know what we were going to pray. Since God is omniscient—he’s always known all things—he’s always known what we would ask for, and he’s always known how he would respond.

That insight raises another question, of course. If God already knew what we were going to pray before we asked, then what’s the point of asking in the first place? Philosophers describe it this way: Even though God’s knowledge is temporally prior to our prayers, our prayers are logically prior to his knowledge and, thus, his response.

Simply put, even though God’s knowledge of our prayer comes before the prayer is prayed (temporally prior), his knowledge in the past is dependent upon what we choose to ask in the present. If we didn’t pray now, there wouldn’t be anything for God to have known in eternity past to respond to in the present moment. In other words, our prayers make a difference.

Plus, God’s omniscience provides a hidden benefit. Since he knows what we’ll ask before we ask it, he can put his answer into motion, when necessary, even before we pray. Imagine a poor family asking God to provide food at dinnertime. At the close of their prayer, they hear a knock on the door and discover a bag of groceries delivered by an anonymous donor waiting for them on the porch. Clearly, the food had to be on its way before the request was offered. God acted in advance because he knew the petition was going to be made.

“Euthanasia is good since it puts suffering people out of their misery.”

Once, I participated in a debate on California’s Initiative 161 legalizing physician-assisted suicide. My opponents charged that I was forcing my religious views on others. They didn’t realize that their position entailed religious assumptions of its own.

When people claim that suicide will end a person’s suffering, they’re assuming a religious view about the nature of life after death. They’re counting on the fact that there’s no conscious existence beyond the grave, or that what greets those who pass on will be a pleasant improvement on the misery of their lives on earth.

If their presumption about the afterlife is wrong, though, and Hell awaits those who deserve it, then for some people, euthanasia will not end their misery but compound it. The person suffering here on earth is not transported from a place of anguish to a place of peace and rest but rather to a place of significantly greater suffering in Hell.

It is theoretically possible, then, that so-called “mercy” killing would actually be cruel, not merciful. By living longer on this earth, a sick person who is not euthanized will either delay more intense suffering that follows or—if they receive God’s mercy in the interim—escape it altogether. Consequently, accelerating death through doctor-assisted suicide would be an act of cruelty, and delaying death an act of kindness. Everything depends on which religious view is correct.

Ultimately, then, it’s impossible to avoid the intrusion of spiritual convictions on either side of this issue. It’s not a matter of one party forcing its religious views on another. It’s a matter of two religious views competing with each other.

“We can’t trust our New Testament reconstruction from ancient manuscripts since they have more variations in the copies than there are words in the original.”

This challenge is a fair one since the claim is true, as far as it goes. There are roughly 138,000 words in the New Testament, yet the surviving handwritten copies reveal an estimated 750,000 disagreements in the wording, though that number is probably much larger.[1] In fact, New Testament critic Bart Ehrman points out that the manuscripts “differ from one another in so many places that we don’t even know how many differences there are.”[2]

Though Bible critics like Ehrman are correct on this point, the fact is misleading since the number of variants itself—any deviation from the standard text that’s found in the existing copies[3]—is ultimately irrelevant to our ability to recapture the original wording of the New Testament. Here’s why.

For one, any difference, no matter how slight or irrelevant, is added to the total count. Yet the vast majority of the total differences between the texts is completely inconsequential—spelling differences,[4] insignificant variations of word order (e.g., “Christ Jesus” vs. “Jesus Christ”), obvious omissions, use of synonyms, clear transpositions of words, nonsense readings, and “singular readings,”[5] among others. None of these trivial differences affect accurate translation in any way and thus have no bearing on our ability to reconstruct the original.

Second, there’s a reason we have lots of variants: We have lots of manuscripts. This is a strength, not a weakness, since there is safety in numbers. Thousands of extant New Testament manuscripts amounting to millions of pages of ancient text provide the best opportunity for comparison and correction, even though the number of variants increases with each new fragment discovered.

Third, the mere comparison of original words to manuscript variants, even though accurate, is profoundly misleading. Note Hixon and Gurry:

The problem is that the comparison itself is meaningless. It makes a little sense to compare the number of supposed variants in all our Greek manuscripts to the number of words in only one manuscript or printed edition. [Emphasis in the original.][6]

It would make more sense to compare the total number of variants to the total number of words in the total number of manuscripts. That exercise, however, would not serve the critics’ interests since the statistic, though accurate, would be completely inconsequential.

So, the number of differences itself is irrelevant. A closer examination of the nature of the variants is what matters, not the raw number. When that work is done by the legion of textual specialists deciphering the variants, even critics like Bart Ehrman have been able to reconstruct the New Testament with an unprecedented degree of virtually word-for-word accuracy.

“Why does God make death the deadline for salvation? It seems arbitrary and even unfair to those who may die on their way to a church service where they intended to become a Christian.”

I’m including this rather unusual question because it offers a handful of different elements that are important to consider when responding to challenges.

The first concern above has to do with the apparent arbitrary nature of God’s salvation “cutoff” point. The author of Hebrews writes, “It is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment” (Heb. 9:27). But why then? Why not sometime later? Why any cutoff point at all? It makes little sense to some critics.

The second concern is more weighty. What if someone gets killed on his way to church where he intended to respond to an altar call to become a Christian? Since death is the point of no return for salvation, then a circumstance this person had no control over deprived him of eternal life. Worse, what if murder was the cause of the death that interrupted the trip? Wouldn’t it be odd if a felon’s crime were the reason his victim was damned to Hell forever?

Implicit in this challenge is a subtle insinuation. Christianity is just too strange, bizarre, or unfair to be taken seriously.

Is Christianity significantly undermined by an inability to divine God’s reasons for a salvation cutoff point? The answer is no for a number of reasons—the death-on-the-way-to-the-altar-call concern notwithstanding.

First, I have no reason to think God is arbitrary about anything. Why assume he’s arbitrary just because in some cases we don’t know why he does what he does? It suggests a defect in the Divine when there’s no good reason to think so.

I’ve often pointed out that questions starting with the phrases like “Why did God…” or “Why didn’t God…” are frequently impossible to answer for good reason: God hasn’t told us. If God is mute on some issues, then we’re simply in the dark. Unless God gives us his reasons, we can speculate all we want. Some of those speculations may have merit, but they will have no authority. Speculations remain speculative.

Second, what if I simply responded, “I don’t know why God set death as the deadline”? What harm would befall the case for Christianity then? None, as far as I can tell. All the evidence in favor of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection would still be intact as well as all the various lines of evidence for God’s existence.

Here’s the basic principle: Our inability to answer hypothetical questions about God’s intentions has no bearing on the truth of the Christian worldview. Full stop. Lack of concrete answers to these kinds of queries signifies nothing.

Third, it’s not clear that any answer to the first question would satisfy a critic. If God had decided on a different “point of no return” for salvation, would that make any difference to the challenger? No matter where God drew the line, it seems, the same question could always be raised, so suggesting alternate cutoff criteria gets you nowhere.

Fourth, some speculations may be useful—though not definitive—if they suggest reasonable possibilities. For example, it makes sense to me that death ends any opportunity for forgiveness because when a person dies, it ends the lifetime of sin for which he will be judged. A criminal’s life of crime comes to an end when he’s caught. If he had eluded capture, he might have changed course and possibly eluded justice as well. When he’s brought before the judge, though, it’s too late. His career of crime is over and “after this comes judgment.” Nothing odd about that.

What about the darker concern, though, that circumstances outside the control of a would-be penitent might seal his fate forever? My answer is twofold.

First—in my view at least—anyone planning to become a Christian at the next church altar call is probably already a believer simply waiting for an opportunity to formalize his faith publicly. Interrupting his trip to church changes nothing about his eternal destiny.

Second, any critique of Christianity must take the whole of Christian doctrine into account, or the critic will be tilting at windmills.[7] Human freedom has its limits, otherwise God would not be God—not the Christian God, at least, and that’s the God in question. Even a murderer’s free will doesn’t ultimately determine the course of the universe. God has his purposes, too, and he accomplishes them in spite of the sinful choices of evil people. Any hypothetical circumstance that presumes human actions alone decisively determine human destiny ignores a cardinal principle of the Christian creed: God is sovereign.

When all is said and done, keep in mind that there are imponderables in every worldview. We shouldn’t be surprised if some turn up in ours.

“What’s a quick biblical argument to show that Jesus is the same as the God of the Old Testament?”

Suppose two Jehovah’s Witnesses knock on your door, and you invite them in for a chat. What passages can you show them, even in their own New World Translation (NWT), that will challenge their conviction that Jesus is not the God of the Hebrew Scriptures?

Here’s an approach that might get them thinking—which is usually the best you can hope for in an initial conversation with anyone, especially a Jehovah’s Witness. Use Old Testament texts that identify unique characteristics of Jehovah God, then turn to the New Testament and show them that the very same characteristics are applied to Jesus by his own disciples.

For example, in the NWT, Isaiah 45:23 says, “By myself I have sworn; the word has gone out of my mouth in righteousness, and it will not return: To me every knee will bend, every tongue will swear loyalty.” Yet in Philippians 2:9–11, Paul cites the very same passage and says:

For this very reason, God exalted him to a superior position and kindly gave him the name that is above every other name, so that in the name of Jesus every knee should bend—of those in heaven and those on earth and those under the ground—and every tongue should openly acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.

The scriptural parallels abound. Both Jehovah in the Old Testament and Jesus in the New Testament are called the Creator (Gen. 1:1; cf. John 1:3; Heb. 1:8a, 10), the Light (Ps. 27:1; cf. John 8:12), the Good Shepherd (Ps. 23:1; cf. John 10:11), the only Rock (Isa. 44:8; cf. 1 Cor. 10:4), the Judge of all the earth (Gen. 18:25; cf. 2 Tim. 4:1; Acts 17:31), the first and the last (Isa. 44:6; cf. Rev 1:17–18), and the Savior (Isa. 43:11; cf. Luke 2:11; John 4:42; Acts 4:12; Titus 2:13; 2 Pet. 1:1).

Conclusion? Jesus is the Creator of all things, the Light of the world, the Good Shepherd, the only Rock, the Judge of all the earth, the first and the last, and the world’s only Savior—the same as Jehovah in the Old Testament.

“People of other faiths are just as confident they’re right about their religious views as the Christian is of his. Obviously, then, culture is the biggest influence on a person’s beliefs.”

American atheist Michael Shermer raised a version of this issue with me in a three-hour national radio debate I had with him a number of years ago.

Of course, Shermer is right, as far as it goes. Everyone who believes anything is convinced his views are true, otherwise he wouldn’t believe them. Multitudes have what might be called “psychological confidence” in their own beliefs, a confidence which, in most cases, is a result of cultural influences in their lives. No argument there.

The problem with this observation is that it doesn’t take us very far. This challenge is another one where a legitimate response could be, “You’re probably right. So what?” Most people feel they are right in their views, true enough—some even invincibly so. Obviously, though, everyone can’t be correct when their views conflict with others’ views. Some may be right, but that means the others are mistaken. Now what?

Consider two men, one a pediatrician in New York and another an indigenous tribesman deep in the Amazon jungle. Each attributes disease to different causes. The pediatrician faults germs; the tribesman faults spirits. The doctor invokes medicine for healing; the tribesman invokes magic. Each is fully convinced of his view precisely because this is what his culture has taught him to believe.

Here is my question: Which one is correct, the doctor or the tribesman?

You will never know the answer to that question by weighing relative amounts of psychological confidence, or by reflecting on the influence of the culture each was raised in, or by pointing to the emotional influences that formed their beliefs.

The psychological, cultural, or emotional reasons people believe anything may tell you about their psychology, or their culture, or their emotional states. They will tell you nothing, though, about whether germs or demons cause disease. They will also tell you nothing about whether Christianity—or any other religion, for that matter—is true or false. To get to the answer to those questions, you have to look elsewhere.

Critics raising this issue have their cart before their horse. They think they can discredit a religious view by citing a host of cultural or psychological influences that shaped the belief. However, they must first discredit the views on their individual merits before it becomes meaningful to ask why anyone would believe something the critic may consider foolish.

In order to get to the truth of anything, including religion, they’re going to have to look at the reasons supporting the view itself. To quote C.S. Lewis, “You can only find out the rights and wrongs by reasoning—never by being rude about your opponent’s psychology.”[8] And, I might add, never by making observations about emotional confidence or the influence of one’s culture on his religious convictions.

Examining the motives (or cultural or historical influences) of one’s view may tell you interesting things about psychology or about history, but it can never tell you anything about the legitimacy of the view itself.

To answer those questions, one needs more than internal psychological confidence. He needs external evidence. That’s why careful Christians don’t just have “faith.” They have convictions anchored to objective evidence because they know the dangers of putting too much stock in their subjective psychological confidence.

In our next Solid Ground, I’ll respond to another batch of “rapid-fire” challenges.

[1] Elijah Hixon and Peter J. Gurry, Myths and Mistakes in New Testament Textual Criticism (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2019), 8–9.

[2] Bart Ehrman, Misquoting Jesus—The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why, first paperback edition (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2007), 10.

[3] To be more precise, according to manuscript expert Daniel Wallace, “A textual variant is any place among the MSS [manuscripts] in which there is variation in wording, including word order, omission or edition of words, even spelling differences. The most trivial changes count, and even when all the manuscripts except one say one thing, that lone MS’s reading counts as a textual variant” (Emphasis in the original.), Daniel B. Wallace, Ed., Revisiting the Corruption of the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications, 2011), 26.

[4] There were no universally agreed upon spelling conventions in ancient times.

[5] A singular reading is a variant found in only one Greek manuscript and is therefore not considered authentic, obviously.

[6] Hixon and Gurry, Myths and Mistakes, 10.

[7] Failure to do this is called a “straw man” fallacy.

[8] Clive Staples Lewis, God in the Dock (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1970), 274.

The Top Ten Posts of 2025

Amy K. Hall — Wed, 31 Dec 2025 09:14:00 GMT

It’s the end of 2025, and as always, I’ve compiled a list of the ten posts of the year that had the most views. This year, the post in the number one spot had nearly twice as many views as all the other nine combined!

Interestingly, though I don’t include posts written in previous years in these lists, as I reviewed the stats for all posts, I found that the most-viewed articles were dominated by posts on suffering this year—a huge uptick from last year and a trend worth noting.

Note also that the list below doesn’t include issues of Solid Ground, so be sure to check out “When God Speaks” and “What Is a Man? What Is a Woman?”—both of which were quite popular this year.

Now, I give you…the top ten posts of 2025!

Horror Movies and Evil: What They Get Right (and Wrong) – “At its best, horror exposes our culture’s struggle with the problem of evil, though its answers are often misguided, incomplete, or just plain wrong. So, why does horror appeal to so many?”

Can Same-Sex Couples Stay the Night?– “When you have friends and family who identify as gay or lesbian, sometimes you find yourself in a dilemma. If a homosexual couple asks to spend the night, do you allow them? You want to be kind and welcoming, but your conscience is telling you that something is amiss by allowing them to sleep together in one of your bedrooms. What should you do?”

Only One Question Solves the Mystery of the Sin of Sodom – “What was the sin of Sodom? Pro-gay theology advocates deny homosexuality was involved. Instead, they point to other offenses like gang rape, inhospitality, sex with angels, and other sins…. There’s only one question that resolves this mystery: What sin explains all the biblical data? In other words, let’s first read the relevant passages and then ask what sin is best characterized by the verses.”

How Did Satan Sin in Heaven If You Can’t Sin in Heaven? – “If Heaven is God’s perfect and holy dwelling place, how could sin ever show up there? It seems to challenge the very nature of Heaven and the rule of God. It’s a good question, and Scripture offers a solid answer.”

Three Key Principles of Biblical Interpretation – “There’s one thing you can do as a Christian that’s more important than anything else. Study the Bible. But sometimes it can feel overwhelming. With so many different authors, genres, and cultural contexts, how can we be sure we’re interpreting it correctly?”

Andy Stanley’s Church Doubles Down on Transgender Ideology – “It appears Stanley’s church has doubled down on accepting transgender ideology. A leaked video from North Point surfaced about a month ago showing Britt Kitchen, their middle school ministries director, explaining how they minister to a child who identifies as transgender…. Based on this video, there are at least three problems with North Point’s approach.”

Three Telltale Signs of “Christianity” Gone South – “If you want to quickly spot any form of ‘Christianity’ gone south, watch for three specific telltale signs—a hat-trick of errors that, in whole or in part, characterize virtually every single Christian-sounding group that is off the reservation. When you encounter a group you suspect may be theologically questionable, find out their answers to this trio of key questions.”

The Genesis of Transgenderism – “Today, men who say they’re women are affirmed. Girls who say they’re boys are declared ‘brave.’ There’s even a global event—International Transgender Day of Visibility—every March 31 to celebrate transgender and non-binary people. What led people in our society to shift how they think about those who identify as transgender?”

The Destructive Power of Porn (and How to Break Free) – “We live in a world where pornography is just a click away, and many think it’s harmless. Some say it’s part of growing up. Others argue it’s natural, even healthy. But here’s the truth: Porn distorts your mind, cheapens intimacy, and draws you away from God’s design for love and relationships. In short, pornography destroys, and it does so in multiple ways.”

Jesus Did Condemn Homosexuality – “You’ve heard it said, ‘Jesus never said anything about homosexuality.’ But I tell you, he did. In fact, Jesus condemned it more than once…. Where is his teaching found?”

The Other Side of 400 Years of Silence

Katie Hulse — Thu, 18 Dec 2025 11:00:00 GMT

Turn the page from the end of the Old Testament to the beginning of the New Testament, and you cross a span of 400 years. Four hundred years—from the last words of the prophet Malachi to the first proclamation of the angel Gabriel. Known as the intertestamental period, this is also referred to as the “400 years of silence.” No word from God is heard through his prophets or his angels.

But that doesn’t mean God was not working to fulfill his purposes (e.g., 2 Pet. 3:8–9). When the fullness of time comes, God speaks again (Gal. 4:4–6). This time, it’s to announce to the world that his Son will be coming into the world. The promise of a Savior, hinted at just after the fall in the very first book of the Bible (Gen. 3:15), would soon be fulfilled.

It begins with the angel Gabriel foretelling the birth of John the Baptist. He says to a Jewish priest named Zacharias,

Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you will give him the name John. You will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth. For he will be great in the sight of the Lord…and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit while yet in his mother’s womb. And he will turn many of the sons of Israel back to the Lord their God. It is he who will go as a forerunner before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah…so as to make ready a people prepared for the Lord. (Luke 1:13–17)

John would be a prophet preparing the people for the coming of the Lord, fulfilling the words spoken 400 years earlier by the last Old Testament prophet: “Behold, I send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way before you” (Matt. 11:9–15; cf. Mal. 3:1).

Soon after, the angel Gabriel appears to a Jewish girl named Mary who is engaged to be married. He tells her,

Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name Him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David; and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom will have no end…. The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; and for that reason the holy Child shall be called the Son of God. (Luke 1:31–35)

God, who spoke long ago by the prophets, would now speak through his very own Son. The world would witness the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his nature (Heb. 1:1–3).

Just think about that for a moment. God himself would be made flesh (John 1:14). God himself would dwell with us. God, the Creator of all things, would take on human form, becoming like us and entering into our world (John 1:17).

This truly is good news. And yet, how can we be sure this is true? How can we know that Jesus is indeed the promised Messiah, that he is God in human flesh?

To begin with, Jesus’ historical existence is virtually uncontested. Even extrabiblical sources like Cornelius Tacitus’ Annals and Flavius Josephus’ The Antiquities of the Jews confirm the historical existence of Jesus of Nazareth. And Jesus’ impact far surpasses the impact of any other individual on the world throughout all of history. We’re reminded of this every time we simply look at a calendar.

Jesus was no ordinary man. And he was not merely a man, though he was that too. As scholars Robert Bowman and J. Ed Komoszewski explain, Jesus shares some of the unique qualities that belong to God alone.

For example, Jesus accepted the honors due to God. He willingly received worship (John 20:28; Matt. 28:17; Matt. 2:11; 14:33; 28:9, 17) while affirming that only God is worthy to receive worship (Matt. 4:10). He said people should “honor the Son even as they honor the Father” (John 5:23).

Jesus also shares God’s attributes. He is eternal and uncreated (John 1:3; John 8:58; Col. 1:16; Rev. 22:13), immutable (Heb. 1:10–12; 13:8), all-powerful (Matt. 28:18; Mark 4:35–41; John 11:38–44), and all-knowing (Mark 2:6–8; John 4:16–18).

Jesus shares the names of God as well. He has the name which is above every name (Phil. 2:9–11), and he is called Lord (Acts 1:24), God (John 1:1; 20:28; Acts 20:28; Titus 2:13), Savior (Luke 2:11; John 4:42; 2 Pet. 1:11), I Am (John 4:26; 8:58), the Alpha and Omega (Rev. 22:13), and the King of kings and Lord of lords (Rev. 17:14; 19:16).

Even further, Jesus does things only God is able to do. He created the world (John 1:3; Col. 1:16–7), forgives sin (Matt. 9:1–8; Luke 7:47–49), provides salvation (Matt. 1:21; Luke 19:9–10; John 3:17), and judges all humanity (John 5:22–23), to name a few. When Jesus forgives a man’s sin, the religious leaders rightly ask, “Who can forgive sins but God alone?” (Mark 2:7).

Jesus even shares the seat of God’s throne (Rev. 22:1; Matt. 25:31; Mark 14:62). He rules over all things (Matt. 28:18; Luke 10:21–22; John 3:35), and his reign will never end (Luke 1:33; Heb. 1:8; Rev. 11:15).

The religious leaders of Jesus’ day sought to kill him because they understood the implications of his words and actions (John 8:56–59). They knew he was claiming equality with God, that he was claiming divinity for himself.

Jesus truly is Immanuel—God with us (Heb. 1:3; Matt. 1:23). And Jesus came so that we could have abundant life (John 10:10). “In Him was life, and that life was the Light of men” (John 1:4).

The greatest gift the world has ever seen—the gift that gives us life—came on the other side of 400 years of silence.

The Rising Tide of Islam

Alan Shlemon — Wed, 17 Dec 2025 11:00:00 GMT

On September 11, 2001, nineteen Muslims hijacked four airplanes and used them as missiles in a terrorist attack against the United States. They targeted and destroyed the World Trade Center buildings in New York City, killing 2,753 innocent civilians. Now, nearly 25 years later, the same city elected Zohran Mamdani—a Muslim—as its next mayor.

After the 9/11 terrorist attacks, many Americans viewed Muslims as the enemy. Now, New Yorkers have voted for a Muslim to lead their city. Note the vast change in American sentiment about Muslims. The pendulum has swung to the other side.

The election raises a concern for many of us as Americans, but it offers a tremendous opportunity for us as Christians. First, the concern.

It’s not surprising that many Americans are troubled about seeing a Muslim rise to power in a prominent American city to the cheers of Muslims in America and throughout the world. Islam does not separate its religious and political ideology. It’s one and the same. Islamic rulers throughout history have routinely incorporated religious ideology in their jurisdiction. There’s no reason to think they wouldn’t try to do the same in the United States. Even if Mamdani has no stated aspirations to implement religious ideology, it’s likely that other Muslims who rise to power will.

Muslims are candid about their beliefs and their plans. There is no hidden agenda. According to Islamic jurisprudence, they divide the world into two houses: Dar al-Islam and Dar al-Harb. Dar al-Islam is the “house of Islam” or “house of peace.” The lands in these regions have been subjugated to Allah and Islamic authority. Muslims can practice their faith freely, and sharia law (Islamic laws) can prevail. The remainder of the world is Dar al-Harb, or the “house of war.” These are lands not under Muslim rule that need to be subdued.

Historically, Islam has seized non-Muslim lands through jihad—violent conquest. This was especially true in Mohammed’s day and for centuries after his death. But jihad can take another form where Muslims immigrate to a non-Muslim land, grow in population, and then progressively take control through political means. Muammar Gaddafi, former Libyan ruler, echoed this sentiment in 2006 when he said, “There are signs that Allah will grant Islam victory in Europe—without swords, without guns, without conquests. The 50 million Muslims of Europe will turn it into a Muslim continent within a few decades.” Census data today suggests this is what’s happening.

We see changes occurring in the United States as well. The small city of Hamtramck (in Michigan) became the first Muslim-majority US city (now 60%–70% Muslim) over a decade ago. I remember walking through Hamtramck and hearing the Islamic call to prayer blasted by loudspeakers across the city. Dearborn, Michigan is also around 50% Muslim and is home to a thriving Muslim community. The city that elected Mamdani—New York City—contains around 750,000 Muslims (about 9% of the city’s population).

The modern Muslim strategy is to exploit existing constitutional systems to gain power. German scholar and Islamic academic Christine Schirrmacher writes that Islam “exploits democratic mechanisms and freedoms for its own cause in order to conduct what we might call a ‘march through the institutions’ more than to present a direct declaration of war with the aid of armed force.” As Muslims rise to power, we can expect their goal will be to imbed Islamic values into the fabric of our nation over time.

At this point, you might be wondering if I’ve bought into a conspiracy theory or become Islamophobic. On the contrary, I’m offering a sober but alarming assessment precisely because I’ve studied Islam for decades, monitored Muslim activity, and interacted with Muslims. Remember, though, I’ve only spoken so far about Mamdani’s election from the perspective of an American. Christians have dual citizenship. We are citizens of an earthly country, but we are also—and more significantly—citizens of Heaven.

As a Christian, I have a different perspective on Mamdani’s election. God is sovereign, and we have nothing to fear. Jesus promised that the gates of Hell will not prevail against the church (Matt. 16:18).

The rising tide of Islam in America signals an opportunity for the gospel to reach the largest unreached people group on earth: Muslims. According to demographic data, there are approximately two billion Muslims in the world. That means about one in four people on the planet is a Muslim. Approximately 40,000 Muslims die each day and enter eternity without Jesus. With more Muslims coming to our doorstep, we no longer need to cross the ocean to do cross-cultural missions. Sometimes we need only cross the street. But are we taking advantage of this opportunity?

I recently met with the pastoral team of a megachurch near one of the largest Muslim communities in America. I was honestly surprised to hear one pastor confess that though they have 170 ministries, not one is dedicated to reaching their Muslim neighbors. In fact, a large Muslim family was sitting next to us in the restaurant as we were talking. How is it that a megachurch virtually ignores followers of the second-largest world religion who live right in their own neighborhood?

What does the Bible tell us to do about our Muslim friends and neighbors? Scripture provides simple instruction. In 2 Corinthians 5:18–20, the apostle Paul tells us our identity and mission. According to this epistle, Christians are ambassadors for Christ—that’s our identity. Regarding our mission, we are commanded to proclaim the message of reconciliation—that’s the gospel message. Therefore, when it comes to Muslims, as Christ’s ambassadors we’re commanded to share the gospel message with them.

How do we fulfill that identity and mission? Think of how a political ambassador would fulfill his role. Typically, ambassadors learn and engage. First they learn about the country’s people, and then they engage the people. The same principle applies to Christian ambassadors to Muslims: learn and engage. First learn about Islam, then engage the Muslim people.

With the rise of Islam threatening to overthrow Christianity as the largest religion in the world, it’s past time for churches to begin that process. As you know, Stand to Reason has developed excellent resources to help believers learn about Islam and engage Muslims in their communities.

As an American, you may feel apprehensive about Mamdani’s election. As a Christian, though, you see things differently. You have an opportunity to reach Muslims with the gospel of Jesus Christ, a message even the gates of Hell cannot prevail against—no matter who gets elected.

The War Within the Story

Greg Cash — Fri, 14 Nov 2025 11:00:00 GMT

The soldier knelt in the dark, pressed against the curve of the wooden wall. The air was thick, heavy with the sweat of bodies packed together. He could barely breathe. His legs had gone numb hours ago, but still he did not move. Around him, one man shifted, another murmured a prayer, their armor creaking softly beneath the weight of a long war. No one spoke. The weight of waiting pressed on them all, a tension wound so tight it might snap with the smallest sound.

Outside, voices drifted back and forth, muffled through the walls. He couldn’t see faces, only feel the debate in their tones—low murmurs that rose suddenly into laughter, then fell again into shouting. The waiting was torture. Each pause in their speech stretched longer than the last. Were they suspicious? Were they convinced?

His throat burned as a drop of sweat slid down his temple and vanished into the dust at his feet. Then it happened. A sharp crack tore through the chamber above him. The wood shuddered. Every man flinched, hearts pounding in the dark.

A moment later came another sound—the rhythmic scrape of rope against wood, slow at first, then steady. He felt the vibration through his knees. The ropes were tightening.

The whole structure lurched. The men held their breath. It was happening.

The chamber groaned as it tilted, the sound of straining wood filling the dark. He braced his hands against the wall, splinters biting into his palms. The floor shifted beneath him, and his stomach turned with it. Another jolt. Then another. The weight of the structure pressed and swayed, dragging them wherever it pleased.

Light pierced the darkness in thin, trembling lines. Through the cracks came movement, the swell of voices, and the roar of celebration. The ground shook as the city gates were opened. Heat poured through the wooden walls as they were pulled forward. He caught glimpses of faces blurred by motion, saw torches, people cheering what they believed to be a victory. They had crossed the walls. The trap was set, and they were the bait.

Then came stillness as the great doors closed behind them and time began to stretch again. The celebration outside carried deep into the night—singing, dancing, the dull ring of metal and laughter fading into the dark. Inside the hollow walls, the soldiers waited, unmoving, counting breaths. The noise ebbed away until only the faint hum of a sleeping city remained.

The stillness was unbearable.

And then, at last, a whisper cut through the dark.

“Now.”

Outside, the night erupted. What had entered as art would awaken as war.

The Power of Story

That’s the power of story. It can disguise invasion as beauty.

Every true story captivates before it convinces. It doesn’t ask permission; it captures the heart then reshapes the mind. You and I have felt it—the surge of justice when evil falls, the ache when the innocent suffers, the breathless relief when redemption wins the day. None of that is random. Stories rule our emotions because they were designed to. They reach us at the level of our nature—woven into us by the Creator, whose story forms the framework of reality itself.

The world’s storytellers understand this instinctively. The greatest of them use art as a weapon—to heal or to wound, to reveal truth or to conceal it. Story holds its power because it mirrors the architecture of God’s world: setting, conflict, climax, and resolution. His design is pressed into the human soul. Every story we tell is, at its root, an imitation of his story. That’s why we crave resolution—because deep down, we remember the faint echo of a garden where all was right under God’s rule. Our souls bear the imprint of what was lost.

The Trojan Horse of Our Age

Today, the war hasn’t changed—only the weapons have.

Every story is a Trojan horse. Each one hides something inside—ideas, beliefs, desires—cloaked in art and beauty to lower your guard. Some carry truth, others carry lies, but all of them carry something.

The real weapon is its cloakability. Art rarely storms your gates declaring its intent. Instead, it comes dressed in beauty. It invites you to laugh, to cry, to feel, and as your heart opens, something waits. When the gates of your mind open wide and your guard is down, storied warriors emerge—ideas about who you are, what is good, what is evil, what is worth living and dying for.

Most people never notice. They shrug and call it “just a movie” or “just a song,” unaware that art has never been neutral. Every story is an act of war, carrying an army inside. Every story fights for something—either to advance the kingdom of light or to strengthen the shadows that oppose it.

But this isn’t a call to fear stories. It’s a call to see them—to discern what they’re carrying. The answer to counterfeit beauty isn’t withdrawal; it’s restored beauty. If the world sends Trojan horses, then the people of God must send their own—works of art and storytelling so full of truth and glory that they breach the hardest walls of unbelief.

Rise, Christian

That’s the call for those who know the Author of all stories: to be both gatekeepers and ambassadors. Be discerning when the world’s Trojan horses try to enter your imagination, but also send your own out into the world. Carry his story through your words, your work, your worship. Let every act of beauty, courage, and truth become a warrior of grace—a banner of his kingdom raised over a world asleep behind its walls.

In the end, the victory belongs to the Storyteller himself, and every rival story will bow to his. Yet until that day, the war of stories rages on. So rise, Christian. Take up your pen, your brush, your camera, your pulpit, your classroom, your business, your home—whatever ground God has given you—and stand firm. Refuse to be silent. Wield truth with gentleness, but without apology. Fill the world with beauty that will not bend, a beauty that reveals rather than deceives. Live as those who know how the story ends, and fight as those determined to be found faithful when the Author turns the final page.

Let this be your whisper that cuts through the dark.

“Now.”

Why Non-Christians Oppose Transgender Ideology

Alan Shlemon — Tue, 11 Nov 2025 11:00:00 GMT

Some people are confused. They think only Christians are opposed to transgender ideology because of a bigoted, Bible-thumping hatred towards people who identify as transgender. This is false.

Christians do recognize God has created human beings a certain way and people will not thrive if they don’t live according to their created intent. But it’s not only Christians who have grave concerns with transgender ideology. Secular non-Christians oppose it too. While they don’t rely on biblical arguments to make their case against transgender ideology, they present secular arguments against it. Here are five of the reasons why non-Christians oppose transgender ideology.

They Reject the Unscientific Views

First, non-Christians deem transgender ideology unscientific. Secular critics rely mostly on scientific data to deduce what is true. What they’ve discovered is that the vocal minority of people who advance transgender ideology hold unscientific views pertaining to biology.

For example, transgender advocates often reject the sexual binary—the idea that every human being belongs to only one of two possible sexes: male or female. Instead, they claim there can be more than two sexes, an in-between sex, or a spectrum of sexes. But this is unscientific. Non-Christians know there are only two sexes because there are only two kinds of reproductive cells (gametes) that humans can produce. Human bodies are designed to produce either sperm or eggs. There is no other possible gamete—no intermediate combination of sperm and egg (like a “spegg”)—that a human body can produce. If there were a third gamete type, there would be a third sex. But there isn’t. There are, therefore, only two sexes, which is why denying the sex binary is deemed unscientific.

Non-Christians also reject other unscientific concepts related to transgender ideology. For example, they point out that gender identity (one’s psychological self-perception) is neither testable, measurable, nor quantifiable. Gender identity, they say, is pseudoscience. It purports to be scientific, but it’s not.

They Reject the Medical Malpractice

Second, non-Christians oppose transgender ideology because it involves medical malpractice. The most recent guidelines of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH)—Version 8, published in 2022—direct doctors to prescribe a three-stage plan for people who identify as transgender or experience gender dysphoria: social transitioning, hormonal transitioning, and then surgical transitioning. Hormonal transitioning, for example, involves cross-sex hormones, which means administering testosterone to biological women or estrogen to biological men. Studies show this significantly increases the risk of blood clots, cardiovascular disease, cancer, osteoporosis, and a whole host of other harmful effects.

Even worse, pre-pubescent children are sometimes prescribed puberty-blocking hormones to give them more time to decide whether they want to identify as a boy or girl. This treatment program was evaluated by the Cass Review, a 2024 independent report of England’s treatment of gender dysphoria. The report showed there was very little evidence to justify the use of puberty-blocking drugs. Furthermore, the treatment carried significant and irreversible impact on bone density, fertility, sexual function, and neurocognitive development. That’s not surprising given that one of the drugs injected in children’s bodies is Lupron, the same drug used to chemically castrate sex offenders.

WPATH’s third stage, surgical transition, involves the amputation of healthy sex organs or the harvesting of body tissue to create “new” body parts that cosmetically imitate opposite sex organs but don’t fully function. Manipulating or removing non-diseased organs is tantamount to bodily mutilation. That such operations are sometimes performed on minors is even worse. These medical practices do not constitute health care. They are neither healthy nor caring for people struggling with gender dysphoria, which is why many non-Christians condemn these “treatments” as malpractice.

They Reject the Threat to Fairness and Safety in Women’s Sports

Third, according to some non-Christians, transgender ideology threatens both the fairness of women’s sports and the safety of girls and women. Secular critics are aware of the inherent physiological and athletic advantages of biological males in competitive sports. It’s well established that biological sex is the most significant determinant of athletic performance. That’s because male puberty, driven by testosterone, triggers a cascade of physiological changes that increase muscle mass (for example, upper-body mass is 30–40% greater in men), bone size and density, and oxygen-carrying capacity (10–15% more oxygen per unit of blood) and produce a host of other neuromuscular and metabolic advantages. These differences don’t entirely disappear when male-to-female transitioners suppress their testosterone. Going through male puberty masculinizes a body, and many of those advantages remain. Allowing athletic competition between transgender women (who are biological males) and biological women gives the males a significant and unfair advantage in sports. This is to say nothing of the increased injury risk that girls and women face when they compete against men.

Women are victimized not only on the field but also in female spaces like changing rooms and bathrooms. Secular critics of transgender ideology have been fighting against the inclusion of biological men in women-only spaces for years. They recognize it’s wrong to subject women to males disrobing or to allow males to see women disrobe.

They Reject the Medical Exploitation of Vulnerable People

Fourth, secular critics of transgender ideology are concerned that the medical industry is exploiting vulnerable people with “gender medicine.” WPATH’s standards of care direct doctors to encourage “gender confirmation surgery,” a euphemism for unnaturally altering bodies with drugs, hormones, and surgery. Once a patient has undergone surgical “transition,” they become a lifelong user of costly drugs and hormones. An individual who “transitions” at 18 years old will likely spend $31,000 to $300,000 over their lifetime. This is to say nothing of the additional tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars that, for example, a man might spend on breast augmentation, genital surgery, facial feminization, voice surgery, and mental health services needed to support his psychological health. Many secular critics see this as financial exploitation since there is no option but to remain tethered to a lifetime of gender-related medical services.

They Reject Mind-Body Dualism

Fifth, some secular (atheist or naturalist) critics reject the premise behind gender identity because they reject the dualism of the body and mind. On the typical atheistic or naturalistic worldview, matter is all there is. There’s no immaterial soul or you that is inside your body. Therefore, there can’t be a self (e.g., a woman) that is the you that is different than your male body. There is only your body, and it’s either male or female. According to people who reject dualism, this is a fatal flaw of transgender ideology. After all, if there is no gender identity—the immaterial you that is your authentic self—then there can be no body that is different than you.

Naturally, this raises the question of whether the Christian is now saddled with the obvious challenge: Since a biblical worldview presupposes the existence of both body and soul, can transgenderism be more easily sustained by a Christian? While Christian theology affirms that humans are a composite of body and soul, it’s the body that is sexed (either male or female). This is to say nothing of the fact that a biblical worldview rejects the concept that sexuality is part of your identity. Such an anthropology is a modern invention and foreign to a biblical worldview.

They’re Not Motivated by Ignorance or Bigotry

As Christians, we believe the Christian worldview best explains reality and provides a framework for how humans can flourish. That’s why Christians who hold a biblical worldview recognize transgender ideology to be flawed and sinful. God, however, has spoken not only through Scripture (special revelation) but also through creation (general revelation). That means even people who don’t accept the Bible as God’s Word can sometimes come to know true facts about reality. That’s the case with transgender ideology. Large numbers of non-Christians also recognize that transgender ideology is deeply flawed. Although Christians and many non-Christians (including many atheists and evolutionists) make strange bedfellows, we’re allied against transgender ideology. The primary motivation is not ignorance or bigotry but love and biology. We’re concerned for the welfare of fellow human beings and making sure that what we stand for is true.

Rapid Fire – Part 2

Greg Koukl — Sat, 01 Nov 2025 08:00:00 GMT

Events in the last few months have thrust Christianity into view in the public square in a way I haven’t witnessed in a long time. Spiritual curiosity is on the rise everywhere, it seems. We’re experiencing it at STR and hearing of the surge of activity with Christian groups and local churches around the country.

As interest in Christ increases, so do both the questions raised by genial spiritual tire-kickers and the challenges offered by more aggressive hardcore skeptics. Thus, in this month’s Solid Ground, I’m continuing to respond to what I’ve called “rapid-fire” challenges. Some are rather simple; others are more complex. Understanding each, though, will help you be a better ambassador for Christ during this surge of interest in him.

“Christians are stupid.”

My simple response to this slight is, “Yes, some of them are. So what?”

When I lectured on relativism at UC San Diego years ago, I’d heard that many students on campus thought Christians were not very bright, so I started my lecture with that point.

“I understand that some of you think Christians are stupid,” I said. “Well, many of them are. But many non-Christians are stupid, too, so I don’t know what that gets you. What I want to show you tonight is that Christianity is not stupid.”

The fact is, lots of religious people are dull-witted and gullible, but so are multitudes of non-religious people. Conjectures about Christians’ low IQ get you nowhere since nothing useful follows from the observation—even if accurate—that some believers are not very clever. The challenge is a dead end because you cannot refute a belief simply by denigrating the believer.

I was once asked why it seemed that most intelligent people don’t believe in Christ. I said it was the same reason most unintelligent people don’t believe in Christ. It has nothing to do with intelligence. Rather, Christianity makes too big of a moral and ethical demand on people. Simply put, they don’t want to bend the knee. The problem is moral, not intellectual.

“Morality based on God is just another form of relativism.”

During a panel discussion I participated in after a talk I gave at the University of Alaska, one of the philosophy professors on the panel mentioned that a divine command approach to morality like the one found in Scripture is just another form of ethical subjectivism—relativism, that is. This troubled me because I believe in God’s moral absolutes. As an ethical objectivist, I’m committed to the idea that God’s commands are the foundation for all our moral obligations. That’s a form of divine command morality. Yet, the comment seemed to put divine command ethics on par with ordinary moral relativism.

In a certain sense, the philosopher had a point. Generally speaking, subjectivism in morality is when moral truth is completely dependent on an individual subject—the person holding the moral conviction. Good and evil are not objective features of the world on this view but are subjective judgments of individual minds. God is a subject—a mind, true enough—and on divine command theory, morality is grounded in him. At first glance, then, it seems that grounding morality in God provides no rescue from ordinary relativism.

But it does. Here’s why.

In moral relativism, morality is based on a subject—a human individual or group of individuals—whose beliefs about what is moral and what is immoral can change over time. What’s right or wrong for that person or group at one point in time could be completely different at another point since human values vary. Nothing fixes morality in any absolute sense.

God is an individual subject, of course, but he’s a completely different sort of subject. He is a personal being, but he is also the very ground of being. He doesn’t give commands arbitrarily according to his changing whim—like ordinary subjectivism—because God doesn’t change. Rather, his commands flow forth from an objective source: his unchanging, morally perfect nature.

So even though God is a subject—a personal individual, so to speak—he is also an object of fixed moral perfection, the standard of good by which all other good (and bad) is measured.

The problem with relativistic morality grounded in human subjects is that humans are numerous and they are capricious. There are many of them, resulting in a variety of moralities, and their moralities change over time because they are not grounded in or attached to anything fixed and moral in itself.

In an odd sort of way, then, morality grounded in God can be objective yet still relative to a subject. In this case, though, that subject is God himself—the objective ground of moral perfection and, therefore, the only unchanging, morally perfect, objective standard for all moral good.

“Radical Christianity is just as dangerous as radical Islam.”

The word “radical” is ambiguous here and needs clarification, along with the word “dangerous,”[1] especially since the theologies of these two religions are so different. What does a radical Christian look like compared to a radical Muslim?

I take this sense of “radical” to mean a religious extremist—one who has a thorough and complete dedication to his spiritual convictions. Being a religious radical in that sense is not always a liability, though. Mother Teresa followed her convictions to the extreme by creating the Missionaries of Charity and spending her life caring for the poor in the slums of Calcutta.

So, whether or not religious “radicalism” is dangerous depends entirely on the fundamental beliefs that a person pursues in the extreme. Generally, religious radicals are dangerous if their theology dictates violence towards unbelievers and/or denial of fundamental human liberties.

Since no religion can be held responsible for the crimes of its heretics, it’s important to be clear on the orthodox fundamentals that define a given religion.

The word “fundamentalist” has a negative connotation and is often used to discredit and marginalize Christians. Taken in a merely descriptive sense, though, religious fundamentalism is characterized by three things. A fundamentalist 1) faithfully follows his religious leader, 2) obeys his religious book, and 3) adheres to the fundamental dictates of his religion.

So how do Christianity and Islam compare by these standards?

What faithful imitation of Christ leads readily to oppression and wanton bloodshed? None. What New Testament teaching mandates forcible conversion to the faith? None. What fundamental dictates of Christian theology command coerced adherence to biblical doctrines? None.[2]

None of these are logical consequences of the teachings of Christ or of the doctrines of Christianity. If they’re not, then oppression and violence done in the name of Christ cannot be laid at his door. Jesus himself warned of interlopers, of wolves in sheep’s clothing. His assessment of them was clear: “I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness” (Matt. 7:23).

Well-meaning but misguided people who self-profess Christianity sometimes do regrettable things, often out of ignorance. This is not an excuse, of course, but it shows that the problem is not with “radical” Christian religion, but with misinformed or malicious individuals.

What about Islam? What does a “radical Muslim extremist” look like—one who is thoroughly and completely dedicated to his spiritual convictions, who follows Mohammed, obeys the Quran, and adheres to Islamic fundamentals?

We’re all familiar with the concept of violent jihad characteristic of many followers of Islam because examples of it show up frequently in the news. Their actions are not a result of well-meaning but misguided zeal since they’re following the example of their leader, who regularly justified military force to advance Islam.

The Quran, their religious book recording their fundamental doctrines and practices, commands the following in surah 9:29:

Fight those who do not believe in Allah and the Last Day, nor comply with what Allah and His Messenger have forbidden, nor embrace the religion of truth from among those who were given the Scripture, until they pay the tax, willingly submitting, fully humbled.

Note that surah 9 is one of the last revelations given by Mohammed.[3] According to the Muslim “principle of abrogation,” when a contradiction occurs between two passages, the later surahs annul the earlier revelations. Thus, any older, more tolerant-sounding teachings of Mohammed are abrogated (nullified) by surah 9, which teaches violence, subjugation, and religious jihad as a spiritual duty.[4]

To summarize the contrast, note this. Mohammed died in AD 632. In AD 732, Charles Martel successfully stopped the European military advance of the Islamic horde at the Battle of Tours. It took Muslim armies 100 years to forcibly conquer the entire Mediterranean region. It took Christians 300 years to “conquer” the same area, and the only blood they shed was their own.

Thus, it is not the case that radical Christianity is just as dangerous as radical Islam. The religions are at opposite ends of the spectrum when they are viewed at their “extremes”—extreme kindness, mercy, and tolerance from followers of Jesus versus extreme violence, suppression, and subjugation from followers of Muhammed.

“Do you take the Bible literally?”

This question sounds like it’s about one thing, but it’s usually about something else.

Let’s start with a definition. According to the New Oxford American Dictionary, the word “literal” means “taking words in their usual or most basic sense without metaphor or allegory, free from exaggeration or distortion.”

The fact is, most people read most things in their usual or most basic sense, including when that sense employs standard literary tools like metaphors or allegories. I call it the “ordinary” way of reading. History is history, poetry is poetry, similes and metaphors are figures of speech, etc. Pretty straightforward.

Why do people hesitate, then, when applying this commonsense notion to the Bible or, more precisely, to certain passages in the Bible? The concern hinges not on how the Christian reads the text but on what the Christian thinks the text actually says.

Of course, no one balks at reading the Bible “literally” when its commands or theology suit their purposes. Jesus’ directive not to judge or his injunctions that we love each other seem clear and unambiguous. No trouble there.

The linguistic rules change, though, when the critic comes across something in the text that offends his own philosophical, theological, or moral sensibilities. “Jesus, the only way? No sex outside of marriage? Give me a break.”

Some claims seem so fanciful that it’s hard for skeptics to take the statements at face value. “Were Adam and Eve the first human beings? Was Adam created from dirt and Eve from Adam’s rib? Did Jonah survive three days in the belly of a great fish? Did a virgin really have a baby? You don’t take that stuff literally, do you?”

Yet, how else should we take it? Following the basic rule of reading the text the ordinary way, that seems to be what the author intended us to understand in each of these cases.

As I said, frequently the problem isn’t with how we read the text but with what the text clearly seems to say. If it’s offensive, odd, or inconvenient in some way, then the linguistic rules change for many. This subtle double standard, I think, is usually at the heart of the taking-the-Bible-literally challenge.

Next is a different sort of “literal” reading challenge.

“Homosexuality was punishable by death in the Old Testament, so Christians who take the Bible literally must promote the execution of homosexuals.”

The answer to this question is based on the difference between what I call taking the Bible literally vs. taking the Bible laterally. This distinction will also help show that Christians are not “cherry picking” moral dictates from parts of the Law while ignoring others, which is the basic complaint here.

In the Law of Moses, homosexual activity was punishable by death (Lev. 18:22–23 and 20:13). Therefore (the charge goes), any Christian who takes the Old Testament Law literally and opposes homosexuality must also advocate capital punishment for homosexuals, as the Law requires.

The strategy with this move is obvious: If we don’t promote executing homosexuals, then we can’t legitimately condemn their behavior, since both details are in the Law. If we don’t take the Bible literally in the first case, we shouldn’t in the second case, either.

How do we escape the horns of this dilemma? By using care and precision with our definitions, that’s how.

The Mosaic Law is the legislation that governed the commonwealth of Israel. So here’s our question: When Moses wrote that Law, did he expect the Jewish people to take those regulations literally?

If you’re not sure how to answer, let me ask it another way. When an ordinance is passed in your local state (California, in my case), do you think the legislators intend its citizens to understand the words of the regulations “in their usual or most basic sense without metaphor or allegory, free from exaggeration or distortion”?

Of course they do. Legal codes are not written in vague or figurative language allowing each citizen to get creative with the meaning. The same would be true for the Mosaic Law. Moses meant it the way he wrote it. He expected his directives to be taken at face value—as all legislation requires.

It seems, though, that now we’re stuck on the other horn of the dilemma. To be consistent, shouldn’t we currently campaign for the death penalty for homosexuals? For that matter, aren’t we obliged to promote execution for Sabbath-breakers and disobedient children, both capital crimes under the Law?

The simple answer is no. Here’s why. Even when a biblical command is intended to be understood literally, that does not mean it is intended to be applied laterally, so to speak—that is, universally across the board to all peoples at all times in all places. Any particular piece of legislation applies only to those who are under its jurisdiction. The Mosaic Law governed Jews during the theocracy. It does not govern them anymore, and it was never intended to govern Gentiles.

Here’s another way of looking at it. California legal codes are to be read literally but not applied laterally. The codes only apply to those in California and have no application to people in other states. California’s laws have local, literal application within its own borders but no lateral application anywhere not under its jurisdiction.

In the same way, the words of the Mosaic Law, like those of all laws, are to be taken at face value by anyone who reads them. Yet only those under its jurisdiction are obliged to obey its precepts.[5]

The Jews in the theocracy were expected to obey the legal code God gave them, including the prohibition of—and punishment for—homosexuality. It was not the legal code God gave to Gentiles, however. Therefore, even if the words of the Mosaic Law were to be taken literally by those under the jurisdiction of that code, this does not mean that in our current circumstances we are governed by the details of the provisions of that law.

Am I saying that nothing written in the Mosaic Law ever applies to Christians or other Gentiles? No, I’m not saying that. There are many universal moral obligations that humanity shares with the Jews of Moses’ time.

Though Moses gave legal statutes for Jews living in the Jewish state, the Mosaic Law in many cases still reflects broad ethical principles that show up in laws governing people in jurisdictions outside the commonwealth of Israel—though punishments may differ based on different legal sensibilities. Both California and Wisconsin prohibit homicide, for example. As I have written elsewhere:

Perversion is still perverse, and wickedness is still wrong, whether it be adultery, rape, incest, or bestiality—or any of a number of evil acts all condemned by Moses in the “old” Law.[6]

So yes, we can glean wisdom and moral guidance from the Law of Moses for our own legal codes, but there are limits. Working out those details is a different discussion, however.[7]

The key question here is not whether we take the Mosaic Law literally, but whether we are now under that legal code. We are not.[8] That law was meant for Jews living under a theocracy defined by their unique covenant with God. The fact that a directive appears in the Mosaic Law does not, by that fact alone, make it obligatory for those living outside of Israel’s ancient jurisdiction. It’s literal, but it’s not lateral.

Consider this situation. Jesus told Peter to cast his net into deep water (Luke 5:4). That’s exactly what Peter did because he took Jesus’ command literally, in its ordinary sense. He had no reason to think otherwise. However, even though Jesus’ command to Peter was literal, that does not mean the same command applies laterally to anyone else. We are not obligated to cast nets into deep water just because Peter was.

Americans are a mixture of peoples in a representative republic governed by a different set of decrees than the Jews under Moses. We are not obliged to obey everything that came down from Sinai. Just because it was commanded of the Jews, that does not mean it is commanded of us. Some moral precepts, however, will show up in every country’s legislation because they reflect universal ethical obligations.

Some may disagree, but if anyone wants to argue for a lateral application of all literal biblical injunctions, it seems to me he is also duty-bound to take his net and cast it into deep water.

In our next Solid Ground, I’ll respond to another batch of “rapid-fire” challenges.

[1] Thus, the initial tactical question, “What do you mean by that?” is in order here.

[2] Of course, ethical teachings of Scripture that prohibit behaviors like murder, rape, theft, perjury, kidnapping, etc., are universally acknowledged as immoral and are, for that reason, reflected in legal statutes. For more detail on this issue, see Gregory Koukl, “Getting ‘Political’—Vice or Christian Virtue?” at str.org.

[3] Surahs are not in chronological order.

[4] Not all Muslims hold to this version of Islam, of course, but vast numbers—hundreds of millions—do. In Islam, as in Christianity, there are both obedient fundamentalists (in the sense clarified above) and theological liberals who deviate from foundational orthodoxies.

[5] This principle is critical to understanding the role of Old Testament Law in New Testament times.

[6] See Gregory Koukl and Alan Shlemon, “A Reformation the Church Doesn’t Need: Answering Revisionist Pro-Gay Theology—Part 1,” available at str.org.

[7] For the record, I think the immorality of homosexuality is one of those universal moral laws since, among other reasons, it’s identified in the New Testament as immoral irrespective of the Mosaic Law (e.g., Rom. 1:27 and 1 Cor. 6:9).

[8] Note Paul’s discussion on this issue in Romans 7:1–6.

How Should I Talk with Children About Abortion?

Megan Almon — Thu, 30 Oct 2025 10:00:00 GMT

When my daughter was a toddler, she visited the bustling newsroom at the community paper where I worked as a reporter. The space, like many newsrooms, was messy—strewn with loose press releases, sticky notes, stray pens, and wadded-up, discarded notebook pages as reporters raced to meet daily deadlines. She made herself busy, playing with “treasures” she’d found under a nearby vacated desk.

A passing colleague noticed her rummaging and paused to greet her.

“Are you a little squirrel playing under there?”

She popped from her hiding place, stood with arms akimbo, and said with all of the passion her petite body could muster, “I not a squirrel. I a human being, made in the image of God!”

Eyes widened, he walked toward his desk chuckling and no doubt thinking about her response.

As a pro-life apologist and a mother, I’m often asked about how to communicate the case for the pro-life view to children.

There is no formulaic answer to this, but I do think there are guiding principles we can employ: Learn the view and live it yourselves; establish a solid foundation; create an environment where questions are welcomed; and, when they’re ready, teach them the case and how to defend it.

Learn and Live It

The basic case for the pro-life view can be stated in less than a minute:

I am pro-life because the science of embryology clearly states that from the moment of conception, we were living, distinct, whole human beings. We weren’t part of another human being, but whole humans at our earliest stage of development. Furthermore, philosophy tells me that there is no relevant difference between the embryos we once were and the adults we are today that justifies abortion. Differences like size, level of development, environment, and degree of dependency aren’t sufficient to say you could have been killed back then but not now.

Learning it propositionally is a start, but learning to integrate these truths and allow them to form us is another matter.

The latter shapes you into the kind of person who understands and acts upon the intrinsic worth (or, stated biblically, the imago Dei status) of each individual. It informs the way you view yourself as well as the way you interact with others—even those who disagree with you.

When it comes to children learning from the adults in their lives, so much is caught rather than simply taught. That’s why we have sayings like “Monkey see, monkey do” and songs like “Be careful little ears what you hear.” Children are sponges who soak up information and habits, often without a filter. The positive side of this reality is that when you live the pro-life view in your language, your choices, and your interactions (especially your interactions with them!), they learn it by absorption. The ability to state those truths propositionally comes later and somewhat naturally.

Foundation First

My husband and I decided early on to speak true “identity” statements over our children before they could speak themselves.

As they learned to talk, it became a sort of catechism that we repeated regularly.

One of us would ask, “What makes you valuable?”

The response we taught them was, “I’m a human being made in the image of God.”

I’m not sure I expected to hear it from my daughter’s lips that day in the newsroom, but it pleased me to know she had made the connection!

That simple statement gave us the foundation we needed—and still make use of—anytime our children began questioning their worth, whether because of making mistakes, or failing to meet the expectations of another, or when comparison to others sneaked in (which, in our media age, remains an ongoing battle for all of us).

As we navigated hard circumstances, prideful tendencies, and disappointments, we inevitably wound our way back to asking, “Is this what makes you valuable?”

The answer, though not always felt in the moment, remained true: “No. My ultimate worth is already determined. I’m a human being made in God’s image.”

Conversely, this foundational reality informed their interactions with others who did not understand their own immeasurable worth. Standing on that foundation, our children were able to extend compassion to others (imperfectly, mind you!) who had mistreated them.

Create Space for Questions

Realizing that our worth comes from our God-given status frees us from the lie that we must have all of the answers, and from the fear that comes when we don’t. When we walk (or even limp along) in this freedom, our homes or learning environments become safe havens for children to ask hard questions as they grow. Their questions can then serve as gauges to determine not only what they’re thinking about but how simple or complex our responses need to be.

This kind of environment can be cultivated practically by inviting questions and creating intentional times and spaces for them.

You might routinely check in and extend an invitation: “Has anything been on your mind lately that you want to talk about or ask me?” Or even a simple, “Hey, you know you’re free to ask us anything, right? In this home/place, we don’t get in trouble for asking questions.”

Know that if you invite them, you should be prepared when they come. My husband, Tripp, often advises adults who work with teens and young adults to receive the questions without alarm.

“If you are shocked,” he says, “don’t let them see it. Just respond with, ‘That’s a great question. Let’s think about that.’”

Our good friend Dr. Kathy Koch (pronounced “Cook”) of Celebrate Kids, Inc. recommends mitigating discomfort or awkwardness by inviting questions when you’re not face to face, which can feel more intense. Create “space” for them when you’re on a walk, driving somewhere in the car, doing a passive activity (like a puzzle, project, or household chore). She also warns parents that children often ask their most pressing questions when it’s time for bed, especially older children. There is a sense of safety that comes with the dark and our patient presence.

If you discern that your child or student is asking a question for which the answer requires more maturity on their part, follow the model of Casper ten Boom. In The Hiding Place, Corrie ten Boom shares that when she was younger than her fellow classmates, she overheard a conversation about “sexsin.” She didn’t know what that was, and that made her fearful. When she accompanied Casper, her father, on his weekly visit by train to the naval yard, she asked him about it. At first, he didn’t respond. When they reached their stop, he asked a troubled Corrie to carry his case for him. She tried to lift it and, failing, told him it was too heavy.

Casper taught her that some knowledge was also too heavy for her to carry, so it was his duty to carry it for her until she was strong enough to carry it herself. (Corrie later related the same lesson to God, who carries for us those things we cannot understand.)

The lesson comforted Corrie. Her father was not afraid of the question. She knew he had an answer, and that he would give it to her in due time.

Finally, a humble “I don’t know” isn’t a failure to the children in our lives but a gift and an opportunity. They see that, just like them, we also need God’s help, and their question provides an occasion to seek the truth together.

Teach the Case

There is no specific age that is perfect for teaching pro-life apologetics. Perhaps my work in the field exposed my children earlier and more than most to the issue of abortion, but I found that my daughter began asking serious questions about abortion at the age of twelve, and her younger brother slightly sooner.

We gave each a simple definition: “Abortion is when someone intentionally kills a child in his or her mother’s womb.”

Both of our children responded with anger. Our daughter’s outrage was accompanied by tears; our son’s was mixed with a fierce protectiveness.

From there, we let their individual questions guide us.

“Why would someone do that?”

“How do they kill them?”

“What can we do to stop it?” or, “How can we help so that mothers won’t want to do that?”

We found it best to answer their questions directly and honestly without over-explaining. If they wanted more information, they asked for it.

Working from our foundation of intrinsic human value, which we applied to every human being involved in the debate, we helped them build the case for life over time. We have done so both offensively and defensively by not only teaching them the pro-life arguments, but by exposing them to alternative views with opportunities to respond and then debrief with us. As they learned, we became the questioners, providing imaginary scenarios or conversations for them and asking them to think through ways to respond.

We hope their guide is the gospel—the shocking and beautiful reality that offers hope and healing to all who will receive the gift.

These are ongoing conversations with our children, one grown and one nearly in high school, and I imagine they will continue as long as abortion exists as a viable option for many in our communities.

As Tripp and I have worked extensively with adults of all ages, we can say with confidence that it is not too late to learn—and live—the case for life.

Columbus and the Flat Earth Myth

Katie Hulse — Mon, 13 Oct 2025 10:00:00 GMT

In 1492, Christopher Columbus set sail amidst disputes involving the shape of the earth. Most people, especially Christians in the Medieval Ages, used to believe the earth was flat, not round. We’re all familiar with this story. We’ve heard it related in classrooms and textbooks since childhood.

Yet this story simply isn’t true. In fact, most people at that time believed the earth to be round. Historian Jeffrey Burton Russell shares,

With extraordinary few exceptions no educated person in the history of Western Civilization from the third century B.C. onward believed that the earth was flat. A round earth appears at least as early as the sixth century BC with Pythagoras, who was followed by Aristotle, Euclid, and Aristarchus, among others in observing that the earth was a sphere.

The ancient Greeks and Romans accepted that the earth is a globe. According to Aristotle’s cosmology (which dominated medieval European curriculum), for example, the natural motion of the element earth (which the planet Earth was thought to be composed of), is toward the center of the universe, and since earth is always stiving toward the center from every side, the natural result of this motion is a spherical shape.

Another argument familiar to the ancient and medieval world involves lunar eclipses. During lunar eclipses, Earth’s shadow appears on the moon, and from any standpoint on the earth—north, south, east, west—Earth’s shadow always appears curved. The conclusion? The earth is a sphere.

Perhaps this understanding of Earth’s shape changed with the onset of Christianity, then? Again, Russell provides insight:

A few—at least two and at most five—early Christian fathers denied the [sphericity] of earth by mistakenly taking passages such as Ps. 104:2–3 as geographical rather than metaphorical statements. On the other side tens of thousands of Christian theologians, poets, artists, and scientists took the spherical view throughout the early, medieval, and modern church. The point is that no educated person believed otherwise.

Early church father Augustine (354–430), for example, accepted a round earth, and medieval theologian Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) employed ancient Greek arguments for a spherical earth. Even the classic work of literature Dante’s Inferno, written in the 14th century, assumes a round earth.

Now, if the majority of people in the Medieval Ages (and earlier) believed the earth to be round, how did we come to the popular understanding today that most believed it to be flat? It seems this modern tale was initiated by two individuals in the 19th century: Antoine-Jean Letronne and Washington Irving. They each reported this narrative in their written works—Letronne in On the Cosmographical Ideas of the Church Fathers (1834) and Irving in A History of the Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (1828).

This tale was then perpetuated by historian John William Draper and some of his followers, like Cornell University president Andrew Dickson White. By the 1860s, it was being related as truth in schools and texts. According to Russell, “The falsehood about the spherical earth became a colorful and unforgettable part of a larger falsehood: the falsehood of the eternal war between science (good) and religion (bad) throughout Western history.”

So, if the argument regarding the funding of Columbus’s voyage wasn’t about the earth’s shape, what was it about? The earth’s size—especially the parts of Earth’s surface covered by sea. Columbus argued that Earth was smaller than was commonly believed. The shape of the earth wasn’t in question. We know that by looking at the ancient and medieval sources. History often sheds light on modern misconceptions concerning the interaction of science and Christianity.

Unseen Roots: How Christianity Grounds Human Value

Alan Shlemon — Tue, 07 Oct 2025 10:00:00 GMT

Take a deep breath. That’s air you’re breathing. You don’t think about it, but you rely on oxygen every moment of your life. You assume it’s always there, and you can’t live without it.

According to author Glen Scrivener, “Christianity is the air we breathe. It is our atmosphere. It’s our environment, both unseen and all-pervasive.” Many of the institutions and values that our society cherishes exist because Christianity has transformed our world. But because we think they’ve always been there, many take them for granted.

One of the most significant events that inaugurated God’s transformation of our world is described in the first chapter of John: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…. And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us” (John 1:1, 14). That’s the story of Jesus—the Word. He left his heavenly domain and pierced the envelope of our world. By doing so, he forever changed our reality.

But what if Jesus never came? What would our world look like? In 1898, researchers discovered an ancient Roman letter in Egypt. It was written in 1 BC by a Roman solider named Hilarion, who was writing to his pregnant wife, Alis, while working in Alexandria, about 100 miles away from her. Realizing she might give birth while he’s still away, he tells her, “If—may you have good luck—you should give birth; if it is a boy, keep it; if it is a girl, throw it out.”

What? Throw it out? Throw their precious little baby girl out to die? Yes, that’s exactly what he said. In that era, baby girls were occasionally tossed outside and left to die of exposure or be eaten by wild animals. They were considered less valuable than baby boys because they were deemed less capable.

I bet you’re thinking, I could never think that way. I could never kill a baby girl! That’s true, and here’s the reason why. Take a deep breath…. That’s the reason. You can’t fathom having such a state of mind because the air you breathe comes from a culture that draws its values from the Christian worldview. Western civilization has adopted the view that every human being deserves to live and be treated with dignity and respect. But where did that view come from?

You’ve been affected by a singular event—when the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. Jesus and the Christian worldview have revolutionized our society’s thinking so much that we can’t even begin to imagine thinking like Hilarion and Alis. One of the most significant changes Christianity made was the change to the way we value human life.

Prior to the advent of Christendom, most cultures viewed humans as having instrumental value. This value system treats human beings as a means to an end. In other words, humans are not valuable in and of themselves. Rather, they are only valuable for what they can do: work at a job, raise children, create art, and contribute to society. On this view, human value correlates to human ability. The more you can do, the more valuable you are. The less you can do, the less valuable you are.

The instrumental value system leads to a grim consequence: The moment a person loses his abilities is the precise moment he loses his value. Then he can be thrown away. In Hilarion and Alis’s world, baby girls were viewed as having fewer abilities than baby boys. Therefore, baby girls were less valuable and could be thrown away. In an instrumental value system, the strong prevail and the weak are discarded.

Today, there are parts of the world that are unaffected by the Christian worldview and its values. In rural India, for example, female infanticide is still a problem. Baby girls are starved, smothered, poisoned, or sometimes even strangled by their umbilical cords. Why? Eastern religions and their values still run the day. India operates on an instrumental value system. Children are a means to an end, and girls are deemed less valuable.

With the rise of Christendom, Western society became structured around a fundamentally different system, one that is based on intrinsic value. On this view, something has value if it has value in itself. A person’s value is, therefore, inherent in their own existence. Because intrinsic value does not depend on one’s abilities, a person’s value never changes.

According to this view, human beings have value because they are made in the image of God (Gen. 1:27). Our value is not based on what we can do, what people think of us, or how much we contribute to society. Rather, our value is based on who we are—an image bearer of God.

Furthermore, our value does not diminish if we lose our physical abilities, mental abilities, friendships, or job. Nothing can change our value because it is inherent in us and not dependent on any ability or external factor.

The intrinsic value system has become a core principle of Western civilization. In fact, it was built into the founding documents of the United States. The Declaration of Independence states: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights.”

Notice, we are valuable because—like Scripture tells us—we are made by our Creator and he has endowed us with value. Notice also that we are not just valuable, but every person is equally valuable to everyone else. That’s because being made in God’s image is not a degreed property. You can’t have more of the image of God or less of the image of God. You’re either made in God’s image or you’re not. You’re either valuable or you’re not.

What’s interesting to note about the Declaration’s wording is that it says these truths are “self-evident.” To someone steeped in the Christian worldview, it’s obvious that humans are intrinsically valuable. That truth is part of the air we breathe.

Indeed, the intrinsic value system is one of the greatest gifts the Christian worldview gave our culture. When you consistently apply this value system, you can’t justify the atrocities of history. You can’t justify the gladiatorial games of Rome, because people aren’t mere entertainment. You can’t justify slavery, because people can’t be owned. And you can’t justify throwing baby girls out to die, because no matter their limited economic potential, they are intrinsically valuable and precious image bearers of God.

All these atrocities are unthinkable because the Christian worldview has permeated the institutions of our society. It’s in the air we breathe. We don’t even realize it, but everything around us has been changed by the Word, who became flesh, dwelt among us, and transformed our reality.

Why Looking Backwards Keeps You Safe

Greg Koukl — Wed, 01 Oct 2025 10:00:00 GMT

Years back, a strange thing was happening in American churches that taught me an important lesson.

Here’s what was happening. In a number of places around the country, a so-called “laughing revival” was taking place. It was characterized by manifestations of uncontrollable hilarity, animal roars, violent shaking, and loud wailing—all supposedly heralding the imminent return of Christ. Was this a “new movement of the Spirit”?

Here’s the lesson I learned: When I face a vexing theological question, I start with what I know for sure and use that to organize the field, eliminate options, and clarify the task. I move from the known to the unknown. In this case, two sound convictions guided my assessment of the “revival.”

First, I know that mystical appearances can be deceiving. Though well-meaning believers are drawn to spiritual drama, experience is simply not an adequate test for truth.

A friend of mine had attended one “revival” service where conferees stampeded to the front for the altar call, some falling down, convulsing on the floor in front of her. She whispered to the person next to her, “In the Bible, this only happened to those who were demon possessed.” She was immediately accused of blaspheming the Holy Spirit.

This won’t do. My friend’s observation was fair, biblically accurate, and fully appropriate in light of the spiritual chaos surrounding her. Yet she was rebuked for even raising the issue. Chastisements about “quenching” the Spirit, putting God in a box, or not “touching” God’s anointed are of no help discerning truth here.

An LA Times spread at the time featured pictures of effusive worshipers in churches in Southern California. The article asked: Is this a revival in the church? It struck me that if the LA Times was looking for revival, it was looking in the wrong place. True revival is never measured by what happens inside the church, but rather by what happens outside the church.

Secular historians note that the Wesleyan revival in the 18th century so transformed the cultural landscape of England that it saved Britain from a bloody revolution like France endured. No one had to go inside a church to know that God was moving because revival is not measured by how much swooning goes on in the sanctuary. Neither laughter, nor cheers, nor howls, nor tears mark the durable work of the Spirit, but only transformed lives that withstand the test of time.

Here’s the second conviction that guided my thinking. Though I was doubtful the Spirit had inspired the laughing revival, I was certain the Spirit had inspired Paul’s last instructions to Timothy.

In 2 Timothy—the apostle’s final charge before dying—Paul passes the torch of the gospel to Timothy with a sober warning: Trouble is coming. There will be trouble in the world as people increasingly fall into moral chaos (2 Tim. 3:1–4). There will also be trouble in the church as Christians turn to myths that tickle their ears rather than endure sound biblical doctrine (2 Tim. 4:3–4).

Paul then gives Timothy the antidote. His solution is found in three simple words: “You, however, continue.” Here’s the full citation:

You, however, continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned them.... All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work. (2 Tim. 3:14, 16–17)

Paul never tells Timothy to look forward to the future for new movements of the Spirit. Rather, he tells him to look backwards to what has already been revealed. Everything we need to be fruitful and productive, to be trained in righteousness, to be adequately equipped for every good work, has already been revealed. For Paul, all the old stuff would continue to be all the right stuff.

Did I conclude that the “Toronto Blessing” was the trickery of men or a deception of the devil—or that it was a genuine move of the Holy Spirit after all? Neither. I concluded that I didn’t have to answer that question. I could play it safe and ignore it completely. How could I be left behind in God’s plan if I was following the orders he’d already given?

Nothing is spiritually wrong with anyone who doesn’t climb on a current evangelical bandwagon. Why? Because since the final writing of Scripture, we always look backwards for truth and spiritual stability, not forward to new experiences.

Here is the simple rule that will always protect you when spiritual fads entice others: Continue in the truth that has already been revealed. I, for one, have my hands full with my original marching orders. I won’t be grieving the Spirit if I’m being faithful to what God has already said instead of banking on new—and maybe fleeting or misleading—experiences.

I learned that I don’t need to concern myself with any alleged new movements of the Spirit if I have my hand on the plow, steadfastly doing the work of the old movement of the Spirit. If you, however, continue, then you’ll be safe, too.