Advent is a time to recall God’s utter and unstoppable faithfulness to His people. Though Israel failed to keep its covenant with God, made at Sinai and renewed on several occasions afterward, He always intended to keep His covenant with Abraham, that “through your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed."
Scripture calls us to “give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you” (1 Thessalonians 5:18). We are to “give” thanks, not “feel” thanks. The holiday is Thanksgiving, not Thanksfeeling.
Hymn writers Keith and Kristyn Getty asserted that Christians must recognize the compatibility between God and science amid an atheistic culture that says no such relationship exists.
Throughout history, Christians have faced demands to be silent. Throughout history, they refused. In Live Not By Lies: a Manual for Christian Dissidents, blogger and author Rod Dreher thinks Christians in the West are entering a season where we will not only have to decide whether we will be silent; we will have to decide whether we will allow ourselves to be forced into going along with what is not true, with lies.
Philosopher R. J. Snell notes that such tolerance has become highly intolerant in recent years. In fact, our culture has devolved to the point that it condemns any perspective which represses an individual’s instinctual desires.
Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito recently stated during a keynote address to the Federalist Society that “For many today, religious liberty is not a cherished freedom. It’s often just an excuse for bigotry, and it can’t be tolerated, even when there is no evidence that anybody has been harmed.”
In a recent interview, a Baylor University professor discussed the possible correlation between secularism and a declining birth-rate.
Curtis Almquist of the Society of St. John the Evangelist notes: "The energy in Jesus’ teachings is about our being prepared: being prepared to die, but, in the meantime and more importantly, being prepared to live. You don’t want to miss a moment of it—your life—because life is so precious and it’s so fleeting."
Are you "prepared to live" today?
In a new podcast episode, Cissie Graham Lynch encouraged Christians to trust God with the presidential election.
