When the Pentagon cries ‘UFO,’ Christians should look to the Bible, not the skies



The Pentagon wants you to watch the skies ... again.

Last month, the War Department published a sixth release of declassified and historical files related to UAPs, while the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office continues to publish military footage of UAPs. Some cases have explanations. Others remain unresolved because of insufficient data.

Most of the people getting excited about 'aliens' have spent their entire lives being taught that nonhuman spiritual beings don't exist at all.

"Unresolved" does not necessarily mean extraterrestrial. It does mean, however, that Christians should stop laughing at the question.

This wheel's on fire

The Bible never says humanity is alone. From Genesis to Revelation, Scripture speaks of intelligent beings who are not human. Some serve God; others rebel against Him. Today, though some may call them "aliens," changing the label does not change what they are.

Job 38:7 says that at creation, "the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy." These heavenly beings existed before humanity and were not originally from Earth.

Western art often depicts angels as harmless babies or ordinary humans with bird wings, but biblical angels look very different. The original Hebrew mal'akh and Greek angelos mean "messenger" and are used to describe what these beings do, not everything they are.

Daniel described a heavenly being with a face like lightning, eyes like flaming torches, and limbs like burnished bronze. Ezekiel's cherubim came with wheels within wheels covered in eyes. And Isaiah's seraphim, the "burning ones," were adorned with six wings each. If someone who rejected Scripture saw such a spiritual being today, what would they call it? Likely an alien or a god.

As Paul says in Ephesians 6, our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. The idea of the unseen realm is not a modern conspiracy theory. Rather, it has always been part of the biblical worldview.

Deities ... or demons?

Ancient archaeology provides another connection. Mesopotamian traditions from Eridu speak of the apkallu, sages associated with the age before the Flood. They were given the role of bringing knowledge to humanity. Centuries later, Assyrian palaces at Nimrud displayed human and eagle-headed winged figures connected with these sages. At Nimrud and Nineveh, enormous lamassu, which are human-headed winged bulls or lions, guarded royal thresholds. Ancient texts also speak of the Anunnaki, a group of powerful deities.

Now put these figures next to Ezekiel's description. He describes each cherub as having four faces at once: a human, a lion, an ox, and an eagle. The apkallu looked like a human body under an eagle's head and wings. The lamassu combined a human head with the winged body of a bull or lion. These same features keep showing up in Ezekiel's description of a similar being.

This doesn't prove the carvings are exact portraits of cherubim, but the resemblance is too striking to ignore. These cultures may have been deceived by real spiritual beings, represented them in their images, and worshiped the creation rather than the Creator. These artifacts show that early people were already telling stories about nonhuman beings, sacred knowledge, and contact between heaven and earth.

The biblical writers didn't treat these pagan gods as harmless myths. Both Deuteronomy 32:17 and 1 Corinthians 10:20 say the sacrifices pagan societies offered were made to demons. That's a different claim than what most people assume today, where the old gods get filed away as folklore.

But swinging too far the other direction causes its own problems, and Christians shouldn't assume every strange light is a demon. A UAP could be a balloon, a drone, an aircraft, classified technology, a natural event, a hoax, or a simple misperception. Some encounters may still involve spiritual deception too. Christians should test the evidence and test the spirits.

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The coming darkness

This connection between the pre-Flood world, ancient cities, and rebellious spiritual powers is one reason we wrote our biblical fantasy novel "Lightborn: Dawn of Darkness." This world is not separate from what we see happening today. The novel explores where this spiritual rebellion began and imagines the ancient world behind the biblical account.

Archaeology shows that ancient civilizations believed in powerful nonhuman beings and worshipped them as gods. Scripture reveals the darker spiritual reality at play. These fallen spirits did not simply disappear along with the ancient world. They continued to influence people and nations, and that spiritual deception will play an important role in the end times.

Most of the people getting excited about "aliens" have spent their entire lives being taught that nonhuman spiritual beings don't exist at all, and that's the actual danger. Paul warned of this in 2 Thessalonians 2, describing a lawless figure who comes cloaked in false signs, wonders, and deception.

We believe the modern alien narrative could help prepare people to receive dark powers as teachers or saviors. Scripture does not say the Antichrist will arrive in a spacecraft. It does warn that supernatural appearances do not automatically come from God and that people may encounter angels without recognizing them.

If a shining being offers secret knowledge, a new religion, or a savior other than Jesus Christ, the church should not first ask which planet it came from. We should ask who it serves. Good angels refuse worship. Fallen ones seek it. Jesus Christ alone is the way, the truth, and the life. Whatever future disclosure may reveal, that truth will never change.

Where was God? Frank Turek asks the question after Charlie Kirk



Arizona State University’s Ratio Christi chapter hosted Christian apologist Frank Turek Monday night. The topic especially caught my attention as a philosophy professor: If God exists, why is there evil?

I call this the major objection to belief in God. Atheists may begin elsewhere, but once the other objections are answered, the problem of evil keeps returning. I have found that true whether I am talking with an atheist at a bar watching a ball game or an elite physicist at Cambridge.

What if the very problem of evil that you think disproves God actually points to God?

Turek made the question as pointed as possible. He told the audience that when he and Charlie Kirk were approaching Utah Valley University on September 10, 2025, Kirk asked him to pray. Turek prayed for the event to be effective and safe.

“God said no,” Turek told the audience. About 20 minutes later, Kirk was fatally shot. Turek has asked the same question publicly ever since: Where was God?

To some smug atheists, and a few conspiracy-minded people, the story invites a sneer: If Kirk was such a good Christian, why didn’t his God protect him? Why would anyone want to be a Christian if that is the outcome?

Turek answered with a challenge: What if the very problem of evil that seems to disprove God actually points toward him?

His argument came in two parts.

First, before we can say evil disproves God, we have to know what evil is. And to know what evil is, we need some account of the good. Invoking Augustine, Turek described evil as a corruption or privation of something good. Augustine’s formulation is simple: Evil depends on the good it damages.

Students are often confident that they can define the good until the examples get difficult. Happiness seems like an obvious candidate, but people can be happy about wicked things. Happiness alone therefore cannot tell us what is good.

That is where students often retreat into relativism: What is good for you is good for you, and what is good for me is good for me.

Turek’s answer was that human beings share a common human nature. If something is genuinely good for a human being as such, it cannot become bad merely because another person prefers something else.

Then he pushed the argument into explicitly Christian territory. If Christianity is true, what could be better than knowing God? He cited John 17:3, where eternal life is described as knowing God and Jesus Christ.

That brought him back to Kirk. Kirk’s murder was evil; Turek did not pretend otherwise. But he argued that God can bring good from evil. Turek says he still hears from people who encountered the gospel because of Kirk’s life and death. In his language, the ripple was not merely a ripple but a tsunami.

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That was Turek’s first point: The objection from evil assumes that some things are objectively wrong. His argument is that objective moral law requires a standard beyond individual preference and that the ultimate ground of that standard is God. The problem of evil therefore borrows the very moral categories it tries to use against him.

Turek then moved from philosopher to pastor.

In a philosophy class, people will debate the logical problem of evil. In the middle of intense suffering, nobody wants a philosopher to arrive with a chalkboard and draw syllogisms. They want to know why this happened: Why this child? Why this cancer? Why this death?

Turek answers with what he calls the ripple effect. We know very little of the past, only fragments of the present, and nothing of the future except what has been revealed to us. We cannot trace all the consequences flowing from a single event.

God, in the Christian account, is not only powerful and good but wise. He knows the whole of history and can order events toward ends we cannot see. Turek appealed to Romans 8:28: God works all things together for the good of those who love him.

That reminded me of an old pastoral illustration. A couple had grown cold in their faith. Their child died, and they asked their pastor why. He told them to imagine a shepherd trying to lead two stubborn sheep across a river from danger to safety. They refuse. So the shepherd picks up their lamb and carries it across. The sheep follow.

Was that for their good?

The point is not that suffering itself becomes good. It is that suffering can force us to confront questions comfort lets us avoid. It exposes our finitude and can make us consider our own sin. When we recognize how little we know and how much God would have to know, Paul’s question in Romans 9:20 becomes harder to brush aside: Who are we to correct God?

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With those two claims — objective goodness and divine wisdom — Turek took questions.

One student asked why God creates people who will be damned to hell. Turek answered that people who finally reject God receive what they insist upon: separation from Him. If that is what they choose, he asked, on what grounds do they complain about receiving it?

Another asked about animal suffering that no human being ever sees. How could that possibly help us?

Turek’s answer was essentially: How do you know it does not? Human knowledge is extraordinarily limited. The fact that we cannot identify a good purpose for some instance of suffering does not prove that no such purpose exists. He also noted that in the Christian account, the whole creation is affected by human sin.

So is Turek right? Does the problem of evil point toward God rather than away from him? Are atheists borrowing from an objective moral framework they cannot ultimately ground without God?

The audience was clearly intrigued. Skeptics had something substantial to push against, and Christians had to think more carefully about what they claim the Bible teaches concerning good, evil, suffering, and God’s wisdom.

As a philosophy professor deep in the heart of Sun Devil territory, I count that as a good thing.

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NY Giants quarterback labeled 'insane' over pregame comments — almost no one knew he was quoting the Bible



Fans called New York Giants quarterback Jameis Winston everything from crazy to a troll on Sunday, and they really couldn't figure out what he was trying to say.

Winston is known for being incredibly eloquent with his thoughts, but this time, he wasn't sharing his own words, and his comments seemingly went right over everyone's head.

'It's us doing, being doers, not speakers.'

Before the Week 3 game against the Tennessee Titans, droves of fans were already reacting to yet another head-scratching interview from the Giants' new starting quarterback, something they've already become accustomed to.

CBS reporter AJ Ross was the one tasked with asking Winston about his game prep and his ability to carry the team as he stepped in for injured QB Jaxson Dart; but there is no way she expected the answer Winston gave.

"One thing that I do is forgetting those that is behind and reaching forward to what's ahead," Winston replied.

Fans were confused. The video was seen over 5 million times, but almost no one understood what the QB was trying to say.

One post called Winston's words "utter incoherence," while another said he was saying "insane things."

No, Winston wasn't trying and failing to sound "eloquent," as another fan put it. He was actually quoting Scripture.

Winston was relaying the message of Philippians 3:13, about Paul the apostle admitting he has not yet achieved perfection.

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Not everyone was pessimistic about Winston's pregame words though. Popular podcast "Bussin' with the Boys" labeled the Alabama native a "poet," while sports website OutKick called him a "national treasure."

Podcaster Keith Malinak was one of the few who understood the message, relaying the passage to more readers.

Winston's unrelenting positivity has a way of resulting in some of the most entertaining — as well as some of the most confusing — interview segments, and he can often catch reporters off guard.

For example, when a CBS reporter asked him about how the weather might affect the game, Winston didn't give the most clear response.

"The circumstances, conditions, and facts, they don't matter," the 32-year-old replied. "It's us doing, being doers, not speakers."

With answers like that, it's not hard to see why fans have a difficult time determining when Winston is delivering biblical quotes or his own personal wisdom.

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Following the 12-7 win over the Titans, Winston began his postgame interview by telling reporters he was "elated" to see his team close out the game.

"Praise God," Winston added.

Consistent questions followed about whether he feels replaceable, but Winston continuously made it clear to reporters how grateful he is to be in his position.

The truth is, most analysts are not confident in Winston's capabilities as a starting quarterback. With no touchdowns and just 229 passing yards in his first two games, criticisms have come quickly and in abundance.

As ESPN's Stephen A. Smith stated, there is a certain expectation of an eventual big mistake when Winston is in the game.

"Jameis Winston is more entertaining and more interesting in the pregame chatter about football than he is once he's behind center. That's the reality of the situation," he said.

The Giants play the Arizona Cardinals in Week 4 in what should be another winnable game. The Giants have many such games before the end of the calendar year.

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Christians are missing the opportunity next door



Christians need not wait for Washington to settle the immigration debate before sharing the gospel with the people who have already arrived.

Whatever happens next — tighter restrictions or a return to the influxes Democrats encouraged — Hindus and Muslims have made their homes here and established temples and mosques. They are our neighbors. Christians have a duty to evangelize them.

The religions of the world have come to our neighborhoods. We have the honor of sharing Christ with the people who practice them. We should get to work.

We should debate whether a society without a shared foundation can hold together through the modern left’s thin materialistic secularism or resurgent occultism. Obviously, it cannot. We should also challenge what the left proposes to put in place of the Christianity that helped form this country.

But those arguments do not suspend the Christian obligation to share Christ. Hindu and Muslim immigrants have come to a country with a long Christian heritage. They should expect to encounter Christianity here, just as a Christian moving to India would encounter Hinduism or one moving to Saudi Arabia would encounter Islam.

Hindu statues and Islamic calls to prayer now confront Americans with religions they may once have known only from books. What a great opportunity to share Christ!

Evangelism can begin in a conversation at work or school. Christians can visit religious centers, get to know their neighbors, and preach publicly. Whatever the setting, we must understand what the other person believes and explain where Christianity differs.

Hindu traditions include worship of many deities, although Hindu schools understand those deities differently. For some American Christians, a Hindu temple may provide their first encounter with statues used in religious worship rather than displayed in a museum.

We have learned the commandment against making and worshipping idols. Yet our sermons often emphasize spiritual idolatry because bowing before a physical image seems so remote from our lives. Our Hindu neighbors may give us occasion to discuss that commandment in its most literal application.

Some influential Hindu philosophical traditions teach monism: that reality is ultimately one. Advaita Vedanta identifies the true self, Atman, with Brahman, the ultimate reality. The formulation “This Self is Brahman” appears in the Mandukya Upanishad.

Yoga and meditation are practices aimed at realizing the self is God. Reincarnation teaches that our soul has existed from eternity and is on a journey to be freed from the body and reach enlightenment as God.

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The Christian answer to identifying the self with God is direct: God created us. We are not God. Creation had a beginning; only God has existed from eternity. The temptation in Genesis 3:5 promised, “You will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

The distinction between Creator and creation also explains Christianity’s rejection of idols. Paul condemns those who “exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles” in Romans 1:23.

Idolatry calls for repentance. Salvation from that sin comes only through Christ.

Islam presents a different challenge. It has a violent history with Hinduism. It also strongly condemns idolatry. It arose after the Jewish and Christian Scriptures and claims continuity with earlier revelation. Yet it rejects the atonement at the center of the Christian gospel.

Biblical revelation teaches the need for vicarious atonement — a sacrifice on behalf of sinners. In the books of Moses, the Day of Atonement gives this teaching a central place. Passover likewise involves the death of a lamb and the application of its blood so that a household escapes judgment. Christians understand these as signs pointing to Christ, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

Islam rejects Christ’s sacrificial death as the means of salvation. The Quran states in 6:164 that no bearer of burdens will bear another’s burden. Muslims emphasize obedience, repentance, and God’s mercy; Islamic teaching also denies that deeds alone secure entry into paradise. The Christian disagreement concerns how God reconciles sinners to himself: through the atoning death of Christ.

The biblical response is that none of our works can ever save us. Even if we became perfectly obedient today — and most of us can admit we cannot — we would still owe a debt for our past sins. Thinking future obedience can erase those sins is like thinking cutting up your credit cards pays off the balance.

God’s perfect justice and perfect mercy must both hold. Simply overlooking sin would leave justice unsatisfied. At the cross, Christ bears the penalty for sin and offers salvation to sinners who cannot save themselves. God remains just while showing mercy.

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Christianity explains our problem and provides the solution God has given. We need reconciliation with our Creator, and we receive it through Jesus Christ.

Our Hindu and Muslim neighbors may know Christianity chiefly through what their own religious traditions say about it. They may never have read the Bible or heard the gospel explained clearly from Scripture. American Christians can open the Bible with them and make that introduction.

We must prepare for those conversations. Evangelists on social media can make the work look easy, but years of study and practice may stand behind a short video. Read Scripture, understand its teaching, and learn to speak kindly with people who disagree.

Pray for the people you hope to reach. Our duty to share the gospel should lead us to prayer, with fasting when appropriate.

Live the Christian life yourself. You are introducing someone to the true and living God, who offers reconciliation through Jesus Christ. Know that salvation yourself before presuming to explain it to someone else.

Finally, ask questions and listen to the answers. You are speaking with a person. Learn what he believes, what he doubts, and what he understands about Christianity. A religious label cannot tell you all of that.

The religions of the world have come to our neighborhoods. We have the honor of sharing Christ with the people who practice them. We should get to work.

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A Christian guide to trolling without sinning



Donald Trump did not invent political trolling, but he may be its most gifted modern practitioner. His opponents still do not understand the tactic, which is why he runs circles around them. To understand trolling, we must see the larger ideological conflict of our time.

For Christians, trolling poses a serious moral question. It can seem cruel: a digital version of poking someone until he explodes, then laughing at the explosion. It also often involves deception. Does that violate the Ninth Commandment? How can deliberate provocation be reconciled with Christ’s command to “love your neighbor”?

When the guardians of tolerance demand that dissenters be silenced, love may even require a well-placed troll.

The answer begins by defining the term carefully.

The internet term “trolling” appears to draw on fishing, not the monster under the bridge. A fisherman drags bait through the water and waits for a fish to bite. A political troll places rhetorical bait before an opponent and waits for an angry, thoughtless response. The Oxford English Dictionary defines trolling as “posting antagonistic or disingenuous messages to provoke a hostile or annoyed response” and more broadly as behavior “intended to provoke or deceive.”

Political trolling is public mockery meant to elicit a response that exposes a contradiction, wastes an opponent’s time, and strips an ideology of undeserved authority. Legitimate trolling therefore presupposes that some public figures and ideologies deserve public mockery.

An effective troll identifies a contradiction in a public figure or ideology, frames it provocatively, and waits. The target becomes flustered and responds thoughtlessly, confirming the original criticism. Rather than merely accusing an opponent of hypocrisy, the troll induces him to demonstrate it before an audience.

This is not the same as insulting strangers for entertainment. Nor is trolling a license to lie, defame, threaten, or mock private suffering. It is more like misdirection in war or sports, used to confuse an opponent and reveal his weaknesses. No one accuses a quarterback of lying when he fakes a handoff, and no one expects a general to warn the enemy about a surprise attack.

Sun Tzu taught that warfare depends on knowing both your enemy and yourself. Schopenhauer cataloged the rhetorical tricks people use to appear right. The troll draws on both insights, arranging the contest so the opponent reveals his weaknesses to the public and loses respect.

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Christians recognize the distinction between just and unjust wars. Not every use of force is murder, and refusing to defend the innocent is not an act of love.

Rhetorical warfare is also real. Words can deceive, intimidate, indoctrinate, and destroy reputations. Institutions use language to disguise coercion as compassion and discrimination as inclusion.

Not every Christian is called to fight a kinetic war, and not every Christian is called to fight a rhetorical one. Some lack the temperament, position, or skill for public confrontation. That is no disgrace. A soldier without discipline endangers his own side, and so does a would-be internet warrior with a social media account and three cups of coffee.

But Christians cannot pretend that no conflict exists. Christian and anti-Christian visions of God, humanity, sexuality, justice, freedom, and authority compete for control of our institutions. They cannot both prevail. The question is not whether society will be governed by a moral vision, but which moral vision will govern it.

The Bible does not condemn every use of ridicule. Elijah mocked the prophets of Baal, suggesting that their god might be occupied or asleep. Jesus called the scribes and Pharisees “whitewashed tombs.” Public teachers promoting public falsehoods were exposed so their teaching and authority would lose the audience’s respect.

We can identify a pattern for legitimate trolling. Its proper target is a public figure advancing a destructive ideology. Its method is ridicule aimed at hypocrisy. Its immediate purpose is to provoke a revealing response. Its true audience is not the target but the people watching. The goal is to protect the vulnerable from harmful ideologies that lead souls to perdition.

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Publicly exposing the absurdities of ideologies such as critical theory or LGBTQ activism gives those who might be led astray an opportunity to reconsider. Stripping an ideology of its unearned authority can turn the audience toward truth and away from leaders and systems that lead to destruction.

I am not recommending that everyone take up trolling. But we should not treat an ideological war as less consequential than a sporting contest, where teams talk smack and use fake plays and misdirection to win.

When opponents of Christianity seek to censor biblical teaching and replace it with Marxist dialectics and LGBTQ sexual ethics, exposing their public leaders to laughter and ridicule is part of the conflict. Their panicked responses can display their folly. The purpose is to protect the vulnerable and persuade those who recognize the emptiness of the anti-Christian position.

Love of neighbor does not require helping a hypocrite preserve his disguise. Sometimes love requires argument, and argument requires confrontation. Trolling can protect your neighbor from wolves in sheep’s clothing. When the guardians of tolerance demand that dissenters be silenced, love may even require a well-placed troll — and the patience to let your opponent prove your point.

Christian men: God wants us to be meek, not weak



On August 15, two Americans on a UFC fight card said the quiet part out loud.

Prelim winner Tresean Gore had just secured a decision that cost him two front teeth. With a mouth full of blood, he told Joe Rogan that he no longer smoked weed, drank, or watched porn and that Jesus Christ had saved his life and soul.

King Solomon foresaw the day of physical failure: 'If you faint in the day of adversity, your strength is small.'

On the main card, winner Jalin Turner’s first statement to Rogan was also a profession of faith.

Professing athletes are not new. Tim Tebow, Harrison Butker, and the Oklahoma women’s softball team have all said the same thing in public: Prowess and its rewards are not solely their own doing.

Toga-clad therapist

Gore and Turner moved us for a narrower reason. During our Bible study, we had been talking about the decline of masculinity among Christian men. When those men surrender responsible, loyal, trustworthy headship — as Scripture defines it under God the Father and His Son — instead of becoming humble, they disappear, leaving a hole that the spirit of the age fills.

American Christian men have forgotten, or were never taught, that their King was the strongest man who ever walked the earth, physically and spiritually. Jesus is the pattern for both. Following Him should produce men who pursue strength of body as well as strength of soul. Too many church leaders have taught the opposite. They have offered a Jesus who is only mild, never mighty: a toga-clad therapist who affirms all and judges none. That is not the Christ of the Gospels, and it is not the men who preceded and followed Him.

Other than Christ, no man in the Bible is without sin. God shows us these men so we will learn that Christianity requires faith, repentance, and obedience — not a clean record. Adam shifted blame. Samson and David yielded to lust. David’s sin was worse than just appetite: he deceived, murdered, and committed adultery. Scripture hides none of it.

Restored to strength

It also does not hide what these men were and what they did. Blind Samson pulled down a Philistine temple with his hands. David defended his flock against wild animals, then dropped Goliath with a stone. His elite guard, the Gibborim — Josheb, Eleazar, Shammah, Abishai, Benaiah — were remembered in 2 Samuel because they could fight. Four times God tells Joshua to be “strong and courageous.” Joshua then defeats 31 kings on the way to the promised land. God preserved Moses’ vigor at 120 (Deuteronomy 34:7); fed Elijah strength for the desert road (1 Kings 19:7-8); and promised through Isaiah that those who wait on the Lord will not faint (Isaiah 40:29-31).

The God of mercy and love is the same God who trained David’s hands for war and his fingers for battle and helped him bend a bow of bronze (Psalms 18:32-34 and 144:1). In 1 Peter 4:11, the apostle directs all who serve God to do so with the strength that God provides. All these men knew sin, fear, and confusion. Faith restored them to strength and courage for God's glory. It did not restore them to softness.

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The weight of the cross

Then there is Jesus. He walked the land for three years knowing His own people would reject Him and kill Him, and He finished the work. The distances of that ministry are measured in thousands of miles, on foot.

On His last day, He was beaten and scourged, and He marched the Via Dolorosa under a patibulum that likely weighed 65 to 110 pounds. He fell because of pain and blood loss that would put most modern men on the ground before the first step. The contrast is not cute. A church that cannot tell the difference between meekness and weakness will baptize the second and call it discipleship.

We would rather live in the world Jesus describes: among people who worship without shame, who speak of Him as plainly as Tresean Gore and Jalin Turner did, and who pursue the holiness He demands. He is not playing. In the wedding parable of Matthew 22, the man without the garment of faith and repentance is bound and cast into the outer darkness. That is the same Lord who walked those miles.

'Act like men'

So the question is not whether Christian men should be kind. It is whether they will be men. No more porn. No more anesthesia by weed and liquor. No more sexual chaos. Less devotion to entertainment that mocks the faith and more time in churches where men teach what Paul taught: Put your house in order (1 Tim. 3:1-5; Titus 1:5-9 and 2:1-2 and 6-8), and “be watchful, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong” (1 Cor. 16:13).

Drawing on the Old Testament, Jesus does tell His followers to love their enemies and pray for those who persecute them (Matthew 5:44 and Luke 6:27, from Proverbs 24:17 and 25:21 and Exodus 23:4-5).

That command is real. It covers the neighbor who hates you, the official who slanders you, even the man who would harm you. It is not a mediation tip. It is imitation of the Father. It is also not a ban on strength. Prayer for a human enemy does not mean pretending he is harmless, refusing to restrain him, or talking to Satan as if he were your neighbor. Scripture never asks anyone to treat the devil as a prayer partner. It does ask men to resist him, to protect the innocent, and still not let hatred become their creed.

King Solomon foresaw the day of physical failure: “If you faint in the day of adversity, your strength is small” (Proverbs 24:10). The next two verses are the gut punch. If you stand by while people are led away to death, God sees, and He will weigh your cowardice.

This is a day of adversity. American Christian men will come up big or small. They will find their strength in God, or they will keep drawing upon a smaller Jesus who demands nothing of their bodies and their nerve. They should pick up where Tresean Gore and Jalin Turner left off: Believe and profess the truth with blood still in your mouth, and then live as if the truth has hands.

Nick Freitas: Christians can’t afford to stay out of politics anymore



The Western church has stepped back from the political and cultural fights shaping our world — and in a conversation with BlazeTV host Nick Freitas, Christian apologist Frank Turek explains why it’s necessary that changes.

“Why do you think that the church has retreated from what we might more broadly call the political world or even just the cultural fights that we see? Why do you think the Western church in particular seems to have kind of just washed their hands of that fight and not all of them,” Freitas asks Turek.

“We don’t want to say anything offensive because we want people to hear the gospel,” he adds, asking, “Why do you think the West took this position?”

Turek explains that the West “dove into anti-intellectualism about 100 years ago when it didn’t think it could answer Darwin.”


“So instead of engaging the culture, it retreated from the culture and just created its own Bible colleges and seminaries,” he says.

“It’s all blind faith,” he adds.

And Jesus’ own words reveal one of the most powerful reasons Christians should remain engaged in politics rather than turning a blind eye.

“He said, ‘You shall know the truth and the truth will set you free,’” Turek says. “Now, that implies if you don’t have the truth, you’re in bondage. So we have to be engaged. And unfortunately, many in the church think, ‘Oh, we ought not to get involved in politics because that’s going to detract from the gospel.’”

“In fact, when pastors say to me, ‘You know, I don’t get involved in politics, I just preach the gospel.’ I say back to them, ‘I guess you don’t think the gospel is very important then.’ And they say, ‘Well, what do you mean?’ I say, ‘Because politics affects your ability to preach and live the gospel,’” he explains.

“Why don’t you go to North Korea and try and start your church?” he recalls asking. “It’s not going to happen. Why? Because politics affects your ability to preach and live the gospel. That’s number one.”

“Making the Argument with Nick Freitas” is available on BlazeTV+, YouTube, and major podcast platforms.

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This little-known fact changes everything about Jonah and the whale



The story of Jonah and the whale is one of the most well-known stories in all of Scripture. But there’s a hidden historical detail the vast majority of people don’t know, says Lakepointe pastor and “Live Free with Josh Howerton” co-host Carlos Erazo.

In this episode, he shares a little-known fact about the pagan city of Nineveh that will change the way you think not only about the story of Jonah and the fish that swallowed him but also about God, who he says never wastes a single detail.

Most people, even many non-Christians, know the basics of Jonah’s story: He was an Israelite prophet whom God commanded to go to the wicked city of Nineveh and warn it of coming judgment, giving the pagans who lived there a chance to repent before God destroyed their city. Wanting judgment, not mercy, to fall upon the Ninevites, Jonah refused God’s command and fled on a ship.

God sent a violent storm, and the sailors, knowing Jonah was the cause of God’s wrath, threw him overboard, where he was swallowed by a giant fish. For three days, he remained in the beast’s belly until it spit him out on dry land. Repentant, Jonah went to Nineveh, where the people believed God, turned from their violence, and were spared from divine judgment.

“That's basically the whole story. ... It's a short book,” says Erazo, “but there's something more happening behind the scenes that a lot of people have no idea.”

He explains that Nineveh was the capital of the Assyrian Empire — a military superpower in Jonah’s day and Israel’s mortal enemy.

“If you know a little bit about the culture, Mesopotamia back in the day, it would be a polytheistic culture, which means that they would have a lot of different gods, little g pagan gods, that they would worship,” says Erazo.

One of those gods was named Oannes. Ancient art and writing describes him as a man-like being with a fish’s head and tail who comes out of the water to teach people divine wisdom.

Erazo displays a picture of an ancient stone relief of Oannes. He is depicted as a bearded man with a fish head and skin worn as a cloak.

“It looks like it's a man with a fish on top, or you could say a man coming out of a fish,” he says.

“If you were a pagan fisherman at the time, and you're kind of out there doing your thing at the coast ... and all of a sudden you see this fish literally come out, and there's this man coming out of the mouth of the fish, and he's out there preaching repentance in the name of this deity, in the name of God, and all of a sudden people are listening to this,” he tells fellow pastor and co-host Paul Cunningham.

Erazo explains that there’s speculation that Jonah was received by the Ninevites because he initially appeared as Oannes coming out of the sea to share wisdom.

“But at some point, they would have realized, ‘Hey, actually this is not one of these little g gods. This is the real God revealing Himself, giving us wisdom and telling us that if we don't repent, He will destroy us in judgment,”’ he notes.

This fascinating historical detail, says Erazo, is an example of how free will and God’s sovereignty beautifully co-exist.

“Jonah may have been running from God, but he was never outside of the sovereignty of God,” he says.

“God knew from the very beginning that Jonah was going to be swallowed by a fish, and he was going to spend three days and three nights inside the fish, which would be a prophetic sign for the Messiah,” he continues, highlighting how Jonah’s three days and three nights in the whale before emerging to save the Ninevites parallel Jesus’ time in the grave before His resurrection that would save humanity from eternal damnation.

“The whole process of him rebelling and running away from God and eventually repenting and obeying God, God knew He was going to use that testimony, that story, that experience, and eventually He was going to use all of that for the people to hear the gospel. ... With God, no detail is ever wasted,” Erazo beams.

To hear more, watch the episode above.

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