In an age where the church has taken much ground, but failed in the last hour to fulfill the Great Commission, perhaps the record of Israel’s prior failure will be of help to us in understanding our times—and what we ought to do.

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As with all sanctification, the pursuit of happiness is already and not yet. It is a forward-looking anticipation of the perfection we already have in Christ, which will become ours when we are glorified. By faith, we anticipate the perfect bliss of eternal union with God, but we also know we already are united to him in Christ. And so we seek to participate in that union now, as practice for what will become fully ours then.

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As Western civilization collapses, Western Christians are struggling for identity. For some, the pendulum is swinging from woke radical individualism to ethnic allegiances. But without recovering these natural bonds as covenantal categories, we are trading one form of identity politics for another. To rightly order the bonds of blood and soil, they must ultimately be fitted together under the covenantal arche of Christ.

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How can it be true that “ask ye whatever ye may wish, and it shall come to be for you,” when our prayers so frequently go unanswered? The answer is that we do not pray as we ought—either continually enough, persistently enough, or with true faith: i.e., a living participation in Christ, discerning what God desires in him.

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Though we seek continually to work out our salvation through righteous deeds, we often fall. How can we not be discouraged? By clinging to Christ, even in failure and humiliation—because in doing so, we share in his victory.

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It is impossible to become like Christ without being attached to his body, just as it is impossible for your finger to keep reflecting your will and intention if it is cut from your hand. Outside the church there is no ordinary possibility of salvation. The transformation of our minds is therefore not just a question of “what am I becoming,” but also fundamentally, “what are we becoming?”

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IVF violates three different biblical laws: (1) gross negligence, as many embryos die; (2) adultery, by introducing a third party into the sex act; (3) presumption, by creating life without the certainty of birth.

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Cretans are liars, sluggards and gluttons—and from this, Paul infers that they will desire to go after fables and myths. Why? Because they want to waste themselves on consumption, without care for whether it is false. Unfortunately, social media algorithms and on-demand entertainment is now shaping us all into Cretans.

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The consumerism of our age shapes our souls, by instant gratification, to covetousness and impatience. These are antithetical to contentment and faith, and leave us numb. The biblical remedy is not to ascetically resist the urge to indulge—but rather to reorder our desires toward God. Fasting teaches us how to do this.

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Scripture has much to say about the happiness of those who consume God’s word. But how should we understand this, when antidepressant usage is common among Christians and non-Christians alike? Part of the answer is that biblical happiness is not a feeling, but an action of faith ordering the affections.

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