Gonna tell y’all something. You better have a plan. If you think you’re gonna make it through this cultural climate unscathed, you’re crazy. Leave your mind unprotected, it’ll be a mudhole. Your heart, hate-infested. You’ll be mad constantly. Foul-mouthed. Unforgiving. Merciless.

You’ll get where you thrive on the failure & shame of others. You’ll like it. Seek it. You won’t be able to look away from it. Anxiety will eat you alive. We cannot rewrite the book. There’s no new way to abundant life in a dying world. The systems are broken. They won’t save us.

People of Jesus must return to Jesus. To the simplicity of wholehearted devotion. To spiritual disciplines of prayer, Bible reading, fasting, giving. To losing our lives in Christ so we can find them. The good life still comes from living the Jesus-life. It’s love & self-giving.

It will never be anything else. There is no new gospel. But make no mistake, there’s nothing this world has ever come up with to match the gospel. I’ve never had less confidence in people including the person in my mirror. But I’ve never had more confidence in Jesus & his gospel.