For many, apologetics is associated with arguments over rational, philosophical proofs. It’s a matter of the head instead of the heart, a debate over facts instead of feelings. But no matter what kind of apologetics you practice, you’re arguing according to a certain set of rules, in a particular language, attuned to what you expect to resonate in your time and place. In other words, it’s always cultural, never purely timeless. And it’s never purely rational.

We need to recover apologetics as a matter of the heart and hands as well as the head. We need to recover apologetics as a project for the whole church and not just for those who enjoy arguing. What we call cultural apologetics is not a new academic discipline. It’s a means to reconnect the church to the best biblical and historical resources for presenting and defending the faith “once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 3).

That’s the vision behind a new book, The Gospel After Christendom: An Introduction to Cultural Apologetics, which I edited for Zondervan Reflective and The Keller Center for Cultural Apologetics. I’m joined now by two of the contributors, both fellows for The Keller Center. Josh Chatraw is the Billy Graham chair for evangelism and cultural engagement here at Beeson Divinity School in Birmingham, Alabama. Visiting us here at Beeson this week is Christopher Watkin, associate professor of French and Francophone studies at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia.

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In This Episode

02:00 — Apologetics as Cultural: Head, Heart, and Hands
03:00 — Biblical Models for Cultural Apologetics
05:10 — Retrieval: Learning from Church History
09:16 — Augustine, Rome, and Biblical Critical Theory
13:00 — Diagonal Thinking, Third-Way Debates, and Politics
16:00 — Confrontational vs. Winsome Apologetics
20:00 — How Jesus Engaged Different People
26:00 — Apologetics for the Whole Church and for Pastors
34:00 — Retrieval Models: Pascal, Montaigne, and Modern Idols
41:00 — Audience Q&A: Out-Narrating, Doubt, Catholicism, Facts vs. Heart Issues
51:46 — Closing Reflections

Resources Mentioned

• The Gospel After Christendom by Collin Hansen, Ivan Mesa, & Skyler Flowers
• Telling a Better Story by Josh Chatraw
• Biblical Critical Theory by Christopher Watkin
• City of God by Augustine
• Confronting Christianity Podcast with Rebecca McLaughlin
• The Speak Life Podcast with Glen Scrivener
• Truth Unites Podcast with Gavin Ortlund

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If gender is constructed, it can be deconstructed. Think about it: if we built it, we can tear it down. Now you know why some activists have been so determined to convince us that gender is something we assign, rather than something we receive. If we assign it, then we can reassign it as we wish. We don’t receive our bodies. We can remake our bodies.

No doubt you’ve observed the rise of transgender theory in Western culture. It’s the denial that the sexed body reveals and determines the gendered self. That’s the helpful summary we find in the excellent new book The Body God Gives: A Biblical Response to Transgender Theory, written by Robert Smith.

Smith is an ordained Anglican minister and lecturer in theology, ethics, and music ministry at Sydney Missionary and Bible College in Australia. He’s written two previous books on gender and identity. This new book by Lexham (now Baker) gives you a little bit of everything. He breaks down the arguments of gender theorists. He guides readers on a who’s who of philosophers who built the intellectual foundations of the secular West: Descartes, Rousseau, Kant, Marx, Wittgenstein, Freud, Sartre, Derrida, Foucault.

And he concludes with biblical argumentation to show us nobody is born in the wrong body. He writes, “God’s desire for my gender is revealed by the design of my body.” I appreciate the way he harmonizes the biblical story from Genesis to Revelation: “Our present task is to work with the grain of creation toward the goal of new creation.”

Rob joins me on Gospelbound to talk transgender theory, how it spread, why it’s peaked, and where evangelicals need to go next.

In This Episode

02:00 – Introducing Rob Smith & The Body God Gives

04:30 – The Transgender Tipping Point

06:21 – Butler, Foucault, and Gender Theory

11:21 – Queer Theory vs. Trans Theory

16:50 – Signs of Peak Transgender Influence

21:47 – Sex, Gender, and Stereotypes

29:00 – Church Culture and Gender Expectations

30:24 – Children, Puberty, and Medical Debate

33:30 – Technology, Identity, and Disembodiment

39:38 – Genesis 1–2 and Embodied Identity

46:37 – Marriage, Singleness, and Biblical Continuity

51:16 – Pastoring Those with Gender Dysphoria

56:00 – Violence, Fear, and Identity Conflicts

01:00:00 – Expressive Individualism and the Modern Self

Resources Mentioned

• The Body God Gives: A Biblical Response to Transgender Theory by Rob Smith
• Why Are Black Women Increasingly Identifying as Bisexual? by Joe Carter

––––

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In this commentary, I reflect on my recent trip to Copenhagen, Denmark, and the broader implications of living in the post-Christendom West. Walking the ancient streets and talking to seasoned church leaders I pondered two major factors that contribute to secularism, and how Protestantism has become a victim of its own success. Yet some European countries and U.S. regions buck the secular trend. Why? Considering the story of secularism—and resilient Christianity—helps us pass down a robust, durable faith to the next generation.

———

In This Episode

04:00 – Faith and decadence on Copenhagen’s streets

08:00 – From opt-out to opt-in belief

12:00 – America’s exception and slow convergence

18:00 – Faith thrives under tension

23:00 – The problem with establishment

30:00 – Reform, burnout, and secular substitutes

36:00 – Postwar humanism and its cracks

45:00 – Reality intrudes on secular optimism

49:00 – Three pressures on secularism and gospel hope

Resources Mentioned

• Graph of Religious Importance and Corresponding GDP
• Graph of Religious Attendance in the US and Europe
• A Secular Age by Charles Taylor
• Destroyer of the gods by Larry W. Hurtado
• Dominion by Tom Holland
• The Age of Hitler and How We Will Survive It by Alec Ryrie
• The Abolition of Man by C.S. Lewis

———

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Imagine you could save your life through one simple, regular act. You wouldn’t always want to do it. Every week you’d come up with multiple excuses. The night before would often be a struggle. Same with the morning before. Every time you finish you feel refreshed, energized, eager to undertake that day’s agenda. But then when it came time to do it again, somehow you’d still struggle to do it.

Ok. I don’t know what comes to mind for you. Maybe the gym. Maybe a quiet time of Bible reading and prayer. Maybe a call or meeting with a family member or friend. But I’m talking about church and a new book by Rebecca McLaughlin, How Church Could (Literally) Save Your Life, published by Crossway and TGC.

Rebecca is widely known to Gospelbound viewers and listeners as author of several of the most encouraging and successful books in TGC history, including Confronting Christianity, The Secular Creed, and Jesus through the Eyes of Women. She’s also a fellow with The Keller Center for Cultural Apologetics. She returns to Gospelbound to discuss the life-changing research on what makes church good for your health.

In This Episode

04:30 – What Makes Church Unique

08:00 – How many modern moral values come directly from Christianity

16:00 – Real Benefits, Real Belief

23:00 – The Church as Family

30:00 – Sharing Faith in a Skeptical World

45:00 – Healing from Church Hurt

48:00 – A Practical Vision for Believers

Guest Resources

• How Church Could Literally Save Your Life by Rebecca McLaughlin
• Rebbeca’s Website
• Confronting Christianity Podcast
• Follow Rebecca

——

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When I see whiffle ball, and I hear the piano, I know we’re probably doing ok as a family. And when I turn on the news and see what Meta has been programming AI to engage in sensual conversations with children, I don’t feel bad about keeping my children away from social media.

I wouldn’t have my job if not for social media. I’ve learned a lot. I’ve made and maintained many friends. I would miss social media. But I’m glad I had a childhood without it. Just a computer with internet contributed to enough problems.

If we as parents could see what our children see on social media, we wouldn’t hesitate to keep them away. That’s why Clare Morell calls for a tech exit: “no smartphones, social media, tablets, or video games during childhood.”

Morell is a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and director of its Technology and Human Flourishing Project. You met her husband earlier this year on Gospelbound as Caleb Morell wrote about the history of Capitol Hill Baptist Church.

In her book The Tech Exit: A Practical Guide to Freeing Kids and Teens from Smartphones, Clare says we’ve reached a tipping point in the fight against letting smartphones take over childhood. The key is preserving something better, something more valuable: the chance for our children to contribute to their family and community, to enjoy the bonds of families and the boundaries of neighborhoods. Clare writes, “It turns out that screens cost children more than just their time; they also cause them to lose their appetite for things of the real world.”

In This Episode

00:00 – Why kids need a “tech exit” in the age of AI chatbots

02:52 – Addictive by design: dopamine, algorithms, and broken parental controls

08:42 – Christian hope and human flourishing: forming persons, not consumers

15:20 – The five-step family plan for smartphone-free childhood

22:52 – Policy momentum: bans, age restrictions, and global lessons

32:33 – Practical guidance for families, churches, and schools

45:24 – Parents as models: rhythms, phone boxes, and screen-free community

Mentioned Resources

• The Tech Exit: A Practical Guide to Freeing Kids and Teens from Smartphones by Clare Morell
• Clare's Substack
• More from Clare
• Alternative “tools-only” phones:
  • Bark
  • Gabb
  • Pinwheel
  • Wisephone

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“Does it feel like you should be happy, you want to be happy, and you try to be happy, but somehow you can’t?”

What a simple, common, yet poignant question. It’s in the preface to the new book Everything Is Never Enough: Ecclesiastes’ Surprising Path to Resilient Happiness, written by Bobby Jamieson. He is the senior pastor of Trinity Baptist Church in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. He earned his PhD from the University of Cambridge and previously served on the pastoral staff of Capitol Hill Baptist Church.

This is a book about happiness that explains you’re probably looking for it in all the wrong places. Jamieson brings us into the world of Ecclesiastes and its enigmatic author, Qohelet, the world of hevel, or absurdity. His inspired words help us see our biggest problem with life is death. The epitome of pride is believing we can overcome it. We’ll never be happy until we surrender in humility to its inevitability.

Jamieson guides us through three stories that guide on a life well lived: the contentment of limits, the joys of resonance, and happiness you can’t lose in this world because it comes from another. He helps us see, “Happiness is not striving for gain from life but receiving life itself as a gift.”

In This Episode

00:00 – Introducing Everything Is Never Enough

05:30 – Who is the Preacher of Ecclesiastes?

07:00 – Vanity, absurdity, and the search for meaning

13:30 – Modern thinkers on money, time, and ambition

22:00 – How Ecclesiastes shaped Jamieson’s life and ministry

35:00 – Preaching Ecclesiastes and pointing to Christ

Mentioned Resources

• Everything Is Never Enough: Ecclesiastes’ Surprising Path to Resilient Happiness
• Hartmut Rosa, The Uncontrollability of the World
• Byung-Chul Han, The Burnout Society
• Michael Sandel, What Money Can’t Buy
• Andy Crouch, The Life We’re Looking For
• C. S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

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Music and family have always been connected for me. My grandfather taught me the Christian faith largely through our Welsh heritage of signing. Shortly before he died, our family gathered around the piano as my mother played and we sang many of his favorites from the Methodist hymnal. Every night with my own family we open the hymnal and sing some of these famous Welsh hymns, including “Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah.” The great Methodist hymn writer Charles Wesley wrote “Jesus, Lover of My Soul,” commonly set to the Welsh tune “Aberystwyth” (a-ber-ist-with). If you’re a fan of the TV show The Crown, you’ll recognize this song from the episode “Aberfan.”

So you can see I’m partial to the old hymns. But unfortunately, we’ve worn out the binding on my old Methodist hymnal. And when I’m singing with my family, I want to include some newer songs they sing in church, songs that have played such a big role in my own generation’s faith: songs like “In Christ Alone,” “Speak O Lord,” and “The Lord Is My Salvation,” written by Keith Getty, my guest on this episode of Gospelbound.

We’re talking about one of the most anticipated releases I can remember, the brand-new Sing! Hymnal, published with Crossway. In their introduction, Keith and his wife Kristyn write, “Hymns are the heart language of the church, used to sing truth to the Lord and to one another in every season of the soul. This has always been the way. . . . Our hymns hold us, inspire us, comfort us—and form us.”

You know Keith Getty as songwriter of some of your most beloved songs. A choir director. A musician. A movement leader. Hopefully you’ve sung with Keith and Kristyn at one of several TGC national conferences. He joins me today on Gospelbound to discuss changes in church music, liturgy, and the legacy of this hymnal.

Learn More About the Sing! Hymnal

• Singhymnal.com

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In a special crossover episode of The Everyday Pastorand Gospelbound, Wesley Huff joins Lig, Matt, and Collin to discuss the role of apologetics in pastoral ministry. How can pastors excel in giving a compelling reason for the hope within us—and train others to do the same? Drawing from both academic expertise and personal experience, Huff offers various cautions and tips for everyday pastors and believers. He shares examples of good apologists today, recommends books, and answers a lightning round of classic objections to the Christian faith.

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