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The Fed rate cut and the “Charlie effect” on church attendance · The Daily Article

• 0:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: Greetings on this Thursday, September the 18th, 2025.
• 0:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: Welcome to Dinnison forums, daily article podcast.
• 0:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm narrator Chris Elkins, giving voice to today's daily article podcast, written by our cultural theologian, Dr. Jim Dinnison.
• 0:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: After days filled with hard news, let's take time today for some good news in the bad news.
• 0:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: The bad news is that the Federal Reserve is growing more concerned about the health of the nation's labor market.
• 0:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: The good news is that the Dow Jones rose 260 points yesterday after the central bank cut its key interest rate by a quarter point and projected that it would cut rates twice more this year.
• 0:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: The bad news is that the bad news is prompting asteroid economics in which consumers spend with abandoned because they sense destruction is coming.
• 0:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: The good news is that consumer spending is keeping pace with inflation and driving the economy.
• 1:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: The horrible news of Charlie Kirk's assassination last week brought good news last Sunday.
• 1:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: His death reportedly brought thousands of people to church.
• 1:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: A faith research that's being called the Charlie Effect.
• 1:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: Now let's look for good news in bad news on a deeper cultural level.
• 1:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: One that offers hope for our collective future and our individual souls.
• 1:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: In a brilliant analysis of our cultural moment, Clemson political science professor C Bradley Thompson writes that, quote, the moral culture of Western civilization is unraveling before our eyes.
• 1:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: He cites two tragedies in the news to make his point.
• 1:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: First, he explains the assassination of Charlie Kirk in light of the conservative activist debate slogan,
• 1:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: According to Dr. Thompson, quote, it means first that he appealed to reason, objectivity, and logic, and he encouraged his interlocutors to do the same.
• 2:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: It also means that Charlie recognized right from wrong, truth and untruth, good and bad.
• 2:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: He believed that honest men and women could reason their way to moral and political truths.
• 2:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: These are the core values and principles of Western civilization,
• 2:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: Next, Thompson notes that murder a few weeks ago of Ukrainian immigrant Iran as a Rutska on a light rail train in Charlotte, North Carolina, quote.
• 2:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: Three things stand out about this heinous murder.
• 2:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: First was the utter savagery of the attack.
• 2:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: Second was the unbearable sadness on Uranus face when she realized what had just happened to her, and third was the fact that no fewer than five people were sitting within sight of Uranus did nothing to help her.
• 2:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: They just sat there and watched her dime.
• 2:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: Uranus eruteska died alone surrounded by people, in quote.
• 3:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: According to Dr. Thompson, these tragedies typify the nihilism of our day, the abandonment of objective meaning and morality.
• 3:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: What is left is the will to personal power, a drive in which the end justifies the means.
• 3:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: Charlie Kirk's alleged assassin justified killing him by claiming that he, quote, spreads too much hate.
• 3:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: The person who allegedly stabbed Iran as a roots get a death that was a black man who said as he walked away, I got that white girl, I got that white girl.
• 3:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: When nihilism reigns, everyone can be its next victim.
• 3:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: You're probably wondering how to find the good news in this bad news.
• 3:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: Here it is, courtesy of a Nigerian English rapper podcaster and Oxford graduate, who is known by the stage name of Zubi.
• 3:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: He posted perceptively to X. Many people come to believe that God is real after realizing that
• 4:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: Satan is real, in quote, when our enemy comes to steel and kill and destroy, noted in John 10, verse 10, evil becomes objectively real and objectively wrong.
• 4:13
  [SPEAKER_00]: This proves that reality and morality are in fact objective.
• 4:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: It makes the point that if Satan is real, God must be real.
• 4:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: And it shows us that we need the latter to defeat the former.
• 4:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: After Charlie Kirk's murder, we've heard it said often that Jesus is our only hope.
• 4:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: Is this true?
• 4:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: Consider four things Jesus does that know other person in human history has ever done.
• 4:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: When we are tempted, Hebrews 218 teaches us because Jesus Himself has suffered when tempted, He is able to help those who are being tempted.
• 4:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: In His strength, we can defeat every temptation we face, according to 1 Corinthians 10, verse 13.
• 5:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: When we suffer, Romans 8, verse 35, promises us that nothing shall separate us from the love of Christ,
• 5:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: continuing in verse 37, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.
• 5:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: As my friend Dr. Dwayne Brooks writes, we are safe in the storm even if we are not safe from the storm.
• 5:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: Third, when we lack purpose, because we are the body of Christ in the world today revealed in 1 Corinthians 12 verse 27, Jesus continues his earthly ministry through us and
• 5:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: who ever believes in me will also do the works that I do.
• 5:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: And fourth, when we face death in that moment, only Jesus promised, I will come again and will take you to myself that where I am, you may be also promised in John 14, verse three.
• 5:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: A church sign I saw this week says, death merely delivers a Christian to Jesus.
• 6:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: who else besides Jesus empowers us to defeat temptation, sustains us as we suffer, works through us in this world, and then transports us safely to the world to come.
• 6:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: The fourth century Saint John Christostom testified.
• 6:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: The waters have risen and severe storms are upon us, but we do not fear drowning for we stand firmly upon a rock.
• 6:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: Let the sea rage.
• 6:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: It cannot break the rock.
• 6:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: Let the waves rise.
• 6:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: They cannot sink the boat of Jesus.
• 6:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: I have his promise.
• 6:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: I am surely not going to rely on my own strength.
• 6:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: I have what he has written.
• 6:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: That is my staff, my security, my peaceful harbor.
• 6:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: Let the world be in upheaval.
• 6:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: I hold to his promise and read his message that is my protecting wall and garrison.
• 6:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: What message?
• 6:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: know that I am with you always until the end of the world.
• 7:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: Though the waves and the sea and the anger of princes are aroused against me, they are less to me than a spider's web.
• 7:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: This is my strong tower, my immovable rock, my staff that never gives way.
• 7:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: If God wants something, let it be done.
• 7:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: If he wants me to stay here, I am grateful.
• 7:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: But wherever he wants me to be, I am no less grateful.
• 7:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: Christostum, therefore asked, if Christ is for me, whom shall I fear?
• 7:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: The fact is, Christ is for you.
• 7:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: Right now, this very moment.
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  [SPEAKER_00]: Whom shall you fear today?