Latest / The Daily Article / US-Iran agreement to be signed in Switzerland on Friday
Transcript
- 0:02[SPEAKER_00]: Good day, it's Wednesday, June the 17th, 2026.
- 0:05[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome to Denison Forum's daily article podcast.
- 0:09[SPEAKER_00]: Today's article is written by co-founder and chief vision officer, Dr. Jim Denison, and narrated by yours truly, Chris Elkins.
- 0:18[SPEAKER_00]: President Trump said that he hoped the war with Iran would soon be in the rearview mirror.
- 0:24[SPEAKER_00]: According to Switzerland's foreign ministry, the U.S. Iran memorandum will be formally signed at the Boogan stock resort, Lake Lucerne, on Friday.
- 0:33[SPEAKER_00]: In the meantime, hundreds are weighing in on the agreement in what it means.
- 0:37[SPEAKER_00]: The Wall Street Journal headline, Trump's stages in Iranian retreat.
- 0:42[SPEAKER_00]: According to the Atlantic, Trump celebrates while America capitulates.
- 0:46[SPEAKER_00]: By contrast, Fox News headline, President Trump praised for agreement with Iran amid some skepticism.
- 0:53[SPEAKER_00]: Fox News also quoted a U.S. Army Special Forces veteran who predicted the deal will create a new Middle East.
- 1:02[SPEAKER_00]: However, poor and policy opined, everyone lost the war with Iran.
- 1:07[SPEAKER_00]: As I noted yesterday, Iran has been a constant and deadly threat to Israel, the U.S. and the West since the 1979 Revolution brought Islamic hardliners to power.
- 1:18[SPEAKER_00]: Whatever we think of the latest negotiations, however, there is a fact concerning Iranians that we should bear in mind today.
- 1:25[SPEAKER_00]: My wife and I were visiting recently with a wise older friend on our walking path.
- 1:30[SPEAKER_00]: Her husband also walked our path regularly before his death.
- 1:33[SPEAKER_00]: As we talked about him, she made a statement I have pondered since.
- 1:38[SPEAKER_00]: A person dies twice if, after their death, their memory is lost.
- 1:43[SPEAKER_00]: We assured her that her husband would have no such second death.
- 1:47[SPEAKER_00]: My father's birthday was last Saturday.
- 1:49[SPEAKER_00]: He would have been 102 years old.
- 1:51[SPEAKER_00]: For many years, each birthday after his death at the age of 55 was a time of grief for me as I thought of all the years he missed.
- 2:00[SPEAKER_00]: But as time passed, his birthday became less a marker of sadness since he likely would have not lived to that age.
- 2:08[SPEAKER_00]: It never occurs to me that he would have lived to 90 or to 100.
- 2:13[SPEAKER_00]: Now I remember his birthday less with sorrow over his death than with gratitude for his life.
- 2:20[SPEAKER_00]: And what I remember most is what he did, not what he said.
- 2:24[SPEAKER_00]: I remember time together repairing old cars, the only kind we could afford, seeing him in the audience at my music performances, and the many days when his health was difficult, but he never complained.
- 2:37[SPEAKER_00]: The Portuguese priest, St. Anthony of Padua, died in 1231 on the same date as my father's birth in 1924.
- 2:45[SPEAKER_00]: Anthony was a brilliant theologian and fearless preacher, more cities and places around the world are named after him than any other saint.
- 2:54[SPEAKER_00]: He noted, quote, the man who has filled with the Holy Spirit speaks in different languages.
- 3:00[SPEAKER_00]: These different languages are different ways of witnessing to Christ, such as humility, poverty, patience, and obedience.
- 3:08[SPEAKER_00]: We speak in those languages when we reveal in ourselves those virtues to others.
- 3:14[SPEAKER_00]: Action speak louder than words.
- 3:16[SPEAKER_00]: Let your words teach and your action speak.
- 3:19[SPEAKER_00]: It is useless for a man to flaunt his knowledge of the law if he undermines its teachings by his actions.
- 3:26[SPEAKER_00]: In quote, James agreed.
- 3:28[SPEAKER_00]: Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.
- 3:32[SPEAKER_00]: James 2 verse 17.
- 3:34[SPEAKER_00]: However, while action speak louder than words, there are some truths that can only be communicated through words, including the gospel.
- 3:42[SPEAKER_00]: A church sign in our area says a Christian preaches by what he does, not by what he says.
- 3:49[SPEAKER_00]: All with disagree, asking from Romans 10 verse 14, how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard?
- 3:56[SPEAKER_00]: And how are they to hear without someone preaching?
- 4:00[SPEAKER_00]: Last week, I quoted the film critic Roger Ebert, who said, all I require of a religion is that it not insist I believe in it.
- 4:08[SPEAKER_00]: He added, I know a priest, a lovely man, whose eyes twinkle when he says, you go about God's work in your way, and I'll go about it in his.
- 4:18[SPEAKER_00]: with all due respect to the priest.
- 4:20[SPEAKER_00]: That's not good enough.
- 4:21[SPEAKER_00]: If Roger Ebert had a deadly cancer that I were an ecologist who knew his dire condition and could save him from it, what word would describe my unwillingness to share what I know?
- 4:33[SPEAKER_00]: This brings us back to the Iranians.
- 4:36[SPEAKER_00]: There are more than 92 billion of them.
- 4:39[SPEAKER_00]: While the underground Christian movement in Iran is the fastest growing church in the world, it presently includes less than 1% of the country.
- 4:48[SPEAKER_00]: If we blame the people for their government and do not pray for their salvation and for Iranian Christians who can speak the truth of the gospel to them, this says less about them than it does about us.
- 4:59[SPEAKER_00]: by contrast, if we agree for their lossness and intercede for their eternal souls, we join Jesus as He does both today.
- 5:08[SPEAKER_00]: And if we embrace the opportunity to share our Lord with our neighbor, we obey both great commandments found in Matthew 22 verses 37 through 39 at once.
- 5:20[SPEAKER_00]: According to Jesus in Luke 6, verse 45, out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.
- 5:27[SPEAKER_00]: What will your words say about your heart today?