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“Signs of a true revival have been piling up lately” · The Daily Article

• 0:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: Greetings and welcome to the daily article podcast from Denison Forum.
• 0:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: Today is Tuesday, November 25th, 2025, and today's daily article is written by friend and cultural theologian Dr. Jim Denison.
• 0:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: As we focus on gratitude this Thanksgiving week, let's consider a recent article in the Atlantic that offers surprising encouragement about evangelical Christianity.
• 0:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: Spencer Cornabre reports, signs of a true revival have been piling up lately.
• 0:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: After years of decline, church attendance has leveled and might even be climbing.
• 0:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: TikTok brims with Christian chorus, thatics, and treadwives.
• 0:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: an administration whose millennial vice president converted to Catholicism just six years ago is pushing explicitly theological policy crusades.
• 0:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: And the musical middle-age has gone mega-churchy, filling the Billboard Hot 100 with country-tinged redemption tales and actual worship songs.
• 1:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: In quote.
• 1:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: The rest of the article focuses on a new album by Rosalia, a singer-core neighbor describes as a Catalan superstar.
• 1:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: In the album, she, quote, adopts the sound and ambition of a classical or a Torio to mirror the modern quest for salvation in all its thrilling and frustrating contours.
• 1:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: Cornever writes, the question of what we believe about our souls and what that belief demands is more serious than lifestyle fans or partisan politics allow for.
• 1:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: I completely agree.
• 1:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: However, Cornever then concludes, embracing that search, Rosalie approaches can be as significant as having an answer.
• 1:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: This is an assertion we need to discuss today for reasons that far
• 1:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: In his book, why we believe finding meaning in uncertain times, Oxford theologian Alistair McGrath, sites evidence that the active believing can for a significant benefit such as giving structural life, providing reassurance, reducing anxiety, and facilitating social integration, in quote.
• 2:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: This is good news, since we're believers by nature, the Notre Dame sociologist Christian Smith writes, all human beings are believers,
• 2:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: not knowers who know with certitude.
• 2:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: Everything we know is grounded on presuppose beliefs that cannot be verified with more fundamental proof or certainty that provides us assurance that they are true.
• 2:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: This is just as true for atheists as for religious adherents.
• 2:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: There is no universal, rational foundation upon which induitively certain knowledge can be built.
• 2:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: All human knowledge is built on believing.
• 2:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: That is the human condition, in quote.
• 2:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: However, when we practice our beliefs through religious activities such as prayer, Bible study, worship, and other spiritual disciplines, we seem to experience especially noteworthy benefits.
• 2:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: For years, scientific research has documented the positive effects of religious observance, from mental health and social stability, to charitable giving, civic engagement, and overall wellness, the pattern is clear.
• 3:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: Engaging in religious practices is good for us.
• 3:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: So we can be thankful for the increase in religiosity Spencer Cornabre and others are reporting these days.
• 3:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: As Cornabre notes, embracing the search for spiritual meaning, produces significant benefits.
• 3:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: But can these benefits be as significant as having an answer?
• 3:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: I went for my early morning walk yesterday, 90 minutes before the rain was predicted to begin in our area.
• 3:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: 10 minutes later, it started to rain.
• 3:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: By the time I made it back home, I was drenched.
• 3:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: The thought occurred to me, humans are better at predicting and controlling what we create than what we do not.
• 3:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: Mechanics can predict the performance of cars more effectively than meteorologists can predict the weather because people make cars, but God makes nature.
• 3:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: Doctors can do much to treat the diseases of bodies made by our creator, but medical science ultimately cannot prevent death.
• 4:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: Only God can.
• 4:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: There are clear benefits to the practice of religion, just as there are benefits to walking in nature or visiting in our gallery.
• 4:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: Similarly, an attitude of gratitude lowers the stress hormone cortisol and increases the feel-good hormones, like dopamine and serotonin.
• 4:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: But the greatest benefit of Thanksgiving, like the greatest benefit of religious practice, comes not from the act, but from its object.
• 4:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: Paul assured us in 2 Corinthians 5 verse 17, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.
• 4:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: The oldest past away, behold, the new has come.
• 4:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: Notice that the apostle did not say if anyone is in the church or if anyone is in Bible study.
• 4:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: His Greek phrase translated in Christ means located within or connected directly to Christ.
• 4:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: But it's a means to the end of knowing its author, personally, stated in John 20 vs 30 and 31.
• 5:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: Refrencing Isaiah 6 vs 1-8, worship is transforming to the degree that we focus our hearts on the audience of one and are odd by him.
• 5:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: As we noted yesterday, our ultimate purpose in life is becoming light-Christ referencing Romans 8 verse 29.
• 5:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: However, the power to know him in a transforming way is found not in us, but in him.
• 5:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: He alone has the ability to defeat our temptations, pardon our sins, heal our deepest hurts, and empower our faithful service.
• 5:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: When we seek to know the living Lord Jesus intimately, he makes us like himself and continues his ministry in the world through us.
• 5:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: As Paul testified in Philippians 4, verse 13, Eugene James Version, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.
• 5:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: But only then, the famed investor Warren Buffett is retiring at years in and recently wrote his farewell letter to shareholders in it he advised, quote, decide what you would like your obituary to say and live the life to deserve it."
• 6:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: In quote, I want my obituary to say, he lived to no Christ and make him known.
• 6:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: What do you want yours to say?