Gospelbound

Is there a fate worse than condemnation?  Yes, say Allen Guelzo and James Hankins in their new textbook, The Golden Thread: A History of the Western Tradition: Volume II: The Modern and Contemporary West. Worse than everyone hating you is no one remembering you.   Right now for Western civilization, the former is leading to the latter. Having been widely condemned as oppressive, imperialist, colonizing, and appropriating, Western civilization is sometimes not even taught, let alone celebrated for producing the moral, technological, political, economic, and lifestyle achievements that give shape to our world. The Golden Thread helps in remembering and teaching without ignoring the failures and shortcomings of Western civilization. The textbook collaborators Guelzo and Hankins have been acquainted for more than 50 years. Hankins wrote volume one, and Guelzo has written volume two. Guelzo is the Thomas W. Smith Distinguished Research Scholar and director of the James Madison Program’s Initiative on Politics and Statesmanship at Princeton University. Guelzo is a long-time favorite writer of mine, not least for his work on the American Civil War and Abraham Lincoln, for which he last appeared on Gospelbound in 2024. I’m honored to host him again as we commemorate the 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States, one of the hinge points in Western civilization in that memorable year of 1776. In This Episode: 00:00 – Why Western civilization slips away when taken for granted 00:25 – Introducing Allen Guelzo and The Golden Thread 02:24 – How should we define Western civilization? 08:02 – The fall of communism and the West’s crisis of confidence 11:23 – China, radical Islam, Russia, and civilizational conflict 12:47 – Self-criticism as the West’s strength and danger 15:38 – World wars, Darwin, Freud, communism, and lost confidence 19:49 – The atomic age and the misuse of scientific achievement 22:09 – Defending the West without triumphalism 25:38 – Winston Churchill, trauma, and Christian civilization 30:15 – Adenauer, de Gaulle, and rebuilding Europe after 1945 32:38 – Strange defeat, German memory, and Russia’s missed moment 38:37 – C. S. Lewis, John Paul II, and Christianity in a skeptical age 39:28 – Contingency, crisis, and the decisions that shape history 42:24 – Christianity, Greece, Rome, and the “layer cake” of the West 51:33 – Technology, memory, and the future of civilization 53:39 – Lincoln, King, Augustine, and recovering the tradition 58:17 – Could artificial intelligence revive classical education? 59:37 – Closing encouragement Resources Mentioned: The Golden Thread Volume I by Allen C. Guelzo & James Hankins The Golden Thread Volume II by Allen C. Guelzo & James Hankins The Golden Thread Substack The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas The End of History and the Last Man by Francis Fukuyama The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order by Samuel P. Huntington Strange Defeat by Marc Bloch Secondhand Time by Svetlana Alexievich The Abolition of Man by C. S. Lewis God in the Dock by C. S. Lewis Dominion by Tom Holland Lord of the Flies by William Golding — — — 📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound 🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together 🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen ▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207 ▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br ✅ SUBSCRIBE:  ▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition ▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You will find many books on the biblical and practical importance of the local church. I wrote one myself a few years ago with Jonathan Leeman called Rediscover Church: Why the Body of Christ Is Essential. But few books can match the way Brad Edwards shows us the need for the church amid rampant anxiety, division, and individualism. Not only our churches but even whole societies would be transformed by implementing the wisdom found in this book, called The Reason for Church.  Brad is the church planter of The Table Church in Lafayette, Colorado. His debut book has been justly acclaimed. He won the 2025 Christianity Today Book of the Year Award and also finished first in the Church and Pastoral Leadership category. He was the winner of The Gospel Coalition's award for First-Time Author that year as well. I’m grateful that he joins me now to talk about everything from authority and institutions to anxiety and whether unity should be the goal for a church. In This Episode: 00:00 – Opening: power, trust, and the temptation toward conformity 00:26 – Introducing Brad Edwards and The Reason for Church 01:41 – Ranking the causes behind declining trust in church authority 04:05 – Accountability, social media, and the limits of online justice 08:25 – Churches, institutions, platforms, and marketplace logic 11:17 – What changes people’s minds about the need for church? 13:27 – Church planting in Boulder County and Colorado’s anti-institutional culture 17:01 – Therapy culture, spiritual abuse, and what the book could not fully address 22:19 – Institution building, movements, and building a remnant 26:30 – Technology, schedules, and the challenge of spiritual formation 29:09 – Individuality versus individualism 34:39 – Should unity be the goal of a church? 37:49 – What surprised Brad most about becoming a pastor 39:21 – AI, agency, and the future of formation 43:07 – Hartmut Rosa, resonance, gambling, and the desire for control 46:55 – AI, education, responsibility, and authorship 52:05 – The church as remnant and refuge in a changing world 53:19 – What pastors want their congregations to know 56:41 – Closing and Gospelbound outro Resources Mentioned: The Reason for Church by Brad Edwards Rediscover Church by Collin Hansen and Jonathan Leeman Bowling Alone by Robert D. Putnam Yuval Levin’s work on institutions Bully Pulpit by Michael J. Kruger GIRLS® by Freya India The Reason for God by Tim Keller Center Church by Tim Keller Dominion by Tom Holland Habits of the Heart by Robert Bellah The Uncontrollability of the World by Hartmut Rosa PostEverything, Brad Edwards’s podcast with John Homsher Harper’s Magazine article on young AI founders   — — —   📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound 🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together 🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen ▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207 ▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br ✅ SUBSCRIBE:  ▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition ▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Tim Keller preached a series of sermons in the 1990s called “The Faces of Sin.” It did not go over well in New York. Angered by the liturgical confession of sin, one woman waited until after the sermon and yelled at Tim, “Neither I nor any of my children will ever confess to being sinners!”  Naturally, Tim’s wife, Kathy, decided these would make good sermons to turn into a book! That’s what we have in the new book What Is Wrong with the World? The Surprising, Hopeful Answer to the Question We Cannot Avoid, published by Zondervan. One quote I think captures the book’s argument: “When we realize we are not a victim of our circumstances but a sinner who can call on someone much greater than ourselves to care for us, we can begin to truly live.” That’s the surprisingly hopeful message of the gospel: our sin is the problem with the world. But all of us can be saved by grace when we confess that sin, repent of that sin, and trust in Christ. Easy enough, right? Remember that woman in New York. It’s no small thing to confess your sin. And ALL of us must confess our sin. Here’s what Tim wrote: “No other religion says that the lowest person in the gutter and the most moral, upstanding citizen in the world are equally lost, equally need to be saved by grace, and can only be saved by grace alone.” What an honor to be joined again on Gospelbound by Kathy Keller about sin, grace, and the gospel. In This Episode: 00:00 – Cold open: “the sin beneath the sin” 00:39 – Introducing Tim Keller’s Faces of Sin sermons and the new book 02:25 – Idolatry, grief, and losing what feels like “everything” 04:15 – Blind spots, community, and uncovering hidden sins 07:14 – “What’s wrong with the world?” starting with ourselves 08:13 – G. K. Chesterton and the sins of omission 11:31 – The gospel is bitter at first bite and sweet within 15:55 – Missing Tim and resting in God’s grace 16:48 – “Nathans,” correction, and giving one another “hunting licenses” 18:30 – Parenting regrets and learning consequences the hard way 22:22 – Why the gospel gives hope in the face of failure 22:52 – How Tim Keller is misunderstood today 30:43 – The Hopewell years and learning mercy ministry 34:55 – Kathy’s favorite Tim Keller book: Jonah / The Prodigal Prophet 37:57 – The books Tim Keller hoped to write 40:25 – “Identity received or achieved” and unfinished work 41:35 – Closing reflections 42:02 – Outro Resources Mentioned: What Is Wrong with the World? by Tim Keller The Faces of Sin (Sermon Series) by Tim Keller The Prodigal Prophet by Tim Keller Ministries of Mercy by Tim Keller The Mortification of Sin by John Owen Making Sense of Us by TGC and The Keller Center The Keller Center for Cultural Apologetics   — — —   📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound 🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together 🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen ▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207 ▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br ✅ SUBSCRIBE:  ▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition ▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Western culture today largely lacks a sense of consecration, of setting apart the ordinary as holy. Yet somehow we still have a strong impulse toward desecration, of turning the holy into the ordinary. Why have we lost the taste of the good while developing a taste for the bad?  That’s a core question at the heart of Carl Trueman’s new book, The Desecration of Man: How the Rejection of God Degrades Our Humanity, published by Penguin Random House’s Sentinel imprint. Carl is a professor of biblical and theological studies at Grove City College and a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. He was a guest on Gospelbound in 2020 for his highly acclaimed, bestselling book The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self.  In his new book Trueman writes, “Transgression of the sacred is exhilarating precisely because it makes us feel like gods, the creators of our own meanings and our own selves. All we need to do is cross lines previously enforced by the idea of God and we thereby assume the role of being gods.” Desecration is how we communicate authenticity, perhaps the most important value for the modern self.  This entire project has backfired. Let’s hear from Carl about why. In This Episode: 00:00 – Carl Trueman on desecration and the modern crisis of humanity 02:30 – Why write another book after The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self? 04:22 – Why the sexual revolution sits at the center of the story 06:11 – Cultural Christianity, conversion, and why truth still matters 10:30 – Nietzsche’s “madman” and the collapse of moral meaning 12:56 – Authenticity, evangelism, and the uphill battle against expressive individualism 18:23 – Do the revolutions of modernity actually deliver what they promise? 21:04 – Genetic selection, artificial wombs, and the moral vacuum of tech culture 27:29 – Social acceleration, anxiety, and the instability of modern life 30:23 – Technology, human limits, and the need for a normative view of humanity 35:58 – Assisted suicide, autonomy, and why stories matter more than abstractions 41:53 – The transgender movement, fairness, and transhumanism 45:44 – Why Christian nationalism is not the answer 49:40 – Creed, cult, code, congregational singing, and hospitality as a plan of consecration 55:53 – Outro Resources Mentioned: The Desecration of Man by Carl Trueman The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self by Carl Trueman The Gay Science by Friedrich Nietzsche The Ethics of Authenticity by Charles Taylor   — — —   📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound 🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together 🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen ▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207 ▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br ✅ SUBSCRIBE:  ▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition ▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Join Collin Hansen, Michael Graham, and Sarah Zylstra as they continue to look back on the top theology stories from the last 25 years. In part 1, they counted down stories #10 to #6. Now in part 2, Graham and Zylstra walk with Hansen through his stories #5 down to #1. In This Episode: 00:00:00 – Why homosexuality became a presenting issue dividing the church 00:00:41 – Sarah Zylstra introduces the second half of the top 10 list 00:01:34 – Recap of stories 10 through 6 from the previous episode 00:03:06 – Number 5: COVID-19 shuts the world down 00:04:57 – COVID, institutional mistrust, and the authority of scientists 00:06:25 – A decade of digital change compressed into one year 00:09:22 – What COVID did to church attendance and online ministry 00:11:38 – Rediscovering embodied worship after metaverse-era predictions 00:14:11 – Number 4: The Trump era and its theological consequences 00:15:41 – Supreme Court appointments, religious liberty, and legal change 00:18:50 – Dobbs, abortion, and evangelical disengagement from the pro-life cause 00:19:54 – Immigration as a leading social and theological issue 00:22:13 – Executive power, post-liberalism, and Christian nationalism 00:24:05 – Number 3: Obergefell and the moral transformation of marriage 00:25:20 – Sexuality, family, and the collapse of shared moral norms 00:27:48 – Don Carson’s 2005 warning about homosexuality as a presenting issue 00:29:22 – Mainline denominational splits and the global Methodist divide 00:32:11 – Why many evangelicals held to historic sexual ethics 00:33:17 – How race and sexuality became bundled in public discourse 00:36:56 – Rebecca McLaughlin and navigating race and sexuality faithfully 00:37:21 – Number 2: The iPhone and the shift to digital life 00:38:05 – Smartphones, fertility decline, and changing social habits 00:39:13 – Social contagion, gender identity, and online plausibility structures 00:40:08 – Podcasts, YouTube, AI, and the reshaping of knowledge 00:43:44 – Mike Graham on screens, AI, and the future of epistemology 00:48:00 – Individualized media diets, institutional decline, and gender divergence 00:50:06 – AI sycophancy, abuse scandals, and algorithm-shaped reality 00:53:51 – Why digital life felt like it could have been number one 00:54:26 – Number 1: Why 9/11 tops the list 00:56:23 – Christianity, Islam, and civilizational conflict 01:00:07 – 9/11, the new atheism, and the category of “fundamentalism” 01:02:01 – Theodicy, suffering, and major disasters after 9/11 01:03:12 – Mike Graham on why 9/11 is civilizationally decisive 01:06:17 – Middle Eastern Christians, Iraq, Syria, and migration into Europe 01:07:11 – Signs of God’s providence and good emerging from tragedy 01:09:18 – Tim Keller, New York church planting, and the young, restless, and Reformed movement 01:12:58 – Closing reflections on God’s providence over the last 25 years Resources Mentioned: Rediscover Church by Collin Hansen and Jonathan Leeman The Secular Creed by Rebecca McLaughlin The WEIRDest People in the World by Joseph Henrich Generations by Jean M. Twenge Timothy Keller by Collin Hansen — — — 📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound 🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together 🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen ▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207 ▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br ✅ SUBSCRIBE:  ▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition ▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Join Collin Hansen, Michael Graham, and Sarah Zylstra as they look back on the top theology stories from the last 25 years. In part 1 of this two-part series, Graham and Zylstra walk with Hansen through his stories #10 down to #6. Since the year 2000, religion in America has changed dramatically. As recently as the 1990s, religion in America was what Tim Keller called “thick”: In general, many clergy were held in high esteem, churches were respected, and people either belonged to a congregation or knew that would be a good idea. Yet since 2000, the percent of religious Americans has dropped and the number of nones (no religion) has jumped up from 8 percent to 22 percent—and climbing. So while social commentators lament how much time Americans spend on our screens, describe how views on sexuality have drastically changed, identify how our politics have become sharply polarized, and observe how mental health especially in Gen Z has declined, they often miss the biggest story of all, the one underneath all the others—the decline in attention and deference to God. In This Episode: 00:00 — The Great Dechurching: belief vs. disaffiliation 00:32 — Sarah hosts: why a 30,000-foot view now 03:26 — “Factfulness” and why we overlook positive trends 05:00 — #10: Global church leadership moving south 09:02 — Theological education hasn’t moved south at the same pace 10:03 — #9: Rise of non-denominational congregations 14:49 — Data point: non-denominationalism grows from ~3% (1972) to ~14–15% today 17:27 — Why churches drop denominational labels; media amplification; scandal-by-association 20:00 — #8: China’s church growth—and crackdown 22:07 — India, Hindu nationalism, and persecution; Nigeria and the Africa frontier 25:41 — #7: The Dechurching of America 30:24 — Apologetics after dechurching: from hostility to apathy 34:25 — Are churches fewer but stronger? 36:39 — Retention vs. conversion: why evangelical identity declines less 39:09 — #6: The Great Awokening (Ferguson to Floyd) 47:20 — Four paradigms for navigating race in America 52:44 — Wrap-up: Part 2 teaser 53:10 — Outro + where to find the podcast/newsletter Resources Mentioned: Factfulness by Hans Rosling The Reason for God by Timothy Keller Making Sense of God by Timothy Keller A Secular Age by Charles Taylor Divided by Faith by Michael Emerson The Color of Compromise by Jemar Tisby We Have Never Been Woke by Musa al-Gharbi — — — 📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound 🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together 🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen ▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207 ▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br ✅ SUBSCRIBE:  ▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition ▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

When we receive applications for fellows at The Keller Center for Cultural Apologetics, we ask them to answer the question, “What one thing should Christians do right now to introduce their neighbors to Jesus?” It’s not that we think there’s only one answer. It’s that we want them to identify the top priority. Last year we were surprised when every applicant gave the same answer. They talked about the public witness of gathered Christians, the church. Maybe they were responding to negative press about the church, going back 25 years to the Catholic abuse scandal at the same time the internet became ubiquitous. Or maybe they were expressing renewed appreciation for the gathered church after the COVID-era shutdowns and public disorder. Either way, they were going back to biblical concept rooted in Israel’s testimony to the nations, and the early church in the book of Acts that found favor with all.  Bob Thune is a fellow for the Keller Center and writes about this so-called ecclesial apologetics in a chapter for our new book, The Gospel After Christendom: An Introduction to Cultural Apologetics, published by Zondervan Reflective. He’s also a featured teacher in an exciting new video small-group curriculum called Making Sense of Us, published by The Gospel Coalition and Keller Center. His session, recorded against the backdrop of the Statue of Liberty in New York City, covers the cultural narrative we tell each other in the modern West about liberty. We believe this curriculum can help you, especially young adults, to both evangelize and edify. When you watch and study with other church members, and even non-Christians, you can learn together about the Bible’s better story about liberty, which we live out together in the church.  In This Episode: 00:00 – A deeper freedom: set free from self for love  00:32 – Keller Center fellows: why the gathered church matters for witness  01:41 – Introducing Bob Thune, ecclesial apologetics, and Making Sense of Us  02:39 – Lesslie Newbigin and a missionary posture toward the modern West  05:06 – Is Omaha post-Christian? Modern Western culture everywhere  06:34 – Ecclesial apologetics despite church messiness  09:17 – Gospel doctrine and gospel culture (truth, goodness, beauty)  11:03 – Christian hospitality: making room for outsiders with conviction and listening  17:03 – Why this differs from the seeker movement  19:10 – Transition to Making Sense of Us: liberty and the Statue of Liberty backdrop  20:16 – Modern misconception: freedom as “freedom from” (negative liberty)  22:17 – Galatians 5: freedom subverted and fulfilled—freedom for love and service  24:48 – Choice as happiness: dislodging the assumption pastorally  26:55 – Cultural pressure points: teen mental health, friendship decline, obligation  29:15 – Autonomy and assisted dying/euthanasia debates  31:56 – More choice, more frustration: speech platforms and “Netflix paralysis”  33:50 – Patience for contested proposals (post-liberalism, nationalism, etc.)  35:01 – “Freedom for” the common good and a shared human project  39:13 – Three church roles: solidarity-bringer, subversive fulfillment, alternative city  43:27 – Augustine’s lesson: church power, loss, and enduring hope  44:05 – Recommended reading and resources roundup  Resources Mentioned: The Gospel After Christendom by Collin Hansen Making Sense of Us by John Starke, Rebecca McLaughlin, Sam Chan, Trevin Wax, Rachel Gilson, Bob Thune, Glen Scrivener, Michael Keller The Air We Breathe by Glen Scrivener  The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt  The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis  Democracy and Solidarity by James Davison Hunter  City of God by Augustine of Hippo — — — 📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound 🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together 🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen ▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207 ▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br ✅ SUBSCRIBE:  ▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition ▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

“Do any of us really want to be in the position where our retirement account grows in sync with the cancer ward?” That’s the question posed by Robin John about tobacco, responsible for 100 million deaths in the last 100 years. Naturally all of us would say no, we don’t want to benefit from other people dying. Yet as Robin points out in his new book, The Good Investor: How Your Work Can Confront Injustice, Love Your Neighbor, and Bring Healing to the World, many of us do hold mutual funds that invest in tobacco companies. We just don’t know it. Come to think of it, how much do we know about any of our investments, especially in long-term retirement accounts? Robin John is the cofounder and CEO of Eventide, an asset management firm dedicated to honoring God and investing in companies that create compelling value for the common good. His vision for Eventide's values-based investing shows how our work can benefit everyone and not just bolster the bottom line for a fortunate few. I’d go so far as to say our world can be a much better place if investors—and employees of all kinds—will learn from his example and prioritize what really matters now, and in eternity. In This Episode 0:00 – Joy, purpose, and God’s design for everyday work 1:49 – Why The Good Investor is ultimately a book about joy 2:48 – Growing up in Kerala, India, and immigrating to the U.S. 4:42 – Community, individualism, and caring for the vulnerable 7:41 – Returning to India and confronting workplace injustice 10:49 – Rethinking success, profit, and the purpose of work 11:53 – Why Christians must examine their investments 14:33 – What does it mean to “root for” a company’s success? 15:36 – Discernment, gray areas, and biblical values in investing 18:07 – Avoiding evil and actively pursuing the common good 19:43 – Weaponry, conscience, and consistency at Eventide 20:13 – The cautionary story of Bill Hwang and ill-gotten gain 23:19 – The false divide between faith and work 25:07 – How investing has changed since 2008 27:14 – What ESG investing is—and where it diverges from Christianity 31:19 – Mission alignment vs. values alignment 32:23 – Encouragement for ordinary, faithful work 34:44 – Legacy, goodness, and hearing “well done” Resources Mentioned The Good Investor by Robin John — — — 📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound 🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together 🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen ▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207 ▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br ✅ SUBSCRIBE:  ▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition ▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

At the end of the class on cultural apologetics I teach at Beeson Divinity School, I assign a group exercise. The students need to compose 10 questions and answers from a modern-day catechism. Historically catechisms have emerged during times of cultural transition and confrontation—such as our own, in the aftermath of Christendom and the Enlightenment, awaiting whatever develops in post-liberalism. So catechisms are not merely a relic of our past but a vital resource for the present that prepares us for the future. I’m delighted with how The New City Catechism, especially our devotional, still serves readers. And I’m delighted by a new volume, The Gospel Way Catechism: 50 Truths that Take on the World, published by Harvest House and written by my friends Trevin Wax and Thomas West. Tim Keller said, “We need a counter-catechism that explains, refutes, and re-narrates the world’s catechisms to Christians.” And what’s what Trevin and Thomas have done in The Gospel Way Catechism. Trevin is vice president of research and resource development at the North American Mission Board. Thomas is the pastor of Nashville First Baptist Church. In This Episode 00:00 – What’s wrong with the world: deeper than ignorance or injustice 00:34 – Collin’s “modern catechism” assignment and why catechisms return in transitions 01:03 – Introducing The Gospel Way Catechism and Keller’s “counter catechism” vision 01:36 – Welcoming Trevin Wax and Thomas West 01:54 – “Can Baptists write a catechism?” and Baptist catechesis history 02:57 – Influential catechisms: Keach, Spurgeon, Heidelberg, Luther, Calvin, Westminster 03:23 – Most controversial truths today: sexuality and deeper “me-first” narratives 04:51 – “What has gone wrong?”: ignorance, injustice, expressive individualism 07:14 – Moving beyond whack-a-mole to the Bible’s deeper diagnosis 09:37 – Western self-centeredness and sin as being “curved in on ourselves” 12:24 – Writing process and Keller’s influence: every catechism is counter-catechesis 13:48 – Origin story at The Kilns (C. S. Lewis’s home) and testing in a London church 15:45 – Objections: “we don’t need this” and why cultural frames change catechesis needs 20:18 – Returning from London: seeing American wealth, waste, and politics differently 24:13 – Why Leviticus gets a chapter: sacrifice, scapegoating, and modern idols 27:59 – Catechesis and spiritual formation: tools, Word-centeredness, and Gen Z hunger 31:38 – Encouragement from readers: cultural narratives filtered, doctrine re-centered 33:09 – In 20 years: transhumanism, bioethics, reproductive tech, assisted dying 36:06 – “What is human?” and “What is truth?”—new iterations of old questions 36:39 – Closing thanks and sign-off Resources Mentioned The Gospel Way Catechism by Trevin Wax & Thomas West New City Catechism by Kathy Keller A Heart Aflame for God by Matthew Bingham — — — 📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound 🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together 🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen ▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207 ▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br ✅ SUBSCRIBE:  ▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition ▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Here in Birmingham, Alabama, I often teach about the civil-rights movement as the most effective faith-based movement for social change in American history. We have a bitter heritage of violent segregation. But the same city produced the heroes of the struggle, the ordinary men and women (especially children) who stared down the police dogs and fire hoses in the march for their freedom.  Justin Giboney honors such heroes as pastor Fred Shuttlesworth and commends their example for today in an informative, provocative book, Don’t Let Nobody Turn You Around: How the Black Church’s Public Witness Leads Us Out of the Culture War, published by IVP. Justin is the cofounder and president of the AND Campaign. The endorsement of this book by Bob Roberts calls Justin a “strange mix of Tim Keller and Martin Luther King Jr. wrapped up in his own personality and voice.” High praise! In This Episode 00:00 – Jesus, truth, and critiquing our own side  00:33 – Birmingham, civil rights, and faith-based social change  01:00 – Introducing Don’t Let Nobody Turn You Around  01:40 – The burden behind writing the book  03:07 – Family history and the Black church tradition  04:05 – Why Fred Shuttlesworth matters  05:14 – “Biblicist and actionist”: faith and public courage  06:05 – Nonviolence, moral discipline, and leadership  07:11 – Shuttlesworth and King: contrasts and complements  09:23 – Why moral progress isn’t inevitable  12:10 – Moral imagination and Christian hope  15:57 – What is the culture war? 18:44 – Humility, self-critique, and redeemable opponents  21:29 – Justice, moral order, and refusing false binaries  22:51 – King, the late 1960s, and the cost of a “third way”  25:26 – Militancy, frustration, and historical context  28:01 – Why Christians can’t abandon character  31:12 – Tyranny, violence, and ending debate by force  33:18 – Advice for young activists  35:19 – Frederick Douglass and critiquing your own movement  38:37 – Accountability, power, and political humility  43:36 – Christian nationalism and historical amnesia  47:24 – Final encouragement: civility, faithfulness, and hope  Resources Mentioned Don't Let Nobody Turn You Around: How the Black Church's Public Witness Leads Us out of the Culture War by Justin Giboney — — — 📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound 🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together 🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen ▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207 ▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br ✅ SUBSCRIBE:  ▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition ▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Work is the meaning of life. Got your attention? Your identity is tied to what you do. I bet I have it now. So argues David Bahnsen in his book Full-Time: Work and the Meaning of Life. Bahnsen is the founder, managing partner, and chief investment officer of The Bahnsen Group, a national private wealth management firm. He’s also the author of several books, including Crisis of Responsibility: Our Cultural Addiction to Blame and How You Can Cure It. In This Episode 00:00 – Why Christians shouldn’t pit work against family or church 01:10 – Why Full Time Work and the Meaning of Life matters so deeply to Bahnsen 02:11 – Losing his father and discovering purpose through work 03:56 – The church’s discomfort with ambition and vocation 06:00 – Identity, salvation, and what our work says about us 09:06 – “Work is the meaning of life?” A biblical case from Genesis 12:55 – The crisis of men not working and its social consequences 16:12 – How Reformed theology shapes Bahnsen’s view of vocation 19:41 – The influence of Tim Keller and Every Good Endeavor 23:14 – Rejecting the zero-sum view of family vs. career 31:41 – Productivity, early mornings, and modeling joyful work 36:10 – Why in-person work still matters after COVID 44:39 – Conviction, politics, and resisting tribal thinking 54:21 – Overcoming resentment by telling the truth Resources Mentioned Full-Time: Work and the Meaning of Life by David Bahnsen Crisis of Responsibility: Our Cultural Addiction to Blame and How You Can Cure It by David Bahnsen Every Good Endeavor: Connecting Your Work to God’s Work by Tim Keller — — — 📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound 🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together 🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen ▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207 ▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br ✅ SUBSCRIBE:  ▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition ▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Join Collin Hansen and Melissa Kruger for their annual discussion as they look back on the top theology stories of 2025 and look towards the year to come. They also share their favorite interviews and books from 2025, updates on personal projects, and what they’re each looking forward to in life and ministry in 2026. Resources Mentioned Theo of Golden by Allen Levi Believe by Ross Douthat Superbloom by Nicholas Carr Everything Is Never Enough by Bobby Jamieson Blaise Pascal: The Man Who Made the Modern World by Graham Tomlin Future Tenses of the Blessed Life by F. B. Meyer A Case Against the Sexual Revolution by Louise Perry I Seek a Kind Person: My Father, Seven Children, and the Adverts that Helped Them Escape the Holocaust by Julian Borger The Deep Dish Podcast The Rest Is History TGC Church Directory The Keller Center for Cultural Apologetics Making Sense of Us TGCW26 — National Women’s Conference RTS Women’s Bible Study — — — 📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound 🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together 🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen ▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207 ▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br ✅ SUBSCRIBE:  ▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition ▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

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. ——— 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 ——— SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things Help The Gospel Coalition renew and unify the contemporary church in the ancient gospel: Donate Today Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen: Apple Podcasts Spotify YouTube TGC Updates Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

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 –––– SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things Help The Gospel Coalition renew and unify the contemporary church in the ancient gospel: Donate Today Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen: Apple Podcasts Spotify YouTube TGC Updates Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

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 ——— SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things Help The Gospel Coalition renew and unify the contemporary church in the ancient gospel: Donate Today Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen: Apple Podcasts Spotify YouTube TGC Updates Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

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 —— SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things Help The Gospel Coalition renew and unify the contemporary church in the ancient gospel: Donate Today Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen: Apple Podcasts Spotify YouTube TGC Updates Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

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   SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things Help The Gospel Coalition renew and unify the contemporary church in the ancient gospel: Donate Today Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen: Apple Podcasts Spotify YouTube TGC Updates Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

“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 — — — 📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things 🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today 🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen ▫ Apple Podcasts ▫ Spotify ✅ SUBSCRIBE:  ▫ YouTube ▫ TGC Updates Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

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 Subscribe to my newsletter, Unseen Things To learn more about The Gospel Coalition and our other podcasts, visit www.tgc.org Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

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. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.