August 20, 2026

Today the church is asking what it actually owes allegiance to — Christ alone, or Christ plus something else. The Aquila Report runs a piece insisting the answer is unambiguous: every boast belongs to Jesus, nothing held back. That's easy to affirm in a pew. Harder when institutions are on the line. The Gospel Coalition puts Christian colleges under pressure — asking whether the label still means anything, or whether it's become branding. Aaron Renn is watching the same pressure play out politically: with Trump exiting the stage, he argues evangelicalism has to decide what it actually is, not just what it's against. These are the same question in different clothes. What do we boast in when the coalition holding us together starts to dissolve?

Christianity Today is running two pieces that pull in opposite directions, and the tension is worth sitting with. One asks whether forgiveness extends to the unrepentant — using Joseph as the test case, and landing somewhere costly. The other looks at a Texas religious liberty bill and asks whether "religious freedom" is being quietly narrowed to mean Christian freedom. Desiring God frames abortion as cosmic warfare — language that raises the stakes and, depending on who's listening, either clarifies or inflames. Earlier this week we were watching the church wrestle with whether its desires are rightly ordered. That question hasn't gone away. It's just wearing policy clothes now.