Discerning What Is Best with Dr Rex M Rogers is a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, doing Christian critical thinking, or spiritual discernment, about current issues, culture, and everyday life (Phil. 1:9-11). Rogers is former longtime president of Cornerstone University and now President of mission ministry SAT-7 USA. He is the author of "Gambling: Don't Bet On It," "Christian Liberty: Living for God in a Changing Culture" and its ebook "Living for God in Changing Times," and co-author of "Today, You Do Greatness: A Parable of Success and Significance."Learn more at rexmrogers.com.
Marriage is a creation and gift of God for all humankind. Some have claimed the end of marriage is soon upon us. Some have promoted the idea. But new trends suggest otherwise, and more importantly, ending marriage does not fit God's will and reality. A good marriage is gold, as is the spouse who makes that possible. For more Christian commentary, check my website at rexmrogers.com.
Transgender people need, as the trans movement claims, "affirmation and acceptance," but not to transition to a sexuality that does not align with their biology but affirmation and acceptance as human beings made in the image of God who makes no mistakes. Trans ideology is now experiencing something of a historical cultural moment. It is a juggernaut that, despite trans activist claims that trans people are marginalized, has taken the country by storm and is now the dominant view in government, ...
In the hands of the secular progressive Left, words are weapons. They can be redefined at will to accomplish the Left's goals, and this has happened and is happening in 21st Century America at an unbelievable pace. Once redefined, the Left can force its will on the populace by insisting its definition of words be used by media, public education, and entertainment, all too eager to act as the Left's advance guard. When this happens, even conservative websites and news sources find themselves usin...
If you are 50 or older, you probably realize and recognize some ways in which American culture has changed in the past 30 or more years. I'm not sure if younger people realize this, though of course some do who read, pay attention, or do some research as a matter of interest. This said, in my view, American culture has changed dramatically and significantly since I was young, even since I was in my middle years. I don't mean that we now have iPhones or the Internet. I'm not talking about tech. I...
Human beings cannot live without hope. Even prisoners in the Nazi death camps or the gulags of the USSR talked about how they would grasp at any shred of hope to survive. The world with its layered crises makes hope an even greater need today,, for individuals certainly, even for nations. Christian hope is different from colloquial, everyday hope like "I hope my team wins next Saturday." The latter is a vain wish about what might happen. Christian hope, however, is a faith and trust in the histo...
Sometimes we think superstition is just the province of backward people or lands, however we define these terms, or we think superstition is just harmless fun and games. Neither view is correct. Superstition is a surrogate religious worldview based upon fear and idolatry and it is as evident in America as anywhere else in the world. Sadly, while superstition ostensibly helps deal with fear it actually fosters it, or merely masks it like whistling in the dark. Christianity, however, is based not ...
American culture is under direct attack from our adversary the Devil, a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour, the Father of lies, the source of division, who if he can divide us, can make us, the Church, weaker. This attack is not simply focused upon so-called "spiritual" or religious matters but every aspect of culture. The more American culture sets aside belief in God and moral truth, the less accountability anyone feels for his or her actions. Anything goes. Nothing matters. No purpose. N...
Violence and other threats have been invading the church and other faith-based sanctuaries with distressing regularity during the past 30 years. Stopping it would be best, but no one knows how. Next best thing is to be prepared for it should it ever happen to your church. Developing a safety and security mindset, intentional plan, and action steps to follow, along with procedures are a minimum for today's conscientious church leadership. Yes, there are arguments against doing so - God will take ...
Since at least the 1960s if not before, concerted efforts have been made to normalize sexuality among children, first the birds and bees, and now far beyond this to include perverted, twisted, immoral, licentious free-for-all sex for children and youth. This is happening daily in America's public schools, it's happening even more extensively and pervasively via the Internet, and it is happening in children's and youth product advertising, entertainment, and more. The consequence of this is not j...
America is now not simply a sex-saturated but a porn-saturated society. Porn drives the Internet and anyone can access it at anytime. Porn is insidious in that it entices and beguiles, drawing people in. It is ubiquitous because it is now in your face everywhere we look, in commercials, on billboards, online, in video games, and more. And porn is certainly iniquitous. It is sin, and that's the problem. Porn debases both the producers and the consumers, dealing degeneracy and destruction to every...
Revival has once again started at Asbury University, Wilmore, KY. Is this revival genuine? Will it make a spiritual impact? Revivals are not as common as they once were in large measure due to the post-Christian culture of this age. But still, God is, and God still works. Could it be that the Lord is speaking in a whisper, calling youth to himself and launching a revival movement that changes the face of America in the next generation? Only God knows, but we can watch and pray for an American yo...
Body image is how a person perceives themselves aesthetically or in terms of sexual attractiveness. It's a concept that is alive and well, in fact thriving, online, particularly among so-called online influencers. A long list of rationales has now been developed in an attempt to elevate or add legitimacy to what for many is simply a new way to market themselves using their bodies, especially of course women. Older women who fought the battles of the Women's Liberation or MeToo Movements are not ...
The Grammy Awards are the music industry’s annual recognition of outstanding achievements in the music arts - and with increasing regularity, utterly prurient, immoral presentations. This happened most recently in the 2023 and 2021 awards shows. It's not that these "artists" should have their First Amendment freedoms curtailed. It is, though, worth considering what is appropriate for public, mass communications over primetime television. There once were decency standards. No more. And pundits to...
Crises, tragedies, happen almost weekly throughout our lives in a fallen world. When they do, especially the most severe, human beings ask existential questions: does God exist? Does he care? Theodicy is one way of understanding such times, for this is a study of God's justice in allowing evil, suffering, or trials and tribulations to exist. Theology brings us back to the person, character, works, and promises of the God of the Bible. For more Christian commentary, check my website at rexmrogers...
Have you ever been afraid? I have. It's especially discomforting when it involves a loved one facing an illness or if it is prolonged. But the Lord said he will never leave us nor forsake us. And the Psalmist David reminded us that when we are afraid we can trust in God. There is much in the Psalms about facing life's fears. The key is to tell God about our anxieties but not stay immersed in them. Rather we tell God and then, as David did, we rehearse the character, works, and promises of God, a...
For several decades, Christian scholars have warned that Christianity is being jettisoned from American culture, at least in terms of influence similar to what it exercised for the first two hundred years of the USA. This displacement of Judeo-Christian values directly affects what values people embrace, how they choose to live their lives, and thus what kind of culture America is becoming. What we see now is an increase in every form of human social pathology, which can be rooted in people's re...
During WWII, there were those who thought Adolf Hitler was the Antichrist and that he and the Nazis were bringing an end to the world as we knew it. Then there was the Cold War of the 1950s-1960s, when we thought thermonuclear war would end the world. We carried our fear and concern re nukes into the late 1970s and early 1980s when I was in graduate school and we often discussed Mutually Assured Destruction and ICBMS. In the early 2000s, it's been extremism, one radical ideology after another. B...
Woke philosophy, sometimes marketed under the terms Social Justice Ideology or Critical Race theory, is the new, legalistic pseudoreligion of American culture. Its adherents operate with a cultish worldview, hold to a code they consider sacrosanct, expect all others to bow to this code, and then reject all who do not agree, including much about America's past and culture. This pseudo religion, because it subsumes the individual into the group and because contrary ideas are verboten, is inherentl...
Transgenderism, or trans ideology, has moved across American culture like an avalanche, brooking no resistance and demanding acceptance by all lest one be considered a hater. This incredible and overwhelming ideological steamroller has, for the most part, been accomplished since 2015 when the Supreme Court of the United States recognized the legality of same-sex marriage. After that, it has literally been an anything goes environment for those promoting sexual liberation. Now transgenderism, lik...
Cuba, the largest island in the Caribbean just 103 miles from Florida, has been dominated and destroyed by a socialist government and economy since 1959. With 3,500 miles of pristine white sand beaches and an average temperature in the 70s and 80s, Cuba could have been an island paradise like Hawaii. But socialism decimated the economy, the people, and the nation's prospects and it is a sad case of what might have been. For more commentary, see my website at rexmrogers.com.
Many people make New Year's resolutions. Probably more than who actually keep or fulfill their resolutions. Often dieting is part of this, but so can choices that reinforce a healthy lifestyle and glorify God, or resolutions that recognize the need to be faithful and true in this chaotic zeitgeist in which we now live. For more Christian commentary, check the website, rexmrogers.com.
The tone or tenor of messaging on major media seems to shift dramatically in the week following Christmas. On the run-up to Christmas, it's all season's greetings, good will, peace, hope, blessing, and immediately following Christmas on the run-up to New Year's Day, it's mostly loud, riotous, partying, drinking, excess, me-me-me, and pleasure in the here and now. It's a dramatic shift. Test this by watching programming on Christmas Eve and then again on New Year's Eve. In the real Christmas stor...
Ideas have consequences. In other words, what we think and believe, matters, because our ideas work themselves out in our attitudes and behaviors. If we embrace bad or immoral or evil ideas, our actions are likely to follow suit. If we embrace good or moral or wholesome, biblical ideas, our actions will show accordingly. That's why the Apostle Paul said in Phil. 4:8, "whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything i...
Same-sex marriage, legalized in Obergefell v Hodges (2015) is now being reinforced by the Respect for Marriage Act soon to be signed into law. Now that same-sex marriage is here to stay, it is not rocket science to think that other sexual boundaries will soon be pushed - in fact they already are. The next focus of the Sexual Revolution that began in the 1960s is now sexualized childhood. This is already apparent and everywhere in public education from kindergarten to graduate school. Premature s...
If you live long enough, you will face trials, trauma, difficulties, maybe even anguish-producing developments in your life. It's part of living in a fallen world. We generally respond to these developments with a number of negative, if quite human, emotions, like anxiety, worry, fear, despair or desperation, discouragement, fear, and more. Americans in particular seem to be attempting to deal with problems via a virtual epidemic of opioids and other anti-depressants. These expensive, addictive,...
My Grandpa Lewis "Bones" Davis was the spiritual patriarch of our family. Not a man of formal education, position, means, or vast accomplishments, he was nevertheless an exemplary spiritual and life counselor sought by people from many counties around. His influence was extensive and continues long past his home going to heaven even unto this day. His Christian faith was deep and his testimony strong, so his wisdom was noteworthy and powerful. Question is, are you and I a Bones Davis in someone'...
Thanksgiving Day is a uniquely American holiday dating back 400 years to the Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock. It's a time for remembrance, hopefully family and faith, and gratitude. I am grateful for a country where religious liberty is yet part of our experience. I am thankful, too, for my identity as a child of God, not an ephemeral identity rooted in sex, race, ethnicity, position, talent, class, etc. I am thankful for Christian parents, Dad in heaven and Mom who turns 91 this Thanksgiving day. For...
The debate is an old one that has come to various generations in different forms. Should we meet only people's spiritual needs, the Gospel, or meet their humanitarian needs, the Social Gospel? Is the latter essential, necessary, a good thing, or can it be a displacement of the former. Certainly we're commanded in Scripture to care for other human beings' needs, physical, emotional, social, economic. Feeding the body. So that's not a debate, or should not be. Clearly, though, we're commanded in S...
Marijuana, once considered a gateway drug, has now gone mainstream, both medically and recreationally. But why, and is this a good and wise choice? Medical marijuana may offer some benefits for those suffering various pains, but research is not at all complete, nor is "the science settled." Plus, there may be safer alternatives. The choice to use medical marijuana should be made carefully. Recreationally, it seems Americans have forgotten why marijuana was outlawed in the first place, that there...
It strikes me that most of public discussion--certainly in news and social media--dealing with controversial social and moral issues is based upon words, i.e., vocabulary, that is defined by the Left. So if you disagree with certain social and moral changes, you have already lost half the battle because you've accepted the use of the terms provided by those with whom you disagree. The abortion debate has long experienced this phenomenon but not its a matter of course in virtually every significa...
