A Hard Week and a Hard Truth

This week has been heavy. Iryna Zarutska, a Ukrainian woman, was killed in a subway. Another school shooting took young lives whose names are now etched into grieving families. And then the tragedy surrounding Charlie Kirk. Evil feels relentless. You don’t have to scroll long online or sit in a breakroom before you see it. People are shaken, angry, confused, and in some cases numb.

As I think about it, I can’t escape this reality: the further we drift from Scripture as a nation, the darker it gets. God’s Word isn’t just a book of history or moral sayings, it’s our compass. Without it, we are lost. And if we treat it like just another textbook, nothing will ever change.

I’ll be honest, I’m guilty too. It isn’t easy to always let God’s Word pierce the heart. It’s one thing to read a chapter. It’s another thing to stop, wrestle, and let the Spirit convict us. Hebrews 4:12 says, “For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any double-edged sword.” But too often, we blunt it down to something safe, something academic.

What we need is the fear of the Lord, not being scared of Him but having a deep reverence. Proverbs 9:10 reminds us that “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” But here’s the truth: many of us don’t live like we’ll one day stand before the judgment seat of Christ (2 Corinthians 5:10). If we really believed that, we’d live differently.

Romans 1 and 2 paint a brutal picture of the human condition. Paul doesn’t hold back. He reminds us how evil lurks in every heart, how desperately we need a Savior. And when I look at our culture, the violence, the broken marriages, the addictions, I can’t help but connect the dots. John 10:10 says the enemy’s mission is simple: steal, kill, destroy. And he’s doing his job well.

I wish I could say things are going to get better, but honestly, I don’t see it. What I do see is this: even if I can’t change the world, I can choose to let God’s Word transform me. And maybe if you do the same, together we can push back the darkness in our corner of the world.

Because in the end, the Word isn’t meant to sit on our shelf. It’s meant to be alive in us, shaping us, convicting us, and turning us into light bearers in a dark world.

So let’s not settle for Sunday religion. Let’s open Scripture with trembling hearts and open hands. Let’s actually let it do the work it was meant to do. The world may not change overnight, but maybe our homes, our workplaces, and our neighborhoods will catch a glimpse of Jesus through us.