Christian Media

The artificial intelligence community just waved goodbye to yet another top safety and regulation official — and he offers a unique angle in his warning to the world.

David Robinson had been leading safety reports for OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT. Robinson resigned in the first week of October, stating that the industry’s approach to safety has been stemming from a broken culture. He penned the following words in a piece for The Atlantic, which contain more truth than perhaps he even knows: “The future depends on wisdom that Silicon Valley lacks.”

We’ll come back to that.

His departure comes on the heels of several other prominent AI safety researchers abandoning the industry. Their exits have paired with dreadful public warnings about the future of this technology, leaving the American people to grapple with the headlines and the unknown.

Take Jacob Coxon, for example. After leaving Claude developer Anthropic in September, he wrote on X that top tech labs are “gambling with our lives” by racing toward self-improving superintelligence. He went on to reveal that the people building AI “earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade.”

Comforting.

For clarity, the industry term “superintelligence” refers to a hypothetical AI system that developers believe could surpass humans in overall knowledge and capability. This could happen through recursive self-improvement (RSI) in which AI models design and continually improve their own successors.

While the Trump administration has taken to using the term as a reference to AI more broadly, Coxon used it as the industry intends: the potential nightmare of AI evolving beyond our ability to contain.

Let’s go back to David Robinson for a second. Beyond diagnosing the issue of a “lack of wisdom,” he went on in his article to describe the kind of wisdom that is desperately needed — the kind that shows us “how to handle dangerous technology and, more fundamentally … what it means to care for people.”

This kind of wisdom has only one source.

Proverbs 4:7 states, “The beginning of wisdom is: Acquire wisdom; And with all your acquiring, acquire understanding.” The natural question is, how can true wisdom be acquired? Well, it is not gained by happenstance or by any means of passivity.

The word of God teaches that wisdom is found only, “if you look for it as for silver and search for it as for hidden treasure” (Proverbs 2:4).

That same proverb states that when wisdom enters the human heart, it bears fruits of knowledge, discretion, and understanding. Knowledge is pleasant, discretion brings protection, and understanding guards the one who finds it.

If those spearheading AI labs begin searching for wisdom with the same fervency as they do innovation, capital gain, and victory in the arms race, perhaps we might reap the benefits of honing a brilliant technology for human flourishing, rather than threatening it entirely.

In the absence of wisdom, we ought not to expect flourishing. Thus, the need for appropriate guardrails toward that end is becoming increasingly dire.

Whistleblowers coming forward to expose carelessness in the industry is a good thing. Speaking up when danger is on the horizon is profitable. What is not profitable, however, is responding in fear.

The wisest man in history, King Solomon, tells us, “There is nothing new under the sun” (Ecclesiastes 1:9).

The pride of man has reared its head through the latest technology and means of production before. As soon as human beings had the chance, they took brick and mortar and built the tower of Babel, aiming to reach as high as heaven to make a name for themselves — not for the God who gave them clay, water, and sun in the first place.

Today, we are seeing the latest expression of that sinful pride: men thinking they can hold infinite knowledge without it destroying them. Casting wisdom aside, they trust in their own minds and technical ability rather than in God.

In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve fell to the temptation of wanting to be all-knowing, like God. He judged that decision then, and He will not be mocked now (Galatians 6:7).

There is nothing more urgent for the unbeliever than to humble themselves, fall on their knees, and cry out to the Creator for salvation. There is, likewise, nothing more urgent for the believer than to refuse every temptation to fear in these times — to live the joyful, abundant life offered to them in Christ.

It is not a suggestion to be unafraid. It is a commandment given us by God, time and time again throughout the Scriptures.

Do not stifle your witness to the watching world.

The book of Ecclesiastes warns us that there are many dark days in this life under the sun, and that we will encounter circumstances which are difficult, perplexing, and often don’t make sense. Yet, there are a few things that author King Solomon found to be good: “Behold, what I have seen to be good and fitting is to eat and drink and find enjoyment in all the toil with which one toils under the sun the few days of his life that God has given him, for this is his lot” (Ecclesiastes 5:18).

New threats to our livelihood may come at alarming rates, but our responsibility as Christians remains the same: Do not dread the future or fear the potential of “superintelligence.” Rather, “fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man” (Ecclesiastes 12:13).

So, keep breaking bread with those you love. Keep enjoying the toil and the lot that God has given you with a grateful heart. Regardless of the news cycle, and whatever may come out of Washington and Silicon Valley — rejoice in what you have been given.

Our lives are but a vapor, a mist, Solomon says. The years go by quickly, and soon, we will return to dust.

That need not be depressing — in fact, let it be motivating as you live the most upright, joyous, and noble life possible along the way. Be encouraged, for we have all the instruction we need to please God in every circumstance, including the ones out of our control.

God says, “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end” in Revelation 22:13. If God is the Omega just as much as He is the Alpha, what is there to fear?

At the end of all things, just as much as at the beginning — He is there. And He rules and reigns at every point in between.

Human history was born from and ends in perfect wisdom, and God will tie the final bow on our story.

Not Sam Altman, or Dario and Daniela Amodei, or Donald Trump, or Xi Jinping — but Jesus Christ will do it, who is the same “yesterday, today, and forever” (Hebrews 13:8).

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This article was written by Erica Mendel and originally published on The Washington Stand. For more content like this, visit Real Life Network.

Entertainment has never been more accessible. A television, phone, or tablet can provide an endless stream of movies, shows, short videos, news, games, and social media without ever reaching the bottom of the screen.

But having more to watch doesn’t necessarily mean families are better served by what they’re watching.

For many households, entertainment has become noisy in more ways than one. Programs compete for attention with faster pacing, stronger language, darker storylines, sexualized content, graphic imagery, and increasingly provocative themes. Algorithms encourage one more episode or video, while families can end an evening having consumed hours of media without feeling particularly rested, encouraged, or connected.

That raises a worthwhile question: Is it time to replace some of that noise with faith-based family media?

For Christian families, the answer may have less to do with watching less and more to do with choosing better.

What Does “Noisy Entertainment” Really Mean?

Noise isn’t necessarily about volume.

Media can be noisy when it constantly demands attention without giving anything meaningful in return. It can be entertainment built around shock, conflict, outrage, anxiety, or relentless stimulation. It can also be content filled with ideas and assumptions that compete with what parents are trying to teach their children.

Even material that isn’t overtly inappropriate can leave viewers feeling distracted or spiritually empty.

Philippians 4:8 gives Christians a useful standard for what deserves sustained attention, directing believers toward things that are true, noble, just, pure, lovely, and praiseworthy. That doesn’t mean every program needs to quote Scripture. But it does challenge families to think about what repeatedly occupies their minds.

Your Family’s Media Diet Matters

The phrase “media diet” is useful because entertainment has something in common with food: what is consumed occasionally matters less than what becomes normal.

One movie is unlikely to define a child’s worldview. Hundreds of hours of stories, characters, values, jokes, and messages over many years can have a much greater influence.

Children learn from stories. They notice which behaviors are rewarded, which relationships are celebrated, which beliefs are mocked, and what characters consider normal.

Adults aren’t immune either. Constant exposure to cynicism, fear, anger, or sexualized entertainment can gradually make those things feel ordinary.

Choosing faith-based media gives families an opportunity to put more spiritually nourishing material into that mix.

Replacing Is Often Easier Than Restricting

Parents can spend enormous energy saying no.

No, you can’t watch that show. No, that movie isn’t appropriate. No, we’re skipping this episode.

Boundaries are sometimes necessary, but they become much easier when there is also a good answer to, “What can we watch instead?” Faith-based streaming provides that replacement.

A family movie night could feature C.S. Lewis: The Most Reluctant Convert, opening conversations about doubt, reason, and conversion. A documentary such as The Listening Road can introduce thoughtful conversations about how people from different backgrounds think about faith. 7 Days in the Holy Land can help families visually connect places in Israel with biblical events.

The goal isn’t simply to remove entertainment. It is to replace some of it with stories and ideas worth carrying into the next day.

Faith-Based Media Can Start Conversations

One of the greatest advantages of watching Christian content together is what happens afterward. A program can naturally lead to questions that might otherwise feel forced:

• What would you have done?
• Why do you think that person responded that way?
• What does Scripture say about this?
• Do you agree with what was said?

Those conversations help turn viewing into family discipleship.

A documentary such as The Call, for example, can lead to discussion about the Great Commission and what evangelism looks like in ordinary Christian life. Way of the Master can prompt older children and adults to think about how they would talk about Jesus with someone who doesn’t share their beliefs.

The screen becomes the beginning of the conversation rather than the end of it.

Not Everything Has to Feel Like Bible Study

Replacing noisy entertainment with Christian media doesn’t mean turning every evening into a classroom. Families still need stories, laughter, discovery, music, and relaxation.

Faith-based media can include movies, animation, travel programs, interviews, biographies, documentaries, podcasts, and conversations. Some content teaches Scripture directly. Other programs simply tell compelling stories shaped by faith, courage, forgiveness, or hope.

That variety matters because healthy family media should still be enjoyable.

The distinction is that entertainment doesn’t need to undermine a family’s beliefs in order to hold its attention.

A Quieter Media Environment Can Help Families Slow Down

Another benefit of intentional viewing is simply reducing the constant demand for stimulation. Mainstream digital media often encourages viewers to keep going. Finish one episode and another begins automatically. Watch one short video and dozens more appear. Attention itself has become valuable currency.

Faith-based streaming can help families establish a different rhythm.

Choose one documentary. Watch a devotional together. Listen to a meaningful conversation. Then turn the television off and talk.

Programs such as Groundworks with Steve Wiggins are particularly suited to this approach because brief, Scripture-centered episodes can provide meaningful input without consuming an entire evening. Living Fearless with Andy and Hedieh can similarly encourage thoughtful conversation about faith and everyday challenges.

The objective isn’t to fill every available minute with Christian programming. It’s to make more intentional choices about which voices receive the family’s attention.

Parents Set the Tone

Children eventually make their own media choices. Before that happens, parents have an opportunity to model discernment. That includes more than policing what children watch. Kids also notice what their parents consume.

If adults spend hours immersed in angry commentary, dark entertainment, or endless scrolling while telling children to make healthier choices, the message can become confusing.

Christ-centered leadership in the home means asking the same questions of adult entertainment that parents ask about children’s programming.

• Is this helping or hurting?
• What is this normalizing?
• Is it worth the time being given to it?
• What could take its place?

Those questions can gradually reshape a family’s media habits without requiring an overnight purge of every mainstream platform.

Real Life Network Offers an Alternative

Real Life Network was created to provide a different kind of streaming environment.

Rather than placing biblical programming beside an enormous catalog of conflicting content, RLN carefully curates its library around Christian faith and biblical truth. Viewers can move between films, documentaries, podcasts, Bible teaching, cultural discussions, devotional programs, kids’ content, and live events without leaving that foundation.

That gives families something increasingly difficult to find in modern entertainment: a place where they can discover rather than constantly defend.

Parents still decide what fits the age and needs of their particular family. But the starting point is very different.

Replacing noisy entertainment doesn’t require rejecting technology, storytelling, or even every mainstream show. It means becoming more intentional about what receives a family’s limited time and attention.

Some entertainment merely fills a room. Better media can fill conversations, reinforce truth, encourage faith, and give families something meaningful to carry with them after the screen goes dark.

For Christian households, that makes faith-based family media more than an alternative. It can become one practical way to cultivate a home in which entertainment supports, rather than competes with, what matters most.

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Explore biblically curated movies, documentaries, family programs, devotionals, and more anytime on Real Life Network.

A newly enacted law in California that requires virtually all employers to give employees “anti-hate speech” training is raising red flags, as experts say that the mandate could force churches to provide training that conflicts with sincerely held biblical beliefs regarding sexuality, gender, and marriage.

Late last month, California Governor Gavin Newsom (D) signed into law AB 1803, a measure that requires all employers with five or more workers, including all churches and other nonprofit religious organizations, to provide employees with “anti-hate speech” instruction. But as observers like the California Family Council (CFC) are pointing out, the legislation does not define “hate speech,” instead handing the job to the state’s Civil Rights Department. The bill mandates that the training must confront workplace speech that “vilifies, humiliates, or incites hatred” against individuals based on what the state has already deemed a protected characteristic, which includes sex, gender identity, gender expression, and sexual orientation.

The CFC goes on to observe that the statute, which will go into effect on January 1, 2028, never mentions churches or religious nonprofits and their First Amendment rights to hold sincerely held religious beliefs about sexuality and gender. It also “fails to separate protected expression from unlawful conduct,” noting that the Supreme Court held in 2017 that “the First Amendment has no hate speech exception.”

Greg Burt, who serves as vice president of CFC, further pointed out the problems with AB 1803’s vague language regarding key terms that it says constitute “hate.”

“What does it mean to vilify? What speech actually humiliates?” he wondered during “Washington Watch with Tony Perkins” Tuesday. “[M]any times legislators consider many Christian beliefs when they’re expressed — especially regarding sexuality or gender — they accuse us of hating people. That’s [the] farthest thing from my mind. But we are simply advocating for our view that sex is determined by biology, and God created us both male and female. Well, to many people that is humiliating and that incites hatred. And so that’s the problem with this legislation.”

Burt went on to clarify that AB 1803 is being folded into a previously enacted statute that mandates sexual harassment training, which already specifies that using accurate biological pronouns constitutes “harassment.” “[Businesses are] already required to go through sexual harassment training, and we found out several years ago they redefined what sexual harassment means to include gender identity,” he explained. “… [The] California Civil Rights Department says misgendering is harassment, and so this training is on top of that already egregious training.”

As for how employers can fulfill the required training, Burt noted that hiring outside trainers is allowed, but the state-provided training that includes pro-LGBT messaging is free. “Right now, the state puts together a free curriculum — that’s how they do it with sexual harassment training, but you’re not required to use that training. You can come up with your own. But we don’t know exactly what ‘anti-hate’ is going to include, right? [Their] definition of speech that ‘humiliates’ — what does that mean? It really depends on the person who’s receiving the language.”

Burt further urged churches and other religious organizations in the Golden State to push back vigorously against the mandate. “What I think the state is doing is it’s trying to intimidate churches into following through with this,” he lamented. “They should not be receiving any kind of ideological training from the state on any moral issue. That’s why what churches need to be doing is asking for religious accommodations. The federal law and the state law already require businesses to accommodate people’s faith if they’re being required to do something that violates their faith. … [T]his is one of those points in history here in California where civil disobedience is going to be necessary.”

Burt concluded by emphasizing that state officials in California are counting on churches to kowtow to their demands instead of standing up for the constitutional freedoms, which has already proven to be a winning strategy.

“I’m sure they’re already thrilled that they get to retrain the entire population to believe what they believe regarding gender identity,” he reflected. “And so once we get accustomed to this and say, ‘Well, this is just what California requires, I guess we have to do it.’ No, you don’t. Folks, you’ve got to resist, and that includes individual employees. That’s what we are encouraging people to do. And we are having success. We have some attorneys we’re working with, and when people have been asking for religious accommodations, they have been accommodated.”

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This article was written by Dan Hart and originally published on The Washington Stand. For more content like this, visit Real Life Network.

Some disasters arrive without warning. Others are preceded by signs that, in hindsight, seem impossible to miss.

The attempted attack aboard a FlyDubai flight bound for Tel Aviv belongs in the second category. A co-pilot attacked the captain with a cockpit crash axe as the aircraft descended rapidly toward the region. The wounded captain managed to unlock the cockpit door, passengers and crew subdued the attacker, and off-duty pilots ultimately helped bring the aircraft safely to the ground.

It was an extraordinary rescue. It was also an extraordinary security failure.

The investigation has revealed concerns about the alleged attacker that existed before he entered that cockpit. Those revelations should prompt serious questions about aviation security, information sharing, radicalization, and what happens when institutions fail to act on warnings already in front of them. The transcript places that failure within a broader theme: the responsibility of a watchman is not merely to recognize danger after it arrives, but to pay attention while something can still be done.  

For more biblical perspective on the news shaping Israel, America, and the world, Real Life Network brings together current events and the good news of the gospel.

A warning is only valuable when someone is willing to act on it.

The Warning Signs Before FlyDubai Flight 1073

The attack aboard FlyDubai Flight 1073 on September 30 immediately raised questions about how the alleged attacker was allowed into the cockpit.

Authorities identified the co-pilot as Hamam al-Hammami, an Omani national. According to reporting from the Wall Street Journal and Associated Press, Oman Air had previously removed him from flying duties because of concerns about extremist views. FlyDubai later hired him after conducting standard background checks, but apparently did not receive or uncover that history.

That was not the only breakdown.

Oman does not have diplomatic relations with Israel, and questions have emerged over how an Omani pilot was cleared to operate a Tel Aviv-bound flight. Israel has acknowledged gaps in its vetting procedures and is reviewing the screening of foreign flight crews. Investigators have also examined al-Hammami’s employment and educational history as authorities in several countries try to determine what was known about him before the attack.

The most remarkable part of the story is what happened after the attack began.

Captain Smit Machchhar described being struck repeatedly from behind. Despite severe injuries and impaired vision, he managed to reach and unlock the cockpit door. That action allowed others to intervene before the aircraft could be destroyed. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later praised Machchhar as a hero and invited him and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to participate in Israel’s Independence Day celebrations.

The precise motive and whether anyone else assisted al-Hammami remain subjects of investigation. Early reporting indicates investigators have not established ties to a terrorist organization and are examining the possibility that he acted alone.

Those distinctions matter. Serious journalism cannot transform suspicion into fact simply because it makes a compelling story.

But uncertainty about every detail does not erase the security failures already apparent.

The lesson is not that every possible threat can be prevented. It is that institutions cannot afford to ignore credible warning signs and then act surprised when those warnings become a crisis.

Europe Was Warned About Radicalization

The concern extends beyond one airline.

In 2017, United Arab Emirates Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed delivered a warning to Western leaders about radicalization in Europe. Speaking in English, he predicted that Europe would eventually produce more extremists and terrorists because of indecision, political correctness, and a mistaken belief that Western governments understood extremism in the Middle East better than governments confronting it directly.

Nearly a decade later, the warning is worth revisiting, but it also requires an important distinction.

Islamist extremism cannot be treated as synonymous with Islam or with Muslims generally. Millions of Muslims reject terrorism and radical ideology. Governments have a responsibility to distinguish between peaceful religious practice and individuals or organizations advocating violence.

But refusing to make sweeping judgments does not require refusing to make judgments at all.

The challenge for free societies is to protect religious liberty while confronting genuine extremism. Those commitments are not contradictory. A government can defend the right of Muslims to worship peacefully while aggressively investigating terrorist networks. It can protect immigrants from unjust discrimination while enforcing immigration and criminal laws. It can welcome peaceful citizens while recognizing that ideological radicalization is real.

Pretending those distinctions cannot be made leaves societies vulnerable from both directions.

The FlyDubai investigation illustrates the stakes. An individual reportedly flagged for extremist views eventually obtained access to the controls of a commercial aircraft headed toward Israel. Whatever additional facts investigators uncover, that sequence deserves scrutiny.

It should also remind Christians that discernment is not fear.

Fear assumes the worst about everyone. Discernment examines evidence, distinguishes truth from speculation, and responds appropriately when genuine danger appears.

A Watchman Has to See Clearly

Ezekiel 33 gives the image of a watchman standing guard. When the watchman sees danger approaching, his responsibility is to sound the alarm.

That image is powerful precisely because the watchman must do two things correctly.

He must remain awake, and he must see clearly.

A watchman who sleeps through an approaching threat has failed. But so has a watchman who constantly sounds false alarms until nobody believes him anymore. Christian vigilance therefore requires both courage and truth.

That principle reaches beyond terrorism.

Researchers are currently conducting new tests on the Durupınar formation in eastern Turkey, a boat-shaped geological formation that some believe could contain remains associated with Noah’s Ark. Recent work has included ground-penetrating radar, soil sampling, digital modeling, and core drilling. Researchers involved with the project have reported subsurface anomalies, including linear and angular features.

The location is intriguing because it lies in the broader Mount Ararat region associated with the Genesis account. The formation’s dimensions and reported subsurface features have fueled decades of interest.

But the evidence has not established that the formation is Noah’s Ark.

The research team itself has acknowledged that radar anomalies do not prove an archaeological origin, and laboratory analysis of recent samples remains underway. Some researchers believe the formation is artificial; other geologists have long argued that it is natural. More testing is necessary.

Christians should be comfortable saying that.

Biblical faith does not depend upon exaggerating archaeological discoveries before the evidence arrives. If compelling evidence eventually emerges, examine it. If the formation turns out to be geological, Genesis does not suddenly disappear.

The Dead Sea Scrolls offer a helpful contrast. Their discovery provided actual ancient manuscripts that scholars could compare with later biblical texts. The Great Isaiah Scroll, dating roughly a millennium earlier than previously available complete Hebrew manuscripts of Isaiah, demonstrated remarkable continuity while also containing textual variants.

The Christian does not need sensationalism when truth is already compelling.

Biblical discernment means refusing to ignore evidence that is uncomfortable and refusing to exaggerate evidence that is convenient.

That may be one of the most important habits Christians can develop in an age of breaking news, viral videos, political advertising, polling, social media, and constant claims of unprecedented discoveries.

The FlyDubai attack deserves investigation without conspiracy theories. Radicalization deserves attention without treating an entire religion or population as guilty. Archaeological discoveries deserve excitement without announcing conclusions before the evidence supports them. Political claims deserve examination regardless of which party benefits from them.

The watchman does not determine what is true.

The watchman pays attention to what is actually there.

Captain Machchhar reportedly had only moments to act. Severely wounded, he reached the cockpit door and opened it, giving everyone else aboard the aircraft a chance to survive.

Most people will never encounter anything remotely comparable. But everyone faces smaller moments when recognizing reality matters: deciding what information to trust, what warnings deserve attention, what claims require more evidence, and what principles should remain firm when cultural pressure makes them inconvenient.

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Stay informed with The Daniel Cohen Show on Real Life Network, where faith, current events, Israel, and the stories shaping the world come together.

Christian families have more streaming choices than ever. Alongside mainstream services, a growing number of platforms now offer Christian movies, Bible teaching, children’s programming, documentaries, inspirational series, apologetics, and family-friendly entertainment.

But the best Christian streaming platforms serve very different purposes. Some are built around biblical teaching. Others focus on movies, children’s programming, Bible studies, or simply giving families cleaner entertainment options.

Here are 10 Christian and faith-oriented streaming platforms worth considering.

1. Real Life Network: Best for Christian Teaching and Faith-Based Programming

Cost: Free

Real Life Network offers one of the broadest combinations of biblical programming available without a subscription fee. The donor-supported platform includes Bible teaching, Christian news, apologetics, documentaries, podcasts, kids’ programs, movies, cultural commentary, and live events.

Viewers can find programs such Real Life with Jack Hibbs, RLN News, The Daniel Cohen Show, Cross Examined, The Creation Today Show, Superbook, and many other offerings within one biblically curated environment.

Unlike services centered primarily on movies, RLN is particularly strong for viewers who want entertainment combined with biblical teaching and programs addressing faith, culture, current events, and worldview.

Best for: Christians looking for a broad, free streaming platform built around biblical truth.

2. Pure Flix: Best for Christian Movies and Family Entertainment

Cost: Paid subscription; plans begin at $9.99 per month

Great American Pure Flix is one of the best-known Christian streaming services for faith-forward movies and scripted entertainment.

Its catalog combines original series, Christian films, family dramas, Christmas programming, kids’ shows, and uplifting entertainment centered on faith, family, and traditional values. Multiple membership levels are available, with higher tiers adding features such as special screenings and early access.

For viewers who want a faith-oriented alternative to browsing mainstream movie libraries, Pure Flix remains one of the strongest options.

Best for: Christian movies, original series, family dramas, and faith-centered entertainment.

3. UP Faith & Family: Best for Wholesome Family Entertainment

Cost: $5.99 per month or $59.99 annually

UP Faith & Family offers thousands of hours of commercial-free family movies, dramas, series, and inspirational entertainment.

Its catalog is broader than explicitly Christian programming. Viewers will find faith-friendly movies alongside wholesome family dramas and popular series such as Heartland.

That distinction makes UP Faith & Family particularly useful for households looking for cleaner entertainment without requiring every program to function as Christian teaching.

Best for: Wholesome dramas, family movies, romantic stories, and uplifting entertainment.

4. Faith Channel: Best for Faith-Based Shows and Inspirational Content

Cost: Free

FaithChannel is a free Christian streaming service offering movies, television shows, documentaries, preaching, teaching, music, podcasts, children’s programming, and other inspirational content.

Its growing library includes programming from a variety of independent Christian ministries and content producers. Titles range from Heroic Faith and The Torchlighters to apologetics, Bible prophecy, family films, podcasts, and children’s shows.

Because much of its catalog comes from different creators and ministries, viewers can encounter a particularly wide variety of formats and perspectives.

Best for: Exploring free Christian films, independent programs, teaching, podcasts, and inspirational content.

5. Go Minno: Best for Christian Kids’ Shows and Bible-Based Content

Cost: $10.99 per month or $69.99 annually after a free trial

Minno is designed specifically for Christian families with younger children.

Its library includes more than 175 shows, including the classic VeggieTales collection, Bible stories, music, educational programs, and Christian children’s entertainment. Families can stream across multiple devices and download programming for offline viewing.

Because the service is built specifically for children rather than including kids’ programming as one category within a larger library, it gives parents a focused alternative to mainstream children’s streaming.

Best for: Preschool and elementary-age children, Christian cartoons, Bible stories, and faith-based learning.

6. Yippee: Best for Safe, Faith-Focused Kids’ Entertainment

Cost: $7.99 per month or an annual subscription after a free trial

Yippee combines Christian children’s television with the energetic creator-driven format kids often encounter online.

Its library includes thousands of episodes from hundreds of series and movies, including Superbook, Christian programming, music, educational shows, and parent-approved creators. Yippee emphasizes that its environment contains no ads and no recommendation algorithms.

That makes it especially attractive to parents whose children enjoy online video but who want more control over what appears next.

Best for: Families seeking a Christian alternative to children’s YouTube viewing.

7. RightNow Media: Best for Bible Studies and Church Groups

Cost: Access is generally provided through subscribing churches and Christian organizations

RightNow Media is less like Netflix and more like an enormous digital discipleship library.

It offers more than 25,000 video Bible studies covering Scripture, marriage, parenting, leadership, finances, recovery, Christian living, and other topics. The service also includes more than 2,000 children’s episodes and downloadable materials for many studies.

Rather than purchasing individual subscriptions, users generally receive access through a participating church, ministry, or organization.

Its combination of teaching videos and discussion materials makes RightNow Media particularly useful for small groups and church ministries.

Best for: Bible studies, small groups, church discipleship, leadership development, and Christian education.

8. RedeemTV: Best Free Christian Film Streaming Platform

Cost: Free

RedeemTV offers more than 2,000 faith-filled titles without subscription fees or advertising.

Its donor-supported library includes Christian movies, documentaries, animated programs, television series, and family entertainment. Titles include The Pilgrim’s Progress, Vindication, Fragments of Truth, Ryan Defrates, and many others.

RedeemTV is especially strong for viewers whose primary interest is films and entertainment. Real Life Network offers a broader mix of teaching, news, cultural programming, and entertainment, while RedeemTV concentrates more heavily on movies and series.

Best for: Free Christian movies and shows without commercials.

9. VidAngel: Best for Filtering Movies and TV Shows

Cost: $9.99 per month when billed directly; supported streaming subscriptions may also be required

VidAngel takes a completely different approach to family entertainment.

Rather than providing only a traditional catalog of Christian programming, VidAngel lets viewers apply customizable filters to supported movies and shows from other streaming services. Families can choose categories of language, sexual content, violence, and other material they would prefer to mute or skip.

That means parents do not necessarily have to reject an entire movie because of a handful of objectionable scenes.

VidAngel requires users to have their own subscriptions to compatible streaming services for much of its filtered content.

Best for: Families who want more control over mainstream movies and television shows.

10. Christian Cinema: Best for Renting and Buying Christian Movies

Cost: Individual rentals and purchases; optional subscription plans are also available

Christian Cinema is useful for viewers who do not necessarily want another monthly streaming subscription.

Movies can be rented individually and streamed for a limited viewing period or purchased and stored in a digital library for on-demand viewing. The service specializes in Christian and faith-based films rather than trying to compete as a broad general-entertainment platform.

Christian Cinema also offers optional subscription plans for additional movies and television programming, but its rent-or-buy model remains a major distinction.

Best for: Viewers who want specific Christian movies without committing to another full streaming subscription.

What Should You Look for in a Christian Streaming Service?

The best platform depends on what you want from it.

Start by considering biblical alignment. A platform described as “family-friendly,” “inspirational,” or even “faith-based” is not necessarily the same as a service intentionally grounded in Scripture. Families should consider who selects the programming and what worldview shapes the library.

Next, consider the type of content your household actually watches. Parents with young children may get more value from Minno or Yippee, while a small-group leader may find RightNow Media far more useful. Movie lovers may prefer Pure Flix or RedeemTV, while viewers interested in Bible teaching, apologetics, news, and culture may find Real Life Network a better fit.

Finally, consider cost, commercials, device compatibility, offline viewing, parental controls, and whether a service requires other subscriptions to function.

Are There Any Free Christian Streaming Platforms?

Yes.

Real Life Network is completely free and donor-supported, offering Christian teaching, news, movies, kids’ programs, apologetics, podcasts, and more without a paid tier. RedeemTV is also donor-supported and offers more than 2,000 titles free without ads. FaithChannel provides free faith-and-family programming as well.

Angel has selected titles available without a Guild membership, although most of its full catalog now requires paid access.

For families trying to reduce monthly subscription costs, the amount of Christian programming available free is substantial.

Which Christian Streaming Platform Is Best for Families?

There is no single answer for every household. For families seeking a platform the whole household can use, Real Life Network has an advantage because its free library extends beyond children’s entertainment to Bible teaching, movies, documentaries, current events, apologetics, podcasts, and family programming.

Families primarily concerned with younger children may prefer Minno or Yippee. Those wanting a traditional movie-and-series experience may choose Pure Flix, UP Faith & Family, or RedeemTV.

The best choice is the one that not only avoids objectionable material but also supports the values parents are working to build at home.

Frequently Asked Questions About Christian Streaming Platforms

What Is the Best Christian Streaming Platform?

The best platform depends on your priorities. Real Life Network is a strong all-around choice for viewers seeking free biblical teaching, Christian news, apologetics, kids’ programming, movies, documentaries, and cultural content. Pure Flix is particularly strong for Christian movies and scripted entertainment, while Minno and Yippee specialize in children’s programming.

What Is the Best Free Christian Streaming Service?

Real Life Network and RedeemTV are two of the strongest completely free options. RLN provides a broad mix of programming, while RedeemTV has a particularly large free library of Christian films and series. FaithChannel is another free option worth exploring.

Is There a Christian Alternative to Netflix?

Several services can function as Christian or family-oriented alternatives to Netflix. Pure Flix most closely resembles a traditional subscription movie-and-series platform, while Real Life Network combines entertainment with teaching, news, apologetics, and family programming at no cost.

What Is the Best Christian Streaming Platform for Kids?

Minno and Yippee are specifically built around Christian children’s entertainment. Real Life Network also offers free children’s programming within a larger platform designed for the whole family.

Do I Need to Pay for Christian Streaming?

No. While many Christian streaming services charge monthly or annual subscription fees, Real Life Network, RedeemTV, and FaithChannel offer free options.

Finding the Best Christian Streaming Platform for Your Home

Christian streaming is no longer a single category. Families can now choose platforms specializing in movies, Bible studies, kids’ shows, documentaries, teaching, news, apologetics, and wholesome general entertainment.

The right choice depends on what you want entering your home and what role you want media to play in your family.

For viewers who want to begin with a service built around biblical truth without adding another monthly expense, Real Life Network provides free access to Christian teaching, news, family programming, movies, documentaries, podcasts, apologetics, kids’ shows, and more.

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Explore free Christian streaming today on Real Life Network.

More than 50,000 Americans from across the country signed a new “Declaration for Life” within hours of its public release that calls on them and their fellow citizens “to stand for life” and for Congress “to ban the chemical abortion drug mifepristone,” Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) told reporters during an impromptu news conference in a Senate office building Wednesday.

“We think this declaration, written by pastors, is calling on spiritual leaders and everyday Christians across America to stand for life and to confront the scourge of chemical abortion. It is so critical on this the 250th anniversary of America,” Hawley said, referring to the four-page declaration he and a committee of pastors and other spiritual leaders from multiple denominations drafted.

The Declaration for Life was officially unveiled Wednesday during the first annual Missouri Prayer Breakfast hosted by the Show-Me State’s senior senator. The document is being circulated nationwide by multiple pro-life groups, including Family Research Council, and millions of Americans are expected to sign the document in the coming days.

“The Declaration of Independence gives us three examples of ‘inalienable rights:’ life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Life is the first of those rights because it is the condition of the others. It is thus the most foundational of rights,” the document proclaims at its outset.

“We believe we have an obligation as Christians and spiritual leaders to remind our countrymen of what Scripture and conscience together proclaim: That every human being from the moment of our knitting together in our mothers’ wombs, was fearfully and wonderfully made. The divine image each human being bears was not earned. It cannot be forfeited. And it is the first duty of the Church to defend human dignity where it is denied,” the document states.

The declaration continues, noting that “what is at stake on this anniversary is nothing less than the conviction on which every flourishing society finally rests: That each and every member of the human family, as a creature fashioned in the image of the divine Creator and Ruler, is the bearer of profound dignity. Where that conviction is honored, civilizations flourish. Where it is forgotten, cultures decline and fall.”

The declaration explains that while in the four years since the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision “returned the abortion question from courts to legislatures,” that decision “did not end abortion in America. Far from it. More abortions are performed in this country today than when [Roe v. Wade] was still the law of the land — over one million abortions in 2025 alone.”

Three-fourths of those abortions are carried out using the chemical drug mifepristone, and, the declaration points out, “thanks to recent changes in government regulations, mifepristone can now be mailed into every state and city in America, regardless of local rules. The abortion drug is nearly always fatal to the unborn child and frequently injurious to the mother. Recent studies indicate the drug puts more than one in 10 women who take it at risk of serious, life-threatening complications, including hemorrhaging, infections and sepsis.”

Hawley told reporters he believes “the time has come to ban mifepristone abortions, and I want to emphasize this is something only Congress can do. … Only Congress can act to take mifepristone off of the Food and Drug Administration’s [approved drug] schedule, only Congress can say it will not be available for abortions. That’s something that Congress should do. Congress should stop passing the buck to other people. Congress should stand up and act.”

As long as Congress fails to act, Hawley emphasized, state actions such as those in Louisiana, Missouri, and others that have banned chemical abortions carried out by medical professionals in those jurisdictions will continue to be rendered meaningless so long as the drug can be mailed across state lines and administered in private by the mother with a cup of water.

Hawley added that “when it comes to elected officials in Congress, there hasn’t been much of anything [done] to protect the innocent unborn, and I think we’ve got to change that. One of the things we want to do with this Declaration for Life is call on candidates for public office in both parties to sign this declaration, to say ‘We support it, we support protecting human life.’”

Earlier this year, Hawley introduced S. 4066, the Safeguarding Women from Chemical Abortion Act that would outlaw chemical abortions. On the House side of the Capitol, the same legislation was introduced as H.R. 7902 by Rep. Diana Harshbarger (R-Tenn.). The Senate bill has seven co-sponsors, all Republicans, while the House bill has 11 co-sponsors, also all GOPers. Neither proposal has been advanced to committee hearings, as Republican leaders focus on other issues.

Another major obstacle for such reforms includes the lack of action from President Donald Trump, whose administration approved in October 2025 a second generic version of mifepristone for abortion use and has delayed a promised FDA study of the drug.

In addition, as Family Research Council President Tony Perkins told reporters during the Hawley news conference, the Republican Party at its 2024 convention abandoned its long-standing defense of the right to life, and its congressional leadership has since failed to act vigorously on the issue.

“Unfortunately, the Republican Party has lost its voice on the right to life issue, and in that vacuum, there are leaders who are stepping forward like Senator Hawley calling upon the church, communities, and the country to step up on behalf of the unborn,” Perkins said.

“We have made great progress,” FRC’s president continued, “but there has been a tremendous setback, and we’ve reached a point where I think we have to call upon the faith community, Christian pastors, to step into this vacuum and speak unequivocally about the sanctity of human life and hold elected officials accountable to the standard. This declaration is a starting point for establishing a standard for what we should be aspiring to as a nation.”

When asked by The Washington Stand if he would initiate legislative action in response to a Government Accounting Office (GAO) study released earlier this week that found thousands of abortions are being paid for annually with federal tax dollars through the Obamacare health insurance program, Hawley replied, “100 percent, and the other thing that is happening is that Planned Parenthood is getting funded right now. The ban on Planned Parenthood funding has expired, [and] it’s being funded with taxpayer dollars.”

The Hyde Amendment — named after former Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.) who authored the measure — was approved by a Democrat-controlled Congress and signed into law by Democratic President Jimmy Carter in 1977. That law bars the use of federal tax dollars to pay for abortions except in a tiny class of exceptions.

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This article was written by Mark Tapscott and originally published on The Washington Stand. For more content like this, visit Real Life Network.

News can be useful. It helps us understand what is happening in our communities, our country, and around the world. It can alert us to events that deserve prayer, action, generosity, or thoughtful attention.

But news can also consume attention surprisingly quickly.

Breaking alerts lead to updates. Updates lead to commentary. Commentary leads to another video, article, or social media post. Before long, a few minutes of staying informed can become hours of absorbing conflict, outrage, fear, and speculation.

Christians don’t need to withdraw from what is happening in the world. But neither should the news determine the condition of our hearts.

Here are seven practical ways believers can remain informed without allowing the news cycle to become spiritually overwhelming.

1. Start with Scripture Before Starting with Headlines

One of the simplest ways to keep news in perspective is to decide which voice gets your attention first.

Opening a news app before getting out of bed can immediately fill your mind with elections, wars, economic concerns, crime, cultural conflict, and international crises. Scripture begins somewhere very different: with God, His character, His promises, and His purposes.

Psalm 119:105 says, “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.”

Starting with God’s Word doesn’t make difficult events disappear. It helps place them within a larger biblical framework.

Before asking, What happened overnight? it can be helpful to remember what has not changed. God is still sovereign. His Word is still true. The Gospel is still good news. Christ is still building His Church.

Headlines change by the hour. Those truths do not.

2. Know the Difference Between Being Informed and Being Consumed

There is no biblical command requiring Christians to know every development immediately. Yet modern media can create a sense that we must continually monitor events or risk falling behind.

That urgency deserves examination.

Being informed means understanding significant events well enough to think, pray, and respond wisely. Being consumed means repeatedly checking for updates even when little has changed and continuing long after the information is useful.

One helpful question is: Am I learning something I need to know, or am I simply feeding my anxiety?

Setting specific times for checking news can help establish boundaries. So can turning off unnecessary alerts or stepping away when a developing story has become repetitive.

You can care deeply about the world without following every headline in real time.

3. Test What You Hear Instead of Reacting Immediately

Fast-moving news rewards quick reactions. Christian discernment often requires something slower. Proverbs 18:17 says, “The first one to plead his cause seems right, until his neighbor comes and examines him.”

That principle is especially useful in an age of social media clips, partial quotations, dramatic headlines, and rapidly developing stories.

Before sharing or reacting, ask:

• Is the information confirmed?
• Am I hearing the full context?
• Is this reporting, commentary, or speculation?
• Does another trustworthy source corroborate the claim?

Christians should have a particular concern for truth. Passing along something inaccurate simply because it supports our assumptions does not honor that responsibility.

Sometimes wisdom means waiting.

4. Evaluate the World Through Scripture, Not a Political Tribe

Politics matters because government, law, freedom, justice, family, human dignity, and public policy affect real people. But Christianity cannot be reduced to a political party or ideology.

Believers should evaluate political and cultural questions through Scripture rather than modifying Scripture to fit a preferred political position.

That means Christians may sometimes agree strongly with a political leader, movement, or commentator and at other times need to challenge what that same person says or does.

Biblical conviction should remain the standard.

Programs that approach culture from an explicitly Christian worldview can be useful here. Cure America with Star Parker, The Daniel Cohen Show, Rose Unplugged, Small Talk Big Issues, and The City of God are among the programs available through Real Life Network that engage cultural and public issues from faith-informed perspectives.

The objective isn’t to replace independent thinking. It is to consider events alongside voices that recognize biblical truth as relevant to public life.

5. Let the News Become a Prompt for Prayer

News can easily produce frustration. It can also become a prayer list.

• A report about war can remind us to pray for civilians, soldiers, government leaders, missionaries, and churches in affected regions.
• A story about persecution can lead us to pray for believers who face consequences for their faith.
• A report involving children, schools, marriage, or culture can prompt prayer for parents, teachers, churches, and the next generation.

First Timothy 2:1–2 instructs believers to offer prayers and intercessions “for kings and all who are in authority.” That command gives Christians something constructive to do with difficult information.

Instead of merely asking, Can you believe this? we can also ask, How should I pray about this?

6. Make Room for Good News Too

News naturally emphasizes problems. That is partly because crises, disagreements, disasters, and unexpected developments are newsworthy. But consuming an uninterrupted stream of what is going wrong can distort our perception of what God is doing.

Churches are serving communities. Missionaries are sharing the Gospel. People are coming to Christ. Christians are caring for the poor, helping disaster victims, defending the vulnerable, strengthening families, and serving in places most viewers will never see on the evening news.

Programs such as On the Ground with Samaritan’s Purse can provide glimpses of Christians responding to suffering with practical help. Fred Jordan Missions TV highlights faith expressed through compassion and community involvement. Evangelism Explosion International focuses on equipping believers to share Christ with others.

These stories don’t erase bad news.

They remind us that bad news isn’t the whole story.

7. Remember Which Kingdom Comes First

Perhaps the most important way to remain grounded is to remember where Christian hope ultimately rests.

Governments change. Political movements rise and fall. Economies strengthen and weaken. International alliances shift. Cultural attitudes change.

Jesus Christ does not.

Philippians 3:20 reminds believers, “For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.” That doesn’t make Christians indifferent to earthly events. In fact, biblical faith should encourage believers to care about their neighbors, communities, country, and world.

But it prevents temporary events from carrying eternal weight.

Christians can vote, serve, advocate, give, pray, speak truth, and remain engaged while remembering that no election, institution, economic system, or human leader can carry the hope that belongs to Christ alone.

Stay Informed Without Losing Your Peace

There is nothing wrong with wanting to understand what is happening in the world.

The challenge is keeping the news in its proper place.

Read Scripture before allowing headlines to establish the tone of your day. Set reasonable limits. Check facts carefully. Evaluate cultural and political questions through a biblical worldview. Pray about what you learn. Look for evidence of God’s work as well as evidence of human brokenness.

Above all, remember that Christians already know the most important news.

Jesus Christ has come. He died for sinners. He rose again. He offers forgiveness and eternal life to those who trust in Him, and He will return.

No breaking-news alert can change that.

Real Life Network offers RLN News along with programs such as The Daniel Cohen Show, Cure America, Rose Unplugged, The City of God, Small Talk Big Issues, and other biblically informed programming to help Christians consider current events without separating the headlines from their faith.

Explore Christian news, cultural commentary, Bible teaching, and more for free on Real Life Network.

Choosing what your family watches used to be relatively simple. Today, children can encounter movies, shows, videos, games, social media, podcasts, and other digital content across multiple devices throughout the day.

That makes media decisions about more than whether a particular movie contains bad language or an inappropriate scene. Stories communicate ideas. Characters model attitudes. Entertainment can reinforce beliefs about relationships, identity, success, morality, authority, and what makes life meaningful.

Christian parents don’t need to approach every screen with suspicion. But thoughtful questions can help families move beyond simply asking, “Is this allowed?” toward developing genuine biblical discernment.

Here are seven questions worth asking.

1. What Is This Teaching My Child to Admire?

Every story has heroes. Sometimes they’re obvious. Other times the audience is simply encouraged to sympathize with certain characters, choices, or lifestyles.

Ask what qualities the program presents as admirable. Is courage celebrated? Loyalty? Honesty? Sacrifice? Compassion? Or does the story consistently reward selfishness, dishonesty, disrespect, cruelty, or behavior that conflicts with what your family is teaching?

This doesn’t mean every protagonist must behave perfectly. Some of the best stories involve flawed people learning from mistakes.

The more important question is whether the story ultimately recognizes the difference between wisdom and foolishness, good and evil, truth and deception.

2. What Does This Program Treat as Normal?

Media doesn’t always persuade through direct arguments. Often, it influences simply by repetition.

When children repeatedly see particular attitudes, relationships, behaviors, or beliefs presented as normal, those ideas can gradually begin to feel ordinary. That is why parents should pay attention not only to dramatic objectionable moments but also to the assumptions underneath a story.

What does the program communicate about marriage? Parents? Faith? Sexuality? Authority? Success? Human worth?

Children may not consciously identify those ideas, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t noticing them.

Parents can help by occasionally asking, “What do you think that show is saying about this?” That simple question teaches children to watch actively rather than absorb everything passively.

3. Is This Appropriate for My Particular Child?

An age rating can be helpful, but parents know their children better than a rating system does.

Two children of the same age may react very differently to the same movie. One might handle a tense historical story well, while another has nightmares after mild suspense. One teenager may be ready to engage thoughtfully with difficult cultural questions while another isn’t.

Christian parenting requires more than finding the boundary of what is technically permitted.

Romans 14:19 encourages believers to “pursue the things which make for peace and the things by which one may edify another.”

A useful question, then, is not only, Can my child watch this? but Will this be beneficial for my child right now?

4. How Does My Child Feel After Watching It?

Sometimes the effect of media becomes clearer after the screen turns off. Does a child seem encouraged, curious, imaginative, or eager to talk? Or irritable, anxious, fearful, disrespectful, restless, or obsessed with watching more?

One viewing won’t necessarily reveal a pattern. But repeated reactions can tell parents something important.

The same is true for adults. Some entertainment leaves viewers refreshed. Other content leaves them angry, agitated, discouraged, or mentally exhausted.

Philippians 4:8 directs believers toward what is true, noble, just, pure, lovely, commendable, virtuous, and praiseworthy. That provides a useful biblical framework for considering not just what enters the mind, but what it produces there.

5. Is Screen Time Crowding Out Something Better?

A perfectly acceptable program can still become a problem if it consumes too much time.

The issue may not be what a child is watching. It may be what he or she is no longer doing. Is screen time replacing sleep? Outdoor play? Reading? Family conversation? Church involvement? Homework? Prayer and Scripture? Time with friends?

Sometimes the wisest media decision is not finding a better show but leaving the television off.

Healthy media habits recognize entertainment as one part of life rather than the center of it.

6. Can This Become a Conversation Instead of Just Consumption?

Parents don’t have to eliminate every story containing an idea they disagree with. Sometimes those moments provide valuable opportunities to teach.

Watching together allows parents to ask questions.

• Why do you think that character made that choice?
• Was it wise?
• What consequences followed?
• What does the Bible teach about that issue?
• How would following Jesus change the way someone responds?

Those conversations help children build discernment that will eventually matter far more than parental controls.

Christian media can provide especially natural opportunities for these discussions. A program such as LifeWise Academy can lead into conversations about bringing biblical truth into everyday life. Genesis Science Minute can introduce questions about creation and science in just 60 seconds. The Pilgrim’s Progress can start conversations about temptation, perseverance, and following Christ.

The goal isn’t to interrogate children after every episode. It’s to make talking about ideas a normal part of family life.

7. Does Our Entertainment Support the Kind of Home We’re Trying to Build?

This may be the most important question of all.

Parents spend years teaching children what is true, who they are, what relationships should look like, why Scripture matters, and what it means to follow Christ.

It makes sense to ask whether the family’s entertainment choices generally support those priorities or continually work against them. That doesn’t require every show to be overtly Christian. But intentionally including faith-based programming can help create a healthier balance.

Younger children might enjoy biblical programming such as Superbook, iBible, or Learn, Grow and Go! Older children and teens can explore apologetics through  In Depth Apologetics for Kids or creation-focused content. Families can also choose movies, documentaries, Bible teaching, and programs built around Christian service, history, and worldview.

Real Life Network provides these kinds of options in one biblically curated streaming environment, giving parents a place to begin without having to sort through an enormous mainstream catalog first.

Teach Discernment, Not Just Rules

Parents cannot screen every piece of media their children will encounter forever.

Eventually, children become teenagers. Teenagers become adults. They choose their own movies, follow their own accounts, download their own apps, and decide which voices deserve their attention.

That’s why the long-term goal is bigger than creating a list of approved and prohibited programs. It is helping children learn to ask good questions themselves.

• What is this teaching me?
• Does it agree with what I know to be true?
• How is it affecting my thoughts and attitudes?
• Is this worth my time?
• Would I make this same choice if Jesus were sitting beside me?

Those questions turn media discernment from a parental restriction into a lifelong Christian practice.

The goal isn’t a home without screens. It’s a home where screens know their place, parents remain engaged, and entertainment doesn’t get the final word on what children learn to value.

Explore free, biblically curated kids’ shows, family programs, movies, Bible teaching, and more on Real Life Network.

Christian streaming has grown far beyond Sunday sermons on demand. Today, viewers can find Christian news, Bible teaching, apologetics, podcasts, documentaries, movies, children’s programs, cultural discussions, devotional content, and live events without paying for another monthly subscription.

For families accustomed to searching across YouTube, television networks, podcast apps, and multiple streaming services, having those options together in one place can make Christian media much easier to discover.

Real Life Network offers all of it for free. Whether you’re looking for something to watch with your children, a Bible teacher to follow throughout the week, a podcast for the commute, or news viewed through a Christian worldview, there are thousands of episodes and many different types of programming to explore.

Here’s a guide to what you can find.

Christian News and Cultural Commentary

For viewers who want to stay informed without leaving their biblical worldview at the door, Christian streaming offers an alternative to relying exclusively on mainstream news.

RLN News covers national and international developments from a Christian perspective, while The Daniel Cohen Show brings a particular focus to Israel, global affairs, culture, and the intersection between current events and faith.

Other programs approach culture from different angles. Rose Unplugged features interviews and conversations about issues shaping society. Cure America with Star Parker examines public policy, faith, freedom, and the cultural questions facing the nation.

Viewers interested in deeper examinations of particular issues can also turn to documentaries such as Truth Rising, The Great Global Reset, and The Eye of the Storm.

Together, these programs give viewers more than headlines. They encourage Christians to consider what is happening in the world in light of Scripture.

Bible Teaching and Sermons

Bible teaching remains at the heart of Christian streaming, but there is no single style.

Real Life with Jack Hibbs offers Bible teaching with application to Christian living and the issues believers face today. A Daily Walk with John Randall provides steady verse-by-verse teaching, while So True with Philip De Courcy brings biblical truth into practical areas of everyday life.

Bridge Bible Talk takes a different approach, allowing listeners to hear actual questions about Scripture, doctrine, and Christian living discussed in a conversational format.

Viewers can also explore the Legacy: Pioneers of the Faith collection for teaching from influential Christian voices of previous generations, including Billy Graham, Chuck Smith, Martyn Lloyd-Jones, and others.

For someone who wants to move beyond occasional sermon viewing and develop a regular habit of biblical learning, there is plenty to explore.

Apologetics, Creation, and Biblical Worldview

Some of the most useful Christian streaming content begins with difficult questions.

Does God exist? Can the Bible be trusted? How should Christians think about science and creation? What evidence supports the resurrection? How can believers respond when friends challenge Christianity?

Cross Examined with Frank Turek tackles many of those questions through Christian apologetics. I Don’t Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist also examines the evidence and reasoning behind central Christian truth claims.

For questions involving creation and science, viewers can explore The Creation Today Show and ICR’s Creation Podcast. In Depth Apologetics for Kids makes some of these same kinds of questions approachable for younger audiences.

There is also Lamps Lit Youth Prophecy Conference, which gives teens and adults an opportunity to explore Bible prophecy through sessions with Jeff Kinley, Todd Hampson, and Jack Hibbs.

These programs can be useful for personal viewing, family discussions, youth groups, and small-group studies.

Christian Podcasts and Conversations

Sometimes watching a full teaching program isn’t practical. Podcasts make Christian content easy to fit into driving, exercise, chores, or other parts of the day.

The Jack Hibbs Podcast discusses Scripture, culture, current issues, and Christian living in a conversational format. Ignite with Barry Meguiar focuses on helping believers become more comfortable sharing their faith.

The Prophecy Pros Podcast with Jeff Kinley and Todd Hampson explores biblical prophecy, while Victor Marx brings conversations shaped by ministry, hardship, faith, and real-world experiences.

For something much shorter, Groundworks with Steve Wiggins offers brief, Scripture-based devotional teaching that can fit into just a few minutes.

There are also programs such as Living Fearless with Andy and Hedieh, which offers conversations about faith, courage, and living faithfully through difficult circumstances.

Christian Documentaries and Movies

Christian streaming also gives viewers access to stories that can educate, challenge, and entertain.

For apologetics and prophecy, Before the Wrath explores the connection between ancient Galilean wedding customs and biblical teaching concerning Christ’s return.

Those interested in Christian history and biography can watch titles such as C.S. Lewis: The Most Reluctant Convert, Billy Graham: A Life Remembered, Billy Sunday, and Louis Zamperini: Captured by Grace.

Other documentaries offer very different experiences. The Listening Road follows conversations about faith across America. The Call examines what can happen when the Great Commission becomes part of a church’s culture. 7 Days in the Holy Land takes viewers to biblical locations, while Scarred Earth considers the Grand Canyon from a creationist perspective.

Families looking for a movie night can explore titles including Seven Days in Utopia, The Jesus Film, and the animated The Pilgrim’s Progress.

The variety is an important point. “Christian entertainment” no longer describes just one kind of program.

Christian Shows for Kids and Families

Parents looking for alternatives to mainstream children’s programming have their own selection of options.

Superbook brings children into the events of Scripture through animated adventures. iBible presents the biblical narrative visually, while Ryan Defrates: Secret Agent combines humor and adventure with lessons about Christian character.

Star-Spangled Adventures gives children an animated introduction to American history and faith, and The Pilgrim’s Progress provides a full-length family movie based on John Bunyan’s classic Christian allegory.

These programs can do more than occupy children’s screen time. They give parents opportunities to ask questions, discuss Scripture, and connect entertainment with family discipleship.

Evangelism, Ministry, and Christian Leadership

Christian streaming can also help believers put their faith into practice.

Way of the Master focuses on evangelism and real Gospel conversations. Ignite with Barry Meguiar encourages Christians to share their faith naturally in everyday situations. Content from Samaritan’s Purse provides glimpses of Christian service and humanitarian ministry around the world.

For those serving in churches, ministries, workplaces, or other leadership roles, RLN also offers leadership-focused teaching designed to connect biblical principles with the responsibilities of Christian leadership.

These programs help move Christian streaming beyond simply learning more. They encourage viewers to consider what faithful action looks like.

One Free Platform, Many Ways to Watch

A Christian streaming library can serve very different purposes from one day to the next. Monday might mean catching up on the news. Tuesday could include a Bible teaching during lunch. A podcast might accompany Wednesday’s commute, followed by a documentary with a small group on Thursday and a family movie on Friday night.

That breadth is one of the advantages of Real Life Network.

Instead of searching separately for Christian news, sermons, apologetics, podcasts, movies, children’s programming, and documentaries, viewers can explore them in one biblically curated environment without adding another subscription bill.

For anyone wondering whether free Christian streaming offers enough variety to become a regular part of their viewing, the answer is worth discovering firsthand.

Explore free Christian news, teaching, podcasts, documentaries, movies, family shows, and more anytime on Real Life Network.

There are moments that should transcend politics.

A memorial honoring nearly 3,000 Americans murdered on September 11 should be one of them. It should be a place for grief, remembrance, gratitude, and reverence. Families who have carried that loss for 25 years deserve something increasingly rare in American public life: a moment in which their pain is not reduced to another political opportunity.

That is why images of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani smiling and laughing together during the 25th anniversary commemoration drew criticism. A photograph cannot reveal the context of every conversation or establish what prompted a smile. But juxtaposed with grieving families at Ground Zero, the moment raised a larger question worth asking: Does American culture still recognize that some things should be treated as sacred?

These are exactly the kinds of cultural questions worth examining on Real Life Network and The Daniel Cohen Show, where the headlines are considered alongside the biblical truths that should shape how Christians understand them.

Leadership Requires More Than the Right Policies

Public leadership is not merely about legislation, budgets, speeches, or elections. Leadership also requires understanding the human consequences behind public events.

That principle extends far beyond a single 9/11 ceremony.

When thirteen American service members were killed during the 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan, controversy followed images of President Joe Biden appearing to check his watch during the dignified transfer ceremony at Dover Air Force Base. Biden later disputed some characterizations of the moment, but Gold Star families publicly described feeling disrespected.

Politics can make people remarkably selective about empathy. When someone on the other side suffers, compassion becomes conditional. When an uncomfortable tragedy threatens a preferred narrative, attention shifts somewhere else.

Christians cannot adopt that standard.

Human dignity does not change according to political usefulness. A child killed in an act of violence matters. A soldier returned home in a flag-draped casket matters. A family still grieving someone murdered on September 11 matters. An immigrant victim matters. An American citizen victim matters. Political affiliation does not determine the value of a human life.

A healthy society should be capable of looking at suffering and seeing a human being before seeing a political opportunity.

Jesus warned that a time would come when “the love of many will grow cold” (Matthew 24:12). That description should make Christians examine more than the behavior of politicians. It should make believers examine their own hearts.

Have politics made compassion selective? Has outrage become entertainment? Have human tragedies become useful primarily when they help defeat the other side?

If so, something far more important than an election is being lost.

Biblical Language Cannot Become Political Branding

The same problem appears when Christianity itself becomes a political instrument.

Texas politician James Talarico has increasingly incorporated Christian language into his political message. In one recent appearance, he invoked Matthew 25 while arguing that Jesus would condemn senators over food assistance, Medicaid, and deportations.

Christians should welcome politicians talking seriously about Scripture. But biblical vocabulary does not automatically make an argument biblical.

Matthew 25 unquestionably demonstrates Christ's concern for the vulnerable. Christians should care about hungry people, strangers, the sick, prisoners, and those suffering around them. But translating those commands directly into support for a particular government program requires an additional political argument. Christians can share the same biblical concern while disagreeing about which policies best address it.

The same principle applies to immigration.

Scripture repeatedly commands God's people to care for foreigners and strangers. Scripture also recognizes nations, governing authorities, boundaries, and civil order. Romans 13 gives government genuine authority, while Acts 17:26 speaks of God determining nations and their dwelling places.

Neither side gets to erase the passages that complicate its politics.

Scripture should judge political convictions. Political convictions should never be allowed to rewrite Scripture.

That requires biblical literacy.

A politician who can quote a verse fluently may still misuse it. A conservative can misuse Scripture just as easily as a progressive. Christians who know only fragments of the Bible become vulnerable to anyone capable of wrapping a political agenda in Christian vocabulary.

Read the Word. Know the context. Test the argument.

Courage Means Refusing to Follow the Crowd

There is another quality disappearing from American life: the courage to stand alone.

The Lindsay Clancy case offers a difficult example. Clancy admitted killing her three young children but mounted an insanity defense. Her 2026 trial ended in a mistrial after eleven jurors favored acquittal and one juror held out.

According to another juror who later discussed the deliberations publicly, the lone holdout was a Black man.

Whatever conclusions people reach about the complicated legal questions surrounding mental illness and criminal responsibility, there is something worth recognizing in anyone willing to maintain a sincerely held conviction while an entire room pressures him to surrender it.

Standing with the crowd is easy. Standing alone costs something.

That lesson reaches far beyond a courtroom.

Christians will increasingly encounter moments when biblical convictions are unpopular, unfashionable, or professionally inconvenient. There will be pressure to remain silent because speaking could cost friendships, opportunities, influence, or reputation.

Conviction means deciding beforehand that truth matters more.

That does not grant permission to be reckless or cruel. Courage without humility quickly becomes arrogance. But humility without courage can become cowardice disguised as kindness.

Christian conviction requires both: the humility to recognize when we are wrong and the courage to stand when God's truth is clear.

America does not merely need better political messaging. It needs adults capable of recognizing sacred things, leaders who understand the human cost of their decisions, Christians who know Scripture well enough to recognize when it is being manipulated, and ordinary people willing to stand for truth when standing becomes uncomfortable.

Politics will continue changing. Candidates will come and go. Headlines that seem enormous today will eventually disappear.

The deeper question is what kind of people Americans are becoming in the process.

When nothing is sacred, everything becomes political. Christians should resist that transformation by recovering reverence, compassion, biblical discernment, and courage.

Continue examining the cultural and political stories shaping America through a biblical worldview on The Daniel Cohen Show, streaming free on Real Life Network.

Screens are part of modern family life. Children use them for school, entertainment, communication, creativity, and even Bible study. The question for Christian parents is no longer simply whether children should have screen time.

A more important question is: What is that screen time forming in them?

Every day, children are absorbing stories about what matters, what makes someone valuable, what relationships should look like, how problems should be solved, and what is ultimately worth pursuing. Some of those messages are obvious. Others are woven so naturally into entertainment that children may absorb them without recognizing them as messages at all.

For Christian parents, managing screen time therefore involves more than counting minutes. It means considering how media fits into the much larger work of spiritual formation.

Children Are Always Being Formed

Soul formation doesn’t happen only during family devotions or Sunday school.

Children are constantly developing beliefs, habits, desires, and assumptions about life. Parents, teachers, friends, churches, books, music, social media, and entertainment all contribute to that process.

Jesus said, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Matthew 6:21 NKJV). What consistently receives a person’s attention often begins to shape that person’s affections.

That makes attention an important part of parenting.

If a child spends a few minutes reading Scripture but several hours each day immersed in entertainment, games, videos, and social media, parents should at least consider which voices are receiving the greatest opportunity to influence that child.

Screen Time Is About More Than Minutes

Much of the conversation surrounding children and technology focuses on quantity: How many hours are too many?

That can certainly be useful. Families need boundaries, and unlimited access to screens can crowd out sleep, physical activity, responsibilities, relationships, church participation, and time outside.

But two children can spend the same amount of time watching screens and have very different experiences.

An hour spent watching random short-form videos isn’t the same as an hour spent watching a meaningful story with the family. A Bible program isn’t equivalent to a violent video game. A documentary that leads to an hour-long family conversation isn’t necessarily comparable to mindless scrolling.

Christian parents can therefore ask two questions:

How much is my child watching?

And just as importantly:

What is my child watching?

Entertainment Teaches Even When It Isn’t Trying To

Stories carry values.

They teach viewers which characters should be admired and which should be ridiculed. They show what produces happiness, what makes someone successful, what families look like, how authority should be treated, and how people respond when something goes wrong.

Sometimes those values align with Scripture. Sometimes they don’t.

That doesn’t mean Christians can only watch explicitly Christian programs. It does mean parents should recognize that entertainment is rarely worldview-neutral.

An animated show can communicate ideas about identity. A sitcom can normalize particular attitudes toward marriage or parents. A superhero movie can raise questions about justice, sacrifice, and power. Even comedy reveals something about what a culture considers worthy of celebration or ridicule.

Helping children identify those messages is an important part of discipleship.

Christian Media Can Reinforce What Parents Are Teaching

One way parents can become more intentional about screen time is by adding content that supports the beliefs and values being taught at home.

For younger children, Superbook brings biblical stories to life through animation, while iBible presents the biblical narrative in an accessible visual format. In Depth Apologetics for Kids can help children begin thinking about why Christians believe what they believe.

Older children and teens may benefit from programs that tackle larger worldview questions. The Creation Today Show explores creation, science, and apologetics, while LifeWise Academy content can encourage conversations about Bible education and living out Christian faith in the broader culture.

Sometimes even very short content can be useful. Genesis Science Minute with David Rives delivers a creation and science insight in just 60 seconds, giving parents an easy way to introduce a topic that can continue around the dinner table or in the car.

The point isn’t to replace every form of entertainment with a sermon. It’s to make sure some of the voices entering the home are intentionally reinforcing biblical truth.

Watching Together Changes the Experience

One of the simplest ways parents can make screen time more formative is to participate.

Watching together gives parents opportunities to notice what their children are seeing and ask questions afterward.

• Why did that character make that decision?
• Was it right?
• What could the person have done differently?
• Does that idea agree with Scripture?
• What would following Jesus look like in that situation?

These conversations do something parental controls cannot. They teach children discernment.

Eventually, parents won’t choose every movie, video, or social media post their children encounter. Children need more than a list of prohibited titles. They need the ability to recognize truth and error for themselves.

Shared viewing provides a low-pressure place to practice.

Don’t Let Screens Crowd Out the Things That Form Faith

Even excellent Christian media has limits.

Watching a Bible program isn’t the same as reading Scripture. Streaming a church service isn’t the same as belonging to a local church. Listening to Christian conversations isn’t a substitute for talking with parents, mentors, pastors, and other believers.

Christian media should support those relationships and practices, not replace them.

Children need time to pray. They need unhurried conversations with parents. They need friendships. They need church. They need service, play, reading, outdoor activity, boredom, imagination, and face-to-face interaction.

Sometimes the most spiritually healthy decision regarding a screen is simply to turn it off.

Parents’ Screen Habits Matter Too

Children notice what adults do.

A parent can establish strict limits for children while spending every spare moment checking a phone. That contradiction can communicate more than the rule itself.

Parents can model healthier habits by putting devices away during meals, choosing programming intentionally, avoiding endless scrolling, talking about why certain shows are or aren’t appropriate, and occasionally choosing something the whole family can watch together.

It also helps children understand that media discernment isn’t punishment.

It’s something Christians practice because what occupies the heart and mind matters.

Choose Media That Serves Your Family

The goal of Christian parenting isn’t to create children who have never encountered a questionable idea. Eventually, they will.

The deeper goal is to raise young people who know Scripture, love Christ, recognize truth, understand the beliefs shaping the culture around them, and have learned how to make wise choices.

Media can either make that job harder or help support it.

Real Life Network gives Christian families another option by offering free, biblically curated programming across children’s shows, Bible teaching, apologetics, documentaries, family content, and more.

Parents still have the responsibility to decide what fits their children and their household. But instead of spending every evening filtering an enormous mainstream library, they can begin with content created or selected to support a biblical worldview.

Screen time is ultimately only one part of childhood. Yet because screens occupy so much attention in modern life, they deserve thoughtful consideration.

The question isn’t simply, How long have they been watching?

For Christian parents, an even better question may be: Who are they becoming while they watch?

Explore free Christian kids’ programs, family shows, Bible teaching, apologetics, and more on Real Life Network.

Twenty-five years after September 11, 2001, two words remain inseparable from that day: Never forget. As a new generation inherits the story of 9/11, Real Life Network and The Daniel Cohen Show are committed to examining the history, ideas, and cultural questions that Americans cannot afford to forget.

But remembering September 11 requires more than remembering its pain.

An entire generation of Americans has now grown up without any personal memory of the attacks. Roughly 100 million Americans have been born since 9/11. They did not watch the second plane strike the South Tower. They did not see smoke pouring across Manhattan or experience the uncertainty that gripped the country. For them, September 11 is history.

That raises an increasingly important question: What exactly are Americans promising never to forget?

Remembering the Victims Means Remembering the Truth

Calling September 11 a tragedy is true, but incomplete.

September 11 was an intentional terrorist attack carried out by 19 al-Qaeda hijackers. Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda were not secretive about their worldview, grievances, or objectives. Their own statements repeatedly framed their conflict with America in explicitly religious as well as political terms.

America must be capable of acknowledging that history.

That does not mean treating every Muslim as a terrorist or holding peaceful Muslim neighbors responsible for crimes they did not commit. Americans should defend religious liberty, reject harassment, and protect the freedom of peaceful people to worship according to their beliefs.

But religious liberty cannot require historical amnesia.

There is a profound difference between refusing to hate Muslims and refusing to acknowledge Islamist extremism. America must be capable of doing the first without falling into the second.

For too long, political leaders, academics, and media figures have sometimes preferred vague descriptions of terrorism because specificity can be uncomfortable. Yet future generations cannot understand September 11 if the ideology of its perpetrators is removed from the history they inherit.

“Never forget” cannot mean remembering only the victims while becoming increasingly reluctant to explain why they became victims.

The Next Generation Will Remember What We Teach

This matters because the people who remember September 11 firsthand will not always be here to tell the story.

Already, debates over the meaning of 9/11 reveal dramatically different interpretations of what happened. Some emphasize American foreign policy, imperialism, economics, or Western actions as the primary explanation for terrorism. Others have gone considerably further, portraying America itself as deserving the violence directed against it.

Those ideas should not be allowed to replace historical clarity.

The terrorists who attacked America were responsible for their actions. The men aboard those airplanes chose innocent civilians as their targets. No disagreement with American foreign policy makes hijacking commercial airplanes and deliberately murdering civilians morally defensible.

The responsibility to preserve that truth belongs especially to parents.

Children should know about the people who boarded airplanes expecting to arrive home later that day. They should hear about the firefighters carrying equipment up stairwells as thousands rushed downward. They should know about Flight 93 and the passengers who fought back. They should understand what happened at the Pentagon and what unfolded at Ground Zero.

And they should know who carried out the attacks and what motivated them.

If parents do not teach their children what happened on September 11, someone else will eventually tell them what September 11 is supposed to mean.

History never remains an empty space. When one explanation disappears, another takes its place.

That is why remembrance is about more than nostalgia. It is a responsibility to those who died and to those who were not yet born.

Remembering Without Living in Fear

There is another part of September 11 worth remembering: what America looked like afterward.

For a brief period, the country rediscovered a sense of national unity that now seems almost unimaginable. Political labels became less important. American flags appeared on homes and businesses. Tens of thousands stood together at Yankee Stadium and sang “God Bless the USA.” President George W. Bush stood among firefighters and rescue workers at Ground Zero and promised that America would respond.

That unity did not last.

But the courage behind it should not disappear.

Charlie Kirk understood the importance of courage in the public square. He repeatedly warned younger Americans about ideological movements he believed threatened faith, family, and the American way of life. His words were often pointed because he believed dangerous ideas had to be identified rather than accommodated. His Christian convictions also became increasingly central to the way he understood the cultural battles around him.

That willingness to speak should challenge Christians today.

Courage does not require hatred. Conviction does not require cruelty. Christians can identify dangerous ideologies while remembering that human beings are not the ultimate enemy. Scripture reminds believers that the struggle is ultimately “not against flesh and blood,” but against spiritual forces of evil (Ephesians 6:12).

Christian courage tells the truth about evil without allowing hatred of people to take root in the heart.

Twenty-five years after September 11, America does not need to live in the fear of that morning. Neither should it erase the lessons purchased at such an enormous cost.

Remember the victims. Remember their families. Remember the first responders. Remember the passengers who fought back. Remember the courage that emerged from the rubble. Remember the enemy that attacked America and the ideology that animated its extremists.

Then make sure the children who were not there understand why it matters.

One day, September 11 will exist entirely outside living memory. When that day arrives, never forget will mean only as much as the truth one generation was willing to pass to the next. Continue examining the stories shaping America through a biblical worldview on The Daniel Cohen Show, streaming free on Real Life Network.

Some truths become easier to understand when you hear them through another person’s experience. A sermon may explain forgiveness, while an interview with someone who has forgiven an enemy can show what forgiveness looks like when it costs something. A Bible study may teach about trusting God through hardship, while a conversation with someone who has survived persecution, addiction, grief, or war can bring that truth into everyday life.

That is part of what makes personal interviews so valuable in Christian media. They allow viewers to hear ideas explored through stories, questions, experiences, and honest reflection. When those conversations are grounded in biblical truth, they can strengthen faith while also helping Christians think more carefully about the world around them.

1. Personal Stories Make Biblical Truth Concrete

Christians often know important biblical principles long before they understand how those principles play out in difficult circumstances. It is one thing to read that believers should trust God. It is another to hear someone explain how he or she continued trusting God after losing a career, facing persecution, walking through serious illness, or experiencing personal tragedy.

Programs such as The Resilient Show, hosted by Chad Robichaux, can open conversations about trauma, recovery, purpose, and resilience through the experiences of people who have endured significant challenges. Stories like these help viewers see that biblical faith is not reserved for ideal circumstances. It is meant to shape how believers live when life becomes difficult.

2. Interviews Allow Important Questions to Be Asked

Strong interviews do more than provide inspiring stories. They ask questions: Why did you believe that? What changed your mind? How did your faith affect your decision? What would you say to someone who disagrees?

Those questions create space for ideas to be examined rather than merely stated. This can be especially valuable when discussing theology, culture, politics, science, or apologetics because viewers get to hear not only a conclusion but also some of the reasoning behind it.

Programs such as Small Talk Big Issues bring together conversations with faith leaders, journalists, entrepreneurs, political figures, and other guests to explore significant issues from a Christian perspective. The interview format makes room for nuance that is often missing from headlines or short social-media clips.

3. Testimony Can Strengthen Faith

Personal testimony has always had an important place in Christianity. The New Testament repeatedly records people describing what Christ had done in their lives. The man healed by Jesus in John 9 offered one of the simplest examples: “One thing I know: that though I was blind, now I see” (John 9:25 NKJV).

A testimony does not replace Scripture, but it can illustrate Scripture. Hearing how someone came to faith, overcame fear, remained faithful under pressure, or experienced God’s provision can encourage believers facing their own struggles.

Living Fearless with Hedieh, for example, draws in part from Hedieh Mirahmadi’s experience of leaving Islam and becoming a follower of Christ. Conversations shaped by experiences like hers can introduce viewers to questions involving religious belief, freedom, culture, fear, and the work of the Gospel.

4. Conversations Help Christians Understand Different Perspectives

It is easy to form opinions about people we have never heard speak for themselves. Interviews slow that process down by allowing viewers to hear how another person understands an issue, why someone holds a particular belief, or how circumstances shaped his or her perspective.

That does not require Christians to agree with everything a guest says. In fact, disagreement can be useful when viewers are learning to compare ideas with Scripture. A strong biblical worldview is developed as believers learn to identify assumptions, examine arguments, recognize truth, and test what they hear against God’s Word.

That kind of discernment is especially important in a culture where complicated issues are often reduced to slogans.

5. Interviews Can Connect Faith with Current Events

Christians do not live their faith in isolation from the world. Questions about government, education, technology, religious freedom, economics, international conflict, family, and culture all affect daily life.

Interview-based programs can help connect those developments with biblical principles. The Daniel Cohen Show, Rose Unplugged, Cure America, and The City of God each use conversations and interviews to engage cultural or public issues from faith-informed perspectives.

Rather than treating Christianity as something confined to church services, these discussions encourage viewers to consider how biblical truth relates to public life.

6. Real People Can Challenge Easy Assumptions

Some of the most valuable interviews are uncomfortable. A person who has experienced persecution may challenge a casual approach to religious freedom. A missionary may challenge assumptions about evangelism. A veteran may speak differently about courage or sacrifice than someone who has never faced danger. A Christian serving the poor may cause viewers to reconsider how they think about generosity.

Programs connected with ministries such as Samaritan’s Purse, Fred Jordan Missions TV, and Evangelism Explosion International can introduce viewers to Christians putting faith into action through service, outreach, disaster response, and evangelism. Those stories can move the question from “What do Christians believe?” to “What should Christians do because they believe it?”

7. Interviews Can Support Apologetics Without Becoming a Debate

Not every interview is an apologetics program, but interviews can still help Christians understand why they believe what they believe. A scientist can discuss evidence for creation. A former skeptic can explain objections that once kept him from Christianity. A historian can discuss the reliability of biblical accounts. A pastor or theologian can respond to difficult questions about suffering, morality, or the resurrection.

Programs such as Cross Examined and The Creation Today Show give viewers opportunities to hear Christian truth claims examined through questions and conversation. Sometimes a thoughtful interview can accomplish something a formal debate cannot because it lets viewers follow the reasoning at a more natural pace.

Hearing Truth Through Someone Else’s Story

Christian faith ultimately rests on the truth of God’s Word, not the personality or experiences of an interview guest. But personal conversations can help illuminate those truths in memorable and practical ways.

A good interview lets viewers encounter people they might never meet, hear perspectives they might never otherwise consider, and see biblical principles applied to real circumstances. It can encourage faith, expose assumptions, deepen understanding, and prompt better questions.

That is why interviews occupy an important place in Christian media. They remind us that faith is not merely a collection of ideas. It is lived out by real people facing real choices in a complicated world.

Explore personal interviews, Christian conversations, cultural discussions, testimonies, and more for free on Real Life Network.

One year after the death of Charlie Kirk, there is much worth remembering about a life that ended far too soon. He was known across the country as a conservative activist, speaker, and founder of Turning Point USA. But the convictions that increasingly defined his public life went deeper than politics. Kirk spoke openly about his faith in Jesus Christ, his love for his wife and children, and his belief that strong families were essential to the future of America.

When asked how he wanted to be remembered, Kirk pointed to courage and his Christian faith. Those who worked closely with him likewise described his relationship with Christ as the most important part of his life. He used an enormous platform not simply to discuss elections and public policy, but to encourage people to follow Jesus and take their faith seriously.

That priority deserves to be remembered.

Kirk also understood something increasingly countercultural: the future of a nation is inseparable from the health of its families.

He married Erika in 2021, and they had two children. Fatherhood became an important part of the message he shared with young Americans. He encouraged young adults to pursue marriage, welcome children, leave behind empty pursuits, and build something that could endure beyond themselves. His wife later recalled that marriage and family were among the greatest joys of his life.

That message mattered because Kirk spent much of his career speaking directly to young people. He founded Turning Point USA at only 18 and built an organization centered on engaging the next generation in the future of the country.

Yet preserving America was about more than winning elections. A country ultimately depends upon the character of its people, the strength of its homes, and the convictions parents pass to their children.

If we want to honor Kirk's life, admiration is not enough. We should imitate what was worthy of imitation.

Go to Real Life Network to watch great moments from the life of Charlie Kirk.

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That means having the courage to profess Christ when doing so carries a cost. It means building strong marriages and treating parenthood as a calling rather than an inconvenience. It means investing in young people instead of surrendering the next generation to whatever ideas happen to dominate the culture. And it means being willing to enter conversations with people who disagree rather than retreating from difficult questions.

Kirk became famous in part because he was willing to walk onto college campuses, take questions, defend his convictions, and invite disagreement. His example should encourage Christians to develop convictions strong enough to withstand opposition without becoming afraid of the people on the other side.

Most importantly, his legacy should point beyond politics.

Political victories pass. Organizations change. Elections are won and lost. But faithfulness to Christ, love within the home, children raised with conviction, and lives invested in others carry significance far beyond an election cycle.

Charlie Kirk cared deeply about America's future. His life offered a reminder that the work of building that future begins with faithfulness to God, courage in the public square, and commitment to the family at home.

Go to Real Life Network to watch great moments from the life of Charlie Kirk.

For decades, television newsrooms held enormous power over what Americans saw and what they never heard about. Producers chose the lead story, decided which events deserved follow-up coverage, and determined which stories would disappear after a few seconds or never make air at all.

That power has weakened, but it has not disappeared.

Today, independent media provides an opportunity to ask a question that traditional news organizations too often avoid: Why do some stories receive national attention while others with serious implications are barely acknowledged?

On Real Life Network, The Daniel Cohen Show goes where the news leads, especially when those stories intersect with faith, culture, politics, and a biblical worldview. Several recent stories provide an important reminder that media bias isn't limited to how a story is reported. Sometimes the more consequential decision is whether to report it at all.

When Attacks on Christians Barely Make the News

Pastor Martin Sedra and his wife, Millicent, recently experienced something no family should have to endure.

Sedra pastors Echo Church in Sydney, Australia, and has publicly spoken about Christianity, Islam, abortion, marriage, and other controversial cultural issues. According to video and the Sedras' account discussed on the show, masked protesters arrived outside their home shortly after the couple welcomed their first child. The group allegedly cut power to the house, threatened the family, and said they would return.

Whatever someone's political or religious disagreements with Sedra, threatening a family at its home crosses a line that should be obvious.

Yet the incident received little attention from major news organizations at the time it was discussed on the show.

That story comes alongside another troubling development: a series of fires involving churches.

The former St. Agnes Church in Toledo, Ohio, burned over the weekend. Another Toledo church, St. Anthony's, had suffered a fire only weeks earlier. Other recent church fires discussed on the program included Friendship Baptist Church in Cleveland, St. Simon Church in New Brunswick, Canada, and Buckingham Presbyterian Church in the United Kingdom. Importantly, the causes of these individual fires should not be assumed before investigators determine them.

But the broader problem of hostility toward churches is documented. The Family Research Council reported hundreds of hostile incidents against churches in 2024, including dozens categorized as arson or attempted arson.

That deserves attention.

Christians should resist the temptation to declare every church fire an act of religious persecution without evidence. At the same time, repeated attacks against Christian institutions should not become background noise simply because they do not fit the cultural narrative preferred by a newsroom.

Media bias isn't only found in misleading words. It can also be found in the stories that never receive enough attention for Americans to ask questions about them.

The same standard should apply regardless of the victims. An attack on a church should matter. An attack on a synagogue should matter. An attack on a mosque should matter. Threatening a Christian family should matter just as an attack against people because of their sexuality should matter.

Consistency is the test.

Who Decides What Counts as News?

A shooting outside a gay bar in Tucson raises precisely that question.

According to the account discussed on the program, two men were killed outside Venture-N by a gunman who later killed himself. Police reportedly found a note identifying additional LGBTQ businesses, raising concerns that the victims had been deliberately targeted. The show also highlighted reporting that the shooter was born in Gambia and was described by a relative as a practicing Muslim.

There is no justification for murdering innocent people because of their sexuality. None.

But there is also no justification for minimizing relevant facts about an attack because those facts complicate a preferred political narrative.

This is where consistency becomes essential. If the religious beliefs of a professing Christian attacker would become part of national coverage, the same journalistic curiosity should exist when an attacker comes from another religious background.

The point isn't to blame millions of peaceful Muslims for one man's actions. It is to report relevant facts without deciding beforehand which ones the audience is allowed to consider.

That principle also applies inside conservative media.

The departure of longtime Fox Business anchor Maria Bartiromo has generated questions after reports that she disagreed with a programming decision concerning coverage of a presidential address. According to the reports discussed on the show, Bartiromo wanted to cover President Trump's remarks and planned additional discussion afterward. Weeks later, she departed the network, which characterized the move as a business decision. The precise internal circumstances remain disputed and should be described accordingly.

But the episode illustrates a larger point.

A journalist's responsibility is not to protect viewers from stories executives consider inconvenient. It is to pursue information, establish facts, provide context, and allow audiences to evaluate what happened.

A news organization loses something fundamental when protecting a narrative becomes more important than pursuing a story.

That standard shouldn't change depending on whether the network is CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, or anyone else.

It is also why independent outlets matter. They cannot guarantee perfect journalism, and they should be held accountable like everyone else. But a decentralized media environment makes it considerably harder for a handful of executives to determine the boundaries of public discussion.

Parents Cannot Outsource Discernment

Media institutions aren't the only institutions Americans should scrutinize.

Parents should be asking similar questions about schools.

A video discussed on the program featured a kindergarten teacher describing an exercise in which young children were asked whether they wished they had been born another gender. Students who raised their hands were then invited to choose different names. The teacher subsequently posted that she had been fired and lost her teaching license.

Whatever debates adults want to have about gender, five-year-olds should not become instruments for an adult's ideological project.

Parents possess a responsibility that cannot simply be transferred to teachers, administrators, politicians, or government agencies.

That becomes particularly important as politicians increasingly speak about children collectively. Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed, for example, has argued for policies based on imagining that “all of our kids were all of our kids,” connecting that idea to public education, health care, and child care. The program contrasted that philosophy with the conviction that parents retain the primary responsibility for raising and forming their children.

Schools certainly have an important role. Good teachers deserve gratitude and respect. But education never happens in a worldview vacuum. Someone is always teaching children what is true, what is good, what a human being is, and where authority ultimately resides.

For Christians, those questions cannot be surrendered to the state.

Parents can delegate instruction, but they cannot delegate their God-given responsibility to know what their children are being taught and who is shaping their worldview.

That principle connects these seemingly unrelated headlines.

News organizations shape what adults believe is important. Schools help shape what children believe is true. Politicians attempt to shape what citizens believe government should provide. Corporations increasingly communicate their own moral and cultural priorities.

In each case, Christians need discernment.

The answer is not paranoia, and it isn't assuming every institution is corrupt. It is paying attention. Ask what is being taught. Examine what is being omitted. Compare claims against the evidence. And above all, measure cultural messages against Scripture rather than allowing the culture to determine how Scripture should be understood.

That is increasingly necessary in an age when the most revealing part of a story may be the part someone decided wasn't worth telling.

Watch The Daniel Cohen Show on Real Life Network for news and commentary connecting the headlines to the good news through a biblical worldview.

One morning, I was riding my bicycle along Washington, D.C.’s Anacostia River when an egret glided over the trail. The pure-white wading birds have always fascinated me with their elegant stillness and regal grace. They look even more impressive on the rare occasions when they spread their wings and take flight, making them look even larger. Yet this impromptu bird-watching experience came to an abrupt and discordant end. The moment before the egret swooped into the brush and out of sight, he made like a bomber and dropped a load of ordnance worthy of an animal twice his size.

A graceful bird, caught in its least graceful position.

The minor incident nearly passed out of my mind until I realized that this un-constipated egret provided an apt example for man’s complex condition. From beginning to end, mankind’s creation is the gift of God. We are created in God’s image and likeness, given dominion over every living thing, and blessed with the good command to fill the earth with God’s image-bearers through procreation (Genesis 1:26-28). Yet our first parents squandered these divine blessings through disobedience and rebellion, for which they were cast out of God’s presence (Genesis 3:22-23) and condemned to die (Genesis 2:17).

Man is a graceful bird, caught in his least graceful position.

Christianity’s nuanced view of human nature becomes incomprehensible without the first three chapters of Genesis. This is why so many human philosophies veer into error on either one side or the other. Most human philosophies boil down to the opinion that man is basically good, or that he is basically bad. Only the Bible (and those influenced by the Bible) can explain how man is created good, but corrupted.

Mankind’s complex condition affects every aspect of our lives, even the way we work. Before anything had tarnished God’s “very good” creation (Genesis 1:31), we read that “The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it” (Genesis 2:15). Work is not a consequence of the fall, but a basic function of man, which God created for good. Adam’s task was merely to imitate God’s own example in creative effort (Genesis 2:9), and it carries religious undertones, as the same verbs are used to describe service at the tabernacle in Numbers 3.

However, mankind’s work did not escape the Fall unscathed. Not only was Adam cast out of the lush garden into uncultivated land, but God also declared, “cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return” (Genesis 3:17-19).

The ground was Adam’s domain of work. By extension, this curse extends to all arenas of work. All work is toilsome, demanding, and sometimes fleeting, as the whole creation is “subjected to futility” (Romans 8:20).

Man is a graceful bird, caught in his least graceful position.

Again, the Bible’s complex theology of work has better power to explain the different attitudes people have towards their work than the fractured, individualistic worldviews dominant in America today. Some people love their jobs, while some people hate them. Why? Can individualism or critical theory offer a satisfying answer to this question? (Critical theory would blame group oppression, but that is not satisfying.)

The Bible has an answer. Some people love their jobs because work is a gift from God — a good gift that God created as part of his blessing on mankind. Even in a fallen world, the wise preacher concludes, “There is nothing better for a person than that he should eat and drink and find enjoyment in his toil. This also, I saw, is from the hand of God” (Ecclesiastes 2:24, see also Ecclesiastes 5:18-19 and 9:9). Yet some people also hate their jobs because work is cursed after the Fall.

Man is a graceful bird, but he is still caught in his least graceful position.

The very unseemliness of the aforementioned egret’s evacuation is what makes it an appropriate metaphor for fallen man under sin. “We have all become like one who is unclean,” Isaiah confesses, “and all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment” (Isaiah 64:6). We need one who can wash our filth away, to achieve for us what we could never achieve by our own works.

Even though work is good, it is not ultimate. The Lord God engaged in his creative work for six days, “and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done” (Genesis 2:2). Just as man was made to imitate God’s work, so man was also supposed to imitate God’s rest (Exodus 20:8-11). But, under the curse of sin, that rest became fleeting and far off.

From the earliest generations, Adam’s descendants sought one who would restore them to God’s rest. Thus, Noah’s father Lamech said in hope, “Out of the ground that the Lord has cursed, this one shall bring us relief from our work and from the painful toil of our hands” (Genesis 5:29). Yet Noah did not bring an end to toil, hard labor, or the futility of human industry. Nor did Moses, Joshua, David, or any human leader called by God throughout history. All were sinners, after all.

Yet painful toil under the curse is not man’s final condition, for “there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God” (Hebrews 4:9). Those who are forgiven of their sins by the blood of Christ receive true grace. They are not only restored to right fellowship with God, but they also receive eternal life and enter into God’s rest.

For now, we recognize that all honest work is good. “In all toil there is profit, but mere talk tends only to poverty” (Proverbs 14:23). “Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need” (Ephesians 4:28). “It is the hard-working farmer who ought to have the first share of the crops” (2 Timothy 2:6). But work is not ultimate, and one day our painful toil will come to an end.

Man is a graceful bird, and one day his graceless condition will be remedied in full. One day, those who are in Christ will enter into the glory and rest of their Redeemer.

This article was originally written by Joshua Arnold and published on The Washington Stand. For more content like this, visit Real Life Network.

Some of the most important cultural debates begin with words. Mercy. Compassion. Truth. Justice. These words carry moral weight, but their meaning can change dramatically depending on the worldview behind them.

On Real Life Network, The Daniel Cohen Show examines the stories shaping American culture through a biblical worldview. This week, those stories raise difficult questions about the value of human life, the meaning of mercy, American citizenship, the institutions shaping children, and the responsibility Christians have to speak when foundational truths are being challenged.

At the center of those questions is a basic conviction: truth does not become relative simply because the culture has found a new way to describe something.

The Difference Between Mercy and Moral Confusion

The Lindsay Clancy case has reopened a painful national conversation about motherhood, mental illness, personal responsibility, and the deaths of children. That conversation deserves seriousness, particularly when postpartum mental illness is involved. But compassion for mental suffering cannot require society to stop acknowledging the value of the lives that were lost.

The broader cultural response is also worth examining. Videos have circulated online showing mothers joking about or pretending to harm their children, while supporters of Clancy have gathered under the slogan “We are all Lindsay.” At the same time, other cases involving mothers accused of killing their children have drawn comparisons to Clancy's case.

There is an important distinction between understanding mental illness and treating violence against children casually. Christians should be capable of showing compassion toward someone experiencing profound psychological suffering while simultaneously insisting that children possess inherent value and deserve protection.

That same confusion over language appears in the abortion debate.

In a resurfaced interview, Anne Hathaway described abortion as potentially “another word for mercy.” The statement illustrates a much deeper disagreement over what mercy actually means.

Scripture gives the word a radically different foundation.

In Exodus 34:6, God reveals Himself to Moses as compassionate and gracious. The Hebrew language provides a striking connection between compassion and the womb: rachum, describing compassion or mercy, is related to rechem, the Hebrew word for womb. The imagery points toward deep, protective compassion.

That makes the modern use of “mercy” to describe abortion especially significant. The biblical picture of compassion directs attention toward protection and care for the vulnerable.

Mercy cannot simply mean removing the person whose existence creates difficulty. Biblical mercy moves toward the vulnerable with compassion and protection.

That principle reaches beyond abortion. A society's understanding of human dignity determines how it treats people when they are weakest, most dependent, or least convenient.

Citizenship, Children, and the Institutions Shaping America

Another debate centers on birthright citizenship and the growing industry commonly called birth tourism.

During a congressional hearing, Dr. Vladimir Lorentz, associated with a business called Have Baby in Miami, repeatedly invoked the Fifth Amendment when questioned about whether his business had helped foreign nationals travel to the United States to give birth. The hearing highlighted concerns about companies marketing American childbirth to international clients and the citizenship that comes with being born on U.S. soil.

Whatever one's preferred constitutional solution, the underlying question deserves attention: What does American citizenship mean?

Citizenship should be more than a commodity attached to the ability to purchase airfare, accommodations, and medical services. A country has a legitimate interest in protecting the meaning and integrity of citizenship while treating people with dignity.

But government policy isn't the only place where questions about American identity are emerging.

The Boy Scouts, now known as Scouting America, and the Girl Scouts have historically occupied a distinctive place in American childhood. Recent examples of Islamic religious programming within scouting organizations have generated controversy, including mosque-based Scout programs incorporating Islamic prayer and Quran instruction and Girl Scout opportunities connected with learning about Islam.

The issue raises a broader question for Christian parents: Who is shaping the institutions entrusted with children?

Parents cannot assume that an organization carries the same values it did a generation ago simply because the name or uniform looks familiar. Schools, youth organizations, entertainment companies, churches, and political movements all communicate a worldview.

Parents have a responsibility to know not only where their children are spending their time, but what those institutions are teaching them to believe about God, truth, identity, and morality.

That responsibility requires courage. Christians cannot complain that institutions have changed while remaining unwilling to participate, lead, ask questions, or speak when those institutions move away from their convictions.

Conviction Is More Than Political Branding

The same test applies to politicians who use Christian language.

Texas politician James Talarico has increasingly incorporated Christianity into his political identity while advancing theological interpretations on abortion, sexuality, and gender that deserve careful biblical examination. A candidate quoting Scripture or speaking in churches should not automatically earn Christian credibility.

The test is not whether someone can use Christian vocabulary.

The question is whether the theology being presented actually agrees with Scripture.

Christians should apply that standard regardless of party. Political affiliation cannot transform bad theology into sound theology, and a politician's claim to Christianity should never replace biblical discernment.

The approaching elections make that distinction increasingly important. Polling discussed on the show suggests Republicans may be in a stronger position among likely voters than conventional expectations for a midterm election might suggest. But polling does not eliminate the responsibility to participate.

Christians are commanded to pray for those in authority. In a representative government, citizens also have the opportunity to participate in choosing those leaders.

Neither panic nor complacency is useful.

Political engagement should flow from conviction, not replace it. The Christian's ultimate allegiance belongs to Christ, which should make biblical truth more important than any candidate or party.

That perspective matters beyond American politics.

Iran continues to face severe economic pressure, while uncertainty remains about the country's political future and the possibility of internal opposition to the Islamic Republic. Reliable information from inside Iran can be difficult to obtain, which makes restraint important. Christians can nevertheless pray for the Iranian people, for those seeking freedom, and for wisdom among the leaders making consequential decisions about the region.

Across all these stories, the underlying challenge is remarkably similar.

Will words retain their meaning?

Will mercy still mean protecting the vulnerable? Will citizenship represent something more than an economic transaction? Will Christian institutions remain recognizably Christian? Will professing believers allow Scripture to shape their politics rather than reshaping Scripture around their politics?

Those questions cannot be answered by slogans.

They require discernment, courage, and a willingness to accept truth even when truth makes people uncomfortable.

Watch The Daniel Cohen Show on Real Life Network for more news and commentary connecting the headlines to the good news through a biblical worldview.

Christianity makes specific claims about God, Jesus, Scripture, morality, and the meaning of life. Apologetics asks whether those claims can stand up to serious questions.

That makes Christian apologetics much more than learning clever responses to skeptics. It is the process of examining what Christianity teaches, why Christians believe it is true, and how those beliefs compare with competing explanations of reality.

First Peter 3:15 calls believers to “always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you.” That defense is not meant to be combative. It is meant to be thoughtful, truthful, and grounded in a faith that is willing to be examined.

Here are seven important apologetics conversations that can help Christians better understand the foundations of their faith and become more prepared to talk about them with others.

1. Does God Really Exist?

Christianity begins with a foundational claim: God exists, and He is the Creator of everything.

Apologetics asks whether there are good reasons to believe that claim is true. Christian thinkers often point to the beginning of the universe, the remarkable order and fine-tuning found in creation, the existence of objective moral standards, and the question of why anything exists at all.

These arguments do not attempt to reduce God to a scientific formula. Instead, they challenge the idea that belief in God is irrational or unsupported.

This conversation can be especially important for Christians who have heard that faith and reason are opposites. Examining the evidence can reveal that belief in a Creator rests on substantial philosophical and scientific questions that atheism must also account for.

2. Can We Trust the Bible?

Christianity also makes a historical claim: God has revealed truth through Scripture.

That raises important questions. Has the Bible been accurately preserved? Are the Gospel accounts historically reliable? Do archaeology and ancient history support or undermine the people, places, and events described in Scripture?

Christian apologetics does not ask believers to simply assume the Bible is trustworthy. It looks at manuscript evidence, textual transmission, historical corroboration, archaeology, eyewitness testimony, and the remarkable preservation of the biblical text.

Because Christianity is rooted in events claimed to have happened in real history, those claims can be investigated.

For many believers, studying this evidence does more than help answer objections. It deepens confidence that the Bible they read today is connected reliably to the texts written in the ancient world.

3. Did Jesus Really Rise from the Dead?

No Christian truth claim is more important than the resurrection. The apostle Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 15:14 that “if Christ is not risen, then our preaching is empty and your faith is also empty.” Christianity therefore does not present the resurrection merely as a symbolic story about hope. It presents it as an event in history.

Apologetics examines the facts surrounding Jesus’ crucifixion, the empty tomb, the testimony of His followers, the reported appearances after His death, and the dramatic change in disciples who moved from fear and hiding to publicly proclaiming that they had seen the risen Christ.

The central question becomes: What explanation best accounts for the evidence? If Jesus truly rose from the dead, then His claims about Himself, God, salvation, and eternal life deserve to be taken seriously.

4. Has Science Disproved Christianity?

Another common claim is that modern science has made Christian belief unnecessary. But Christianity and science are not answering precisely the same questions. Science studies the natural world and how it functions. Christianity makes broader claims about why the universe exists, where its laws come from, why life exists, and whether creation ultimately points beyond itself.

Christian apologetics explores questions such as: Did the universe have a beginning? Why does nature operate according to consistent laws? How did life originate? What explains the extraordinary complexity found in living systems?

These are not questions Christians need to fear.

Apologetics gives individuals an opportunity to examine creation, science, and biblical claims together rather than accepting the assumption that faith and serious inquiry cannot coexist.

5. If God Is Good, Why Is There So Much Suffering?

Christianity claims that God is both good and powerful. The reality of suffering therefore creates one of the most difficult apologetics questions. If God is good, why does He allow pain, injustice, disease, natural disasters, and death?

This is not merely an abstract philosophical puzzle. For someone who has suffered deeply, the question may be intensely personal.

The Bible does not minimize suffering. Its pages are filled with grief, lament, injustice, persecution, and loss. Christianity teaches that the world is fallen, human beings possess genuine moral agency, evil has real consequences, and God is working toward a final restoration in which suffering and death will not have the last word.

Good apologetics should never treat another person’s pain as an intellectual exercise. But it can show that suffering does not make Christianity incoherent. In fact, Christianity offers a framework for understanding both why the world is broken and why there is reason for hope.

6. Can There Really Be Objective Right and Wrong?

Christianity also makes moral claims. It teaches that some things are truly right or wrong because morality is grounded in the character of God. That raises another important question: Are moral truths objective, or are they simply personal and cultural preferences?

If morality is entirely subjective, then statements such as “torturing innocent people is wrong” ultimately become expressions of opinion rather than statements about reality. Yet people routinely speak as though some actions are genuinely unjust, regardless of what an individual or society happens to approve.

Christian apologetics asks whether that universal moral intuition points beyond humanity to an objective moral lawgiver.

This conversation has significant implications for modern debates involving human dignity, justice, sexuality, family, freedom, and the value of human life. Before debating individual issues, it can be helpful to ask the deeper question: Where does moral authority come from in the first place?

7. Is Jesus Really the Only Way to God?

Perhaps one of Christianity’s most challenging claims in modern culture is Jesus’ statement in John 14:6: “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.”

That claim sounds exclusive because it is exclusive. Christianity teaches that reconciliation with God comes through Christ. But apologetics asks an important follow-up question: Is Jesus justified in making that claim?

The answer depends on who Jesus is. If He is simply one religious teacher among many, His words may sound unreasonable. But if He is truly the Son of God who died and rose again, then His claim carries unique authority.

The conversation therefore circles back to the historical case for Jesus Himself.

Christianity does not claim that Christians are morally superior to everyone else. It claims the opposite: Every person needs salvation. The Gospel teaches that God has provided that salvation through Christ and offers it freely to anyone who believes.

Where Can I Find Christian Apologetics Resources?

These conversations can seem intimidating at first, but apologetics does not require a theology degree.

Real Life Network offers free programs that help people examine Christianity’s major truth claims and think more carefully about difficult questions.

Cross Examined with Frank Turek explores topics such as the existence of God, morality, the resurrection, Scripture, and common objections to Christianity. The Creation Today Show examines questions involving science, creation, and worldview. Other RLN teaching and interview programs address biblical reliability, cultural issues, and the reasons Christians can have confidence in what they believe.

These resources can be useful for personal study, parents and teens, small groups, or anyone who wants to become better prepared for conversations about faith.

Christian apologetics does not promise an instant answer to every question. What it does offer is an invitation to examine Christianity seriously.

If Christian claims about God, Jesus, Scripture, morality, and salvation are true, they should be able to withstand honest investigation. And the more carefully believers understand those claims, the better prepared they become to explain why their hope is grounded in more than sentiment or tradition.

Explore free Christian apologetics and biblical worldview programming anytime on Real Life Network.

When people discover a new streaming platform, one of the first questions they often ask is: Is there a free trial?

That makes sense. Most streaming services today require a monthly subscription, a limited trial period, or tiered upgrades before viewers can fully access content. But Real Life Network works differently.

The simple answer is this: RLN does not require a free trial because the entire platform is ALREADY FREE to watch.

There are no subscription tiers, hidden fees, or surprise upgrades needed to access the content.

Why Real Life Network Is Free

Real Life Network was created with a mission-first approach rather than a subscription-first model. The goal is to make biblical teaching, faith-based programming, documentaries, podcasts, and family-friendly content accessible to as many people as possible without financial barriers.

Instead of charging viewers, RLN is supported entirely through the generosity of donors who believe in the mission of Real Life with Jack Hibbs and the broader outreach of the network.

This allows viewers to:

• Stream content without monthly payments 
• Explore the full platform freely 
• Share programs with friends and family easily 
• Access biblical teaching regardless of financial situation 

For many families, this removes a major obstacle and makes faith-based streaming far more accessible.

No Subscription Required

Unlike many mainstream streaming platforms, RLN does not require:

• Paid memberships 
• Credit card trials 
• Premium unlocks 
• Hidden add-ons 
• Automatic billing after a trial period 

Viewers can simply create an account and begin watching.

This straightforward approach reflects the network’s focus on ministry and outreach rather than maximizing subscriptions.

What You Can Watch on RLN

Even though RLN is free, the platform includes a wide variety of content across multiple categories. Viewers can explore:

• Bible teaching and sermons 
• Podcasts and interviews 
• Faith-based films and documentaries 
• Apologetics and worldview programs 
• Family and kids’ programming 
• Cultural discussions and special events 

Programs such as Real Life with Jack Hibbs, A Daily Walk, Bridge Bible Talk, Way of the Master, and documentaries like Before the Wrath and C.S. Lewis: The Most Reluctant Convert are all available without requiring a paid subscription.

Why This Matters for Families

Streaming costs can add up quickly. Many households already juggle multiple subscriptions across entertainment, music, and live TV platforms. By offering free access, RLN gives families a way to add faith-based content into their homes without increasing monthly expenses. It also makes it easier to:

• Introduce children to biblical programming 
• Watch sermons and teaching regularly 
• Share content with small groups or friends 
• Explore faith-based media without commitment pressure 

This accessibility is especially meaningful for viewers who are exploring Christian content for the first time.

A Different Kind of Streaming Model

Most modern streaming services are built around subscriptions because content licensing and original production are expensive. Christian streaming platforms often operate differently, especially those tied closely to ministry outreach.

RLN’s donor-supported model allows the platform to focus on:

• Expanding biblical content 
• Supporting discipleship and evangelism 
• Reaching viewers globally 
• Providing family-safe programming without paywalls 

Rather than asking viewers to “upgrade” for better access, the platform is designed to make truth available as broadly as possible.

What If You Want to Delete Your Account?

Another common concern with streaming services is cancellation. Many viewers are frustrated by complicated account systems or unclear billing structures. RLN keeps the process simple.

If a user decides they no longer want an account, they can:

1. Go to their account settings 
2. Select delete account 
3. Confirm deletion 

There are no cancellation fees, hidden commitments, or subscription complications because there is no paid membership attached to the account.

Why Donors Support Free Christian Streaming

The reason RLN can remain free is because many people believe biblical teaching and Christ-centered content should remain widely accessible. Supporters of Real Life with Jack Hibbs help fund:

• Ongoing platform development 
• New programming and documentaries 
• Streaming infrastructure 
• Outreach and discipleship efforts 

Their generosity allows viewers around the world to access content without worrying about cost barriers.

Real Life Network does not offer a free trial because it doesn’t need one. The platform is already free to access, with no subscriptions, hidden fees, or premium tiers required.

That approach reflects the heart behind the network: making biblically grounded content available to anyone seeking truth, encouragement, and faith-based programming.

Explore free Christian streaming anytime on Real Life Network.

The relentless hold that online pornography has on American society is continuing unabated, with limited public effort to contain or reduce it. Surveys show that porn use is almost as widespread among practicing Christians as it is in the general public. Even as age verification laws have spread throughout the country, a lingering question remains: could an internet service provider (ISP) filtration model implemented in the U.K. help lower porn consumption in the U.S.?

With the universal adoption of internet-enabled phones has come the reality that smut is now consumed as easily and privately as viewing a text. AddictionHelp.com estimates that an astounding 95% of porn traffic is viewed on phones, with just 5% of traffic viewed on desktops. This may help explain why porn use is so rampant among younger generations of adults aged 18-35 in America, with a stunning 87% of men and 28% of women viewing it at least weekly. Porn is so omnipresent that the vast majority (70%) of males under 18 have viewed porn, along with 40% of minor females. Fully half of teens under 15 have also viewed online obscenity.

Perhaps most distressing for the church is that even the majority of practicing Christians are consuming porn. According to a 2024 report from Barna and Pure Desire, 54% of those who say “faith is important to them and have attended church in the last month” sometimes view porn, compared to 61% of all U.S. adults.

All of this consumption is taking place on human beings who are being sexually abused and coerced into being filmed. One study found that all porn subjects were coerced to participate in being filmed in some way, with 96% of them being victims of sexual abuse as children.

The effects of porn use on consumers are also contributing to a spiraling mental health crisis in the U.S. Research shows that habitual consumption causes increased anxiety and depression, emotional numbness and relationship strain, impaired focus and productivity, and increased isolation and loneliness, not to mention increased sexual dysfunction.

The immense damage that porn has inflicted on public health has led to a large swath of U.S. states enacting laws that require porn sites to verify the age of potential users before allowing them website access. Since 2023, 25 states have passed such laws. While human rights advocates have rightly celebrated these efforts at reducing minors’ consumption of porn, subsequent studies have found that the laws have done little to mitigate overall porn use. One study found that the laws’ effect induced a 10% reduction in time spent on porn sites, but “Many users appear to have circumvented restrictions with VPNs [virtual private networks] or shifted to noncompliant sites that did not verify age.”

Another way that countries like the U.K. are attempting to tackle the smut problem is by requiring ISPs to offer internet services that filter out porn sites. In 2011, the U.K. government announced an agreement with the country’s four largest ISPs in which their default internet service would be free of porn sites, requiring subscribers to “opt in” to an unfiltered service if they wanted access to smut. ISPs began implementing the policy in 2013. But subsequent reports revealed that the vast majority of British users opted out of the service, showing that the model has likely had a negligible effect on lessening porn consumption in the country.

Still, the model remains untried in the U.S., where many parents would likely choose to curtail porn at its source instead of having to navigate third-party filters to protect their children. However, experts like Benjamin Bull, who serves as general counsel for the National Center on Sexual Exploitation, say that the ISP filtration model may not stand up to legal scrutiny if it were enacted in the U.S.

“While we admire the U.K. model for blocking pornography unless users opt out, I fear the First Amendment to the United States Constitution would likely make such a law in this country be held unconstitutional,” he told The Washington Stand. “Although pornography found by a court to be legally ‘obscene’ has no constitutional protection, there is a presumption of constitutional protection until such a ruling occurs. Our Supreme Court would likely strike down the U.K. model as a ‘prior restraint’ on presumptively protected expression and therefore a violation of the First Amendment.”

Bull continued, “However, in the most recent term of our Supreme Court, the court upheld a Texas law that prohibits dissemination of pornography to minors unless the online platform first obtains confirmation that the recipient is 18 years of age or older. In other words, age verification is now a requirement for online dissemination of pornography in Texas and several other states that have adopted this law. The reason is that while pornography is presumptively protected for adults, it has little, if any, protection for minors. Because of a ‘compelling’ governmental interest in protecting children, the Supreme Court held that the burden of determining that the recipient is an adult prior to dissemination passes constitutional muster.”

“This is much weaker than the U.K. model, and our Supreme Court may not have reached this decision had the U.K. not been a leader in curtailing unlimited access to pornography, which social scientists have concluded has a corrosive and negative effect on society in so many ways,” he added.

This article was written by Dan Hart and originally published on The Washington Stand. For more content like this, visit Real Life Network.

Throughout history, people have looked to their leaders for strength, wisdom, and direction. But here's a question worth asking: who do our leaders look to?

Our Founders understood something that seems almost forgotten today. They believed rights came from God, not government. That's why the Declaration of Independence speaks of our Creator. The idea was simple but profound: if our rights come from God, then government cannot legitimately take them away.

For most of American history, if your job title was President of the United States, then securing the free exercise of religion wasn't a side issue — it was part of the job description.

From the very beginning, George Washington understood that. Washington spoke of Divine Providence and believed the success of the nation depended on something higher than human ambition. In 1790, he assured a Hebrew congregation in Newport that the government "gives bigotry no sanction" and "persecution no assistance." He set a tone that religious liberty would not belong to one group but would be protected for all.

John Adams carried that same conviction forward. He warned that nothing was more dangerous than the government meddling with religion. For Adams, liberty and morality were inseparable, and freedom without virtue could not survive.

Thomas Jefferson, who was often misunderstood, insisted that rights come from our Creator, not government. And when he spoke of a "wall of separation between church and state," he was arguing for protection of faith from government interference — not the removal of faith from public life.

James Madison, the Father of the Constitution, went even deeper. He believed conscience itself could not be governed — that no authority on earth had the right to control what a person believes before God.

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So, when we talk about religious liberty in America, we're not talking about a modern idea or a political talking point. We're talking about something woven into the foundation of this country. And that thread continues through American history.

Abraham Lincoln, in the midst of national crisis, turned repeatedly to prayer and spoke openly of God's sovereignty over the nation. His Second Inaugural Address reads less like a political speech and more like a sermon on accountability before God.

Even later presidents carried this understanding forward. Benjamin Harrison, a devout Presbyterian elder, lived his faith openly and led prayer meetings long before and during his time in leadership. His convictions were part of how he governed and how he lived.

William McKinley, a lifelong Methodist who once considered entering the ministry, leaned heavily on his faith during moments of national decision, including times of war and uncertainty. He understood leadership as stewardship under God.

And Ronald Reagan, in the modern era, put it plainly when he said, "Freedom prospers when religion is vibrant, and the rule of law under God is acknowledged." He believed, simply, that without God, democracy cannot endure.

Now, none of these men were perfect. That's not the point. The point is that across centuries, from Washington to Reagan, there has been a consistent recognition: leadership is strongest when it is humbled by something greater than itself.

One worldview says authority begins and ends with man. The other says authority ultimately comes from God. And that difference shapes everything — from how a nation defines freedom, to how it protects conscience, to how it understands human dignity.

That's why the conversation about faith in the public square still matters today. Not because government should replace the church, but because leaders, like the rest of us, are shaped by what they believe about truth, authority, and God. It isn't really about politics. It's about whether faith still has a place in the public square. It's about whether moral truth exists beyond political power. And it's about whether leaders should seek wisdom from sources greater than themselves.

A Pastor Who Stood at the Crossroads of Faith and Power

There is one man who quietly stood at the intersection of faith and power for more than half a century. Not a president. Not a politician. But a pastor. And that was Billy Graham.

Graham once said that whether the story of Christ is told in a huge stadium, across the desk of a powerful leader, or shared with a golfing companion, it satisfies a common hunger. He understood something most people in power eventually discover -- fame, authority, and success don't silence spiritual need. They reveal it.

Over the course of American history, that truth played out in remarkable ways. Every U.S. president from Harry Truman to Barack Obama met with Billy Graham while he was alive. Republican or Democrat, conservative or liberal, when presidents faced crisis, war, scandal, or personal decisions, many of them asked for one thing: prayer and counsel.

It began simply with Harry Truman. In 1950, a congressman called Billy Graham and asked if he'd like to meet the president. Without any briefing on protocol, he agreed and went in with three colleagues to speak with President Truman, who told Graham that he lived by the Sermon on the Mount. Before he left, the two prayed together. Years later, Truman warmly received Graham at his home in Independence, Missouri.

Dwight Eisenhower invited Graham's counsel during moments of military and national tension, once calling him "an ambassador of heaven." Graham later said Eisenhower was the first president who really asked his counsel in depth, when he was sending troops into Little Rock. Just before Eisenhower died, Graham was invited to see him at Walter Reed Hospital. After talking again about assurance of salvation, the two men prayed.

John F. Kennedy spent time with him just before taking office, reflecting on the moral condition of the nation.

And Lyndon Johnson — perhaps one of the presidents closest to him — invited Billy Graham into the White House repeatedly. Graham later recalled that whenever he said, "Let's have a prayer," Johnson would kneel beside him.

Richard Nixon and Billy Graham had known each other since 1950, and over the years they developed a real personal friendship. While Nixon was often seen as private and complicated in public life, Graham experienced something different behind the scenes — he found him warmer and more compassionate than the public image suggested.

Nixon was also shaped by his Quaker background, and in private moments he would often ask Graham to pray with him and read Scripture when they met. But during the final year of his presidency, as Watergate intensified, those meetings stopped. It was later reported that Nixon didn't want Graham drawn into the scandal, or "tarred with Watergate."

Gerald Ford defended their friendship publicly, saying Graham's visits were "get-togethers of old friends" with no political agenda. Jimmy Carter called his reputation "above reproach."

Ronald Reagan credited Billy Graham with deepening his own prayer life, especially after the assassination attempt in 1981, when Graham immediately came to pray with the Reagan family. Reagan said it was through Billy Graham that he found himself praying even more than daily, and that in the position he held, his prayers increasingly were for the wisdom to make decisions that would serve God and be pleasing to Him.

George H.W. Bush said no one could be president without understanding prayer, and credited Graham with helping him understand that truth. Bill Clinton remembered hearing him preach as a boy in Arkansas and later described his ministry as always completely private, always completely genuine. George W. Bush said a private conversation with Billy Graham in Maine planted the spiritual seed that led to his own faith renewal. Barack Obama visited him in North Carolina and prayed with him privately. And even Donald Trump met him during a celebration honoring his ministry legacy.

Different eras. Different politics. Different personalities. But a consistent pattern: when the most powerful leaders in the world needed grounding, many of them turned to a pastor.

Billy Graham never accepted political appointments, even when presidents like Johnson and Nixon offered them. He refused every time — because he understood his role was not to govern, but to point people back to God. And maybe that's why presidents trusted him. He wasn't there to manage policy. He was there to remind them of something higher than policy. Something higher than power. Something higher than themselves.

In a culture where leadership is often measured by influence, Billy Graham quietly reminded us that true leadership is measured by humility. And that raises a question worth sitting with: if some of the most powerful men in the world needed spiritual counsel, what does that say about the rest of us?

Because whether you're in the Oval Office or living an ordinary life, the truth remains the same. We all need wisdom beyond ourselves. We all need grounding beyond politics. And ultimately, we all need a foundation that doesn't shift with the times.

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In August 2026, Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey signed the Prioritizing Patient Access to Care Act, removing the state's remaining gestational limits on abortion and giving health care providers broader discretion to perform the procedure later in pregnancy without legal consequence. The room applauded. Hard
to believe, I know. Massachusetts now stands alongside nine other states and the District of Columbia in permitting abortion up to the moment of birth.

Healey framed the law as protection for families facing devastating medical news late in pregnancy, and as a shield against a more restrictive national climate. But protection is not the word for it. What this law actually does is strip away the last legal limit on when a child's life can be ended — clearing the way for abortion up to the very moment of birth. Pro-life advocates have rightly called this what it is: the United States is now one of only a handful of countries on earth with no gestational limit on abortion whatsoever, and laws like this one expose late-term children, who can feel pain, who can survive outside the womb, to the most violent procedures medicine performs.

An entire room stood and applauded that.

There's something our culture rarely talks about, something this signing makes impossible to ignore: the faces we can see. The lives that are here.

I'm talking about the people who survived abortion attempts.

For decades, abortion in America has largely been discussed through politics, court decisions, and ideology. But behind all of that — there are human beings. And some of those human beings survived.

They are alive today. They have names, stories, families, and voices. You can look into their eyes and hear them tell you what happened. And that changes the conversation. Because suddenly abortion isn’t theoretical or abstract. It’s personal.

There are documented cases of babies surviving abortion procedures in the United States. Survivor organizations have worked to bring visibility to those stories. Survivors have spoken publicly about living with physical injuries, emotional trauma, and the lifelong reality of knowing someone once tried to end their life before they were even born.

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One of the most well-known survivors is Melissa Ohden, who survived a saline infusion abortion and has spent years speaking publicly about her experience and advocating for the born alive.

And even actor Sylvester Stallone spoke recently about being told by his mother that an attempted abortion failed before he was born. He has stated that his mother told him, "The only reason you're here is because the hanger didn't work.

Think about that for a moment. These are not "hypotheticals." These are people. People who laugh. Who love. Who contribute to the world. People made in the image of God.

And Scripture could not be clearer about the value of life.

Psalm 139 says: "For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in mymother's womb."

And Jeremiah 1:5 says: "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you."

That means human worth is not determined by circumstance. Not by convenience. And not by whether a life was planned, expected, or even wanted by others.

Value comes from God. Because God is the author of life.

And when we hear the stories of abortion survivors, we are forced to confront a reality our culture often tries to avoid: What happens when the child survives? What happens when the life everyone was told would never matter... is standing right in front of us? With a face, a voice, and a testimony?

And maybe that is why these stories are so powerful. Because they remind us that every life carries purpose. Every life — not some, not only the easy or convenient lives. Every life.

Now I also know this conversation touches a deep pain for many people. There are women — and men — who carry grief, regret, and wounds connected to abortion. And the Christian message is not that forgiveness is impossible. It’s the opposite. There is grace through Christ. There is healing through God. And there is most assuredly
redemption at the cross.

But truth still matters. And the truth is that these survivors exist. They are living proof that what is in the womb is not potential life. It is life.

Make Your Life Count

There are moments when we are reminded just how fragile life really is. Hearing the voices of people who survived abortion attempts, looking into the faces of people who were never expected to live — it changes something. It forces us to remember that every single life carries value.

Not because society assigns it value, or because government recognizes it. And not because culture approves of it. But because God created it.

Every life.

And maybe that's the deeper message in all of this. Not just that life should be protected — although it absolutely should. But that life should mean something. That our lives should count for something greater than ourselves.

Ephesians 2:10 tells us: "For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them."

Think about that. Prepared beforehand. That means your life is not random. It is not accidental. And it is never without purpose. Not the child in the womb, the struggling mother, or the survivor whose story seemed impossible. Not you.

We are told that we were created for good works — that we have nothing to do with — God already prepared those good works for us before we were even born. All we need do is to walk in them.

God wastes nothing.

And the truth is, none of us knows how long we've been given here. But we do get to decide what we do with the time we have.

Will we use our lives to protect what is vulnerable? To stand for truth when it's unpopular? To bring light into places that have grown dark? Will we make our lives count and walk in good works?

Because one day, titles won't matter. Politics won't matter. Fame won't matter. What will matter is whether we lived with courage, loved well, stood firmly in truth, and whether we pointed people toward God.

That is a life that counts.

And maybe the people who survived what should have taken their lives understand that better than most. Because when someone survives what should have taken their life, they tend to understand something very deeply: life is a gift. A sacred gift. And gifts from God are never meant to be wasted.

So wherever you are today — whatever your story may be — remember this: you were created on purpose. By God. For a purpose. Because of that we should commit to live courageously, stand faithfully, and love boldly. And dedicated in love to the One who created you to make your life count.

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This subject was explored in depth on an episode of Rose Unplugged on Real Life Network; “Choice is a Person”.

The biggest stories in the news often have another layer beneath the headlines. Political movements reveal the ideas shaping the country. Foreign relationships raise questions about influence and consistency. Cultural icons leave legacies that extend far beyond their fame.

On Real Life Network, The Daniel Cohen Show looks at those connections through a biblical worldview, bringing together the news, Israel, and Scripture. This week, those stories stretch from a growing debate over Sharia law and antisemitism to election integrity, foreign influence, and a remarkable connection between Dolly Parton and Jewish families around the world.

Sharia Law, Antisemitism, and the Direction of American Politics

President Donald Trump recently told Glenn Beck that he would prohibit Sharia law in the United States. The statement raises a larger question Americans need to consider: Can a religious legal system operate alongside the protections and principles of the United States Constitution?

Sharia and the American constitutional system contain fundamental differences regarding the relationship between religion and government, individual rights, and the source of law. Whatever policies ultimately emerge, America cannot maintain competing legal systems when their requirements conflict with constitutional protections.

The issue becomes even more important when considering the political movements gaining influence across the country.

In Michigan, Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed’s association with political commentator Hasan Piker has generated controversy. Piker has faced criticism for past comments about America, Israel, Hamas, and American Jews. Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, who is Jewish, has also publicly expressed concerns about the political environment within her own party. She has made clear that her Jewish identity comes before her political affiliation.

That is a principle worth remembering far beyond Michigan.

When allegiance to a political movement requires overlooking hatred, threats, or extremism, truth must take priority over party loyalty.

For Christians, antisemitism also carries biblical significance. Zechariah 2:8 describes Israel as the “apple of His eye,” pointing to God’s covenant relationship with the Jewish people. Christians should therefore be among the first to reject hatred directed toward Jews, regardless of whether it comes from the political left or right.

The same discernment is necessary when evaluating claims surrounding Israel and Gaza. Questions about UNRWA personnel, Hamas, humanitarian aid, and conditions inside Gaza demonstrate why accusations should be examined carefully rather than simply repeated. Facts matter. Context matters. And when accusations against Israel spread around the world, getting those facts right matters even more.

The Standard Has to Apply to Everyone

Consistency becomes much harder when scrutiny turns toward our own political side.

President Trump’s opposition to Sharia law deserves to be weighed alongside his administration’s relationships in the Muslim world, including Qatar and Turkey. The prospect of a Boeing 747 provided by Qatar, in particular, raises legitimate questions about appearances and foreign influence.

Qatar has maintained a complicated role in Middle Eastern affairs, including relationships with Hamas, while also serving as a major American security partner. Turkey presents its own challenges under President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, whose relationship with Israel has become increasingly hostile.

Foreign policy inevitably requires dealing with governments that do not share American values. But Americans should still expect consistency from their leaders.

If foreign influence deserves scrutiny when it reaches the political left, it does not suddenly become harmless when it reaches the political right.

The same principle should apply to conservative media. Holding Democrats accountable while ignoring destructive rhetoric or questionable influences among conservatives does not demonstrate principle. It demonstrates partisanship.

Christians especially cannot allow political affiliation to determine when truth matters.

Election integrity provides another example. A recent Supreme Court decision allowed portions of Trump’s executive order concerning elections to move forward after determining that states challenging the order had sued prematurely. The dispute involves measures including ballot tracking and the creation of citizenship data that could be shared with states.

The Court did not settle every underlying legal question, meaning the dispute is far from finished. But the larger principle should not be controversial: eligible Americans should be able to vote, legitimate votes should be counted, and election systems should have safeguards capable of earning public confidence.

The Dolly Parton Story You Probably Haven’t Heard

Against those contentious political stories stands a very different kind of American story.

Dolly Parton’s legacy is usually told through the obvious accomplishments: more than 100 million records sold, iconic songs, movies, awards, Dollywood, and a career spanning generations.

But there is another part of that legacy.

In the 1970s, a Jewish man from Brooklyn named Sandy Gallin became Parton’s manager. Gallin helped guide her crossover from country music into mainstream entertainment, including encouraging her to record “Here You Come Again.” Their professional relationship eventually developed into a partnership lasting roughly 25 years.

Then came another connection.

Parton launched the Imagination Library in 1995 with a simple mission: put books into the hands of children. Jewish philanthropist Harold Grinspoon saw what Parton had created and was inspired to develop a similar program for Jewish families.

That idea became PJ Library, which today distributes books about Jewish life and tradition to families around the world.

A Christian woman from Tennessee wanted children to read. A Jewish philanthropist saw what she was doing and carried that idea into Jewish homes across the globe.

Genesis 12:3 records God’s promise to Abraham: “I will bless those who bless you.”

Parton possessed the fame and business success to build an enormous personal fortune. Yet some of the most meaningful parts of her legacy are not about what she accumulated. They are about what she gave away.

A meaningful legacy is measured less by what we accumulate than by what we give, whom we bless, and what remains after we are gone.

That lesson reaches beyond Dolly Parton.

Politics will change. Elections will come and go. Today’s most influential personalities will eventually disappear from the headlines. But character, courage, generosity, and faithfulness leave a different kind of legacy.

Christians should be willing to confront antisemitism wherever it appears, examine political leaders consistently, demand truth from the institutions around them, and refuse to let partisan loyalty replace biblical conviction.

And when God gives someone influence, resources, or opportunity, the question is not merely how much can be gained from it.

The better question is what can be given through it.

Watch The Daniel Cohen Show on Real Life Network for more news and commentary connecting the headlines to the good news through a biblical worldview.

On Sunday, August 23, Family Research Council President Tony Perkins delivered remarks at the Ukraine National Prayer Breakfast in Kyiv, with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, members of the Ukrainian Parliament, and other dignitaries in attendance.

Mr. President, distinguished members of the Ukrainian government and Parliament, leaders of the church, honored guests, ladies and gentlemen:

It is a profound honor to be with you here in Kyiv at this consequential moment in the life of your nation. Thank you for the privilege of joining you for the Ukraine National Prayer Breakfast.

I come as a friend of Ukraine, grateful for the opportunity to stand with you in prayer, but most importantly to share with you from the word of God.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn wrote in “The Gulag Archipelago”:

“The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either — but right through every human heart.”

The Apostle Paul describes the deeper conflict this way in his letter to the Ephesians:

“For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.” (Ephesians 6:12)

There is a war for Ukraine’s territory, but the battlefield we see reflects a greater battle being waged in the heavenlies — a battle for the soul of Ukraine and the hearts of its people.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, I worked with the U.S. Department of State managing one of its Anti-Terrorism Assistance Program sites. Shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, we began training police officers and other security officials in the United States from former Eastern Bloc countries.

I would personally acquire Bibles and place them in their dorm rooms before their arrival.

With one Polish class, the demand for Bibles was so great at the time that I was unable to get the Bibles before the officers arrived. They finally came in the night before the class was scheduled to leave.

My office was on the ground floor of the dormitory, so I sent word to their interpreter and escort that I had Bibles in Polish in my office if they would like one.

Within 10 minutes, the entire class was crowded into my office — some in their underwear, having jumped out of bed.

With tears in their eyes, some told me they had never owned a Bible. One asked for another for his elderly mother. One asked me to sign his Bible.

I told him, “I didn’t write it, so I better not sign it.”

I have never witnessed such a genuine hunger for the word of God.

Thirty-five years ago, Ukraine declared its independence, which was overwhelmingly affirmed by the Ukrainian people in December of that year.

That historic political awakening was preceded three years earlier by a remarkable spiritual opening as Christians marked the 1,000th anniversary of the Christianization of Kyivan Rus under Volodymyr the Great in 988.

While there were certainly political advantages for him to embrace Christianity, the ancient chronicles present a striking before-and-after portrait of Volodymyr. The ruler once associated with pagan worship, violence, and numerous wives and concubines became a ruler who destroyed idols, built churches, promoted Christian instruction, cared for the poor, and sought to govern according to his newfound Christian faith.

According to the earliest Christian accounts, the Christianization of Volodymyr changed the Grand Prince personally, and it changed the policies and direction of his realm.

A spiritually renewed heart lays the foundation for a reformation of our ways.

Genuine spiritual renewal should produce reform.

But reform apart from spiritual renewal cannot be sustained.

Jesus illustrated this principle with a sobering warning in Matthew 12:

“When an unclean spirit goes out of a man, he goes through dry places, seeking rest, and finds none. Then he says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when he comes, he finds [it] empty, swept, and put in order. Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last [state] of that man is worse than the first. So shall it also be with this wicked generation.”

The warning? Jesus was speaking to those of His day who had experienced a measure of reform through John the Baptist’s ministry yet rejected the One to whom John pointed, Christ Himself. The warning, which extends beyond that generation, is that freedom from the bondage of evil cannot be sustained by merely removing what is evil; the life that has been emptied must come under the transforming rule and presence of God.

Thirty-five years ago, Ukraine swept away atheistic communism, but what has taken its place?

Could the battle for Ukraine’s territory also be part of a larger spiritual battle, an effort to return this nation to the bondage from which it was delivered?

In the 1950s, as America moved deeper into the Cold War with the Soviet Union, the Rev. George M. Docherty, pastor of the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C., delivered a sermon on February 7, 1954, on the American Pledge of Allegiance and what it did not include. With President Dwight Eisenhower sitting on the front pew, the reverend declared, “Apart from the mention of the little phrase ‘the United States of America,’ it could be the pledge of any republic. I could hear little Muscovites repeat a similar pledge to their hammer-and-sickle-flag in Moscow. Russia is also a republic that claims to have overthrown the tyranny of kingship. Russia also claims to be indivisible.”

Three days later, a bill was introduced in Congress to add the words “under God” to our pledge of Allegiance.

And on Flag Day, June 14, 1954, Eisenhower signed the bill into law, saying, “From this day forward, millions of school children will daily proclaim the dedication of our nation and our people to the Almighty.”

Two years later, Congress made “In God We Trust” our national motto.

America’s leaders at that moment understood that the contrast with atheistic communism could not merely be political. Enduring freedom required a transcendent foundation, a recognition that the nation and its liberties ultimately stood under the authority of God.

Notice that Jesus begins by describing a man, a man delivered from the oppression of evil, but He ends by applying the warning to an entire generation: “So shall it also be with this wicked generation.” A generation that rejects the truth.

The warning is clear: it is not enough to drive evil out. The house cannot remain empty.

Ukraine has a remarkable Christian heritage. The flame of faith was kept burning through decades of persecution by courageous Christian men and women.

Here in Kyiv, one family embodied that courage.

Pastor Petro Vins was repeatedly arrested for preaching the gospel under Stalin. His family was told that he died in a labor camp. Decades later, they learned that he had actually been executed by the Soviet state.

His son, Georgi Veens, became a Baptist pastor here in Kyiv. When Soviet authorities sought to control the church, Georgi refused to surrender its spiritual independence.

Georgi was arrested and sent to Soviet labor camps — not once, but twice — for his religious activities. While imprisoned, Soviet authorities even refused to allow him to possess a Bible.

Think about that. A government so afraid of this Book that it would not allow a prisoner to possess one.

Years later, I watched men emerging from behind the Iron Curtain run from their beds for the opportunity to own one of these life-changing books.

And then there was Georgi’s mother, Lydia. She organized and led other relatives of imprisoned Christians, documenting the persecution and getting their stories beyond the Iron Curtain. She too was imprisoned for her faithfulness.

One family. Three lives. The same choice: Christ over communism.

And they were not alone. There were hundreds more who chose Christ and the way of the cross and courage over communism and compromise.

But now it is this generation’s turn.

Having said no to communism — will you say yes to Christ?

Now is the moment for Ukraine to fan that flame of faith in Jesus Christ — not just with political reforms, but with spiritual renewal and a declaration of dependence upon Almighty God.

Will the independence declared 35 years ago be sustained by a spiritually renewed nation that declares its dependence upon God?

Not merely in words, but, as with Grand Prince Volodymyr in 988, in deeds.

Not in proclamation alone, but in practice.

Solzhenitsyn was right: the line between good and evil runs through every human heart. And ultimately, that is where the battle for the soul of Ukraine will be decided — one heart at a time, as men and women surrender their lives to Jesus Christ.

What does it mean to surrender your life to Jesus Christ?

“But what does it say? ‘The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart’ (that is, the word of faith which we preach): that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. For the Scripture says, ‘Whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.’” (Romans 10:8-11)

Believe in your heart and confess with your mouth.

This article was originally published on The Washington Stand.