Gospelbound

Andrew Wilson is one of the happiest guys I know. So it only makes sense that he would write a book called Happiness: What It Is, Where to Find It, and How to Make It Last Forever, published by Crossway. He’s the expert. I’m delighted when I see Andrew at a TGC conference, or a retreat for The Keller Center for Cultural Apologetics. I look forward to every chance to spend time with him. He writes in this book, “Nothing is more honoring to a friend, a child, or a spouse than saying they make you happy. Nothing is more demeaning to them than telling them they don’t.” I can say, with no reservation, Andrew makes me happy when we’re together.

Ok. But where does that leave the rest of us? If we’re not naturally happy? If we’re not feeling happy right now? If we’re not hanging out with Andrew? The Declaration of Independence, 250 years ago, put happiness at the center of life’s aim: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Andrew covered that statement in his excellent earlier book, Remaking the World: How 1776 Created the Post-Christian West. Given the anniversary, I plan in this interview to sneak in a question or two about that fateful year. And we’ll discuss much more, including the difference between joy and happiness, whether God promises happiness, and why millennials grew up to be sad.

In This Episode:

00:00 – What makes us genuinely happier

00:40 – Why Andrew Wilson wrote a book about happiness

04:29 – Happiness, sorrow, and biblical examples of deep joy

07:26 – Is joy different from happiness?

11:53 – Does God promise happiness to Christians?

13:35 – Why millennials became less happy as adults

19:41 – Freedom, responsibility, and the limits of liberation

23:21 – The “problem of superfluous happiness”

26:01 – How pursuing happiness helps us fight sin

29:23 – Why virtue, gratitude, and humility make us happier

32:53 – Compassion versus empathy

34:15 – Turning delights into disciplines

37:06 – Remaking the World and America’s 250th anniversary

39:48 – What makes the United States unique?

47:08 – Discovery, defense, temperament, and optimism

48:55 – Closing and book recommendations

Resources Mentioned:

Happiness by Andrew Wilson

Remaking the World by Andrew Wilson

Generations by Jean M. Twenge

The Happiness Hypothesis by Jonathan Haidt

The Expulsive Power of a New Affection by Thomas Chalmers

— — —

📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things:

https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound

🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together

🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen

▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207

▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br

✅ SUBSCRIBE: 

▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition

▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters

Use code “GOSPELBOUND” for 25% off tuition.
Learn more at downlinememphis.com/virtual-institute or email info@downlineministries.com for group pricing and discounts.

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

Different preachers get excited about different aspects of the sermon. Some collect and deploy excellent illustrations. Others just nail the application week after week. Others can really reach your heart. 

What really fires me up are the connections between the Old and New Testaments, the way God’s plan of redemption unfolds in familiar and new ways from Genesis to Revelation. So you know I’d be excited about an excellent new resource, the CSB Connecting Scripture New Testament, edited by G. K. Beale and Benjamin Gladd. This study Bible includes a robust cross reference system that will help you see Old Testament quotations, allusions, and parallels within the New Testament so you can see all 66 books as a unified story from God. You’ll also find book introductions, study note commentary, articles, charts, and infographics.

In This Episode:

00:00:00 – Why continuity between Old and New Testament wording matters

00:00:41 – Introducing the CSB Connecting Scripture New Testament

00:01:53 – Ben Gladd and the mission of the Carson Center

00:04:06 – Why another study Bible?

00:07:06 – Green and blue fonts: changing the reading experience

00:08:24 – Quotations, allusions, and the “connective tissue” of Scripture

00:11:06 – Why Old Testament allusions matter for Bible study

00:12:46 – John 6, grumbling, and Israel in the wilderness

00:13:46 – Mark 1, John the Baptist, and the burning bush

00:15:41 – “Fishers of men” and Jeremiah 16

00:18:55 – Reading Revelation through Old Testament “emojis”

00:22:07 – John 1:1, Genesis 1:1, and Christology

00:27:47 – How the apostles read the Old Testament

00:31:19 – Guardrails for identifying legitimate allusions

00:35:36 – Do English translations obscure biblical connections?

00:42:27 – How pastors can use the study Bible in sermon preparation

00:44:19 – Why pastors should use the Old Testament for illustrations

00:48:31 – The Carson Center’s Concise Bible Commentary

00:53:44 – Learning from Don Carson and G. K. Beale

01:00:11 – Dictionary of the New Testament Use of the Old Testament

01:00:44 – Biblical Theology Briefing podcast

01:02:34 – A future Connecting Scripture Old Testament

01:05:19 – Closing

Resources Mentioned:

CSB Connecting Scripture New Testament edited by G. K. Beale and Benjamin L. Gladd

Keep Watch for Biblical Allusions by Ben Gladd

ESV Study Bible

CSB Study Bible

NIV Study Bible

Concise Bible Commentary from the Carson Center and Crossway

Dictionary of the New Testament Use of the Old Testament edited by G. K. Beale, D. A. Carson, Benjamin L. Gladd, and Andrew David Naselli

New Studies in Biblical Theology series

Pillar New Testament Commentary series

Biblical Theology Briefing Podcast with Ben Gladd and Matthew Harmon

— — —

📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things:

https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound

🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together

🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen

▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207

▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br

✅ SUBSCRIBE: 

▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition

▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters

Use code “GOSPELBOUND” for 25% off tuition.
Learn more at downlinememphis.com/virtual-institute or email info@downlineministries.com for group pricing and discounts.

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

Alister McGrath remembers life as an atheist back in the late 1960s. He believed only what could be proven to be true. And he judged religious believers for trusting in an irrational fantasy.

Looking back, though, he can see an emotional basis for what he thought were purely rational conclusions. He didn’t want God to exist, because God would threaten his freedom. As an atheist he could do whatever he wanted. He could be the center of the universe. 

Now as a Christian and one of the most well-known apologists in the world, McGrath sees how much desire determines what we believe about the universe. He says, “The human desire for unaccountability leads to the metaphysical conclusion that there should not be a God.”

Last summer McGrath and I caught up when he was the keynote speaker at a Beeson Divinity School conference on Persuasive Preaching. I was invited to engage and respond to his presentation. Alister is a theologian and Christian apologist with a particular interest in the relation of science and faith. In fact he recently retired as a professor of science and religion at Oxford University. 

I know him as a godly encourager and kind interlocutor. I’ve learned a lot from him on various subjects, especially C. S. Lewis. In fact, I was listening to him at Lanier Library in Houston when he inspired me to begin work on a book about Lewis and Winston Churchill. So I’m excited to talk with him again about atheism and apologetics and a heavy dose of Lewis.

In This Episode:

00:00 – Why belief cannot always be proven

00:37 – Collin introduces Alister McGrath, atheism, desire, and C. S. Lewis

02:19 – McGrath’s move from atheism to Christianity in 1971

03:58 – Conversion as a process rather than an instant transformation

05:07 – C. S. Lewis’s “Is Theology Poetry?” and Christianity as a big picture of reality

06:30 – Christianity as aligning with the deep truths of the universe

08:01 – The New Atheists and the power of rhetorical certainty

11:06 – Why the New Atheist movement faded

13:26 – How apologetics has changed over the decades

16:29 – Tim Keller’s apologetic influence

20:25 – Integrating apologetics into preaching

23:22 – Faith versus fact—or faith versus faith?

24:28 – Enlightenment assumptions and the limits of proof

26:33 – Morality, Christianity, and secularized Christian values

28:31 – Truth, meaning, and transformative belief

30:07 – “Bleakness is not an indicator of truth”

31:53 – C. S. Lewis, Winston Churchill, and wartime apologetics

35:03 – Lewis, The Problem of Pain, and the BBC broadcasts

36:52 – Lewis’s faith, academic career, and public apologetics

39:53 – The Weight of Glory and spiritual flourishing in wartime

42:39 – Lewis on marriage, forgiveness, and the Holocaust context

45:29 – The Guardian, archives, and The Screwtape Letters

48:44 – McGrath’s storytelling apologetics and closing reflections

49:38 – Gospelbound outro

Resources Mentioned:

Mere Christianity by C. S. Lewis

The Problem of Pain by C. S. Lewis

The Screwtape Letters by C. S. Lewis

The Great Divorce by C. S. Lewis

The Weight of Glory by C. S. Lewis

The Air We Breathe by Glen Scrivener

Dominion by Tom Holland

The Dawkins Delusion? by Alister McGrath

Making Sense of Us by TGC and The Keller Center

The Keller Center for Cultural Apologetics

— — —

📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things:

https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound

🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together

🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen

▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207

▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br

✅ SUBSCRIBE: 

▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition

▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters

Use code “GOSPELBOUND” for 25% off tuition.
Learn more at downlinememphis.com/virtual-institute or email info@downlineministries.com for group pricing and discounts.

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

Is there a fate worse than condemnation? 

Yes, say Allen Guelzo and James Hankins in their new textbook, The Golden Thread: A History of the Western Tradition: Volume II: The Modern and Contemporary West. Worse than everyone hating you is no one remembering you.  

Right now for Western civilization, the former is leading to the latter. Having been widely condemned as oppressive, imperialist, colonizing, and appropriating, Western civilization is sometimes not even taught, let alone celebrated for producing the moral, technological, political, economic, and lifestyle achievements that give shape to our world. The Golden Thread helps in remembering and teaching without ignoring the failures and shortcomings of Western civilization.

The textbook collaborators Guelzo and Hankins have been acquainted for more than 50 years. Hankins wrote volume one, and Guelzo has written volume two. Guelzo is the Thomas W. Smith Distinguished Research Scholar and director of the James Madison Program’s Initiative on Politics and Statesmanship at Princeton University. Guelzo is a long-time favorite writer of mine, not least for his work on the American Civil War and Abraham Lincoln, for which he last appeared on Gospelbound in 2024. I’m honored to host him again as we commemorate the 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States, one of the hinge points in Western civilization in that memorable year of 1776.

In This Episode:

00:00 – Why Western civilization slips away when taken for granted

00:25 – Introducing Allen Guelzo and The Golden Thread

02:24 – How should we define Western civilization?

08:02 – The fall of communism and the West’s crisis of confidence

11:23 – China, radical Islam, Russia, and civilizational conflict

12:47 – Self-criticism as the West’s strength and danger

15:38 – World wars, Darwin, Freud, communism, and lost confidence

19:49 – The atomic age and the misuse of scientific achievement

22:09 – Defending the West without triumphalism

25:38 – Winston Churchill, trauma, and Christian civilization

30:15 – Adenauer, de Gaulle, and rebuilding Europe after 1945

32:38 – Strange defeat, German memory, and Russia’s missed moment

38:37 – C. S. Lewis, John Paul II, and Christianity in a skeptical age

39:28 – Contingency, crisis, and the decisions that shape history

42:24 – Christianity, Greece, Rome, and the “layer cake” of the West

51:33 – Technology, memory, and the future of civilization

53:39 – Lincoln, King, Augustine, and recovering the tradition

58:17 – Could artificial intelligence revive classical education?

59:37 – Closing encouragement

Resources Mentioned:

The Golden Thread Volume I by Allen C. Guelzo & James Hankins

The Golden Thread Volume II by Allen C. Guelzo & James Hankins

The Golden Thread Substack

The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas

The End of History and the Last Man by Francis Fukuyama

The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order by Samuel P. Huntington

Strange Defeat by Marc Bloch

Secondhand Time by Svetlana Alexievich

The Abolition of Man by C. S. Lewis

God in the Dock by C. S. Lewis

Dominion by Tom Holland

Lord of the Flies by William Golding

— — —

📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things:

https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound

🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together

🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen

▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207

▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br

✅ SUBSCRIBE: 

▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition

▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters

Use code “GOSPELBOUND” for 25% off tuition.
Learn more at downlinememphis.com/virtual-institute or email info@downlineministries.com for group pricing and discounts.

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

You will find many books on the biblical and practical importance of the local church. I wrote one myself a few years ago with Jonathan Leeman called Rediscover Church: Why the Body of Christ Is Essential. But few books can match the way Brad Edwards shows us the need for the church amid rampant anxiety, division, and individualism. Not only our churches but even whole societies would be transformed by implementing the wisdom found in this book, called The Reason for Church. 

Brad is the church planter of The Table Church in Lafayette, Colorado. His debut book has been justly acclaimed. He won the 2025 Christianity Today Book of the Year Award and also finished first in the Church and Pastoral Leadership category. He was the winner of The Gospel Coalition's award for First-Time Author that year as well. I’m grateful that he joins me now to talk about everything from authority and institutions to anxiety and whether unity should be the goal for a church.

In This Episode:

00:00 – Opening: power, trust, and the temptation toward conformity

00:26 – Introducing Brad Edwards and The Reason for Church

01:41 – Ranking the causes behind declining trust in church authority

04:05 – Accountability, social media, and the limits of online justice

08:25 – Churches, institutions, platforms, and marketplace logic

11:17 – What changes people’s minds about the need for church?

13:27 – Church planting in Boulder County and Colorado’s anti-institutional culture

17:01 – Therapy culture, spiritual abuse, and what the book could not fully address

22:19 – Institution building, movements, and building a remnant

26:30 – Technology, schedules, and the challenge of spiritual formation

29:09 – Individuality versus individualism

34:39 – Should unity be the goal of a church?

37:49 – What surprised Brad most about becoming a pastor

39:21 – AI, agency, and the future of formation

43:07 – Hartmut Rosa, resonance, gambling, and the desire for control

46:55 – AI, education, responsibility, and authorship

52:05 – The church as remnant and refuge in a changing world

53:19 – What pastors want their congregations to know

56:41 – Closing and Gospelbound outro

Resources Mentioned:

The Reason for Church by Brad Edwards

Rediscover Church by Collin Hansen and Jonathan Leeman

Bowling Alone by Robert D. Putnam

Yuval Levin’s work on institutions

Bully Pulpit by Michael J. Kruger

GIRLS® by Freya India

The Reason for God by Tim Keller

Center Church by Tim Keller

Dominion by Tom Holland

Habits of the Heart by Robert Bellah

The Uncontrollability of the World by Hartmut Rosa

PostEverything, Brad Edwards’s podcast with John Homsher

Harper’s Magazine article on young AI founders

 

— — —

 

📫 SIGN UP for my newsletter, Unseen Things:

https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/gospelbound

🎁 Help The Gospel Coalition build up a renewed church for tomorrow. Let's Build Together: Donate Today at https://www.tgc.org/together

🎧 Don’t miss an episode of Gospelbound with Collin Hansen

▫ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gospelbound/id1499898207

▫ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0kRYr5FTKr5ru1N7MR65Br

✅ SUBSCRIBE: 

▫ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thegospelcoalition

▫ TGC Updates: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/newsletters

Use code “GOSPELBOUND” for 25% off tuition.
Learn more at downlinememphis.com/virtual-institute or email info@downlineministries.com for group pricing and discounts.

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