Monthly Archives: March 2026

A Better Toughness

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I’ll admit, the news of Chuck Norris’s passing ten days ago in Hawaii hit pretty hard. While I wasn’t a devoted fan of all his films and television shows, I more than appreciated him. When I was younger, if one of his movies was playing, I watched it. Because he wasn’t just tough. He was emotionlessly cool in his toughness. I’m guessing that’s why he became a kind of cultural shorthand for invincibility.

I’m sure you’ve seen or heard the jokes. Everybody has. My wife, Jennifer, has a favorite. It goes something like, “Chuck Norris is so tough, he can pick an apple from an orange tree and make the best lemonade you’ve ever had.” Jokes like that one, while ridiculously silly, certainly do laud what a tough and determined man can achieve. For many, Norris seemed to embody what winning looked like.

That said, I’m also Gen-X. Regardless of the current generation’s memes, we owned Chuck Norris’s myth in real-time. For me personally, legends like him, especially the ones built around genuine toughness, don’t go quietly from my imagination. While not exactly the same, I felt the same way when Patrick Swayze died. I wasn’t a fan of his later films. But no matter how many times Hollywood remakes Red Dawn, Swayze will forever be Jed Eckert, the backwater nobody who led a group of high school kids against foreign invaders. Even today, when I experience a personal victory, you might hear me whisper a subdued shout, “Wolverines!” I have a sticker on my Jeep Wrangler that does the same.

Now, before I steer too far off course, again, I was genuinely saddened to hear about Norris. In a world that admires strength, he stood as a towering symbol of it, and for all the right reasons. Not only a cultural icon, but he was also a man of conviction—open about his Christian faith and intent on living it out before the world. That matters to a guy like me. If anything, it adds depth to his legend. It’s a reminder that behind the myth of his invincibility was a man who understood that, apart from Christ, he was nothing, regardless of his worldly feats. It seems that the real Chuck Norris knew that strength, real strength, isn’t always demonstrated as we’d expect.

Considering today’s date—Palm Sunday—the point resonates. Not every hero’s entrance looks like a victory parade.

Today’s the day the Church commemorates our Lord’s ride into Jerusalem. It begins His walk to the cross. The crowd shouts. The road is paved in their cloaks. The palm branches wave. In all of this, there is, unmistakably, a sense that something powerful is happening. And yet, a donkey? Where’s the war horse? The prophetic scriptures called this particular rider humble and lowly. Where’s the physical dominance? Luke’s Gospel tells us that Jesus was weeping as he entered. That’s not very manly.

So, what’s going on here?

Well, none of these details is incidental; rather, they steer us toward a particular point. What we see is a deliberate subversion of everything we instinctively associate with strength. Kings ride stallions. Conquerors arrive to chest-rattling kettle drums and banners. But Jesus comes lowly. He’s unthreatening, at least on the surface. Everything about Him threatens this world’s powers. Still, in His humility is the better strength and authority we need. We don’t need laser lights and smoke machine spectacles. We need someone to submit Himself into the lowliest station to bear our sins and take hold of a victory we could never grasp, not even in a million lifetimes.

I guess what I’m saying is that if Chuck Norris represented the kind of strength the world instinctively understands, Palm Sunday presents something altogether different. We behold a strength that refuses to serve the self, even when it could. This is part of the tension inherent to the moment. It’s easy to admire the man who cannot be defeated. It’s harder—and far more unsettling—to reckon with the One who chooses not to win the way we expect.

I suppose this is why it was so easy for the crowds that were shouting “Hosanna!” to grow quiet—and then hostile, and then complicit in our Savior’s death. They wanted Jesus to come into Jerusalem wearing a black belt, ultimately kung-fu-ing the Romans, overturning their earthly rule. But Jesus came to overturn something deeper. The crowds wanted mortal victory. He came for eternal redemption.

I’m so glad Chuck Norris knew this. I watched an interview shortly after his death in which he told the interviewer, essentially, how his mythic toughness was nothing compared to Christ’s unwillingness to yield in going to the cross. Wow.

His inherent point was that the world actually needs the Lord’s kind of strength more than the muscle of any action star. We certainly need regular people of strength who can step into the world and take control. But we need the otherworldly kind that removes threats, settles scores, and makes things right in ways that matter for eternity. Sin, death, and the devil have us surrounded. Christ comes to our rescue. He does this by His humble submission to the cross. It looks like defeat. But it isn’t. Chris enters Jerusalem bearing the exact kind of toughness we need most. It’s the kind of toughness that’ll keep fighting even as it’s entirely misunderstood. It’s a toughness that’ll keep going, even when it’s rejected. It’s a toughness that makes its way into and through, not away from, an unspeakable suffering, the likes of which no one has ever experienced before. And ultimately, it’s a toughness that lays down its life for enemies, doing so to make them friends.

In other words, what looks like weakness is, in fact, the most unassailable strength imaginable. Perhaps more importantly, it has in mind a very simple premise. Christ, the Son of God, does not lack the power to end a world of enemies. He could obliterate everything with a wink. The thing is, He’s motivated by divine love. He has not come to destroy sinners, but to redeem them.

I should add, regardless of Christianity’s strength through the ages, what I’ve just described is the reason the cross, not the sword, has always been the defining image of Christianity. It’s not because Christ lacked strength. It’s because His strength was of an entirely different order. It’s cruciform strength. It gives rather than takes. It endures rather than escapes.

The world likes stories of men who cannot be beaten. But there’s the simple truth that no mortal man can outwit or outmaneuver death. It is, as Saint Paul said, “the last enemy” we all will face (1 Corinthians 15:26). Chuck Norris faced it recently, and like everyone else before him, could not outmuscle the reality.

But then again, in a sense, Norris did outmaneuver it. Well, he didn’t. But his Lord did, and by Christ’s strength, just as Norris believed by the power of the Holy Spirit through the Gospel, he was not beaten. Death had no final say for Norris because it had no final say for Norris’s Lord. That must be the last word here.

Action movie legends like Chuck Norris are strong in so many ways. They can take on armies carrying two Uzis and donning perfectly feathered hair and a well-groomed beard. But in the end, there’s only ever been one kind of strength that could carry the weight of this world’s sin. Behold, he comes to you, “righteous and having salvation is he, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey” (Zechariah 9:9).

But Then I Actually Thought About It…

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Saint Paul is the one who wrote, “The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost” (1 Timothy 1:15). The “foremost” of this saying applies to all, if only we’re willing to admit it. I can certainly share how easily it applied to me recently. I’m not afraid to tell you. I just preached a few weeks ago that repentance without confession is still sin in hiding.

This is my repentance coming out into the open.

Essentially, I was scrolling through Facebook. I noticed a photo, someone’s selfie with a friend. It was just a simple photo. Both in its frame were smiling widely, clearly enjoying the moment together. But the one taking the photo had something in his teeth. It wasn’t overwhelmingly obvious. However, it was noticeable enough to me. And so, now, my confession.

My first instinct was to chuckle and say to myself, “You might want to check your teeth before posting selfies.” And that, friends, is how easy it was for me to fall short.

I suppose the only upside to the response is that I restrained the urge to post what I was thinking. I could’ve done it. I could’ve justified it, too, believing I’d be preserving them from further ridicule, maybe giving them a chance to swap the photo with something else. It would have been easy enough to wiggle into that perspective.

But then, I actually thought about it. I didn’t just react. I thought. And the more I did, the more I looked at the image. And the more I looked at the image, the more obvious something else became. These two people weren’t posting a dental advertisement. They were sharing a moment of joy between them. They captured an image of friendship. And while I was busy capturing the flaw, they were busy demonstrating something so much better.

This is my sin. Not yours. Still, the overarching realization that occurred sheds light on the times in which we live. We live in a culture that has nudged us toward noticing the wrong thing first. Social media rewards it. News cycles feed off of it. Someone makes a mistake, says a clumsy word, posts an imperfect photo, and instantly, the comments fill with negative criticism. Everyone becomes a certified inspector of someone else’s flaws or understanding. Everyone becomes an expert in pointing out what someone didn’t get right or should have done better.

I’ve said it a thousand times that this is one of the worst parts about writing for public consumption. There’s always someone waiting in the wings to take what was meant for good and convert it into something dreadful. They’re lurking there, not to correct or improve what I’ve said, but to tear it down—to tear me down. It is almost reflexive now. People see before they think. They condemn before they understand. They correct before considering whether the correction is actually even necessary.

And sometimes the thing they miss is the very thing that mattered most in the first place.

I think that’s just one more reason why the season of Lent is so necessary. It’s not only about penitent postures relative to sin and, ultimately, the grace of our Savior who took those sins into and upon Himself, to free us from their decaying bondage. It’s also about the promised recalibration born from that wonderful Gospel. Lent, compared to all other Church seasons, is one where the Lord gently exposes the habits of the heart we barely notice anymore. Unfortunately, it seems far too many seem disinterested in Lent, even as it’s perfect for a social media world. It reveals the small reflexes of pride, the quiet hunger to appear clever, the subtle impulse to correct others rather than rejoice with them.

Lent slows us down long enough to actually see through the lens of the Gospel in some incredibly practical ways. Relative to the photo I mentioned, and as I hinted at before, social media prompts us to be clever when maybe we should be quiet and think. It prompts us for praise when what would better suit us is humble and thoughtful restraint. The good in the photo was obvious when I did that—when I stopped looking for the flaw and remembered my own failings. Now, through that lens, it was better seen as two friends enjoying life together. It was a small, happy moment, entirely undeserving of the conflict and criticism and outrage that social media demands we iterate over every ridiculous little thing.

And the thing is, I left that moment feeling better. That’s because faith’s choice is always so much better. Faith knew the better response in that situation was not to point out the speck in the guy’s teeth. The better response was simply to smile and be glad that joy still exists. Indeed, that’s one of the quiet disciplines of Lent. It’s a season for learning to see again. It helps us to see our own hearts honestly. It helps us to look upon our neighbors with charity. It absolutely helps us to see the good gifts of God that we too easily overlook when we are busy inspecting imperfections.

That said, you and I both know that the world already has enough critics. What it needs more are people who can bring the joy of Christ’s wonderful love into the darkness. And so, we do. We do it strengthened by faith’s humble repentance. We recognize that we, like Saint Paul, are the foremost of sinners in need of grace. Through that penitent lens, the landscape of God’s grace—all the undeserving joys He provides day in and day out—becomes far more visible through this world’s fog than the things that might bring sorrow. That’s because the grace of God has a way of reordering our sight.

When the Gospel steadies the heart, the flaws that once seemed so urgent lose their power to dominate the moment. That’s what repentance does. It doesn’t simply make us feel sorry for sin. It teaches us to see rightly again. It reminds us that the greatest flaw in the picture was never the thing in the guy’s teeth. The greatest flaw was the pride in my own heart that was so ready to point out what was really no big deal at all.

And that is exactly why Saint Paul’s words remain so trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance. Christ came into the world to save sinners. Not just the most scandalous among us. But sinners like me. Sinners like you, too. It’s far too easy for any and all of us to drift toward small cruelties we might otherwise excuse as harmless. Yet, Christ came for those, too. Even better, He came to bear the sins we barely notice and the sins we cannot forget.

Let my failure, no matter how insignificant it might seem, be today’s reminder.

Not Recording… But Recording

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The following has been on my mind for some time. I’ve only just now felt the urge to parse my thoughts. Essentially, Jennifer and I were sitting together and watching a news report on the Nancy Guthrie case a few weeks ago when something relatively small (but actually not very small at all) slipped into the host’s conversation.

Nancy Guthrie’s Ring Doorbell footage was playing on the screen. The suspect was visible, moving about the Guthrie porch area, doing what he could to cover the camera’s lens and then break into the home. At one point, Dan Bongino joined the broadcast. Bongino is the former Deputy Director of the FBI. The host and Bongino both commented on the FBI’s impressive technological capacity, how the Bureau likely had the tools to use the video’s contents to identify and track down the suspect, even though his face was covered by a ski mask.

But then came the statement that bothered me.

The show’s host mentioned that, even though the Ring Doorbell camera was turned off and not recording, the FBI was able to obtain the footage we were watching at that very moment, which was, in fact, stored at Google. Nothing was added to the comment. There was no explanation. No clarification. The conversation simply moved on.

I immediately turned to Jennifer and said, “Did you hear that? The camera wasn’t recording, but somehow the FBI was able to acquire recorded footage from Google’s servers.”

That detail, while it seemed to matter very little to the host or Bongino, has not left me. We are told our devices are dormant until activated. We have a Google Home device that sits quietly on a cabinet near our dining area. It’s not supposed to listen unless prompted with what’s called a “wake word,” and it’s not supposed to record until that wake word is used and the command to record is given. It’s certainly not supposed to store audio without our consent. Still, notice the logic. To hear a “wake word,” it has to be listening—always.

And so, the FBI obtained uninterrupted video footage from a Google device that wasn’t awake.

How many times has the Thoma family joked about this sort of thing? More than I can count. It’s become something of a running gag in our house. For example, if the kids are horsing around, poking fun at each other, mock-threatening in that exaggerated, theatrical way siblings do, someone might laugh and say, “I’m gonna murder you.” They all laugh. And yet, almost instantly, one of them will add, “In Minecraft.”

It’s reflexive now. The joke, of course, is that our Google device is always listening. So, if an algorithm somewhere flags the word murder, we quickly clarify that no actual murder is about to take place, but rather someone is going to get revenge in the blocky video game universe of Minecraft. The kids laugh, but they also qualify. They tease, but they also amend the record. And that’s the curious part for me. Again, we’ve been assured the device isn’t listening. And yet, here we are, instinctively adding digital disclaimers at dinner, as though an invisible guest might be taking notes.

But we have good reason to believe it’s happening. Maybe you’ve had the same experiences we’ve had. There’ve been times when we were discussing something obscure during dinner or while sitting around the corner on the couch—talking about something oddly specific—and moments later, we discovered advertisements or suggested articles or videos related to that very topic appearing in our feeds. No one looked anything up on the internet during the original discussion. No one shared a video link by text. We simply spoke. Then, suddenly, strangely, there was the topic of our discussion in digital form on all our phones.

We laugh and say, “Big Brother’s listening.” Maybe he is.

This also has me wondering out loud that if a Ring camera can be “not recording” and yet still have retrievable footage stored somewhere, what exactly does “not recording” mean? Technology companies use careful language. My guess is that “recording” may not mean what ordinary people think it means. In other words, maybe it means something other than the typical layman’s understanding of “on” and “off.” Whatever the definition might be, the former Deputy Director of the FBI just told me that federal investigators can, in fact, access recordings from a device that’s not recording. And they can use it against you.

I suppose for me, the question in that moment became something more like, “What’s the price I’m willing to pay for convenience—or personal safety?” I like the fact that we have cameras around the outside of our home. Writing for public consumption has proven the cameras necessary. But I also like the convenience of seeing that a package was delivered while I’m away. I like being able to adjust the thermostat from an app. I like calling out into the thin air, “Hey, Google, what’s the weather going to be like today?” even though I live in Michigan and I can pretty much guarantee it’s going to be cold.

But for all the things I might appreciate about technology, convenience and personal safety are rarely free, especially in the modern home. The modern home hums with interactive devices. I was at Home Depot a week or so ago and passed by a refrigerator with an interactive screen bigger than my desktop computer’s two monitors combined. And so, I suppose the question changes a little. I should probably be asking whether we understand the scope of what we’ve invited into our homes.

Having said all this, I’m not sure where to go next. Although I suppose Lent is an appropriate season for asking these kinds of questions, especially that last one.

Lent is a season of examination. The examination most certainly could reach into our digital habits. But in the end, its reach isn’t technological. It’s spiritual. Lent is in place to help us slow down. We quiet the world’s noise. We take inventory. We ask what has quietly crept into the house of our hearts and what’s humming in the background of our souls.

Sure, we worry about devices that are always listening. We joke about invisible listeners, and we clarify our ribbing jokes with “in Minecraft,” just in case. But God’s Word reminds us that there is, in fact, One who truly hears every word and knows everything about us. Read Psalm 139 if you don’t believe me. The first twelve verses will tell you everything you need to know:

“O Lord, you have searched me and known me! You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar. You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways. Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it altogether. You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high; I cannot attain it. Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there! If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me. If I say, ‘Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light about me be night,’ even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is bright as the day, for darkness is as light with you” (vv. 1-12).

What the Psalmist declared could be either terrifying or comforting. It’s terrifying if God is merely a cosmic surveillance system waiting to use our words against us—to capture us in wrongdoing and bring swift judgment. On the other hand, the Psalmist’s words are comforting if the One who hears and sees is also the One who went to the cross for every intentional or unintentional crime of thought, word, and deed we’ve ever committed (Matthew 12:36). In other words, the difference is the cross.

And that’s where Lent is taking us—to Good Friday’s holy massacre.

This world is an uneasy one. The assumption is that we’re being watched, not only by corporations and governments, but by sin, death, and the devil, forces far more formidable than the FBI. And yet, in the midst of these things, the Holy Spirit calls us by the Gospel to remember that we are seen fully by God—and loved and cared for still. The Lord who knows what is whispered in our dining rooms is the same Lord who bore our sin in His body on the cross. He does not need devices or algorithms to track us down. He certainly didn’t look upon His world with His first inclination being that it would only end in eternal imprisonment. His first response was love. His first response was rescue. His first response was to act. And so, He reached into this world personally. Through the person and work of Jesus Christ, God came down Himself.

Perhaps that’s the best direction to go with all of this. We fear unseen listeners in plastic devices sitting on shelves in our living spaces. And yet, the One who truly sees and hears us—the One who knows the worst that we are—was already there all along. Even better, He took upon Himself human flesh and joined us at the table. He wasn’t invisible. He was seen. He showed us just how much He cares. And now, through faith in His sacrifice—inevitably demonstrated through repentance, faith, and the amending of the sinful life—the verdict is declared to those who believe: Whatever you’ve done, it isn’t enough to condemn you. You are forgiven. And this happened in reality, not in Minecraft.

An Unforgettable Moment—State of the Union 2026

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Perhaps you had a chance to watch or listen to President Trump’s State of the Union speech last Tuesday. I didn’t watch the whole thing. I’d only just gotten home before it started, and the day had already been a long and exhausting one. Still, I watched until about 10:25 PM—and that was plenty.

Political speeches, especially Trump speeches, are rarely remembered for their eloquence, even when they’re chock full of accomplishments, policy prescriptions, and legislative ambitions. That said, I can’t think of another president I’ve enjoyed listening to more than Donald J. Trump. He can be quite funny. And not to mention, he’s fearless. He steers into things that few before him have been willing to offer even the slightest glance. I should add that when my family and I met him in person, on my daughter Evelyn’s birthday, no less, he was the kindest and most genuine politician I’d ever met. He already knew it was her birthday before we walked in, and even as the Secret Service reminded us before entering that the visit would be quick—and not to touch him—he saw us enter and reached out to us, even hugging Evelyn. He took time with us, asking us questions. He shook my hand and described the pastoral office with great respect. He didn’t have to do any of those things. But he did. That’s because he’s that kind of person.

“Still, how can you admire this crass man? And you call yourself a Christian pastor!”

My first reaction to statements like that is to say I’m friends with lots of folks the perfect humans among us might be inclined to call imperfect. My second thought is to say, be careful not to fall into what has become a rather tired pitfall. I did not choose Donald Trump to be my pastor. I voted for him to be my president, and God’s Word draws a clear distinction between the roles of civil authority and spiritual shepherds. As I’ve noted on countless occasions, if I were ever on trial for murder, I’d want the best lawyer defending me, not the most pious Christian. Saint Paul teaches that governing authorities are instituted by God to “bear the sword” and to punish wrongdoing and promote civil order—a function of justice, not pastoral care (Romans 13:1-4). By contrast, 1 Peter 5:2-3 and Ephesians 4:11-12 describe pastors as shepherds who oversee souls, teach sound doctrine, and equip the saints for ministry. And of course, Jesus says, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s” (Matthew 22:21). When He did this, at a minimum, He affirmed distinct spheres of responsibility. Both are established and ordained by God, and so, in that sense, they’re not absolutely divided. They’re designed to cooperate. Nevertheless, the plain structure is that civil leaders are accountable for governance and public order, while pastors are accountable for spiritual oversight. The offices are different by divine design.

But now, before I wander too far from what I intended to say, regardless of the politician giving any particular speech, most of what anyone says tends to fade almost immediately into the churn of news cycles and partisan rebuttals. What sticks are the moments—scripted or unscripted—that cut through the usual political theater, giving way to actual revelation. There was one particular moment during Tuesday’s address that stood apart for me. It proved Trump’s prowess. And for the hundreds of millions around the world watching the speech, it pared away any obscurities, leaving only the unmistakable mineral differences between two very different ideological positions.

When the president asked members of Congress to stand if they believed the primary responsibility of government is to protect American citizens before illegal aliens, the chamber responded immediately. A very simple question elicited a whole-body posture, a “yes” or “no” response that couldn’t be hidden.

Republicans rose instantly at the question, their applause swelling into a prolonged ovation that lasted several minutes. Across the aisle to their left, Democrats remained seated. Some scowled. A few shouted. Others mocked or gestured dismissively as the applause continued around them. The contrast couldn’t have been sharper. I turned to Jennifer and said, “There you have it. There’s no hiding from that. That’ll be remembered.”

Standing in support or sitting in protest during the State of the Union speech is normal. Trump used that practice, ultimately handing control of the rostrum over to the whole room, inviting everyone to state their most fundamental ideology concerning government. Who is it principally for? And the whole room answered. At that moment, the division was no longer theoretical. It wasn’t buried beneath news reporters asking the same question, only to receive rambling responses designed to avoid it entirely, lest the one being questioned offend the extremists in their party. Stand if you think the American government is in place to serve Americans before illegal aliens. Sit if you don’t.

The Republicans stood. The Democrats remained seated.

In the end, that was an important moment, if only because, as I said, almost any disagreement, whether it’s political, theological, financial, or whatever, is quite often softened by language designed to obscure fundamental differences. Competing parties frequently claim identical ends while disputing only means. Relative to what’s happening in our country right now, the rule of law, compassion, justice, and fairness are words claimed by pretty much everyone. But the varying sides understand those words differently. That all disappeared when Trump put the stand-or-sit challenge before the chamber. He cut straight through to the heart of the definitions in a way that the disagreement could no longer be about strategy or implementation. It was about first principles—who the American government is actually established to serve.

This exposed the deeper moral framework. For one side, prioritizing citizens represents the foundational duty of national sovereignty, which is one of the most basic justifications for the existence of the state itself. The other side openly refused to endorse this premise. And now, the differing postures formed an image that’s not going to fade from America’s memory anytime soon. Americans witnessed the divide. This time it had handles. It was no longer hidden behind nuance. It no longer rested comfortably behind mere policy preferences, as if both Republicans and Democrats want the same things, they’re just using different pathways to get there. Nope. The divide stems from fundamentally different understandings of the government’s moral priorities.

The whole country saw this ideological landscape mapped in real time.

In the end, like every other speech that’s ever been given, this one will be mostly analyzed for its claims and proposals. I don’t know about you, but on my part, I usually forget what the talking heads eventually end up scrutinizing. What I don’t forget are the images—the memorable moments I can visualize. I was only sixteen years old, but I can still remember watching the exchange between Lloyd Bentsen and Dan Quayle when, after Quayle compared himself to JFK, Bentsen retorted something like, “Senator, I served with Jack Kennedy, I knew Jack Kennedy. Senator, you are no Jack Kennedy.” I can safely say I knew very little about either candidate at the time. But it was a moment, for sure. And combined with the ruckus that followed, that moment defined the entire memory. Everything else has since faded.

The same kind of moment happened on Tuesday night. Years from now, few will remember the statistics cited or the priorities outlined. But many will remember that chamber—half standing, half seated—answering a relatively simple challenge without words, and in doing so revealing something far more enduring than differing points of view. It revealed, plainly and permanently, what each side believes the United States government exists to do—and whom its elected officials are in place to serve. I sense that many saw this clearly, especially folks who tend to exist in the middle on so many important issues, and now that they have, it’ll be really hard for the usual suspects to pretend they didn’t see it.