These eight peaceful morning prayers will steady your thoughts and renew your joy in Christ.

Are you bracing for the worst instead of believing in God’s best? Discover how to shift your focus from fear to faith and trust the One who can do more than you imagine.

Feeling defeated in various aspects of life? Discover powerful prayers and Bible verses designed to lift you up and remind you of your inherent worth and God's unwavering support. Reclaim your strength and find victory through faith with these encouraging words.

I found my 88-year-old mother reading her Bible. “I didn’t know Cain killed Abel,” she said. “I guess that’s why Abel never visits us.” This made me chuckle and yet grieved my heart at the same time. Three years ago, doctors diagnosed my mother with Alzheimer’s, the most common type of dementia. My father, who died last year, suffered from vascular dementia for many years. Dementia is a loss of cognitive ability severe enough to interfere with daily life. There are more than 100 types of dementia, with Alzheimer’s, vascular, Lewy body, and frontotemporal being the most common. Each comes with unique challenges. For example, my mother can become convinced she’s paraplegic when she walks just fine. In contrast, my dad honestly believed he could still safely drive to the grocery store, despite failing a driver’s test at the DMV and leveling a waist-high concrete mailbox with his minivan. Dementia can drive a caregiver either to exasperation or to the cross. It’s important to remember dementia is a physical disease that causes psychological symptoms. Dementia patients can’t always control their behavior. But for the more than 11 million U.S. adults caring for someone with dementia, it can be hard to remember that when a parent lashes out, empties every kitchen cabinet, or wanders outside at 3:00 a.m. It can be hard for me to remember, and I’ve spent my career in the medical field. Dementia can drive a caregiver either to exasperation or to the cross. When I confessed before the Lord my utter helplessness to care for my parents, he gave me the faith to know he was near and the strength to offer empathy to my folks (Rom. 8:26–27). Along the way, God kindly provided both the resources and knowledge I needed to care for them. Here are eight things to know as you care for a loved one with dementia. 1. Planning is crucial. An estimated 70 percent of people turning 65 will require nursing-home care at some point in their lives. Most of us live as though we know for certain that we and our loved ones will be in the remaining 30 percent. While it’s impossible to anticipate every need that will come with aging, we must have frank conversations with our loved ones. And in the face of a dementia diagnosis, time is of the essence. Consider these questions: What are your loved one’s expectations and desires for care? Are you willing and able to provide that? What steps do you need to take to ensure his or her care? 2. You’ll need the help of an attorney, not just a medical team. Putting measures in place to enable appropriate care often involves legal documentation. Obtaining a power of attorney (POA) for both financial and health care decisions is wise in many situations, but it’s essential when caring for someone with dementia. A POA is a legal document that appoints someone to manage your affairs if you become incapacitated, allowing them to act on your behalf if necessary. Having both documents for my parents allowed me to intervene when they made bad decisions due to dementia. 3. There are many false assumptions about financial resources for aging. My job as a nurse case manager often involves helping a family find placement for an aging loved one in a long-term care facility. When I ask them how they’ll pay for the care, families often respond with “We know there must be some agency that pays for this.” The reality is that Medicare doesn’t pay for long-term care, which can cost upward of $9,000 a month. Medicaid will pay for long-term care at selected facilities, with precise coverage depending on the state you live in. Even then, you must qualify financially, which can take five years. 4. Caring for a dementia patient requires patience and wisdom. Our normal assumptions about how to navigate conversations and disagreements often don’t apply when it comes to someone with dementia. For example, my mother asks us to buy her a cell phone every day. She can no longer operate one (even one made for seniors), but that makes no difference to her. I don’t give explanations as to why she can’t use a cell phone because laying out all the reasons gets us nowhere. She receives any disagreement from me as a threat, and that can make her anxious and even combative. In this situation, I’ve learned it’s more helpful to ask, “Is there someone we can call right now, Mom? We can use my phone.”  5. Reminders of reality can cause repeated grief. When doctors first diagnosed Mom with dementia, I told myself I’d never lie to her. Then my dad died. Mom had trouble remembering he was gone. If I reminded her that Dad was dead every time she forgot, she’d experience each of those reminders as if we were telling her for the first time. Instead, we’ve told her that Dad cannot be with us right now. When she demands to know where he is, we tell her he’s getting rehab. Though Scripture exhorts us to truthfulness, the example of the Hebrew midwives who deceived Pharaoh to protect newborn babies seems relevant here (Ex. 1:15–21). While each person must follow his or her conscience, in situations where telling the full truth to a dementia patient would cause unnecessary grief, a lie may be a form of compassionate protection.   6. Dementia care is a marathon, not a sprint. Alzheimer’s can last more than 10 years, depending on the patient’s overall health. Educate yourself about the disease to understand what’s ahead. John Dunlop’s book Finding Grace in the Face of Dementia provides an informative and compassionate look at this disease. Be Light Care Consulting offers seminars on dementia for a nominal fee. They can be viewed at your own pace in short snippets of time. As you care for a loved one, get help when you need it; if possible, it’s wise to divide responsibilities. For example, my brother provides day-to-day care for Mom, and I manage the endless phone calls and related paperwork about her care. Several times a year, I swap places with my brother so he can have a much-needed break. 7. Even as cognitive abilities decline, the capacity for knowing Christ may still exist. A dementia patient may forget, for example, that Cain killed Abel but remember old hymns right down to the fifth stanza. Don’t discount the importance of continuing to share the gospel with an unsaved loved one or of using Scripture and hymns to comfort a believer. God’s Word is powerful and effective regardless of our limitations. 8. God still uses dementia patients. When an aged friend, Marcy, passed away, her neighbor, Renee, asked me for a ride to the funeral. Imagine my shock when 89-year-old Renee told me about her recent conversion. God’s Word is powerful and effective regardless of our limitations. “It’s Marcy’s fault,” Renee explained. “Every day for months, she would come over and tell me how Jesus loved me and died for me. Marcy kept forgetting she had told me about Jesus the day before, and the day before that. You get the picture. After the umpteenth time hearing about it, I realized it must be true. God loved me and died to save my soul! I don’t think anyone but Marcy could help me understand.” For many of us, becoming incapacitated by dementia is one of our greatest fears. And caring for a loved one who has it is an incredibly difficult road. But I find comfort in knowing that nothing—dementia included—can separate us or our loved ones from God’s love (Rom. 8:35–36). As we care for those with dementia, may we be conduits of his love.

It’s not every day that a Christian-made, gospel-inspired film gets nominated for an Academy Award. Perhaps the last time it happened was Terrence Malick’s The Tree of Life in 2011. But this year, one of the five Oscar nominees for Best Animated Short Film is a gorgeous example of what faith-driven artistry can look like. It’s called Forevergreen, and the logline is simple: “An orphaned bear cub finds a home with a fatherly evergreen tree, until his hunger for trash leads him to danger.” Ironically, it’s a story that explores a “tree of life” in a literal and symbolic sense. The 13-minute film, directed by Nathan Engelhardt and Jeremy Spears, features a soundtrack by Josh Garrels and Isaac Wardell that’s every bit as beautiful as the stunning animation. But most beautiful of all is the story Forevergreen tells. It’s about a beneficent pine tree who sacrifices himself—literally bridging a chasm—to save a “prodigal bear” from his self-induced destruction. Watch the film on YouTube (or embedded below) for a limited time. You’ll see why the Academy honored it with a nomination. You’ll also see a concise, gorgeous meditation on gospel truth. I recently chatted with Engelhardt and Spears about the making of Forevergreen, how Christian artists tell stories, and what they think of AI’s disruption in the arts. How did you two end up teaming up creatively? Both of us have been in the animation film industry for roughly 20 years. We met 15 years ago at Disney Feature Animation, where we still currently work professionally together on films like Wreck-It Ralph, Frozen, Moana, Encanto, Big Hero 6, Zootopia, and more. As Christian guys, we both had a desire to use our gifts to tell a story that glorified God. We know anyone can glorify God in their vocation without making a film, but we felt a strong calling from God to use the talents he gave us in this unique way. Caption Where did the idea for Forevergreen originate? What catalyzed the process that got you to an award-winning final product? Forevergreen began as a shared desire to tell something meaningful about God’s grace and unconditional love toward sinners. Years earlier, Nathan had gone through a difficult season of spiritual darkness where past mistakes left him feeling unworthy of God’s love. During that time, Scripture—and a simple folktale called The Tale of Three Trees—reminded him that God can use broken and humbled things for his purposes. That message planted the seed of a story about undeserved grace and forgiveness. What began as a loose adaptation of that folktale gradually evolved into an original idea about a tree and a woodsman. Around that time, Nathan invited Jeremy to join him as a codirector so they could develop the story together. As a story artist, Jeremy was excited to find a way to best communicate his own difficult spiritual seasons and eventual faith in Christ through an animated film. Both of us were eager to stretch ourselves creatively and experience the full animation process by making a film from start to finish, in our free time. While researching and brainstorming, Jeremy came across an image that sparked a breakthrough: a massive fallen redwood spanning a deep ravine with a waterfall behind it. Instantly the symbolism became clear. The fallen tree could represent Christ-likeness in laying down his life to bridge the divide and rescue someone who could never cross on their own. Jeremy imagined the rescued character as a grumpy, undeserving bear—someone difficult to love yet still the recipient of sacrifice and grace. Instantly the symbolism became clear. The fallen tree could represent Christ-likeness in laying down his life to bridge the divide and rescue someone who could never cross on their own. What Jeremy didn’t realize was that something similar had already happened in Nathan’s life just days earlier. While explaining the gospel to a coworker, Nathan had drawn the classic Bible-tract illustration of a divide between God and man, with the cross forming a bridge between the two. So when Jeremy pitched the idea of a fallen tree bridging a canyon, we realized we had both independently drawn the same picture only days apart. In that moment, it felt unmistakable that God was guiding the story we were meant to tell. How would you summarize the emotional or spiritual effect you hope Forevergreen has on viewers? Our hope is that Forevergreen would inspire a sense of wonder about what life is about and the God who desires to have a relationship with us. Even in your darkest times of hopelessness, God so desired to have a relationship with you that he reached across an infinite chasm by sending his Son, Jesus Christ, to save you and provide hope for your life. Artist: Paul Felix On the website description, it mentions that Forevergreen features ‘never before seen animation techniques.’ Could you describe those new techniques? We set out to create a film with a tactile, handcrafted aesthetic to reinforce our characters’ relationship. It was important for the bear to appear as if he was carved from the tree, serving as an allegory to reflect man being made in the image of God. Our process combined the tactile charm of hand-carved wooden figures with the precision of computer graphics, capturing the warmth of stop-motion through fully 3D-generated frames that look uniquely crafted. To avoid the static or “rubbery” look of standard CG texture deformation, we needed surfaces that felt alive, changing subtly from frame to frame as if a unique wood carving were created for every pose of animation. Doing this by hand would have been far too time-intensive, especially for a volunteer passion project, so we needed a repeatable, scalable solution. One of our crew members, Rich Fallat, developed a texture batching process that automated “wobble” and imperfections across keyframes using a proprietary paint tool to generate texture variations automatically, as well as directionality and variation to avoid repetition so no two textures were the same. This workflow allowed us to achieve our envisioned wood-carved look while maintaining production efficiency. When did Josh Garrels and Isaac Wardell get involved on the music side? What did that collaboration look like? We are both fans of Josh’s work, particularly his eclectic style and evocative, moody vocals—perfect for a film set in nature. To ensure the music was integrated from the start, we chose not to use traditional “temp tracks” from other films. Instead, Josh and Isaac were involved early on, providing demos during the preliminary storyboarding phase of production. These early tracks significantly influenced the sequences and moods we aimed to convey. Our editor, Jeff Draheim, cut these demos into the storyboards, which allowed us to experience the emotional impact of the score alongside the visuals early in the process. In the final phases of the film, Josh and Isaac completed a final polish of the score, adding layers of instrumentation while maintaining the established animation timing. It was a wonderful process to witness. Artist: Seth Boyden I don’t think people realize how hard it is to make a standalone short film that feels complete and coherent and packs a thematic punch in a short narrative space. What makes a great short film? For other aspiring short filmmakers, what creative advice would you give? An acid test for us on whether a story is worthy of our time and attention is to ask the simple question “Does this story need to exist?” If the answer is yes, we know we are onto something and must pursue it. A great film leaves you with something to think about. It stirs your heart and changes something inside you. Our advice for aspiring filmmakers is to tell a story that is meaningful to you. Don’t let an idea just stay in your mind. Get it out into the real world by writing it down. Once it’s written down you can respond to it, and more importantly others can respond to it. You’ll never be able to show anyone your work if it stays in your mind. Artist: Jin Kim Christians seeking to communicate gospel ideas through art often struggle to do it in a way that achieves clarity without it feeling preachy. But you achieve that balance well in Forevergreen. What advice would you give Christian storytellers seeking to make culturally significant, excellent work that also comes from a distinctly Christian sensibility? With Forevergreen, we used characters the audience could connect with and ultimately see themselves in. We are this bear, and we know what that bag of chips represents. The reason this story connects with people so broadly is its universal relatability. It isn’t designed to be message-driven or targeted at a specific demographic; rather, the message is directed at everyone! We aim for films to be specific, have a point of view, and resonate with a wide audience. You want to tap into universal truths, which the Bible is full of. Romans 3:23 says, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Forevergreen is a relatable story because it’s a story about all of us. What are your thoughts on ‘Christian art’ vs. ‘art made as Christians’? Are they distinct categories? If so, which do you think Christians seeking careers in the arts should pursue? Speaking solely of visual art, both are valuable, although art made by Christians may have the potential to be more disarming. Jeremy has a side business where he makes wood carvings. He tries to make them with excellence because he’s inspired by his Creator, who made everything with excellence. Forevergreen is a relatable story because it’s a story about all of us. Even beyond our story being inspired by the gospel message, we think the act of making Forevergreen as artists can point to the Creator. A purposeful film is evidence of a purposeful filmmaker, just like creation is evidence of a purposeful Creator. The Bible says, “Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might” (Eccl. 9:10, NIV). Paul reiterates this point in 1 Corinthians 10:31 (NIV): “So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” Artist: Paul Felix I noticed a logo that says ‘human-made’ at the bottom of the film’s website. As artists highly skilled in your craft, what are your thoughts, fears, or worries about AI-made art? How should artists be thinking about the value of human-crafted stories and visual storytelling in a world where AI could one day make quality films in five seconds? AI is just a tool. It has no POV, no heart, and no soul by definition. This is what separates us from the machine. Stories are innately human. AI can be helpful with repetitive tasks, but it should never remove the human voice or hand of the artists. If saving time and effort became the goal of every artist, we should not be surprised to find some pretty shallow stories in the future. Anything that’s not worth the effort to make is probably not worth anyone’s time. That’s why it’s called a work of art or a labor of love. There’s a wonderful quote from Chariots of Fire that says, “I believe God made me for a purpose, but he also made me fast. And when I run, I feel his pleasure.” Why would you deprive yourself of that God-given pleasure of process in exchange for the easy button of efficiency—especially if the end result is more soulless? We must not swing the pendulum too far and fear AI or misuse AI. But we should take a measured approach and use our God-given wisdom to know when we have relinquished the part that makes creating art a human, life-giving endeavor. Caption

Benjamin Gladd and Nancy Guthrie outline principles for making sound biblical connections, tracing themes in the text, and avoiding common pitfalls of biblical interpretation. The New Testament includes 350 direct quotations from the Old, along with 6,000–8,000 Old Testament allusions. Deep Bible study and the proper use of cross-references will help us rightly interpret both Testaments in light of each other and better understand how all the Scriptures together point to Christ. In This Episode 00:00 – Understanding biblical theology and its importance 02:52 – Defining quotations and allusions 09:15 – Examples of allusions in the New Testament 14:06 – Tracing biblical themes 30:50 – Connecting the Old Testament to Christ 42:54 – Strategies for making organic connections 43:11 – The role of biblical theology in teaching and preaching Related Resource: CSB Connecting Scripture New Testament edited by G. K. Beale and Benjamin Gladd SIGN UP for one of our newsletters to stay informed about TGC’s latest resources. Help The Gospel Coalition renew and unify the contemporary church in the ancient gospel: Give today. Don’t miss an episode of The Gospel Coalition Podcast: Apple Podcasts Spotify YouTube

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ABC News, already the worst among the Elitist Media broadcast network evening newscasts, may have plumbed a new low. A story subject’s murderous, transgender father was hit with Disney pixie dust and spun into the more anodyne “former family member.” Watch the report in its entirety, as aired on ABC World News Tonight on Thursday, March 12th, 2026: WATCH: @ABCWorldNews retcons the Rhode Island triple-murdering transgender as the "former family member" of the brave kid who willed his team into the state championship. It was, in fact, his deranged father. pic.twitter.com/8RSJIkYxk2 — Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) March 13, 2026 DAVID MUIR: Finally tonight, America Strong. The goal of a lifetime for a high school hockey hero. Here's Will Reeve. WILL REEVE: Tonight in Providence, Rhode Island: the high school hockey player, game-winning goal in double overtime, and his triumph after unimaginable tragedy. Blackstone Valley School senior Colin Dorgan, number 17. Nearly a month ago, Colin’s mother, brother and grandfather were killed at his hockey game- targeted by a former family member. His team, his community rallying behind Colin. And now, three weeks later, they’re back on the ice. Their jerseys stitched with a heart with the initials of the victims. It's double overtime in their Division II state semifinal game. And here’s Colin, all alone. ANNOUNCER: It's Dorgan! Oh, my goodness! Colin Dorgan! A storybook ending to this semifinal! BVS wins it in double overtime! REEVE: His school, behind the glass, on their feet cheering for him. The announcers recognizing the moment. ANNOUNCER: Nothing will ever change what happened to that young man. But there’s a moment for him that he will never forget. REEVE: Afterward, Colin calling it the greatest moment of his life, so soon after the worst. Tonight Colin Dorgan sending his team to the state championship game, saying he could feel the love from every person out there in the arena. MUIR: We are all cheering you on, Colin, and good luck. I’m David Muir. I’ll see you back here tomorrow. Good night. It isn’t often that we profile an end-of-newscast human interest feelgood story for some sort of over-the-top bias. Those items are usually about lost pets reunited with their families, or a profile in human resilience. And, in all fairness, this story is about that, too. This story confirms what America learned over the Winter Olympics- that hockey guys appear to be made of sterner stuff.  ABC mars this beautiful story by trying to sweep the kid’s father under the rug. “Former family member” is a bizarre sophistry because it leads one to question, exactly, when he became “former.” Was it when he decided to pretend to be a woman, or when he killed himself after eliminating other members of his family?  ABC was just as awful when the story first broke. Correspondent Stephanie Ramos waited until the end of her report to say that the kid’s father also went by a female name, as if we were talking about a drag queen stage name. Ultimately, what we have here is a powerful story of human resilience in the face of unspeakable tragedy. This story will endure, notwithstanding ABC’s pathological need to adhere to a trans agenda.  

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