There’s an irony at the heart of modern Western life. We have more freedom, wealth, opportunities, and technology than any previous generation, yet many feel more anxious and restless than ever. We chase success, but it never feels like we can get enough of it. We pursue happiness, but it always seems to disappear like a vapor as soon as we grasp it. We strive to craft our identities, but the pressure to define ourselves is exhausting. This isn’t just a problem for our late-modern culture—it’s in the church too. Christians aren’t immune to the cultural scripts shaping the world around us. We may profess faith in Christ, but we often live by the same cultural stories as everyone else: that our productivity measures our worth, that the good life is found in self-definition and self-expression, and that our struggles with identity and purpose can be solved with the right career, relationship, or life upgrade. But what if the real problem isn’t our circumstances? What if it’s the story we’re living in? We live within stories that shape how we see the world and make sense of our lives. These cultural narratives often go unnoticed, yet they influence us. Through Scripture, we can uncover these hidden scripts, confront their distortions, and learn to live the gospel way. How Cultural Narratives Form Us Every culture has a catechism. It may not be printed in a book or recited at a sporting event, political speech, or business dinner. But it still teaches and shapes us. A catechism is a set of guiding truths, sometimes structured as questions and answers with supporting commentary and explanations. Christians aren’t immune to the cultural scripts shaping the world around us. We’re being catechized daily—not just in the local church but through advertising, social media, entertainment, and the unspoken assumptions of our time. Our experience of this isn’t so much that the culture around us tells us what to think as that it tells us who to be. And if we don’t recognize the scripts we’re following, we’ll live by them without questioning their validity. Consider these recent trends in our cultural moment. Take hustle culture. Perhaps the dominant cultural script, hustle culture insists that your worth is tied to your productivity, that meaning is found in work, and that success is the highest good. “Rise and grind” isn’t just a slogan; it’s a worldview. Burnout has become a badge of honor, proving you’re pushing hard enough. But many are exhausted and empty beneath the bravado of endless striving. Hustle culture promises significance and delivers anxiety. Or consider cancel culture. Today, righteousness is no longer about repentance and redemption but about ideological purity. Those who fail to conform to the trending cultural view are cast out, often without any path to restoration. Cancel culture echoes a deep human longing for justice, but it’s justice without grace. Unlike the gospel, cancelation offers a person no way to be made whole again. Even the “tradwife” movement, a growing trend on social media that glorifies traditional gender roles as a return to a purer, simpler past, reveals our longing for stability and identity. In reaction to the breakdown of modern gender roles, some women are embracing domestic life as a form of self-expression, even as a rebellion against feminism’s influence. Scripture upholds these roles as good gifts (Titus 2:3–5; Prov. 31). Still, the modern tradwife trend is less about submitting to and worshiping Christ and more about curating an aesthetic identity. Scripture and the Better Story Over the past year, my work on developing a catechism has been a journey into these kinds of unseen stories. I’ve found that these cultural narratives can only be unmasked when we hold them to the light of Scripture. God’s Word doesn’t just tell us what to think; it tells us who and whose we are, revealing the better story that answers our deep heart questions. Take happiness. The world tells us happiness is something we must chase at all costs and that it comes from achievement, possessions, or self-fulfillment. But Scripture offers a radically different vision. Psalm 1 describes a truly blessed person not as someone endlessly striving but as one who delights in the Lord’s instruction and meditates on it (v. 2). Jesus makes the same point when he reveals that he aims at giving joy to his people (John 15:11). Happiness isn’t something we manufacture—it’s a by-product of abiding in God. Or take freedom. The world’s vision of freedom is freedom from—no limits, no obligations, no constraints. But Jesus says that it is acknowledging and submitting to Truth that leads to freedom (8:32). True freedom isn’t found in self-rule but in surrender to the One who made us. Just as a fish is free only when it remains in water, we’re most free when we live within God’s design. God’s Word doesn’t just tell us what to think; it tells us who and whose we are. Even our search for identity finds its answer in Scripture. In a world that tells us to define ourselves—to build an identity through work, relationships, or lifestyle choices—the gospel offers us something radically different: “For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God” (Col. 3:3). The pressure to self-create vanishes when we realize our identity isn’t something we achieve but something we receive. Live in the Better Story If cultural narratives shape us unnoticed, then we must become people who intentionally immerse ourselves in Scripture’s better story. The gospel isn’t just an argument against falsehood—it’s an invitation to something deeper, more authentic, and more satisfying. So here’s the challenge: What stories are shaping you? What narratives have you unknowingly absorbed? Where has the culture discipled you more than Christ has? This week, take five minutes at the end of each day to examine a message you’ve received—through media, work, or a casual conversation with a friend. Hold it up to Scripture. Does it align with the gospel or subtly lead you in ways you’ve never questioned? We don’t have to be swept along by the scripts of our age. We can recognize them, unmask them, and replace them with the truth of Christ. The world will keep offering us stories, but only one will truly satisfy. The gospel doesn’t just counter false stories; it replaces them with a better one. A story in which joy is not found in self-fulfillment but in knowing God. A story in which freedom is not limitless autonomy but belonging to Christ. A story in which our worth is not self-made but secured in our Creator’s love. What story will you live in?