Will an iPhone cost $2,300?

The sweeping tariffs imposed by the Trump administration this week continue to make global headlines. For example, China has now responded by imposing a 34 percent tariff on imports of all US products starting April 10.

What does all of this mean for Americans? One answer comes from Reuters, reporting that consumer goods like iPhones could be hardest hit, with increases of 30 percent to 40 percent if the company passes the cost to consumers.

Since most iPhones are still made in China, which was hit with a 54 percent tariff, an iPhone 16 Pro Max, which currently retails at $1,599, could cost nearly $2,300.

I would not pretend to be an economist, much less a fortune teller. It’s far too soon to know the ultimate impact of the tariffs on the global economy and our personal finances. But these are without question uncertain and unsettling times. Even without the tariffs and the stock market reactions that have ensued, we could rehearse the issues that trouble us daily, from China and Taiwan to Israel and Hamas to Russia and Ukraine to political polarization at home.

Thomas Paine said of the American Revolutionary War, “These are the times that try men’s souls.” We could not begin to compare our challenges to theirs, of course. However, I have learned over many years of pastoral experience that each person’s crisis is unique to them. “Minor surgery is what the other person has,” as the saying goes.

Wherever you find yourself today, you need courage to face your challenges. So do I.

“Christians Are Conspiracy Theorists”

Brad East teaches theology at Abilene Christian University. His recent Christianity Today article, “Christians Are Conspiracy Theorists,” caught my eye.

He begins by describing a new group your friend has joined. It is “led by a mysterious figure whom no one has seen for years,” though “group members insist he’s still alive.” Your friend encourages you to join his group:

Start attending meetings. Rescind your acquiescence to the status quo. Swear a new allegiance. Submit to mysterious rituals. And once you do—you now notice a look in your friend’s eyes you’ve never seen before—you’ll have access to a type of knowledge and power others lack. You’ll never see things the same way again; you’ll even, in a way, be involved in saving the world.

As East notes, this is what it means to become a Christian, as seen through the eyes of those who do not yet share our faith.

In today’s Daily Article, Dr. Ryan Denison makes the same point a bit differently:

As Christians, we are asking the lost to bet their eternity on the idea that Jesus is God, that he came and died for their sins, and that he has been raised back to life again. Moreover, we’re also asking them to make a personal relationship with him the bedrock upon which every part of their lives is built. Every hope and dream is to become secondary to following his will.

Then he notes: “That’s a lot to take on faith, and the dependability of the messenger will go a long way in determining just how tough it is to believe.”

Ryan is referring to Christians who share the gospel with unbelievers, of course. I would take his excellent point one step further, noting that the “dependability of the message” is the foundation upon which you and I stand in choosing to believe what we believe and then sharing it with the world.

Why I doubted my salvation

For many months after I became a Christian at the age of fifteen, I struggled to find assurance in my salvation. When I prayed a salvation prayer, I felt no emotions at all. Nothing changed in a discernable way in my life. I had not been committing heinous sins that I now had to stop. You would not have seen any significant alteration in my life other than church attendance.

When others shared their stories, by contrast, they often described feeling a “weight lifted off their shoulders” or similar emotions. Many cried when they trusted in Christ. Many saw dramatic differences in their daily lives. Since none of that was true for me, I was deeply worried that I had not genuinely been saved.

I spoke with my pastor a few times about this, but he assured me that I had in fact done all that the Bible requires by asking Jesus to forgive my sins and become my Lord. Over the months, I began to realize that the Bible nowhere describes how it feels to become a Christian. Our feelings are the caboose at the end of the train rather than the engine driving it.

As time went by, I came to understand that it took the same faith to believe I am a Christian as it did to become one. I still, to this day, have not seen God in a visible way. I still have no incontrovertible proof that would convince all skeptics if I simply shared it.

I have discovered that a relationship with God, like all relationships, requires a commitment that transcends the evidence and becomes self-validating. For example, you could not prove that you should read this article until you read it. You would examine the evidence, to be sure—Am I a trustworthy writer? Has my previous work been worth the time invested in reading it? Do others vouch for me? 

But none of that is proof that this article is worth your time, even if others were. Any writer can have a bad day. You had to step beyond the evidence into a commitment that led to an experience.

It is the same with marriage—no one can prove they should be married until they are. It is the same with becoming parents, or taking a job, or choosing a school, or any other relationship.

And it is the same with Jesus—the more we trust him, the more we discover how trustworthy he truly is.

Two miraculous gifts of grace

The storms of tariffs and stock markets and geopolitics and personal challenges are coming again today. So take Jesus’ advice: Be a “wise man who built his house on the rock” (Matthew 7:24). Then, when the rains fall and the floods rise, and the winds blow and beat on your house, it will not fall “because it had been founded on the rock” (v. 25).

• Remember that God loves you because “God is love” (1 John 4:8). Consequently, there is nothing you can do to earn or forfeit his love for you. He loves you as much as he did when he sent his Son to the cross to die for you. All of God there is, is in this moment.
• Remember that your Father’s will is “good and acceptable and perfect” (Romans 12:2) and that he can only want your best today.
• Know that, if you have trusted in Christ as your Savior and Lord, his Spirit lives in you now as his temple (1 Corinthians 3:16) and wants to “guide you into all the truth” (John 16:13). If you seek his leading by submitting to him (Ephesians 5:18), reading his word, praying, and listening to his voice, he will “make straight your paths” (Proverbs 3:5–6).
• Now, whatever comes your way, know that “all things work together for good” as your Father redeems all he allows for his glory and your best (Romans 8:28).

I am not at all suggesting that such faith will always prevent our problems or make the fallen world less fallen. The rock upon which the wise man built his house did not prevent the storms from striking, but it did enable his house to stand.

You’ve probably heard the saying,

Sometimes God calms the storm, and sometimes he lets the storm rage and calms his child.

Both are miraculous gifts of grace. Your Father wants to give one of them to you today.

Are your hands open to his heart?