This week, Conner breaks down the sudden cancellation of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, the theories surrounding the move, and what it means for the future of late-night TV. Then Micah explores the latest controversies surrounding Israel—what’s really happening, and how should Christians think biblically about the conflict and the nation of Israel?
Plus some thoughts on the viral Coldplay concert saga, Ozzy Osbourne, movie stars, and SO much more. It’s a fast-moving episode with thoughtful insight and a steady reminder: even in the chaos, we’re called to think clearly and live faithfully.
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Topics
- (00:56): Stephen Colbert’s cancellation
- (01:41): Media lawsuits and settlements
- (06:08): Financial troubles in late night
- (10:26): The future of late night TV
- (15:55): The theology of Israel
- (25:03): Theological perspectives on Israel and the church
- (27:37): Praying for peace and rejecting antisemitism
- (30:41): Fun and games: Movie stars still matter
- (34:55): Check-in: Recent news and updates across culture
Resources
- Mailbag: [email protected]
- Culture Brief Instagram
- Sign-up for Denison Forum’s daily newsletter: DenisonForum.org/subscribe
Links mentioned in this episode:
- Stephen Colbert responds to cancellation of The Late Show
- Is the conflict in Israel a sign of the end times?
- Are the Jews still God’s chosen people?
- The Coldplay Couple Did Something Bad. The Internet Did Something Worse.
Other articles on this week’s top headlines:
- Morning Brew: Colbert’s show got canceled and TV may never be the same
- Politico: Trump’s Epstein evolution
- Monday, July 21, 2025 – The Flyover
- Why Colbert got canceled – by Nate Silver
- Canceling ‘The Late Show’ Is Bad News for Late-Night TV, not Stephen Colbert – The New York Times
- All-star roster of comedians show solidarity with Stephen Colbert in first ‘Late Show’ after cancellation | CNN Business
- CNN Newsletter: Reliable Sources with Brian Stelter
- “He’s a madman”: Trump’s team frets about Netanyahu after Syria strikes
- Financial Times: Mike Johnson shuts US House early to avoid Jeffrey Epstein vote
About Conner Jones
Conner Jones is the Director of Performance Marketing at Denison Ministries and Co-Hosts Denison Forum’s “Culture Brief” podcast. He graduated from Dallas Baptist University in 2019 with a degree in Business Management. Conner passionately follows politics, sports, pop-culture, entertainment, and current events. He enjoys fishing, movie-going, and traveling the world with his wife and son.
About Micah Tomasella
Micah Tomasella is the Senior Advancement Officer at Denison Ministries and co-hosts Denison Forum’s “Culture Brief” podcast. A graduate of Dallas Baptist University, Micah is married to Emily, and together they are the proud parents of two daughters. With an extensive background in nonprofit work, finance, and real estate, Micah also brings experience from his years in pastoral church ministry.
About Denison Forum
Denison Forum exists to thoughtfully engage the issues of the day from a biblical perspective through The Daily Article email newsletter and podcast, The Denison Forum Podcast, as well as many books and additional resources.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
NOTE: This transcript was AI-generated and has not been fully edited.
Conner Jones: [00:00:00] Hi, I’m Conner Jones.
Micah Tomasella: I’m Micah Tomasella,
Conner Jones: and this is Culture Brief, a Denison Forum podcast. We are navigating the constant stream of top stories and news, politics, sports, pop culture, all the headlines you’re seeing this week, we’re talking about them and we’re doing it all from a Christian perspective.
Micah, we got a loaded show. What are we gonna be talking about today?
Micah Tomasella: You’re right Conner. We’re talking about all the things today. We’re talking Stephen Colbert. Is it The Death of Late Night tv? We’re talking the theology of Israel and all the different opinions that can swirl around and the different theological viewpoints surrounding Israel, the astronomer, CEO, fallout, Ozzy Osborne, Scotty Scheffler, and a whole lot more.
So let’s jump into the brief. The brief.
Conner Jones: Okay. You said it, Micah. Is this the end of late night? Is late night television dying? This might have been it. Yes. Stephen Colbert’s show, the Late Show with Stephen Colbert [00:01:00] is canceled now. He will be on the air until May, but CBS par company. May. May of next year.
May of next year. Yeah. He’s, I mean, oh wow. Okay. I mean, he’s contracted through the end of this season. And so he’s, he’s got 10 more months on air and he’s, he’s made that very clear, he is not, he’s not going down without a fight essentially. You know, there’s, there’s a lot of opinions out there about canceling Colbert.
Obviously a lot of think pieces over the weekend as people were like, it was this a political move, was this because he’s liberal and CBS wants to cow tow to Trump, all of that? Or is this just a grander thing with the basically death of late night tv? Is it a bad business model nowadays? Kinda wanna hit on all of that and give some context here.
And I want to jump all the way back. To December of 2024. Not that long ago, but it feels like a lifetime ago. In this 2025 environment, I’m going back to a BC news, paying out a settlement with Donald J. Trump for $15 million. This was before he was president of the second term I guess, but they were still paid out the settlement that was gonna go to his presidential library fund.
As we know, presidents get a [00:02:00] museum library. Situation after they’re done with their presidency and they, they paid out $15 million to help fund that. That’s because back in 2024 Spring, George Stephanopoulos, one of their anchors was interviewing house representative Nancy Mac. She’s a Republican, and he asked her why she continue to support Trump after he was found, quote, liable for rape in a 2023 civil case in Manhattan.
But. The jury in that case, that civil case that he referenced did not find Trump liable for rape. They found him liable for sexual abuse, which is not great, but it is different. And so Trump was able to sue. He was able to say I was misrepresented and liable. Essentially a liable case there. I will say I was sort, was researching this legal experts.
You know, they believe that A, B, C might’ve had a big case here. They could’ve had, they done a whole drawn out legal case and everything actually won. But that would’ve required Disney’s the, the A, b, C parent company to essentially lay out some proprietary information and stephanopoulos to reveal some private texts.
They didn’t [00:03:00] wanna do that, so they paid the settlement. They got blasted for it. ’cause people were like, you are basically doing what we’ve been worried about this whole time. The media is going to bow down to Trump as president and you guys are supposed to keep him in check anyways. CBS is now in the same boat because back in October, they interviewed Vice President Harris when she was running for president at the time, and Trump claimed that they edited a 60 minutes interview.
I think a lot of people know about that. They’ve seen the clips, everything, maybe some of the quick edits that happened there, and he claimed it hurt his electoral chances, right? So he sued them. People were wondering, is Paramount gonna take this to fight? Are they going to pay a settlement like Disney did?
They did in fact pay a settlement. This came out July 2nd, just a few weeks ago. They also, at a similar rate, $16 million to the library fund for Trump to settle this whole thing. Now, I will say he, he sued for $20 billion, so 16 million’s. Kind of like very small in the grand scheme of things. Wow. But it’s also big symbolically, like here’s another media company [00:04:00] forking out money to basically appease Trump, as the detractors would say.
Even some CBS news producers have quit in recent months because they claim that they’re being told to. Change their editing style, change their news stories, all of that, especially on 60 Minutes, which is a big, heavy hit piece type of show. And you know, they’re saying our superiors made us do this stuff to be friendly, to Trump, to get on his good side.
Okay, but why? That’s the question right? This is because Paramount is in financial trouble and they have been trying to secure a deal to merge with a company called Skydance Media for the last year or so, and they need the FCC, which is the Federal Commission that oversees television, broadcast rights, and is under the wing of Trump.
They need their approval, and so a lot of people are saying Paramount paid the settlement to get on Trump’s good graces so that he will approve. This merger and it’s basically saved the company and more so than that, in some people’s eyes, give the big payday to the Redstone family that owns Paramount currently as well as a bunch of the executives and everything helps keep the company alive, but also [00:05:00] maybe, you know, some nest eggs are in there for certain individuals.
Okay, now mix all that in with Stephen Colbert because Colbert has been an outspoken critic of Trump. For years really. But then even last week, he railed against his own company’s settlement with Trump, the one I just mentioned and called it a big fat bribe. That was just last week. And then on Friday they were like canceled.
So yeah, of course this is falling across party lines. Democrats are like, Hey man, this was not cool. Senators Elizabeth Warren and Adam Schiff warned that this cancellation could threaten press freedom’s. Bernie Sanders tweeted Stephen Colbert, I wish I could do his voice. I can’t, but I would if I could.
Don’t even try. Now I’m not gonna try. Okay. Stephen Colbert, an extraordinary talent and the most popular late night host Slams the deal. Days later, he’s fired. Do I think this is a coincidence? No. Says Bernie Sanders. Kind of an interesting thought there. I will say yes. Colbert technically had the highest ratings across the broadcast television networks and late night, they still were not super high.[00:06:00]
There is a show on Fox News called Gut Filled that technically rates higher, but across the other ones like Jimmy Kimmel and Fallon, all that, he was the highest. Anyways. CBS has said that this is purely a financial decision against a challenging backdrop in late night. It’s not related any way to the show’s performance, content, or other matters happening at Paramount.
So they’re trying to clear the air, saying this is just because the finances, and I’ll hit on that in a second. Trump, of course, loved it. He said, I absolutely loved that Colbert got fired. His talent was even less than his ratings. Jimmy Kimmel is next. I don’t think Jimmy Kimmel’s going anywhere, anytime quite soon, but Trump seems to think so.
Anyways, a lot
Micah Tomasella: of, I definitely Colbert better than Kimmel. Do you personally, I was gonna ask you about this. Yeah. Do you watch any of these late
Conner Jones: night guys?
Micah Tomasella: I mean, I just see clips. I mean, I just think Kimmel can be really condescending and, and smug sometimes in the way that he approaches things.
And you know, Colbert does have faith, right? You know, and he talks about it pretty openly. Now, a lot of people might not agree with him [00:07:00] politically, but I definitely think. Colbert. I mean if I, I think I like Fallon best ’cause he kind of stays outta politics for the most part.
Conner Jones: Mm-hmm.
Micah Tomasella: And then probably Colbert and then after that Kimmel.
Conner Jones: Okay. Good to know. Yeah, I’m right there with you. I don’t really watch late night. I actually don’t remember the last time I watched a show. It’s just always
Micah Tomasella: clips. I’ve never watched it live, I don’t think, maybe in the last 10 years. That’s the
Conner Jones: whole trend, right? Is that the shows are not getting the viewers anymore, but they are big online.
But Colbert show, even though it had the highest ratings. Has the smallest online presence. They have the smallest YouTube subscriber number, the smallest Instagram followers. It was losing money, right?
Micah Tomasella: Which you’re about to get into because it’s, it’s, it’s an interesting argument, I feel to kind of ch, I mean, everybody’s gonna cherry pick stuff, but yeah, okay, he had the highest late night ratings, but are these other shows losing as much money as Colbert is losing?
I mean, it’s just, that’s what’s hard to know. It’s interesting.
Conner Jones: Yeah. Companies aren’t public about that. That took some deep reporting from Matt Bella. He’s probably the most plugged in guy in Hollywood. He did some reporting for Puck that [00:08:00] was like, Hey, I found out that this show is losing $40 million a year.
That’s why CV has canceled it. That’s insane. Now, some networks might be losing money like that and it’s not that big Now it’s big for Paramount, who’s in financial trouble already. Unless they get this merger to go through the other companies, they can afford some of those losses for the cultural relevance.
Yeah, and Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Fallon on these other networks. Those guys are more than just their shows. They also host game shows. They host Oscars and Emmys and all of that. You know, like they’re bigger than that. Colbert’s really just his one show at night, and so I think that’s a piece of it. I will say Colbert on Monday, he got canceled on Friday, so his first episode was a Monday.
And he had some explicit words for Trump himself. I won’t say those here, but he also said they made one mistake, they left me alive. And now for the next 10 months, because he’s not going off air until May, he’s saying the gloves are off. I can finally speak unvarnished, truth to power and say what I really think about Donald Trump.
So if we thought he was really railing against him for the last few years, who knows what he is else? Is he gonna say?
Micah Tomasella: I dunno. He’s been one of his [00:09:00] most outspoken critics. Yeah. Anyways,
Conner Jones: it’s like you were saying, Micah, this is just part of a bigger thing, right? Like aside from sports and live broadcast writes for like football and golf and college football and everything, CBS really is kind of just like dying.
Yeah, I, they’ve got some shows, but they’re trying to move to Paramount Plus on streaming. All these networks are trying to figure that out, right? But late nights just one of the casualties and a lot of people think Seth Myers is on the chopping block over at NBC.
Micah Tomasella: If Fallon could come. Oh, I totally forgot about Seth Meyers, which tells you something totally forgot about him.
Conner Jones: They’ve already started making cuts to his show. They told him to cut his band and everything, trying to cut costs, but he may be on the chopping block Anyways, the ad revenue for the Late Show with Stephen Colbert get this in 2018, they were making $121 million in ad revenue. That’s pretty good. But by this year it was down to 70 million.
I mean, that’s a big steep drop, and he was only getting in about 2.1 million view. On average per episode in the month of June, which is not that high, but more so only 200,000 of those viewers were [00:10:00] actually in the key demo that advertisers love, which is 18 to 49. That indicates that of the rest of the viewers of the 2.1 million, most of them were older, and advertisers don’t like that, especially at late at night.
So that’s ageist. Advertisers do better. It’s all wages, but I’m not an advertiser in that sense. That’s their prerogative. They know the target audience they want anyways. Ad revenue across all of late night has dropped 50% in the past seven years. Okay, so now what? What’s the future here? Yeah, yeah. I think one with Colbert, we’ll just see what his play is.
He’s talented. He’ll find a place to land podcast or a new show, or on a streamer or something. And he’s very well off, but he does have 200 staffers that are now about to be out of a job. You know, keep those people in your mind. It’s not just him. If you disagree with his politics, think about the people who are doing the work every day.
It’s true. Yeah, it’s true on the set, right? Yeah. Okay. CBS, what are they gonna fill a time slot with? A lot of people think they’re gonna bring in one of these podcast comedians, or like the guy who does the hot ones videos on YouTube where he gets celebrities to take hot wings and eat them and basically cry through it because it’s so spicy anyways.
Maybe Theo Vaughn, maybe Andrew Schultz, one of those guys will [00:11:00] take over the show at a much cheaper cost. We’ll see as far as late night in general. NBC, how long will they keep Fallon and Seth Myers around a, B, C. Jimmy Kimmel. Is this the death of late night? Is this like the beginning of the end, essentially?
And then as far as the CBS merger goes. If the new owner, David Ellison, gets to take over and indications show that it’s going to happen, especially now that this cancellation happened, Trump seems to be pretty pleased with Paramount. He’s gonna probably approve this very soon, and this merger’s gonna happen.
CBS will probably change. I mean, the CBS that a lot of people listening to this grew up watching or listening to the news on there. Even football, it’s going to look and sound different and the, you know, the ideas that come out of the newsroom will be different including David Ellison. First off, he’s the son of one of the world’s richest men.
Larry Ellison, I think he’s the fourth richest man in the world, the founder of Oracle. So he’s got endless money to be able to tap into once he takes over, right? Like they can do whatever they want. Here he’s been trying to get in Trump’s like just realm over at UFC fights, buying front row tickets to try to sit near Trump when he shows up to this, [00:12:00] these fights.
He’s also been interviewing people already ahead of the merger. Including Barry Weiss, who a lot of people know from the New York Times, but also she founded the Free Press, which is as puck put it, a move that would inject a hefty dose of center right pro-Israel anti woke editorial sensibility into the network.
I think that’s what a lot of people are hoping will happen at CBS is like more center style anyways. All this to say late night lawsuits, everything. It’s all kind of just hitting the fan right now and we’ll see what happens. I will say that Trump is also suing the Wall Street Journal now because of an article they published last week about Jeffrey Epstein and his relationship to him.
And so the lawsuits against media companies continue with Trump. He’s suing them for $10 billion, which is interesting because it’s his. Powell, Rupert Murdoch, who owns the Wall Street Journal, also the owner of Fox News. Big conservative guy. So kind of an interesting dynamic there. I wouldn’t wanna be in the same room as those two the next time they’re meeting anyways, he’s
Micah Tomasella: suing for 10 billion to get another
Conner Jones: 15 million.
15
Micah Tomasella: million probably. Yeah. I [00:13:00] mean, so he can claim it as a win, you know? Yep. Yeah.
Conner Jones: You can sue for an outrageous amount, and then if you get any sort of,
Micah Tomasella: I’m not saying it’s great. You know, I’m just saying I think that’s probably what the strategy is.
Conner Jones: It’s definitely a strategy there, for sure. Anyways, I think Micah, there’s some spiritual things we can take away here, including the fact that media is a business and I’m quoting, or really paraphrasing Dr.
Jim Denison here. He, he wrote a great article in this whole Colbert situation this week, and I’ll, I’ll link that in the show notes. If you want to read that article, but I’ll paraphrase some of what he said and he, he basically just mentioned that, yeah, media is a business. This is what happens. There’s business decisions that have to be made no matter political spectrums and all of that.
These media businesses. Sell advertising. That’s their model. And the personalities have to sell advertising. And if they’re not, you know they’re going to get canceled. They’re gonna change their talking style, whatever it is. This is true for any political pundits or even podcast. Do you have a podcaster that you like on a certain political spectrum?
They’re gonna be saying things that they know drives more viewership or listenership and drives up ad revenue. So consider that as you listen [00:14:00] to people and remember that they are kind of trying to sell something beyond just. Give you information. A lot of the times anyways, the more effectively that they identify that audience, as Jim said, they seek to reach and appeal to that audience, the more profitable they become.
Kinda like I just mentioned, there’s nothing necessarily inherently wrong with that, but it does become a problem when Christians confuse winning the culture wars with winning souls. Not the same thing. Different. They’re not the same thing, and. He makes a good point. He is this is probably the deception of Satan.
Since Satan cannot have our souls, he instead seeks to steal our witness. Mm-hmm. The last thing he wants for us is to share the gospel persuasively and passionately with our friends, neighbors, colleagues, anybody in our life. And so he encourages us to substitute culture wars for the hard but joyful work of personal evangelism.
Wow. Yeah. Yeah, it’s kind of a, yeah. Wow. I feel that, I would say the real temptation is for a lot of leaders in the church to think that, hey, focus on culture wars. Maybe your pastor focuses on culture wars at the pulpit or whatnot, but really that’s [00:15:00] kind of a distraction. They should be preaching on the gospel and biblical truths and, and there are biblical truths to culture wars, so it’s not always something you shouldn’t discuss, but it doesn’t place.
You can tell the difference
Micah Tomasella: pretty quickly, like what their tell, what their goal agenda is, what their foundation is. I
Conner Jones: think the point is that culture wars does not replace evangelism and it That’s correct. Be a temptation to do that. But Jude three calls us to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints.
This faith alone, not any political party or partisan position leads to salvation in Christ and for followers of Jesus. Nothing should be more urgent than helping others know our Lord. Take that with you this week. Remember that as you consider just media personalities and media, whoever you’re listening to or watching, it’s all business.
And it does not replace in a cultural war sense any sort of evangelism, right? Your focus should always be the gospel and then the other things are just part of life.
Micah Tomasella: Amen. Amen, Conner. Alright, so let’s dive into our next story, and I’ve kind of entitled this, the [00:16:00] Theology of Israel. So if you’ve been paying attention, which of course.
Our loyal audience and listeners of culture brief, paying attention to the news, they’re staying on the cutting edge. They’re understanding what’s going on, of course, right? So if you’re paying attention to what’s happening in the Middle East lately, you’ve seen the headlines. Israel is once again at the center of global tension.
So over the last week, just to name a few, there’s been more, Israel launched airstrikes into Syria saying they were targeting Iranian backed militias, threatening northern Israeli towns, a Catholic church. The only Catholic church in Gaza was hit in the process and civilians were killed. And it was serious enough that the Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, actually personally called the Pope and apologized to Pope Leo.
And then even longtime supporters, so the American Ambassador, the US Ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee and the former governor of Arkansas, I mean, just has been kind of like, I mean, really, truly one of the top five most forefront fervent supporters of [00:17:00] America supporting Israel, right? For years. He’s synonymous with it.
Even he spoke out and criticized Israel and reportedly Trump’s inner circle some in his inner circle and Axios report said this called Netanyahu a madman. So it’s messy, it’s tragic, and it’s raising all kinds of questions again, that go way beyond politics, especially as Christians. Because when things flare up with Israel, here’s some questions that I ask, some questions that we ask as Christians.
’cause we hear a lot of different theological viewpoints on how we should be viewing what’s going on with Israel right now, especially with violence, especially with war. A lot of Christians start to ask, is this part of the end times is? Is that what this means? Does modern day Israel actually still hold a special place in God’s plan?
Does the state, does the Nation of Israel still hold a special place in God’s plan? Or is it. Just like any other country, should we be supporting everything Israel does, no matter what? Should we carte blanche just to prove everything that they’re doing? [00:18:00] Somebody like Ted Cruz would kind of say, yes, we should, right?
And so there is a lot of just different opinions out there. I’m not even necessarily gonna say misinformation. I just think that we need to kind of ground ourselves on what God’s word says and lay out the biggest viewpoints of this. So these aren’t just political questions, they’re theological. And honestly, how we answer them depends a lot on.
The kind of theology we’ve been taught, that we’ve been brought up with, and what we believe about God’s covenant with Israel, the church, and how this all fits into God’s bigger story. So let me just clarify this upfront. Before I get into this. I know some of you are gonna see this differently. That’s okay.
That is totally okay. I’m not claiming to be an expert here either. I’m not gonna sit here and lay all this out and say this is the view that you should pick at the same time. But I have spent over the years, a lot of time reading on this, listening and learning from people who really studied this deeply, who are pretty smart, like our founder, Dr.
Jim Denison. So I wanna lay out the three major theological views Christians hold about Israel. But before we [00:19:00] do, there’s one important piece of history to keep in mind that I think kind of gives us context before we go into these views. So the modern nation of Israel didn’t officially exist until 1948, which might be surprising to some people.
Many of you probably knew that Conner and I have had the joy of visiting Israel, and we know firsthand how special this place is, how special the people are like we’re. We’re saying that from the top, I mean, it, it is a special place. Mm-hmm. But they weren’t actually an official nation until 1948. That’s, that’s a big deal.
For nearly 2000 years, there was no recognized Jewish nation, just the Jewish people scattered across the world. Then after World War II in the Holocaust, the UN proposed a plan to reestablish Israel as a homeland for the Jewish people, for them to go. So for some Christians, that moment in 1948 was a prophecy fulfilled right before their eyes.
For others, it was simply a political decision. Either way, since 1948, it has kicked off a whole lot of theological argument, reflection, and [00:20:00] debate. That’s still raging today since Israel became a nation in 1948. So here are the three main views on Israel. Let’s break down the three main. View one is dispensationalism.
This is probably the most familiar view in many evangelical churches. Again, I am just painting this with a very broad stroke right now. So you very well could have grown up in an evangelical church that didn’t teach this, or you’re not really aware of this type of belief. I’m just saying it’s, it’s pretty common in most evangelical churches.
So here’s what dispensationalism teaches. God has two separate plans, one for Israel and one for the church. Israel’s Reestablishment, 1948 and its ongoing survival are signs that God is preparing for the end times. I’m gonna give you some key scriptures, some further reading. So each of these views have some scriptures that they’re grounding themselves on.
So I’m gonna encourage you guys to read these further. Genesis 12 was God’s promise to Abraham. So read that Romans 11 is all about God’s plan for Israel. And then [00:21:00] Ezekiel 37 is the dry bones rising again, concept. So here’s what it means today, a lot of Christians who hold this view believe we should support Israel politically and militarily no matter what, because they see Israel’s victories and struggles as prophetic signs, meaning that they’re tied to the end times, like the modern government and state of Israel needs to stay intact.
Then if it falls, that basically means that Jesus is coming back. It’s, it’s very much tied to end times, to the rapture, all that stuff. So here’s why it’s compelling. It honors God’s promises to his people and it pays close attention to scripture, like it does have some biblical backing. It just makes some inferences for sure.
But where it can go wrong is it can lead to unconditional support of everything Israel does, even when justice or peace are at stake. So it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s almost to the point to where no matter what they do, they can do no wrong. And I read a few things that kind of lead to the fact that, you know, the way the Palestinians are being treated in Gaza, [00:22:00] it sure does seem like they’re doing some wrong, that, that they’re not perfect, right?
Mm-hmm. That’s the dispensationalist view. Any thoughts on that so far, Conner? What kind of tradition were you brought up in? What’s been your understanding on this?
Conner Jones: Grew up in a Baptist church. So I feel like there was multiple views. I do think dispensationalism has always been popular. Yeah. I also think that in recent years as really specifically the last two years as Israel has waged this war against Gaza, people have started to question dispensationalism and rethink this through.
But man, I’m sitting here learning a lot. This is like Professor Ella taking us through this. I’m even, I’m, I’m like, just keep teaching me like every, our listeners are loving this too. I, I don’t really give this much thought a lot of times. All the, all these, I appreciate you saying that.
Micah Tomasella: Yeah, no, I appreciate you saying that.
I mean, I’ve spent several years working in churches as a pastor, you know, before I came on staff here at Den and Ministries. But really, I. Where this feels most relevant is, you know, I’m pulling a lot of this information, the bulk of this information, obviously from God’s word, but from what Dr. Jim Denison and Dr.
Ryan [00:23:00] Denison have written, right? This is kind of their breakdown, just kind of put into my own words to be able to explain it to the audience, but I can’t stop thinking about this. Like every time I see something with Israel. What they’re doing. Maybe something I agree with or maybe something flat out I disagree with, and that I think is bad.
It comes back to this central question. Mm-hmm. Because we have grown up in an era where Israel and their viability has been so tied to prophecy and to end times and brought up, like this is the truth. And so I just can’t help but think what does all of this mean? And so I figured you and the audience would wanna hear.
Conner Jones: No, I definitely, I think it’s easy to ignore, or not ignore, but like kind of see, oh man, that’s going on across the world. I just don’t feel like you have much credence or thought to it because it’s hard to watch. Yeah. And then you just don’t even consider all these theological implications. So I love
Micah Tomasella: that you’re taking us through this.
Yeah. Yep. Okay, so view two. We just went over view one, which is dispensationalism view two is covenant theology, covenantal theology, [00:24:00] or some people call it replacement theology, which is kind of a more rudimentary way of explaining it because this is more common and more like reformed or mainline traditions, denominations.
So here’s what it teaches. The church has become the new Israel, so the bride. US believers, we have become the new Israel and God’s promises in the Old Testament were fulfilled completely in Jesus and now apply spiritually to everyone who follows him. Key scriptures to point out Galatians 3 28 through 29.
We are Abraham’s offspring by faith now. And then Ephesians two, Jews and Gentiles are united in Christ, right? So Jesus came and changed everything where you did not have to be a Jewish person. You could literally be a Gentile after Jesus, a non-Jewish person, and you could follow the one. True God, you could follow Yahweh, right?
So something big did shift after Jesus. So here’s what it means today. Christians are called to pray for all people, including Jews, but shouldn’t assume the modern nation of Israel [00:25:00] holds a special covenantal role at all anymore. Why? It’s compelling. It keeps the focus on Christ and the global church.
Here’s where it can go wrong, and I want to emphasize where this can go wrong. Taken too far, it can ignore the significance of God’s promises to the Jewish people and even slide into some antisemitism. So it’s this concept of Israel and the Jewish people have no distinction anymore. I’m not so sure if that’s the case.
I think that there might be a balanced view of this to say that yes, a whole lot changed after Jesus. Of course, and we could get into that even more fully, but many of our audience understand that. But the replacement theology, the covenantal theology would say the body of Christ, the bride of Christ.
Is just the same. You either know Jesus or you don’t know Jesus. It’s kind of that concept. So that is that theology. That is that view. One more. View three. This is called modified or two covenant theology. This is kind of a balance between both. And it’s a middle ground view that’s really growing in popularity these [00:26:00] days.
So what it teaches, God still has a covenant with the Jewish people, but the church doesn’t replace Israel at the same time. We shouldn’t automatically see every move Israel makes as divinely approved. Key scriptures, Romans nine, 10 and 11, especially Romans 1128 through 29. As regards to the gospel, they are enemies for your sake, but as regarding election, they are beloved for the sake of their forefather.
What it means today, Christians should support Israel’s right to exist and stand against antisemitism, stand against hate, but also care about justice and peace and the dignity of all people, including Palestinians. Why it’s compelling. It does honor God’s covenant with Israel saying, Hey, all that stuff that happened in the Old Testament, that’s still relevant, right?
But it also keeps us grounded in the gospel. That if you believe in your heart and confess with your tongue that Jesus Christ is Lord and was raised from the dead, then you will be saved. It gives credence to that, that we are all God’s children and we all are given equal access to the [00:27:00] throne, to the Father.
Here’s where it can go wrong. It leaves a lot of room for mystery. It doesn’t answer some of those question. It’s one of those uncomfortable things of this doesn’t feel like a definitive answer, and we all like definitive answers, and so it doesn’t give the black and white answers, which can be uncomfortable in times of crisis.
Mm-hmm. When we don’t really. Mm-hmm. Fully understand what’s going on. So Conner, what do we do with all this man? And that’s a rhetorical question. I don’t want you to answer it. I’m gonna answer it. Therefore, it’s a rhetorical question. Haha. So with everything happening right now, like the bombs, the pain, the politics, the confusion, it can be overwhelming to know, goodness gracious, how do I respond?
What do I do with all of this? But here are a few things that feel really clear right now as I’m processing through this. Pray for peace guys. Pray for Israel, for Gaza, for Syria, pray for innocent lives on every side. Every single human being is made in the image of God knitted together in their mother’s womb.
He loves us all equally and has a plan for our lives, but we need to grab hold of that [00:28:00] plan and recognize him as our savior. We just have to understand that. That all of this grieves God’s heart. If an Israeli dies, if a Palestinian person dies, that grieves God’s heart, that’s an innocent person that was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, reject antisemitism.
Is my second point. And also reject the idea that any one nation always gets it right. Like I’m just like, I’m gonna be strong in this. There there’s just no perfect nation. There’s just no nation that can just do no wrong because it’s, it’s a symptom of humanity. We are born into sin, therefore we are incapable of perfection.
Therefore, there will be no perfect nation because nation are led by people, right? It’s kind of simple. If you think about it, and then also be humble just because you read a few prophecy charts or watched a few videos on one topic or heard a passionate sermon, it doesn’t mean you’ve got it all figured out and it, this does not mean I have it all figured out.
I don’t. I do not. And maybe most of all, don’t confuse God’s plan with your [00:29:00] politics. It’s okay to care deeply and still hold things loosely before the Lord and surrender. Bringing out our biggest questions to him is so important. It’s so important. So the key spiritual takeaway from this, just one real quick.
Is, here’s what I keep coming back to is Romans 1133. I talked about Romans nine through 11 earlier owe the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearchable are his judgements and how inscrutable are his ways. God is at work and ways we cannot fully see. And while we may not know what tomorrow holds in Israel, we may not know what tomorrow holds for us.
But we can trust the one who holds it all together. So let’s keep praying, let’s keep learning and keep your eyes on Jesus the true king of peace. So for deeper understanding on these topics, I wanna point you guys to some further reading that I drew most of this from is these two articles. The first one is, is the conflict in Israel, A Sign of the End Times written by Dr.
Ryan Denison. And then the other one is, [00:30:00] are the Jews still God’s Chosen People by Dr. Jim Denison? They’ll be linked in the show notes, but you can also just Google those titles and their names and find them. But this is where I pulled a lot of this information, but I just kind of gave you a 30,000 foot view.
So if you wanna read even more in depth, this is a great place to start. And then even in these articles, it gives you further resources too.
Conner Jones: Yeah. Really appreciate that. Great breakdown. So many questions, so many things to think through there for Christians specifically, how do we theologically process through this?
So appreciate that Micah and I. Everybody go read the scriptures yeah, don’t just let people tell you how to do it. Interpret the scriptures for yourself too. You’re, and see how the Holy Spirit is leading you to understand and interpret what’s going on in the world. Thank you Micah, for that. Hey, let’s hop into a quick game real fast.
You ready? Yep. Okay. This is really just a game for Micah. I should clarify that because I was like, I’m gonna, I actually don’t know
Micah Tomasella: what’s about to happen straight up guys. I do not. I’m gonna quiz on something. It’s just written out as a game for Micah. I do not know what’s gonna happen. Yeah. Okay, here we
Conner Jones: go.
Here we go. Okay, so I just gotta clarify that [00:31:00] I think a lot of people are saying movie stars don’t matter anymore, but I want this to be my thesis for movie stars still matter. There’s a lot of people who would say that we don’t have Hollywood movie stars. It’s just old guys like Denzel Washington and Brad Pitt and stuff, and that the day of movie, I love Denzel.
Rebuttal that with this game right now. Okay. There’s a new top 10 list of the highest grossing actors and actresses of all time, and I think it proves that movie stars still matter. And there’s a new person, actor, and or actress who is at the top of this list. They just crossed the threshold to be number one as the number one highest grossing.
Actor, actress in history. This means basically that of all the movies that this person has been in, that that is accumulated to be a massive number and they’re the highest, as everyone’s calling it, the highest grossing actor slash actress. In Hollywood. Micah, my question for you is, can you guess who that individual [00:32:00] is?
Micah Tomasella: Conner, I, I think I do know who it is because I, I know who’s number one on this list. I’ve seen a lot of videos about this. What? No Scarlett Johanson,
Conner Jones: it is Scarlett Johansen. Yes. Yeah.
Micah Tomasella: Yeah. I saw a lot about this, but I know nobody else on the list. But yes, I did know that it was Scarlett Johansen, which is surprising and not surprising.
I think she’s, she was like, she’s been in like every Marvel movie, like she finds her way into every Marvel movie. She got all the spinoffs. That’s probably exactly why it happened, right?
Conner Jones: It is. And then she was in this Jurassic World movie, and that’s what, oh yes.
Micah Tomasella: That’s
Conner Jones: a few weeks ago. Went after that.
Did you see that? I did go see it. It sucked. Did you like it? No, it was not very good. Did you say it
Micah Tomasella: sucked? Is that what you said? Strong opinion there. And then I heard you saw Superman. What’d you think about that?
Conner Jones: Superman. Superman was okay. In fact, I found some of it to be a lot of fun. Some of it to be so overly just.
CGI, some of it to be so overly political it, it does not hold back. James Gunn, the directors not hold back on his thoughts on Israel in a very symbolic way. It definitely makes that very clear. Israel versus [00:33:00] Gaza, it’s not subtle whatsoever. So anyways, does Superman drop into that? Superman is very involved in that.
I won’t ruin in the Israel
Micah Tomasella: Gaza conflict.
Conner Jones: Yeah, obviously not those two countries by name. This is, I mean, it’s all made up country names, but it’s very clear what he’s depicting there anyways. Really. Okay. And I thought it was an okay movie. I thought there were some fun parts. I thought there were some annoying parts, some over CGI parts.
Anyways, I would suggest going to see it, but both those movies have disappointed me, so I’m holding out hope for Fantastic Four this weekend, and we’ll just see if that’s,
Micah Tomasella: I’m looking forward to that one. Was Superman, visually spectacular? Would you say it was, I mean, was it like. Certain parts, you know?
Conner Jones: Yeah. I mean, one, one that you
Micah Tomasella: should see in the theater or one that you could get away with watching at home. I think that that should be like the new barometer.
Conner Jones: In theater or at home. My opinion is always in theater. I mean, I saw it in xd, so you know, I was like, of course you did over here. Big, big screen.
You know what I’m saying? I had that cinema movie club. You had that $16 ticket, bro. Oh yeah.
Micah Tomasella: Oh yeah. Anyways. [00:34:00]
Conner Jones: I will say on this list, speaking of all that, all of these actors and actresses, it’s like Samuel Jackson, Robert Downey Jr. Zoe Saldana, Chris Pratt, Bradley Cooper, Chris and Zoe
Micah Tomasella: Sias on the top 10.
Dude, think
Conner Jones: about it. She’s not only in Marvel movies, she’s in the Avatar movies.
Micah Tomasella: Oh yeah. Two of the biggest franchises ever. She’s always was was Tom
Conner Jones: Cruise on it? Tom Cruise is, he’s number six, and he’s the only actor on this list that is not in the MCU. Everyone else is in. Then he’s number one,
Micah Tomasella: then he is number one.
No, because he’s been the fixture of all of his movies. So he’s been the sole calling card of all of his movies, so that’s true. He’s number one, in my opinion, because everybody else gets to ride on everybody else’s coattails by just being a part of the Marvel universe that took Cruise, took over to made
Conner Jones: it because he’s Tom Cruise.
Like it’s not just because he is, he’s a superhero. Although, you know the, the Mission Impossible Movies and Top Gun and all that. Anyways, yeah, I would say it’s different in his regard. Hey. Thanks for playing Micah. Let’s hop into our check-in section. Check in on a few things that have been happening since we’ve talked about them, or some other big news stories.[00:35:00]
You wanna lead us off here?
Micah Tomasella: Yep. So legendary Rockstar Ozzy Osborne passed away at 76. His career spanned decades with Black Sabbath and as a solo artist and his infamous reality TV show that caught fire. Mm-hmm. Sharan, he wrapped up a farewell tour just two weeks ago, and he was known as the Prince of Darkness.
Kind of a tough nickname to be remembered by, but RIP, Ozzy Osborne.
Conner Jones: Very unique voice, definitely checkered history, but you cannot deny that his voice was one of the most unique and powerful, probably music history, I have a
Micah Tomasella: memory of. I had like a, like a boombox in my room growing up, or just like a CD player or whatever you’d wanna call it.
But I had a. Like a mix. And one of the songs in there, you remember when you would burn mixes on CDs and stuff. So I had a, a song on there called Crazy Train. Oh yeah. And then that was also in Madden, which I used to play growing up too, the NFL Football Video Game. And that that song, crazy [00:36:00] Train was, I, I just remember that.
I think that’s like the most iconic song that, that I would remember. When I think about him, that’s probably his most well-known. Yeah. Song Uhhuh. I mean, you can’t go. To any big event without that song playing. Uhhuh. And then another quick update, which it’s a bittersweet update. So the updated death toll in in the central Texas floods is now at 1 35, but the number of missing has been revised from 160 to three.
So everybody had kind of been talking about, oh my goodness, if this stays true, it’s gonna end up being nearly 300 people who passed away from these floods. But that’s not the case. After some further research and kind of drilling down to get some of these people identified, the number was kind of steadily declining and it went from one 60 to 90 to then to three.
So there still are three missing, and we still have 135 total deaths, which is so tragic. However, it’s not nearly 300 like what was initially expected, and so thank you Lord for that.
Conner Jones: Yeah. Yeah. Something else going on is the Epstein stuff continues to just, you know, like it’s not going away as much as Trump wanted to.
No, no. The [00:37:00] DOJ did announce that they’re going, and this is Pam Bondi, attorney General, DOJ is going to hopefully meet with. Epstein co-conspirator, Ghislaine Maxwell. That is their plan. They’re trying to get information about anyone who might have committed crimes against these victims. And the Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said he anticipates meeting with her in the coming days.
Now, some people are saying she’s gonna meet with them in the hopes that she’s gonna get some sort of pardon or confrontation from Trump, right? I doubt that’s possible, but we’ll just see. She’s gotta have an angle there too. Her and her lawyers Speaker of the house, Mike Johnson on this, shut down the house early.
They were supposed to go a day early home. Yeah, they were supposed to go home on. Thursday for their month long summer recess where all the Congress members go back home. They come back in September, you shut it down today early
Micah Tomasella: so that they can, some of the Congress members don’t go home. Some of them have been in office for so long.
They are completely just live in dc, detached from their constituents and just like living that DC lifestyle. Oh yeah. I’m pro term limits. I’m just gonna throw that out there right now, that in the future, forget who elected you in the first place. Can I just throw that in there real quick?
Conner Jones: Yes. Throw it in there.
[00:38:00] Let’s talk about that one in the future. Let’s,
Micah Tomasella: let’s do a, a brief on that down the line, because that’s a, that’s a good one. That’d be an interesting conversation because I mean, if you’re, if, if you’re living in DC for 20, 30 years, you like the fancy dinners, you like all the benefits and functions, but you’re representing Kentucky, you know, how often are you gonna go back to Kentucky after doing that for 20 or 30 years?
You just lose touch with who actually elected you in the first place. It’s human nature. It’s human nature. I feel a soapbox there, man. Got some thoughts For sure. You agree with me though? I think you and I talked about this. I do. I would love to talk about this more. I think you and I talked about this.
Conner Jones: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Okay. All that to say. Yeah. What were you saying? The ones who are going home are going home a day early, so that speaker Mike Johnson could avoid a vote on Epstein to release files. Kind of interesting. He’s saying it’s because the Democrats are trying to play games with them and all of that, but it doesn’t make the Republican side of this look great, continues to make it look like they’re trying to cover something up, trying
Micah Tomasella: to hide something.
Conner Jones: And the House Oversight Committee has said that they, when they get back in September, they’re going to probably subpoena Maxwell to come testify before Congress. We’ll, if that happens,
Micah Tomasella: yeah, we’ll get some answers this fall. People just want ’em sooner. [00:39:00] I mean, I’d like ’em sooner, you know, yeah.
Conner Jones: Yeah.
Okay. Question for you, Micah. Have you ever heard the term. Probably not saying this correctly. Shaden Frea. Shaden Freida,
Micah Tomasella: I think is how you say it. Just because I read news like you do. Yes. Like in the last day. I’ve heard of it, but not before that.
Conner Jones: It is like the word of the week. And here’s why. It’s ’cause of this whole Coldplay scenario.
Everybody’s seen the video. We’ve all, we all know what, I’m not even gonna break it down. We all know what happened at the Coldplay concert with the CEO and HR manager at the company, astronomer that tech company, Shaden Freuder. Means pleasure derived by someone from another person’s misfortune.
And it was in like every think piece over the weekend that came out through this whole thing. I mean, New York Times Free Press, Albert Moeller, everybody was like dropping this word in their articles. It was like, I guess I need to understand this concept. And I, I think it’s an interesting concept ’cause they’re all like, are you experiencing this?
Where you’re seeing this presumably wealthy, CEO as well as very powerful person and the person who is supposed to keep everything in check with relationships in the office. Are you seeing this in a pleasurable sense? Oh yeah. Down with them, all of that. I [00:40:00] would say it’s very easy to do that. We can all check our hearts on this though, right?
If we’re finding pleasure in these two people’s misfortune, check your heart. It’s difficult not to find pleasure in it, and especially when the whole internet blows up over the weekend, and there’s memes and videos and skits and baseball games are doing their own Coldplay cam now. It was
Micah Tomasella: everything for several days.
It’s everywhere. It’s just now dying down, I feel like. But it’s still at top five right now. Definitely.
Conner Jones: I mean, it just doesn’t go away. I would say this, remember the scripture, and remember when Jesus said, let he who has not sinned cast the first stone? Yeah. They were in a bad situation. They should not have been.
Obviously together. They’re cheating behind their family’s backs, which remember there’s families involved in this. I mean, there’s. Husbands wives and children that are broken because of this whole thing now. Yeah. And these two’s lives are so public and embarrassingly so it just kind of stinks for them.
Anyways, I would just say consider that, consider your heart, and also I would like to just comment on that. This, I think is the new motto, culture. It used to be late night, people used to always talk about late night [00:41:00] skits, and now it’s like. Everything that’s online, it’s all through YouTube and social media and everything, right?
Micah Tomasella: Yeah.
Conner Jones: And I would also recommend an article by the free press titled The Coldplay Couple did something Bad, the internet did something worse, and I found the, the final sentence of that article, when we take joy in the distress and ruination of other people, we make monsters of ourselves. I found that to be very impactful.
Micah Tomasella: In this current society, there’s a whole lot of monsters then that is the name of the game.
Conner Jones: And just remember, put yourself in their shoes. Imagine if your sin was publicly displayed for the world to see how you would feel and how everybody judging you. How that would,
Micah Tomasella: I mean, yes. I mean, first of all, you shouldn’t be cheating on your spouse.
Second of all, absolutely. If you’re gonna be cheating, you shouldn’t be going to. One of the most public things you could ever go to. And it’s done right. They’re both right? Yeah. Like on executive leadership teams for a very large company anyway. Yes. It was, no, I’m with you. I’m not. I’m with you. It was really stupid and there obviously it should, it’s just kind of asking for it.
It’s just kind of asking for, and we’re asking
Conner Jones: for it, but I’m also saying it’s kinda like small town politics, but for the world to [00:42:00] see, the internet does not have to face these people face to face. They can say whatever they want. Imagine that. And you’re in their shoes. It would be hard. I mean, I, I just, yeah.
Micah Tomasella: Yep. So one more thing on the check-in section. Scotty s Scheffler won the open championship,
Conner Jones: woo, after we talked about his faith last week. So cool to
Micah Tomasella: see it. God bless you. Scotty s Scheffler, just an amazing guy, an amazing Christian witness who is the best player in golf. So there was a Nike ad that came out.
I just kinda wanna highlight it real quick. After Scotty won those Nike ads are the like the best thing they have going for them right now because there’s their value keeps plummeting. They keep losing money every quarter, but man, these ads after their athletes win are iconic. So here’s what it says, Nike ad, you’ve already won.
But another major never hurt. And so the photo is of Scotty and his son on a golf course and it said, you’ve already won. And then the next one is [00:43:00] him swinging a golf club. But it says, but another major never hurt. And then the caption says, priorities unchanged. Another major secured. The winds keep coming on and off the course for Scotty Scheffler.
So we got some Instagram messages on this last week in terms of the Scotty Scheffler conversation that we had last week. And Lisa she says he was giving off some strong Ecclesiastes vibes. Vapor. Vapor, everything’s vapor.
Conner Jones: She’s referencing his press statement before the tournament even happened that he ended up winning, but where he was basically like, golf’s not my end all be all, which is a good thing.
And so I agree with you, Lisa. Yeah, he, he definitely, he came off maybe a little. Down on it. Yeah. But at the same time, I think he offered more hope than what even that Ecclesiastes verse says, because if you read the rest of Ecclesiastes, it offers hope. Where Solomon is saying, yeah, life’s vapor, vapor.
And he is very down on it, but he’s also comes in later says, but there’s more to life. And Scotty said the same thing. Amen. It’s not just about golf or money and fame, it’s about being married and with his family. [00:44:00] And that’s what Ecclesiastes says. So yeah, just remember that. Hey guys, thank y’all for listening to us this week on Culture Brief.
We are so grateful that you guys join us. Please send us your mailbag comments, your questions, everything to culture [email protected] and follow us on Instagram, shoot us an Instagram message at Culture Brief Podcast on Instagram. And thank you for listening today. All videos, all articles, anything that we mention, any social posts, we will link those in our show description.
If you did enjoy today’s episode, please subscribe, rate or review the show and share it with a friend, and we will see you next Thursday.
Micah Tomasella: Bye-bye.
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