The World and Everything in It: December 13, 2024

PREROLL: Good morning! John Stonestreet here. As we close out this year, I want to remind you about WORLD’s Year-End Giving Drive. If WORLD’s work has been a meaningful part of your year and your Christian faith, 
I hope you’ll consider making a gift to support this great organization.

Just visit WNG.org/yearendgift. That’s WNG.org/yearendgift.


We’ve got lots to cover on Culture Friday today so I’ll talk to you again in about 10 minutes.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: Good morning!

We do have lots to cover: Jordan Neely, Daniel Penny, Brian Thompson, Luigi Mangione …

Who are the heroes? Who are the villains?

NICK EICHER, HOST: That’s ahead on Culture Friday.

Also today, the reopening of Notre-Dame.

And later, a new animated movie based on two and a half pages of Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings

AUDIO: By her hand, many great deeds were done. But do not look for tales of her in the old songs.

WORLD Arts and Culture Editor Collin Garbarino has a review.

And the Music of Advent…

BROWN: It’s Friday, December 13th. This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Myrna Brown.

EICHER: And I’m Nick Eicher. Good morning!

BROWN: Up next, Mark Mellinger with today’s news.

MARK MELLINGER, NEWS ANCHOR: White House: Israel-Hamas ceasefire may be imminent » The Biden Administration says there’s renewed momentum for a ceasefire and hostage deal to end the war between Hamas and Israel in Gaza.

White House National Security Spokesman John Kirby says, if you’re Hamas right now…

KIRBY: The options aren’t good. Your military capabilities have been all but decimated. Your main leader is gone.

National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan was in Israel Thursday making a last push for an end to the fighting.

He says Israel’s ceasefire in Lebanon with Hamas ally Hezbollah has caused Hamas to adapt its negotiating posture, and he’s hopeful the U.S. can broker a ceasefire in Gaza before President-elect Donald Trump takes office.

SULLIVAN: I wouldn’t be here today if I thought this thing was just waiting until after January 20th. I am here today because I believe every day matters, and we are going to use every day we have to try to close the deal as soon as we possibly can.

Up next, Sullivan meets with Qatar and Egypt, two key co-mediators in the ceasefire talks.

Meanwhile, the fighting in Gaza isn’t letting up. An Israeli airstrike in the central Gaza strip killed at least 25 Palestinians and wounded dozens more Thursday.

American freed after 7 months as Syrian captive » An American citizen held hostage in Syria for 7 months is now free.

Travis Timmerman says he crossed into Syria on a Christian pilgrimage and was imprisoned by Bashar al-Assad’s government. But this week, the rebel group that toppled Assad’s oppressive regime freed him.

Here’s Timmerman describing his release, and elements of his captivity, to a reporter.

TIMMERMAN: I was imprisoned in a cell by myself. In the early morning of Monday, Monday of this week, they took a hammer and they broke my door down.
REPORTER: ‘Did you hear the voices of torture (indecipherable) in the prisons?’
TIMMERMAN: ‘Yes, I could hear the interrogations and the beatings.’”

The rebels say they’ll hand Timmerman over to U.S. authorities once his recovery’s complete. They also confirmed they’re searching for Austin Tice, an American journalist who went missing in Syria 12 years ago.

Jersey drone controversy latest » Lawmakers on Capitol Hill are pressing for more information about those unexplained drone sightings over New Jersey.

The Pentagon has dismissed claims by New Jersey Congressman Jeff Van Drew that the drones originated from a small Iranian vessel off the East Coast.

But whatever their origin, Senator Richard Blumenthal says it’s time for answers…and swift action.

BLUMENTHAL: We have no idea where these drones come from, who owns them. We should be doing some very urgent intelligence analysis, and take them out of the skies, especially if they're flying over airports or military bases.

New Jersey state representative Dawn Fantasia says the first sightings began on November 18th. Since then, she says there’ve been four to 180 reports a day… but the White House says none of them have been confirmed.

Trump is TIME Person of the Year » President-elect Trump is celebrating his second selection as TIME Magazine’s Person of the Year.

The official announcement came Thursday. TIME says it chose Trump for marshaling a comeback of historic proportions, for driving a once-in-a-generation political realignment, and for reshaping the American presidency & altering America's role in the world.

Trump celebrated by ringing the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange, where he also touched on the eyebrow-raising news that he’s invited Chinese leader Xi Jinping to his inaugural.

TRUMP: I was even thinking about inviting certain people to the inauguration. And some people said, ‘Wow, that’s a little risky, isn’t it?’ And I said, ‘Maybe it is. We’ll see. We’ll see what happens.’ But we like to take little chances.”

The Associated Press reports it’s unlikely Xi would actually attend the ceremony.

TIME also named Trump its Person of the Year in 2016.

Report shows 26 confidential FBI human sources at J6 rally » A new report is shedding more light on what happened during the Jan. 6 Capitol attacks.

The report from the Justice Department’s inspector general finds there were no undercover FBI agents at the Capitol at the time of the riot.

But there were 26 paid federal informants in Washington that day, three of whom were there on assignment from the FBI.

Republican Congresswoman Kat Cammack says she wants to know why. She told Fox Business's The Evening Edit with Elizabeth MacDonald...

CAMMACK - When we have Donald J. Trump back in office, we will actually get the answers that the American people deserve, of what exactly the FBI knew, what their directives were and who issued them.

Some of Trump's supporters have suggested federal agents provoked the violence that day. But critics say the report's findings cast doubt on those claims.

NYC mayor meets with new border czar » New York City Mayor Eric Adams met with the incoming Trump Administration’s border czar Tom Homan Thursday.

While they didn’t get into deep talks about the president-elect’s mass deportation plans, Adams says…

ADAMS: “We have the same desire to go after those who are committing violent acts, repeated violent acts, among innocent New Yorkers and among migrants and asylum seekers. That’s what I heard from him and I was pleased to hear that because we share the same desire.”

Adams says he still needs more details to determine to what degree the New York Police Department will support federal deportation efforts.

Like many major cities, New York has been battling problems caused by a large influx of illegal immigrants. Adams says whether the Big Apple remains a sanctuary city is up to the city council.

I'm Mark Mellinger.

Straight ahead: John Stonestreet is standing by for Culture Friday.

Plus, WORLD’s Collin Garbarino reviews a new animated film set in Middle Earth.

This is The World and Everything in It.

NICK EICHER, HOST: It’s Friday the 13th of December, 2024.

Glad to have you along for today’s edition of The World and Everything in It. Good morning, I’m Nick Eicher.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: And I’m Myrna Brown.

It’s time for Culture Friday, and joining us now is John Stonestreet, president of the Colson Center and host of the Breakpoint podcast.

Good morning!

JOHN STONESTREET: Good morning.

BROWN: Well, John, for the first time, Muhammad is the most popular name for baby boys in England and Wales, overtaking Noah and Oliver. That’s according to the UK newspaper The Guardian. This data, from the Office for National Statistics, did find the influence of pop culture shaped some naming trends, but Muhammad’s popularity topped charts in four regions of England. John, is this development concerning? Is this how civilizations die?

STONESTREET: Well, we've seen these kind of stories before, so it's not the first time, at least regionally, that this has popped up. But this is not just a story about the growth of Islam in the UK—as something that we continue to hear a lot about from various corners, and have for a while. It's also about just the declining birth rate. In other words, these numbers of boys names would not be nearly as significant if the overall number of children born were not declining, and had been in steep decline.

You know, we don't have a single nation in what would be called the Western world that is meeting replacement rate and have not for quite some time. Some are so far behind the rate that it's questionable whether they'll ever be able to recover. So, you know, as a good friend of mine likes to say, this ain't magic, it's math. You know, this is just where the future lies. The future lies with the fertile.

Now, the other part of the story, of course, is that the secular West typically fails to consider the significance of religious conviction and religious belief. When you presume that religion is nothing but a personal, private fantasy, which is the kind of the dominant modern to post modern narrative about religion, then it's hard to really reckon with a group of people who take their religion this seriously—including seriously enough to order life around, like having babies.

It's not just the number of children born in the UK that have an Islamic name. It's the number of children born in Islamic countries as compared to Western countries. All of these factors play in.

Secularism is an infertile religion. It is a religion that lives for the now, not for the future. A religious worldview, one particularly that takes the creation mandate seriously, is one that prizes fertility and actually sees the building of a religious culture—not just a personal, private religion, with some buildings you can go to when, when you want.

What babies are named are not the root of the problem. They're the expression of the problem. The lack of fertility being one and the inability of secularists to take religion seriously being the other.

BROWN: OK, Jordan Neely, John. Sad, sad story. This young man, after his mother was murdered by her abusive boyfriend and her body stuffed in a suitcase, a teenage Neely had to testify in court on his mother’s behalf.

Talk about trauma.

He’s placed into foster care as an orphan.

From there began a decline fueled by homelessness, mental health issues, and multiple arrests.

This does not excuse Neely’s actions. Where was Jordan’s absentee father, Andre Zachary when his son needed him?

Well, we know where he is now, filing a lawsuit against Daniel Penny, seeking a payday!

Question: Why won’t the same voices claiming Penny is racist say something about Neely’s father? Isn’t that just part of enabling this culture of fatherlessness?

STONESTREET: Yeah, I mean, I think it's a great question. It's a question that a lot of people aren't willing to ask, and it's because the dominant mood of the left is one of critical theory: basically, that this has to be explained in racial terms. It certainly doesn't explain the thing that's universal to the human experience, and that is that we're born with moms and dads. Children, no matter what the race is of the child who have moms and dads in the home, overwhelmingly outperform on almost every measurable category, children who are subjected to being orphaned or fatherless.

Look, the system itself failed after that. You know, this progressive idea that we don't actually address mental illness, we don't actually address anti-social behavior, we don't actually call it that. It just escalated over and over and finally, you know, reached this point. This example, this story, is an example that this inability is not just with individuals, it's on a societal level. It's tragic.

EICHER: I wonder about the Daniel Penny side of the case, John. I wonder, really do, even though he was acquitted, I wonder whether the message sent is, don’t get involved. Too costly.

Of course, the jury heard all the evidence and acquitted him, but consider the cost, the risk. To listen to him tell his story, he restrained Neely because clearly people felt threatened. Penny had training, knew how to handle himself. But I wonder whether this ordeal, and others like it, changes the equation.

STONESTREET: Well, you know, I keep thinking of the biblical narrative of "woe to those who call right wrong and wrong right." The Bible says that that's possible, not only for individuals, but actually entire societies. Romans 1 certainly gives that implication.

I was thinking about that this week, in light of this case, and in light of C.S. Lewis's argument in Mere Christianity for the existence of moral norms that are universal and knowable. Remember, he uses this example where he says that some societies might fight for this, some societies might fight for that, but no society rewards someone from running away from the battle instead of running to it.

Now, this is an example of us, right? I mean, here you have somebody running into the fight instead of running away from it, and he's called the bad guy. You kind of think, well, Lewis's example here falls apart now. You know, early 21st century modern culture, I think it testifies to the truthfulness of the scripture that we actually can when we're untethered from God, the untethered from reality itself. So it is stunning that, you know, kind of a classic argument for the existence of universal morality can be shown to be incorrect in our context, because we are that untethered to begin with.

EICHER: Do you think Penny is a hero?

STONESTREET: You know, I don't know that I know all the details, or anyone knows. I mean, I think we jump sides, you know, pretty quickly on this. I think he was willing to do a hard thing. I think he was willing to step in and protect. Did all of his actions pass muster? That I can't say, but the impulse to protect other people, yeah, that is the right thing. That is what civil society is really made of. It's not just made of the state acting on the state's behalf. But actually people taking personal responsibility, both for themselves and their neighbors, and that impulse was at least present in what Penny did. So I guess I don't have to think that he did everything right, to think he did the right thing in this situation. In a fallen world, sometimes the right thing has tragic consequences.

That's my best read on this without knowing all the details.

EICHER: All right, now let’s look at a clear case of vigilantism, if the reporting turns out to be accurate, and a trial establishes the facts: The murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson. The news this week is the arrest of the prime suspect, Luigi Mangione, the alleged killer. But the response, my goodness. Senator Elizabeth Warren … a U-S senator saying, you know, these rich CEOs, they can only push people so far and then they start to take matters into their own hands. Really sounded like a justification. We had a piece in WORLD Opinions this week saying it’s not just the left but some on the right saying things like this about the elites better watch their backs. Now, Warren walked this back, but she said what she said. Something of the same I heard on Piers Morgan former Washington Post reporter Taylor Lorenz saying she took joy from the killing. This is a little frightening.

STONESTREET: Well, look, I think when this story of the murder of the health United Healthcare CEO is put together with the story of Jordan Neely and Daniel Penny, it is a striking critique on the fact that we are clearly untethered from reality. I thought that the most powerful media coverage this week, in addition to hearing someone like Taylor Lorenz actually say that seeing someone murdered brought her joy, and that that is supposed to be an acceptable position.

EICHER: Well, of course, she was fired from Vox for saying that.

STONESTREET: She did get fired. I mean, you know, look, and I, my guess is this was kind of the last straw, and a whole series of just upside down ways of saying things.

But Scott Jennings on CNN, you know, basically said, I'm gonna make this as simple as possible for you. You know, here's my chart. And he had good guy and bad guy, good guy being, you know, Daniel Penny and bad guy being, you know, this murderer—seeing that that actually is not the way a lot of people see it.

An underpinning of this, both for Taylor Lorenz, but also with this murderer, is the bankruptcy of education as a solution to our problems. In a kind of a scientific and a post scientific age, there's this sense that, you know, ignorance is the real source of evil, and education is the real magic.

Now, education is a magic of which the world kind of hasn't seen in terms of lifting people out of poverty and so on. But make no mistake, the greatest thinkers on education, from the very beginning have been really clear: Getting a great education, or getting an elite education, as is in the case with this murderer, does not make you moral. Your moral problem is not ignorance. Your moral problem is deeper than that. Therefore, education does not fix your moral bankruptcy. It can actually worsen it.

There's the classic line from D.L. Moody, if you take someone who steals railroad ties and you give them an education, you've taught them to steal the entire railroad the next time. And Luther said something you know really similar, is that it can basically make us just a whole lot better at being bad.

You think about what we know—which isn't much yet—but what we know about this shooter and the arrogance and the elitism by which this person knows better, and so therefore I'm not subject to your laws.

There's a whole tradition to this. Clarence Darrow, the attorney in the Scopes Monkey Trial, made his name by defending two brothers who murdered their parents, and he got them off of the death penalty in 1920s by basically saying, This is how they were educated. They read too much Frederick Nietzsche. I mean, this is an astonishing sort of history that there is a fundamental flaw in modern education.

The word education means to lead out of. That's educare, that kind of Latin root. So historically, education has been understood to mean to lead someone out of ignorance and into truth. But that assumes there is an objective truth. You get rid of the objective truth, then education is not leading someone out of themselves, out of their ignorance. In fact, education today is leading someone further and further into themselves. Follow your heart, you know.

Turning ignorant students into activists and thinking that's what gives them an education. Well, this guy just thought he was the ultimate activist. Now, don't get me wrong, a whole lot of people go through that same education and never end up doing this, but the ideas that he embraced were consistent with what he had been taught. He just took it to the extreme.

So I think we have an indictment here with these stories on both how we think about morality and how we think about education.

EICHER: Again, again, nothing’s been proven. We have to put “alleged” in front of “killer.” Don’t get us in trouble here. He gets a trial.

STONESTREET: No, that's fair. Sure that's absolutely fair.

BROWN: John Stonestreet is president of the Colson Center and host of the Breakpoint podcast. Thank you John!

STONESTREET: Thank you both.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: Today is Friday, December 13th.

Thank you for turning to WORLD Radio to help start your day.

Good morning. I’m Myrna Brown.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher.

Coming next on The World and Everything in It: moviegoers get the chance to return to Middle-earth.

This weekend, a new animated feature film based on one of J.R.R. Tolkien’s lesser known tales debuts in theaters. Here’s arts and culture editor Collin Garbarino.

COLLIN GARBARINO: A little more than 20 years ago, Warner Bros.’ New Line Cinema and Peter Jackson took J.R.R. Tolkien’s fantasy masterpiece The Lord of the Rings and adapted its 1200 pages into an epic trilogy that spanned 9 hours and 18 minutes. A decade later, Jackson took the 300 or so pages of The Hobbit and created another trilogy that runs to almost eight hours. And, of course, there are even longer versions of these trilogies, if you can suffer through them. Then a couple of years ago, Amazon and New Line Cinema created a multi-season series called The Rings of Power from a little over 100 pages’ worth of appendices found at the back of Tolkien’s The Return of the King. How many more hours of adaptation can be squeezed out of ever-slimmer page counts? New Line is aiming to find out.

EOWYN: All Middle-earth knows the tale of the War of the Ring. But there are older tales.

The studio’s latest offering is The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim, a 2-hour-10-minute animated movie based on a mere two and a half pages from one of Tolkien’s appendices. This definitely sets a new record for runtime-to-page-count ratio.

The film is set on the plains of Rohan, and it takes place 200 years before Jackson’s movies. It purports to tell the story of Helm Hammerhand, the namesake of Helm’s Deep, the fortress that played such a prominent role in The Two Towers. Helm might be king, but the real hero of the movie is his daughter Héra, a headstrong shieldmaiden with fiery red hair.

EOWYN: By her hand, many great deeds were done. But do not look for tales of her in the old songs. There are none.

That voiceover at the film’s beginning serves to warn you that most of what follows doesn’t have much to do with what Tolkien wrote, so don’t bother reading those two and a half pages.

The action begins when an unsuitable suitor named Wulf asks for Héra’s hand in marriage, but neither Helm nor his daughter seem inclined to grant his request.

HÉRA: I have no thoughts of marriage at all. Our fathers speak as if I were not even in the room.

Wulf becomes an implacable enemy of the Rohirrim. He launches an attack, seeking revenge against Helm, Héra and the rest of their family. The Rohirrim resist the onslaught before fleeing to Helm’s Deep where they must outlast a siege during a bitter winter that takes its toll on both sides.

HELM HAMMERHAND: We will paint the dawn red with the blood of our foes.

Even though this film is animated, it’s not necessarily for kids. It’s rated PG-13 for strong violence. But perhaps the most curious aspect of The War of the Rohirrim is the studio’s decision to render it using Japanese animation. Veteran anime director Kenji Kamiyama filmed the actors with motion capture and then used computer 3D renderings as the basis for his 2D hand-drawn scenes. It makes for some interesting imagery, but there’s a visual dissonance between Kamiyama’s Japanese style and the northern European culture of Tolkien’s Rohirrim. While everyone else in the film is garbed in some medieval-ish garb, Héra runs around in an outfit that looks straight out of the futuristic anime Attack on Titan.

So, why would the studio want to make a Lord of the Rings anime?

I suspect New Line’s reasoning went something like this: “Nerds like Tolkien, and nerds like anime; therefore, nerds will love a Tolkien anime.” I have my doubts as to whether this syllogism is sound.

OLWYN: This is your plan?

HERA: I never said it was a good one.

The movie attempts to tie the story to Jackson’s original trilogy, but I can’t imagine passing fans will be tempted to watch an anime about this obscure battle.

HELM HAMMERHAND: Riders of the Mark! Brothers of Rohan! Arise!

And Tolkien die-hards are likely to be offended by the script that takes excessive liberties with Helm’s story. In Tolkien’s two and a half pages, Helm’s daughter doesn’t even get a name, and she certainly isn’t the hero. She’s merely the spark that starts the war. Tolkien’s story is a tragedy without a happy ending, but in this story, Héra saves the day because she’s super awesome.

HERA: I need you. Rohan still needs you.

HELM HAMMERHAND: No, Héra. They need you. You must lead them now.

When writers abandon Tolkien to supposedly improve the story, they usually come up with something much worse. Héra’s adventure in this film feels entirely derivative. It’s like a pastiche of Eowyn’s story from The Return of the King melded with various warrior-princess clichés from other media.

I don’t think New Line really understands who its target audience is with this film, especially all those Tolkien fans who value fidelity over trendiness.

I’m Collin Garbarino.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: Today is Friday, December 13th. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Myrna Brown.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher. Up next: Turning mourning into dancing. The Notre Dame Cathedral is once again open to the public. WORLD’s Mary Muncy reports.

AUDIO: [CHORAL SINGING]

MARY MUNCY: Last Saturday, Parisians filled the pews of the Notre Dame for the first time in more than five years.

MARY VONNE: [SPEAKING FRENCH] We thought it was over for the Notre Dame, and we see that it could be reborn.

Parisian Mary Vonne thought it was over for the iconic cathedral, but she says: “it’s been reborn.”

More than five years ago, on April 15th, 2019, an evening mass was underway when an alarm began to sound during the service. The priest thought it was a false alarm. But the building manager evacuated the cathedral…just in case.

Twenty minutes later, a second alarm. This time, there was no mistake the roof was on fire.

An hour and a half after that first alarm, onlookers gasped as the spire collapsed into the sanctuary below.

Two-thirds of the roof was destroyed, but nearly all the priceless art, religious artifacts, and stained glass windows were saved.

The restoration project required more than 2,000 skilled artisans to not only rebuild the roof and spire, but repair damaged stone work, clean and retune 8,000 organ pipes, and recreate 1,500 solid oak pews.

The workers used traditional materials and techniques—though a handful of modern fire prevention and detection upgrades are a part of the new design.

AFP estimates the total restoration cost was nearly $740 million dollars, most of which came from a handful of French billionaires.

Last week, Macron and thousands of contractors, tradesmen, and their families got an inside peek at the restoration. Macron tearfully thanked them all:

EMMANUEL MACRON: [FRENCH] Don’t forget that you repaired, that you contributed to reinvent, that you loved this place and that you rebuilt it. Don’t forget that during these five years of your life, you shared together, without a doubt, the most beautiful project of the century. And do not forget the thanks I give to you, but also your families, because I am aware of the sacrifices they agreed on so that you can keep this promise of rebuilding Notre-Dame within five years – you did it. And this is an immense pride for the entire nation.

He says that they should never forget what they contributed to the project of the century. The nation is proud of them and appreciates their sacrifice.

Then, last weekend.

SOUND: [NOTRE DAME BELL]

The bells of the Notre Dame rang out across the city for the first time in five years. And on the rainy, cold Saturday thousands of people gathered outside the cathedral.

ERNA ZIP: [FRENCH] It's magnificent, I'm full of emotion and I'm just happy.

Erna Zip says it’s magnificent and that she’s full of emotion: She’s just happy.

IBRAHIM HOSSEIN: [FRENCH] Seeing it again five years after is extraordinary! I was sad, it's true, the day the fire broke out. But now... happiness comes sooner or later. I'm so happy!

Ibrahim Hossein says seeing it again after five years is extraordinary.

The two watched…

SOUND: [OPENING THE DOORS]

…as the archbishop of Paris opened the doors.

About 2,500 people entered for the first service since the fire, while the rest watched the ceremonies from screens outside. They all listened as the principal organist awoke the Great Organ.

Then the Notre Dame choir chanted the office and a final blessing…

HENRI CHALET: [FRENCH] It's been more than five-and-a-half years that we have been homeless.

Choir director Henri Chalet says they’ve been homeless for five and a half years.

CECELIA DE VARGUS [FRENCH]: Despite the horrible thing that happened, there's still a positive side, seeing how all the people, all the French people sought to rebuild the cathedral with such speed.

But choir member Cecelia Vargus says some good has come of it. She saw the French people work together to rebuild the cathedral.

The church opened to the public on Sunday evening. Elzario Bandiera attended the first open mass.

ELZIARIO BANDIERA: [FRENCH] It reminds me of Christ's passage from death to resurrection, with the fire, the collapse, all the time it took for things to pick up again. So it kind of echoes our lives, everything we go through, our failures, when we're lying there on the ground and then we take time, we step back, we let ourselves be rebuilt, the cathedral let itself be rebuilt.

He says Notre Dame’s restoration echoes our life in Christ—moving from death to life. Sometimes we fail, lie on the ground for a time, but then Christ lifts us up again… just like the cathedral.

For WORLD, I’m Mary Muncy.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: Up next, the Music of Advent.

NICK EICHER, HOST: This Sunday marks the third week of Advent. For the last two weeks, Christians around the world have been preparing for—and reflecting on—the coming of Christ.

At the close of each Friday program this month correspondent Bonnie Pritchett is guiding us through a selection of Advent songs and hymns.

BROWN: We’re collecting them into a Spotify Playlist and are keeping it updated throughout the season so you can find the music for your own enjoyment. We’ve included the link to that in today’s transcript at wng.org/podcasts. 

BONNIE PRITCHETT: Throughout the Old Testament—from Genesis to Malachi—God promises to send the Messiah. As the Hebrew scriptures draw to a close the prophet Malachi addressed God’s wayward people: Destruction awaits those who abandon God.

To those who fear his name, God had another message.

SONG: BUT FOR YOU WHO FEAR MY NAME

LYRIC: [BANJO] You shall be my very own on the day that I caused you to be my special home. I shall spare you as a man has compassion on his son who does the best he can…

The husband-and-wife duo, Vito and Monique Aiuto, perform under the name The Welcome Wagon. Their 2008 release, But for you who fear my name, highlights the Messianic prophecies in Malachi chapters 3 and 4.

LYRIC: But for you who fear my name the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in his wings. And you shall go forth again, skip about like calves coming from their stalls at last...

God’s promises resonate in Malachi’s short book: “The sun of righteousness will rise.” “You will go out leaping like calves.”

SONG: O COME, O COME, EMMANUEL

And those promises echoed through 400 silent years of waiting.

LYRIC: O come, o come, Emmanuel and ransom captive Israel that mourns in lonely exile here until the Son of God appears…

While the hymn O Come, O Come, Emmanuel calls out on Israel’s behalf, this choral ensemble of English, Arabic, and Hebrew singers reminds us that through Israel’s Messiah the whole world will be blessed.

SINGING IN ARABIC

Jewish and Arab Christians, compose the Israel-based ministry One for Israel. The organization produced this album in 2023 called Peace on Earth, Goodwill Toward Men.

LYRIC: [SINGING IN HEBREW] Rejoice, rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee, o Israel…

Malachi and Isaiah prophesied that God would send a messenger to prepare the way for Emmanuel’s arrival. The band, the Calendar Years, tells the story of John the Baptist in this 2014 release called Herald, in the Wilderness.

SONG: HERALD, IN THE WILDERNESS

LYRIC: Herald, in the wilderness breaking up the road. Sinking mountains, raising plains for the path of God. Prophet to the multitudes calling to repent in the way of righteousness unto Israel sent. A voice in the wilderness…

In his 1867 hymn pastor Henry Alford recounts John’s calls for repentance and his declaration that Jesus is the Lamb of God. Alford also tells the price John paid for his faithfulness and suggests the wilderness of our world still needs heralds.

LYRIC: Holy Jesus, when he heard went apart to pray. Thus, may we our lesson take from his saint today. A voice in the wilderness. A voice calling out. A song of a child, a king. Prepare ye the way of the Lord…

For WORLD, I’m Bonnie Pritchett

LYRIC: A voice in the wilderness. A voice calling out. A song of a child, a king prepare ye the way of the Lord. Prepare ye the way of the Lord. Prepare ye the way of the Lord.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Well, it’s time to say thanks to the team members who helped put the program together this week:

Mary Reichard, David Bahnsen, Emma Perley, Mary Muncy, Caleb Welde, Amy Lewis, Joe Rigney, Leo Briceno, Carolina Lumetta, Onize Oduah, Leah Savas, Janie B. Cheaney, Addie Offereins, Anna Johansen Brown, Emma Freire, Cal Thomas, John Stonestreet, Collin Garbarino, and Bonnie Pritchett.

Thanks also to our breaking news team: Kent Covington, Mark Mellinger, Lynde Langdon, Travis Kircher, Lauren Canterberry, Christina Grube, and Josh Schumacher.

Thanks to the guys who stay up late to get the program to you early, Johnny Franklin and Carl Peetz.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: Our producers are Paul Butler, Kristen Flavin, and Harrison Watters, with assistance from Lauren Dunn and Benj Eicher.

The World and Everything in It comes to you from WORLD Radio. WORLD’s mission is Biblically objective journalism that informs, educates, and inspires.

The Bible says: “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen….By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.” —Hebrews 11:1, 3

Be sure and worship with your brothers and sisters in Christ in church on the Lord’s Day! And, Lord willing, we’ll meet you right back here on Monday.

Go now in grace and peace.

WORLD Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of WORLD Radio programming is the audio record.