The World and Everything in It: November 26, 2024

PREROLL: Israeli Aviva Siegel spent 51 days as a hostage in Gaza. This weekend she spoke with WORLD about the horrific crimes she witnessed there. I’m Travis Kircher. And in a moment, we’ll have her story. Stay with us.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Good morning!

With a more Israel-friendly administration coming in, might that be leverage for President Biden to get a hostage deal with Hamas?

We’ll talk to an expert.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Also today, we’ll hear that firsthand account from an Israeli woman taken hostage on October 7th.

SIEGEL: I know exactly what it's like—what it feels—and it's the worst thing that any human being should go through.

And later we’ll meet a composer who finds inspiration in creation.

FORREST: One of the best things I do is just get out back here and, and work in the garden. And it's the exact opposite of everything that I do in the office…

REICHARD: It’s Tuesday, November 26th. This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Mary Reichard.

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

REICHARD: It’s time now for the news. Here’s Kent Covington.

KENT COVINGTON, NEWS ANCHOR: Israel latest » The White House says a ceasefire agreement to halt fighting between Israel and Hezbollah may be close.

National Security Council spokesman John Kirby:

KIRBY: The conversations that I almost had, uh, were very positive. Um, and we, as I said earlier, we believe the trajectory is, is going in the right direction here to potentially, uh, getting the ceasefire done.

The agreement reportedly calls for a 60-day ceasefire that could bring peace, at least temporarily, in Lebanon and along Israel’s northern border.

Hezbollah has been firing rockets into Israel since the start of the war in Gaza last year. And Israeli forces launched a ground invasion in Lebanon in October.

Israeli Ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon:

DANON:  Our goal was very clear, which is to push Hezbollah north, uh, of the Litany River. Um, we haven't finalized it, but we are moving forward.

Israeli officials said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security Cabinet was set to convene today to discuss the proposal.

One of the last sticking points has reportedly been that Israel wants more guarantees to make sure that Hezbollah's weapons are fully removed from the border.

House committee to work with DOGE » In Washington, House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer says Republicans are ready to drop the ax on government waste when Donald Trump returns to the White House in January.

COMER:   We want to start with, uh, getting the new Department of Government Efficiencies back and the President's back, uh, with, uh, codifying legislation, passing legislation, uh, we want the President to start off with as many executive orders as possible in, uh, being able to reduce the size of government.

A new House subcommittee is set to work closely with the Department of Government Efficiency. Business leaders Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy will lead that department which will be an independent office, not a government agency.

Tennessee Congressman Tim Burchett calls it an opportunity to tackle the debt crisis.

BURCHETT:  We're printing money. We're borrowing money from our great grandchildren right now. Every hundred days, we add a trillion dollars to the debt and nobody has a plan to pay it back. I think this would at least stop some of that, that debt being piled on.

The national debt has now topped $36 trillion dollars with the government set to add another $2 trillion to the debt in this fiscal year.

Immigration fight » Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Green will lead that aforementioned subcommittee.

And she says some of the first federal spending cuts could come in places where local and state governments refuse to cooperate with federal immigration law.

GREEN: Absolutely. Those, those, uh, sanctuary states and cities are in danger of losing their federal funding and rightfully so.

Officials in blue states and cities are gearing up for legal fights over funding cuts.

Many migrants are racing to reach the US southern border before Trump takes office. Border officials say they’re still seeing many children show up without a guardian, including some as young as 2 years old, brought to the border by traffickers.

And a whistleblower is speaking out about the fate of many migrant children. Tara Rodas is a former employee of the Department of Health and Human Services.

RODAS: The truth is that children have been handed over to criminals, to traffickers, and to members of transnational criminal organizations to include MS 13, 18th Street Gang.

Virginia migrant rape suspect » Meantime, in Virginia a case with  shades of the highly publicized Laken Riley murder case in Georgia.

Police have arrested an illegal Honduran migrant for allegedly raping a woman on a hiking trail outside Washington, D.C. just days after he was released from jail on a separate sex charge.

Herndon, Virginia Police Chief Maggie Deboard:

DEBOARD: There has to be a priority to remove anyone who is committing violent acts against the community.

She says criminals must be held accountable the first time.

The suspect, Dennis Romero, has reportedly been accused of multiple sex attacks in Herndon.

Republican Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin is outraged that Fairfax County officials released Romero after his first offense, rather than turning him over Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Jack Smith Trump cases » Special counsel Jack Smith has moved to drop two cases against Donald Trump … as the president-elect prepares to return to the White House. WORLD’s Kristen Flavin reports:

KRISTEN FLAVIN: Smith’s office is winding down the cases and closing up shop. In court filings on Monday, the prosecutors cited longstanding Justice Department policy that says sitting presidents cannot face criminal prosecution.

They said the decision has nothing to do with the strength of the cases or the evidence against Donald Trump.

One of the cases being abandoned accused Trump of election interference. The other involved his retention of classified documents after leaving office.

The president-elect has called those cases and others … purely political.

Steven Cheung, Trump's incoming White House communications director, said Americans “want an immediate end to the political weaponization of our justice system and we look forward to uniting our country.”

For WORLD, I’m Kristen Flavin.

White House Christmas tree » It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas at the White House.

First lady Jill Biden received the official White House Christmas tree. The 19 foot Fraser fir came from Cartner’s Christmas Tree Farm in an area of western North Carolina devastated by Hurricane Helene.

JILL-BIDEN: The Cartner Family lost thousands of trees in the storm.

But she said, “this one remained standing and they named it ‘Tremendous’ for the extraordinary hope that it represents.”

I'm Kent Covington.

Straight ahead: the harrowing story of an Israeli grandmother held hostage by Hamas for more than 50 days.

Plus, what a new administration may mean for hostages that remain.

This is The World and Everything in It.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: It’s Tuesday the 26th of November.

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

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

Up first, Middle East dealmaking.

Efforts to get a cease-fire in Lebanon and also free Americans held hostage in Gaza have a new urgency with the Trump administration due in in less than two months.

President -elect Trump’s pick for National Security Adviser Mike Waltz made his priorities clear.

WALTZ: We still have seven American citizens being held hostage in the tunnels of Gaza. By the time of inauguration day, they will have been held longer than the Iranians held our hostages in 1979.

Where do negotiations stand now, and how might the transition in power play a role? Joining us now is Richard Goldberg. He’s a former member of the National Security Council staff, and now a senior advisor at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

REICHARD: Rich, good morning.

RICH GOLDBERG: Good morning.

REICHARD: Well, let’s talk about the cards the Biden administration is holding…do they have leverage to secure a deal to release hostages in the next two months?

GOLDBERG: Well, it's always possible to use leverage, especially there's leverage in the fact that you have an incoming administration and you have an unpredictability of policy, especially if you believe that the policy will turn more hawkish. That to mean more supportive of Israel, more hostile towards Israel's detractors in the region. So that gives you a little bit of oxygen to use to say to different actors, "Hey, you know us. You don't know what you're going to get under a Trump administration." Why don't you use all your leverage now that you may not have used over the last year and get us some sort of a deal on terms that the Israelis might believe are good and favorable to them, so that we can have a hostage deal, that we can bring the Americans back. So yes, there are opportunities. The President is still the president. He still has all the levers of power. He's the Commander in Chief of the military. He can impose sanctions, but all of those decisions can be erased on January 20, so it cuts both ways.

REICHARD: MM-hm. Let’s talk about Trump’s team now…two of his early appointments included former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee as Ambassador to Israel, and and Congresswoman Elise Stefanik as Ambassador to the UN. Add to that Mike Waltz for National Security Advisor and Senator Marco Rubio for Secretary of State. What do these picks say to you about how the United States’ Middle East policy is likely to change now?

GOLDBERG: This is a team that really reflects a few doctrines. Number one, peace through strength. Number two, strong, robust support for Israel and not showing any daylight between these two allies, Washington and Jerusalem. And number three, strong support for maximum pressure on Iran, and understanding that the root cause of instability in the region is caused by the Islamic Republic in Iran, and not caused by some sort of Israeli-Palestinian conflict, as has been the lens of the Obama administration, the Biden administration and previous administrations over the last few decades. That means you get back into the recipe book for how you restore stability, how you bring about peace through strength. I think it means you will see a shift for Israel, as far as not withholding weapons, ensuring there is political support constantly, both publicly from the White House podium, from the State Department and at the UN Security Council, and then also looking for ways to pressure Iran and constrain both Tehran and its proxies. So both from Governor Huckabee, who's going there as ambassador to Israel, somebody who is known to be a pretty strong voice in support of Israel. The joke, of course, going around, is that it might be the first US ambassador to Israel who lobbies the Israeli government to be more pro-Israel. But obviously he's a voice that is sent by the President to speak and communicate to Israelis. I think it's an important voice right now, after Israelis have seen a year of street protests of pro Hamas supporters on campuses, in the streets, harassment of Jews the United States, the burning of Israeli and American flags, a worry of what direction the country is going in here, you're going to have somebody who represents the United States, reassuring the Israelis that America stands with them strongly, at the same time coming on American television from Jerusalem and explaining and articulating to the American people why it's so important to support Israel while we see this lunge leftwards in certain elements of the American body politic. So I think an important pick in its own right.

REICHARD: Wondering what you are hearing from America’s adversaries to indicate how they perceive Trump’s team? Do they see this next administration as a real threat to them?

GOLDBERG: Well, I think that in the Iranians, you are seeing a change already. They have not followed through on what had been, apparently a public threat to respond militarily to Israel for the last military strike that Israel had conducted inside of Iran. There still may be something smaller that might come. But clearly, the Supreme Leader has been shaken a little bit in his decision making by President Trump returning to office, potentially to rebuild the maximum pressure campaign. So I think you're already seeing those signals change. They're also starting to signal their interest in potential nuclear talks. Now, I think that's a lot of a trap potentially being laid for the president-elect, which he'll see through, but still telling that they have not been offering those talks to the Biden administration now signaling that as President Trump's coming to office. So yes, I think that just the election is having an impact in foreign policy, but what matters will be what the president decides to do on day one in office, to follow through on the perception, to ensure that he is not just a transition deterrent, but he is a deterrent as president as well.

REICHARD: Richard Goldberg is a former member of the National Security Council staff, and now a senior advisor at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Richard, we appreciate your time with us. Thank you.

GOLDBERG: You bet.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Coming up next on The World and Everything in It: trapped in Gaza.

Now, a word of warning: this is a tough story. Difficult subject matter and maybe too graphic for younger listeners. If you have children nearby, it might be well to scroll forward about 7 minutes and come back later. But do come back later! This is a powerful story.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: It’s a story that stems from the October 7th attacks over a year ago, when Hamas tore through Israeli settlements and killed roughly 1,200 people. They also took more than 240 hostages back to Gaza. Among them Aviva Siegel … and she’s speaking out about the horrors she witnessed.

WORLD Reporter Travis Kircher brings you her story in the first of a two-part series.

SIEGEL: I was born in South Africa, and I was brought to Israel with my mom when I was nine years old. We lived in a little town…

TRAVIS KIRCHER: Aviva Siegel has spent most of her life living on what’s called a kibbutz. It’s a sort of close-knit farming community unique to Israel.

SIEGEL: People just live together in a very quiet place that all you can hear and see is green and trees and flowers and birds and lots of dogs and cats and lots of just lovely people that want to be together.

She met her future husband Keith on a kibbutz. She was doing the mandatory year of community service required of all Israeli citizens before serving in the military. Keith was a volunteer from Chapel Hill, North Carolina, visiting his brother. They hit it off.

SIEGEL: Keith is a lovely, lovely, lovely, sweet, gentle person. I fell in love with him in two seconds…He was supposed to study in university, and he decided to stay and to get married to me.

That wedding took place when she was 20 and he was 22. They eventually moved to the Kfar Aza kibbutz. It had a lot of young people. It was also a mere four miles from the Gaza border. There was the occasional rocket attack from the other side, but no one worried about a large-scale massacre.

SIEGEL: I don't know—understand—how so many people, I mean, thousands of people living so close to Gaza, and we knew how dangerous it was, but nobody really thought that something like that can happen.

But on October 7th, 2023, after they’d lived there for more than four decades it did.

SIEGEL: I knew that something really, really bad is happening. It felt like it was the end of the world. And my house, because it's so close, shaked.

Siegel says it started in the early morning hours with rocket attacks. She and Keith got out of bed and ran to their bomb shelter in their pajamas. That’s when they encountered Hamas terrorists.

SIEGEL: I was shaking. Keith was trying to calm me down, and then we heard them shooting the house, walking inside, and 15 terrorists just opening the door of the shelter. I stood up and screamed, and I know today that that's what saved our lives. They took us in such a brutal way. They tore Keith’s shirt and they pushed us, and Keith fell, and they broke his ribs, and they were shooting us. One of the bullets hit Keith's hand.

Then they forced them into a vehicle and drove them the short distance to Gaza.

SIEGEL: They took us in Keith’s car with a terrorist with a knife in front of my face and a gun in front of Keith and I.

Aviva says one moment sticks out in her mind: seeing the reactions of the people on the streets of Gaza when they arrived.

SIEGEL: All Gaza was standing outside, clapping their hands shooting in the air, shouting in Arabic, welcoming us while we were shaking and didn't understand what's happening to us. And they received us, knowing that we're coming.

The terrorists took them into underground tunnels. Siegel says that was especially hard for her because she’s always been afraid of the dark.

SIEGEL: I'll never forget the terrorists looking at me from underneath the ground and calling me and saying, “Come!” while I'm shaking, while the ladder shaking with me. And I went before Keith to look after Keith, and he looked after me when he was walking behind me

Aviva and Keith were now two of more than 240 Israeli hostages trapped in Gaza. And as the drama would play out on television screens across the world the horror for them was just beginning.

SIEGEL: The worst thing for me is when they tortured Keith they tortured Keith all the time, I don't know, because he's a man, maybe, and it was so hard for me to see that and try not to be too emotional, because I wasn't allowed to cry. Keith, with his ribs broken, begged them during the day just to lie down to relax his pain, and they laughed.

While in captivity they would hear heartbreaking stories of the massacre from their fellow hostages. Like the mother who said Hamas militants shot both her husband and daughter in front of her children.

SIEGEL: The kids were—one was nine, one was 11, and one was 17. They just had seen their father dead in front of their eyes, and their sister was shot in her face just because she fainted.

She says she personally witnessed sexual abuse.

SIEGEL: That was a terrible, terrible moment, because I've got the feeling that it could happen to me and it could happen to Keith, and it could happen all the time, because they just did whatever they want to, whenever they want to.

But there’s one memory that haunts her to this day: that of a young woman—a fellow hostage. The terrorists accused her of lying then in Aviva’s words beat her to pieces.

SIEGEL: And when she came back…she sat like a little child, crying and shaking, and I couldn't get up to help her, because I wasn't allowed to hug. And that was a very difficult moment for me, because I'm a mother. I felt like their mothers, and I wanted to protect them, and I could not.

Aviva learned later that Kfar Aza—the kibbutz that was her home—lost 64 people on October 7^th many of whom were burnt alive, raped, or shot. And of those 64 people, she knew nearly all of them personally.

But she didn’t know any of this yet. For now, she and her husband Keith were imprisoned underground. Trapped in Gaza. Hearing the lies Hamas was telling them over and over and over again.

SIEGEL: They're going to kill us, and that we'll never, ever go back because there's no Israel anymore, and we're just going to stay there, and we've been forgotten, and the whole world is just bombing Israel. There's no Israel left.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Travis Kircher.

REICHARD: Tomorrow, the rest of Aviva Seigel’s story, including how she got out, what she’s saying to U.S. leaders, and her response to criticism of Israel.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Tuesday, November 26th.

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

Good morning. I’m Mary Reichard.

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

Coming next on The World and Everything in It: a soundtrack for the Creation story.

Writing choral music is all in a day’s work for composer Dan Forrest. Recently, he wrote a 72-minute composition inspired by the Creation story. Here’s WORLD’s Bekah McCallum.

BEKAH MCCALLUM, REPORTER: When he gets in a creative rut, Dan Forrest heads outside. What was a pandemic project morphed into a garden with a Narnia-style lamp post and even a brook with a footbridge.

FORREST: One of the best things I do is just get out back here and, and work in the garden. And it's the exact opposite of everything that I do in the office there because it's tangible, it's visible, it's still creating beauty. So, in a sense, I’m still doing the same thing, but I’m kind of doing it more immediately.

When Forrest isn’t gardening—or visiting gardens—he’s a full-time choral music composer. His arrangements and compositions have been performed by groups like Voces8 and the Brigham Young University Choir.

His best-known work, Requiem for the Living, has been performed over a thousand times since it debuted in 2013. His most significant accomplishment is an oratorio or choral piece with orchestral accompaniment. It’s called Creation. He describes the work as a soundtrack of sorts for Genesis 1 and 2.

It’s not the first oratorio to take its cue from the story of how God made the world.

HAYDN And God made the firmament and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the water which were above the firmament. And it was so.

Over 225 years ago, German composer Joseph Haydn wrote Die Schopfung or The Creation.

FORREST: It's um it’s this venerable piece of choral repertoire that's been around for 225 years, and people still sing it. There's probably dozens of performances every year still, in the US, let alone worldwide. It’s lasted so long.

Inspired by Haydn, Forrest decided to compose a contemporary version while giving his own oratorio a sense of permanence. That’s part of why much of the text for Forrest’s Creation comes from Latin liturgies.

FORREST: So I'm trying to make these ties to the past, both textually and musically. There are these things that come back that Christians have been singing this hymn for over a millennium.

You can hear that here in his first movement as the choir chants “Veni, Creator Spiritus” or “Come, Holy Spirit, Creator.”

There are twelve movements in all. Forrest divides the oratorio in three main sections: the Godhead, the days of Creation, and a final celebration of everything that God calls good.

The deep bass solo in movement three might remind attentive listeners of a beloved story.

FORREST: You can't really set CS Lewis to music, because the estate won't allow it. But CS Lewis described what Aslan's song was like in that chapter of The Magician's Nephew, and I tried to embody the song.

For the movements about the days of Creation, Forrest didn’t want to just copy-and-paste the text from Genesis 1 and 2.

FORREST: I didn't want to write like: “In the beginning, God created light, and there was light, and the evening and the morning for the first day, bom bom.” That's more like the 1800s approach.

Instead, the pieces take their cue from the day of Creation they represent. Here’s an excerpt from the movement called “Deep Blue.”

The oratorio’s energy gradually builds until the final two movements. Movement 11 is titled “Do It Again,” and the lyrics are based on a poem by G.K. Chesterton.

DO IT AGAIN: It may not be necessity that makes all daisies alike. Perhaps God makes every daisy one at a time because he never grown tired of making them.

For Forrest, composing Creation took much longer than 6 days. Almost a year after the oratorio first premiered, he was still tweaking the score. It hasn’t helped that he’s his own worst critic and, in his words, a “classic overthinker.” The music could challenge audiences as well.

FORREST: It's one thing to write a little four minute piece to be sung as part of a worship service. It's another thing to try to hang on to people, especially in the 21st century with their attention spans for this long, for 70 some minutes.

Since Creation could be tricky for choral groups to perform, Forrest has to reckon with the fact that it might not be quite as well-received as some of his other works.

FORREST: Whether mine makes it or not, you know, only time will tell, maybe we'll have three or four performances, and everybody will be like, it's too long, and it's too hard. And you don't want to do it. The goal is hopefully not, haha.

Forrest certainly wants the oratorio to stand the test of time. But regardless, he hopes that whenever it’s performed it will point his listeners to Christ.

FORREST: Beauty doesn't redeem us. But it can point us to the fact that we long for redemption, and that there is a Redeemer to be had.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Today is Tuesday, November 26th. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Nick Eicher.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard. Thanksgiving is the day after tomorrow, and the countdown to Christmas is on. Commentator Steve Watters has a suggestion on how to slow down and make this time meaningful.

STEVE WATTERS, COMMENTATOR: I still remember as a kid being confused by the lyrics of “It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas.” The song starts well as Bing Crosby lists the many decorations, traditions, and toys of the season.

But just before the chorus he throws in the odd line: “And mom and dad can hardly wait for school to start again.” Huh? The Christmas season was only just beginning. What kind of parents are these?

When I became a dad, I started to get it. As soon as it began to look like Christmas, our kids would get amped up with excitement and start asking about holiday plans and passing along endless gift suggestions.

I realized then that the season my wife and I always loved had taken on a new level of stress. We felt the weight of going from being the primary recipients of Christmas joy to being the ones expected to produce that joy.

As the pace of activity and expectations grew, the beginning of the most wonderful time of the year felt like a gauntlet filled with strings of lights to replace, gifts to assemble, endless activities to pack in, Christmas photos to take for cards to make and to mail, and the occasional spilled eggnog to clean up.

In the midst of this experience one year, I remember looking over at my wife and whisper-singing: “and mom and dad can hardly wait for school to start again.”

I empathized with the lyric, and yet I didn’t want to be that dad from the song counting down to the return of the school routine.

This motivated me to more proactively plan the Christmas season and prioritize meaningful traditions—like driving to see lights while listening to Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, building puzzles, watching favorite Christmas movies, and attending our church’s Christmas Eve service.

We discovered, though, that the most valuable priority we added was Advent reading. We started with Jotham’s Journey by Arnold Ytreeide. Our kids loved how Jotham’s adventures intersected with the nativity story over each day’s reading. As they grew older, we moved to Advent readings by John Piper, Paul Tripp, Sinclair Ferguson, and more.

Building our Christmas season around daily Advent readings produced benefits we didn’t anticipate.

At first it felt like just another thing to squeeze into the calendar, but increasingly, it set the pace for our Christmas season. The regular rhythm and anticipation guided us meaningfully throughout the month of December.

The readings also set our focus—directing our thoughts to why we celebrate Christ’s birth. And they helped me to see that we couldn’t produce the Christmas joy we wanted our children to have. It allowed us instead to point them to the One who offers everlasting joy.

Advent readings offered hope to me as well. Like when I did and said things that I’m sure left my kids looking forward to when my work days would start again. Thank God for Advent readings that emphasize the redemptive purposes of the baby in the manger. I needed the encouragement to confess my sin, ask for forgiveness, and hope in Christ again.

More than our gifts, festive activities, or holiday treats and feasts, our children need to see us hoping in the Christ of Christmas, especially in our lowest moments.

We can still expect challenges, disappointments, and messiness as it once again starts to “look a lot like Christmas,” but we don’t have to dread the season or secretly wish for a regular routine. The pace, focus, and hope of Advent readings can fuel our joy in Christ each day of the season.

We can lead and live in grace in such a way that when Advent draws to a close next month, we can change the song to say: “And mom and dad can hardly wait to do it all again.”

I’m Steve Watters.

REICHARD: Steve put together a list of potential Advent readings for families, and we’ve included those in today’s transcript and show notes.

Advent reading resources:

• Jotham’s Journey by Arnold Ytreeide

• The Mystery Hidden for Ages by Sally Michael

• Good News of Great Joy by John Piper

• Come, Let Us Adore Him by Paul Tripp

• Love Came Down at Christmas by Sinclair Ferguson

• Repeat the Sounding Joy by Christopher Ash

Recapturing the Glory of Christmas by Albert Mohler, Jr.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Tomorrow: Congress has a growing list of priorities for President Trump’s first hundred days in office; we’ll have a report. And, the conclusion of our story about a woman held hostage by Hamas. That and more tomorrow.

I’m Nick Eicher.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard.

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 Apostle Paul wrote to the Christians in Philippi while he was in prison: “Do all things without grumbling or disputing, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain.” —Philippians 2:14-16.

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.