The World and Everything in It: September 25, 2025

PREROLL: Good morning! I'm WORLD Global Desk reporter Onize Oduah. Coming up in a few minutes, my international news roundup—including flooding in Japan and election protests in Tunisia. I hope you enjoy today's program.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Good morning!

A new leader at the helm of the House Freedom Caucus…will he change the group’s tone towards party leadership?

REP. HARRIS: It all depends on what the speaker’s plans are for December

NICK EICHER, HOST: That’s ahead on Washington Wednesday.

Also World Tour.

And a growing trend of men seeking out more traditional forms of religion.

And WORLD commentator Joe Rigney wrestles with what the Bible says about being shrewd. 

LINDSAY MAST: It’s Wednesday, September 25th. This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Lindsay Mast.

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

LINDSAY MAST: Now news with Kent Covington.

AUDIO: [Blast in Lebanon]

KENT COVINGTON, NEWS ANCHOR: Israel-Lebanon » Strikes and counterstrikes yesterday as the Israeli's Iron Dome defense system moved to intercept hundreds of rockets fired out of southern Lebanon by the terrorist group Hezbollah.

AUDIO: [Air raid sirens]

Air raid sirens sounded over Israel’s northern region where authorities say rockets damaged buildings and caused several fires.

Meanwhile, Israeli airstrikes continued to target Hezbollah militants. Lebanese health authorities say hundreds of people have been killed in strikes over the past couple of days.

Israel says Hezbollah has been hiding weapons and even missile launchers inside residential homes. Israeli officials have been warning local residents to evacuate.

HAGARI: [Speaking Hebrew]

And military spokesman Daniel Hagari said one of the airstrikes took out Hezbollah commander Ibrahim Kobeisi.

UN General Assembly - Israel » With fears of a full-scale war along Israel’s northern border growing, Israeli Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon said his country is “not eager” to launch a ground invasion in Lebanon - or anywhere else.

DANON:  I don't want to send my son, and we don't want to send our boys to fight in a foreign country. But we are determined to protect the civilians of Israel. We prefer a diplomatic solution. If it's not working, we are using other methods to show to the other side that we mean business.

Danon heard there on the first day of the UN General Assembly in New York.

Biden UN General Assembly » President Biden, meantime, once again called for peace … in his final address as president to the UN General Assembly.

BIDEN:  Progress toward peace will put us in a stronger position to deal with the ongoing threat posed by Iran. Together, we must deny oxygen to terrorist, to its terrorist proxies, which have called for more October 7th.

In a wide-ranging address, Biden also alluded to keeping China in check … and raised concern over artificial intelligence and its potential to be used for repression.

And he reaffirmed U.S. support for Ukraine in pushing out Russian invaders.

Zelenskyy/U.S. weapons package to Ukraine » Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy also addressed the assembly, laying out a victory plan that he argued would finally end the war.

That plan includes continued military pressure, strengthening global alliances, and heavier diplomatic pressure on Moscow.

ZELENSKYY: This is the process that will lead us to peace, to a just peace, a real peace, a peace that will last.

He also used his appearance to further plead his case to the United States and Western allies to allow his troops to use long-range weapons to strike deeper into Russia.

Biden administration officials reportedly told the Associated Press Tuesday that Washington is set to send another $375 million dollars in military aid to Ukraine.

House contempt Blinken » Republicans on the House Foreign Affairs Committee have advanced contempt of Congress charges against Secretary of State Tony Blinken.

Committee Chairman Michael McCaul says Blinken has avoided testifying about the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021.

MCCAUL:  Let the record reflect that for four months, I patiently asked for and waited on his availability in September. But instead of working with me, secretary Blinken made false promises and accused me of politicizing this important issue.

For his part, Sec. Blinken says that he was “profoundly disappointed” by the decision to advance contempt proceedings.

And the top Democrat on the committee, Gregory Meeks, charged that Republicans are misusing the panel’s authority, calling it a “political stunt.”

Garland on assassination attempts » Federal prosecutors have formally charged Ryan Wesley Routh with trying to assassinate Donald Trump.

He was initially charged with two federal firearms offenses after allegedly stalking the former president with a rifle last week at Trump’s South Florida golf resort.

Attorney General Merrick Garland told reporters earlier in the day that more charges were coming.

GARLAND: All of our top priority should be ensuring that accountability occurs in this case and that those who run for office and their families are safe and protected.

He said prosecutors and agents are working around the clock to gather evidence to ensure accountability not only for the suspect but also for any security failures that allowed Routh to get relatively close to Trump.

Hurricane Helene » Tropical storm Helene is barreling toward Florida’s Gulf Coast and picking up strength over those warm Gulf waters.

By the time it makes landfall tomorrow, it’s expected to be a Category-3 hurricane.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has already declared an emergency in more than 60 counties. He told residents on Tuesday:

DESANTIS: You have time to prepare, you have time to plan, you have time to take the action that you need to take to protect you and your family.

He urged coastal residents to be on the lookout for evacuation orders.

Georgia is also expected to feel Helene’s wrath. The system could strike Atlanta on Friday as a tropical storm.

I'm Kent Covington.

Straight ahead: A new leader for the House Freedom Caucus on Washington Wednesday. Plus, World Tour.

This is The World and Everything in It.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: It’s Wednesday the 25th of September.

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

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

Time now for Washington Wednesday.

Last week, The House Freedom Caucus elected a new chairman. The group includes some of the most conservative Republicans in the House, and they have a track record of butting heads with leadership over spending. As the House gears up to vote on a short-term stopgap bill aimed at averting a government shutdown next Monday, the question facing the caucus is what kind of stance will their new leader take?

WORLD reporter Leo Briceno has the story.

LEO BRICENO: Maryland Rep. Andy Harris isn’t afraid of playing hardball with budget negotiations.

ANDY HARRIS: If we don’t get a good deal in December, I would urge the speaker to just say, ‘hey, come see us on January 3 when we potentially control both houses and will control the presidency by the end of January.

Harris has been in Congress since 2011, and sits on the powerful appropriations committee. As of last week, he’s Chairman of the House Freedom Caucus.

Historically, the Freedom Caucus has fought tooth and nail against funding extensions—like the one the House is voting on today. The House is set to consider a short-term bill that would extend the government’s current spending levels through December 20th. Without it, the government would hit a partial shutdown next Monday.

Last year, five members of the Freedom Caucus joined with three other Republicans and all Democrats to remove U.S. Speaker Kevin McCarthy over this exact issue.

This time around, the House has a new speaker, and the Freedom Caucus has a new leader. Will history repeat itself? Here’s Harris:

HARRIS: It all depends on what the speaker’s plans are for December... I need to hear that if the Democrats are unwilling to negotiate in good faith that he’s willing to just kick this into the next year, including a shutdown in December if necessary.”

The Freedom Caucus doesn’t have any direct say in spending legislation. But since its founding in 2015, it has used its influence to punish GOP leaders in the House who don’t live up to their conservative promises.

JIM CURRY: They knew what they wanted to be, but I don't know that early on it was obvious, to the leadership, that this was going to be a threat.

That’s Jim Curry, professor of political science at the University of Utah. He says the party took the Freedom Caucus more seriously when Ohio representative Jim Jordan initiated a push to remove then House Speaker John Boehner. Here’s Boehner in 2015.

JOHN BOEHNER: It's become clear to me that this prolonged leadership turmoil would do irreparable harm to the institution. So this morning, I informed my colleagues that I would resign from the speakership and resign from Congress at the end of October.

Curry believes the Freedom Caucus is just the most recent expression of longstanding traits in the Republican party. Back in 1994, Georgia Rep. Newt Gingrich famously made a “Contract with America.”

CURRY: There's always been this element in the Republican Party going back to the late 70s, early 80s of this sort of anti-leadership, ‘we're not going to go along.’ ‘We're going to try to push you to the right.’ This is what Gingrich was doing…it’s kind of the same thing where he was willing to be a thorn in his own party’s side trying to push them to take stronger positions, harder edge positions.

Freedom Caucus members say their job is to make sure Republican leaders keep their promises.

Here’s Rep. Ralph Norman of South Carolina. He’s a member of the Freedom Caucus and sits on the House Rules Committee.

RALPH NORMAN: It’s the conscience of the American people. It’s the conscience of where America is… Americans don’t expect us to win every fight. They do expect us to fight.

Rep. Bob Good of Virginia, is the outgoing chairman of the Freedom Caucus. He says the Freedom Caucus has helped implement procedural changes in the 118th Congress that increased lawmaker participation and transparency.

BOB GOOD: I think it’s clear that the Freedom Caucus has been responsible for holding accountable the speaker, and for opening the process of selecting a speaker… Secondly, the Freedom Caucus is absolutely responsible for restoring in large part regular order, increasing the voice of every member of congress through imperfect but large return to single-subject legislation, 72-hours to review legislation before we vote …And the Freedom Caucus has brought debates within our spending process to be how much are Republicans going to fight to cut spending, not if we’re going to fight to cut spending. I think all of those are good things.”

Good lost a close primary back in July, so his time in Congress will end in January. Although he’s going to serve out the remainder of his term, Good decided to step aside and give the Freedom Caucus a chance to select new leadership.

Some Republican members outside of the Freedom Caucus don’t see the group’s mission the same way as Good or as Norman do. Rep. Derrick Van Orden of Wisconsin, for instance, believes the group’s willingness to undermine party leadership is particularly harmful.

DERRICK VAN ORDEN: The role of the Freedom Caucus in this congress is to do their utmost for Republicans to lose the majority. And I’ve told this to all those guys to their face that if we're not in the majority next Congress—meaning we can’t fulfill Donald Trump’s agenda, because they’re gonna take the Senate—it lies solely on the shoulders of the members of the Freedom Caucus, in particular the eight guys—seven guys, one gal—that voted to get rid of Kevin McCarthy.”

Van Orden believes that the Freedom Caucus has a bad habit of succumbing to the loudest voices in the group.

VAN ORDEN They sure know how to stand right there and scream to the sky, don’t they? They really know how to fundraise. And again, I’m talking about very few of the Freedom Caucus. Because It ain’t clay, it ain’t Eli, it ain’t Andy. A whole bunch of those people are solid people.”

He’s referring there to Clay Higgins of Louisianan, Eli Crane of Arizona—and Andy Harris, the new chair.

Harris is closer to the “establishment” that the Freedom Caucus has railed against in recent years. He’s one of the 12 Republicans tasked with shepherding spending legislation through Congress. Curry, the professor from the University of Utah, says that’s kind of the way that the group has been trending. He doesn’t think that’s a mistake.

CURRY: They have become more open to, or willing to, or wanting to grab traditional reins of power.”

In addition to being a little more a part of the establishment, Harris has also diverged from other Freedom Caucus members on legislative votes this congress.

Since January of 2023, members of the House Freedom Caucus have helped defeat 11 bills that came to the floor for a vote. Of those 11 votes, Bob Good joined in on those efforts six times. Harris joined in only once.

PRO CODES VOTE FAILS: Two thirds not being in the affirmative, the rules are not suspended and the bill is not passed.

His voting record may signal that he’s less willing to join in on brazen displays of rebellion against party leadership. Or it might mean the Freedom Caucus wanted to go with someone who could further their goals in a more understated way.

For now, Harris is playing it aggressive. Assuming that Congress extends government funding to December 20th, Harris says he’s not ruling out a spending fight that would shut down the government right before Christmas if it means cutting spending in some way.

HARRIS: In the end, I think the Speaker has to be willing to shut down the government in December. And you know, we just, I think you oughta just shut it down or you punt it into the new year. Either way, works for me in December.

Reporting for WORLD in Washington, D.C., I’m Leo Briceno.

NICK EICHER, HOST:  Coming up next on The World and Everything in It: WORLD Tour with our reporter in Africa, Onize Oduah.

[AUDIO: Sound of protesters]

ONIZE ODUAH: Tunisia protests —We take off today in Tunisia’s capital of Tunis where protesters are opposing changes to the electoral law, weeks before a national election.

The proposed legislation will transfer the power to supervise elections and settle electoral disputes from the Administrative Court to ordinary courts.

Opponents see the move as yet another attempt by President Kais Saied to win a second term.

Romthan Ben Amor joined the protests.

BEN AMOR: [Speaking Arabic]

He says here that the bill highlights the fear that persists among the president and his supporters ahead of the vote.

Saied appointed an electoral commission that has so far disqualified three presidential candidates. The commission defied a ruling by the administrative court in their favor and only allowed two opponents to run against Saied. Authorities sentenced one of the opponents to 20 months in prison last week for what he has called politically motivated allegations.

Tunisia’s election is scheduled to begin Oct. 6.

Sri Lanka’s new leader — We head over to Sri Lanka where the country’s first leftist president assumed office on Monday.

Marxist Anura Kumara Dissanayake defeated 37 other candidates to emerge the winner of the Saturday vote. He previously served as agriculture and irrigation minister and lost a presidential election bid back in 2019.

He now comes into office as Sri Lanka still grapples with an economic crisis. His predecessor imposed tax hikes and other austerity measures in a bid to end shortages of key staples and stabilize the economy.

Dissanayake said he knows he’s inheriting a government in deep crisis.

DISSANAYAKE: [Speaking Sinhala]

He says here that he’s not a magician, but will prioritize making informed decisions to help the country.

Dissanayake became the country’s first president to emerge as winner with less than 50 percent of the votes.

AUDIO: [Flood response]

Japan flooding — Over in northern Japan, residents are cleaning up after heavy rainfall brought floods and landslides that have killed at least six people.

At least a dozen rivers overflowed across the region of Ishikawa. The area is still battling the aftermath of a 7.5 magnitude earthquake that killed more than 370 people in January.

Floodwaters also affected the emergency housing built for the earthquake victims.

They include residents like Shoichi Miyakoshi. His wife died in a 2007 earthquake, and January’s earthquake destroyed his home. Flooding then destroyed his temporary housing.

MIYAKOSHI: [Speaking Japanese]

He says here that he will have to start all over again through another cold winter.

AUDIO: [Singing]

Oktoberfest — And we close today at the world’s largest folk festival in Germany.

Hundreds of thousands of people crowded the city of Munich dressed in traditional Bavarian costumes—like leather trousers, checkered shirts, and corseted dresses.

AUDIO: [Countdown and applause]

On Saturday, Munich Mayor Dieter Reiter inserted a tap into the first keg, officially kick-starting two weeks of activities.

Germans trace the annual Oktoberfest traditions back to a horse race in 1810 that celebrated the wedding of Bavarian Crown Prince Ludwig and Princess Therese of Saxony-Hildburghausen.

Leonard Seydold is attending the event for the third time.

SEYDOLD: [Speaking German]

He says he’s looking forward to enjoying the atmosphere and having fun.

This year’s festivities came with extra security after a deadly knife attack in the western city of Solingen last month.

Event organizers set up metal detectors for the first time at Oktoberfest.

Authorities also deployed 600 police officers and an additional 1,500 security officers.

That’s it for this week’s World Tour. Reporting for WORLD, I’m Onize Oduah in Abuja, Nigeria.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Well, it’s that time of year to vote in the coveted 2024 Voting Toy Hall of Fame! Tonight’s the deadline.

This year’s nominees include the Transformers:

ANNOUNCER: Create your own power links combination!

And ponies:

GIRL: I love you, My Little Pony.

Surprisingly, some nominees are oldies… but goodies. Like balloons!

The criteria for consideration in the Toy Hall of Fame includes icon status, longevity, discovery and innovation. And an unwritten criterion, chief curator Christopher Bensch at the Strong National Museum of Play on the No-Nonsense podcast last fall:

CHRISTOPHER BENSCH: You need to be a toy or game that is safe for its intended audience.

So, no jarts, fun as they are.

STICK HORSE: (neighing)

Even the lowly stick horse is nominated this year!

It’s The World and Everything in It.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Today is Wednesday, September 25th.

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

Good morning. I’m Lindsay Mast.

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

Next up: Of monks and men.

Over the last five years the number of monks in a southeastern Finland monastery have nearly doubled. It’s just one example of a growing trend…young men around the world are moving towards more conservative expressions of Christianity. WORLD Radio’s Mary Muncy reports.

AUDIO: [SHEEP BELLS]

BROTHER STEFANOS: I was a student at the time before I came here.

MARY MUNCY: 23-year-old Brother Stefanos entered the Valamo Orthodox Monastery two years ago. He began as a novice. But is on his way to becoming a full-fledged monk.

STEFANOS: I was worried about the rising costs, things like that.

Orthodox men without minor children—or other binding commitments—can join the monastery. A new convert goes through a year of living as a novice before the other monks vote on whether he can join the monastery.

Once he joins, there are many steps in the process before fully embracing monastic vows. Eventually, he may decide to commit to the monastery for the rest of his life—promising to live in “celibacy, obedience, and without personal ownership.”

Stefanos grew up in an Eastern Orthodox family and says he ‘just knew’ he would someday become a monk.

STEFANOS: I was also fairly stressed about my future and like trying to actually find if this, what I'm studying, is good and if I actually want this life and also the social dynamics of just the living in general can be sometimes quite overwhelming, as we all know.

AUDIO: [HERDING SHEEP]

Now, he spends his days praying, studying, and caring for the monastery’s sheep—amongst other things. Many other young men have joined in the last decade.

BROTHER RAPHAEL: In earlier times there was no internet and Orthodox Church was kind of this mystical, far away, church in the East.

Brother Raphael is almost 30. He showed up six years ago. He decided to join the monastery while studying for a philosophy degree.

RAPHAEL: I did imagine myself becoming a family man and starting a career and all of this once. I didn't feel comfortable with that kind of idea for myself, even though I thought I would enjoy it, but I decided otherwise.

Raphael and Stefanos are part of a growing trend: young men drawn to orthodoxy.

DANIEL DARLING: Among men online, the rise of sort of discipline culture and workout culture might track with this.

Daniel Darling is the director of cultural engagement at Southwestern Seminary. He’s also a WORLD Opinions contributor.

DARLING: Men are saying, Okay, we've got our physical discipline down pat. We have influencers. We watch, we have a routine. But what does spiritual discipline look like?

Darling believes the push to the monastic lifestyle might be a swing towards strict spiritualism after coming to the end of hedonism.

Reformer Martin Luther criticized monasticism saying it had no basis in scripture. He knew first hand that it could lead to a works-based faith. Others say that while it’s wise to spend time in solitude and silence with God, that seclusion ought to be for the purpose of renewed energy to go into the world.

AUDIO: [LIFE AROUND THE MONASTERY]

But a simple life of devotion, ritual, and an acute sense of transcendence is what drew Brother Raphael to the monastery.

BROTHER RAPHAEL: Orthodoxy in some sense is very patriarchal, conservative and Orthodoxy even considers tradition with a large 'T', so tradition is very important.

Raphael also thinks men in particular are being drawn to it because they’re more conservative than women. And at least in America, statistically, that’s true. And not just religiously, but politically. According to the Pew Research Center, men are more likely to associate with the Republican party, while women are more likely to associate with Democrats.

Dan Darling says that divide is being reinforced by where men and women get their news.

DANIEL DARLING: I think people are reaching the end of themselves, and they're being influenced, I would say, by some other folks, like your Jordan Petersons and others, who are not believers, but are hinting at the fact that modernity and all this stuff has been unsatisfying, and there's got to be something more.

Men gravitating towards more conservative political parties has long been a trend in American politics, but new data suggests it’s also true of faith.

According to the American Survey Center, 54 percent of Gen Z who have left their formative religion are women. It’s the first time the study has found that more young women are leaving the church than men.

DARLING: a lot of young men have grown up in this country without any meaning and purpose, because maybe they've grown up in a broken home, or home without a father who was present, who could show them what it looks like to be a man, what it looks looks like to conduct yourselves in that way. And so they find meaning and purpose in the church.

Darling says the church is one of the few places celebrating healthy masculinity—where it’s taught that God made men and women and together they create a whole.

DARLING: It's a good thing to see men coming to church.

He says the church has made a concerted effort to reach men in recent years, and he hopes that continues. But…

DARLING: We don't want to do that at the expense of losing women.

And on that front, the data isn’t very encouraging. Additionally, Gen Z is still leaving religion in higher numbers than any previous generation—continuing a long standing trend.

But back at the monastery the head monk Michael says since the pandemic, he’s getting more emails than ever from young people wanting to join the monastery— especially from men. And he sees that as an encouraging trend.

ARCHIMANDRITE MICHAEL: I think it's maybe quite uncertain times that we are living in and people want to have something steady, something to stand on.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Mary Muncy.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Today is Wednesday, September 25th. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Nick Eicher.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: And I’m Lindsay Mast. A new film raises questions, and not just about its subject. The question of deception in uncovering the truth is a matter of concern among Christians. What does the Bible say about it? Here’s WORLD Opinions contributor Joe Rigney.

JOE RIGNEY: Matt Walsh’s mockumentary Am I Racist? has provoked a wide-ranging discussion about the ethics of deception among evangelical Christians. Some say Walsh used deception to secure interviews, pretending to be a diversity equity and inclusion consultant, though he denies that. I have not seen the movie and so am unqualified to speak to his methods. However, the larger discussion of the ethics of lying is a recurring one and worth some clarification.

On the one hand, the Bible repeatedly insists on the importance of truth-telling:

Proverbs 12:22… “Lying lips are an abomination to the LORD, but those who act faithfully are his delight.”

Ephesians 4:25…“Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another.”

And of course, Exodus 20:16: “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.”

On the other hand, the Bible is also filled with examples of God’s people engaging in various types of deception. Abraham twice deceives a pagan king about the identity of his wife Sarah (and his son Isaac follows in his footsteps). At his mother’s urging, Jacob deceives his father Isaac to secure his blessing. Joseph conceals his true identity from his brothers to test them. And David feigns madness to the Philistine king to escape from danger. He also writes Psalm 34 during that time, exhorting others to “Keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking deceit.”

Theologians debate the moral goodness of some of these actions. Was the sister-wife deception an act of faithless cowardice or faithful shrewdness? Was Rebekah and Jacob’s deception of Isaac an evil act or an attempt to overcome Isaac’s sinful preference for Esau—which was contrary to the promise of God?

But other examples of deception include commendation of the deceivers within the Bible itself. The Hebrew midwives fear God and preserve the lives of Jewish boys in the face of Pharaoh’s bloodlust and as a result are blessed by God with families. The Canaanite prostitute Rahab conceals the Hebrew spies and then tells an outright falsehood to the state officials who are seeking them. As a result of her actions, she and her family are preserved from judgment, and Rahab is commended as an example of someone whose faith led to good works.

And then, of course, there are instances where God Himself conceals the truth as an act of judgment upon particular individuals: giving Samuel a cover story to tell King Saul when the prophet is sent to anoint David as the new king and sending a “lying spirit” in the mouths of the prophets to destroy King Ahab.

All of these examples complicate a straightforward equation of deception as sin. And we must allow for different types of deception in these passages. We might distinguish between stating outright falsehoods (as Rahab did) and stating partial truths (as Abraham did when he called Sarah his sister). In the latter case, the deception was in the concealment of a fact. Frequently, this kind of dissembling is designed to encourage the hearer to draw a false conclusion.

My own conclusion from these stories is relatively straightforward, even if it remains controversial. Just as we distinguish between righteous killing (such as self-defense) and unrighteous killing (murder of innocents), we should also distinguish between righteous deception and unrighteous deception.

What distinguishes the two? Two factors stand out in the Biblical stories. The righteous deception occurs either under conditions of open warfare or to prevent great harm. Neighbors—those with whom we live at peace—are owed the truth. Open enemies who intend harm to us or others are not.

Thus, those who lied and concealed the truth from Nazis to protect Jews were acting righteously. I believe that David Daleiden was also justified when he went undercover to expose Planned Parenthood and the sale of aborted baby parts. The same would apply to the use of spies and camouflage in war, as well as undercover sting operations by law enforcement targeting pedophiles, in which officers masquerade as underage children to expose and arrest the wicked.

There are, of course, reasonable questions about limiting principles. Deceiving to save a life may be permitted. But what about deceiving to expose false ideologies? How do we determine if someone is an open enemy…to whom it would be permissible to lie to prevent grave evil?

Such questions are beyond the purview of a short commentary. But they ought to send us back to the Scriptures to better understand God’s standards so that we can wisely—and righteously—apply them in our own day.

I’m Joe Rigney.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Tomorrow: Israel battles Hezbollah to the north, as pressure remains to end the war with Hamas. What’s next for Gaza? We’ll have a report.

And, Afghanistan imposes more restrictions on women. We'll hear about what life is like on the ground. That and more tomorrow.

I’m Nick Eicher.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: And I’m Lindsay Mast.

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: “Besides being wise, the Preacher also taught the people knowledge, weighing and studying and arranging many proverbs with great care. The Preacher sought to find words of delight, and uprightly he wrote words of truth.” —Ecclesiastes 12:9-10

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