My present early-morning discipline begins with sustained reading of a biblical prophet—currently Hosea—followed by attentive engagement with the news, especially stories that resonate with or resist the prophetic witness. Using a reflective practice inspired by my late friend, theologian Ted Jennings, I then pray and reflect, seeking discernment, guidance, and courage to live and serve amid the dissonance between God’s vision and the world’s realities.
In recent weeks, that dissonance has come into sharp focus around two governing assumptions that dominate public life and stand in direct tension with the witness of the Hebrew prophets.
The first is the claim that might makes right: that coercive military and economic power defines the “real world” and is therefore the path to security, order, and peace. This conviction was stated plainly by a senior government official: “We live in a world, in the real world, that is governed by strength, by force, by power… These are the iron laws of the world since the beginning of time.”*
The second assumption is that individual moral judgment is the final arbiter of truth and goodness. When asked what restrains the exercise of his power, the President replied: “There is one thing—my own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”**
Though voiced by political leaders, these are not merely political claims. They are philosophical, theological, and ethical affirmations. They operate across political parties, national borders, and economic systems. They appear within every major religion. And their temptations lie in wait within every human heart.
Power understood as coercive domination and morality reduced to personal preference are as old as the Garden of Eden and the Pharaohs of Egypt—and as contemporary as the streets of Minneapolis and today’s power-centric leaders.
Against this vision, the Hebrew prophets—and Jesus who stands firmly in their tradition—bear witness to a radically different understanding of power and moral life. Power is not domination but covenantal responsibility. Moral truth is not self-generated but grounded in the character of God and ordered toward justice, compassion, and the flourishing of the vulnerable.
The prophets and Jesus insist that true power serves rather than subdues, and that moral truth is discerned not by private assertion but through concrete practices of justice, mercy, accountability, and humility before God. The decisive test of both power and morality is revealed in how individuals, communities, and nations treat the poor, the stranger, the oppressed, and the powerless.
Set against domination and moral autonomy, the prophets and Jesus announce an alternative to the love of power and the protection of privilege: the power of love embodied in concrete policies and practices that reflect the character and will of God.
The belief that domination secures peace and that morality belongs to the individual alone is not progress but idolatrous regression—an echo of Eden’s rebellion and Pharaoh’s empire.
According to the biblical witness, God’s real world calls for continual repentance from our captivity to domination and self-justifying morality, and for renewed commitment to acts of compassion, justice, mercy, accountability, and peace.
We move toward God’s real world not by force, but by faithfulness—confident that justice is not an illusion, truth is not optional, and love is stronger than fear. As the prophetic tradition reminds us, the arc of the universe bends toward justice. Truth endures. Love prevails.
Whose “Real World” shall we choose?
*Stephen Miller interview with Jake Tapper, CNN, January 14, 2026
**President Donald Trump Interview with NYTIMES reports, January 14, 2026.
Shifting Margins 