November 13, 2025

Visiting Copenhagen, Denmark, earlier this fall, I got a feel for the challenges of secularism as I talked to pastors and missionaries, some native Nordics, others from the UK, and many from the United States. I tried to listen and watch, observe and take notes. The first night of our TGC Norden conference, I taught from Jeremiah. At the same time, F.C. Copenhagen was playing a Champions League match against Leverkusen from Germany. I could have walked to the stadium from the church in less than 40 minutes. Needless to say, my preaching was no match for the draw of football. As in the United States, sport has increased as religion has decreased as the object of devotion, time, attention, and money.

Then on Saturday morning I wandered the clean, safe streets as crowds enjoyed coffee and pastries in unhurried sidewalk cafes. Laughing children danced in the fountains of the town squares. I arrived at the host church just in time to hear my friend close the conference by preaching an excellent message on suffering from Romans 8. The transition from the sunny streets to the stuffy church jarred me. And I asked myself, Which one of us is out of touch with reality? Of course it’s the crowds in the streets, showing far less concern for the inevitability of death than their existentialist ancestor Søren Kierkegaard (buried not far away from this church) thought they should.

Then I asked myself, But who feels out of touch with reality? We do, the Christians sitting inside a dark church talking about suffering and the sovereignty of God. We’re the ones who feel like we’re living a self-inflicted nightmare while the world enjoys the last weeks of sun before the long northern winter descends with its early nights and late mornings.

These church planters and missionaries are my heroes. At The Keller Center we exist to support them. They are pillars of reality and truth amid the unreality of abundance you can’t take with you into eternity. They face apathy and sometimes outright opposition from people amusing themselves to death with alcohol and drugs.

This is the challenge of Christianity in our secular age. It’s not that we’re wrong. Changing cultures don’t change the fact that 2,000 years ago Jesus the Son of God rose from the dead, and he’s the only way any of us can escape the sentence of death and eternal judgment. The challenge is that many secular places Jesus doesn’t feel needed. He doesn’t feel necessary for doing good or living a good life. It’s the same story from Boston to Manchester, Bergen to Malmö. Reality doesn’t feel real.

In this commentary for my Gospelbound podcast, I unpack two reasons for the rise of secularism and three looming threats that might snap the West back to reality.