My life has been in turmoil throughout 2025. I’m going through a divorce. I felt lost and paralyzed.

I’ve been in my own darkness for a long time. Quietly, I’ve started working on my relationship with God in private. I’m far from perfect and far from a textbook example of a Christian—especially an Appalachian Missionary Baptist—but that’s not the point of my writing tonight.

On Wednesday, September 10, 2025, a father, husband, son, friend, Christian, political debater, and leader to a great and growing number of America’s youth—Charlie Kirk—was assassinated.

America was galvanized. Conservatives and moderates around the world were heartbroken and angry. For the first two days, most people on social media seemed divided: some were in mourning, while others supported the response and were ignited by anger and exhaustion, ready to defend their values after years of what they saw as one‑sided rhetoric against them. Some were even ready to start a civil war along party lines; for many, this was a step too far. Meanwhile, others mocked Charlie’s death, his family, his supporters, his values, and his faith. Not content that he was gone, some felt the need to celebrate it.

I was in the first camp. I grew up a Christian. I gave myself to Christ at a young age. I’ve strayed from the path, been angry and disappointed with the church, and for a long time didn’t think about my relationship with God. But I have always known that God is real, and that walking in the footsteps of Jesus is the right thing to do.

Tonight I opened the X (formerly Twitter) app and started scrolling through my feed, reading posts from people I follow and people I’ve never heard of. In 45 minutes, I saw dozens of people asking how to find a church and how to worship God. How to go to church. How to be accepted at a church. Dozens of others said they hadn’t been to church in a decade—or decades—but that they would be in attendance this Sunday for Charlie. My heart hasn’t leapt like that in six or seven years. I’ve felt the Lord. I’ve felt the Holy Spirit. But never like this.

I’ve seen people lower their heads and move a foot around in the dirt—“Yeah, I should go back to church, but I don’t know.” I’ve been there myself ten thousand times. I have never in my life seen so many people on a platform so often used for sex, commercialism, hatred, and argument step out into the void of social media and say, “Help me go to church.” I didn’t know this conviction was inside me. I’ve never in my life stood up in church and shouted—I don’t shout unless there’s a spider or a wasp involved—but I’m sitting at my keyboard in my new home thinking of ways to tie myself to my chair. Every time I think that thousands of people could walk into churches this Sunday and hear the Word of God for the first time, I’m overwhelmed. Charlie Kirk was a great man. I’ve heard several reasons why his death would not be in vain, but nothing compares to the thought that, in dying a martyr, he is sending so many of God’s children back to the Lord’s house.

Unfortunately, I have to return to the tragedy itself and to the way this has tested our patience as a people. To those mocking us, condemning us for being angry, and making fun of the principles of Christianity, I offer a few passages from Scripture:

Ecclesiastes 3:1, 8 (KJV)

“To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: … A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.”

Joel 3:9–10 (KJV)

“Proclaim ye this among the Gentiles; Prepare war, wake up the mighty men, let all the men of war draw near; let them come up: Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruninghooks into spears: let the weak say, I am strong.”

Very especially Nehemiah 4:14 (KJV)

“And I looked, and rose up, and said unto the nobles, and to the rulers, and to the rest of the people, Be not ye afraid of them: remember the Lord, which is great and terrible, and fight for your brethren, your sons and your daughters, your wives and your houses.”

And Psalm 94:16 (KJV)

“Who will rise up for me against the evildoers? or who will stand up for me against the workers of iniquity?”

You would be wise to take heed of the Isoroku Yamamotos among your ilk. You may not know how this ends, but I do—and so does the Anointed Ruin who guides your heart.

Thank you, Lord, for letting so many whom I have witnessed—and so many more whom I have not—turn to you in such a dark time in America and the world. Heal their pain and turn it into a fire that will light the way for others to you. Protect us, and let your will be done. Give relief and guidance to Charlie’s wife and children, and protect them as only you can.