The Russell Moore Show

In this special Easter edition of the Russell Moore Show, Russell draws from past episodes to explore how the resurrection of Jesus reframes everything: from scientific belief and intellectual doubt to embodied life, unexpected joy, and suffering. Featuring clips from episodes with Francis Collins, Michael Wear, David Taylor, Christian Wiman, Kate Bowler, and Tim Keller, this episode draws out our Christian hope: if Christ is raised, then reality itself is different. Across stories of cancer diagnoses, intellectual conversions, poetic insight, and quiet moments of joy, the episode insists on a central truth: the resurrection is not metaphor. And if it happened, then even in grief, uncertainty, and death—everything is going to be okay. Keep up with Russell: Sign up for the weekly newsletter where Russell shares thoughtful takes on big questions, offers a Christian perspective on life, and recommends books and music he's enjoying. Submit a question for the show at [email protected] Subscribe to the Christianity Today Magazine: Special offer for listeners of The Russell Moore Show: Click here for 25% off a subscription. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Russell answers a listener question about whether commercialization has ruined country music. Watch the video of this episode on YouTube here. Submit your own question for the show! Email [email protected] — and remember: attach a voice memo! Keep up with Russell: Sign up for the weekly newsletter where Russell shares thoughtful takes on big questions, offers a Christian perspective on life, and recommends books and music he's enjoying. Subscribe to the Christianity Today Magazine: Special offer for listeners of The Russell Moore Show: Click here for 25% off a subscription. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The American experiment has never been about achieving perfection, but facing a task always unfinished. Watch the video of this episode on YouTube here. At a moment when many Americans feel fearful, exhausted, or tempted to despair, Russell Moore welcomes Pulitzer Prize–winning historian Jon Meacham for a conversation about the moral and spiritual meaning of democracy. Drawing from Meacham’s new anthology, American Struggle: Democracy, Dissent, and the Pursuit of a More Perfect Union, Meacham argues that the American experiment has never been about achieving perfection, but about the difficult and unfinished task of seeking a more perfect union. Throughout the conversation, Moore and Meacham discuss the 1619 Project, the myth of an idyllic Christian nation, the Scopes Trial, the resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s, and the recurring temptation to treat political opponents not as rivals but as enemies. Meacham makes the case that democracy depends on humility, compromise, and a willingness to resist the politics of destruction. Together, he and Meacham consider whether reconciliation is still possible in a culture shaped by vengeance, fear, and performative power. Even so, the conversation does not give way to fatalism. Their exchange is a sober but hopeful reminder that history is not destiny, that political renewal remains possible, and that the future of the republic depends on ordinary people choosing courage over cynicism. Resources mentioned in this episode: American Struggle: Democracy, Dissent, and the Pursuit of a More Perfect Union — Jon Meacham Keep up with Russell: Sign up for the weekly newsletter where Russell shares thoughtful takes on big questions, offers a Christian perspective on life, and recommends books and music he's enjoying. Submit a question for the show at [email protected] Subscribe to the Christianity Today Magazine: Special offer for listeners of The Russell Moore Show: Click here for 25% off a subscription. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The civil rights leader treated love of God and love for others as inseparable. Watch this episode on YouTube On occasion, we like to record audio versions of the latest from Russell’s weekly newsletter. Sign up for the newsletter, Moore to the Point, where Russell shares thoughtful takes on big questions, offers a Christian perspective on life, and recommends books and music he's enjoying. Submit a question for the show (and include a voice memo!) at [email protected] Subscribe to the Christianity Today Magazine: Special offer for listeners of The Russell Moore Show: Click here for 25% off a subscription Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Every Moment Holy author Douglas McKelvey on writing prayers for the moments both sacred and mundane. Watch the video of this episode on YouTube here. There are moments in life when something significant is happening, but we don’t quite know how to mark it. Not a wedding, not a funeral—just one of those in-between spaces when we feel that words ought to be said but don’t know how to say them. In this episode, Russell Moore talks with writer and liturgist Douglas McKelvey about the Every Moment Holy series of prayers and the newest volume focused on marking the unique experiences of young adulthood in the new book of prayers, Rites of Passage. Their conversation explores why people often need help finding words for prayer in the most human experiences: grief over a beloved pet, awkward encounters with a former relationship, the anxiety of measuring oneself against impossible standards, or the transitions of young adulthood. McKelvey reflects on the long process of writing these prayers and the sobering responsibility of crafting words that others might speak to God in their most vulnerable moments. They also talk about the unique pressures facing emerging adults today and why the church must learn again how to shepherd people through these seasons. Drawing from the Psalms and the rhythms of historic Christian prayer, McKelvey argues that liturgy doesn’t remove pain or uncertainty. Instead, it helps people remember a deeper truth: that God is present in every moment, even when we don’t yet see how the story will resolve. Resources mentioned in this episode: Every Moment Holy: Rites of Passage The Every Moment Holy project Keep up with Russell: Sign up for the weekly newsletter where Russell shares thoughtful takes on big questions, offers a Christian perspective on life, and recommends books and music he's enjoying. Submit a question for the show at [email protected] Subscribe to the Christianity Today Magazine: Special offer for listeners of The Russell Moore Show: Click here for 25% off a subscription. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Russell answers a listener question about what algorithms miss about heartbreak. Watch the video of this episode on YouTube here. Links mentioned: Previous episode about Martina McBride’s song “Independence Day” Song, Dean Summerwind’s “Parked Out By the Lake” Malcolm Gladwell’s Revisionist History episode “The King of Tears” Submit your own question for the show! Email [email protected] — and remember: attach a voice memo! Keep up with Russell: Sign up for the weekly newsletter where Russell shares thoughtful takes on big questions, offers a Christian perspective on life, and recommends books and music he's enjoying. Subscribe to the Christianity Today Magazine: Special offer for listeners of The Russell Moore Show: Click here for 25% off a subscription. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Former Harper’s Magazine editor Christopher Beha on his journey from skeptical Atheism to skeptical Christianity. Watch the video of this episode on YouTube here. For many people, faith and skepticism are opposites, but novelist and former Harper’s Magazine editor Christopher Beha argues that the two may be more intertwined than we assume. In this conversation about his new book, Why I’m Not an Atheist, Beha reflects on his journey from a devout Catholic upbringing to atheism and eventually back to Christian faith. Beha describes how an early mystical experience and later personal tragedy pushed him into deep questions about suffering, prayer, and the nature of belief. In college, those questions led him to identify as a skeptic, valuing reason and intellectual independence. Yet over time he came to see that skepticism itself has limits. The turning point came not through philosophical argument but through life itself, like falling in love and becoming part of a family. Those experiences prompted Beha to return to church, where he began hearing familiar Christian teachings in a new way: not primarily as moral demands or metaphysical propositions, but as a story centered on love and relationship–without setting aside his questions. Together, Russell and Chris reflect on what it means to believe while still wrestling with doubt, how parents might talk with children who are questioning faith, and why the path toward belief often begins not with certainty but with simply showing up. If you’ve wrestled with the Christian life being sold as putting aside all questions and doubt to choose unwavering certainty, you may appreciate hearing from Chris. Resources mentioned in this episode: Why I Am Not an Atheist by Christopher Beha Essays by Michel de Montaigne Keep up with Russell: Sign up for the weekly newsletter where Russell shares thoughtful takes on big questions, offers a Christian perspective on life, and recommends books and music he's enjoying. Submit a question for the show at [email protected] Subscribe to the Christianity Today Magazine: Special offer for listeners of The Russell Moore Show: Click here for 25% off a subscription. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On the war with Iran. On occasion, we like to record audio versions of the latest from Russell’s weekly newsletter. Read this article here. Sign up for the newsletter, Moore to the Point, where Russell shares thoughtful takes on big questions, offers a Christian perspective on life, and recommends books and music he's enjoying. Submit a question for the show (and include a voice memo!) at [email protected] Watch this episode on YouTubeSubscribe to the Christianity Today Magazine: Special offer for listeners of The Russell Moore Show: Click here for 25% off a subscription. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A bonus episode with bestselling author and friend, Jennie Allen, on the occasion of her new book, The Lie You Don’t Know You Believe. Watch the video of this episode on YouTube here. Many people live with a persistent sense that something is not quite right—a low-grade hum of anxiety, insecurity, or striving that never seems to go away. In this bonus episode, Russell Moore talks with author and Bible teacher Jennie Allen about the hidden lies that can quietly shape our lives for years. Drawing from her brand-new book, The Lie You Don’t Know You Believe, Allen argues that many of our struggles—whether feelings of worthlessness, being unlovable, or helplessness—can often be traced back to stories we began believing long ago. Russell and Jennie discuss how those beliefs form, often in childhood moments that seemed small at the time but quietly shaped a person’s identity. Along the way, they consider how faith, self-reflection, and grace can help people see their stories more clearly without turning the process into an exercise in blame. The discussion also moves outward—from personal struggles to cultural ones—touching on why people crave recognition, why fear so often drives public life, and how Christians can respond without being ruled by anxiety. Ultimately, Allen points toward a simple but demanding path: recognizing the lies that bind us and fixing our eyes on Christ. Resources mentioned in this episode: The Lie You Don’t Know You Believe by Jennie Allen Keep up with Russell: Sign up for the weekly newsletter where Russell shares thoughtful takes on big questions, offers a Christian perspective on life, and recommends books and music he's enjoying. Submit a question for the show at [email protected] Subscribe to the Christianity Today Magazine: Special offer for listeners of The Russell Moore Show: Click here for 25% off a subscription. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The author of Theo of Golden sits down with Russell in Andrew Peterson’s Chapter House for a conversation on the breakout novel. NO SPOILERS! Watch the video of this episode on YouTube here. Russell is joined by Allen Levi, the author of the breakout novel Theo of Golden, to ask why so many readers are hungry for a story about kindness—and whether such a person could exist outside the pages of fiction. Russell and Allen sit together in Nashville for a conversation based on questions RDM collected from listeners and friends. Without any spoilers, Levi describes Theo of Golden as a book not only about kindness, but about the reason for kindness—an ordinary holiness rooted in the reality of Heaven. Levi’s clear-eyed theology of “glory and grime” found in Golden insists that darkness is real, but it doesn’t get the last word. To close, Russell offers for Allen to share a rare on-air prayer for listeners who are exhausted by suspicion and artificiality. If you’re struggling to see how kindness is worth the cost, or if you’re weary from cynicism, this episode is for you. Resources mentioned in this episode: Theo of Golden by Allen Levi “The Confession” by Leo Tolstoy “Think Little” by Wendell Berry How to Know a Person by David Brooks Keep up with Russell: Sign up for the weekly newsletter where Russell shares thoughtful takes on big questions, offers a Christian perspective on life, and recommends books and music he's enjoying. Submit a question for the show at [email protected] Subscribe to the Christianity Today Magazine: Special offer for listeners of The Russell Moore Show: Click here for 25% off a subscription. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices