John Beeson

We are all familiar with the mark of the beast. Fear and confusion surrounding it seem to swirl around it. As a child, I remember hearing a preacher declare that the birthmark on Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev’s head was the mark of the beast. We were warned that Visa cards or barcodes might be the mark. Today, rumors abound that the mark is a QR code, a vaccine, or something connected to artificial intelligence. Such speculation dramatically misunderstands John’s explanation of the mark...

You are on a date night with your wife, observing the people around you. “First date?” you ask. “For sure!” she says, noticing the telltale signs. The young lady carries a single rose. The young man is a little nervous. They are slightly overdressed for the restaurant. Eyes locked, their attention is rapt on one another. Cell phones never make an appearance. Young love. A mom and dad in their late thirties burst into the restaurant with three boisterous children guffawing at a joke. They...

There is no topic we love discussing more than ourselves. The self-discovery industry has never had more pull than it does in the contemporary West. In the immortalized words of the country singer Toby Keith, “I wanna talk about me, wanna talk about I, wanna talk about number one, oh my me my. What I think, what I like, what I know, what I want, what I see.” We laugh because it’s true and we laugh because it reveals our narcissism. Christians might be tempted to push back on all of the...

TRANSCRIPT: Everyone loves a great reveal. [music] If you saw it, you likely haven't forgotten the penultimate scene in the Sixth Sense [music] when everything you thought you understood was suddenly turned upside down or the final scene in the Usual Suspects when the mystery of Keyser Soze turns out to be right in front of you the whole time . [music] Genesis 3 contains one of the most devastating reveals in all of scripture. As the passage unfolds, Moses [music] forces us to reread the...

TRANSCRIPT: Americans have spoken. We don’t trust pastors. A recent Gallup survey found that only 27% of Americans ranked pastors as “high” or “very high” regarding their honesty and ethical standards. We are outpaced by accountants, bankers, and mechanics with those in the military or medical professions more than doubling our score. Twenty years ago pastors were ranked among the very highest. Why the shift? Over the past two decades, there has been a steady flow of news that has exposed...

Can we choose our identity? Daniel Day Lewis is known as one of the most committed method actors of our time. When he takes on a role, he embodies the character not only on camera but off camera, and he only responds to his character’s name. For the movie In the Name of the Father , Day-Lewis lost fifty pounds and spent three days in solitary confinement without water. For his role as a man with cerebral palsy who could only use his left foot, Day Lewis lived like the character off-set,...

“That isn’t a toy!” parents warn a child playing with a knife or a hammer. Pharaoh thought he could play a game with God and win. He lost. Your heart is not a toy. The story of God’s battle with Pharaoh in the book of Exodus is the story of the consequences of a hardened heart. It’s the story of someone who thought they could toy with God and with their heart. We cannot. In the first five plagues, Pharaoh’s hardens his heart three times and his heart “is hardened” (it’s ambiguous who is doing...

She was one day old with the brightest bluest eyes, a bald head, and the cutest little ears that stuck nearly perpendicular out of her head. We checked out of the hospital's front desk, and we walked to our car with our baby girl in the car seat. As the safety officer checked out the security of our car seat base, a wave of fear came over me. Why would they let us take this beautiful baby home? Hi, my names is John Beeson. Welcome to the Beehive. To be a parent is to experience fear. Will...