Lindsay Clancy, Free Will, Spiritual Warfare, & The Devil’s Story of Christmas

Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! After a summer break, Ian and Michael are returning with new episodes, including the completion of our popular Lenses series and a deeper exploration of Confronting Evil in Our Time. With more than 500 copies of the companion book sold, we’re excited to continue exploring the Christian wisdom needed to recognize and confront evil in our time.

We’ll also be expanding our journey through the great works that have shaped Christian thought, including C.S. Lewis’s The Great Divorce and Mere Christianity, along with John Milton’s Paradise Lost. And on September 8, Ian’s new book, The Devil’s Story of Christmas, arrives—a fictional journey through the Christmas story that explores prophecy, Christ’s birth, spiritual warfare, and the battle between Heaven and Hell.

We also had a difficult conversation about the Lindsay Clancy case and what it forces us to consider about the relationship between mothers and children. When does love become possession? When does protection cross the line into control? And how do we distinguish compassion for someone’s circumstances from accountability for their actions? These are uncomfortable questions, but they matter because our culture increasingly struggles to define the boundaries between love, responsibility, autonomy, and protection. Interestingly, these same themes appear in The Devil’s Story of Christmas, particularly in the “Killing of Innocents” chapter, where Ian explores the darker side of what can happen when love and control become dangerously intertwined.

At the heart of it all is a question we can’t ignore: How do we confront evil without surrendering our responsibility to choose what is right? Spiritual warfare is real, but so is human free will. The answer begins with Christian wisdom, Scripture, community, and the courage to face difficult questions. Subscribe and follow along—the podcast is coming back this fall.