Denison Forum

President Biden’s Farewell Address Highlights Our National Need for Biblical Hope

On Wednesday night, President Biden addressed the nation for the last time from the Oval Office and for the first time since announcing that he was withdrawing from the election last July. Going into the speech, most expected Biden’s farewell address to focus on his accomplishments over more than five decades in government and maintain a positive tone. However, while such an account was part of his address, the most memorable elements trended toward the challenging and ominous. Among his points of emphasis were:

The need for Americans to believe in the institutions of democracy.
A call for patience in evaluating many of his policies, cautioning that “it will take time to feel the full impact of all we’ve done together. But the seeds are planted.”
A warning against the concentration of power among the wealthy and the growth of a “tech-industrial complex” that mirrors the industrial-military complex that President Eisenhower spoke of in his farewell address.
The need for continued reform in the Supreme Court and Congress.
And a warning to the American people to not become disheartened or jaded against the democratic process but, rather, to remain hopeful and engaged in it.

Ultimately, we are each free to evaluate for ourselves the degree to which Biden’s assessment of the last four years—as well as what awaits us in the years to come—mirrors reality. If the immediate reactions to the speech are any indication, that assessment is likely to remain both partisan and divisive. But the president’s encouragement to not allow such divisions to define our views of what it means to be American was well-said and important for each of us to remember.

After all, one truth that should be beyond dispute is that we are blessed to live in a country where, every four years, we’re offered the chance to peacefully change the direction of the nation. And a quick look at what’s going on in Venezuela demonstrates just how lucky we are.

When Elections Don’t Matter

Roughly a week after President Biden announced that he was no longer running for a second term, Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro declared that he had won a third. The problem is that most people, both within Venezuelan borders and beyond, are convinced he didn’t. Rather, tallies at the ballot box level—Maduro has not allowed the official results to be made public—show “a landslide win” for opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez, who is recognized as president-elect by the United States, most of Europe, and the rest of the Western world.

The US has even offered a $25 million reward for information leading to Maduro’s arrest. The Venezuelan president was charged with narco-terrorism in 2020 for “flooding the US with cocaine and using drugs as a weapon to undermine the health of Americans.” Yet it is he who remains in power while Gonzalez attempts to build enough support to take control of the office he won last summer.

While Gonzalez remains publicly confident that he will eventually be able to return and lead Venezuela, Maduro enjoys the support of China, Russia, and Iran, as well as geographically closer allies like Cuba and Nicaragua. The old cliché that you can measure a man by his friends seems apt in this instance, and the Venezuelan people are likely to continue suffering under his leadership—and the sanctions placed on their nation—as a result.

“Hope Does Not Put Us to Shame”

A common thread that runs through both the President’s farewell address and the controversy in Venezuela is the call to perseverance and hope in the midst of struggle and reasons for doubt. Apostle Paul speaks to enduring through difficult times in a way that is vital for us to understand today.

In Romans 5, the apostle states, “We rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us” (Romans 5:3–5).

Unfortunately, having hope matters little unless it is placed in the right person, and history demonstrates that any gains that come from placing our hope in other fallen humans will prove fleeting at best. That’s why what America needs most is not a greater hope or belief in the ideals it represents—as the president and others have prescribed—but in the God who largely inspired those ideals at our nation’s founding.

As Christians, one of the best ways to help our country and culture is to show people the power of placing our hope in God rather than presidents, governments, or any other facet of our nation’s leadership.

Where Is Your Source of Hope?

As President-elect Trump prepares for his inauguration on Monday, many are optimistic about what his second term will bring. There are perhaps just as many who are concerned. But the moment he either becomes our source of hope or the reason why we lose hope altogether, we’ve lost sight of the perspective God calls us to keep.

So long as our hope is in the Lord, we will not be put to shame. Trials will come, and there will be days when it’s difficult to see God’s hand at work in the world around us. But that’s where the endurance and character of which Paul also wrote become so important.

What sets biblical hope apart from the best our culture has to offer is the knowledge that the source of that hope is not simply a better or more powerful version of ourselves. Rather, it is a being who is fundamentally perfect in love, knowledge, ability, and every other characteristic that matters. Yet the desire to find that perfection instead of fellow fallen creatures seems endemic to human nature.

This side of heaven, placing our hope in Jesus rather than in other people will always be a struggle. That’s why we have to make a conscious effort every day to surrender that hope back to the Lord and rely on the Holy Spirit to help us keep it there.

Where is your source of hope today?

Quote of the Day:

“If you’re looking to politics for fulfillment, you’ll always be disappointed, foolishly uncompromising, and enraged. It’ll never be enough, even when your side wins. Use politics as a tool to pursue justice and moral order. It’s not the place to find identity or fulfillment.” —Justin Giboney

Jim Denison, PhD, is a cultural theologian and the founder and CEO of Denison Ministries. Denison Ministries includes DenisonForum.org, First15.org, ChristianParenting.org, and FoundationsWithJanet.org. Jim speaks biblically into significant cultural issues at Denison Forum. He is the chief author of The Daily Article and has written more than 30 books, including The Coming Tsunami, the Biblical Insight to Tough Questions series, and The Fifth Great Awakening.