Almost no one can define “the culture war,” and that’s the problem. The phrase gets slapped on everything, which means nothing. It’s big enough to hold whatever you love or hate and vague enough to be used as a weapon—to push people out, turn people off, or whip them up. If it means everything, it means nothing.
So let’s be clear: the culture war is the public struggle over what is true, what is good, and what is normal—and which institutions will teach, protect, and enforce those answers. That makes the battlefield basically everything: politics and courts, schools and syllabi, media and tech platforms, family life and social norms, workplaces and the wider economy—the stories we tell our kids and the rules we enforce in public. Every policy, curriculum, and platform trains someone’s sense of what counts as acceptable.
Now, test the myth of “neutrality.” Imagine a society with no shared moral operating system—nothing that names some acts good and others evil. Pretend we can live without an agreed standard. Then try to explain why anyone shouldn’t use any drug they want, or marry seven people (or themselves), or request euthanasia on demand. What could you appeal to? If personal feeling is the only ground, everything becomes negotiable. So the real question isn’t whether we draw moral lines; it’s where, why, and on whose authority. Everyone draws lines, and no one invents them in a vacuum. What—or who—we worship shapes what we call good. This isn’t about forcing belief; it’s recognizing that no free society survives without shared moral commitments.
As John Adams warned, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
So my thesis is this: The culture war is the unavoidable contest over our moral order; Christians must engage it faithfully—doing the near-term work of protecting neighbors now while building virtuous institutions for the long run. We must reject tribalism that lives only for today, and the performative “transcendence” that cloaks cowardice in spiritual language.
The two paths:
From here, two impulses show up—both with something to admire, both with a dangerous drift if we’re not careful.
First, political shrewdness. At its best, it moves quickly, uses the levers at hand, and shields the vulnerable now. Sometimes it requires making hard choices— like supporting a deeply imperfect candidate to secure a generation of judges who will protect life and liberty. This kind of maneuvering can bring society tremendous benefits that justify the side effects—but be careful. All too often, this type of ends justify the means calculation can devolve into zero sum tribalism. This mindset only asks “did it work?” and “did we win?” It ignores other important questions like, “what did it damage?” and “who are we becoming?” This competitive mentality refuses to admit our side’s faults or a rival’s partial good (scared to death to lose ground). You focus on notching wins even if it disciples your people in hypocrisy, loses the persuadable middle, and ultimately damages the institutions you’re trying to save. This approach seems worth it until one day you wake up surrounded by a scorched earth landscape filled with people who no longer trust or respect you.
Second, a transcendent vision. This camp refuses to admit they’re in the culture war—standing above it, often looking down on political maneuvering as grubby or beneath the church. They try to win by taking the long view: forming Christians, renewing character, and rebuilding institutions. That work is necessary. But when this stance disconnects from immediate, dangerous, immoral realities and ignores present opportunities to protect neighbors, it slides into performative transcendence—lofty talk that excuses sitting out the hard, imperfect choices right in front of us. People get hurt while we wait for a world that doesn’t yet exist.
So what do we do?
So how do we keep urgency from hardening into cut throat-tribalism and vision from drifting into disengagement? Truly faithful engagement holds together our present responsibility to protect while also stewarding our concern for our shared future—combining the strengths of both instincts without their temptation to drift.
In order to embrace both, we have to get comfortable with sober realism. The kind of approach that recognizes our choices are most often between better or worse, not a tidy good or evil. In this post-Christian moment, we may not be offered a clearly “Christian” option again. More often our options carry mixed blessings and real downsides. Refusing to choose won’t keep our hands clean; it usually hands victory to the worse option. We may hate having to “play the game,” but—as Pastor Kevin DeYoung reminds us—“sometimes the opposite of war is not peace and quiet; it is surrender and loss.” And Jesus told us to be “shrewd as serpents and innocent as doves”—to act wisely and lawfully to limit as much harm as we can without becoming what we oppose, even as we count the long-term cost to our credibility and to the health of our institutions.
Next, it will require moral clarity. We are steeped in a culture that hates the hypocrite more than it hates the radical. In light of that we must keep the same rules for both sides—call balls and strikes. Name your own side’s excesses; acknowledge when a rival advances something genuinely good. That clarity and consistency can create the credibility required to persuade, to rebuild trust, and to grow the team—drawing in the persuadable who respect independence from party lines talking points.
However, clarity isn’t the end of the task. We must not only resist what is false with our words; we must also begin to build what is true. As John Piper warns, if we spend most of our energy bemoaning the world, our vision of God shrinks. We collectively begin to lose our imagination for what the Kingdom of God makes possible. So don’t just critique; construct. Plant and strengthen the goods that make truth (the fruit of the gospel) plain and evident for everyone to see and experience: faithful homes, sacrificial churches, thriving families, excellence at work, honest and good institutions.
And yes, that includes participation in what the world will call politics—not as an idol, but as part of the world God called us to steward. For the Christian still holding out, remember: the theology didn’t drift into politics; politics invaded theology—offering rival answers to ultimate questions: life, dignity, gender, sex, family, and justice. Our response cannot be to abstain or abdicate but instead to put politics in perspective: recognizing it is necessary and effective but not ultimate. We must take dominion over everything the Lord gives us without mistaking those tools for a savior.
Keys to faithful engagement:
Don’t opt out. You’re already on the battlefield living with the consequences. So show up—classroom, board room, social media, coffee shop, and kitchen table.
Call balls and strikes. Keep the same standards for your side and the other. Admit your team’s wrongs and recognize the good across the aisle. Clarity and consistency build credibility—and credibility persuades.
Don’t just critique. Construct. Be more than a prophetic siren. Start and strengthen the goods that make truth and the fruit of the gospel visible: faithful homes, serving churches, excellent work, honest institutions.
Keep politics in perspective. Use it, don’t worship it. Act to reduce concrete harm now, but don’t trade away your integrity or our future to “win.”
My hope? A Christian remnant who feel obligated to engage, educated about the terrain, and equipped to blend courage with consistency—protecting neighbors today while building for tomorrow—never becoming monsters of the moment or retreating into a pious neutrality. Win the necessary battles without losing our witness.