The sign on the door of The Shepherds Cafe still read OPEN, but the morning had the quiet feel of a place that hadn’t decided whether it wanted company yet. The espresso machine warmed itself with a soft hiss, and winter light pressed against the windows like a sober reminder that the world outside did not pause for anyone’s sanity.
Elijah sat near the window with a mug he wasn’t drinking quickly. His phone lay face-up on the table, frozen on another headline that felt less like reporting and more like provocation—one more example of people speaking loudly while thinking lightly. He read it again, not because it was confusing, but because it was so obviously missing the most basic ingredient: reason.
He set the phone down and exhaled.
“Where did common sense go?”
He didn’t say it like a joke. He said it like a grief statement.
The phrase was everywhere—blogs, short clips, opinion rants, and “thoughtful” pieces that still carried the same exhausted undertone: Something is wrong with how people are thinking. Elijah wasn’t naive enough to believe past generations were flawless. But he was old enough to see the change: not just disagreement, but a growing hostility toward logic itself. Definitions didn’t matter. Evidence didn’t matter. Consequences didn’t matter. Feelings became final authority, and whichever crowd shouted loudest acted like truth had been decided.
Elijah’s eyes drifted to his Bible, already open—because when the world got noisy, he had learned to return to what didn’t bend.
His finger landed on Acts 17:1–4. He reread it slowly, letting each line sink.
Paul entered the synagogue. He reasoned with them from the Scriptures. He explained and proved that the Christ had to suffer and rise again. Some were persuaded.
Elijah paused on the verb: reasoned (Acts 17:2).
Christianity wasn’t presented as a mood or a branding campaign. It was presented as truth that could be explained, defended, and understood. The gospel didn’t require people to turn their brains off; it required them to submit their minds to God’s revelation.
Elijah stared out the window at the street for a moment, then turned back to the table.
If reasoning collapses in the public arena, it won’t stay outside the church. It will seep in.
And when it seeps in, the damage is spiritual.
He thought of all the warnings given to Christians about mental drift—warnings not aimed at outsiders, but at believers.
The slow leak.
The gradual compromise.
The lazy mind.
He turned to Hebrews 2:1 and read it quietly: “For this reason we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away from it.”
Drift. Elijah knew drift wasn’t rebellion. Drift was neglect. Drift was what happened when a man stopped steering because he assumed he was still headed the right direction.
Then he flipped to Hebrews 5:12–14—and the words hit with uncomfortable precision.
The writer rebuked Christians who should have matured but hadn’t (Hebrews 5:12). He explained that “solid food is for the mature” and that maturity belongs to those “who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil” (Hebrews 5:14).
Elijah read that last verse twice.
Training.
Practice.
Discern.
If people lose common sense, they lose more than social stability. They lose the mental discipline necessary for biblical discernment. And without discernment, Christians become vulnerable—not only to cultural deception, but to religious deception too.
He turned again, this time to Romans 12:2: “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind…”
Elijah let that phrase settle: renewing of the mind.
Not renewing the emotions. Not renewing preferences. Not renewing politics.
The mind.
Then he opened to 2 Timothy 2:15: “Be diligent to present yourself approved to God… accurately handling the word of truth.”
That verse wasn’t written to lazy thinkers. It assumed the Word could be handled correctly or incorrectly. It assumed discernment mattered. And it assumed that sloppy handling would hurt people.
Elijah’s jaw tightened slightly—not with anger, but with resolve.
Because here was the danger: if the world trained people to despise reasoning, many Christians would begin to approach Scripture the same way they approached headlines—quick impressions, shallow certainty, and no patience for context. That’s how people end up twisting Scripture without realizing they’re doing it.
He turned to 2 Peter 3:16, where Peter warns that in Paul’s letters there are things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, “as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction.”
Elijah stared at the verse.
Untaught. Unstable. Distort.
That wasn’t a warning about intelligence. It was a warning about untrained minds—minds not anchored, not disciplined, not formed by Scripture.
And then he thought of the counterfeit gospel problem—how easily people traded apostolic teaching for comfortable alternatives.
He went to Galatians 1:6–9 and read Paul’s sharp rebuke: they were deserting Christ for a different gospel, and Paul said even if an angel preached a different gospel, he was to be accursed (Galatians 1:8–9).
Elijah didn’t smile at that severity. He respected it.
Because false gospels don’t usually arrive wearing horns. They arrive wearing smiles. They arrive with attractive shortcuts. They arrive with language that sounds spiritual but quietly moves people away from obedience to Christ.
And how do you resist that?
You reason from Scripture like Acts 17:2–3.
You pay close attention so you don’t drift like Hebrews 2:1.
You train discernment through practice like Hebrews 5:14.
You renew the mind like Romans 12:2.
You handle the word accurately like 2 Timothy 2:15.
Elijah closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them and looked around the café.
A young man at a corner table scrolled rapidly, absorbing a thousand claims without stopping to test a single one. Two older men argued at the wall, their volume increasing while their reasoning decreased. Elijah watched the pattern and thought: if you want to destroy a society, you don’t have to remove laws first—you remove the ability to reason, and the rest collapses on schedule.
And then Elijah’s thoughts sharpened toward the church.
If Christians lose common sense, they lose:
The ability to explain truth plainly (Nehemiah 8:8—the Word read and explained so people understood). The ability to test spirits and teachings (1 John 4:1—“test the spirits”). The ability to distinguish good and evil (Hebrews 5:14). The ability to see through smooth deception (Ephesians 4:14—tossed by every wind of doctrine). The ability to build faith on evidence, not impulse (John 20:30–31—signs written so you may believe).
Elijah picked up a napkin and wrote a sentence, slowly:
If common sense is eroding, Christians must rebuild disciplined thinking on purpose.
Then he wrote four Scripture-grounded commitments beneath it:
Slow down and define words (Proverbs 18:13—answering before listening is folly). Refuse shallow certainty (Proverbs 14:15—the naive believes everything). Test everything by Scripture (Acts 17:11—examining the Scriptures daily). Pursue maturity through practice (Hebrews 5:14—discernment trained by constant use).
Elijah looked at what he’d written and realized the phrase “Where did common sense go?” wasn’t only a complaint. It was a warning light.
And Elijah knew what came next: not more ranting, not more venting—training.
Because a church that cannot reason from Scripture will eventually become a church that cannot recognize drift. And drift doesn’t announce itself. It simply carries people away while they’re distracted.
Elijah took a slow sip of coffee and spoke the phrase one last time, but this time with a steadier tone.
“Where did common sense go?”
He nodded as if answering himself.
“Wherever it went,” he said quietly, “we’re going to bring it back—by renewing the mind with the Word.”