Should Christians dive into culture to change it, or pull back to stay pure? Kevin Swanson tackles that tension head-on in this chapter from The Tattooed Jesus, warning against both the compromise of chasing relevance and the faithlessness of total retreat. Drawing on Augustine's city of God, the parable of the wheat and tares, and examples from Hollywood to global corruption rankings, he makes the case for a faith bold enough to actually shape the world around it.

What does it take to stand firm when the culture around you turns openly hostile to the church? Kevin Swanson walks through Romans 1 and the brutal backdrop of Nero's Rome to show how the early church survived seven persecutions over three centuries — through holiness, prayer, and a settled confidence in the love of God.

Film and television shape a generation's worldview more powerfully than most Christian parents realize. Often, the average teenager retains more from a movie night than Sunday's sermon. In this audiobook chapter from The Tattooed Jesus, he offers a method for analyzing movies on multiple levels, from genre and zeitgeist to the metaphysical worldview hidden beneath the story. Using examples from Star Wars, Man of Steel, The Lion King, and the horror genre, Swanson shows families how to discern what a film is really teaching.