Jeff Dornik – May 4

There is a strange comfort in believing that history simply happens to us. The headlines appear, the experts assemble, the slogans arrive, the approved emotions are distributed, and everyone is expected to nod along as if civilization just coughed up a consensus sometime between breakfast and the evening news. We are told that public opinion is organic, cultural change is inevitable, institutional trust is virtuous, and only deeply unserious people would ask why the same class of officials, media gatekeepers, academics, bureaucrats, and corporate overlords always seem to benefit from these allegedly spontaneous moral awakenings.

It is an adorable theory, in the way a toddler wearing a lab coat is adorable. In Following the Leader, I deal directly with one of the most uncomfortable truths of the modern age: public perception is not merely observed by power, it is shaped by power. The point is not that every event is scripted by some shadowy committee of Bond villains stroking cats in a candlelit basement, although at this point one does start to wonder whether at least one government contractor has submitted a proposal for that. The point is far simpler and far harder to dismiss. Institutions with money, influence, data, coercive authority, and ideological ambition do not sit around hoping the public accidentally arrives at conclusions favorable to them. They work to form those conclusions.

We have lived through this repeatedly. The American people were told Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, and most assumed they were being informed. They were told that two weeks to flatten the curve was merely a temporary act of public health prudence, and most assumed they were being protected. They were told that certain stories were too dangerous to discuss, too irresponsible to share, or too extreme to examine, and most assumed they were being spared misinformation. What they rarely assumed was that the management of perception had become one of the central functions of modern power, because people would rather believe they are witnessing history than admit they are being guided through it. That is one of the core arguments in the excerpt from Following the Leader that inspired this article.

This is where Scripture cuts through the fog with its usual irritating habit of being right. Ecclesiastes 1:9 says, “There is nothing new under the sun.” Human beings have always sought power. They have always manipulated language. They have always disguised ambition as virtue and control as protection. The tools have changed, but the heart has not. Pharaoh had taskmasters. Caesar had imperial propaganda. Modern elites have algorithms, credentialed panels, fact-checking consortia, public-private partnerships, and the kind of sanctimonious press release language that makes tyranny sound like a wellness retreat.

Power has always understood that perception determines allegiance. What people believe will determine what they tolerate. What they fear will determine what they surrender. What they call normal will determine what they defend. If you can define the boundaries of respectable thought, you do not need to win every argument. You simply make certain questions socially expensive enough that most people learn to censor themselves before anyone else has to do it for them. This is not brute force. It is formation. It is discipline. It is the quiet training of the public conscience until obedience feels like compassion and cowardice feels like responsibility.

The great lie of our age is not merely that bad people say false things. That has been true since Eden, where the serpent introduced humanity to the first misinformation campaign, complete with theological reframing and a surprisingly effective user engagement strategy. The deeper lie is that the systems shaping public consciousness are neutral. They are not. Institutions have moral commitments. Platforms have incentives. Media organizations have loyalties. Governments have appetites. Educational systems have formation goals. Corporate empires do not spend billions capturing attention because they are passionate about your personal flourishing. Apparently, nothing says human dignity like reducing the image of God to a behavioral data profile and then selling access to his nervous system in real time.

 We are living in a moment when millions of people sense that something is wrong, but they have not always had the language to name it. They know the narratives shift too quickly and too conveniently. They know yesterday’s forbidden question often becomes tomorrow’s reluctant admission. They know the same institutions that fail upward with stunning consistency still somehow retain the authority to lecture everyone else about trust. They know the machine is not all-powerful, but it is very rarely confused about its own interests.

The Christian response cannot be paranoia, because paranoia is just fear wearing a trench coat and pretending to be discernment. The response must be wisdom, courage, and allegiance to Christ above the manufactured consensus of the age.

 Romans 12:2 tells us, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind.” That command assumes the world is always trying to conform us. It assumes there are pressures, patterns, and systems seeking to mold our loves, fears, loyalties, and instincts. The renewal of the mind is not a decorative spiritual concept. It is resistance training for the soul.

That is the heart behind this book. Cynicism is cheap, and frankly the market is oversaturated. This book is written to call people back to clarity. We need to recognize how influence works, how narratives are constructed, how leaders are manufactured, how crowds are moved, and how Christians can recover the moral courage to follow the true Leader when every lesser authority demands applause.

This is a book for those who are tired of being managed, tired of being manipulated, and tired of being told that discernment is dangerous while blind trust is somehow a civic virtue. It is for those who understand that truth does not become extreme simply because corrupt institutions find it inconvenient. It is for Christians who refuse to outsource their conscience to experts, algorithms, pundits, politicians, or whatever committee is currently deciding which opinions are safe for public consumption.

The machine is not omnipotent. It is not sovereign. It is not eternal. It is not even as impressive as it thinks it is, which is a mercy, because few things are more exhausting than self-important bureaucracies with messianic branding.

Christ is King. Truth still matters. Courage is still required. And the people of God do not have to be herded by the spirit of the age when we have already been commanded to follow the voice of the Shepherd.