Russia has become the most sanctioned country in the world. This week, more global corporations announced they would shutter or suspend their business in Russia. Goldman Sachs says it’s leaving, and YouTube won’t let Russian creators monetize their videos.

In the global economy, it is difficult to inflict harm on your enemies without affecting yourself or your allies. So, it is hard to know whether sanctions are effective. Some are convinced that putting the squeeze on Russia’s economy will make Putin come to his senses. But as Lee Jones suggests in UnHerd, sanctions presuppose that every man has a “price,” a line they believe to be too costly to cross. 

So does Putin have a line? If he does, it may come as a shock to the West that it is probably not the one they imagined. What if he doesn’t care that his people don’t have McDonald’s and YouTube? What if he doesn’t care for the admiration of the world? What if he doesn’t even care that his people are suffering? Could it be that he wants something different than the glorious rise of a liberal progressive world order? Maybe that thought is occurring to our elites.

For now, Putin’s brutal invasion seems to have thrown a dirty great rock into the calm pool that was the plan for globalization. How could he interrupt the march of a new world order? Although our elites use similar tricks to Putin – propaganda, surveillance, debt slavery – to keep people in their sway, his are the only ones we hear about. This is not to condone war but to a call to think deeply and wake up. 

If you didn’t hear last week’s Brief History of Power podcast, it was packed with thought-provoking conversation. Dr Koontz argues that our leaders are mostly managers, devoid of convicting principles but willing to do what they need to to keep The Machine ticking over. 

With that in mind, we are not downcast, but rather sober-minded. Believing a hard truth is much better than a comforting lie. So Mad Christian, keep watch! Be in the Word and encourage each other. In the end, Mad Christian, the fact of humanity’s fallen state is made quite bearable when you know that Christ has risen. This season of darkness will one day give way to the light of his glorious kingdom. Because you paid for, you are immortal now, not a data point in a global enterprise, but a citizen of heaven. 

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For more reading on the ways global technocracy is shaping the world, Unlimited Hangout published a massive article which might serve as a reference.