I cannot agree more with J.D. Vance’s statement here. In this memoir, he describes a web of personal, cultural, and spiritual problems that are so interconnected and tangled that there are no easy solutions.

J.D. Vance, our soon-to-be Vice President, grew up with a bunch of lunatic hillbillies and dysfunction upon dysfunction. A snapshot: Substance-abusing mom, revolving door of “dads,” constant uncertainty and conflict in the home, no special talents or intelligence to distinguish him. How did he rise above that to become a U.S. Marine and Yale Law School grad—and eventually the second-in-command of the most powerful nation on earth?

If we can simply take J.D. Vance’s experience and replicate it through government policies and laws, then everyone, no matter their situation, should be able to achieve what he did, right?

Of course not! I love that, instead of writing a political book, Vance decided instead to write a memoir, describing what it was like to grow up the way he did. He says again and again that, while he’s not skeptical of public policy, it wasn’t anything the government did that tipped the scales in his favor. It was the people in his life. He describes in the last chapter of the book how close he came to falling through the cracks. If just one family member, teacher, coach, or friend didn’t intervene for him at a critical point in life, he could’ve easily changed trajectory for the worse.

I believe the problems we face are spiritual at the root.

I have a Rich Mullins CD with one of those hidden tracks at the end. This track is at least an hour long, and it’s filled with snippets of Rich’s commentary during concerts and such. In one of them, he says something like this: You know, the scary thing about God is that he didn’t make a Plan B. He created the church, and he gave us a job, and if we don’t do it, there’s no Plan B. The church is the only thing that can make a real difference in this world. The government can’t do it, so stop trusting in the government. Educational systems can’t do it, so stop trusting in educational systems. God formed the church, and it’s our job.

I’m butchering it, but it resonates now more than ever.