13 CT News Stories That Made Us Happy in 2021

It was another hard year on many fronts, but it wasn’t all bad news.

2021 brought more headlines about COVID-19, religious persecution, division, and spiritual abuse. Amid the heaviness, we saw God at work through his people in big ways and small, from signs of hope for Christians in the Middle East to a surprise worship leader at a church in California.

Here are 13 of our favorite good-news stories covered by CT this year, listed in chronological order.

Read all of our year-end lists here.

- More from CT Editors

Also in this series

Introduction

Christianity Today in 2021: Our Top News, Reviews, Podcasts, and More

CT Editors

Top 10 CT News Stories of the Year

CT Editors

Christianity Today’s Top Testimonies of 2021

CT Editors

Christianity Today’s 15 Most-Read Book Reviews of 2021

CT Editors

CT’s Top 10 Articles for Pastors in 2021

CT Editors

CT’s Top 20 Stories of 2021

CT’s 2021 Cover Stories, Ranked

CT Editors

Biblical Archaeology’s Top 10 Discoveries of 2021

Gordon Govier

CT’s Stories of 2021 That You May Have Missed

CT Editors

Our Favorite Christianity Today Podcasts from 2021

12 Leaders Evangelicals Lost in 2021

Daniel Silliman

The Global Church in 2021: CT’s Top 20 International Articles

Morgan Lee

Our Latest

David Platt All You Want For Christmas

The Russell Moore Show

David Platt on All You Want for Christmas

What if the most radical thing about Christmas isn’t that God came near—but that he came to serve?

Excerpt

The Story Behind Handel’s ‘Messiah’

The Bulletin with Charles King

Meet the unlikely characters who defined this musical classic.

The KK Park complex in Myanmar's eastern Myawaddy township.

News

The Christians Helping People Enslaved by Cybercrime Scam Centers

Erin Foley in Mae Sot, Thailand

After Myanmar’s military raided a compound, a network of ministries helps trafficking victims return home.

Dreaming Against the Machine

Technologies like AI privilege “growth” and “effectiveness” over imagination and inefficiency. God operates differently.

A Hanukkah menorah is projected onto the sails of the Sydney Opera House in memory of the victims of the shooting at Bondi Beach in Sydney on December 15, 2025.

News

Church Provides Shelter, Aid During Bondi Beach Attack

Amy Lewis

Australian Christians are finding ways to support the Jewish community after an ISIS-motivated shooting killed 15.

Brown University student kneels in front of a memorial

News

How Rhode Island Churches Responded to the Brown Shooting

Harvest Prude and Kara Bettis Carvalho in Providence, Rhode Island

God “draws near to us in our suffering,” local pastor Scott Axtmann preached after Saturday’s deadly attack. Area ministries were active too.

Two women facing away, one has an Israel flag draped over her shoulders, the other woman has her arm around the first.

The Bulletin

Hanukkah Attack in Australia and Christmas Hospitality

Steve Cuss, Mike Cosper, Clarissa Moll

Shootings prompt a conversation about antisemitism and violence, and Being Human’s Steve Cuss discusses God’s hospitality.

The book cover.

Review

Personal Preference Is No Way to Judge Faithful Worship

Steven Félix-Jäger’s new volume on biblical, aesthetic, theological, and pastoral considerations in worship will serve many churches.