And Sons

What do we do when, not if, we face criticism? Often the critique has truth in it, but the internal messages that go along with it aren't the most accurate. Our culture has become a dehumanizing and critical one, but even when the criticism is nothing more than a difficult conversation, there are ways we can learn to navigate well.

An elegant tool, from a more civilized time. Wait, that's not right. A simple tool, for a cluttered time? Better.

Pursuing joy and life can feel like uphill and difficult choices in every direction. But what if joy isn't as far away as we think?

Dreams (and we mean aspirations) are difficult. They are, on the one hand, a way God tells you about your future. They are, on the other, vulnerable, sabotaged, and often unrealized. In this episode, Sam and Blaine unpack dreams. What does it mean to share part of God’s heart for creation? What does it mean to see an unrealized potential in the world no one else sees? Because dreaming is, in fact, meant to show God’s heart to the world. But, because we live in this story and not another, dreams are usually intertwined with deep pain. Sam and Blaine explore dream-care as soul-care, whole-heartedness, and the loving act that is making your dreams available to God.

FRAMING THE SEASON

1. What are you doing, Jesus, in me in this season?

2. What’s the theme of this season?

3. What do I need to know about my role in your larger mission for this season?

4. What prophetic words, images, or instructions do you want to call to mind to frame this season?

5. What are you doing in my (area of concern: work, marriage, house search, job search, etc) in particular?

UNDERSTANDING THE OPPOSITION

1. What warfare is set against me in this season? What strategies is the enemy employing in an attempt to undermine your work, Jesus?

2. Who’s in charge (the ranking foul spirit)?

3. What is set against my marriage (or area of concern from above), in particular?

4. What in my flesh is vulnerable, or in the way of what you’d like to do?

5. What in the World is particularly opposed to your work in this season?

TAKING HOLD OF THE PROVISION

1. What is your provision in this season? What is it in you, Jesus, and in your kingdom and work, that overwhelms and envelops the opposition as I take hold of it?

2. Provision for the warfare?

3. Provision for the opposition of my flesh?

4. Provision for the opposition of the world?

5. What personal instructions to you have for me to help my alignment with you in this season?

6. Anything else?

Referenced in the show:

Space, Time, and Incarnation Thomas F. Torrance

Deus Caritas Est by Pope Benedict

Fill These Hearts by Christopher West

For Sigmund Freud, nephew Edward Bernays, and marketing, PR! - A Social History of Spin by Stewart Ewan

Nephesh by the Bible Project

Ruach by the Bible Project

Merry Christmas from And Sons by And Sons

In an effort to fight the creeping, medicating, overextended presence of our smartphones, the And Sons team and four Ransomed Heart team members gave up their smartphones for a month to see what would happen.

The goal was to see if technology is really the enemy, or if we use other forms of medication in its place. It's an And Sons experiment.

The season of advent is evoking a lot of longing for us this year. It seems you can't say the word hope without feeling the pain of all the things not yet realized. There's joy to be sure, but the longing for Jesus to come again is getting to feel more like a cry for relief than any joyful carol.

"You will know them by their fruits" Matt 7:16

It's a litmus test Jesus gave us for false prophets, and yet it extends deeper than just teachings. The fruit of an action, the fruit of a train of thought, the fruit of an experience... they all tell us about the Good of the thing producing them.

Can we use the fruit and work backwards, though? When we experience inner death, sorrow, grief... can we use those as breadcrumbs to find a deeper root that is producing them, and if so, can we change what's going on beneath the surface?

Friendships are one of the deepest places of pain for just about everyone these days, it seems. How do we become the kind of men who have friendships going back 30 years? What are the rhythms that sustain and invite such things?