Practicing the Way with John Mark Comer

What is the meaning of life? According to Jesus, the meaning of life is love: becoming a person who loves God and loves others. Breaking down the story of the Road to Emmaus and our modern cultural moment, John Mark challenges us to embrace the good news of the resurrection and live as beacons of love and hope in our world.

Key Scripture Passages: Luke 24v13-35

Resources for this practice:

https://practicingthewayarchives.org/practices/naming

Do you feel stuck in your apprenticeship to Jesus? Drawing from the wisdom of followers of Jesus throughout church history, John Mark discusses how identifying landmarks on the journey of our apprenticeship to Jesus can help us get unstuck. This week, he talks about one ancient journey paradigm called The Three Ways to show how the purpose of our spiritual formation is becoming people of love and presence.

Key Scripture Passages: Luke 9v57-62; 1 Corinthians 13v11; Hebrews 5v12-14

Recommended Resources for this practice:

https://practicingthewayarchives.org/practices/naming

Invitation to a Journey, Robert Mulholland

Sacred Fire, Ronald Rolheiser

Did Jesus practice sabbath? John Mark talks about Jesus’s teachings and relationship to the sabbath by highlighting four common words associated with the word “shabbat”: stop, rest, delight, and worship. John Mark shows how these four words give us clues on how to find happiness, joy, and peace in this practice.

Key Scripture Passages: Mark 2v23-28; Mark 3v1-6

Resources for this practice:

https://practicingthewayarchives.org/practices/sabbath

Sacred Rhythms, Ruth Haley Barton

“Sabbath is an act of resistance, a prophetic act over against the accomplishment and accumulation of our society.”

In a culture that is addicted to the twin drugs of accomplishment and accumulation, sabbath is how we “fight” back against Egypt, Pharaoh, and his empire. John Mark continues his biblical theology on sabbath with an exploration of work and rest in the story of the Exodus.

Key Scripture Passages: Exodus 20v8; Deuteronomy 5v12-15; Nehemiah 13v15-22

Resources for this practice:

https://practicingthewayarchives.org/practices/sabbath

“If you go against the grain of the universe, you get splinters.” – HH Farmer

Sabbath was built into the rhythm of creation and going against this rhythm has consequences. John Mark lays out a biblical theology of sabbath, showing that sabbath is instituted by God, blessed, holy, made for worship, a command and a gift, and a day to remember. 

Key Scripture Passages: Genesis 1v31-2:3; Exodus 16v9-30; Exodus 20v1-8

Resources for this practice: 

https://practicingthewayarchives.org/practice/sabbath

Are you tired? We are plagued by a cancerous restlessness of our condition and our culture, made worse by our digital technology. Through sabbath, the way of Jesus instead offers rest and peace. In this episode, John Mark teaches on the need for sabbath in our lives and its potential to radically change our walk with God.

Key Scripture Passages: Matthew 11v28-30; Hebrews 4v1-11

Resources for this practice:

https://practicingthewayarchives.org/practices/sabbath

The Subversive Sabbath, AJ Swoboda

"When Christ calls a man, He bids him come and die." - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

We live in a culture that focuses on self-gratification, but Jesus calls us to deny ourselves, pick up our cross, and follow Him. In this episode, John Mark talks about how denying the self and our disordered desires leads to our deepest joy, peace, and happiness.

Key Scripture Passages: Matthew 16v21-27; Galatians 2v20; Galatians 5v24-25; Colossians 3v1-5

Resources for this practice:

https://practicingthewayarchives.org/practices/fighting

How do we resist being shaped by modern culture? The "world," as the New Testament writers called it, shapes how we think and live. John Mark discusses how we can discover how we being shaped by culture. By learning how to reconnect with God's definitions of good and evil in those ways, we find how to be "in the world but not of it." 

Key Scripture Passages: John 15v18-21; John 17v6-18; 1 John 2v15-17; Romans 1v20; 1 John 3v16; 

Resources for this practice:

https://practicingthewayarchives.org/practices/fighting

Why Liberalism Failed, Patrick Deneen

Liberal Christianity, Theo Hobson

The Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis

Disappearing Church, Mark Sayers

The Truth About Lies and the Lies About Truth, David Takle

You don't just reap what you sow: you become what you sow. Continuing his exploration of Galatians, John Mark teaches that our decisions to walk by the Spirit or by the flesh have a compounding effect that shapes our character and our destiny. He finishes by encouraging us to embrace the way of Jesus as practice walking by the spirit.

Key Scripture Passages: Galatians 6v1-9; James 1v4

Resources for this practice:

https://practicingthewayarchives.org/practices/fighting

Satan and the Problem of Evil, Greg Boyd

Doesn't freedom mean that I can do what I want? Not according to Jesus. John Mark contrasts our modern culture's definition of freedom with how Jesus and the other biblical authors thought about freedom. He then breaks down Galatians 5 and shows us how the practices of Jesus help us to walk by the Spirit towards true fulfillment in God and not be mastered by the flesh. 

Key Scripture Passages: Ephesians 2v1-5; Galatians 5v1-26

Resources for this practice:

https://practicingthewayarchives.org/practices/fighting

The Gift of Being Yourself, David Benner

Why Liberalism Failed, Patrick Deneen