The Bullpen with J.D. Greear

By J.D. GreearReligion & Spirituality Christianity

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The Bullpen with J.D. Greear episodes

January 24, 2022How Do You Honor a Toxic Parent?
Show Notes:
This brings us to one of the “big 10” — the 10 Commandments. There are a couple of things to understand starting with the 10 commandments are divided into two sections. The first four deal primarily with our relationship with God. The last five deal with our relationship to each other. Honoring your parents is the “hinge” in the middle, so which group does it belong to? Well, both. It’s the bridge between the two categories.
When we’re young, our parents stand in for God. By submitting to our parents, we’re learning to submit to God.
To “honor” your parents means to recognize parenthood as the temporary stand-in for God that it is, and you respect your parents accordingly. When you’re young, that means obeying them, and for your whole life it means respecting them.
If your situation is abusive, you need to get yourself out. Call 800-799-SAFE, the domestic violence hotline.
If your situation is not abusive, understand that you can respect the institution your parents represent even when you don’t represent them as individuals. When honoring your parents, you are honoring the God behind your parents whose authority is represented by them.
Honoring your parents is really a means to honoring God.
Lean not on your ability as a parent; lean on God’s grace as the hope for your child.
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question!
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
10 min
January 17, 2022If a Child Wanders From the Faith, Is It the Parents’ Fault?
Show Notes:
We should be as intentional with our families as we are with our jobs.
There is a sense that, on one level, I as a parent affect the faith journey of my kids.
But on another level, there is a limit to the responsibility parents have for the choices our kids make. God has made them as individuals. A lot of godly parents will have a child who wanders. And it’s not because they did something wrong.
Think about it: God was a perfect Father. And the only two humans he “fathered” directly (Adam and Eve) both rebelled. It wasn’t because of deficiencies in God’s parenting.
There are decisions only our kids can make. Even under the best of circumstances, they can decide to pursue things that are contrary to what God would have for them.
Pray for your kids. Speak truth to them. But ultimately, know that God wants us to lean into his grace.
God cares more for our kids than we do and he can pursue our kids in ways that we can’t.
Lean not on your ability as a parent; lean on God’s grace as the hope for your child.
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question!
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
15 min
January 10, 2022 What’s the Deal With Nicolas Cage?
If you’ve heard Pastor J.D. preach, you’ve probably heard him talk about Nicolas Cage. So, what’s the deal? Does he really think Nicolas Cage is the greatest actor of all time? Find out in this light-hearted episode!
6 min
January 03, 2022How Should We Live in the World but Not of the World?
Show Notes:
Who do you feel the closest kinship with? Who do you spend most of your time with? The lesson from Lot’s life is that you have to make up your mind from the beginning: Who do you really want to be? If it’s with the world, go there 100%. If it’s with God, go with him 100%.
What do you love? What does that say about what your heart really desires?
Are you trying to get as close to the world as you can without becoming it?
So how can I be around “Sodom” but not make the mistake Lot did? It has to do with who you choose to make your close friends and your community. Those are the ones you become like—just like Proverbs 13:20 tells us.
The most miserable person in the world is the half-committed Christian.
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question!
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
13 min
December 27, 2021Can a Christian Be Possessed by a Demon?
Show Notes:
It depends on what you mean by “demon possessed.” It’s never used in the Greek language that I know of, and it’s not in the Bible. The word in the Bible is “demonized,” which actually broadens it a little bit.
So, if you mean, “Can a demon so overtake a Christian so that they have no will left and no ability to choose right from wrong,” the answer is definitely no.
But if you mean, can a demon influence us or afflict us, Scripture I think indicates yes. But their entry into our lives comes from listening to the lies Satan tells us.
We’ve got to “talk back” to Satan’s lies with the truths of Scripture and the gospel.
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question!
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
12 min
December 20, 2021Do You Partner in Ministry With People You Disagree With?
Show Notes:
A theologian named Michael Byrd breaks down theological truths into three primary categories.
First, there are matters essential for salvation. On these matters, we have to have agreement. These include the person of Christ, the way of salvation, etc. These are things absolutely worth dividing over, and I would not partner with someone in ministry in an area like this where we disagree.
Second, there are matters that are important to the faith and the church but not matters of salvation. These things are also things where you need a relative amount of unity. They’re almost always spelled out in Scripture.
Third, there are matters of indifference. Those are non-essentials, debatable things, preferences, opinions, etc.
You’ve got to know what category different truths go into. Romans 14 says we are not to divide over inconsequential, disputed matters.
Wisdom is knowing what to unite around and what things are worth dividing over.
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question!
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
11 min
December 13, 2021What Is an “Idol?”
Show Notes:
When we think “idol,” we oftentimes think of a statue that you bow down to. But there’s more to it than that, and idolatry actually occupies the first two of the ten commandments, so you know it’s important.
We often have a “root idol” that controls a lot of the way we live our lives, whether that’s power, control, comfort, or approval.
In order to stop looking to these idols to meet our needs, we have to give God the ultimate weight in our lives.
Idols are not usually bad things, they’re often good things that we’ve given God-sized weight in our lives.
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question!
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
12 min
December 06, 2021How Can You Believe in a Virgin Birth? (With Rebecca McLaughlin)
Show Notes:
Rebecca, today we’ll answer another question from your book, Is Christmas Unbelievable? In the book, you answer the common question, “How can you believe in a virgin birth?”
A lot of people would say the virgin birth is a supernatural bridge too far. And I guess I can see why people say that, but in reality, if there’s a God who made the entire universe and everything in it, it’s actually sort of illogical to think that the same God couldn’t perform miracles, including having Jesus be born differently than everyone else.
The virgin birth has always been a miraculous claim—not just because of what modern science has told us.
But I happen to personally know some of the top scientists in the world who are believers and do, in fact, believe in the virgin birth. So, I don’t think we need to be concerned that the belief in the virgin birth is only for the scientifically uneducated.
Some question whether it really makes a difference if Jesus was born of a virgin or not. In fact, it is completely fundamental to our faith that Jesus was both fully human and fully divine. It’s not an optional extra or a “nice to have.”
The frame of reference we need to have for Jesus should so blow our minds that the reality of him being born of a virgin and conceived by the Holy Spirit is just one of many angles of the extraordinary reality of who he is as God made flesh.
The claims about Jesus that the gospels make are completely miraculous from his conception onwards. I don’t think we should be abashed about believing it all.
Check out Rebecca McLaughlin’s new book, Is Christmas Unbelievable?, today!
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question!
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
12 min
November 29, 2021Can We Take the Gospels Seriously? (With Rebecca McLaughlin)
Show Notes:
Rebecca, in your book Is Christmas Unbelievable, you answer some questions about the supernatural parts of Christmas. So much of what we know about Christmas, of course, comes from the gospels. But can we really trust them?
A lot of people say the gospels are unbelievable because they’re written decades after the events happened. But first of all, the gospels are not like you or I being asked what we had for breakfast last week. It was the disciples’ job to learn Jesus’ teachings. They rehearsed these stories for decades after his death, every day—that’s what they did all the time! Then, there were hundreds of other people who traveled around with him and saw the miracles he did who could attest to what he taught and did. We actually have a rich source of witnesses to the events of the gospels, not just the recollections of one or two guys 30 years later.
The gospels have proven to be impressive historical documents time after time—so much so that we should feel comfortable giving them the benefit of the doubt for historical facts that can’t be proven with other sources.
The gospels all testify about Jesus’ divinity in their own unique way.
Check out Rebecca McLaughlin’s new book, Is Christmas Unbelievable, today!
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question!
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
12 min
November 22, 2021Where Is the Devil at Work Today?
Show Notes:
First of all, we have to acknowledge that Satan is, indeed real. We have to take him seriously. But some people are guilty of not taking him seriously at all, and some are guilty of blaming every bad thing in life on him.
A lot of people don’t know that the phrase “demon possessed” is actually not in the Bible. The phrase “demonized” is, instead. I don’t believe that a demon can actually come in and possess someone who is a believer, but I do think demons can afflict a person who is a believer, especially when they’re not walking in obedience or saturated in the Word. We need to be alert and sober-minded, like Peter says.
When you look at the totality of human history, you would be naive to attribute some of history’s greatest tragedies to anything other than the influence of Satan, the prince of this world.
Fortunately for believers, the blood of Jesus covers us and anything covered by Jesus blood is safe from Satan and his attacks. Second, we have God’s Word itself. When Jesus was tempted, he quoted Scripture back to Satan and if it worked for Jesus, we can know it’ll work for us. That’s why I work to memorize Scripture.
I think Satan LOVES social media, it’s designed to magnify our self-obsession, which is Satan’s calling card!
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question!
As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast!
Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
12 min

About The Bullpen with J.D. Greear

From the publisher's feed

Every sermon starts with more than can fit into a message. For years, Pastor J.D. Greear has filled his sermon notes with extra illustrations, questions, insights, and rabbit trails that never made…