Unbinding the Bible

In this episode, I'll share a few thoughts that I've been wrestling through recently. By sharing these thoughts, I'm hoping to help the church rethink how it approaches those not yet a part of our communities and how we model our lives around Jesus' power-under ways.

In this episode, we'll tackle yet another area where so many evangelical Christians have adopted a power-over mindset: the way current partisan political discussions speak about guns. I want us thinking about this issue as kingdom citizens FIRST, Americans SECOND, and see what, if anything, the Bible has to say on the matter.

Taking our cues from Moses' actions in Exodus 32, we'll spend the next several episodes asking ourselves, "Which deeply held beliefs of ours are rooted in a power-over understanding of God?" It might be hard to detect at times, but we need to probe deeply into the things we believe so we can best represent our God as the power-under, compassionate, servant-like God that he is, revealed most perfectly of course in the person of Jesus Christ. In this episode, we’ll talk about abortion.

I quoted Ben Cremer several times in this episode. He has a weekly newsletter you can sign up to receive filled with thoughtful reflections on how the Christian faith intersects with politics and culture. You can sign up to receive his newsletter here.

In this episode, I'll share a few personal thoughts from the past six years of my life and how that has shaped the way I think about the Christian faith and the way it is expressed by many well-intentioned Christians. I'll list several books that have shaped my thinking in recent years and then explain why I believe Jesus wants to critique any and all forms of power-over ideologies that are held to in his name.

In this week's episode, we're looking again at Exodus 32 and the Israelites' crafting of the golden calf. Here's the theme we'll be exploring: Who you think God is will determine how you choose to image him; how you choose to “represent” him as one of his priests. And we have a front-row seat to see the ways both Moses and Aaron "represent" God as one of his priests. This is an episode you don't want to miss!

We're back with Season 5! On this week's episode, I'll share a bit about my summer off and what I've been up to and then we'll dive into the context a bit of what led Israel to thinking the creation of a golden calf in Exodus 32 made any kind of sense. I think that today's episode will give you insight and understanding to just how easy committing idolatry can actually be, and I'm confident this will properly frame the way we need to think about grinding down our own golden calves.

In this episode, I'll share with you a few ramblings of what's been going on with me and then read a few additional ramblings that I wrote out concerning golden calves and roots, both of which are plaguing the evangelical church.

This episode is the final one of our 4-part THROWBACK THURSDAY series. Originally published as episode 038, we'll talk about a strange verse from Colossians 1 where Paul says, "in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions" (v. 24). What could he possibly mean here? And what relevance does it have for Christians? These are great questions! And I'll answer them and others during the episode.

In this THROWBACK THURSDAY episode, we'll look at how the NT speaks of the solidarity that the followers of Jesus share with Jesus himself. The main theme of this week's episode is: All Christians become, “in Christ,” the very things Christ was while on earth. It is one of the NT's most important themes, and yet one that I've noticed is absent from the awareness of most Christians. Hopefully this episode will help clear things up.

In this episode, we're going to address one of the gospel's fundamental questions: Why does the one coming to restore justice to the world end up suffering? We'll take a close look at the mission of Jesus as well as his offer of (and our need for) the forgiveness of sins.