Union Church

Listen along as we see the presence and power of Jesus give proliferation of the church.

Notes/Quotes:

Luke 4:16-21

“In that culture, one’s status in a community was not so much a function of economic realities, but depended on a number of elements, including education, gender, family heritage, religious purity, vocation, economics, and so on. Thus, lack of subsistence might account for one’s designation as “poor,” but so might other disadvantaged conditions, and “poor” would serve as a cipher for those of low status, for those excluded according to normal canons of status honor in the Mediterranean world. Hence, although “poor” is hardly devoid of economic significance, for Luke this wider meaning of diminished status honor is paramount.” Joel Green

“In Luke’s Gospel Jesus is either going to a meal, at a meal, or coming from a meal.” - Robert Karris

In Luke 5 Jesus eats with tax collectors and sinners at the home of Levi.

“There are three ways the New Testament completes the sentence, ‘The Son of Man came...’ ‘The Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many’ (Mark 10:45); ‘The Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost’ (Luke 19:10); ‘The Son of Man has come eating and drinking . . . ‘ (Luke 7:34). The first two are statements of purpose. Why did Jesus come? He came to serve, to give his life as a ransom, to seek and save the lost. The third is a statement of method. How did Jesus come? He came eating and drinking.” - Tim Chester

Acts 2:42-47

"We formerly rejoiced in uncleanness of life, but now love only chastity; before we used the magic arts, but now dedicate ourselves to the true and unbegotten God; before we loved money and possessions more than anything, but now we share what we have and to everyone who is in need; before we hated one another and killed one another and would not eat with those of another race, but now since the manifestation of Christ, we have come to a common life and pray for our enemies and try to win over those who hate us without just cause.” Justin Martyr to Antonius Pius 


Atheism [i.e., Christian faith] has been specially advanced through the loving service rendered to strangers, and through their care for the burial of the dead. It is a scandal there is not a single Jew who is a beggar, and that the godless Galileans care not only for their own poor but for ours as well; while those who belong to us look in vain for the help that we should render them - Emperor Julian

Acts 28:30-31

Listen along as we continue our series through the story of Scripture.

Notes/Quotes:

John 20:30-31 -

(21:25)

In a world of darkness - Jesus is Light

John 1:1-5

The term “the Word” (Gk. Logos) conveys the notion of divine self-expression or speech and has a rich OT background. God’s Word is effective: God speaks, and things come into being (Gen. 1:3, 9; Ps. 33:6; 107:20; Isa. 55:10–11). John also shows how this concept of “the Word” is superior to a Greek philosophical concept of “Word” (logos) as an impersonal principle of Reason that gave order to the universe. “And the Word was with God” indicates interpersonal relationship “with” God, but then and the Word was God affirms that this Word was also the same God who created the universe “in the beginning.” Here are the building blocks that go into the doctrine of the Trinity: the one true God consists of more than one person, they relate to each other, and they have always existed. - ESV Study Bible

John 1:14

In Hebrew the term “dabar” means both "word" and "deed." Thus to say something is to do something. "I love you." "I hate you." "I forgive you." "I am afraid of you." Who knows what such words do, but whatever it is, it can never be undone. Something that lay hidden in the heart is irrevocably released through speech into time, is given substance and tossed like a stone into the pool of history, where the concentric rings lap out endlessly. "In the beginning was the Word," says John, meaning perhaps that before the beginning there was something like Silence: not the absence of sound, because there was no sound yet to be absent, but the absence of absence: nothing nothinged: Then the Word. The Deed. The Beginning. The beginning in time of time. "The Word was with God, and the Word was God," says John. By uttering himself, God makes God heard and makes God hearers. God never seems to weary of trying to get across to us. Word after word God tries in search of the right word. When the creation itself doesn't seem to say it right—sun, moon, stars, all of it—God tries flesh and blood. Frederick Buechner

John 10:10

“Never forget that when we are dealing with any pleasure in its healthy and normal and satisfying form, we are, in a sense, on the Enemy’s ground. I know we have won many a soul through pleasure. All the same, it is His invention, not ours. He made the pleasures: all our research so far has not enabled us to produce one. All we can do is to encourage the humans to take the pleasures which our Enemy has produced, at times, or in ways, or in degrees, which He has forbidden…When He talks of their losing their selves, He means only abandoning the clamor of self-will; once they have done that, He really gives them back all their personality, and boasts (I am afraid, sincerely) that when they are wholly His they will be more themselves than ever.” C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

(Bible Project image)

John 16:7-11

John 20:21

Following Jesus is not a skill we acquire. Following Jesus is not a strategy we work out.  It is obedience – ‘my Lord.’ It is worship – ‘my God.’ No religious skills that you and I acquire will ever produce resurrection. No spiritual strategies that we work on will ever produce resurrection.  Following Jesus doesn’t get us where we want to go; it gets us where Jesus wants us to go.

Mark 4:35-41

Mark 1:1

The providence which has ordered the whole of our life…has ordained the most perfect consummation for human life by giving to it Caesar Augustus, by sending in him, as it were, a savior for us and those who come after us, to make war to cease, to create order everywhere…the birthday of the god [Augustus] was the beginning of the gospel for the world that came by him. - Priene Calendar Inscription, 9BC

“The introduction of Jesus is no less momentous than the creation of the world, for in Jesus a new creation is at hand” - James Edwards

15:39

“Jesus does not reproach the disciples for their lack of knowledge, however, but for their fear, the Greek word for which means “losing heart” or “cowardice.” The real threat to faith comes not from lack of knowledge but from doubt and fear.” - James Edwards

Only two groups seem to give anywhere near the expected response—the desperate and the demoniacs. The latter at least show signs of knowing who Jesus is; but they get no further because recognition leads to resistance, not faith, till they are delivered. The desperate alone are seen to be faithful. They have nowhere else to go, and no future to hope for without a cure. In the main they cast themselves on Jesus and find all that they need, and more. - Donald English

Mark 5:19-20

Listen along as we enter the New Testament and see the arrival, announcement, and acts of the Messiah.

Notes//Quotes:

Matthew

“First, God generally designed or allowed a desperate situation to arise before presenting His deliverance. Secondly, He always called upon a faithful servant to “stand in the gap,” making intercession to Him on behalf of the people (Ezek 22:30), and to be His agent through whom He performed His work.” William MacDonald

“The remedy for sin is not denying sin’s presence or explaining it away, but openly admitting it. We are free from sin only when we face it; we disown sin by owning up to it; sin is remitted where sin is admitted.” - Dale Bruner

The wrath of God is not the irritability of God; it is the love of God in friction with injustice. It is the warm, steady, patient, but absolutely fair grace of God in collision with manifest selfishness. - Dale Bruner

If we hear the Father’s twice-repeated Voice at the baptism and transfiguration correctly, the one fact the Father wants believers to know, above apparently all other facts, is how much we have in Jesus. If we know this, we know the most important fact in the world. “Here,” God is saying in so many words, “in this man, is everything I want to say, reveal, and do, and everything I want people to hear, see, and believe. If you want to know anything about me, if you want to hear anything from me, if you want to please me, get together with him” - Dale Bruner

“You have to keep unmasking the world about you for what it is: manipulative, controlling, power-hungry, and, in the long run, destructive. The world tells you many lies about who you are, and you simply have to be realistic enough to remind yourself of this. Every time you feel hurt, offended, or rejected, you have to dare to say to yourself: 'These feelings, strong as they may be, are not telling me the truth about myself. The truth, even though I cannot feel it right now, is that I am the chosen child of God, precious in God's eyes, called the Beloved from all eternity, and held safe in an everlasting belief.” - Henri Nouwen

“Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?” Matthew 11:3

“For immediately after John’s sermon, in the rest of chaps. 3 and 4, Jesus comes (almost like a sinner) to be baptized, and in water! John even tried to dissuade Jesus from being baptized (3:13–15). In John’s eyes, Jesus was from the very first a little baffling, a little strange; less messianic than he had expected and less cataclysmic than he had preached. Then in the Three Temptations, Jesus rejects rather than accepts the powerful ministries offered by Satan (and even well-meaningly predicted by John)—sensational, spectacular, and speedy ministries (4:1–11). In the Three Services (4:12–25), Jesus called his first disciples with power—but just a few were called (four are recorded), they were not persons of great influence (they were simply fishermen), and their task seemed less to be setting the world on fire by destroying evil (which was John’s main picture) than it was, more prosaically, “catching people” into salvation (which is Jesus’ main picture, 4:19).” 

“In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus taught “with authority,” but what he taught seemed more calculated to put axes in the hands of his opponents than in the hands of his disciples: disciples were in fact specifically forbidden avenging attacks on evil, were particularly promised persecution and tough times, and when talk did come to great and powerful deeds (7:22: prophecy, exorcism, many miracles), Jesus seemed less to encourage them than to warn of them. The whole Sermon on the Mount calls its hearers to a fundamental morality—to such prosaic deeds as scriptural reverence, temperamental patience, sexual purity, marital fidelity, no oaths, nonviolence, and even the love of enemies (the Six Commands of 5:17–48). Are these “the deeds of the Messiah” preached by John and predicted by the OT?" - Dale Bruner

“Go and tell John what you hear and see: 5 the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them. 6 And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.”

Listen along as we close out the Old Testament.

Malachi 2:17-3:5

“The book of Malachi sits aptly in our Bibles as the last book of the Old Testament, for it looks back to the Old Testament and assumes, summarizes and applies its message. But it also looks forward to the New Testament, with its promises of the coming reign of God.” - Peter Adam

“The general picture we get from the book is that the long years of Israel’s exile did not fundamentally change the hearts of the people. They’re still in rebellion against God, the temple is corrupted, and the reader is left waiting for some kind of resolution. And that’s exactly what Malachi announces. The Day of the Lord is coming to purify Israel from all moral compromise and evil, so that a faithful remnant can emerge out of the other side. While the tone of the book is kind of a downer, it ends with a hopeful note that God will come one day to sort everything out. And that final, hopeful note is precisely what makes Malachi a great ending to the Christian Old Testament. But remember, it’s not the original ending.” Amber Dillon

Mal 1:2

“One of the book’s most striking features is the way in which every word of God is contradicted or questioned by God’s people. This is the deep structure of the book, and its recurring theme. Contradicting God and his words was unfortunately characteristic of this contrary people! Whatever God said, they contradicted by questions.” - Peter Adam

Mal 1:6-8

2:10-16