United? We Pray

Merry Christmas from United? We Pray. For this very special Christmas episode, we sit down with Dr. Fred Sanders to talk about the Incarnation of Christ. What does it mean that Jesus came to Earth as a baby boy? What does it mean that he came as a Jewish baby boy with a specific ethnicity? We talk about redemption, union with Christ, prayer, and what the Incarnation has to do with all of it. This was one of the most moving and devotional episodes we've ever recorded, and we hope it motivates you to greater worship of our Savior. Merry Christmas, beloved.

LINKS & SHOW NOTES:

• This UWP Podcast Episode was produced by Josh Deng with editing by Roshane Ricketts.
• For more information about Fred can be found here. 
• His excellent blog can be found here. 
• Los Angeles Bible Training School

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To learn more about United? We Pray, follow us on Instagram and keep exploring our website. Please consider rating the podcast on Apple Podcasts, and subscribe using your favorite podcast client to hear more!

Shai Linne joins us again today to talk about his section in The New Reformation (Moody, 2020) in which he outlines various ethnic sins which commonly fall under the heading "racism." By differentiating these kinds of sins, Shai gives us tools to deal with them from Scripture and lowers the temperature of the conversation by removing a label that almost no one can see themselves wearing. While none of us think of ourselves as racist, all of us have been guilty of some kind of ethnic sin in the past. We hope this conversation helps you to think, talk, and pray more specifically. 

LINKS & SHOW NOTES:

1. The New Reformation, by Shai Linne
2. Austin's article on interracial marriage. 
3. This UWP Podcast Episode was produced by Josh Deng with editing by Roshane Ricketts.

Support the show

To learn more about United? We Pray, follow us on Instagram and keep exploring our website. Please consider rating the podcast on Apple Podcasts, and subscribe using your favorite podcast client to hear more!

It was an honor to be joined by Dr. Karen Swallow Prior, author of the new book The Evangelical Imagination: How Stories, Images, & Metaphors Created a Culture in Crisis. Dr. Prior has keen insight into the role our imaginations play in creating assumptions about ourselves and those around us. She shares how the Evangelical imagination was created within our community and how it has changed over time. We hope you are encouraged to think more deeply about the assumptions we all carry about our neighbors, and hope you join us in praying for a more redeemed imagination for all of us. 

LINKS & SHOW NOTES:

• This UWP Podcast Episode was produced by Josh Deng with editing by Roshane Ricketts.
• To order Dr. Prior's excellent new book, click here. 
• To find more information on her substack newsletter, click here. 

Support the show

To learn more about United? We Pray, follow us on Instagram and keep exploring our website. Please consider rating the podcast on Apple Podcasts, and subscribe using your favorite podcast client to hear more!

Isaac and Austin sit down with Dr. Matt Hall, who is the Provost at BIOLA in California. We discuss his interest in history. There are good and bad ways to study history, so we talk about pitfalls to avoid and how we can make sure we're being as honest as possible. We also talk about black history and ways it has been neglected, abused, or viewed through a narrow lens of suffering. In all of this we aim to encourage especially those who teach history. It may be hard work, but it is good, God-honoring work when done well. 

LINKS & SHOW NOTES:

• This UWP Podcast Episode was produced by Josh Deng with editing by Roshane Ricketts.
• For more information about Matt and his work at BIOLA, click here. 

Support the show

To learn more about United? We Pray, follow us on Instagram and keep exploring our website. Please consider rating the podcast on Apple Podcasts, and subscribe using your favorite podcast client to hear more!

How does the Biblical concept of ethnicity relate to our modern conceptions of race? Does Jew and Gentile equal Black & White? Shai Linne is back to take us through Scripture to show how God's promise to Abraham for a multi-ethnic family is central to the gospel and our lives together as Christians. We hope you are encouraged to look to Scripture for help in addressing our biggest social problems. 

LINKS & SHOW NOTES:

• This UWP Podcast Episode was produced by Josh Deng with editing by Roshane Ricketts.
• For more information on Shai and his work, including his forthcoming album, click here.

Support the show

To learn more about United? We Pray, follow us on Instagram and keep exploring our website. Please consider rating the podcast on Apple Podcasts, and subscribe using your favorite podcast client to hear more!

Talking with kids about race is hard but important work. Shai Linne is back with us to share his own childhood experience, as well as advice for talking with kids about race. We want to be proactive in teaching our children that they are made in the image of God, and they are valuable and beautiful. We also want to prepare them for this fallen world and equip them to love the many different types of people God has created. We hope you are encouraged and hope you join us in praying for wisdom. 

LINKS & SHOW NOTES:

• This UWP Podcast Episode was produced by Josh Deng with editing by Roshane Ricketts.
• Here is the link to Shai's excellent children's book. 
• For more information on Shai and his work, including his forthcoming album, click here.

Support the show

To learn more about United? We Pray, follow us on Instagram and keep exploring our website. Please consider rating the podcast on Apple Podcasts, and subscribe using your favorite podcast client to hear more!

Shai is back with us for a conversation about ethnic diversity. Diversity is hard. Many of us can love the idea of an ethnically diverse church, for example, but be disappointed when the reality is much more difficult than we expected. We talk through reasons it can be so hard and share personal experiences that illustrate the point. This episode feels a little heavier than most, but even in the difficulty, we trust that the Lord is still working.

LINKS & SHOW NOTES:

• This UWP Podcast Episode was produced by Josh Deng with editing by Roshane Ricketts.
• Here is the polling data Austin referenced about diversity in churches. 
• For more information on Shai and his work, including his forthcoming album, click here.

Support the show

To learn more about United? We Pray, follow us on Instagram and keep exploring our website. Please consider rating the podcast on Apple Podcasts, and subscribe using your favorite podcast client to hear more!

Shai is back for the second episode in this series. We are talking books! Both Shai and Austin are avid readers, so they go back and forth with book recommendations across multiple categories. Discussed are books to shape our minds, books we think every Christian should read, books on history, and what we think are the best books on race. Then, after all the books we think may be helpful, we talk about the one book we know will always be helpful - the Bible. We hope you are encouraged to take up and read!

LINKS & SHOW NOTES:

• This UWP Podcast Episode was produced by Josh Deng with editing by Roshane Ricketts.
• You can search the book titles by name, but if you want to read the DOJ reports Shai mentioned, they are available here: Baltimore, Ferguson, Minneapolis
• For more information on Shai and his work, including his forthcoming album, click here. 

Support the show

To learn more about United? We Pray, follow us on Instagram and keep exploring our website. Please consider rating the podcast on Apple Podcasts, and subscribe using your favorite podcast client to hear more!

Grace and peace, friends. Isaac is out on paternity leave, so for the next six weeks, we will be joined by guest co-host Shai Linne. Shai is an author, musician, theologian, and friend. In this episode, we talk about how complicated multi-ethnic corporate worship can be. As always, Shai is careful to define our terms and keep us focused on the most important things. He offers encouragement to those who feel like outsiders and exhortations for us to keep love of our brothers and sisters as our main focus. We hope you enjoy this series with Shai!

LINKS & SHOW NOTES:

• This UWP Podcast Episode was produced by Josh Deng with editing by Roshane Ricketts.
• For more information about Shai and his work, click here. 

Support the show

To learn more about United? We Pray, follow us on Instagram and keep exploring our website. Please consider rating the podcast on Apple Podcasts, and subscribe using your favorite podcast client to hear more!

For the third and final episode in this series, Matt Martens fields questions from our audience after his talk on criminal justice reform. He covers topics varying from criminal justice procedure, Christian ethics, history, and theology. We would encourage you to listen to the previous two episodes before listening to this one. Matt's book ends with the encouragements to think differently, speak differently, and vote differently to enact criminal justice reform. We hope these episodes will help you do just that.

LINKS & SHOW NOTES:

• Listen to the previous two episodes with Matt: Part 1, Part 2
• You can find more information on Matt Martens here.
• You can preorder his excellent new book here.
• This UWP Podcast Episode was produced by Josh Deng with editing by Roshane Ricketts.

Support the show

To learn more about United? We Pray, follow us on Instagram and keep exploring our website. Please consider rating the podcast on Apple Podcasts, and subscribe using your favorite podcast client to hear more!