Vision For Life

Vocation is integral to God’s design for human flourishing. We were created to work and created to worship, and the routines of church and work coexist to form us. Our worship rightly orients our work and teaches us, in the words of Jesus, to “remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine.” What is the impact of a life, grounded in Christ, as it enters the world of work?

In part one of this five-part series considering particular sectors of the marketplace and the necessity of faithful presence within that context, special guests Hannah and Jill join Autumn to discuss the state of education in America today and the significance of education and educators.

In a recent article entitled “6 Ways Christians Can Respond to Our Strange New World,” Carl Trueman posits that new notions of selfhood and growing hostility toward long-held Christian beliefs and values are forcing us to reckon with and navigate a “strange new world.”

Autumn and Hunter discuss four, five, and six of the six directives Trueman lays out in the article, as follows: 4) Shape intuitions through biblical worship, 5) Retrieve natural law and the theology of the body, and 6) Live in realistic hope.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

"6 Ways Christians Can Respond to Our Strange New World" by Carl Trueman (https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/respond-strange-new-world/)

"The Confessions Of St. Augustine" (http://www.amazon.com/dp/0385029551/)

In a recent article entitled “6 Ways Christians Can Respond to Our Strange New World,” Carl Trueman posits that new notions of selfhood and growing hostility toward long-held Christian beliefs and values are forcing us to reckon with and navigate a “strange new world.”

Autumn and Hunter discuss the first three of Trueman’s six directives laid out in the article, as follows: 1) Recognize our complicity, 2) Learn from the ancient church, and 3) Teach the whole counsel of God.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

"6 Ways Christians Can Respond to Our Strange New World" by Carl Trueman (https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/respond-strange-new-world/)

"Didache: The Teaching of the Apostles" (https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530476909)

"The City of God" by St. Augustine (https://www.amazon.com/dp/1598563378)

"Believing in the Future: Toward a Missiology of Western Culture" by David Bosch (https://www.amazon.com/dp/1563381176)

"The Open Secret" by Lesslie Newbiggin (https://www.amazon.com/dp/0802808298)

Special guests Charlie Hall and Joel Limpic join Autumn on the podcast to discuss their work, their heart for the teams and people they lead, and the necessity of cultivating gospel culture. Charlie serves as the Pastor of Worship and Liturgy at the multi-congregational Frontline Church in Oklahoma, and Joel as the Pastor of Liturgy and Arts at Park Church in Denver, CO.

Charlie and Joel share experience and insight gained through years and years of local church leadership. According to these to seasoned leaders, cultivating gospel culture in staff teams, volunteer teams, and the larger church congregation requires accountability, approachability, honesty, rootedness in God’s story and created world, and humble confession.

Autumn and Hunter are joined by special guest Philip Moore. Philip is a pastor in the Paris area and serves the Acts 29 Network as Vice President for Global and Director of Europe.

They discuss the fact that Western culture (Western Europe, North America, Australia) seems to be going through an “identity crisis.” Philip brings his perspective as a pastor in a secularizing country and points us to two themes he is seeing across Europe, which are also true in America: (1) Hyper-individualism doesn’t just have an impact on individuals and their spiritual well-being. It is also having massive social and political consequences. (2) “Emotional reasoning” has become the main way we think things out, which leads to inconsistency and instability.

Having identified these two themes, we then discuss what it looks like to live in a different way as Christians in this kind of culture.

Resources mentioned in this episode:
"Democracy in America" by Alexis de Tocqueville (https://www.amazon.com/dp/0451531604)
"Babel: Around the World in Twenty Languages" by Gaston Dorren (https://www.amazon.com/dp/0802147801)

In today’s centennial episode celebration (what?), Hunter and Autumn look back at the five most listened-to episodes:

- Episode 4: How Can Government Promote Good?
- Episode 59: VFL Reads: Glennon Doyle’s Honesty Gospel
- Episode 18: A Redeeming View of Mental Health
- Episode 88: VFL Reads: Why American Teens are So Sad
- Episode 72: VFL Reads: The Case Against the Trauma Plot

What, if anything, are the themes that unit these topics? And what can we conclude about what makes these topics compelling?

Resources mentioned in this episode:
"Habits Of The Heart" By Multiple Authors (https://www.amazon.com/dp/0520254198/)

Family Ministry at Fellowship Denver takes shape in three primary ways:
1. Age-Appropriate Teaching
2. Church-As-Family
3. Gospel Renewal at Home

In today’s episode, Frank Trimble and Jenna Hallock of Family Time Ministry join Autumn to discuss the third formative value: Gospel Renewal at Home. The mission of Family Time Ministry is to train and equip parents and grandparents to pass the Christian faith to the next generation in the home. Their encouragement to parents and to all of us is to thoughtfully develop and prioritize regular rhythms of interacting with God through the study of Scripture, prayer, and singing.

Find out more about Family Time Ministries at https://famtime.com