Crackers and Grape Juice

Jason and Teer caught up with Dr. Phillip Cary to talk about Dr. Cary's new latest book, 'The Meaning of Protestant Theology.' Dr. Cary unpacks Luther's gifts to the Protestant Church 500+ years removed from the Reformation and explains why Wesleyan theologians and pastors should not distance themselves too much from Calvin. https://www.amazon.com/Meaning-Protestant-Theology-Luther-Augustine/dp/08...

Our guest this week is Dr. Jeffrey Pugh, Professor of Religion at Elon University. Jeffrey is the author of books such as The Devil’s Ink, The Homebrewed Christianity Guide to the End Times, and Religionless Christianity: Dietrich Bonhoeffer in Troubled Times. It’s his expertise on Bonhoeffer we turn to in this episode, asking him to reflect on the border crisis, how Christians are to discern when...

Friend of the podcast, Thomas Lynch, rejoins us to talk about his new book, Whither and When: On Lives and Living. Thomas is an undertaker and poet whose work has garnered numerous awards, including the National Book Award for his collection of essays The Undertaking: Notes on the Dismal Trade.

For this episode, we talked with Joel Goza who is a Duke Divinity School alumni and now works as a church planter and for a non-profit in the 9th Ward. His new book is an important one, especially on Independence Day weekend. It’s titled America’s Unholy Ghosts: The Racist Roots of Our Faith and Politics.

For the fourth year in a row, the podcast posse hosted a live pubcast to kick-off annual conference, this time at Ballast Point Brewery in Roanoke where we had over 200 folks attend. Our guests were Jeff and Steve Mullinix, who shared with us their story of growing up in the closet, attending Bob Jones University, and eventually finding one another and marrying. Jeff is an ordained elder in the Un...

Friend of the podcast, the wild and crazy Dr. David Fitch is back to talk about his latest book, “Us vs. Them: “Freedom from a Faith that Feeds on Making Enemies.” Fitch talks with us about how ideological functions to shape our reading of scripture, how we can read scripture locally as community, and how we discern where God is leading us in a way that avoids cultural antagonisms.

Jason and Taylor sat down with Joshua Retterer to talk about the late Robert Farrar Capon and his work. Their conversation touches on a number of subjects including eschatological nerve, an affair with a happy ending, laughing in church, and being overwhelmed with morality.

Fresh on the heels of his Twitter face-off with Jerry Falwell Jr, Jason talked with Winfeld Bevins about his his new book Ever Ancient, Ever New. Actually, no, Jason talked to him months ago, before General Conference even and we’re posting it now to take advantage of the social media scrum. Bevins is an Anglican and a professor of church-planting at Asbury Seminary in the Bluegrass State.

She’s back! Friend of the podcast, Christy Thomas joins us to reflect on where the United Methodist Church is at in its present moment somewhere on the timeline between divorce and reconciliation. Christy is a retired United Methodist pastor from Texas, journalist, and blogger at The Thoughtful Pastor.

Thomas McKenzie is a church-planting Anglican priest at Church of the Redeemer in Nashville, Tennessee. He’s also the author of the Anglican Way and a recent Lenten devotional on the Desert Fathers. He also knows, as few seem to know, that Battlestar Galactica is a far superior show to Game of Thrones.

In this episode, Jason talks with Amy Laura Hall of Duke University about her upcoming work on muscular Christianity, her most recent book “Laughing at the Devil,” Julian of Norwich, and their mutual affection for Stan the Man.

This week is a real treat! We are sharing Jason's unedited live talk from the Mockingbird Annual Conference in New York! A huge thank you to Mockingbird for having Jason speak and for recording it as well!

“Orthodoxy is historically defined according to the creeds, and there is nothing at all in the creeds about human sexuality.” Steve Harper, author of the new book, Holy Love, published today, is our guest for Episode #206. Steve is a former Professor of Historical Theology at Asbury Theological Seminary, which is— mind you— the UMC’s most conservative school. Steve was also a leader in traditional...

In a culture of performancism, virtue-signaling, and enoughness-chasing, Nick Lannon's new book tells us the good news that Life is Impossible (and that's the good news). Nick is an Anglican priest in Louisville, a movie buff and sports buff, and a contributing writer to Mockingbird Ministries and Liberate.

Martin Luther said that God loves to hide himself behind his opposites. Though we prove time and again to think we need to strive and succeed so that we might be found acceptable by God or, in succeeding, find God in God's glory, the God who condescends to us in the suffering Christ never stops so condescending, meeting us not in our triumphs but in our struggles, suffering, and failures. Friend o...

Calvin said the human heart is an idol factory. Augustine said our hearts are restless until they find rest in God. DZ of Mockingbird Ministries and the author of the new book, Seculosity, says we’re more religious than ever before we’re church “in church” in different ways (love, politics, parenting, technology, fitness) searching for “enoughness” from gods that, without the promise of grace, can...

Jerry Herships joins the podcast to talk about his newest book, 'Rogue Saints: Spirituality for Good-Hearted Heathens.' In this episode, we talk about what exactly Jerry means by "shitty church," if you are looking for a church how you can avoid one, and if you are a pastor how you can avoid pastoring one. --------------- More on the book: The world is full of good-hearted heathens, those who love...

200 Episodes!!! Say what?!? Listen as the guys take a trip down memory lane to talk about their favorite episodes, their white whale guests and what's to come for the podcast Crackers and Grape Juice!

Jason crushes on his hero Barbara Brown Taylor while talking with her about her new book, Holy Envy: Finding God in the Faith of Others. The author of previous books like the Preaching Life and Leaving Church, Baylor University recognized Taylor as one of the most influential preachers in the English language.

Now that the sting of the UMC Special General Conference is lessening, what is next? How can those who are dissatisfied with the work done by the delegates in St Louis organize and be better prepared for GC2020? Rev. Mandy Sloan McDow is the Senior Minister at First United Methodist Church in LA and is the co-author of the forthcoming book, 'Out of the Depths: Your Companion After Divorce.' Follow...

The podcast team caught up with Emma Green to talk about the implications of what occurred at the Special General Conference in St. Louis. Emma argues the storyline coming out of #GC2019 is a common storyline being experience throughout the United States: a breakdown or inability to live in community with people who we disagree with. This struggle to maintain community is causing fracture througho...

By a slim margin the 'traditional plan' was selected to be the way forward for the United Methodist Church. Disciplinary action against LGBTQIA clergy will be swifter and without the benefit of due process. In all reality, the plan selected by the Special General Conference does not meet the UMC's constitutional requirements. Just an hour after the Special General Conference was adjourned, Cracker...

The team caught up with Diana Butler Bass on the eve of the conclusion of the UMC's Special General Conference. She offers thoughts about the historical and theological significance of a denomination's discernment over human sexuality.

In an effort to provide honest conversations from the 2019 Special General Conference, the Crackers & Grape Juice team invited supporters of all of the plans being considered by the United Methodist Church’s governing body to explain why the plan they support is the correct plan. Former alumni of Bob Jones University and current members of the West-Ohio Conference, Rev. Jeff Mullinix and Steve Sha...

In an effort to provide honest conversations from the 2019 Special General Conference, the Crackers & Grape Juice team invited supporters of all of the plans being considered by the United Methodist Church’s governing body to explain why the plan they support is the correct plan. Rev. Christy Thomas, author of the Thoughtful Pastor blog, offers her reflections after Day 2 of the Special 2019 Gener...