OneLife Nashville: Rare but vital conversations about Jesus

In this episode Tim shares how God used an episode in the story of Abraham to encourage him. He had reached a point of frustration with where we were (and weren't) in our journey here in Nashville, and God pointed him to Abraham's encounter with Melchizedek as a way of helping him work through that frustration. Part of walking with God is learning how to enter more fully into the story tha...

In this episode we pause to share some of our personal story of God calling us to Nashville, and how that experience was like walking in the footsteps of Abraham for us. Sometimes God leads us to do things that don't make sense in the here and now. If we walk with God he will eventually ask us to walk by faith and not by sight, which is always easier said than done. One thing we discovered abo...

In this episode we finish the story of Abraham offering his son Isaac. The interesting thing about the way this story ends is that it seems like God is still "making" a covenant with Abraham, which goes along with the other episodes in Genesis where it seems like God "leaks" out different aspects of his covenant with Abraham, establishing it in incremental stages. For example, God starts the coven...

In this episode we jump into the story of Abraham offering Isaac. This is a difficult story to talk about because, in reality, it is quite intense. Despite it raising lots of questions, we think this story, when placed in the context of the larger story of Abraham, reveals a relational side of God that is often overlooked. God is a real "person" and is actually affected by us. Our relati...

In this episode we keep trekking with the story of Abraham, and what it means for him to be our "father." As we discussed in the previous episode, to be a "son" or "daughter" of someone does not require us to be a physical descendant of that person. It's not just about lineage - it's also about likeness. And what Paul wants his audience to see is that as long as Gentiles have the same kind of fait...

In this episode we look at a key concept in the New Testament about what it means from someone to be your "father", and what it means to be their "son" or "daughter". Because the blessing of Abraham is said to be located both "in" Abraham and in his "seed", it was common for Jewish people in Paul's day to claim the blessing of Abraham by virtue of their physical descent from Abraham (lineage), and...

In this episode we look at how the physical covenant of circumcision with Abraham pointed to a deeper, internal circumcision of the heart that was required of Israel as they sought to be faithful to the Mosaic Covenant. Circumcision is a cutting away - a separating - of something from our human nature that somehow limits our ability to partner with God in our own transformation. That part of our h...

In this episode we jump back into the story of Abraham where God introduces several new things into his covenantal relationship with Abraham. Abraham is now 99 years old, and it has been 13 years since Abraham mistakenly pursued his own path of producing a child with his handmaiden, Hagar. Now, with both Hagar and Ismael in his household, God appears to Abraham to advance the development of his co...

In this episode we continue to explore Romans 4, but we move from the word "righteousness" to the Greek word logizomai, often translated as "credited" or "imputed". This word is important to understand because it communicates how we become righteous. Because of Paul's analogy between work, wages, debt, and grace, translators have normally used words that imply some kind of transfer, deposit, or cr...

In this episode we continue exploring what it means to be righteous. We move from Romans 1:16-17 into Romans 4:1-5 where Paul brings up the story of Abraham in Genesis 15 as a way of illustrating how someone can be made righteous apart from the law of Moses (or any law). Abraham was considered righteous by God when he believed the promise God made to him. Paul says we can be made righteous, too, w...

In this episode we continue to look at the story of Abraham, but this time we zoom in on the part of his story where he begins to doubt God's intentions for keeping his promise to give him and his wife a child. God made that promise when Abraham was 75 years old. But 10 years have gone by, and there's still no child. At 85, Abraham is struggling with whether or not God is going to do what he said...

In this episode we discover what Paul understands the blessing of Abraham to be. It may surprise you, but the blessing of Abraham is actually the Spirit of Christ. This can be quite shocking if you have tended to focus more on justification, salvation, redemption and all the other Bible words that describe the benefits of what Christ has done for us. Those are definitely a part of what we receive...

In this episode we keep exploring how Galatians 3 explains the promise God made to Abraham to bless all nations through his seed. In Galatians 3:5-9 Paul marked out two pathways for receiving the blessing of Abraham - the works of the law vs faith. Next, in 3:10-13 he is going to make his case for why relying on the works of the law will actually bring a curse, and not a blessing. Essentially, the...

In this episode we look at how the promise God made to Abraham to bless others through him gets more clearly defined as the story goes along. For example, if you pay close attention, you'll notice that God starts off by saying to Abraham in 12:3 that "In you all families of the earth will be blessed." At this stage the promise is somewhat generic - "In you" - and focused on the micro - the familie...

In this episode we continue breaking ground on the story of  Abraham. But this time we look at the concept of blessing, and how that shows up in God's promises to Abraham. We look at the definition of the word blessing, and how it this shapes the way we see the Abrahamic covenant. God said he would not only bless Abraham, and those who blessed him, but that all families of...

In this episode we discuss the beginning of the story of Abraham from God's perspective. He waited anywhere from 200 to 1,000 years to initiate the next phase of his plan to ultimately bring human nature to its intended goal. We discuss Abraham being called the "friend of God" and how that reveals God's desire to build a genuine friendship with us. God really does want to meet with us, mature us,...

In this episode we look at a passage in Deuteronomy 32 that talks about how God responded to the Tower of Babel. This is a unique passage because it reveals the Tower of Babel as a turning point in Biblical history. From that point onward, God assigned each one of the 70 nations (a number that symbolizes the totality of all the nations) a Son of God - members from his divine council - to rule over...

In this episode we look at the story of the tower of Babel, and what Nimrod was trying to accomplish in building it. Essentially, the city and tower of Babel was intended to be a man made version of the garden of Eden with the tower of Babel being like a man made mountain with a temple at the top. Except they didn't want to meet with God on a regular basis -  they wanted to meet with fallen s...

In this episode we look at the sin of Ham and Nimrod, and how they represent a common tendency in all of us to fulfill legitimate desires in illegitimate ways. Both Ham and Nimrod were seeking to control their own lives - and the lives of those around them - in ways that violated God's plan. Key Passages: Genesis 9:20-27 Leviticus 20:17 - the idioms of  "seeing someone's nakedness" and "uncov...

In this episode we take a more relational look at the story of the flood. Specifically, we look at how the deepening of the corruption in human nature during the time of Noah affected God. It caused him deep sorrow to watch people participate in their own corruption. God's relationship with people at that time was described as striving, or contending. God was trying to get people to move in one di...

WARNING: This episode may not be for your children. Please take a listen before playing it with them around. In this episode we explore the events of Genesis 6:1-12 and how they contribute to our understanding of the story of the Bible. We compare and contrast the incursion of the rebellious divine being in Genesis 3 with Adam and Eve, and the incursion of the rebellious divine beings in Genesis 6...

In this episode we look at how evil mutates in the second generation from Adam and Eve. If evil is a kind of deficit, dysfunction, or damage then the murder of Abel by his brother Cain qualifies for all three. But evil doesn't just show up in the murder, it also shows up in situation surrounding the offering of Cain, God's response to it, and Cain's response to God. The entire story is highly rela...

In this episode we summarize key themes from the past 10 episodes, and bring it all together to show how our understanding of the problem determines how we understand the solution, and how this shapes our understanding of Jesus. A new concept we discuss is how, in a developmental process, there is a cause and effect relationship between the choices we make, how those choices shape our condition, a...

In this episode we look at how God more adequately "covers" Adam and Eve's nakedness with animal skins, and how that can give us insight into the inadequacy of Adam and Eve's attempts to address their own fear and shame, as well as possible hints of a sacrificial system to come. We then talk about how Christ is like the animal skins in that we can be covered with his new humanity, which was fashio...

In this episode we look at the consequences of the serpent's (nachash) choice to tempt Eve, as well as Adam and Eve's choice to eat the fruit. This introduces a new level of conflict between the serpent and his seed, and the woman and her seed. The nature of this conflict between these two seeds is named and illustrated in John 8:37-47 when Jesus exposes the plans of the Pharisees to kill him. He...