Word of Life Church Podcast

Jesus appearing in a locked room, speaking peace, and sending his disciples into the world with a commission to forgive, should speak powerfully to a traumatized post 9-11 church that is afraid, angry, and retreating into ever smaller locked rooms of security obsessed ideologies.

What’s Happened To You? The Call What's happened to you? You used to be so shy You used to hang your head down You wouldn't look in my eyes Did you some great vision Did you finally break through Did you shake the foundations What's happened to you? What's happened to you? You used to look so tired Now there's a spring in your step And your words are on fire Did you hear some great secret Did the...

Jesus entered into Death by death in order to fill Death with himself; so that now to enter into Death is to encounter Christ.

The principalities and powers assert the right to wield violence because they claim to be wise and just. But the crucifixion of Jesus reveals the awful truth, and puts the principalities and powers to shame. We shroud our violence in the myth of justice, but in our violence we are neither wise nor just. What we are, is capable of the greatest crime: the murder of the innocent Son of God. At Golgot...

Lift up your heads, O gates; lift them high, O everlasting doors; and the King of glory shall come in. “Who is this King of glory?” “The LORD, strong and mighty, the LORD, mighty in battle.” Lift up your heads, O gates; lift them high, O everlasting doors; “Who is this King of glory?” “The LORD of hosts, he is the King of glory” (Psalm 24:7–10)

To read the Bible in such a way that's it’s not a sprawling mass of contradictions we have to center our reading at some stationary, unmoving point. That is, we have to find the place to stand in this thousand page epic of redemption where we say, “It's from this vantage point that I’ll read and interpret the rest of Scripture. It’s not Leviticus with its prohibition against eating shellfish and o...

The story of Lazarus abides among us as a story of enduring hope despite all odds. When all seems lost, when all hope has faded, we remember the story of Lazarus. Because Jesus is the resurrection and the life, no one — no matter how mired in sin and death, in sorrow and despair — is a lost cause.

Economic self-interest is the single greatest obstacle to participating in the kingdom of God. Jesus doesn’t teach Marxist economics. Jesus doesn’t teach Capitalist economics. Jesus teaches Love economics. We’ve been scripted to believe that life is a competition of acquisition. But that is a lie. Life is not a game; life is a gift. The purpose of life is not to win; the purpose of life is to lear...

Jesus has healed the blind man and it was a scandal. There should have been a party, but instead there was an investigation. The Pharisees were all upset about this and they launched a criminal investigation. Jesus shows them what true judgment looks like. To their surprise, it wasn’t fault-finding or pointing the finger of accusation. The judgment of Jesus is not a judgment of condemnation, but a...

The life of faith is a life of trust. When Jesus invites us on the journey of following him with these words, "Come follow me" he is saying to us "Come trust me." What does it look like to answer that call? What happens if we struggle to answer that call? This sermon explores these topics and more as we dive into the call to trust.

"Things fall apart; the center cannot hold." Nothing of this world can resist the inevitable entropy of life and death. Only that which is eternal can be the center that holds so that things don’t fall apart. Which just another way of saying only God can occupy the orbital center of our life. Christ is before all things, And in him all things hold together. –Colossians 1:17

Saint Patrick’s Breastplate Christ, be with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me, Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me, Christ on my right, Christ on my left, Christ where I lie, Christ where I sit, Christ where I arise, Christ in the heart of everyone who thinks of me, Christ in the mouth of every man who speaks of me, Christ in every eye that sees me, Christ in every ear that hears...

The dark night when Nicodemus came to Jesus reflected the dark night of his own soul. For a long time Nicodemus had lived in the sunny land of a Pharisee’s certitude. Nicodemus had it all figured out. He had all the answers. He was the Bible Answer Man. But then along came Jesus and suddenly his equations no longer added up. Jesus was an untrained, self-made rabbi from Galilee who was not a Pharis...

We live in an unprecedented time of the exponential growth of human knowledge. Some have suggested that knowledge in some sectors is doubling every 12 months. This does not necessarily mean that we are getting smarter, because knowledge is not the same thing as wisdom. For Christians, Jesus is for us the wisdom of God. In Christ we learn Wisdom begins with the fear of the Lord and it is curated in...

Because Jesus prevailed over the devil in his wilderness temptation, and remained true to the Father’s will all the way to the cross, the world now has a saving alternative to the death dealing ways of Pharaoh and Caesar. Because Jesus was formed in the Scriptures and not the dominant script of idolatry and injustice, we can be formed in the Word of Christ and overcome the devil. As the Apostle Jo...

As I call Christians to the practices of radical forgiveness and nonviolent peacemaking that Jesus embodied and most clearly sets forth in the Sermon on the Mount, I often encounter Christians using Romans 13 as a kind of rebuttal. Their argument goes something like this: “God has ordained the government and has given it the sword to execute vengeance; therefore we cannot be opposed to war because...

On Mount Sinai we only see the back of God; so assumptions are made and at the bottom of the mountain people are executed in the name of holiness, justice, etc. But on Mount Tabor we finally see the face of God in Christ, and at the bottom of the mountain people are healed and set free from their demons. On Mount Tabor the Theology of Terror (back of God theology) is excelled by the Theology of Lo...

“It is simply out of the question that God ‘helps’ the Germans or the French or the English. God does not even ‘help’ us Swiss. God helps justice and love. God helps the kingdom of heaven, and that exists across all national boundaries. The foolish mixing of patriotism, war enthusiasm, and Christian faith could one day lead to the bitterest disappointment. We will not join in drinking this intoxic...

If God reveals himself to us as I WILL BE WHAT I WILL BE, it seems to indicate there is to be a "divine unfolding" over time. How we first know God will not be how we will know God as we stay on the journey. This doesn’t mean God is changing. God is immutable. God does not mutate. God does not change. But from our perspective it may certainly appear that God is changing. This is the divine unfoldi...

We share this planet with seven and half billion other people. What are they for? Are they mere “extras” in a movie called "ME"? Are they resources to be used in the advancement of our selfish agendas? Are they objects to be analyzed, categorized, and utilized according to how they benefit us? Of course not! That approach to the worth and purpose of people is entirely antichrist! People are bearer...

We need holy places to help cultivate our sense of the sacred. By spending time in places connected with sacred history or set aside for worship we develop a capacity to see the glory of God in every bush. This is holy ground. But the deeper truth is that every step we take is on holy ground. It's all holy. There are no non-sacred places, only sacred places and desecrated places. But it’s specific...

The most embarrassing moments in church history are when the church sold its soul for political power. Whenever the church reaches for the sword of Caesar, it lets go of the cross of Christ. We don’t have to change the world, we only have to be that part of the world already changed by Christ. But this requires that we be genuine Jesus people.

The story of Jacob at Jabbok is one of the richest mines for spiritual gems in all Scripture. It’s the first place where we are specifically told of someone who saw the face of God. It’s also the origin of the name Israel—a name that becomes synonymous with God’s people.

The spirit of the age blesses the cocky and self-confident— But Jesus blesses the poor in spirit. The spirit of the age blesses those who are shallow and thus happy all the time— But Jesus blesses those who have the capacity to mourn deeply. The spirit of the age blesses the power-hungry who want to run the world— But Jesus blesses the meek who are willing to trust God. The spirit of the age bless...