Word of Life Church Podcast

One of the most fascinating stories in the Gospels is the account of Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration. Along with his birth and his crucifixion and resurrection, the Transfiguration is one of the most important events in the life of Jesus. It is packed with mystery and meaning. In the Transfiguration, we are able to see Jesus' divinity shining through his humanity. The flesh of Jesus is human...

The Bible never hides the humanity of its heroes. Noah, Abraham, David all have incredible failures recorded in the Bible. Even the prophet Elijah, known best for praying fire down from heaven, is shown curled up and a tree praying to die. Elijah believed it was up to him to save all of Israel, and he believed he was on his own. But God showed him he wasn;t the only one left. In fact, there were o...

On the 31st anniversary of Word of Life Church, Pastor Brian Zahnd tells the story of back-to-back days standing atop Mount Sinai in Egypt and Mars Hill in Greece. To do so is not easy, and would not have even been possible in the days before jet travel. But it was an experience filled with prophetic symbolism and was an indication what the next five years would hold for Word of Life Church. Moses...

Our mission as the Church (to preach, baptize, make disciples, teach, do theology) flows from our worship. Why do we preach the gospel, make disciples, teach, do theology, build churches, care for the sick and poor? Because we worship the true and living God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Everything we do as a church flows from our identity as a worshiping people. Worship is central, primary...

Guest speaker Brad Jersak from Abbotsford, British Columbia, paints of picture with words of God's dream for humanity and the Kingdom of God as described in Isaiah in a message inspired by by Tom Sine's Mustard Seed Conspiracy.

Mountains are a classic metaphor for prayer. A lot of praying in the Bible happens on mountaintops. Once, when Jesus was praying on a Galilean mountain, his disciples asked him to teach them to pray. So Jesus did what all Jewish rabbis did to teach their disciples how to pray, He gave them a prayer to pray. He didn't teach on abstract concepts or sentimental ideas, he gave them a specific prayer....

In Christ we have come to the mountain of God. And God, much like a mountain, is far too vast to be comprehended from one perspective. If you want to have a full conception of the living God, you need more than one perspective! To have more than one perspective of a mountain, you need to traverse the mountain, to climb on it. Of course, it's not easy. Mountain climbing is never easy. It's difficul...

In the final track of the 2012 edition of Finding God on Your iPod, Pastor Brian Zahnd examines the vision of Jesus and Paul for a new humanity, gathered together into one flock with Jesus as the shepherd; A humanity in Christ that learns to kill the hostility instead of kill one another. From this text, Pastor Brian is able to offer a prophetic critique of the systematic destruction of the indige...

Jesus taught that lamp of our being is the eye. We can have bright eyes or dark eyes. How we look at life has a lot to do with whether our soul is filled with darkness or light. We can look at life with squinty-eyed greed, calculation, and cynicism. Or we can look at life with wide-eyed wonder, love, and acceptance. After four years, Bob Dylan finally makes an appearance in Finding God On Your iPo...

The satan is the spirit of accusation, especially fear-based accusation. When people feel threatened in some way, such as their security, their worldview, or their ideology, they tend to channel that negative vibe into an accusation of someone else. This is the scapegoat phenomenon. Instead of allowing the spirit of faith, hope, and love to control them, they seek to dispel the negative feelings b...

For a long time God has been trying to communicate his self-revelation to humanity. We must realize that Jesus is the exact imprint of God's nature-the perfect, eternal Word of God! Everything we know and believe must be reconsidered in the last days in the light of God's final word- Jesus Christ! Jesus is the revelation of truth that is superior even to Scripture. Jesus Christ is God's final worl...

Pain in the great equalizer. We have all felt pain of one kind or another, but we do not have to bear it alone. We can take our brokenness to Christ and experience healing of body and soul. Healing and recovery is a part of the life story of Johnny Cash, a true American icon. Six months before his death, he recorded the song "Hurt" originally written by Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails. In this son...

We are God's workmanship, his poem, created in Christ Jesus. God is not a machine mass-producing religious experience industrial style. God is an artist. We are his work of art and we move the life with the grace of Christ. We should desire to be a work of art. This is the longing in The Guggenheim Grotto song, "Philosophia". As we engage our lives with Jesus Christ, the redemptive result is poeti...

Pastor Derek Vreeland presents a bonus track to the 2011 Finding God on Your iPod series: Barton Hollow, by the folk-duo The Civil Wars. This song tells the story of a criminal wrestling with guilt, forgiveness, and doubt. We are fully aware of our shortcomings and failures and while we confess faith in God who forgives, sometimes doubt creeps into our lives. Doubt is never the enemy of faith, bec...

In the fifth and final week of 2011′s Finding God On Your iPod, we listen to hall of fame rockers Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers and their latest album, Mojo. The song Something Good Coming is a song about hard times and hope. It is a very human song, admitting that life can be hard, but deep down we hold on to hope that something good is coming. As Christians, we believe that God is the creator an...

In part four of 2011′s edition of Finding God On Your iPod, we look at the song "If I Die Young" by The Band Perry. The song is loosely based on the poem The Lady of Shalott by Lord Alfred Tennyson and deals with the subject of your own death. Modern society avoids speaking, or even thinking, about our own demise, but the undeniable reality is one day we are all going to die. And faced with that r...

In the third installment of 2011′s edition of Finding God On Your iPod, Pastor Brian introduces the blues based rock of The Black Keys and their song Unknown Brother. It's a simple song expressing one of humanity's deepest longings, that someday we will meet again our departed loved ones and family members. The great problem the Gospel addresses is death. Romans tells us, "The wages of sin is deat...

In the second installment of the 2011 Finding God On Your iPod series, Pastor Brian examines the song "Roll Away Your Stone" by Mumford & Sons. The song is reminiscent of the story of the prodigal son, especially the lyrics, "It seems that all my bridges have been burnt / But you say, that's exactly how this grace thing works / It's not the long walk home that will change this heart / But the welc...

We used to wait. One of the biggest changes that has occurred in the past century is the speed of life. Much of our technology has been utilized to make things happen so much faster, so much so that we don't have to wait for much. When Arcade Fire tells us to wait for it, they're saying something we all need to hear. The Bible really has nothing good to say about being in a hurry. In fact, the ina...