Discovering Jesus

This is the final sermon in our Minor Prophets series, and the final sermon that will be preached by Pastor Tyler at Tricity Chinese Christian Church before he pursues further education at seminary.Today we will be looking at the context and background of Malachi, how the author of Malachi points toward Jesus, how the whole Book of the Twelve points toward Jesus, and how the whole Old Testament points toward Jesus. Join us as we discover Jesus in the final book of the Christian Old Testament, and explore the issues Malachi covers, like intermarriage, racism, unpunished evil, God hating Edom, and more.

We are approaching the end of the Minor prophets! Today we look at two of the more unique books, Haggai and Zechariah, two prophets active during the return from exile. Haggai and Zechariah both believed that reestablishing the monarchy through Zerubbabel was the best and only way to realize the utopian vision of Jerusalem becoming the centre of the world and the Kingdom of God coming to earth. However, as we'll see, this was not to be.When we dig into the background and context of Zechariah, and do some reading in  between the lines, it becomes clear that things did not pan out like the two prophets had hoped or predicted. So what happened? And what relevance do some failed prophecies in the Hebrew Bible have for us today?

This week we are jumping into the shortest of all the Minor Prophets: Obadiah. Obadiah has some very, very strong things to say about the kingdom of Edom, even though, as we'll see, Edom has not done anything particularly egregious when compared with the other nations. And yet, Obadiah, along with a couple other prophets and psalmists, have a special place in their heart for lobbing angry epithets at Edom.Why is that?Today we find out what was going on behind the scenes to cause such an attitude toward Edom, and why Obadiah is actually supposed to be a book of great encouragement to those who might feel as though God has abandoned them.

This week we take a look at one of the last prophets to speak before the Babylonian exile, and whose name has garnered much controversy: Habakkuk.We will learn how to say his name properly, and more importantly, how history and biblical criticism work together to shed light on the beautiful gospel message that lies in the prophetic book.

This week we are turning our Bibles to the prophet Zephaniah, and we are turning our gaze toward one of the most difficult themes in all the prophetic books: the violence of God.Despite many denials to the contrary, the violence of the Old Testament God really is at odds with the self-sacrificing, enemy-loving Christ of the New Testament. Today we explore why that is, and why Yahweh sometimes looks more like a Canaanite warrior god (or Kratos from God of War) than he does Jesus.We'll learn just why it is so important to read the Bible as a unified story, not as disconnected books, and how books like Zephaniah, once we learn to read them well, communicate a beautiful message that ultimately looks to the cross of Christ.

This week we cover two books of the Bible! We are going to get into what exactly progressive revelation is, and how that helps us understand some of the anger in the prophetic books. Along the way we will see what Nahum and Jonah do and do not have in common, and how comparing the two books with the cross of Christ can help us learn how to pray for our enemies.

This Easter we explore exactly why Jesus had to be crucified, and why the resurrection matters. After all, if all we needed was a perfect sacrifice, isn't crucifixion a little over the top, and a little cruel? Wouldn't a nice, simple sacrificial ritual like in Leviticus have sufficed? Further, if all we needed was a perfect sacrifice, why the resurrection?There is much more going on in the Easter story than just Jesus offering his body as a perfect sacrifice, and it all starts in Deuteronomy.

This week we move south to the Kingdom of Judah, with the first Minor Prophet to preach from there: Micah. Micah is supremely concerned with the social injustices that occurred under the reigns of Kings Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, and indicts primarily the elites, politicians, and pastors/priests of Judah. But, within the fair and exciting calls for social justice, there is also a message of hope: hope for forgiveness for any and all, that we might be restored to God.So if you have ever felt you didn't deserve God's forgiveness, or that you somehow need to earn it, or that God will not accept you back until you have proven how sorry you are and done proper penance, our hope is that Micah can bring you some comfort today.Additionally, Micah will also challenge us on where our cares lie, on whether or not we are taking advantage of God's forgiveness and failing to walk obediently in humility with God.

Did you know that some parts of God's personality are stronger than others? This may come as a surprise (particularly for our Reformed friends), but the Bible is pretty clear that, when it comes to God's wrath, anger, and punishment, these are his weaker attributes. Join us to learn exactly why that is and what it means for Hosea's audience, and us today.

For the ancient Israelites, Yahweh was just one of many gods, and it was difficult for them to understand why they should worship him and no other gods. And even for us today, it may even seem a little narcissistic on Yahweh's part to jealously demand such loyalty and to punish infidelity so brutally as he threatens to do in the prophets.However, as we begin the book of Hosea, we will see that Yahweh actually has very good reason for acting this way, and if we just dig a little below the surface, we'll see that he is far more than just a jealous, narcissistic god. It turns out that worshiping other gods leads to far more and far worse than just "not worshiping Yahweh."

In only two weeks we're finishing the prophet Amos! This week Amos will continue to call Israel to repentance, as well as brutally trash-talk another wayward prophet. But our main focus will be on what Amos feels the Israelites' key sin was: a failure to worship properly.According to Amos, behind Israel's sin of social injustice is a failure to worship the way God wants. What does it mean to worship God, then? And why does God require basically say, "Worship me, or else!" Isn't that a little bit manipulative or abusive?The answer to all these questions has something to do with understanding idol worship and how we, as Christians, in a strange way, are supposed to learn to worship from the example of idol worship in the ancient near east.

We begin this year with a new series: The Minor Prophets.We will be starting with Amos, arguably the first of all the written prophets to preach, and his journey to Bethel, Israel, to condemn Jeroboam II and the elites for their abuse of the poor and oppressed.Amos has much to say about social justice, but for our purposes today, he also has much to say about how and why God uses punishment and discipline, how God can claim to love his people yet exact terrible curses on them, and how we as Christians ought to pray for God to discipline us if we want to remain useful to him.

We have reached the final week of our series on the Parables! While we have not covered every single parable, we have covered enough to give us a general feel for what messages Jesus intended his parables to convey and how to read them in their very Jewish context.This week we are going to look at the final three parables Jesus taught before he was betrayed and crucified. These particular parables were given specifically to his disciples as a warning against apostasy in the coming persecution they were going to experience. So if you've ever wondered what an evil servant, ten virgins, and a resentful man burying money have in common, join us to learn the answer!

This week we take a look at another set of three parables. As Jesus nears the end of his life, his parables are becoming ever more explicit, and full of indictments on the current ruling class of priests and scribes, particularly on how they have oppressed and ignored the outcasts and rejects of society.However, as we'll see, simply being an outcast or reject does not give one automatic entry into the Kingdom. God still requires that we wear the right clothes to get in.

The Gospel writers always have a reason for why they arrange their parables the way they do, and Luke is no different.Join us as we discover the common thread Luke detects between Jesus' Parable of the Persistent Widow and the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector, and why he places them right after Jesus' "mini-apocalypse."*We apologize for the drop in audio quality.

Most Christians know Jesus had a thing or two to say about rich people, and we can sometimes think that Jesus thought all wealth was bad. This leads to an uneasy state of mind where we feel guilty for having wealth but also are told that God blesses his children. What did Jesus actually say about money? Was he entirely against it? Is money always a sign of God's favour?In our parable today Jesus is going to tell us about a rich man and a poor man whose fortunes are reversed after they die. Many Christians are very familiar with this story. What a lot of those same Christians might not be familiar with, though, is that Jesus was not the first to tell a story like this.Jesus is retelling a very popular, well-known Egyptian folktale, that most of his hearers would have heard before. However, Jesus tells it with a twist at the end that, if they are listening, the Pharisees and other Jewish leaders would perceive as a direct and piercing criticism of their neglect of the poor and vulnerable.Far from a parable on what hell is like or a simple message of "wealth is bad," Jesus' message is a challenge to the Western church to pay attention to a responsibility we may have neglected: justice for the poor and vulnerable.Social justice can be seen as a "dirty word" in evangelicalism because some Christians understandably do not agree with all the ideologies of certain social justice movements. But, as Jesus, the Old Testament prophets, and God himself make abundantly clear throughout Scripture, we might be throwing the baby out with the bathwater, as well as throwing ourselves out of the Kingdom of God.

This week we take a look at one of Jesus' most confusing parables, commonly known as The Parable of the Dishonest Manager. While this parable is often used to speak on wealth, the way Jesus uses it is quite a bit different than maybe our western, middle class, capitalistic sensibilities often understand it. In today's sermon, we will learn that the proper backdrop for this parable is the wrath of the Roman empire, and that one of the reasons Jesus believed Rome was going to descend on and destroy Jerusalem was because of how Israel's elites mismanaged their wealth.

Have you ever wondered why Jesus told Peter he needed to forgive 490 times, or why Peter even asked how many times he needed to forgive in the first place? It turns out Jesus is saying much more than that we just need to forgive a lot of times, or even an unlimited amount of times. And Peter might not be as unforgiving as we sometimes think.Jesus seems to believe that forgiveness isn't just a good thing to do, but is critical to our own salvation.

When Jesus said that we must become like little children, he wasn't talking about having a "child-like faith" unencumbered by "adult rationalism" or something like that. Jesus was talking about something entirely different, and way more radical.Matthew puts Jesus' parable of the Lost Sheep in a different context than Luke, and thus changes the meaning drastically, however it is by no means any less political or intense. Jesus is a brilliant, radical, almost crazy leader with completely upside-down ideas on how the world ought function.So this week we are going to learn about the type of Christian Jesus wants, and how the ways in which we treat the people at the bottom of our socioeconomic ladders says a lot about whether or not we agree with Jesus' concept of Christianity.

One of the keys to understanding many of Jesus' parables is to know the difference between Eastern shame culture and Western guilt culture. Today we are going to explore those differences, and how they can shed light on Jesus' parable of the banquet. We will discover that this parable, like many, is political in nature, and all about socioeconomic status.We'll also discover what Jesus meant when he told us his disciples to hate their families and carry their crosses. In the end, it's all about the Kingdom.

Jesus' parables were often told in progressive sets that built on one another. This week we look at three of his most famous parables, here renamed "The Man Who Like To Party," "The Woman Who Liked To Party," and "The Son Who Did Not Like To Party."Jesus is again going to respond to his detractors, the Pharisees and lawyers, as to why he keeps some pretty nefarious and corrupt company, and why his political/religious movement isn't endangered by his networking strategies and priorities.As we explore Jesus' response, we will see that Jesus' most famous parable, often called "The Parable of the Prodigal Son," is not about what we usually think it is about as modern Christians. That is to say, we often think the Pharisees would have been surprised by the father's "prodigal love" for his reckless son and that this love - an image of God's love - is Jesus' main point.However, as we'll see, the Pharisees were not surprised in the least that Jesus depicted a loving God who accepts repentant sinners by grace through faith. In fact, they probably would have been concerned if Jesus depicted God as otherwise.Instead, there is a deeper, more relevant, more practical, and more challenging question Jesus has for the Pharisees, and for us, if we have ears to hear.

This week we continue to learn about the parables Jesus told; we discover that Jesus' short stories weren't really about teaching abstract biblical truths or timeless theology. Jesus used his parables for something quite different.It's all about context, and the right context transforms the parables Jesus told. This week we are looking at:1. The Parable of the Really Good Investment2. The Parable of the Career Change3. The Parable of the Indiscriminate Net

Jesus' parables were some of the most controversial and politically charged things he said. Turns out Jesus had a lot of opinions on how to make Israel great again, and some of them were quite unpopular with certain political groups. This week he is going to make the case for how the Kingdom of God does not come via violence, and how we unknowingly violate his pacifist position without even realizing it in our everyday interactions with others.

The Lord's Prayer has been used and revered for a couple thousand years by the church, and for good reason! It is a beautiful, succinct prayer that has given voice to many, many people and enabled many to approach God.In fact, this prayer has been used so often that we sometimes miss what it's actually all about. The Lord's Prayer is not just a nice outline to structure your own prayers with, it's actually a very specific type of prayer for a very specific thing. And today, we find out what this prayer is all about, and why "The Lord's Prayer" might not be the best name to give it.

The way we prayer matters. And it turns out it matters a lot. From MSN chatbots to ancient Roman prayer rituals, we are going to find out how our prayers reveal what we really think about God, and what instructions Jesus gives to correct our prayers and bad theology.

Jesus lays out some pretty concerning warnings at the end of his Sermon on the Mount; he lets us know that some people, even though they performed incredible signs and wonders, will not get into the Kingdom of Heaven. What qualifies someone, then? What does it mean to "build your house on the rock"?This week we are going to get into ancient building methods, and what Jesus really meant when he told us to build our houses on the rock instead of the sand.

The idea of a narrow road to life and a wide road to destruction was not uncommon in Jesus' day. Lots of other rabbis and Greeks and Romans used this word picture. What is unique is who is on the narrow and wide paths.

This week we dig into one of Jesus' most famous sayings ever. It's always amazing how much we can get out of just a couple lines. Jesus manages, as always, to challenge us and encourage us in new ways and in new levels as we take this common, well-known saying and pull new meaning out of it.

This week we pull apart Jesus' interesting and deceptively simply recommendation to "take the log out of your own eye" before you look at the speck in someone else's.

He is risen!Have you ever wondered why, if Easter is the centre of our faith and of all human history, it can be difficult to get excited about going to church service and celebrating Jesus' resurrection? Today we compare Easter to some other traditions we enjoy, and how to be encouraged if Easter doesn't seem as exciting as we are told it should be.

This week we look at Jesus' famous saying that where we put our treasure, there our heart will be. We're going to see that this actually isn't Jesus' main point; most people already knew about this concept in Jesus' time, and the main point he is making for his ancient audience occurs a little later in his sermon. And when we see what Jesus' main point actually is, this sermon ends up being incredibly relevant for those of us who are in quarantine and find ourselves with little to no income and tight on money. Jesus first admonishes us for our lack of faith, but then right away encourages us to abide in God's love and learn to trust him. He never promises financial prosperity - in fact, Jesus often promises and even encourages the opposite for some - but he always points us toward the Father's love.

After destroying the Pharisees' reputation as credible Bible teachers, Jesus is now going to point out how even how they practice their faith is problematic and should not be followed. We're going to see how they failed to put God at the centre, and how we, although we often think we put God at the centre, regularly don't. We'll also look at how Jesus has a solution for our anxiety during this worldwide pandemic, as well as what it means to "die to self", since that seems to be exactly what the Pharisees were not doing but is the central idea to Jesus' concept of the Kingdom of Heaven. And as always, we will be asking ourselves the question, "Do I really want what the Kingdom is all about, or do I just think I do?"

Jesus has spent the last little bit of his sermon exposing the ways the Pharisees are leading the Jewish people astray with their bad theology, and he has been helping us become more self-aware about how we truly feel about his Kingdom. Today he is bringing that section to a close by lobbing one last bomb at the Pharisees and give us the chance to ask ourselves do we really want to know God, or do we just want to want to know God; and what should we do about that? Today we are going to also try and parallel the Kingdom of God with Kpop, it should be a lot of fun!

What does it mean to take God's name in vain? How did you swear in the Bible times? Why was Jesus so adamant about not taking vows or oaths, and why does that matter for us today, where most of us have never taken an oath in our lives? We look at these questions and find that, as always, what Jesus has to say is extremely relevant for us. Just like he has been doing, Jesus again invites us to become more self-aware of our faith and whether or not we truly desire his Kingdom.

As modern Christians, we can often forget that one of the hats Jesus wore was that of a rabbi. And as it turns out, because we are usually unfamiliar with the way rabbis taught and spoke, we can often misinterpret Jesus' teaching, especially when it comes to his moral teachings about anger and lust. Today we take a look at what Jesus was really saying as a rabbi in his Sermon on the Mount, as we try to redeem this passage that is so often used to drop legalistic burdens on the shoulders of Christians. Instead, we will find that Jesus is all about trying to make us more self-aware of whether or not we truly desire God's presence.

Often, we see the Pharisees' sin as being too legalistic about the law. But as it turns out, the Pharisees were known in Jesus' time for something far more sinister: loopholes. This week we learn about how the Pharisees created loopholes in the law and how Jesus is not so much about telling us what to do as making us self-aware of our true motives behind our faith. Also, what did Jesus really mean when he told his audience to be "salt and light"? All that and more in this week's sermon.

This week we begin exploring Jesus' longest and most famous speech. Less a sermon, and more a political rally, Jesus gives his vision of how to make Israel great again. As per usual, Jesus says things that make some people angry, and has a vision of government that is entirely opposite to how most think successful governments are run. It turns out, most of us are virtue signalling.We will see how the so-called Beatitudes are not particular ways to get #blessed by God, but are actually scathing attacks on how people in Jesus' culture believed we ought to be good and successful people. There is much to learn from this speech Jesus gives, and we are excited to journey through it!

This Christmas we take a deep look at the pagan sorcerers that Matthew calls the "Magi" who came to worship Jesus in Bethlehem. We discover just how peculiar and unexpected their appearance is, and the numerous implications this has on a story that we know so well yet often don't take the time to truly meditate on. This Sunday we are challenged by God's passionate desire to see his Son glorified and worshipped, and our role to do the same.

This week we finish the book of Hebrews! We talk about why it matters that Jesus was crucified outside of Jerusalem, and why we might not be experiencing the full experience of faith we are promised over and over in the Bible.

In our society, church seems to be becoming less and less needed and relevant. Today we explore why that seems to be the case and why it is a blessing in disguise, forcing us to reevaluate what church actually is and why we need it.

This week we learn about God's love triangle, and why the concept of the Trinity is central to understanding why we are significant as human beings, but also helps us answer our main question: Why should I make every attempt to be holy in this life if Jesus is going to perfect me anyway at the resurrection? We hope you enjoy our journey through God's Word.

This week we are going to learn about our purpose as Christians: Holiness. However, how to attain holiness in this life is not what we normally think, because the natural way we think we should achieve holiness is all about us and what we can do instead of being about Jesus. Further, we are going to discover what the author of Hebrews really meant when he talked about God disciplining his church through persecution.

The author of Hebrews talks about how we are to put aside all "heavy weights" and "sin" in order to run the race of life. Today we are going to learn just what those heavy weights and sins are, as they are not what we are so often told. Uncovering the true meaning of this passage will help us discover some lies we believe about Jesus.

Have you ever found that your Jesus hardly ever challenges you or disagrees with you? As we learn about the faith we and the ancient Jewish church share, it will become clear that often in our modern day we accept a knockoff version of Jesus instead of the real thing, which inhibits our growth as Christians and keeps glory from God.

This week we learn what seems to be one of the key reasons that the early Jewish Christian church struggled with wanting to return to Judaism. We'll see how we can often empathize with this church and how, when we feel God is not near us, we can find encouragement and comfort from what this church learned.

Unfortunately, due to recording issues, Part 7 was lost. However, Part 8 picks up where Part 7 left off, dealing with the ancient Israelite sacrificial system and how it is relevant for us today. This week we learn what the Old Testament can teach us about the cross, particularly about how to properly confess our sins to God.

Have you ever wondered why the God of the Old Testament seems to be so obsessed over rules, demanding that humans earn their salvation, only to have a complete turnaround in the New Testament and give salvation to any and all as a gift? This week we look at what's actually going on there, and why we might not be living under the "New Covenant" as much as we might think we are.

This week we dive deep into the Old Testament and learn who exactly Melchizedek was, and why he is so important to the author's argument that Jesus is the better high priest. We will then see what the implications are of this and what Melchizedek means for us today.

Theology is word that is very easily thrown around Christian circles, yet often we aren't quite clear on what it means, or we don't think it is terribly practical for us normal people to spend so much time thinking about it. Isn't that for theologians in their ivory towers? This week we are going to explore why theology is incredibly practical, and we will be encouraged to do it, as well as given some clear, simple steps to begin, because it isn't quite as simple as just cramming information on the Bible into your brain.

Have you ever wondered why obedience to God so often feels like a neverending chore we engage in just to somehow prove our faith is "real"? Today our lofty goal is to, by the end of this sermon, discover how we can obey God with joy. We will do that by learning how the ancient Jews accused God of divine nepotism, how Jesus was made perfect, and what the parable of the Ten Minas is actually about.

So, unfortunately the first episode of our new series failed to be recorded again due to a software malfunction. To sum it up, last week we learned that Jesus is our high priest and that we belong in the presence of God, therefore we should make every effort to enter into that presence. This also sets a goal for our Christianity, instead of making it some endless treadmill of morality. This week we expound on that idea and look a little bit more at what it means to enter into God's "rest", greatly enriching our understanding of salvation along the way.