Ordinary Reformation

Episode 35 Show NotesA bit of catch-up on quarantine life and Annie’s note taking challenges.What is a working definition of a worldview?Personally, why has the subject of worldview become more important of late?How pragmatism & pluralism has influenced our own worldview, even within a Christian context.How the study of God’s character, hermeneutics and biblical theology shape our worldview.Why should every Christian care about worldviews?When Christians adopt pragmatism: we end up asking “what works” far more often than “what has God said.”When Christians adopt secularism: we forget that we are sojournes and exiles here, we excuse our love of money, idols of comfort and security; live for here & now, little thought of eternal rewardsWhen Christians adopt pluralism: we end up saying things like, “well that works for them, who am I to say?”How do we grow or strengthen a proper biblical worldview?ResourcesBook: Family Driven Faith, Voddie Baucham“Education is discipleship.” - Voddie Baucham (full context here)Teaching Series: “A Christian Worldview” - RC Sproul

Show NotesA Biblical Foundation for Family Worship - Why it MattersA bit of our story and lessons learned along the wayHas the current evangelical fixation upon the individual killed off family worship?Some practical helps:- The practice is more important than the particulars- Less is moreIt’s more than imparting knowledge- Expect God to work, but don’t demand his work to look like the idea in your head- Dads - take responsibility.ResourcesARTICLE: Family Worship 101ARTICLE: Family Worship Has Fallen on Hard TimesBOOK: Family Worship Bible GuideARTICLE: Family Worship For Dummies

What has our life been like in the last 21 days of social distancing and staying at home?What is Ordinary Reformation in a nutshell?How has the stay at home order and current pandemic changed home life?What changes do you want to take with you once life returns to “normal?”What has been the biggest struggle in this?What have you learned or appreciated about the local church through this?ResourcesWEBSITE: Christian Worldview Class, Ligonier MinistriesBOOK: The Trellis and the Vine, Colin Marshall & Tony Payne

Organized according to the mind of Christ. In this episode we settle in and talk through the subject of church polity. How a church is led and organized is not an obscure doctrine with little importance! Join us as we talk about discipleship, church discipline, sanctification and friendship as it relates to healthy church polity.    

Head over to ordinaryreformation.com for the show notes and full list of links.

SHOW NOTESIntroductory chit-chat about the latest in life, the reason for the s l o w drip release of these podcast episodes, getting older and what we are reading.What is the great aim or goal of parenting?Why is parenting so hard?Deuteronomy 6:4–7 (ESV)> “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. 5 You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. 6 And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. 7 You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.RESOURCESPuritan Theology, Joel Beeke & Mark JonesThe Family at Church, Joel BeekeParenting, Paul TrippThe Duties of Parents, JC Ryle

## SHOW NOTES- Another podcast from the great outdoors and all the wildlife that goes with it.- Do you feel like you have grown in prayer life? How has your prayer life changed in 20 years?- What are the goals of prayer? What is our aim?- What are some aids and helps in developing a life of prayer?- What does prayer without ceasing look like?- How do you find time to pray?- Ways to grow in prayer?

Back from our summer/fall break we kick off a new season of Ordinary Reformation. Not wanting to wade too deep into the waters of challenging topics just yet, we take some time to talk about what we are learning and have been challenged by in the past few months. Friendships, church life, contentment and God’s faithfulness to speak through his Word round out the subject matter of this episode.

Consider this podcast somewhat like the last day of school just before summer break. We are not tackeling anything of real great importance, but you sure don’t want to miss out because it is going to be lots of fun! Looking ahead to summer we talk through (1) What we are learning (2) What we are reading and a little bit about volcanoes.

SHOW NOTES- A bit of chit-chat about the end of school and summer goals for our family- What we found most helpful about this book?- What is conscious?- How do we define conscious biblically?- How can we calibrate our conscious and what do we mean by this?- The importance of objective authority which gives us elbow room in matters of consciousRESOURCES- Book: Conscience: What it is, How to Train it, and Loving Those Who Differ

Part 2 of 2 in our conversation about worship and singing in the church. What sort of songs should we be singing? Should the structure or order of the service have any particular format? Plus, some closing thoughts from Keith & Kristin Getty's book, "Sing."

Let's talk about worship. Specifically, the singing. What is the goal of singing in the church? What sort of songs ought we be signing? What makes a bad song? Should I be able to hear myself over the band or see the "stage" through the fog and lasers? We sit down with Ben and Kristin Kopec who lead worship at Redeemer Community Church and ask them. (Part 1 of 2).

Sometimes we pick up sayings or even believe certain things that just aren't true. In this episode, we chat about several sayings and mindsets that Christians can adopt that are misleading and sometimes destructive. Plus, we get several interruptions from the little people who can't seem to pick up on the fact we are trying to record a podcast.

In this episode, we get all gushy on the local church. We love her, we need her, we belong to her. By God's own design he has saved us into a new community and we list out the reasons why we are so glad he has.

Taking the show on the road, we set up our mobile studio and interview our good friends Chad and Tiffany Statton about adoption. Consider this as a layman's guide to adoption as we sit down at their kitchen table and learn from their experience as they have adopted all 6 of their children.

So we decided to mark our 20th episode by playing a little game of question and answer. This is just a fun episode you can put on in the background as we ask each other about likes and dislikes, plans and preferences. Happy 20th episode!

Seeing that March is Women's History Month, we thought it would be a good opportunity to take up the subject of feminism and biblical womanhood. What is feminism, is it compatable with biblical womanhood? 

Following up on a listener question, we sit down to talk about the subject of failure. We live in a fallen and sinful world and we are fallible humans, that means failure is all around us. So how do we respond? Plus we get interrupted not once, but twice.

When asked what you believe about the Bible, we all seek to summarize our beliefs in some form. The topic of the day is: how ought we go about summarizing what the Scriptures teach? In answering this question, we talk through the basis and benefits of historic confessions as well as the important place for catechism within the Christian life.

Having recovered from a pinata beat-down of food poisoning, strep and some strange rash we take a moment to share what we have been learning amidst such seasons. Also, we respond to a listener question having to do with evangelism and service.

How we understand the biblical doctrine of conversion has a tremendous impact upon the way we think about and practice evangelism.

The doctrine of total depravity is often neglected or misunderstood, and if we start wrong, we end wrong. In this episode we take time to talk about what this doctrine is and why it becomes so critical to our biblical understanding of conversion.

In this episode we take another listener suggestion and talk through the topic of hospitality. What is it? Are all Christians called to be hospitable? How does this work amidst busy lives?

This week we reach into the grab bag of listener suggestions and pull out the topic of "your journey to reformed theology" (AKA Brian's question). Given that neither of us grew up in a reformed church, we talk about our own progressive understanding of sin, grace and conversion and how Calvinism is essentially a short-hand term for biblical theology.  

New year, new plans. Given that many of us are setting the course for fulfilling our goals and plans for the new year, we decided to talk about the subject of ambition. What are the pitfalls in making plans? How should we think biblically about ambition? Also, we nerd out a bit and talk about the tools and resources we use to keep moving forward and not loose our way. 

Podcast - Suffering & Affliction- A prolonged "chit-chat" covering Stephen King, feminism, and the appeal of a state-run church (plus a shoutout to @tragicfood and mandarin peels)- A couple of upfront caveats on this discussion about suffering: (1) this is not an exhaustive conversation but what are we learning in affliction and (2) a reminder that everyone suffers we should not compare our suffering to others- What are the struggles to grapple with in sickness and various forms of suffering?- What Scriptural truths or attributes of God can we find comfort in within suffering?- How Christianity transforms our understanding of suffering that is radically different from secularism or any other world religion.- John Flavel and "The Best of Work in the Worst of Times"- Our ability to suffer well requires: resting in his suffering, confident in his goodness and ability to sustain usTheology matters!RESOURCESBook: Tim Keller, Walking with God Through Pain and SufferingBook: Dave Furman, Being There: How to Love Those Who Are HurtingJohn Piper: 5 Sermons on Suffering 

Following up on our conversation about hearing from God, we thought it would be helpful to spend some time talking about the will of God. Does God have a definite and determined will for us? Must we figure out what that is before we take another step? How do we discern the will of God for our lives?

After unpacking the authority of Scripture in the last episode, we figured it would be good to then follow up with a discussion about how God speaks to us today.

In this episode, we turn our attention to the topic of the authority of Scripture (Sola Scriptura). After we take a few minutes to define what this is, we talk through the sufficiency, clarity, authority, and necessity of God's Word.

In this episode, we migrate to our off-site studio and take some time to talk about Advent. After laying a bit of foundation for what Advent is, we talk through some of our own traditions, why this is important to our family, gift giving, Santa and his shelved elf, and our favorite Christmas songs.

In this episode, we thought it would be good to do a follow up on the topic of marriage, as we sit down to talk through some of the practical implications of the biblical vision of marriage.* navigating conflict* marriage as a 50/50 partnership* how having kids changes marriage* the infatuation with love languages.

In this episode, we attempt to tackle the subject of marriage. After reading through some of the key biblical passages, we talk through what a loving husband looks like, how a wife can honor her husband, what we would tell our 19-year-old self and what makes a horrible marriage vow.

Repentance is a term that is found throughout Scripture and is heard often within the church, but do we really understand what it is? In this episode, we talk through some of our own misunderstandings of repentance, what the Scriptures teach and how we are learning to work this out within our own lives.

Hoping to make a solid follow up to our first episode, we look to the topic of "the gospel" and talk through three questions (1) What is the gospel? (2) What is not the gospel? and (3) Why does it matter?

In this first episode we take some time to unpack 3 questions: (1) Why are we doing this podcast? (2) What do we mean by "Reformation"? and (3) Why the emphasis upon ordinary?