Podcasts about what is god

Sadhana is a daily spiritual practice that involves using your body, mind, and emotions to achieve well-being and enlightenment. Sadhana is not about seeking enlightenment but surrendering to love and the Infinite One. For the mind alone cannot know the Infinite One. As your conscious awareness moves from the mind to the heart, and love is awakened, the love brings you to what is truly your home. Your mind cannot contain the complexity of the cosmic mind, but your heart can know God. The focus is to meditate upon the great, to surrender everything that you have known, or understood as your own into the Infinite One.  If you want the direct experience of Brahman, you must open your heart, surrender everything, and allow Divine Love. There is no separation. If you let go, Cosmic Love is within you. Your very form, your ideas, your thoughts, your existence is all within God. All is composed of God. There is no separation. What Is God? God is everywhere, in everyone, & in everything. About  Maetreyii Ma Nolan, Ph.D. Maetreyii Ma Nolan, Ph.D., is an award-winning author, spiritual teacher, and psychologist, expert in consciousness and holistic healing. With a rich background in psychology and spirituality, her work has positively influenced many people's lives. Maetreyii Ma Nolan's wisdom and teachings garner recognition worldwide, making her a respected voice for inner transformation and spiritual awakening.  She is trained as a licensed Psychologist, an Acharya or Ordained Minister of Yogic Meditation, a certified IAYT Yoga Therapist, and an EYRT 500-hour Yoga Teacher with many years of experience with deep meditation and yogic wisdom. You can visit her website here: https://www.yogama.org  About Maetreyii Ma's Works Over the past decades, Maetreyii Ma has delivered thousands of presentations to various audiences. Her latest project is to make those presentations available to the broadest possible audience. Maetreyii Ma's talks fall into six main categories: The Power and Nature of Love Self-realization, Spirituality, & Awakening Dharma, Society, & Karma Working with the Mind & Emotions Relationships & Samgha Science & Cosmology  The Baba Flow Maetreyii Ma's talks are based on a spiritual process called Baba Flow. The Baba flow is an intuitive flow of spiritual guidance and teachings from the deep inner essence, the one essential Source known by many names. In the Baba Talks, Maetreyii Ma, in a deep state of Bhava, or devotional absorption, opens to this Source and allows the teachings to flow through. Since 1969, Maetreyii Ma has been a student of Shrii Shrii Anandamurti, affectionately known as Baba. In 1970, she began to have profound mystical experiences of the Divine and experienced the inner presence of her Guru. Baba's inner presence brought a deep knowledge of the endless love and compassion of the Divine, perfect beauty and wisdom, and the unconditional love and overflowing grace of the Sadguru. About Ananda Gurukula Maetreyii Ma is President of Ananda Gurukula, a non-profit organization dedicated to awakening the human spirit and sharing the ancient mystic wisdom of yoga.  Through Ananda Gurukula, Maetreyii Ma is able to offer meditation practices, mentoring (https://www.yogama.org/mentoring.html), meditation and yoga wisdom retreats, and webinars and workshops on the ancient knowledge of yogic teachings, in addition to local weekly Sunday evening meditations, called Dharmachakra (https://www.yogama.org/dharmachakra.html), a third Friday Kirtan (https://www.yogama.org/kirtan.html), and a Saturday morning Satsanga (https://www.yogama.org/satsanga.html). All are invited to attend our events at the Ashram in the Santa Rosa area.  For those who do not live in the local Santa Rosa area, Maetreyii Ma offers her Baba Talks for free on Youtube (https://www.youtube.com/@maetreyiima7) and Podbean (https://www.babatalks.info/).  Ananda Gurukula also publishes books and the Baba inspirational writings on many subjects. See more about Maetreyii Ma's books at https://www.maetreyiima.org/shop.html.

Decisions, Decisions - Week 3 - What Is God's Will? by The Summit Church

In this 'EPISODE 396 PRE-TRIB RAPTURE FACT OR FICTION? WHY DO WE PUT FAITH IN ISRAEL AND THEIR BOOK WE CALL THE BIBLE? IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED BY GOD HIMSELF OUR CREATOR? WHAT IS GOD'S OPINION ABOUT THE LAST DAYS?Author and host Elbert Hardy of itellwhy.com reads and discusses what God our Creator says about his Word and our future. The last days... What do they mean and what does God himself say about the Rapture , the Last Days and the Second coming of Jesus Christ. Where in God's timing is the gathering of all his chosen ones?Go to itellwhy.com to read Elbert's books free of charge, no Ads and no requests for money or Email addresses. You can watch faith building YouTube Links to Videos and the listen to Elbert's Life of Christ Audio Book in 30 minute Episodes arranged and read by the author straight from the Bible, but rearranged in logical harmony of the Gospels, Revelation and other scriptures. All FREE of charge in the public interest.

What Is God? Really and truly...does this work scare you? Trigger you? Make you nervous? Or bring about a sense of calm, peace and knowing? Today I am joined by my husband Juuso to look at what God really is, to explore what it means to come to this knowing, what "I am my own Guru" really means and also our path to God (which includes Yoga, the Akashic Records, the Pleaides...all of Life.) We hope you enjoy this episode!  Notes from the Episode Walk Home to Oneness with us in GUIDED Shop our workshops How to do a Line Activation (complete with emptying exercise) Follow @alnwithin on IG  Join Ashley Hämäläinen's Akashic Records Waitlist ALN | Stillness SPOTIFY Playlist  ALN | Flow SPOTIFY Playlist Leave us a loving review and get 20% off your first month (of a six month or year-long membership) in GUIDED or 20% off a single workshop. Send a screenshot of your review to hello@alnwithin.com. Offer only available for new members.

This is the first sermon in a series on the life of Abraham, one of the most critical characters in the story of God's people. In this message, God calls Abraham to a new direction for his life, but God does not reveal the destination. Quite literally, Abraham would have to set out on a long journey trusting God with the direction. In life, God's will for us is most often a direction and not a destination. We must learn to be obedient with the direction and trust God with the destination. In this sermon, Pastor Ethan shares “What Is God's Will For My Life?”  The Bridge Church exists to join God in multiplying his kingdom in Wilmington and the world. For more information on The Bridge Church, please visit https://thebridgeilm.com/ Next Steps:  https://thebridgeilm.churchcenter.com/people/forms/302918 If you feel led, give online by clicking here: https://www.thebridgeilm.com/give STAY CONNECTED Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thebridgeilm/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheBridgeILM Events Page: https://thebridgeilm.churchcenter.com/registrations/events

Are you wondering what God wants you to do with your life? Understanding His will doesn't have to feel like an impossible puzzle! In this episode, Mike Stone dives into Scripture to uncover what God's will really means and how you can discern His plan for your life with confidence.

Wellness + Wisdom | Episode 692 What does it mean to experience God and how to embrace pain as a teacher to deepen your spiritual growth? Paul Chek, Founder of the CHEK Institute, joins Josh Trent on the Wellness + Wisdom Podcast, episode 692, to dive deep into the true nature of GOD and the difference between believing in God and experiencing God, how love acts as the essence and expression of divinity, why generational healing, plant medicine, and lucid dreams can unlock deeper understanding of the soul, and the importance of purpose-driven action in aligning with divine consciousness and leading a life of purpose. "Your awakening and your realization of what God is will astound you and it will keep you so inspired to keep going because you'll realize the more you understand about the magic and the mystery of God the more magical and mysterious life becomes and the more exciting it is to be alive." - Paul Chek 15% Off Spirit Gym Spirit Gym, created by Paul Chek, is a transformative program aimed at holistic health, spiritual growth, and self-discovery. The program focuses on teaching individuals how to unlock their soul's purpose and achieve true fulfillment in life. The program offers a unique blend of principles that guide participants through mental, emotional, and spiritual development. It emphasizes changing one's life story, fostering creativity, and developing deeper self-awareness. Spirit Gym also offers tools for breaking free from limiting behaviors, like addiction and depression, and cultivating a life of love, joy, and purpose. Paul Chek's approach integrates the mind, body, and spirit to promote healing and self-realization. 15% off with code "JOSH15" In This Episode, Paul Chek Uncovers: [01:30] What Is God? Paul Chek Paul Chek | All Is God - 3 Part Series Be Here Now by Ram Dass Why people misunderstand the word "God." How Paul helped Josh find a new way to approach life. Why religions have created the wrong idea of God. The Religious Case Against Belief by James Carse Why we can't have a spiritual experience if we're not open to the mystery of God. How all belief systems are closed. [11:00] Do You Believe or Do You Know? The difference between believing and knowing. Why Paul doesn't "believe" in God. IG reel @paul.chek How Paul shows people how to engage consciousness. Why the birth of his first son was a profound spiritual experience. How his father made him feel like he was in a prison camp. [20:35] Trusting The Voice of God How a voice told Paul that his life would be one of purpose. Why massage was the only thing that helped relieve his asthma as a child. How he had a natural gift for massaging. Spirit Gym - 15% off with code "JOSH15" [29:00] Becoming One with The Universe Why many people experience God through pain and suffering. What it means to become one with the universe. Why the soul is in possession of our body. How pain makes us question if we're going to die. Why monks use torture to achieve a conscious out-of-the-body experience. [32:55] Plant Medicine Experience Why Paul has done over 1,000 plant medicine ceremonies. How sacred dance can be a tool for experiencing samadhi. Why some people experience fear in plant medicine ceremonies. Our souls can only have transcendent experiences that match the level of consciousness we are at. The definition of wisdom according to Paul. How plant medicine can be a karmic experience. [41:05] Connecting with God Why God is the only being that can create and sustain itself. How God is an idea that becomes an experience. Why Paul had one of the deepest experiences of God through Tai Chi. [47:45] Love Is God Why love is the verb of God. How religion gets us trapped in our head. Why giving love honestly and receiving love openly is the path to knowing God. The beauty of love is that it never works. How loving everybody else and not loving ourselves creates disease in the body. [52:35] The Power of Dreams Why God is people which means it doesn't utilize people. How every single creation that exists is unique. Why the characters in our dreams are an aspect of ourselves until proven otherwise. How God dreams novelty into existence. The purpose of lucid dreaming. How Paul was shown that he didn't need to be afraid of death. [01:00:30] God Is Ever-Present Why we are in an endless game. Love is experienced by all sentient beings. How people's auras are overlapping and creating a third being. [01:05:45] Perception of Time Why Josh fears that one day he won't be able to hold his children. Energy can't be destroyed, only transformed. Salicrow and Angie Chek: Death and Beyond  How our sense of time can create false narratives. What happens after we die. How Paul taught her sister to talk to her deceased husband. Why the biggest challenge for a soul is being addicted to matter. [01:21:55] Spiritual Alchemy How alchemists discovered that the spirit is affecting matter. Why alchemy is the science of what's animating the body. How after we die we can connect with our loved ones through dreams. How Josh experiences unconditional love. Why unconditional love is not easy. [01:31:10] Evolved Consciousness How Yogananda made a professional runner believe in God by outrunning him. Why we need to be brave in order to see what's been in front of us the entire time. How remote viewing is only accessible if we believe it's possible. Why spiritual development is figuring out who we are. [01:38:35] Leaders Hold Lanterns How people fall into the ego trap when they say "I'm God." Why the life people lead shows us the truth about the healing they need. How to Eat, Move and Be Healthy! by Paul Chek Why working too much on our spirituality can make us resent it. How having two wives has been an accelerator of Paul's spiritual development. Why we learn from the people that we spend time with. When we say "I know that," it's the ego stopping us from mastery. How Paul creates independence in his students to not need him in the future. [01:49:00] Let The Pain Guide You How pain shows us that we haven't resolved the root cause of the problem. Why we project our own wounds onto other people. How our body is telling us what's going on inside. 668 Evolve Your Consciousness: The True Healing Work To BE An Adult, Learn How To Love + Live A Thriving Life | Margo Running How pain navigates us to go in the right direction. [01:56:35] Healing Generational Wounds How Paul speaks to the souls in the Spirit Gym. When we dream together, we grow together. How the environment impacts our epigenetics. Why our body can make adjustments when we change our diet. How the group soul is connected to us at all times. Why we carry the unresolved energy from the previous generations. It Didn't Start With You by Mark Wolynn How children are tasked with the unfinished business of their parents. [02:10:50] Paul's Relationship to Women Why realizing that our problems are passed onto our children can motivate us to heal. How Paul found out that he wasn't happy in a monogamous relationship. Why chasing after women could be a pattern he got from his father. How knowing his purpose helps Paul take actions that are aligned with it. Why men who lie to their wives get physical symptoms from the fear of getting caught. [02:22:30] Getting The Second Wind in Life Why chasing women can get in the way of walking a path of purpose. How we're blind to our shadow side. Why we shouldn't rush to find our soulmate. A soulmate is a mirror sent from God. Why having children gave Paul a push to continue the work. How to use our heart to feel what we know. Leave Wellness + Wisdom a Review on Apple Podcasts Power Quotes From The Show The Unfinished Business of Your Parents "Whatever you have not resolved in this lifetime will go with you and your children will have to work on it. This is why Jung said, all children are tasked with the unfinished business of their parents' lives. Even if your kids didn't know about it, they're going to have to carry it out because your soul is still in resonance with their genes. So everything that's unresolved in you actually is like a flow of desire that's coming through the psychic energy that the DNA of their bodies is picking up because they're in resonance with you as their parent." - Paul Chek Should You Take Plant Medicine? "People should not do psychedelic journeys either when they're psychologically not ready, they're doing it for the wrong reasons, they're being pressured into it, or they're doing it with the wrong people that have the wrong motives because you can use a psychedelic just as effectively to enter the dark arts as you can the light arts or the healing arts." - Paul Chek Where Are You Living Untrue to Reality? "Your soul only opens the door to the transcendent experiences that are needed for you to awaken to the truth of yourself at the level of our spiritual development that you're at. So you have a God experience when you're ready for it. And until then you have an awareness of all the parts of you that you've put energy into that are blocking you from realizing the truth of yourself. And that's what real spiritual development is, is becoming aware of where you are living untrue to reality." - Paul Chek Links From Today's Show  Paul Chek Paul Chek | All Is God - 3 Part Series Be Here Now by Ram Dass The Religious Case Against Belief by James Carse IG reel @paul.chek Spirit Gym - 15% off with code "JOSH15" Salicrow and Angie Chek: Death and Beyond  How to Eat, Move and Be Healthy! by Paul Chek 668 Evolve Your Consciousness: The True Healing Work To BE An Adult, Learn How To Love + Live A Thriving Life | Margo Running It Didn't Start With You by Mark Wolynn Josh's Trusted Products | Up To 40% Off Shop All Products

Renowned writer and professor of philosophy, Jacob Needleman, talks about a new way of approaching the question of how to understand a higher power in his latest book, What Is God? ...more --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ndeworld/support

Series: Chaos to CovenantTitle: “What's the matter with us?"Scripture: Genesis 3:1-7; Matthew 4:1-10Bottom line: When we forget or doubt that God is good and his word is trustworthy, we will give in to temptation and sin against our Creator.INTRODUCTIONCONTEXTSERMON OUTLINECONCLUSIONNOTESQUESTIONS TO CONSIDER OUTLINESDISCUSSION QUESTIONSMAIN REFERENCES USEDINTRODUCTION[Holding an apple while I talk]In his book The Genesis Factor, David Helms says that Genesis answers many of life's questions. He says or implies that Genesis 3 deals with at least 3 questions:Is God really good? If God is good, why are there boundaries? (God's character)Can you trust God's word no matter what? (The Bible)What's the matter with us? (Humanity)Who do you trust more than anyone in the world?Now, imagine that that person is now also the most powerful person in America.They can do anything they want to. They are powerful and you trust them.Now, imagine you're with them and they say to you, "I have a gift for you." They hand you what looks like a credit card. They tell you this card gives you unlimited access to every source of food in America. Restaurants, grocery stores, food trucks, farms...you name it...for free. This card also gives you access to any and every university, professor, expert, library or bookstore in America. Any source of wisdom you seek you have unlimited access to for free. Pretty amazing, huh?They add that there's also a restaurant where you can find food that increases your health and extends your life. This super-restaurant is always open and you have unlimited access to it as well.Now, they have one restriction. You cannot eat at the only 5 Star restaurant in town. The one in the middle of town. Let's say you drive by it every day too. This restaurant also has a supercomputer with the best AI on the planet. It has access to all knowledge in our world--good and evil. But if you order from there, if you partake from there, you will die. So you enjoy the unlimited access you have to food, knowledge and wisdom all over town. But one day you notice the 5 Star restaurant you're restricted from eating at. You notice that the parking lot is full, though. You find yourself walking over. You can see people enjoying their food but not dying. So you walk in and the host welcomes you in. You ask why aren't people dying from the food? He answers, "Oh that's just to keep you from gaining the same power that your friend now has. You won't die if you eat this food or partake of this AI bar." Forgetting what your trusted friend or family said, you find the host's words more believable the more he talks. You smell the food and see the expressions on everyone's faces. They all look like they're enjoying everything. You look around to see who's looking and then you go in and get a plate...and you eat. What just happened?You gave in to the temptation to ignore the one restriction you had from your most trusted person who gave you unlimited access to everything else. And you died. CONTEXTAdam and Eve have been created and married. They are in a blissful garden of existence where they have all that they need and their Creator, the Lord God, spends time walking and talking with them everyday. They have no relational distress with God or each other or creation. They are experiencing perfect peace and joy. And yet they find themselves capable of being tempted to forget that God is good and doubt his trustworthiness.SERMON OUTLINE (GENESIS 3:1-24) by H. WillmingtonThis section describes the corruption of all things. In other words, it answers the question:What's the matter with us?I. THE TRANSGRESSION OF ADAM (3:1-24)A. Adam's disobedience (3:1-6)1. The treachery (3:1-5)a. Satan begins by casting doubt on God's Word (3:1-3): "Did God really say you must not eat any of the fruit in the garden?"b. Satan concludes by denying God's Word (3:4-5): "'You won't die!' The serpent hissed...'You will become just like God, knowing everything, both good and evil.'"2. The tragedy (3:6): Both Eve and Adam disobey God and eat of the forbidden tree.B. Adam's deceit (3:7-8): He attempts to cover his nakedness by making clothes from fig leaves. He then hides among the trees.C. Adam's despair (3:9-11): He acknowledges his fear and nakedness before God.D. Adam's defense (3:12-19): Adam blames Eve, but Eve blames the serpent.E. Adam's discipline (3:14-19): God sets up his divine court in Eden and imposes the following sentences:1. Upon the serpent (3:14-15): to be the most cursed of all creatures and to crawl on its belly, eating dust. Also, his head will be crushed by the offspring of the woman.2. Upon the woman (3:16): to suffer pain in childbirth and to be ruled by her husband.3. Upon the man (3:17-19): to endure wearisome labor as he grows food from unproductive soil and to eventually die physically.4. Upon nature (3:18): to be infested with thorns and this-tles.F. Adam's deliverance (3:15, 20-21)1. The promise (3:15): Someday a Savior will defeat Satan, the serpent!2. The provision (3:20-21): After Adam names his wife Eve, God clothes both of them with animal skins.CONCLUSIONBottom line: When we forget or doubt that God is good and his word is trustworthy, we will give in to temptation and sin against our Creator.Read Matthew 4:1-10 and see how Jesus resisted temptation. Three times he is tempted and three times he responds with scripture. He remembers that God's word is true and authoritative and that the Father is good. We must immerse ourselves in scripture with people and on our own getting a good grip on the Bible so that we'll not sin against God.Ps 119:11 "I've hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you." -DavidSinning against God leads to death.When we die spiritually, it's because we have been infected. We've been infected by a spiritual virus that can only be cured by a blood transfusion that uses Christ's shed blood at the cross. This blood coupled with our belief that it saves is what saves us from sin and death, shame and guilt, and hell itself."But God demonstrates his love in this, that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." -Romans 5:8There's hope even in Genesis 3“And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.””‭‭Genesis‬ ‭3‬:‭15‬ ‭NIV‬‬““Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah.” When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?” Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off—for all whom the Lord our God will call.”” ‭‭Acts‬ ‭2‬:‭36‬-‭39‬ ‭NIV‬‬How do we respond? Answer 2 questions:InvitationWhat is God saying to me right now?What am I going to do about it? Write this down on a sheet of paper. What I hear you saying, Lord, is ___________________.[my name] is going to believe/do __________________________________________________ as a result.Finally, share this with your Home or Mission group this week when you gather as a testimony about what God is doing in your life. You don't have to get too specific to give him praise.PrayNOTES"Who are we really? Genesis 2 replies:We are divine dust.We are to live under divine rule.We are divinely created for relationship."- David Helms, p. 59"What Is God's Mission?What is God's mission in the world? If we, as Christians, are supposed to love God and obey him, it would certainly help if we knew what he was up to. Fortunately, God has given us the Bible, a book that tells us exactly what he is up to!If we are going to understand God's mission, the first thing we have to understand is that the Bible is not primarily a storehouse of random facts about God or Israel or the world.Nor is it primarily a collection of rules. Instead, it is primarily a fascinating and powerful story about God. This story is told in four acts:1. Creation: The first act is Creation. "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth" (Gen. 1:1).God created the world and everything in it, and he called it "very good" (1:31). God loved and enjoyed what he had created!At the pinnacle of his creation are a man and woman. They were different from the rest of his creation because he created them in his image and likeness(1:26-28). Unlike the animals, they could be entrusted with managing the world God created (1:28), making families (1:28), and working to enhance the garden(2:15). Also, unlike the animals, they were moral and spiritual beings who were instructed not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. A good way to summarize the uniqueness of human beings is to say that they are spiritual, moral, social, and cultural beings who were supposed to use the totality of their lives to please God. And at the time of creation, they did please God. In fact, everything in the garden was just the way it was supposed to be.Adam and Eve had a right relationship with God, with each other, and with the rest of the world.2. The Fall: The second act is the Fall. Just after God created the world, the Bible's story takes a dark turn.Adam and Eve decided to rebel against their Creator (3:1-7). Instead of loving him supremely and obeying him completely, they disobeyed him and sought to take his place on the throne of the world and the throne of their lives. They believed the lie of Satan that they could become gods. In response to their sin, God cast them out from the garden of Eden.Being cast out from the garden of Eden represented the fact that things were no longer the way they were supposed to be. Adam and Eve no longer had a right relationship with God, with each other, or with God's world. Each of us, just like Adam and Eve, has sinned against God. Each of us, like Adam and Eve, experiences broken relationships with God, with oth-ers, and with the world around us. Our lives are characterized not only by God's goodness but by sin and its consequences. Even as we experience the beauty and goodness of life in God's creation, we also experience the ugliness and badness of sin and its consequences.3. Redemption: The third act is Redemption. Immediately after Adam and Eve sinned, God promised to send a Redeemer, a Savior, to save them from their sins (3:15).This promise represents our first "peek" at the gospel.Throughout the Bible, God continues to reveal more and more about who this Redeemer would be until, finally, in the Gospels, we learn that he is Jesus!Jesus—fully God in all of who he is-came to earth and took on full humanity. He was fully man and fully God. He lived a perfect life, but was crucified at the hands of sinful humans. When he died on the cross, was buried, and rose again, he was making atonement for our sins and providing salvation for the world. On the cross, he took the guilt for our sins upon his shoulders so that he could suffer the condemnation that we should suffer. When he rose from the dead, he rose as a victor, having paid fully for our sins and secured the future salvation of the world." -Bruce Ashford, I Am Going, pp. 4-5From Wilmington's Bible Handbook:It's primeval history (universal world history) of the world (universe) made up of 5 stories with the same structure. (1-11)The FallCainSons of God marrying daughters of manThe FloodTower of BabelThey all follow this 4-fold pattern:Sin: the sin is describedSpeech: There is a speech by God announcing the penalty for the sinGrace: God brings grace to the situation to ease the misery due to sinPunishment: God punishes the sinPatriarchal history (12-50) or the history of Israel's founding fathers. It continues to reveal the many graces of God based on the gracious promise God made to and through Abraham in Genesis 12:3.Truths to noteGod existed and exists eternallyGod exists in plural unity as the Holy TrinityGod was in the beginningGod was before anything existed in our universe and the universe itselfGod created everything that exists in the universe and the universe itselfGod creates something from nothing Latin ex nihiloAn atheist scientist came to God and said, “We've figured out how to make a man without you.” God said, “OK, let me see you do it.” So the atheist bent down to the ground and scooped up a handful. But God stopped him and said, “Oh, no you don't. Get your own dirt!”God creates with words. He spoke creation into existence. His words still have power.God creates purposefully for his glory and our good.God starts with light to display his creation and provide an essential ingredient for life.God only creates things that are good. Together it was all very good and will be again.God is a God of order and moves from chaos to order. Elohim (gods) intensifies God's divine majesty, when used as a noun. When used as a verb, it's singular for there is only one true God.God created all things. "Heavens and earth"God created an "open" universe, not a "closed" one where he never interactsNotes from Bible Project Videos1-11 God and the world12:3 Hinge verse12-50 God and Abraham's family"Blessing" is a key word hereChoice: Tree of knowledge of good and evilTrust God's definition of good and evil, orSeize autonomy and define good and evil for themselves?Serpent (against God) tells a different story. He lies when he tells them that if they eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil that they will be like God. Because they already are like God (made in his image).The PatternSee D. J. A. Clines, Catholic Biblical Quarterly, No. 38 (1976), pp. 487, 488. Clines explains that Gerhard Von Rad initially observed a pattern of sin, mitigation, and punishment. Then Claus Westermann discerned another element, that of divine speech. Though he did not include it in the pattern, Clines does. Thus the following chart:I. II. III. IV. SINSPEECHGRACEPUNISHMENTFALL3:63:14-193:213:22-24CAIN4:84:10-124:154:16SONS OF GOD6:26:36:8, 18ff7:6-24FLOOD6:5, 11f6:7, 13-216:8, 18ff11:8BABEL11:411:6f10:1-3211:8Preach the Word, Genesis, Kent Hughes, chapter 1, note 3, p. 625QUESTIONS TO CONSIDERWho is God?What has he done/is he doing/is he going to do?Who am I? (In light of 1 & 2)What do I get to do? (In light of who I am)How do I do it?Let's ask some summary sermon questions:Q. What do I want them to know?A. Q. Why do I want them to know it?A. Q. What do I want them to do about it?A. Q. Why do I want them to do it?A. Q. How can they begin to do this?A. OUTLINESOUTLINE (GENESIS 3:1-24) by H. WillmingtonThis section describes the corruption of all things.I. THE TRANSGRESSION OF ADAM (3:1-24)A. Adam's disobedience (3:1-6)1. The treachery (3:1-5)a. Satan begins by casting doubt on God's Word (3:1-3): "Did God really say you must not eat any of the fruit in the garden?"b. Satan concludes by denying God's Word (3:4-5): "'You won't die!' The serpent hissed...'You will become just like God, knowing everything, both good and evil.'"2. The tragedy (3:6): Both Eve and Adam disobey God and eat of the forbidden tree.B. Adam's deceit (3:7-8): He attempts to cover his nakedness by making clothes from fig leaves. He then hides among the trees.C. Adam's despair (3:9-11): He acknowledges his fear and nakedness before God.D. Adam's defense (3:12-19): Adam blames Eve, but Eve blames the serpent.E. Adam's discipline (3:14-19): God sets up his divine court in Eden and imposes the following sentences:1. Upon the serpent (3:14-15): to be the most cursed of all creatures and to crawl on its belly, eating dust. Also, his head will be crushed by the offspring of the woman.2. Upon the woman (3:16): to suffer pain in childbirth and to be ruled by her husband.3. Upon the man (3:17-19): to endure wearisome labor as he grows food from unproductive soil and to eventually die physically.4. Upon nature (3:18): to be infested with thorns and this-tles.F. Adam's deliverance (3:15, 20-21)1. The promise (3:15): Someday a Savior will defeat Satan, the serpent!2. The provision (3:20-21): After Adam names his wife Eve, God clothes both of them with animal skins.DISCUSSION QUESTIONSDiscovery Bible Study process: https://www.dbsguide.org/Read the passage together.Retell the story in your own words.Discovery the storyWhat does this story tell me about God?What does this story tell me about people?If this is really true, what should I do?What is God saying to you right now? (Write this down)What are you going to do about it? (Write this down)Who am I going to tell about this?Find our sermons, podcasts, discussion questions and notes at https://www.gracetoday.net/podcastAlternate Discussion Questions (by Jeff Vanderstelt): Based on this passage:Who is God?What has he done/is he doing/is he going to do?Who am I? (In light of 1 & 2)What do I do? (In light of who I am)How do I do it?Final Questions (Write this down)What is God saying to you right now? What are you going to do about it?MAIN REFERENCES USED“Genesis,” by R. Kent Hughes, Preaching the Word Commentary, Edited by Kent HughesExalting Jesus in Genesis, by BethancourtThe Genesis Record, by Henry MorrisThe Genesis Factor, by David Helms & Jon Dennis“Look at the Book” by John Piper (LATB)“The Bible Knowledge Commentary” by Walvoord, Zuck (BKC)“The Bible Exposition Commentary” by Warren Wiersbe (BEC)Outline Bible, D Willmington (OB)Willmington's Bible Handbook, D Willmington (WBH)NIV Study Bible (NIVSB) https://www.biblica.com/resources/scholar-notes/niv-study-bible/Chronological Life Application Study Bible (NLT)ESV Study Bible (ESVSB) https://www.esv.orgThe Bible Project https://bibleproject.com“The Bible in One Year 2023 with Nicky Gumbel” bible reading plan on YouVersion app (BIOY)Claude.ai

What Is God's Will For My Life | Josh Canizaro

Today, our episode's all about discipleship around political engagement, based on a series of Bible studies Jonathan and his team at his real job recently created for this election season and beyond. Some points we hit:-        Why it is essential for our political action to understand  we were not created for this world-        Why followers of Jesus won't overemphasize the importance of political victories and losses-        The reality that we are all connected to each other and God desires everyone's political liberation-        And, after that discussion, we dive into a recommendation from one of our recent newsletters on the fallout from Israel's torture of Hamas operativesCredits-            Follow KTF Press on Facebook, Instagram, and Threads. Subscribe to get our bonus episodes and other benefits at KTFPress.com.-        Follow host Jonathan Walton on Facebook Instagram, and Threads.-        Follow host Sy Hoekstra on Mastodon.-        Our theme song is “Citizens” by Jon Guerra – listen to the whole song on Spotify.-        Our podcast art is by Robyn Burgess – follow her and see her other work on Instagram.-        Editing by Multitude Productions-        Transcripts by Joyce Ambale and Sy Hoekstra.-        Production by Sy Hoekstra and our incredible subscribersTranscript Introduction[An acoustic guitar softly plays six notes in a major scale, the first three ascending and the last three descending, with a keyboard pad playing the tonic in the background. Both fade out as Jonathan Walton says “This is a KTF Press podcast.”]Jonathan Walton: If we are clear-eyed about the brokenness of the world, I would love for us to be as clear-eyed about the bigness of the gospel of Jesus Christ. I don't think our concept of sin and our concept of redemption is actually mature enough to deal with the problems of the world.[The song “Citizens” by Jon Guerra fades in. Lyrics: “I need to know there is justice/ That it will roll in abundance/ And that you're building a city/ Where we arrive as immigrants/ And you call us citizens/ And you welcome us as children home.” The song fades out.]Jonathan Walton: Welcome to Shake the Dust, seeking Jesus, confronting injustice. I'm Jonathan Walton.Sy Hoekstra: And I'm Sy Hoekstra. I'm so excited about what we're gonna be talking about today. We have concluded our series of interviews with authors from the anthology that we published in 2020 about Christianity and politics in the era of Trump. For the next several five or six episodes until the election, you will be hearing more from the two of us. We'll probably have a couple more interviews, but it will not be from those authors. But today, we are jumping into something that I think is very core to what we do at KTF Press. We're talking about political discipleship and how the ways that some stuff that we maybe in some churches relegate to the realm of personal salvation, like the incarnation and the death and resurrection of Jesus, actually have a whole lot to say about how we engage politically. But before we get to all of that, Jonathan.Jonathan Walton: Remember, if you like what you hear and what you read from KTF Press, and would like for it to continue beyond this election season, please go to KTFPress.com and become a paid subscriber and encourage your friends to subscribe as well. We've got a ways to go if we're gonna have enough people to sustain this work, but we believe this work is valuable for us and for you, and so we hope that you do too. Go to KTFPress.com, that'll get you the bonus episodes of this show, access to monthly Zoom chats with the two of us and more, but only if you are subscribed. So again, go to KTFPress.com, subscribe today.The Bible Studies Jonathan's Team Created about Christian Political EngagementSy Hoekstra: All right. So Jonathan, this conversation is actually coming from some work that you are doing in your regular job with InterVarsity. First of all, remind people what you do with InterVarsity [laughter], and then tell people about these resources that you've produced and kind of what the goal of them is.Jonathan Walton: So I'm a Senior Resource Specialist with InterVarsity. And what that looks like is when there are some significant problems, then those things get sent up to the discipleship and leadership team to think about, and one of the things in our sandbox is political discipleship. And so for the last six months, we've been working on a curriculum that folks will be able to use to not just see and seek Jesus during this election season, but actually be formed into people who can see Jesus on the seat in our image as a seat of a stool with three legs, and on the seat. The Lord over our feelings, over our thoughts, over our actions, is Jesus. And so this five part Bible study really leans into that and prayerfully will push people to make that decision, to say, “Oh yes, if I'm a follower of Jesus, then my orthopathy, my orthodoxy and my orthopraxy will be under the Lordship of Jesus.”Sy Hoekstra: You just said three big words. I think a lot of people know that orthodoxy kind of means right belief, and orthopraxy kind of means right practiceJonathan Walton: Yep.Sy Hoekstra: Orthopathy, what does that mean?Jonathan Walton: Orthopathy, which most of us function on is our feelings and passions. So what does it look like for us to actually say, “I feel uncomfortable, I feel afraid, I feel sad.” And instead of acting out of that feeling and then forming a theology that justifies our actions that were based on our feelings of fear or anxiety or discomfort or loss of control, we actually said, “Oh, I feel afraid of this,” or “I feel uncomfortable about this, but I can actually put that fear, that discomfort, that anger, under the seat of Jesus,” and be able to have our thoughts and actions be in line with the kingdom of God, and not just in line with our deepest wounds or whims.Sy Hoekstra: Okay, so that is some helpful context. You have created these Bible studies as part of your job as a resource developer, and we will have links to those Bible studies that are available for free online. So if you wanna do a five session Bible study with a small group or whatever, you can go get Jonathan's stuff and talk about politics with your small group, which I think everybody should be doing right now [laughter], at least if you live in the United States. Not everybody that listens to the show is in the United States, but for all the Americans, go do that, please. Oh, and actually, sorry you didn't write these. You were part of the team that developed these.Jonathan Walton: Yes.Sy Hoekstra: The actual writing was done by other people, but you were very involved in the process.We Were Not Created for This World, and That Affects Our PoliticsSy Hoekstra: So let's get into one of the main ideas here, which I think is, let's talk about some of the implications of the idea that we were not created for the world that we live in. This is kind of a big deal I think, in your thinking, and I would like you to tell us what, first of all, what kind of world were we created for, and then what does that imply for our politics?We Were Created for a World Where Everything Existed in HarmonyJonathan Walton: One of the things that gets lost in most of our theology about the quote- unquote, fall is that we don't engage as much with what the world could have looked like if we had not, quote- unquote, fallen. And so I like to think about every possible thing in the world that is broken and not working well, what if it had been working just fine? So let's imagine for a moment that work, like Adam and Eve in the Garden doing the stuff, was good. Like work was good. Let's imagine for a moment that a man never blamed the problem on a woman, and a woman never blamed the problem on the man. Let's imagine a world free of shame, jealousy, deceit and blaming. Let's lean into that slim window in Scripture and that slim window and stories that were passed down for generations, and generations where there was no deceit.We could know one another and be known. We could forgive, because I don't imagine that no one got hurt, but I imagine though, is people were quick to forgive and quick to ask for forgiveness. To be able to live in harmony with the world, that includes that big Shalom theology, where there's peace in me, there's peace between me and others, there's peace between me and creation, there's peace between me and God. There's reconciliation, there's Shalom there. And so since we do not have that world, the world that we currently live in is one that we will have constant dissonance with.We Must Be People Who Rejoice When Empires FallJonathan Walton: So fast forward all the way to Revelation 18,19, and 20, when quote unquote, Babylon, or the Empire is destroyed.And there are people that are weeping over Babylon, and there are people that are rejoicing that Babylon has been destroyed. Followers of Jesus need to be in the camp that says we are rejoicing that Babylon is destroyed. Hallelujah, salvation and glory be unto our God. If we are those people that say, “Ah, you know what? We're so sad that all the spices and all the products and all the slaves are no longer being brought to our shores to serve us,” then you suffer under the judgment of God. The judgment of God says these systems are unjust. A lot of followers of Jesus and other folks don't like to talk about the judgment of God, but I will be honest, I am totally fine talking about the judgment of God when talking about destroying unjust systems and structures in the world [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: Yeah.Jonathan Walton: Like Jesus, let that come as quickly as possible. So in Amos via Martin Luther King, how most people recognize it, let justice roll down like a mighty stream. That's what we are talking about. When these systems of injustice and violence are washed away. We were not made to be exploited or to exploit other people. We were not made to dominate, destroy, rule and violate. That's not what it is. And so that's what I mean when we say we should have dissonance with this world that we are in because we were not made for this nonsense that we experience regularly.Sy Hoekstra: And then our politics should reflect that dissonance.We Should Not Be Seduced by ColonialismJonathan Walton: Yes. Our politics should reflect that dissonance, and what we should not do is be seduced by coloniality. And here's what I mean by that. Aníbal Quijano, who was a Peruvian sociologist and scholar on coloniality, talked about the seduction of European colonialism, such as that, even though you take colonialism away, we cannot imagine ourselves independent of that colonized structure being in place. And so if we look around the world, the sun never set on the British Empire in that way, there are entire people groups including Black people in the United States, who it's very difficult to imagine life outside of the stratified, segregated society that we find ourselves in.And so for me, I think when we think about our political systems, and we talked about this before on the podcast, one of the things we need a radical revolution of is imagination. Like to be able to imagine a different way of share, like mutual aid, reciprocity. Being able to say, “You know, what? What if I'm not a wage earner in a society, I am still valuable.” Sy, you've talked about this in your essays about disability. Like, what would it look like for us not to see the CEO and the kid with down syndrome as equally valuable for God, even though one of them contributes more to the GDP, like we need to lean into that. And so when we make decisions in politics, we actually need to wrestle with that dissonance as opposed to trying to impose a perfect will in an imperfect world, because it will not exist or come to pass.We Should Always Be Unsatisfied with Political Outcomes, and Be Aware We Don't Control ThemSy Hoekstra: Yeah. So I think one of the things that you and I have talked about that is basically how we will almost always be unsatisfied with the decisions and the activity that we engage in in politics.Jonathan Walton: Yes, and that is okay [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: Yeah, exactly. Right. That's part of it. You should be that way, is what we're saying.Jonathan Walton: Yes.Sy Hoekstra: You shouldn't be someone who votes wholeheartedly like, what I'm rejecting right now is people who are just like, “Yes, Trump is God's man. We're with him 100 percent. He's gonna do all the stuff we need him to do.” There isn't really a Christian equivalent to that on the left, or I would reject that as well, if anyone was saying that same thing with that same level of fervor about Kamala Harris [laughter].Jonathan Walton: Yeah.Sy Hoekstra: But well, we'll talk about how there is still some idolatry on the left, but we'll get into that nuance in a second. I just want to emphasize this point, that it's the lack of satisfaction with our votes and the lack of satisfaction with outcomes of activism isn't just what you should expect, it's reflecting a reality in a good way [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Right.Sy Hoekstra: That you are not… you know what I mean? You're always going to feel that tension because you were made to be loved and treated with justice and kindness and generosity and to do the same for others, and that is fundamentally not how our system ever works.Jonathan Walton: Exactly.Sy Hoekstra: We will know that we don't have control over the systems that we have. We should know that [laughs]. We should go into our political engagement with that in the front of our minds, that we don't control the outcomes, and we shouldn't be surprised when they don't come out exactly the way we want them to. But again, when we were talking about this, another thing you pointed out was we also don't have control over God and how God affects the outcomes that God wants to affect [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Right.Sy Hoekstra: We don't know how that's going to happen. So a political loss for us does not necessarily mean anything about God or God's plans, right?Jonathan Walton: Yes.Sy Hoekstra: So that is kind of the hopeful other side of that coin that I was just talking about. And that doesn't mean by the way, that we don't make clear decisions in certain contexts and be like, “No, this person is absolutely better than this person.” I have no problem saying that. You know what I mean? I feel like sometimes when you talk about being a citizen of the kingdom, there's a lot of like, especially White Christians, who will say that kind of means that we should never really judge anybody's choices at all [laughter], and I fully disagree with that [laughs], because in a given context, someone can be much better than somebody else. They're just not perfect.We Should Want to Make Things Better in Small Ways and Do as Little Harm as PossibleJonathan Walton: Well, the only other thing I'll say, and this actually may apply to later questions in the conversation as well. But I had a conversation, I was one of the keynote speakers for the Community Boost nonprofit leaders conference this week. And one of the speakers, she was on the panel I was moderating, her name is Jennifer Jones Austin. She's the Executive Director of the Federation of Protestant Welfare organizations in New York City.Sy Hoekstra: Gotcha.Jonathan Walton: She used to have a position in corrections in New York City as an advocate [laughs]. She said, “It is my job in this space,” holding her faith in all these things she possibly can, she said “This system is toxic, it's broken, it is terrible, and in so much as I can, I will prevent all harm that I can. And if I also could do incrementally better, then I will do that, knowing full well that this is not the kingdom of God, and I will be wholly dissatisfied with all the things, even the progress, quote- unquote, progress that I'm able to make.” And I think that is a sobering embrace of the realities of where we stand as followers of Jesus who are able to and in so far as we are willing to actually participate in the change of the systems and structures that we are in.So that's Priscilla with education. She is going to [laughs], in Jesus name, do as little harm as she possibly can and make as much progress, quote- unquote, progress as she possibly can.Sy Hoekstra: This is your wife, who's the principal of a school for people who don't know.Jonathan Walton: Yes, and I've recognized also that this is me within InterVarsity, an evangelical organization in the United States that fully participates in the system of this country. Like philanthropy is broken, giving is broken. We all know these systems will not usher in the kingdom of God. At the same time, we are called to participate and reflect the kingdom of God as best as we can. And so I think as we vote, as we enter in, as you were saying, we do not have control over the system, we do not have control over God, but we do control if we are obedient to him and faithfully wrestle with what it looks like to follow him in context. Because, as Munther Isaac, Palestinian theologian, prophet, amazing person said, a theology without context is irrelevant, and we are doing our best to live out of theology in our context.Sy Hoekstra: Both of us saw him speak last week, or I guess when you're hearing this, it'll be two weeks ago at Riverside Church, and it was incredible. And one or two of the things Jonathan has said so far, are certainly inspired by Reverend Isaac. If you look at our newsletter from the 23rd you can watch the entire talk on YouTube. It's incredible. I really suggest everyone does it. When Jonathan says he's a prophet, that's not…Jonathan Walton: Oh, I'm not joking. Yeah [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: It's not an exaggeration. It's like the word prophet is something that gets thrown around a lot, and it can be grandiose when you apply to certain people. This man fits the bill [laughter].Jonathan Walton: Yes.Why Christians Shouldn't Overemphasize Political Wins and LossesSy Hoekstra: Okay, so let's get into another point that we were talking about that I think is important when it comes to political discipleship, especially in this moment of heightened tension in the election. Which is there are so many ways that understanding yourself as a citizen of the kingdom of God makes you less likely to overemphasize political victories and losses. And you can err to one side in the way that Trump does, which is what I was talking about before, or the way that Trump supporters do, where they can say, “Trump being elected will basically be our political salvation [laughs]. We will be fine. Our power will be given back to us the way that we deserve, our enemies shall be defeated,” etcetera, etcetera.But like I also said, there are ways that the left does this and there are ways that the right does this when it's not Trump and we're not in a sort of cult of personality situation. So can you talk to us about what overemphasizing political victories and losses looks like, and why understanding the kingdom helps you avoid doing that, making that mistake?Our Hope Is Not in Political Victories or Material ProsperityJonathan Walton: Yeah, absolutely. So I think the way the right predominantly does this is using salvific language like, “We are going to save you.” And so there's this identification alliance with right wing rapture theology that says, we just need to be redeemed from the world or going back to something that is more holy, just, beautiful, righteous and good. Usually for White evangelicals, that's around 1958. 1958 was the peak of White evangelical and White American leadership and ownership of all these different things in the United States. And so that reality that many people in the current day White evangelical movement are trying to get back to. 1958 also signals what the left tries to do.1958 was the advent of the civil rights movement coming into the mainstream of the United States when Martin Luther King wrote, when White evangelicals in the United States had to contend with Martin Luther King. So Jerry Falwell writing, segregation or not, like which is it, and then doubling down on segregation. But from 1958 you can begin to see this surging of the rights of women being talked about, the rights of people of color being talked about. Then you get into quote- unquote, the sexual revolution, feminist revolution of the 70s and 80s, like music changing into a way that there's television, things to be broadcast. Folks being shocked that the people they listen to on the radio are people of color, like you start to get this change [laughs].And so what the right says is salvation, the left says is progress. And so pastors and people who push towards more progressivism and politicians who don't read in context like to pull out that piece when Martin Luther King says, the moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends towards justice. We take that out, and basically what that does is a soft baptism of generational superiority. Meaning that I'm better than the last generation, and the generation after me will be better, when scripture does not say that. Ecclesiastes says there's nothing new under the sun. There have always been people fighting against slavery, oppression, abuse and violence, and there have always been people who are trying to impose those systems, whether they be the Roman government or the American government or the Spartans or the Cretans, it doesn't matter who it is.This has always been the same argument and fight. The Nazis before, the Americans today, Israelis one day, slaveholders another day, Palestinians one day, enslaved Africans another day. The reality is this has always been going back and forth. The invitation has always been the same, to follow Jesus. That's the invitation. There isn't a like, “Man, you know what? In 1950, it was really bad.” That's what progressives would say, “But we've come a long way, and we're continuing forward, onward and upward.” And then conservatives would say, “Oh, man, you know it used to be this way. Let me go back to my little town and…” but both of those are salvation narratives that actually don't leave us saved. They don't. Jesus is the only way.They don't leave us saved, because the salvation of Jesus is ultimate and all encompassing at once. The quote- unquote, safety that moral progressivism or conservatism offers us is for a few, for moments in time. The only thing in my estimation, as an individual that has read a little bit and prayed a lot is the only thing that has been as pervasive and adopted by so many people is colonialism. The idea of White supremacy, the idea that we need to exploit and violate, the idea that we need to extract as much as possible and we deserve to accumulate at an unfettered pace, that is pervasive across cultures, backgrounds and narratives. That has been carried everywhere even more so than the gospel.And so I would hope that the salvation of all things through Christ would be as comprehensive and fierce as the salvation through works. So it's life, liberty and pursuit of property slash our own comfort equals happiness, or take up your cross, deny yourself and follow me, they are fundamentally opposed to each other.Sy Hoekstra: That was good and deep, and I love it. Let me drill down for a second on the progressivism, because I think some people would hear you say, and you've explained this a little bit, but I mean, some people hear you say, things haven't gotten better, or things took off in some fundamental and helpful way in the 60s, that that's not something that we should think of as salvation. And they might kind of go, “What does he mean by that? I don't know. That's a little…” Because I know you are saying things have gotten better.Jonathan Walton: Oh, yeah. Absolutely.Sy Hoekstra: Like, obviously, there are people who materially did a whole lot better [laughs] after the Civil Rights Movement.Jonathan Walton: Yes. Absolutely. Right.Sy Hoekstra: But what you are saying is, when you are clear-eyed about the amount of harm that the hierarchies and systems of oppression do in this country globally, there are so many things to be concerned about and so many things to deeply lament that the true and good and incredible thing that Black people can vote now [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Yes, me and you can have this conversation [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: Yeah, all those kinds of things. Those things are incredible and should be celebrated, and there are just so many other things that are so wrong and terrible.Jonathan Walton: Yeah.Sy Hoekstra: You're just being clear-eyed about the world as it is.Jonathan Walton: Right.Sy Hoekstra: Because you can do that, because you're not looking toward a narrative of progressivism to assure you that you are okay.Jonathan Walton: Yes. Yes. The fundamental container that you and I find ourselves in has improved. That's true.Sy Hoekstra: You and I, like meaning literally you and I.Jonathan Walton: Yeah, me and you. Literally, Sy Hoekstra and Jonathan Walton, the container that we find ourselves in has improved since the lives of our parents. My momma was not born with all of her rights, I was born with all of mine, to an extent in this country. That container has gotten better. The container is still on this side of heaven, which means it's incomplete.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah.Jonathan Walton: So can I celebrate, and I do celebrate, the reality that I could go to a bank and get a mortgage and it would be illegal if they discriminated against me and my wife for being people of color, that is awesome. I can celebrate the fact that my wife can get a credit card in her own name, and my daughters will be able to as well. That was something that was illegal. go look it up. I appreciate that. At the same time, let me not be seduced to think that this is the container I was made for because I wasn't. I was made for Genesis 1.Sy Hoekstra: Or seduced into a kind of softer, subtler idolatry of America.Jonathan Walton: Yeah.Sy Hoekstra: Or the West, or the societies that we live in, or wealth, or whatever it is that you think has made things more comfortable for you.Jonathan Walton: Yes.Good Political Fruit that Comes with Putting Hope in JesusSy Hoekstra: The reason I spent so much time on that is it's a complicated idea, but I think it's important for people to understand, because it really does free you from the problems that inevitably come when you sort of think, let's say Harris gets elected. We're just like, “Oh, good. We staved off Trump, we beat back fascism. We defeated it, hooray.” [laughs] It stops you from looking at the long history of America and saying no, fascism, authoritarianism, like real oppression of people is a normal part of the DNA of this country, and will continue to come back, and we need to continue to be ready to fight it all the time.Jonathan Walton: Right.Sy Hoekstra: It does not ever go away, and if you want to sit in comfort and say, “Good, we finally did it,” or “I can rest now,” you can't. You're being seduced into something that is not true [laughter]. And also, being clear-eyed in this way also stops you from doing something that people complain about progressives doing all the time, which is show up to your door every four years or every two years, and ask for your vote, and then not do anything to actually fight the oppression that you're under on a daily basis once they're elected [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Yes.Sy Hoekstra: If you're clear-eyed in this way, you can fight for people's flourishing 365 days a year…Jonathan Walton: Yes.Sy Hoekstra: …and every year. What I'm just doing now is talking about some of the good fruit that comes from letting go of these sort of soft political idols that sometimes people have. Because, I think… And the reason I say soft political idols, they're just political idols, but I think people look at the obviousness and the brazenness of the way that people idolize Trump and Christian power in America, and they think, “I'm not doing that in any similar way,” and a lot of us actually are.Jonathan Walton: Right.Sy Hoekstra: So that's why I'm harping on this.Jonathan Walton: Yeah. And two sentences that I hope will help people as well, is that the reason we're saying this too is because what will drive you is actually hope in the right stuff, as opposed to ending up with putting, literally, for me, like my hope in Obama. I remember the posters, like I was excited.Sy Hoekstra: Do you remember that music video?Jonathan Walton: Which one? There were many.Sy Hoekstra: The “Yes We Can” music video.Jonathan Walton: Oh, yes, yes, yes. I do remember that.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah [laughs]. I remember that in particular, I remember you being so excited and emotional about that video, and then later coming back to me and being like, “I should not have cared about that video that much,” [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Right. But man, it is attractive. Like Lil Jon at the DNC right now is there to seduce a certain group of people [Sy laughs]. And Kid Rock is just, let's swap out Kid Rock. Kid Rock was at the RNC. We have to engage, like you said, clear-eyed, so we know what to put our hope in. Because the gospel is a hope that does not disappoint.What Is God's Good News about Politics, and How Can We Apply It to Our Lives?Sy Hoekstra: Amen to that, Jonathan [Jonathan laughs]. But let's talk about the hope that does not disappoint, because I think the stuff that we've been talking about, if you just stopped there would be a little bit, I don't know, it can be a little bit depressing. If you don't already have this perspective [laughs] it's like, it can be hard.Jonathan Walton: Yeah.Sy Hoekstra: It can be hard to deal with being clear-eyed about the brokenness of the world, it's not an easy thing to do [Jonathan laughs]. So let's talk about what actually is the good news about politics that you are trying to get people to see through, through these Bible studies and through this kind of work that you're doing.Question Your Assumptions, and Understand the Connectedness of All PeopleJonathan Walton: Yeah. I mean to what you just said, if we are clear-eyed about the brokenness of the world, I would love for us to be as clear-eyed about the bigness of the gospel of Jesus Christ. I don't think our concept of sin and our concept of redemption is actually mature enough to deal with the problems of the world. And so I think that one, the first session is just what are our starting points? Most of us have been cultured into political discipleship, we've never actually consciously thought about it. And so that's the first part, just where are our starting points? Then we get into the reality that the theology of the kingdom of God, and the theology that we are all made in God's image is a political reality.If I believe that I am made in the image of God, and every single person around me is made in the image of God, then that has political implications, because my flourishing and their suffering, or my suffering and their flourishing, they are actually intertwined. If I actually live out that theology, when they bleed, I bleed, when I bleed, they bleed. That's why the command to mourn with those who mourn is not, it shouldn't be far off, because I'm mourning my own human family, or I'm rejoicing with my own human family. And so that first study gets into that, and then we have, each study has a real-life story, and each study has a testimony about how these things have been applied or wrestled with in the current day.Making Informed Decisions about Whether We Want to Seek God's LiberationAnd so when we get into the choices that the Israelites made in Samuel, they wanted a king. Wrestling with that, oh snap, the Israelites literally said to the Prophet Samuel, we want to be like everybody else.Sy Hoekstra: And sorry, just really quickly for people who are unfamiliar, there's a moment in the book of 2 Samuel, I think, where Israel goes from saying, “We don't want to just be this people of God who kind of live in this promised land and follow these instructions that God gave us, we want to have a king,” which was not part of like God's plan for their society, “The way that all the societies around us have a king, so that we can have kind of similar power and influence the way that they do.”Jonathan Walton: Exactly. And so when Samuel responds, he says, “Your king will be exploitative. Your king will violate. Your king will take your kids. Your king will do all these things.” And they say, “Yes, sign us up.” And so we need to have conversations about what will actually happen when we say, “Yes, we do want this,” instead of what God intends. And then make concrete decisions about, do we actually want that, and what are the implications? And then if we do decide to follow Jesus, then what does he do and what is his response. When Jesus shows up and says, “I am the Messiah,” out of Isaiah, chapter 61 pulled into Luke chapter 4, the initial sermon is, “I have come to set the oppressed free, proclaim sight to the blind, proclaim freedom for the captives.”He did not say, “I have come to convert you to a certain political ideology, a certain political party or platform.” He didn't say that because he literally says, the kingdom of God is not of this world. And so how do we see that as good news as followers of Jesus? And do we see that as good news in the context we're in today? And then finally, if we do see that as good news, how do we partner with God to actually participate as followers of Jesus in seeking the shalom of all the people around us? Because we do live as followers of Jesus in exile. Now, we are different from the Israelites because, friends, we are not disempowered as Americans.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah.Jonathan Walton: I have an American passport, which puts me in a fundamentally different political bracket than my brothers and sisters who are undocumented, than my human family that suffers under drone strikes. It's different. But at the same time, I can hold fast to the reality that how can I steward my power, my influence, my resources, towards the flourishing of all people, not just myself, which is resisting the gospel of Babylon. And so we have, one of my favorite people in the world is Connie Anderson, and she talks about how she was one of those White women in a midwestern state who had no idea who she was voting for and why. But then she goes to a board meeting at the invitation of someone to really get involved in local politics, and she realized the person that she was voting for had dementia, and he was on the city council voting for things, arguing for it in one minute, and then some time would pass, arguing against it in another minute.And then when someone said, “Hey, didn't you just say the opposite?” Then shout at them, “Don't try to tell me what I think.” And she said, “The only reason I voted for this person was because I recognized their name.” And she began to get involved, and now she leads workshops on anti-racism, trying to help White people do the work of deconstruction, not deconstruction of their faith, but a deconstruction of the White supremacy in their lives and how they can partner with God towards more redemptive things. And she is doing the good hard work of politics, and not politics from a lens of this world would be better if we get the right person in power, but this world will be better and transformative when Jesus is in power.And so how do I partner with him to reflect his kingdom in the system and structures that I have influence and power over? And besides a lot of the work that we do with KTF, this is probably the thing with InterVarsity that I am most proud of. So I sincerely hope that folks will grab it.We Need to Revolutionize Our ImaginationSy Hoekstra: Absolutely. Go check it out. Thank you for sharing the wisdom from it. And I especially want to emphasize what you said about, what did you say about our imagination? You said change or, the verb I can't remember [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Oh, bring a revolution in our imagination [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: Yeah, there you go. That's what you said. I knew it was good [Jonathan laughs]. That is something that I am particularly passionate about, and kind of dovetails into why I spend so much time reading speculative fiction, like sci-fi and fantasy and everything [laughs], because… and thinking about how the people who write those books affect the worlds that we imagine too. That may seem like a weird, random turn into another subject to some people, but it is the way that I exercise my imagination, and I find a lot of the way that God talks to me in that work [laughs]. Like in the ways that I think about how we can imagine really different worlds and other stories that we don't see here now.Jonathan Walton: Yes.Sy Hoekstra: That to me, is extremely important, and I know that there have to be at least some of you who feel that way too.Jonathan Walton: Amen.Sy Hoekstra: So [laughs] I know there are some avid fiction readers out there. Jonathan, we have a segment to get into.Which Tab Is Still Open? Israel's Horrifying Treatment of Palestinian DetaineesJonathan Walton: Yes. Yes, we've talked a lot, and we are still talking as we're going to get into our segment, Which Tab Is Still Open, because this is something we're still talking about 10 months later, 76 years later, where we dive a little deeper into one of the recommendations from our newsletter. So Sy, this one is yours, so tell us a little bit about it.Sy Hoekstra: It is mine, although I think I maybe originally got it from you. This is something that we have both been thinking and talking about a lot, so I will just summarize the story very quickly, and then we'll both talk about it for a while. So we're gonna be back on Israel and Palestine. Now, listen everything we just talked about is gonna affect this conversation that we're having now [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Yep.Sy Hoekstra: But there have been some horrible whistleblower stories, and I will not get into the details. So hopefully we're avoiding the need for a content warning here. But some horrible whistleblower stories about some things going on, I believe you pronounce it, the Sde Teiman detention center in Israel, which is where basically they're keeping a lot of known or suspected Hamas operatives who attacked on October 7. The allegations are about basically physical and sexual torture, and that's all the detail that I will get into, being regularized and just a part of the culture at this particular detention center. So recently, after a lot of these reports, there were 10 IDF soldiers who were charged by military courts, or nine soldiers and one reservist who were charged by military courts with perpetrating one of these acts of violence.And what followed is something that's a little bit unimaginable to me, until I think about January 6th, which was a series of riots at this detention center of people literally trying to just charge into the detention center and take the IDF soldiers who have been charged and put in detention themselves, and just kidnap them out of the place, just like free them. And these rioters, there were a couple hundred of them. A lot of them were just regular people living in the area. But some of them were actual government administrative workers and some of them, a couple of them were actual members of the Israeli parliament who participated in this riot, and they did not succeed. Like the soldiers are still there.Two of them were let go eventually, meaning, the charges were dropped. Eight of them, the military is actually pursuing the charges against them. There has not been any punishment for any of these rioters [laughs]. Nothing's happened to them. There's been no legal consequences. There was another riot and another base, same thing, no real consequences. I was trying to see if maybe just like the American media wasn't reporting on it, but I used multiple large language models [laughter] to look into whether there were any stories about these rioters and what consequences they face, and it's really been nothing. The members of parliament are still just sitting in parliament.Some people who are not in the government, who are in the opposition parties have called for investigations, but nothing has happened. There were many statements made by different far-right government members of parliament that were in support of the rioters. One person in Benjamin Netanyahu's party, basically stood up in Parliament and said, “I do not care what these soldiers did to Hamas operatives, because anything done to Hamas operatives is legitimate, in my view.” Like there's just no limits. When we say that there's an apartheid in Israel, this highlights kind of what we're talking about, because there is sort of within Israel proper, there is, you can still make some arguments about this, but there is a lot of democratic representation and rights for people who live there.And then in the West Bank, since 1967 there's basically been martial law where a general is in charge and makes all the decisions on behalf of people who live there, with the exception of the Jewish settlers who live there, who still have all the rights, as though they lived in Israel proper. And so there's this kind of weird thing going on where even though this base is in Israel, it is under the jurisdiction of the military. So it's this kind of martial law, I don't know, running into Israel's law in a sort of way that's highlighting some divisions in Israel. Because obviously, there are a lot of people within Israel who are very concerned that this has happened, and that people are going completely unaccountable for it.I mean, some people are literally talking about, I don't think this is a mainstream idea, but there's some people talking about, what if a civil war breaks out in Israel, because there are people who are so against what has happened, but the ruling government coalition is just so in favor of continuing the war at all costs, they're now starting to fight with Lebanon. They may start to fight with Iran. So anyways, those are the basics of the story. Jonathan, what are your thoughts [laughs]?Privilege Marginalized Voices in Your Media So You Don't End UP Believing FalsehoodsJonathan Walton: If you are listening, you've made it this far in the podcast and all those things, I hope you would privilege Palestinian voices and the voices of Jewish activists in your media diet, so that you are not persuaded towards believing what is not true. The reality is Israel, not the people, but the state, is a settler colonial project, and much of this I'm gonna repeat from Munther and other people that I have learned from because I am now trying to privilege their voices. I remember, and I've said this on podcast before, my RA when I was 18 years old, who lived in the West Bank, arguing with a Zionist Jewish young man who lives in Brooklyn and had never been to the West Bank about what it looks like.So you're watching someone from a lived reality argue with someone downstream of propaganda. And so the exact same thing could be true of someone who lives in a segregated Black neighborhood trying to explain how law enforcement works to someone who has never actually dealt with law enforcement in the United States, or a man who is having a conversation with a woman about what it's like to have her rape kit submitted and then it never be tested or run or anything. So just trying to bring things home a little bit in that we have to prioritize the voices of marginalized people in these conversations.Now, that is true all the time, particularly when there is no media or video. And in this particular case, there is video of all of this, similar to George Floyd, similar to Sonya Massey in the United States, there's video of this terrible perpetration of sexual violence, and there's video of the soldiers guarding this action so that people don't see it from the cameras and that it continues to happen, which is why these soldiers were quote unquote, arrested in the first place.What Would It Take for Americans to Wake Up to the Reality of This Suffering?Jonathan Walton: Now, my final thought around this is, which really a question, is like I wonder how desensitized we have become to the suffering of others and made it normal for these types of things to happen. And I wonder what it would take, in Jesus name I pray it is not violence.But I wonder what it would take for us to be awakened to actually do something about it as American citizens, because it is our tax dollars, our money, it's all of us that are funding that. And so those are my thoughts as I consider this, because there's a population of people that is further desensitized running into a population of people as being further radicalized because they are seeing more and more images and media come across their feeds. And my longing and hope is that there would be an awareness of the people who have been so desensitized and propagandized of the pain and suffering of the people who are experiencing deep harm, so that there can be some sort of reconciliation and just peace and a ceasefire and all those things before, not because of a war. That's my prayer.And so, yeah, as I am, [laughs] I'm gonna in Jesus name, be at Hunter College, be at Brown, be at MIT, be in Florida this fall, I'm gonna be talking about that. Having conversations, encouraging people to advocate so that there is a lesser chance of violence. Sy, that was a lot for me [laughs]. What are you thinking and feeling?Dehumanization Always Leads to Horrifying Violence, and Turns Oppressors into MonstersSy Hoekstra: That was very good. The thing that is so frustrating to me is how incredibly predictable this was.Jonathan Walton: Yeah. Right.Sy Hoekstra: From the moment October 7th happened, they said, “This is our 911” Okay, This is your Abu Ghraib. This is your Guantanamo. Like we cannot expect to react the exact same way to an attack and not have this happen again. You can't expect to have the same dehumanization and racism against Arabs and not have this happening again. I don't know. It's just so frustrating to me, having grown up with the War on Terror, and just feeling like I'm watching it all over again. And just like it was in America, there's a lot of people in Israeli society who think this is all fine and totally support it.Jonathan Walton: Right.Sy Hoekstra: And we may have done it in a little bit more of a buttoned up way. We might have done it with some lawyers making questionable interpretations of international humanitarian norms or whatever. We might have put the stamp of approval on it of some more powerful forces than they have available to them in Israel, but they're doing the same thing that we were doing. The thing that we need to come away from this is knowing that your dehumanization of other people has real life consequences, and the consequences are both for the victims who experienced horrific things and for the victimizers. Because one of the whistleblowers, when they were talking to CNN, the CNN reporter who doesn't believe this himself, and he put to the soldier, “A lot of people in Israel would say, well, Hamas does way worse than this to our captives. So what's the problem?” And he said, “Hamas is not your bar.” It's like, fine, if you want to be a terrorist organization, go ahead, be a terrorist organization. But you have to recognize that that's the moral decision you're making. You are not better than them, if this is what you are willing to do to them. And your dehumanization of other people at some point will turn you into a monster, is what I'm saying.Jonathan Walton: Right.Sy Hoekstra: And I just, I don't know [laughs]. I'm mad about it because of the horrifying consequences that it has on individual people, so it's a little bit visceral for me, but it is just so frustrating to watch all these things happen all over again and with our same stamp of approval.Jonathan Walton: Yes.Sy Hoekstra: And if you want an example of why electing Kamala Harris will not be a victory for all things good and moral, it is because this sort of thing will continue.Jonathan Walton: Yeah.The Church Is Complicit in This TerrorSy Hoekstra: Another thing from Reverend Isaac last week was he really did a good job of emphasizing how complicit in all this the church is. Emphasizing points like, Christian Zionism actually predates Jewish Zionism, and there are actually way more Christian Zionists in the world than there are Jewish Zionists, just the raw numbers.Jonathan Walton: Yep.Sy Hoekstra: And our support of that theology, our creation of that theology, our failure to fight it at every turn, that is what makes us just wholly complicit in what is happening over there. And Jonathan literally, here's the last note that I wrote in our outline: “Hopefully Jonathan has something uplifting to say before we end” [laughter], because I'll be real, I'm not thinking of it right now.Followers of Jesus need to Focus on Doing Small Advocacy out of Deep Love for OthersJonathan Walton: Yeah. So God's good news about politics is what we're talking about. We are talking about the allocation, distribution of resources, and how people have decided to govern ourselves, and what has happened in the United States, if we're just gonna hang out in the container that we're in, that in the United States we have decided with billions of dollars of our tax dollars, that we are going to build, then send, then advise the genocide of another group of people. I do not want the voting and advocacy and time and work that I do to be perpetrating that or be complicit in that. I might be involved because I have no choice not being overruled, but I will not be unopposed or complacent.And so as followers of Jesus, I think we have two options, and Peter did this really, really well. Peter was suffering under the oppression of the Jewish people, just like Jesus was, and Jesus' family and Jesus' friends and all the disciples as they were being occupied by Romans. And Peter thought he was doing the absolute just right, good thing in carrying a knife all the time, so that when Jesus got arrested, he pulled out his sword and chopped off the dude's ear. And this is John 18, the scene when Jesus was arrested. Jesus then picks up dude's ear, puts it back on his head, tells Peter to fall back. And Peter had two options. Peter could have said, “You know what, this sucks. I'm just not gonna do this anymore. Jesus, you're wrong.”He could have done that. He could have said, “You're presenting me with this gospel of hope in the world that is to come, not the world that is right now.” And he could have said, “I'm just going to give up, or I'm going to… look Simon the Zealot, we listen to this dude talk. It's time to start this.” He could have done that, but instead, eventually he got to, “I'm actually going to be the rock of this Church that Jesus said I was going to be,” which is why you and me and so many people listening to this podcast, have decided to follow this man who happens to be God named Jesus, who 12 ordinary men and a bunch of women that we did not name because they too are from a patriarchal society, we know a few of them, like Mary and Mary Magdalene and Dorcas and Phoebe, who decided to say yes, and thousands of years later, we're still talking about them.And so my hope would be that we as followers of Jesus, would say, “Hey, you know what? What small group of people can we do a little bit of revolutionary actions out of a deep, deep love for so that many, many, many years from now, people are still choosing love over fear and violence.”Sy Hoekstra: There we go, Jonathan. I knew you had it. I knew you had it in you [Jonathan laughs]. But I appreciate that, because when I say uplifting, that feels like something I can resonate with even while I'm looking at the horrifying nature of what I'm looking at. That feels like something where you're not sugarcoating it.Jonathan Walton: Yeah, right.Sy Hoekstra: And that's what I appreciate, and that's what I meant by uplifting. I don't want us just to end on a happy note, because you're Christian and you have to or whatever [laughter].Jonathan Walton: Amen, amen.Sy Hoekstra: So thank you so much for all this work that you're doing trying to create those small communities where people love and do good things. We did a lot of work and tried very hard to do it when we were in college, and I appreciate that you're still trying to get people to do the same thing as they go through that time in their lives.Jonathan Walton: Amen.Prayers and Support for Protesting Students Returning to CampusSy Hoekstra: And you and I will be absolutely praying for and supporting in any way that we can the students as they come back to campus and continue to, again as Munther Isaac said, lead the way in ways that the church has been so afraid to do and so unwilling to do.Jonathan Walton: Yeah, exactly.Sy Hoekstra: If you're listening to this, and you're about to go on to a campus [laughs], or you're already on a campus, we are praying for you, and we absolutely cannot imagine, I don't know, just the uncertainty and the strangeness of what you're doing, but we so appreciate it that you are doing it. And if you're not, and you're just choosing to support people in other ways, because there are many reasons to make that decision, then more power to you as well.Outro and OuttakeSy Hoekstra: Okay. We are going to end there. Jonathan, thank you so much. This was a great conversation. I'm really glad that we got to do it. We'll have those Bible studies that Jonathan created in the show notes.Our theme song is “Citizens” by Jon Guerra. Our podcast art is by Robyn Burgess. Editing by multitude productions. Transcriptions by Joyce Ambale. Production of the show, by me and all of our lovely paid subscribers. Please remember, go to KTFPress.com and become a paid subscriber. Get the bonus episodes of this show, as well as access to the monthly Zoom conversations. When you're listening to this we will just have had one, so be sure to sign up for the next one coming in September. Thank you all so much for listening, and we will see you all in two weeks.Jonathan Walton: Bye.[The song “Citizens” by Jon Guerra fades in. Lyrics: “I need to know there is justice/ That it will roll in abundance/ And that you're building a city/ Where we arrive as immigrants/ And you call us citizens/ And you welcome us as children home.” The song fades out.]Jonathan Walton: We are close to the camera. We are ready to go.Sy Hoekstra: Oh, yeah. By the way my camera, I tried so many different things to make it work here in Canada, and there's just nothing to be done.Jonathan Walton: I understand.Sy Hoekstra: So highlight reels from this episode will come from Jonathan Walton [laughs].Jonathan Walton: No worries, yes.Sy Hoekstra: Just make sure everything you say, you look really cool saying it.Jonathan Walton: I do look really great [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: Hey, I'm glad you know that about yourself, Jonathan, I cannot confirm [Jonathan laughs]. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.ktfpress.com/subscribe

This is my 100th episode!! Thank you so much for listening and being along for the ride.Today I wanted to talk about one of my favorite subjects: God. How we speak about God.How we receive God.How we love God.How we live God out in our lives.And the powerful reminder of God's word - that we were not born with or given the spirit of fear, but of power, and of love, and of sound mind.Who and what is God for you? Thanks for listening! Follow leah on IG, FB & TK @leahthemodernsage for more!

Pastor: Jordan Hansen Series: Priority Mail (8) Title: 1 Thessalonians, What Is God's Will For My Life? Date: 2024.07.20+21 --------------------- Online Form - https://forms.office.com/r/MERhx5yuNc --------------------- CHAPTERS: 00:00 - Teaser 00:36 - Series 01:18 - Sermon 06:21 - Point 1 11:26 - Point 2 17:46 - Celebrate Recovery 18:57 - Point 3 24:27 - Point 4 31:23 - Conclusion 32:08 - Online Form (1) 32:26 - Prayer & Fasting 32:49 - Online Form (2) 36:36 - Closing --------------------- LINKS: Mid-Year Meal Pack - July 26, 6 - 9 pm. One day, one shift, one pack, unlimited impact! Get the details for all the jobs and register for this serving opportunity here: https://www.clcdayton.com/mymp. Worship and Production Open House - August 4. For more information and to register visit https://myclc.org/Worship-OpenHouse. All-Church Prayer and Fasting - August 8 - 28. Prayer services, August 14, 21, and 28, 6 - 7 pm. CLC will be open for prayer during office hours, Monday - Thursday, 8 am - 5 pm and Friday, 8 am - 12 pm. ---------------------

GOD AND COUNTRY DAY; What Is God's Purpose Of Government? Explore the divine plan behind earthly governance, seeking to understand how God's principles guide our leaders and shape our communities. Discover the biblical foundations of government, the role of justice and mercy, and how we, as believers, can engage with and influence the world around us. Don't miss this enlightening discussion that promises to deepen your faith and expand your perspective on the intersection of spirituality and civic responsibility.

Tom Montalk is a truth seeker on a quest to expose the dark and empower the light. His primary goal is to help others arm themselves with knowledge to better fulfill their evolutionary potential. After studying physics and electrical engineering for four years, he left college to pursue more independent research. In this episode, we talk about the matrix, nature of reality, reincarnation, journey of the soul, Demiurge, transcending ego, aliens who rule over us, scalar physics, the purpose of the spirit in the matrix and more. Recorded January 27, 2024 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelabyrinth.podcast/ Podcaster: Pratham Padav | Telegram: Projectionist Guest: Tom Montalk | Website: https://montalk.net/ | YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TomMontalk | Twitter: https://twitter.com/TomMontalk Chapters: 0:00 Intro 1:26 What Is The Matrix (Nature of Reality)? 10:45 Why Was The Matrix Constructed? 15:34 Our Purpose In The Matrix 17:58 Reincarnation & Nihilism 23:23 Manifestation 31:40 Transcending Ego 41:18 Alien Encounter 47:27 Aliens Vs Demons 56:48 Physical, Etheric & Astral 1:02:41 Alien Agenda 1:16:20 Can Humans Defeat Evil Aliens? 1:23:11 What Is The Black Sun or Logos or Thought Center? 1:27:24 Predictions For 2024 & Beyond 1:33:38 Trump, Biden, Vivek, RFK Jr., Nikki Haley 1:43:13 Who Was Jeffrey Epstein? 1:44:08 Scalar Physics 1:45:30 What Is God?

A new MP3 sermon from Pastor Nick Holden is now available on SermonAudio with the following details: Title: What Is God’s Currency? Subtitle: Psalms Speaker: Nick Holden Broadcaster: Pastor Nick Holden Event: Midweek Service Date: 4/25/2024 Bible: Psalm 78; Psalm 75 Length: 20 min.

A new MP3 sermon from Pastor Nick Holden is now available on SermonAudio with the following details: Title: What Is God’s Currency? Subtitle: Psalms Speaker: Nick Holden Broadcaster: Pastor Nick Holden Event: Midweek Service Date: 4/25/2024 Bible: Psalm 78; Psalm 75 Length: 20 min.

A new MP3 sermon from Pastor Nick Holden is now available on SermonAudio with the following details: Title: What Is God’s Currency? Subtitle: Psalms Speaker: Nick Holden Broadcaster: Pastor Nick Holden Event: Midweek Service Date: 4/25/2024 Bible: Psalm 78; Psalm 75 Length: 20 min.

What Is God's Big Deal With Sex? It's my body. Can't I do with it whatever I want? Pastor Geoff Bradford preaches on these questions and looks at "normal vs. natural" behavior as relates to our bodies with in the body of Christ.

1 Peter 2:4-10 9 Pray then like this:“Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.Your kingdom come, your will be done,     on earth as it is in heaven.Give us this day our daily bread,and forgive us our debts,     as we also have forgiven our debtors.And lead us not into temptation,     but deliver us from evil.Matthew 6:9-1320 For the kingdom of God does not consist in talk but in power.1 Corinthians 4:20I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.Galatians 2:20 We will never see what God wants until we die to what we want.What Needs To Change?What Is God's Kingdom?How does God expand His Kingdom?How do We expand His Kingdom? But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.Matthew 6:33Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world.”John 18:36For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.Romans 14:17But if it is by the Spirit of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.Matthew 12:28Heal the sick in it and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.'Luke 10:9“Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”Matthew 3:2“Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.Matthew 5:10The Lord has established his throne in the heavens, and his kingdom rules over all.Psalm 103:19Being asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, he answered them, “The kingdom of God is not coming in ways that can be observed, 21 nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!' or ‘There!' for behold, the kingdom of God is in the midst of you.”[h]Luke 17:20-21 This was not a mystical revelation by Jesus that in some seed form, the Kingdom of God is within everyone in a New Age sense. After all, Jesus would not have told Pharisees that the kingdom of God was within them. The statement of Jesus called attention to Himself, not to man. Like many today, the Pharisees said they wanted the Kingdom of God to come; but you can't want the Kingdom and reject the King.David GuzikPeople often wonder, “What is the Kingdom of God?” Some have devoted their entire lives to the topic. Theirwork has been informative and helpful, but to make this really simple—the Kingdom of God is Jesus Christ.Michael KoulianosThe Kingdom of God is Jesus and wherever his rule and reign is, there is the Kingdom.In Christ, there is a true priesthood of all believers. All of us who trust in Jesus alone for salvation have free access into His presence, and all of our lawful vocations are set apart for true God-honoring service. The janitor who does his work to the Lord is in no worse position spiritually than the most gifted preacher on the planet, for all Christians have been declared righteous servants of the creator God.Ligonier MinistriesChurches are not the kingdom of God, but are primary and inevitable expressions, outposts, and instruments of the presence of the kingdom among us.Dallas WillardHOW DOES GOD EXPAND HIS KINGDOM?For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.Romans 14:179 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.1 Peter 2:9Prophets, Priests, KingsProphets: people who shared God's knowledge; spoke for HimGod used prophets to fix a knowledge problem.Priests: people who stewarded God's presence; ministered to Him.God used priests to fix a sin problem.Kings: people who stewarded God's people/nation; led like HimIn the Garden of Eden, Adam was a “prophet” in that he had true knowledge of God and always spoke truthfully about God and about His creation. He was a “priest” in that he was able freely and openly to offer prayer and praise to God. Adam and Eve were also “Kings” in the sense of having been given dominion and rule over the creation.Wayne Grudem JESUS FIXES OUR KNOWLEDGE PROBLEM (Prophet)15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. Colossians 1:158 Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.” 9 Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. John 14:8-9JESUS FIXES OUR NEARNESS PROBLEM (Priest)11 And every priest stands daily at his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. 12 But when Christ[b] had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, 13 waiting from that time until his enemies should be made a footstool for his feet. 14 For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.Hebrews 10:11-14 JESUS FIXES OUR LEADERSHIP PROBLEM (King)11 I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12 He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. 13 He flees because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep. 14 I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, 15 just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep. 16 And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. John 10:11-16HOW DOES WE EXPAND HIS ...

What Is God's Solution for Codependency? Listen to the podcast or watch on YouTube. In a world that teaches us to depend on sources other than God, it's easy to become codependent and lose our identity. I know this… I've been there.  At Treasured Ministries, we're on a mission to help women conquer codependency God's […] The post Godly Girl Power appeared first on Treasured Ministries.

André Duqum is the host of the Know Thyself podcast. In this episode, we talk about André's gifts, how he helped someone expand in freedom, God, peace & war balance, love, podcasting with purpose, and much more. 0:00 Intro 1:10 Reflecting On 18-Year-Old André's 4:31 “Pattern Interrupt” People 10:49 How To Become More Present 13:13 4 Stages Of Competence 15:21 How Was André So Good From Episode 2? 16:31 André's Gifts 18:02 Light And Dark 20:21 Andre's Relationship With Dad 26:02 Where Is André Not Free? 27:51 Bringing Awareness 32:10 What Is God? 33:33 “True Inner Freedom” 35:12 Powerful Example 39:19 “The Goal Is Not To Be Good At Meditation” 42:04 What About The Problems? 44:44 Peace & War Balance 45:33 Most Important Practices With Phone 49:35 You Are The Light 51:11 Love 52:33 What's André's Most Common Negative Thought? 54:02 Podcasting With Purpose 1:05:12 What's André's Pain? 1:06:42 André's Expansion 1:12:49 Challenge André's Links YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@AndreDuqum Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/andreduqum Podcasting: https://www.podcastpurpose.com/ My Links

What Is God’s Plan For Israel? LIVE Q&A for October 19, 2023 https://storage.googleapis.com/enduring-word-media/q-and-a/10192023.mp3 The post What Is God's Plan For Israel? LIVE Q&A for October 19, 2023 appeared first on Enduring Word. https://enduringword.com/what-is-gods-plan-for-israel-live-qa-for-october-19-2023/feed/ 0

[00:30] Biden's Pathetic Interview About Gaza Highlights U.S. Weakness (43 minutes) This weekend, 60 Minutes host Scott Pelley interviewed Joe Biden about the war in Gaza. Pelley spoke for Biden throughout the interview, explaining the fake president's brief yes or no answers and describing his talking points for him. The death toll from Hamas's October 7 invasion of Israel is rising as the injured die and more charred bodies are identified. At least 150 hostages remain in captivity in Gaza, including Americans—but the U.S. government is doing nothing to rescue them. Meanwhile, anti-Israel and pro-Palestinian protests around the world show that Jew hatred is not limited to Hamas terrorists. [43:30] Who and What Is God? (12 minutes) The first chapter of Herbert W. Armstrong's seminal work, Mystery of the Ages, answers the fundamental question, “Who and what is God?” This question is the most important of all.

In this episode you'll discover HOW to discern between all the noise and different things in our lives to see WHAT IS GOD'S direction, and what is NOT for our lives. Knowing the difference will help you move forward in the best ways for your life. GO FOLLOW US AT OUR NEW YouTube CHANNEL by clicking this link: https://www.youtube.com/@the-drop-podcast  

Have you experienced the glory of God? ABOUT THE MESSAGEWith so many ideas of who God is floating around our society, it is vitally important to have a strong understanding of who it is that we follow and worship. The word “god” is very broad and vague, but our God has a name that sets Him apart from all others that may claim to be “gods”. In this message, Pastor Mark Stermer breaks down the name that God gave for us to call Him and all that it means. He also explores scripture for what God says about His true nature. Knowing this truth of who God is will influence all other areas of your life and is the very foundation to stand upon! ABOUT JESUSIf you want to learn more about who Jesus is and what it means to have a relationship with Him, we would love to help you on that journey:https://www.thechurch.fm/jesusFor a deeper dive into The Word of God on a daily basis check out our Free Ancient Paths Daily Devotional: https://www.thechurch.fm/ancient-paths WHO WE AREWe believe that the goal of every Christian is To Be Conformed Into the Image of Jesus Christ, and a relationship with Jesus as well as being involved in a healthy church community are both important to achieving that goal. Find out more about who we are and all that we do at https://www.thechurch.fm/about.   We would love to meet you in person! Find our locations and service times here https://www.thechurch.fm/campuses and download our smartphone app here https://pushpay.com/get?handle=saintamantcampus&source=external to access video content, daily devotionals, updates on what is going on at The Church, and so much more.  To get connected here at The Church International simply visit us here https://www.thechurch.fm/connect-track and we will walk you through all of the life giving opportunities that we have to connect with you and your family.  We want to give a special thanks to everyone who donates to what God is doing through this ministry. If you would like to partner with us through generosity and giving you can do so at https://www.thechurch.fm/give-online. SOCIAL MEDIAThe Church International:Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thechurchinter/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thechurchinternational/Website: https://www.TheChurch.FM Pastor Mark:Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MarkAStermerInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/mark_stermer/ Pastor Cindy:Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cindy.stermer.9Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cindy_stermer/  MESSAGE BREAKDOWN00:00 Introduction03:29 Who Is God?03:41 He Was And Is07:56 One True God09:27 What Is God's Name?10:22 YHWH13:49 The Bible Project Video17:49 The Root Meaning20:44 Core Of Who God Is33:36 Worship & Prayer

In this episode, the crew takes on the question of "What is God?" and Jason interviews bestselling author, Keith Giles!You can follow Keith on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.You can find his incredible new book, Sola Deus, here.Be sure to check out his Square One course for those who are deconstructing their faith. Messy Spirituality listeners get an 80% discount by using promo code:  MESSY.Follow the crew:You can find Lola on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTokYou can find Kyle on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok.You can find Jason on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter (because he's way too old for TikTok).Be sure to check out our Youtube channel.Also, please join the conversation over on our Messy Conversations group on FB!Thanks for listening! Please leave us a rating or review and subscribe or follow the show on your platform of choice! Connect with the crew:You can find Lola on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTokYou can find Kyle on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok.You can find Jason on Facebook, Instagram, and Threads (because he's way too old for TikTok).Be sure to check out our Youtube channel.Also, please join the conversation over on our Messy Conversations group on FB!Thanks for listening! Please leave us a rating or review and subscribe or follow the show on your platform of choice!

If you appreciate this work, consider supporting it - https://www.patreon.com/seekgodtogether https://www.seekGodtogether.com Today is the first installment of several in Colossians 1. Verses 15-20 are a soaring song about Jesus. You can read it for yourself but today we'll read verse 15 which says, “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.” What does God look like? What IS God like and what does He do? Is there a question more important? You can spend your entire life building your own little empire, staying healthy, increasing your learning, having a family, fill in the blank, but get this question wrong, and the results could be catastrophic. There is nothing more important for you to ponder than God Himself. And this isn't just for the religious. Everyone on earth including you has two things in common. First - you are currently alive. Second - you will eventually die. Contemplating the Creator and engaging the Creator is truly the most critical activity for a human being and every human owes it to themselves to ask the biggest questions. Paul has an answer for the God question. God is Jesus. Jesus is God. Jesus is the image of God. Why would God need an image? Well, because God is invisible. When you picture God, what do you see? An old man, a flashing throne, an amorphous swirling glob of energy? They're all wrong. The answer is nothing. There is nothing to see. The God of the Bible has no form, no physical features, nothing our senses can experience. Does that bother you? The implication is that without an image, without revelation, there would be no way for you or me to know or experience God. Thankfully He has an image. Jesus Himself. An image carries the properties of the deity to people so they can understand. Zeus had images - many of them. They were all dumb lifeless statues. And as grand a statue sitting in the Parthenon may have been, it was still carved by human hands, and utterly powerless. But not Jesus. The true God images Himself in a way humans can truly grasp - a human image. But while Jesus is a flesh and blood image, He is more. He is the quote “firstborn” over all creation. Firstborn. Some take firstborn to mean first made. But that's not what it says. God doesn't birth children. But He does have a firstborn - in Greek it's - pro-TO-tokos and means preeminent. Don't understand it? Join the club. All we need to know is that Jesus Himself predates the manger, and the universe itself. He predates time and all, literally all of creation is His - He's the darling of all creation - the preeminent one. It might be enough for today to linger in the thought of a timeless Christ, the accessible image of God Himself. We don't have to understand. It is enough to behold and worship. Jesus, You are blowing my mind. Self-existent image of the invisible God. I am in awe of You.

Is this message Eddie Manly shared with us examples of how Jesus was the only one who ever perfectly obeyed God and always did the Father's will. We are to follow Jesus' pattern and instructions, such as He gave in “The Model Prayer” found in Matt.6:9ff. We are to believe that God is Sovereign over all things and therefore “controls” all things, yet at the same time are to pray that God's will would be done on earth just as it is being done in heaven. If you'd like to watch the full service from March 5th 2023 with worship led by Stefan, and communion led by Eric, follow or click on this link! The post What Is God's Will For Our Lives? appeared first on Living Rock Church.

Eureka the Pentecostal Church - Thursday Night Service 02/09/2023  "What Is God like?" - Part 2  Pastor Jonathan McDonald             Connect with us!Instagram: instagram.com/eurekachurchFacebook: Facebook.com/TheEurekaChurchYoutube: youtube.com/c/EurekaThePentecostalChurchWebsite: eureka.churchListen/Download this sermon on Spotify or Apple Podcast - Eureka the Pentecostal Church

What Is God's Plan for You?The Keys to Discernment - Matthew KellyGet a copy of Amazing Possibilities today! https://amzn.to/3BS95nuIf you have not read HOLY MOMENTS, order your copy today: https://holymomentsbook.comGet Matthew's 60 Second Wisdom delivered to your inbox: https://www.matthewkelly.com/subscribe Subscribe to Matthew's YouTube Channel today! https://www.youtube.com/c/MatthewKellyAuthor/featured?sub_confirmation=1 https://www.matthewkelly.com The Best Version of Yourself and 60 Second Wisdom are registered trademarks. #MatthewKelly #BestVersionOfYourself #amazing #inspirational #motivational #BestVersion

What Is God's Will for Me in This New Year? . MESSAGE SUMMARY: In 2023, have you accomplished God's will for your life? The will of God to us humans is both “active” and “passive” at the same time. God's will to us is “passive” because God is going to accomplish His will on earth – God's Sovereignty is universal. However, God's will to us can be very “active”. We can know God's will for us, but knowing His will requires our willingness and participation. The will of God is a choice for us. In John 7:17, the Apostille John quotes Jesus regarding God's will: “If anyone's will is to do God's will, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority.". Therefore, we can choose whether we will do God's will. Too many of us make and execute our own plans from our own will and then we ask God to bless our actions. What is God's will for your life in 2023? God has several things that “He wills” for our lives, but we must cooperate: 1) to have a growing personal relationship with Him; 2) to be a disciple of Jesus the Christ; 3) to be an ambassador and vessel of God's love; 4) to have minds that are constantly renewed so that we are transformed – we renew our minds by the Word of God, “we are what we think”; 5) not to be controlled by anything other than the Spirit of God; and 6) to become Sanctified – becoming God-centered in our lives. Why do “specific things in our lives” constitute God's will for us? To answer this question regarding the specifics of God's will in our lives, we: 1) should ask if we even should know the answer to this question regarding our knowing the specifics of God's will in our lives – based on Romans 13, the answer is “yes” 2) we can discern God's will for us through praying, meditating, and fasting on the Word of God; 3) the Lord will speak His will through dreams, visions, and words of knowledge and wisdom; 4) God speaks His will to us by putting “desires” in our hearts; and 5) God makes His will known to us by our personal reflection. Questions we should ask and reflect upon in discerning God's will for our lives include: 1) what have been my prevailing feelings in the past and what are these feelings now -- have my feelings been mostly of sadness or of joy; 2) what have been the blessings of God in my life – can I express praise and appreciation for these blessings; 3) have things happened for which I need to accept responsibility and why did they happen; 4) is there a possibility that I am living in denial of certain realities; 5) is there ill will or resentments that remain unaddressed or unforgiven; 6) in the company of others, am I a pleasant person; 7) what is God trying to say into my life today; 8) what can I do or say in my life that will make others feel more loved and appreciated; 9) am I mindful of the socially awkward, poor, and suffering – how do I respond to current events through a Biblical world view; 10) how am I spending my time and money – do I see them as God's time and money that have been loaned to me; 11) how is my prayer life; 12) am I growing and maturing as a follower of Jesus; and 13) am I prepared to meet Jesus face-to-face today? In the words of the Psalmist in Psalms 143:10: “Teach me to do your will, for you are my God! Let your good Spirit lead me on level ground!”.        TODAY'S PRAYER: Keeping the Sabbath, Lord, will require a lot of changes in the way I am living life. Teach me, Lord, how to take the next step with this in a way that fits my unique personality and situation. Help me to trust you with all that will remain unfinished and to enjoy my humble place in your very large world. In Jesus' name, amen. Scazzero, Peter. Emotionally Healthy Spirituality Day by Day (p. 129). Zondervan. Kindle Edition. TODAY'S AFFIRMATION: Today, I affirm that because of what God has done for me in His Son, Jesus, I AM RIGHTEOUS IN GOD'S EYES. God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Corinthians 5:21). SCRIPTURE REFERENCE (ESV):  Matthew 7:21; Matthew 6:7-15; John 7:17; 1 Timothy 2:3-4; Matthew 28:19; John 13:31; 1 Corinthians 13:1-13; Romans 12:2; Ephesians 5:17; 1 Thessalonians 4:3-8; Matthew 2:13-15; 1 Corinthians 12:7-8; Psalms 37:4; Psalms 139:23-24; Psalms 143:10-11. A WORD FROM THE LORD WEBSITE: www.AWFTL.org. DONATE TO AWFTL: https://mygiving.secure.force.com/GXDonateNow?id=a0Ui000000DglsqEAB 

What Is God's Will for Me in This New Year? . MESSAGE SUMMARY: In 2023, have you accomplished God's will for your life? The will of God to us humans is both “active” and “passive” at the same time. God's will to us is “passive” because God is going to accomplish His will on earth – God's Sovereignty is universal. However, God's will to us can be very “active”. We can know God's will for us, but knowing His will requires our willingness and participation. The will of God is a choice for us. In John 7:17, the Apostille John quotes Jesus regarding God's will: “If anyone's will is to do God's will, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority.". Therefore, we can choose whether we will do God's will. Too many of us make and execute our own plans from our own will and then we ask God to bless our actions. What is God's will for your life in 2023? God has several things that “He wills” for our lives, but we must cooperate: 1) to have a growing personal relationship with Him; 2) to be a disciple of Jesus the Christ; 3) to be an ambassador and vessel of God's love; 4) to have minds that are constantly renewed so that we are transformed – we renew our minds by the Word of God, “we are what we think”; 5) not to be controlled by anything other than the Spirit of God; and 6) to become Sanctified – becoming God-centered in our lives. Why do “specific things in our lives” constitute God's will for us? To answer this question regarding the specifics of God's will in our lives, we: 1) should ask if we even should know the answer to this question regarding our knowing the specifics of God's will in our lives – based on Romans 13, the answer is “yes” 2) we can discern God's will for us through praying, meditating, and fasting on the Word of God; 3) the Lord will speak His will through dreams, visions, and words of knowledge and wisdom; 4) God speaks His will to us by putting “desires” in our hearts; and 5) God makes His will known to us by our personal reflection. Questions we should ask and reflect upon in discerning God's will for our lives include: 1) what have been my prevailing feelings in the past and what are these feelings now -- have my feelings been mostly of sadness or of joy; 2) what have been the blessings of God in my life – can I express praise and appreciation for these blessings; 3) have things happened for which I need to accept responsibility and why did they happen; 4) is there a possibility that I am living in denial of certain realities; 5) is there ill will or resentments that remain unaddressed or unforgiven; 6) in the company of others, am I a pleasant person; 7) what is God trying to say into my life today; 8) what can I do or say in my life that will make others feel more loved and appreciated; 9) am I mindful of the socially awkward, poor, and suffering – how do I respond to current events through a Biblical world view; 10) how am I spending my time and money – do I see them as God's time and money that have been loaned to me; 11) how is my prayer life; 12) am I growing and maturing as a follower of Jesus; and 13) am I prepared to meet Jesus face-to-face today? In the words of the Psalmist in Psalms 143:10: “Teach me to do your will, for you are my God! Let your good Spirit lead me on level ground!”.        TODAY'S PRAYER: Keeping the Sabbath, Lord, will require a lot of changes in the way I am living life. Teach me, Lord, how to take the next step with this in a way that fits my unique personality and situation. Help me to trust you with all that will remain unfinished and to enjoy my humble place in your very large world. In Jesus' name, amen. Scazzero, Peter. Emotionally Healthy Spirituality Day by Day (p. 129). Zondervan. Kindle Edition. TODAY'S AFFIRMATION: Today, I affirm that because of what God has done for me in His Son, Jesus, I AM RIGHTEOUS IN GOD'S EYES. God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Corinthians 5:21). SCRIPTURE REFERENCE (ESV):  Matthew 7:21; Matthew 6:7-15; John 7:17; 1 Timothy 2:3-4; Matthew 28:19; John 13:31; 1 Corinthians 13:1-13; Romans 12:2; Ephesians 5:17; 1 Thessalonians 4:3-8; Matthew 2:13-15; 1 Corinthians 12:7-8; Psalms 37:4; Psalms 139:23-24; Psalms 143:10-11. A WORD FROM THE LORD WEBSITE: www.AWFTL.org. DONATE TO AWFTL: https://mygiving.secure.force.com/GXDonateNow?id=a0Ui000000DglsqEAB 

What Is God's Will for Me in This New Year? . MESSAGE SUMMARY: In 2023, have you accomplished God's will for your life? The will of God to us humans is both “active” and “passive” at the same time. God's will to us is “passive” because God is going to accomplish His will on earth – God's Sovereignty is universal. However, God's will to us can be very “active”. We can know God's will for us, but knowing His will requires our willingness and participation. The will of God is a choice for us. In John 7:17, the Apostille John quotes Jesus regarding God's will: “If anyone's will is to do God's will, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority.". Therefore, we can choose whether we will do God's will. Too many of us make and execute our own plans from our own will and then we ask God to bless our actions. What is God's will for your life in 2023? God has several things that “He wills” for our lives, but we must cooperate: 1) to have a growing personal relationship with Him; 2) to be a disciple of Jesus the Christ; 3) to be an ambassador and vessel of God's love; 4) to have minds that are constantly renewed so that we are transformed – we renew our minds by the Word of God, “we are what we think”; 5) not to be controlled by anything other than the Spirit of God; and 6) to become Sanctified – becoming God-centered in our lives. Why do “specific things in our lives” constitute God's will for us? To answer this question regarding the specifics of God's will in our lives, we: 1) should ask if we even should know the answer to this question regarding our knowing the specifics of God's will in our lives – based on Romans 13, the answer is “yes” 2) we can discern God's will for us through praying, meditating, and fasting on the Word of God; 3) the Lord will speak His will through dreams, visions, and words of knowledge and wisdom; 4) God speaks His will to us by putting “desires” in our hearts; and 5) God makes His will known to us by our personal reflection. Questions we should ask and reflect upon in discerning God's will for our lives include: 1) what have been my prevailing feelings in the past and what are these feelings now -- have my feelings been mostly of sadness or of joy; 2) what have been the blessings of God in my life – can I express praise and appreciation for these blessings; 3) have things happened for which I need to accept responsibility and why did they happen; 4) is there a possibility that I am living in denial of certain realities; 5) is there ill will or resentments that remain unaddressed or unforgiven; 6) in the company of others, am I a pleasant person; 7) what is God trying to say into my life today; 8) what can I do or say in my life that will make others feel more loved and appreciated; 9) am I mindful of the socially awkward, poor, and suffering – how do I respond to current events through a Biblical world view; 10) how am I spending my time and money – do I see them as God's time and money that have been loaned to me; 11) how is my prayer life; 12) am I growing and maturing as a follower of Jesus; and 13) am I prepared to meet Jesus face-to-face today? In the words of the Psalmist in Psalms 143:10: “Teach me to do your will, for you are my God! Let your good Spirit lead me on level ground!”.        TODAY'S PRAYER: Keeping the Sabbath, Lord, will require a lot of changes in the way I am living life. Teach me, Lord, how to take the next step with this in a way that fits my unique personality and situation. Help me to trust you with all that will remain unfinished and to enjoy my humble place in your very large world. In Jesus' name, amen. Scazzero, Peter. Emotionally Healthy Spirituality Day by Day (p. 129). Zondervan. Kindle Edition. TODAY'S AFFIRMATION: Today, I affirm that because of what God has done for me in His Son, Jesus, I AM RIGHTEOUS IN GOD'S EYES. God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Corinthians 5:21). SCRIPTURE REFERENCE (ESV):  Matthew 7:21; Matthew 6:7-15; John 7:17; 1 Timothy 2:3-4; Matthew 28:19; John 13:31; 1 Corinthians 13:1-13; Romans 12:2; Ephesians 5:17; 1 Thessalonians 4:3-8; Matthew 2:13-15; 1 Corinthians 12:7-8; Psalms 37:4; Psalms 139:23-24; Psalms 143:10-11. A WORD FROM THE LORD WEBSITE: www.AWFTL.org. DONATE TO AWFTL: https://mygiving.secure.force.com/GXDonateNow?id=a0Ui000000DglsqEAB 

If we had the opportunity to speak to our younger self, what would we say? What wisdom could we give to that younger self about the meaning and purpose of life? What does our experience tell us about why we are here and who we are? This conversation explores these questions and why they may be important to our lives. Jacob Needleman, Ph.D. is a professor of philosophy at San Francisco State University and former director of the Center of the Study of New Religions at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California. He has also served as a research associate at the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research. His books include Why Can't We Be Good? (Tarcher 2003), The Heart of Philosophy (Tarcher 2003), Time and the Soul: Where Has All the Meaningful Time Gone -- and Can We Get It Back? (Berrett-Koehler Publishers 2003), Lost Christianity (Tarcher 2003), Money and the Meaning of Life (Doubleday 1994), The Wisdom of Love: Toward a Shared Inner Life (Morning Light Press 2005), What Is God? (Tarcher 2010), Necessary Wisdom (Fearless Books 2013) and An Unknown World: Notes on the Meaning of the Earth (Tarcher 2012)Interview Date: 6/2/2016 Tags: Jacob Needleman, freedom, ethics, listening, truth, Gurdjieff, essential questions, polarized times, ancient mystical wisdom traditions, Christianity, attention, Denise Levertov poem A Gift, Philosophy, Personal Transformation, Spirituality, Science

WHAT is GOD? (With former Atheist Kevin Vost)QUESTIONS? Ask us here: https://www.subscribepage.com/e3e8c7CHECK OUT OUR T-SHIRTS & MERCH https://thecatholictruth.org/shop/Like our shirts? Designed by Glorybound Apparel: https://gloryboundco.com/FOLLOW US:Our YouTubeBlog ArticlesFacebook Page hereInstagram: catholic_truth_officialPinterest: Catholic TruthSUPPORTMonthly by PatreonMonthly, Yearly, or One Time through PayPalOUR WEBSITE (Retreats, keynote talks, parish missions, articles and more)BOOK: Counterfeit Spirituality (Centering Prayer, Yoga, Reiki, Astrology, etc). What is good? What is not? How can we know the difference?)BOOK: WHY Do You Believe In GOD? (True conversations with atheists and evidence for God and faith).Need a Catholic speaker or retreat? https://TheCatholicTruth.orgIn-person or online Confirmation retreat? https://thecatholictruth.org/speaking-and-retreats/Music Credit: http//www.bensound.comroyalty-free-music     

Author Micah Dank joins us once again to ask a single question. What is God? Simple question, hard to answer. Drawing upon a lifetime of study into religion, astrotheology, myth, philosophy and science, he hopes to answer the question that has been at the back of every humans mind since the dawn of consciousness. SHOW NOTES ++Micah's Links++  AMAZON | INSTAGRAM  | YOUTUBE| UNIVERSAL TRUTH SCHOOL ++HTKASC LINKS++  WEBSITE | ROKFIN |  YOUTUBE | APPLE PODCASTS | INSTAGRAM FACEBOOK | TWITTER | BITCHUTE | SPOTIFY | ODYSEE  

Dr. Kevin Vost returns to Philosophy for the People to discuss his book What Is God and how reading Thomas Aquinas ended his 25 years of being an atheist.  Phil for People Links/Resources Phil for People on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/PhilosophyforthePeople  Pat's Substack: https://chroniclesofstrength.substack.com/  Pat's "pay what you want" courses: https://pftp.gumroad.com/  Philosophy for the People on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2TI4Vcy8IPRHHPXRdqMpbG  Philosophy for the People on iTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/philosophy-for-the-people/id1639532152

If you appreciate this work, consider supporting it - https://www.patreon.com/seekgodtogether https://www.seekGodtogether.com Today is the first installment of several in Colossians 1. Verses 15-20 are a soaring song about Jesus. You can read it for yourself but today we'll read verse 15 which says, “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.” What does God look like? What IS God like and what does He do? Is there a question more important? You can spend your entire life building your own little empire, staying healthy, increasing your learning, having a family, fill in the blank, but get this question wrong, and the results could be catastrophic. There is nothing more important for you to ponder than God Himself. And this isn't just for the religious. Everyone on earth including you has two things in common. First - you are currently alive. Second - you will eventually die. Contemplating the Creator and engaging the Creator is truly the most critical activity for a human being and every human owes it to themselves to ask the biggest questions. Paul has an answer for the God question. God is Jesus. Jesus is God. Jesus is the image of God. Why would God need an image? Well, because God is invisible. When you picture God, what do you see? An old man, a flashing throne, an amorphous swirling glob of energy? They're all wrong. The answer is nothing. There is nothing to see. The God of the Bible has no form, no physical features, nothing our senses can experience. Does that bother you? The implication is that without an image, without revelation, there would be no way for you or me to know or experience God. Thankfully He has an image. Jesus Himself. An image carries the properties of the deity to people so they can understand. Zeus had images - many of them. They were all dumb lifeless statues. And as grand a statue sitting in the Parthenon may have been, it was still carved by human hands, and utterly powerless. But not Jesus. The true God images Himself in a way humans can truly grasp - a human image. But while Jesus is a flesh and blood image, He is more. He is the quote “firstborn” over all creation. Firstborn. Some take firstborn to mean first made. But that's not what it says. God doesn't birth children. But He does have a firstborn - in Greek it's - pro-TO-tokos and means preeminent. Don't understand it? Join the club. All we need to know is that Jesus Himself predates the manger, and the universe itself. He predates time and all, literally all of creation is His - He's the darling of all creation - the preeminent one. It might be enough for today to linger in the thought of a timeless Christ, the accessible image of God Himself. We don't have to understand. It is enough to behold and worship. Jesus, You are blowing my mind. Self-existent image of the invisible God. I am in awe of You.

God has a will and He invites us to do His will. So, “What Is God's Will?” In today's sermon, Pastor Abie Kulynych digs through Colossians 1 to help us understand that the Bible declares about the will of God. 

 What Is God's Will For You? According to the Bible, God's Will is that you give thanks in ALL circumstances. Join Gary as he looks at the Mass Readings for the 28th Sunday in Ordinary Time and discover why it's so important to give thanks ALWAYS!

How can we understand apologetics, especially in face of Christianity and the faith?In this video, we are joined by  @Adherent Apologetics to discuss what we believe to be the role of apologetics and how Christians can interact with this field of thought. --------------------------To check out more about my content feel free to go to my YouTube Channel Philosophy for All to access clips and extra discussions

If you appreciate this work, consider supporting it - https://www.patreon.com/seekgodtogether Today is the first installment of several in Colossians 1. Verses 15-20 are a soaring song about Jesus. You can read it for yourself but today we'll read verse 15 which says, “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.” What does God look like? What IS God like and what does He do? Is there a question more important? You can spend your entire life building your own little empire, staying healthy, increasing your learning, having a family, fill in the blank, but get this question wrong, and the results could be catastrophic. There is nothing more important for you to ponder than God Himself. And this isn't just for the religious. Everyone on earth including you has two things in common. First - you are currently alive. Second - you will eventually die. Contemplating the Creator and engaging the Creator is truly the most critical activity for a human being and every human owes it to themselves to ask the biggest questions. Paul has an answer for the God question. God is Jesus. Jesus is God. Jesus is the image of God. Why would God need an image? Well, because God is invisible. When you picture God, what do you see? An old man, a flashing throne, an amorphous swirling glob of energy? They're all wrong. The answer is nothing. There is nothing to see. The God of the Bible has no form, no physical features, nothing our senses can experience. Does that bother you? The implication is that without an image, without revelation, there would be no way for you or me to know or experience God. Thankfully He has an image. Jesus Himself. An image carries the properties of the deity to people so they can understand. Zeus had images - many of them. They were all dumb lifeless statues. And as grand a statue sitting in the Parthenon may have been, it was still carved by human hands, and utterly powerless. But not Jesus. The true God images Himself in a way humans can truly grasp - a human image. But while Jesus is a flesh and blood image, He is more. He is the quote “firstborn” over all creation. Firstborn. Some take firstborn to mean first made. But that's not what it says. God doesn't birth children. But He does have a firstborn - in Greek it's - pro-TO-tokos and means preeminent. Don't understand it? Join the club. All we need to know is that Jesus Himself predates the manger, and the universe itself. He predates time and all, literally all of creation is His - He's the darling of all creation - the preeminent one. It might be enough for today to linger in the thought of a timeless Christ, the accessible image of God Himself. We don't have to understand. It is enough to behold and worship. Jesus, You are blowing my mind. Self-existent image of the invisible God. I am in awe of You. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

Transcript Podcast Introduction This is Poetry Thursday. We'll complete the book of Song of Solomon with the reading of chapters 7 and 8. I'm calling today's show, “What Is God?” Comments on Song of Solomon 7 As we've already discussed on a previous episode, this book can be seen as an allegory about the relationship between... The post Song of Solomon 7-8: What Is God? first appeared on Lifespring! Media.

Today we will define our terms and explain what we mean by God. God has many different descriptions from many different backgrounds, but we will be focusing on the traditional Western perspective on God. My InformationInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/l.t._world/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LTWorld123Website: https://ltworld.info/Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjZL...

What IS God-centered investing? Can you have a God-honoring portfolio that DOES make money? You sure can. Learn more about the merits of Biblically-Responsible Investing (BRI) from Luke Andrews. He uncovers the nitty-gritty of why this method is more than just good for your bank account – it's gold for your eternal life as well. … Continue reading God-Centered Investing – Part II The post God-Centered Investing – Part II appeared first on iWork4Him Podcast.

What IS God-centered investing? Can you have a God-honoring portfolio that DOES make money? You sure can. Learn more about the merits of Biblically-Responsible Investing (BRI) from Luke Andrews. He uncovers the nitty-gritty of why this method is more than just good for your bank account – it's gold for your eternal life as well.Featured Guest: Luke AndrewsMinistry/Workplace: Inspire Advisors

In the west, the Church cannot afford to be sheltered in privilege and ignore the challenges, victories, and kingdom creativity happening in Jesus-centred communities in the developing world. Putting Jesus at the centre means we must learn from our global and often marginalized brothers and sisters in how they're putting Jesus at the centre and the ways they're advancing kingdom creativity. Join us for a fascinating, challenging, and awakening conversation with César Garcia, the General Secretary of Mennonite World Conference (MWC). MWC is a global movement linked to the Radical Reformation, including Anabaptist and Anabapt-ish traditions, with a mission to connect churches around the world for community, learning, and resourcing. César is author of What Is God's Kingdom and What Does Citizenship Look Like? (Jesus Way: Small Books of Radical Faith) by Herold Press.