Word of Life Church Podcast

<p>We have all heard the famous parable of "The Good Samaritan". It has become so famous in our culture that it has unfortunately lost its meaning. Despite popular belief, the point of the parable of the Good Samaritan is not to be "a good Samaritan." Jesus crafted this parable to answer a question about eternal life and love of neighbor. Jesus was speaking to Jews, and Jews and Samaritans hated one another like poison! In his parable, Jesus reveals that it is not one of 'us' (the Jews) loving 'them', but rather, 'them' loving one of 'us'. He has turned the tables and asked a very subversive question: What do you do when your enemy acts in love and treats you like a neighbor? Who proved to be a neighbor to the Jewish victim? It was the enemy, the Samaritan, who showed the Jewish victim mercy. And Jesus us commands us to do the same, for to show mercy is to enact eternal life.</p>

<p>The Samaritans were a separate ethnic group from the Jews, with different theological views. These differences often translated into violence between the two groups. Most Jews would thus travel around Samaria instead of traveling through it. But on his journey to Jerusalem, Jesus journeyed right through the middle of it. During their travel, a Samaritan town refused him and his disciples hospitality because they were Jews. In response to this insult, the disciples James and John wanted to burn them up with the fire of God, and found scriptural evidence to support their argument. In their desire to burn the Samaritan 'them' with the fire of God, James and John cite the Bible to support their desire. This is exactly what Elijah did when the Samaritans opposed him. James and John (and the rest of the disciples) obviously think violence is an option, and they believe Jesus will ultimately turn to violence in order to usher in the Kingdom of God. But they are wrong! Jesus is not Elijah! Jesus' way of changing the world is not on a battlefield but at a shared table. He blesses his enemies, and instead of resorting to violence, will allow his body to be broken and his own blood to be shed.</p>

<p>We would prefer to think there is never any conflict between our family and our faith. But this is not always the case. Sometimes we find the family we're born into is in conflict with the kingdom we have been reborn into. Jesus himself experience this conflict. His family didn't really get what he was doing. They did believe that he could be the Messiah, they simply didn't think he could be the Messiah the way he was going about it. They didn't believe he could be Messiah and preach "love your enemies" at the same time. And although Jesus' family didn't immediately understand the gospel of his kingdom, they eventually understood. They were all present at Pentecost. His brother James became the first pastor. Jesus' love for his family never waned, but he also knew he had to subordinate his natural family to his kingdom vocation.</p>

<p>To follow Jesus is revolutionary. That's not hyperbole; it's the absolute truth. To live the Jesus way is the most revolutionary thing a person can do. To follow Jesus' practice radical love, forgiveness, hospitality, and humility, and to join God's alternative society that is formed around Jesus Christ is life-changing. It's revolutionary! in the 1970′s, the Jesus Revolution was a genuine move of the Spirit of God. It was a real revolution. It's strength was that it was a return to radical focus on Jesus. It's weakness was that it was largely separated from the church. When the Jesus Revolution finally did connect with the church, it was swallowed up by conventional evangelicalism and lost its radical edge. We are at the brink of another cultural Jesus Revolution. We can't settle for a tame, domesticated, conventional Christianity. We need to be a little bit rebellious, a little bit dangerous. We should dare to be a Jesus revolutionary!</p>

<p>By far the most common way we're formed in faith is we receive it from our parents. There are Christian conversions from other religions and non-religious backgrounds, but these are more rare. Many of us are Christians because are parents were also Christians. We are all formed by tradition with choices made by parents, in our language, in our culture, etc. But we don't just give our kids a Bible and expect them to be Christian. They need the understanding and experience of Christian tradition!</p>

<p>As followers of Jesus Christ, we are called to speak the truth lovingly, to speak words that build up, to put away anger, wrath, and slander, and to forgive one another. How do we live this out in our homes particularly in the context of marriage? In this message, Pastor Derek Vreeland offers a helpful tool to empower couples to communicate in such a way that brings resolution to conflicts and forgiveness to torn relationships. Following these guidelines, couples can express the peace of God at home.</p>

<p>The greatest challenge that we face in passing on our Christian faith to our children and our grandchildren is the growing tide of secularism in America. Secularism is the idea that stemmed from the Enlightenment that God must be restricted to the private realm. But the private spirituality of the solitary, self-styled Christian will not withstand secularism. To live as a Christian in the 21st century West will require the organized faith community of the Church with its sacred traditions. The Enlightenment that introduced the modern age taught us to think individually. But the Biblical way of thinking is corporately and generationally. Christian tradition is how Christian faith is passed on from generation to generation. It is true that tradition must be kept alive by the Spirit. But rejection tradition wholesale leads to the evaporation of faith. This is why at Word of Life Church we are recovering and rehabilitating the word "tradition." Our grandchildren will not be Christians because of an emotional experience. They will be Christian by the process of formation through the traditions of prayer, scripture, sacrament, worship, creed, and calendar.</p>

<p>In life, it's easy for us to assign labels to people. It's how we identify ourselves inside a group. But often, even without realizing it, we put label on other people in order to negate them. We reduce them to a category. We put labels on ourselves that we have to live up to (or down to). Once you adopt a "pressure group label" you have to live up to the expectations of the group. Self-adopting a pressure group label is pledging allegiance to group-think hostility. When we, as Christians, label people and view them as a category rather than a person, we misjudge them. Our self-righteousness can require us to categorically exclude a sinful person from our presence. When viewed as a person however, our righteousness compels us to receive and forgive sinners.</p>

<p>The degree to which the Sermon on the Mount has been ignored by Christians is scandalous. We want Jesus to die for us, but leave our world alone, especially if we are on top of the world. But Jesus has no intention of leaving our world alone- he fully intends to change it! What Jesus preached in his sermons and what Jesus did on his cross are one in the same! In the Sermon on the Mount and on the cross Jesus re-oriented the world from an axis of power enforced by violence to an axis of love expressed in forgiveness. To critique the enforcement of violence in our culture will draw the ire of many. And often, it's hard to be truly compelling about loving and forgiving our enemies when we don't have real and deadly enemies. But Martin Luther King, Jr DID have real, deadly enemies. But he taught, and practiced, the Jesus way of loving and forgiving your enemies. It was a message that would ultimately bring his death, but he changed the world!</p>

<p>Jesus is forming a movement of people who will join him in announcing and enacting the Kingdom of God. An important understanding about Jesus is the way in which he selects his followers. Jesus does not seem to be very concerned about our categories of "good people" and "bad people". Instead, he divides people into the proud and the humble. The shocking thing is who joins Jesus' new movement. It's not the insiders, but the outsiders. It's not the righteous, but sinners. The moment Simon self-identified as a sinner, he qualified to become a disciple. Jesus spent very little time condemning moral transgressions. The emphasis of Jesus' ministry was to be with people, to share a table with them. Teaching people how to encounter Jesus Christ and live in his presence will do far more to produce real transformation than trying to apply the law. Christianity is not a Bible study or a moral code, it's an encounter with Jesus Christ!</p>

<p>After Jesus completed his 40 days of prayer and fasting in the wilderness, he soon returned to his hometown of Nazareth. Initially, Jesus was well received by his own people. They were brimming with excitement and great anticipation that their hometown kid might really be the long foretold messiah. But Jesus quickly realizes that the people in his hometown really just want to see him do miracles. They want Jesus to be a spectacle and do tricks for them. Jesus also knows that it is virtually impossible to be a prophet in your hometown. The prophet always challenges the idea of "us vs. them". When the hometown crowd hears one of their own challenge the idea that God is not on their side, they quickly turn on him.</p>

<p>John the Baptist called on Israel to repent in preparation for the Messiah. When people began asking what it was they should do, everything John said had to do with money. When you are willing to rethink what you do with your money... you've repented! John doesn't mention any other sins, but he continually stresses economic repentance. Why? Because he is trying to prepare a people who will follow Messiah into a new kingdom. The greatest obstacle to entering the kingdom of God is the tyranny of economic self-interest.</p>

<p>God did not suddenly appear on the earth in human form one day. He came just as every other human did: He was born to a mother as an infant, and grew through childhood and into an adult. But the Bible tells us very little about Jesus' childhood life. The only account of his life between infancy and age thirty is found in the book of Luke, in which a 12-year-old Jesus is "lost" at the Temple in Jerusalem. And when Mary and Joseph finally find Jesus safe in the Temple, it is there that we hear the first recorded words of Jesus, when he says "Why are you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?" Although Jesus was speaking to his parents, he could very well be speaking to each one of us, "Why are you looking for me?" We seek after God in church buildings on Sundays, not because Jesus is lost, but because WE are lost. And we believe that Jesus knows the way!</p>

<p>When God became Man and came to the earth, he experienced the fullness of humanity. He didn't merely just appear as a man. He was born as a helpless baby, lived a life as a man in the Roman occupied territory of Israel, and died. Jesus became Immanual, God with us, so that he might give us a new way of being human. He came that he might lead us beyond the ways of death into life and resurrection. As humans, we are indeed a violent species. From Cain killing Abel, to Auschwitz, to Hiroshima, to Sandy Hook Elementary School, we have been born into violence. Born on the first Christmas, the Prince of Peace offers us a better way.</p>

<p>What kind of news would make you literally leap for joy, jump up and down, and throw your hat in the air? The end of a long war? The fall of the Berlin Wall? Winning the lottery jackpot? Being cured of cancer? When war ends and tyranny topples, when prosperity comes and sickness goes, that is good news! And this is the kind of good news that Mary and Elizabeth celebrate together. These two poor and oppressed Jewish women, living in an occupied land, are both pregnant with children that angels have prophesied great things over. They are overflowing with joy because they believe something is about to happen. They believe God is about to act and launch a revolution through their two sons. The coming revolution is the kingdom of God: God's way of running the world.</p>

<p>What a mystery the mother of Jesus is. Mary is the human, the woman, through whom God enters and takes on humanity. Mary is a mystery because she's intimately connected with the greatest mystery of all: The Incarnation. In Christ God became fully human and Jesus is fully human as you! The story of Jesus begins in earnest with the Annunciation, the angelic announcement to a young virgin that she would bare a son named Jesus, called the Son of God. Mary is poor and obscure. She is an utterly insignificant peasant in the nowhere of Nazareth. But now an angel is telling a peasant girl that the true Son of God is going to enter the world in poverty; it's not the economy that matters most, but the reign of God. When the angel Gabriel begins the Annunciation to Mary, he begins with the message "Rejoice!" We might say this is the proper beginning of the New Testament. The long, dark night is at last coming to an end and it's time to Rejoice! God is keeping his promise to bless the world though the seed of Abraham, Rejoice! God is keeping his promise to make the Son of David the ruler of the nations, Rejoice! The child who will bless the world and rule the nations is about to be born, Rejoice!</p>

<p>We shouldn't ever think that Jesus just popped into history 2,000 years ago out of nowhere. Jesus is the continuation of a story that began a very long time ago with Abraham & Israel. With the birth of Jesus God is not starting over. God is keeping his promise to bless the world with the seed of Abraham and to rule the world with the Son of David. And in Luke's Gospel, he is telling the story of how Israel's Messiah became the king of the world. In Jesus Christ we are offered the forgiveness of sins, the promise of everlasting life, and the way of peace. This is the salvation of the Lord.</p>

<p>Pastor Brian Zahnd concludes his two-month series on climbing the Mountains of God with the "Mount Everest of the Gospels", the Mount of Beatitudes. The Beatitudes are not commands, but portals to a new way of thinking. They are not platitudes, but paradoxes. The Beatitudes are the Preamble to the Constitution of the Government of God. The government of God is nothing like the governments of this age. If we can become a people formed by the Beatitudes, what would happen? We will receive comfort and mercy. We will see God and be called the children of God. We will be persecuted. But we will receive the kingdom and we will inherit the earth.</p>

<p>One of the most fascinating stories in the Gospels is the account of Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration. Along with his birth and his crucifixion and resurrection, the Transfiguration is one of the most important events in the life of Jesus. It is packed with mystery and meaning. In the Transfiguration, we are able to see Jesus' divinity shining through his humanity. The flesh of Jesus is human flesh, but it is also divine flesh. Jesus is not "absorbing" or reflecting glory, like the story of Moses on Mount Sinai. The glory shining from Jesus comes from within. If you will climb the mountain and gaze at the glory of God in the face of Christ, you will experience your own transfiguration, a spiritual metamorphosis. And this is what this Christian thing is all about! To become like Jesus! The goal of the Christian life is not to go to heaven when you die, but rather to become like Jesus now!</p>

<p>The Bible never hides the humanity of its heroes. Noah, Abraham, David all have incredible failures recorded in the Bible. Even the prophet Elijah, known best for praying fire down from heaven, is shown curled up and a tree praying to die. Elijah believed it was up to him to save all of Israel, and he believed he was on his own. But God showed him he wasn;t the only one left. In fact, there were over 7,000 other faithful worshipers. You can't do walk the Christian journey alone, you can't make it on your own. Sometimes you need to be on the mountain of God deep in prayer, but sometimes you need to get off the mountain and go find a friend. In the long run there's probably nothing more important than friendship. However important you think friendship is, God would probably tell you it's even more important. And whatever it is that you are sacrificing your friendships for in order to achieve, is probably not worth it in the long run. Elijah thought his zealous work for God was the most important thing, but without friendship he ended up emotionally crippled and useless for ministry.</p>

<p>On the 31st anniversary of Word of Life Church, Pastor Brian Zahnd tells the story of back-to-back days standing atop Mount Sinai in Egypt and Mars Hill in Greece. To do so is not easy, and would not have even been possible in the days before jet travel. But it was an experience filled with prophetic symbolism and was an indication what the next five years would hold for Word of Life Church.<br><br>Moses also climbed Mount Sinai, and it is the place where he received the 10 Commandments from the Lord. This was the Law, written by the finger of God on two stone tablets. The purpose of the law is to produce justice and a worshiping society; to learn how to worship God in order to treat people right. Jesus tells us on the Mount of Beatitudes that he did not come to abolish the Law, he came, rather, in order to fulfill it. The entire Sermon on the Mount is about the whole Law summed up in two commandments: To love God with all your heart and to love your neighbor as yourself. This is the Jesus Way. This is what God's design for humanity is.</p>

<p>Our mission as the Church (to preach, baptize, make disciples, teach, do theology) flows from our worship. Why do we preach the gospel, make disciples, teach, do theology, build churches, care for the sick and poor? Because we worship the true and living God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Everything we do as a church flows from our identity as a worshiping people. Worship is central, primary, formative, and it is essential. Our attitude when we gather together on Sunday mornings should be that we are disciples intending to worship, not consumers needing to be entertained. One of the worst ways to evaluate worship is by how it makes you feel. The purpose of worship is not to make you feel something (it's not about you, afterall), but rather, the purpose of worship is to properly relate to God and be properly formed. On Sunday mornings when we gather as a corporate body, we will be faithful, intentional, thoughtful, and thankful. And we will remember, everything we do as a church flows from our identity as a worshiping people.</p>

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

<p>Mountains are a classic metaphor for prayer. A lot of praying in the Bible happens on mountaintops. Once, when Jesus was praying on a Galilean mountain, his disciples asked him to teach them to pray. So Jesus did what all Jewish rabbis did to teach their disciples how to pray, He gave them a prayer to pray. He didn't teach on abstract concepts or sentimental ideas, he gave them a specific prayer. Without being taught how to properly pray, we simply recycle and reinforce our own fears, desires, and misguided opinions. We never make any actual progress; we just keep trying to get God to do what we would do. We try to manage God. It is a pagan concept of prayer to attempt to cajole God into doing what we want. The Christian concept of prayer is that we need to be transformed by God. The primary purpose of prayer is not to advise or manage God, but to be properly formed.</p>

<p>In Christ we have come to the mountain of God. And God, much like a mountain, is far too vast to be comprehended from one perspective. If you want to have a full conception of the living God, you need more than one perspective! To have more than one perspective of a mountain, you need to traverse the mountain, to climb on it. Of course, it's not easy. Mountain climbing is never easy. It's difficult and demanding; dangerous in places, scary at times; and seeking to understand God is the same way. But you can do it. And it's worth it!</p>

<p>In the final track of the 2012 edition of Finding God on Your iPod, Pastor Brian Zahnd examines the vision of Jesus and Paul for a new humanity, gathered together into one flock with Jesus as the shepherd; A humanity in Christ that learns to kill the hostility instead of kill one another. From this text, Pastor Brian is able to offer a prophetic critique of the systematic destruction of the indigenous peoples and cultures of North America in the name of Manifest Destiny. "Manifest Destiny" was an American self-delusion justifying the systematic destruction of indigenous peoples and cultures in the name of "progress."</p>

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

<p>The satan is the spirit of accusation, especially fear-based accusation. When people feel threatened in some way, such as their security, their worldview, or their ideology, they tend to channel that negative vibe into an accusation of someone else. This is the scapegoat phenomenon. Instead of allowing the spirit of faith, hope, and love to control them, they seek to dispel the negative feelings by transferring it through accusation. This is the primary work of satan. And it is the opposite of the work of the Holy Spirit! The way you deal with accusation is not to lash out, but rather, to forgive, and when possible, help people see what they are doing. You cannot let unjust accusation turn into self-accusation. That's the devil in your head. In the song Negative Vibes by Irish singer-songwriter Damien Dempsey, he addressing his critics and the spirit of accusation when he sings "I'm never going to let your negative vibes and comments get through to my psyche and cripple me."</p>

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

<p>Pain in the great equalizer. We have all felt pain of one kind or another, but we do not have to bear it alone. We can take our brokenness to Christ and experience healing of body and soul. Healing and recovery is a part of the life story of Johnny Cash, a true American icon. Six months before his death, he recorded the song "Hurt" originally written by Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails. In this song, Johnny Cash sings in mournful regret of the hurt he caused others through a life in turmoil. While he created a lot of hurt through his life-long struggle with addiction, he experienced healing and wholeness as he chose to live in the kingdom of God. As the story of Johnny Cash demonstrates, God did not turn an blind eye to our suffering, but chose to enter into suffering humanity so that by his wounds we can be healed.</p>

<p>We are God's workmanship, his poem, created in Christ Jesus. God is not a machine mass-producing religious experience industrial style. God is an artist. We are his work of art and we move the life with the grace of Christ. We should desire to be a work of art. This is the longing in The Guggenheim Grotto song, "Philosophia". As we engage our lives with Jesus Christ, the redemptive result is poetic. Our lives gain a graceful structure and poetic expression that is beautiful. Jesus is the poet who can rearrange the logos of our life, the words that tell our story, and do it in such a way that our life becomes a beautiful poem. For your life to be a work of art, for you life to become a graceful poem, the place to begin is to give your life over to the great Artist, the great Poet.</p>

<p>Pastor Derek Vreeland presents a bonus track to the 2011 Finding God on Your iPod series: Barton Hollow, by the folk-duo The Civil Wars. This song tells the story of a criminal wrestling with guilt, forgiveness, and doubt. We are fully aware of our shortcomings and failures and while we confess faith in God who forgives, sometimes doubt creeps into our lives. Doubt is never the enemy of faith, because every doubt is based on an alternative belief. Instead of ignoring our doubts, we need to face them, struggle through them in community with other followers of Christ. Wresting with doubt is one of the ways we grow in faith.</p>

<p>In the fifth and final week of 2011′s Finding God On Your iPod, we listen to hall of fame rockers Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers and their latest album, Mojo. The song Something Good Coming is a song about hard times and hope. It is a very human song, admitting that life can be hard, but deep down we hold on to hope that something good is coming. As Christians, we believe that God is the creator and that God is good, and that no matter how messed up life can be, it's not the final word. We know God cares and will ultimately intervene and set things right. When you're poor, hungry, and sorrowful because life hasn't turned out the way you would like and you feel terribly unlucky, Jesus says that you are lucky and something good is coming! But why? Why are you blessed? Be careful trying to explain it or you may find yourself thinking you deserve it. It's the mystery of an unexplained grace. It may be better to just say, "I'm lucky!" There's nothing wrong with saying "I'm lucky" if you follow it with, "praise God."</p>

<p>In part four of 2011′s edition of Finding God On Your iPod, we look at the song "If I Die Young" by The Band Perry. The song is loosely based on the poem The Lady of Shalott by Lord Alfred Tennyson and deals with the subject of your own death. Modern society avoids speaking, or even thinking, about our own demise, but the undeniable reality is one day we are all going to die. And faced with that reality, one must wonder then what the meaning of life is; what is it all about? When death is imminent, there can come a clarity as to what really matters in life. The meaning of life is love. We are created by the God who is supremely identified with love. As you work out the equation for the meaning of life, if it doesn't add up to love, go back and recalculate. "Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. So now abide faith, hope, and love, these three; but the greatest of these is love."</p>

<p>In the third installment of 2011′s edition of Finding God On Your iPod, Pastor Brian introduces the blues based rock of The Black Keys and their song Unknown Brother. It's a simple song expressing one of humanity's deepest longings, that someday we will meet again our departed loved ones and family members. The great problem the Gospel addresses is death. Romans tells us, "The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." To believe in Christ and to be baptized into Christ is to pass from the dominion of death and its futility into the promise of eternal life. The great promise of eternal life will be fulfilled in us as it was fulfilled in Christ by resurrection. This is the blessed hope, the Christian hope, the resurrection hope of Easter.</p>

<p>In the second installment of the 2011 Finding God On Your iPod series, Pastor Brian examines the song "Roll Away Your Stone" by Mumford & Sons. The song is reminiscent of the story of the prodigal son, especially the lyrics, "It seems that all my bridges have been burnt / But you say, that's exactly how this grace thing works / It's not the long walk home that will change this heart / But the welcome I receive with the restart." The change of heart that we believe happened to the prodigal son didn't so much happen on his long walk home from the far country as much as it happened because of the way his father welcomed him home, The father did not punish his son for leaving, for squandering his inheritance, but instead celebrated his son's return with a lavish party and meal, slaughtering the prized fattened calf. God is love. And in the end it's the love of God that will change our heart. If we will love God in return, his love becomes like a shared meal. This table where the Father has prepared the fattened calf to welcome you home is the table where you can find the restart that will eventually change your heart.</p>

<p>We used to wait. One of the biggest changes that has occurred in the past century is the speed of life. Much of our technology has been utilized to make things happen so much faster, so much so that we don't have to wait for much. When Arcade Fire tells us to wait for it, they're saying something we all need to hear. The Bible really has nothing good to say about being in a hurry. In fact, the inability to wait patiently is a kind of lust that tends to lead to trouble. When you're in a hurry, you're out of sync with God. Modern man thinks everything can be made better by making it fast or instant. But God disagrees. God says, wait for it. The Bible says things like, "be still, be at rest, have patience, and wait for God". But the beast of our modern life says things like, "be loud, be upset, demand it now, wait for nothing." If we allow our souls to be conformed to the beast of a superpower culture, we become the most impatient people in history, and it explains why we can't even sleep at night!</p>