The Jesus Society

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A conversation about relationships, renewal & purpose in the Kingdom of God

Episodes

Monday Mar 14, 2022

Following Jesus in the 21st Century -- Part 3: The Victory of the Cross

Monday Mar 14, 2022

This is Episode 82 of the Jesus Society Podcast. And today we’re gonna continue talking about following Jesus in the 21st century. And specifically we're going to unpack the cross. And I’ve done some of this before. But I’m going to approach it a bit differently today. There are four big, overlapping Old Testament themes that converge in the cross of Jesus, and they’re all hugely important. And we have to talk about all four of those today.

So join me today as we discuss:

1. The compelling story of the cross.

2. What kind of victory was won by Jesus on the cross?

3. How western Christianity has sold ourselves short when it comes to the cross.

4. How the cross makes possible our priestly vocation in the world.

5. How the gospels have more to teach us about the meaning of the cross than we sometimes think.

6. How Jesus inaugurates the Kingdom of God on earth as in heaven through defeating the powers of evil.

7. How the cross redefines power.

8. The importance of the temple in understanding the cross.

9. Why Jesus chose the Passover as the time to die for the world.

10. Why the cross is about far more than just dealing with our moral failures.

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As always, we’d appreciate it if you’d tell others about the podcast. If you enjoy the show, please subscribe, rate and review us on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Please visit us on our Facebook page for The Jesus Society Podcast (@JesusSocietyPodcast). And check out our website — https://thejesussociety.com/.

You can also find episodes of The Jesus Society podcast onto YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCEy1ppP5RWd3jXPc6bI6WuQ/) and Odysee (https://odysee.com/@TheJesusSocietyPodcast:6). If you search for The Jesus Society Podcast on either YouTube or Odysee, you’ll find us.

And, if you’d like to support the show and our related ministry, click on the “Support TJS” link on the Jesus Society website to find out how (https://thejesussociety.com/).

Thanks for listening!

And remember, you are greatly loved.

Music and audio production by Nathan Longwell Music

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Resources for Today’s Show:

1. The Jesus Society Podcast, Episode 7 (April 20, 2020) — The Story of the Bible - Part 7: What REALLY Happened on the Cross? (https://thejesussociety.com/2020/04/20/tjs-podcast-episode-7-the-story-of-the-bible-part-7-what-really-happened-on-the-cross/)

2. William D. Edwards, Wesley J. Gabel, and Floyd E. Hosmer, “On the Physical Death of Jesus Christ,” Journal of the American Medical Association (Vol. 255, No. 11, March 21, 1986), available at https://thejesussociety.com/2022/03/14/the-medical-side-of-the-crucifixion/

Monday Mar 07, 2022

Following Jesus in the 21st Century -- Part 2: Discipleship and God’s Kingdom Agenda

Monday Mar 07, 2022

This is Episode 81 of the Jesus Society Podcast. And today we’re continuing our talk about what it means to follow Jesus in the 21st century.

The first piece of this, which we got into last week, had to do with some of the biblical background to the kingdom of God, and Jesus’ statement in Mark 1 that “the time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand.” Because if we’re going to follow Jesus, we’ve got to understand something about what he’s up to.

And the point that we tried to make last week is that in Jesus, God is at last coming to fulfill his age-old purposes. His purposes for Israel, his purposes for the human race, his purposes through Israel for the human race, and through the human race for the world.

Join us today as we discuss:

1. Saved from creation or saved for creation?

2. How the story of Israel and the story of God both intersect in Jesus.

3. The gritty call to discipleship

4. God's Kingdom agenda and the part he wants us to play.

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Please visit us on our Facebook page for The Jesus Society Podcast (@JesusSocietyPodcast). And check out our website — https://thejesussociety.com/.

And, if you’d like to support the show and our related ministry, click on the “Support TJS” link on the Jesus Society website to find out how (https://thejesussociety.com/).

Thanks for listening!

And remember, you are greatly loved.

Music and audio production by Nathan Longwell Music

_______________________

Resources for Today’s Show:

1. The Jesus Society Podcast, Episode 7 (April 6, 2020) — The Story of the Bible - Part 5: Did God Give Up on Israel? (https://thejesussociety.com/2020/04/06/tjs-podcast-the-story-of-the-bible-part-5-did-god-give-up-on-israel/)

2. The Jesus Society Podcast, Episode 7 (April 20, 2020) — The Story of the Bible - Part 7: What REALLY Happened on the Cross? (https://thejesussociety.com/2020/04/20/tjs-podcast-episode-7-the-story-of-the-bible-part-7-what-really-happened-on-the-cross/)

Monday Feb 28, 2022

Following Jesus in the 21st Century — Part 1: The Kingdom of God is at Hand

Monday Feb 28, 2022

This is Episode 80 of the Jesus Society Podcast. And today we’re going to begin a series that I think I’m gonna call Following Jesus in the 21st Century. And the first piece of that, which is today's episode, has to do with the call of Jesus to discipleship — what that means, what’s the biblical background to that, and what on earth Jesus intends both for us and what he intends to do through us.

And this, of course, touches on all sorts of things — purpose, hope, meaning — all things I think we’d all say we’d like some clarity on.

So join me today as we discuss:

1. The purpose of God as background to our calling (what on earth is God up to?)

2. What does Jesus mean in Mark 1:14 when he says, "The time is fulfilled . . . .?" What “time” is Jesus talking about? In what sense is it fulfilled?

3. The Old Testament background leading up to "the time."

4. How the exile fits into all of this.

5. What it means for God to become King? After all, isn’t God always King? — judge doesn’t mean to condemn or destroy — it means to make everything right at last.

6. Understanding the concept of judgment (because that's important, too).

7. Wrestling with how the kingdom and the cross fit together.

8. Two very different kinds of churches today.

9. How the call of Abraham, and Aaron, and Elijah, and David serve as models to our call to discipleship.

10. God's singular purpose from Genesis 1 to day.

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As always, we’d appreciate it if you’d tell others about the podcast. If you enjoy the show, please subscribe, rate and review us on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, AND now also on Amazon Music.

Please visit us on our Facebook page for The Jesus Society Podcast (@JesusSocietyPodcast). And check out our website — https://thejesussociety.com/.

And, if you’d like to support the show and our related ministry, click on the “Support TJS” link on the Jesus Society website to find out how (https://thejesussociety.com/).

Thanks for listening!

And remember, you are greatly loved.

Music and audio production by Nathan Longwell Music

_______________________

Resources for Today’s Show:

1. Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church, by N. T. Wright (https://www.amazon.com/Surprised-Hope-Rethinking-Resurrection-Mission/dp/0061551821/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?)

2. Justice in the Kingdom of God (https://thejesussociety.com/2020/06/20/justice-in-the-kingdom-of-god/)

3. What it means to Reign in Life (https://thejesussociety.com/2021/05/24/tjs-podcast-what-it-means-to-reign-in-life-in-rom-517-episode-63/)

Monday Feb 21, 2022

How to Find Answers to Biblical Questions

Monday Feb 21, 2022

This is Episode 79 of the Jesus Society Podcast. And on today’s episode, we're going to talk about how to find answers in the Bible to our questions.

Well, when he first asked me to do this, I thought it would be simple, but the more I've ruminated on it, the less simple it’s become. And that's true in part because there is a dizzying array of misinformation about the Bible out there. And that leave a lot of Christians terribly confused about what the Bible does, and doesn’t say.

So how do we sort through all that and get to the truth? That’s the question. So I’m going to jump in today to where angels fear to tread and have a go at sorting some of that out. So buckle in and hold on.\

So join me as we discuss:

1. Three challenges in understanding the Bible.

2. What kind of book is the Bible?

3. Who was the Bible written to?

4. The challenge of going back in time.

5. How we create our own problems in reading the Bible.

6. Three helpful suggestions for finding answers.

7. The two MOST helpful suggestions in all this.

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As always, we’d appreciate it if you’d tell others about the podcast. If you enjoy the show, please subscribe, rate and review us on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, AND now also on Amazon Music.

Please visit us on our Facebook page for The Jesus Society Podcast (@JesusSocietyPodcast). And check out our website — https://thejesussociety.com/.

And, if you’d like to support the show and our related ministry, click on the “Support TJS” link on the Jesus Society website to find out how (https://thejesussociety.com/).

Thanks for listening!

And remember, you are greatly loved.

Music and audio production by Nathan Longwell Music
_______________________
Resources for Today’s Show:
1. The Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, NRSV (https://www.amazon.com/Cultural-Backgrounds-Study-Hardcover-Comfort/dp/0310452686/ref=sr_1_5?)
2. The NIV Study Bible (https://www.amazon.com/Study-Revised-Hardcover-Letter-Comfort/dp/0310448948/ref=sr_1_4?)
3. Christian Standard Version Bible (https://www.amazon.com/Study-Bible-Hardcover-Bibles-Holman/dp/1433648091/ref=sr_1_4?)
3. The Bible for Everyone, by John Goldingay and N. T. Wright (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0281074011/ref=ox_sc_saved_image_7?).
4. An Exhaustive Concordance matching your favorite translation.
5. Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (https://www.christianbook.com/eerdmans-dictionary-of-the-bible/9780802877437/pd/877438?)
6. The Old Testament for Everyone Commentary Set, by John Goldingay — 17 Volumes, but also available one at a time (https://www.amazon.com/Old-Testament-Everyone-Set-Seventeen/dp/0664261760/ref=sr_1_1?)
7. New Testament for Everyone Commentary Set, by N. T. Wright — 18 Volumes, but also available one at a time (https://www.amazon.com/New-Testament-Everyone-Set-Eighteen/dp/0664238262/ref=sr_1_3?)

Monday Nov 08, 2021

What the Church is Supposed to Be

Monday Nov 08, 2021

This is Episode 78 of The Jesus Society Podcast, and today’s podcast is something I’ve been thinking about and working on for a very long time.

Now, before you listen to today’s episode, I highly encourage you to go back and listen to last week’s episode, which is an episode I did early in 2020, but which I re-released last week because it provides some important background for what I’m going to be talking about today. I think this episode will have more impact if you listen to last week’s episode first.

So with that out of the way, the crux of the issue is this: For most of us, when we talk about “the church,” lots of things come to mind. After two thousand years, we’ve all got a lot of history and hangups and baggage wrapped around that word, some of it good, some of it not so good, and some of it that rightfully makes us cringe. A lot of you, like me, have been hurt by church. And that itself creates a fog that’s hard to see through and see past.

And all those things come flooding to the forefront whenever we hear the word “church,” and that prevents us, I think, from understanding the church and seeing the church as intended to be seen.

And yet, the church, as I resolutely maintain, is God’s idea. It’s a good thing. The Bible refers to the church as the bride of Christ (Eph. 5:25-27).

And so the challenge is, how do we understand and talk about the church without all of that other stuff getting in the way? What is the church supposed to be in the world? That’s what I want to try and provide some clarity to today.

Join me today as we discuss:

1. The challenge of talking about the church.

2. The church and the Jesus Society.

3. The struggle to articulate a vision of the church that is true to the biblical picture without the grime and grit that often clouds that picture.

4. Guess who else has been working on this?

5. What kind of communities was the Apostle Paul trying to establish and build in the first century in his Kingdom work throughout the Roman Empire?

6. Descriptor #1 - Jesus-Honoring

7. Descriptor #2 - Edifying

8. Descriptor #3 - Egalitarian

9. Descriptor #4 - Philanthropic

10. Descriptor #5 - Fictive Kinship Groups

11. So what do we do with this in the 21st century?

12. The challenge of holding together the two critical virtues of holiness and unity in the church.

The kinds of Christian communities Paul was creating changed the world.

I think they still can.

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As always, we’d appreciate it if you’d tell others about the podcast. If you enjoy the show, please subscribe, rate and review us on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, AND now also on Amazon Music.

Please visit us on our Facebook page for The Jesus Society Podcast (@JesusSocietyPodcast). And check out our NEW website — https://thejesussociety.com/.

And, as we continue to try and grow our audience, we’re currently loading all episodes of The Jesus Society podcast onto YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCEy1ppP5RWd3jXPc6bI6WuQ/) and Odysee (https://odysee.com/@TheJesusSocietyPodcast:6). If you search for The Jesus Society Podcast on either YouTube or Odysee, you’ll find us.

And, if you’d like to support the show and our related ministry, click on the “Support TJS” link on the Jesus Society website to find out how (https://thejesussociety.com/).

Thanks for listening!

And remember, you are greatly loved.

Music and audio production by Nathan Longwell Music

_______________________

Resources for Today’s Show:

1. The Jesus Society Podcast: “TJS Rewind - Attractive Christianity (Episode 77, November 1, 2021).”

2. “Who Was the Apostle Paul and Why Does He Still Matter?” The Ask N. T. Wright Anything Podcast, Episode 87 (October 14, 2021).

3. N. T. Wright, Paul: A Biography (HarperOne, 2018).

4. Rodney Stark, The Rise of Christianity: A Sociologist Reconsiders History (Princeton University Press, 1996).

Monday Nov 01, 2021

TJS Rewind: The Attraction of Christianity

Monday Nov 01, 2021

Today's episode is a TJS Rewind episode, originally recorded last year. I'm republishing it today because it provides some important background material for the episode I'm planning to release next week.

Today I want to delve into early church history a bit. I think studying church history is important. And here’s why: If you don’t understand where you’ve come from, you have no ability to critique where you are. So I want us to spend some time looking at what Christianity looked like and how it functioned within the broader society in the roughly 300 years after Jesus.

AND how all that informs our faith and our lives with Jesus today.
Join me today as we discuss:
1. Christianity by the numbers - how much the early church grew and how fast.
2. How and why the early church grew.
3. What was the attraction in early Christianity.
4. Jesus, Origen, and being lights in the world.
5. The importance of virtue and friendship
6. What is supposed to happen when the church gathers vs. what we think is supposed to happen.
7. Why people became Christians in the first century
8. The importance of individual charity in the early church.
9. Is Christianity still attractive today?
10. Disaffiliated Christians today and what might be attractive to them. It's not what you think.
11. Attractive Christians vs. attractive church services. They're not the same thing.
12. The first time I went to church after giving my life to the Lord, and what it teaches us.
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As always, we’d appreciate it if you’d tell others about the podcast. If you enjoy the show, please subscribe, rate and review us on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, AND now also on Amazon Music.

Please visit us on our Facebook page for The Jesus Society Podcast (@JesusSocietyPodcast). And check out our NEW website — https://thejesussociety.com/.

And, if you’d like to support the show and our related ministry, click on the “Support TJS” link on the Jesus Society website to find out how (https://thejesussociety.com/).

Thanks for listening!

And remember, you are greatly loved.

Music and audio production by Nathan Longwell Music

_______________________

Monday Oct 25, 2021

Reformation Redux: Faith vs. Works

Monday Oct 25, 2021

This is Episode 76 of The Jesus Society Podcast, today I want to revisit a subject most Christians have fussed about since the Reformation. And that is the idea of faith and works. This is not an unimportant topic, but I believe it has been polarized by the issues of the Reformation, and that polarization has caused us to lose sight of some things and to see both of these things with the clarity that Scripture demands. Those things are what I hope to try and sort out today.

Join me today as we discuss:

1. The briefest history of the Protestant Reformation.

2. The Protestant evolution and how these issues have played out over the last 500 years.

3. Understanding the "faith only" camp.

4. Understanding the "other" camp.

5. Two definitions of "faith."

6. The biblical perspective on faith.

7. The biblical perspective of works.

8. The book of James to the rescue.

9. How the Enlightenment has caused us to obsess about the wrong things in this issue.

10. Faith and works - two sides of the same coin?

11. Some wise words from N. T. Wright.

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As always, we’d appreciate it if you’d tell others about the podcast. If you enjoy the show, please subscribe, rate and review us on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, AND now also on Amazon Music.

Please visit us on our Facebook page for The Jesus Society Podcast (@JesusSocietyPodcast). And check out our website — https://thejesussociety.com/.

And, if you’d like to support the show and our related ministry, click on the “Support TJS” link on the Jesus Society website to find out how (https://thejesussociety.com/).

Thanks for listening!

And remember, you are greatly loved.

Music and audio production by Nathan Longwell Music

_______________________

Resources for Today’s Show:

1. Matthew W. Bates, Salvation by Allegiance Alone: Rethinking Faith, Works, and the Gospel of Jesus the King (Baker Academic, 2017).

2. Matthew W. Bates, Gospel Allegiance: What Faith in Jesus Misses for Salvation in Christ (Brazos Press, 2019).

Monday Sep 20, 2021

Dealing with Difficult People

Monday Sep 20, 2021

This is Episode 75 of The Jesus Society Podcast, and today I want to talk about dealing with difficult people. And the reason I want to talk about this today is that I’ve been dealing with some difficult people over the last few weeks.

If you don't ever have any problems dealing with difficult people, then perhaps you can just skip this episode, but if, like many of us, you struggle to know how to deal with difficult people, then you might just find a few things in this episode that'll help.

Join me today as we discuss:

1. Some of the types of difficult people we encounter.

2. Some biblical guardrails to help govern our interactions with difficult people and at least keep us from getting off into the ditches.

3. The tricky business of dealing with fools.

4. How the book of Nehemiah can really help us when it comes to difficult people.

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As always, we’d appreciate it if you’d tell others about the podcast. If you enjoy the show, please subscribe, rate and review us on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, AND now also on Amazon Music.

Please visit us on our Facebook page for The Jesus Society Podcast (@JesusSocietyPodcast). And check out our NEW website — https://thejesussociety.com/.

And, if you’d like to support the show and our related ministry, click on the “Support TJS” link on the Jesus Society website to find out how (https://thejesussociety.com/).

Thanks for listening!

And remember, you are greatly loved.

Music and audio production by Nathan Longwell Music

_______________________

Resources for Today’s Show:

1. Henry Cloud and John Townsend, Boundaries Updated and Expanded Edition: When to Say Yes, How to Say No To Take Control of Your Life Paperback (2017)

Monday Aug 30, 2021

Discovering God's Plan for Your Life

Monday Aug 30, 2021

This is Episode 74 of the Jesus Society Podcast. And I’m still not ready to pick up our discussion of the Lord’s Prayer again. I apologize for that — I don’t like to start stuff and not complete it — but I’m not getting traction there, and until the Lord and I find a way to get some traction, I’m just going to lay it aside for a while.

But what I do want to talk about today is discovering God’s plan for your life. And to do that, I want to start by looking at possibly the most famous of all Bible passages, at least for modern Western Christians, and that is Jeremiah 29:11, which says this:

"For I know the plans I have for you”— this is the Lord’s declaration— “plans for your well-being, not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.”

So with that as our starting point, join me today as we discuss:

1. Understanding Jeremiah 29:11 in context

2. The message for us from Jeremiah 29:11.

3. Do you need to know God's plan for your life in order for it to come to pass?

4. Four absolute, beautiful, freeing truths about God's plan for your life.

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As always, we’d appreciate it if you’d tell others about the podcast. If you enjoy the show, please subscribe, rate and review us on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, AND now also on Amazon Music.

Please visit us on our Facebook page for The Jesus Society Podcast (@JesusSocietyPodcast). We’ve also got a Facebook group for the Jesus Society Podcast. Also, check out our NEW website — https://thejesussociety.com/.

And, if you’d like to support the show and our related ministry, click on the “Support TJS” link on the Jesus Society website to find out how (https://thejesussociety.com/).

Thanks for listening!

And remember, you are greatly loved.

Music and audio production by Nathan Longwell Music

_______________________

Resources for Today’s Show:

1. Wayne Jacobsen, He Loves Me: Learning to Live in the Father’s Affection. Newbury Park, CA: Windblown Media, 2007. (https://www.amazon.com/dp/0964729253/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_0KME1TA9SN35481CH5EW)

Monday Aug 16, 2021

When Life Overwhelms You

Monday Aug 16, 2021

This is Episode 73 of the Jesus Society Podcast (NOT Episode 3 as I say in the recording). And we are NOT continuing our discussion today of the Lord’s Prayer. Frankly, I've been a little overwhelmed by life lately. So that's what we're going to talk about today -- WHY I've been feeling overwhelmed, and what to do to maintain sanity, connection, and peace during the all-too common times life this.

Join me today as we discuss:

1. What's going on in my life and why I'm feeling overwhelmed.

2. Some steps to take to help manage life and retain your sanity and stability when you're feeling overwhelmed.

3. The importance of rest, disengaging, and finding perspective.

4. Setting healthy boundaries for yourself and others as a strategy to manage the overwhelmedness.

5. Learning to triage your life.

6. Why you absolutely MUST maintain healthy connections with the people in your tribe during overwhelmedness.

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As always, we’d appreciate it if you’d tell others about the podcast. If you enjoy the show, please subscribe, rate and review us on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, AND now also on Amazon Music.

And, if you’d like to support the show and our related ministry, click on the “Support TJS” link on the Jesus Society website to find out how (https://thejesussociety.com/).

Thanks for listening!

And remember, you are greatly loved.

Music and audio production by Nathan Longwell Music

_______________________