Word of Life Church Podcast

To be a Christian, to be a disciple of Jesus, to participate in the Revolutionary Kingdom of Christ, is to be a follower of the Lamb—the Lamb who takes away the sin of the world. But what does this mean?___________Here is the text to the prayer of St. Francis...Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace.Where there is hatred, let me sow love;where there is injury, pardon;where there is doubt, faith;where there is despair, hope;where there is darkness, light;where there is sadness, joy.O, Divine Master,grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;to be understood as to understand;to be loved as to love;For it is in giving that we receive;it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;it is in dying that we are born again to eternal life.Amen.

In the bleak landscape of death's darkness, the light of life comes as a shocking surprise. Our world is well-acquainted with the ugly reality of death and sin. This is why the life and resurrection of Jesus become the most shocking moments in human history, present, and future. Love, incarnate and resurrected, shocked the world and overcame death. As followers of a beautiful savior, how might we live faithful lives reflecting the shocking beauty of Christ?

Baptism has become a portal out of this old broken-down world and into God’s world of new creation, an escape hatch out of the kingdom of empire, power, idolatry, and injustice and into the kingdom of love. Jesus was baptized to fulfill God's plan to rescue the world. All those who follow Jesus through the waters of baptism can enter his revolutionary kingdom.

The light of Jesus reveals the obstacles, the clutter, the junk, and the unnecessary complexities in our lives. God knows we need things. We need hings to wear, things to eat, things to live in, things to drive, but the light Jesus shines on all these things is the truth that life is not found in pursuit of things. Life is found in pursuit of the kingdom. The way of Jesus is the way of kingdom-minded simplicity.

Pagan astrologers read it in the stars — a new king of the Jews had been born. And so the magi came from the Orient bearing their gifts and accidentally got tangled up with the current King of the Jews — a debauched and murderous megalomaniac named Herod who decades earlier had been made an imperial client king by the Roman Senate. Not long after that the death squads were breaking down doors and killing baby boys in Bethlehem. An angel got Mary and Joseph and the baby king out of town in the nick of time. And so the Holy Family became refugees seeking asylum in a foreign country in order to escape a violent regime in their homeland. If this all sounds very political, you’re right, it was…and it still is.

"You know what happens when a portrait that has been painted on a panel becomes obliterated through external stains. The artist does not throw away the panel, but the subject of the portrait has to come and sit for it again, and then the likeness is re-drawn on the same material. Even so was it with the All-holy Son of God. He, the Image of the Father, came and dwelt in our midst in order that He might renew mankind made after Himself."–Athanasius of Alexandria (296-373), On The Incarnation

"You know what happens when a portrait that has been painted on a panel becomes obliterated through external stains. The artist does not throw away the panel, but the subject of the portrait has to come and sit for it again, and then the likeness is re-drawn on the same material. Even so was it with the All-holy Son of God. He, the Image of the Father, came and dwelt in our midst in order that He might renew mankind made after Himself."–Athanasius of Alexandria (296-373), On The Incarnation

Isaiah anticipates a time when the earth will be arid and lifeless, and the people will be blind, deaf, and disabled. The land will be burning and the people will be blind to the problem, deaf to the word of God, and unable to do anything about it. The spiritual aridity of the people is reflected in a once lush land turning into a scorching desert. But in his Messianic poem of hope, Isaiah says something will happen that will change everything: The desert land will blossom and broken lives will be healed. What will cause there to be streams in the desert and for the lame to leap like a deer? God will come!