Christian Questions Bible Podcast

Theme Scripture: Hosea 12:3-4
Many know the story of Jacob wrestling with an angel. When we just drop in on the account and read what happened, there are many unanswered questions. Why would you pick a fight with an angel anyway? Why would an angel even let you fight? Couldn't the angel have overwhelmingly defeated Jacob even before the altercation began? What could possibly be gained by such a confrontation? Once we begin to understand who Jacob was and the experiences of his life that led up to this confrontation, it all begins to fall into place. What we will find is that Jacob lived a life filled with experiences of great faith, as well as experiences of great deception and rivalry. God allowing him to wrestle with the angel gives us a clue as to how God knows us and meets us where we are.

Theme Scripture: James 1:22
We have all heard the saying, “Life is what you make it!” It is usually at the approach of a new year or a birthday or some landmark life event when we turn our focus inward and think about changes we would like to make. Normally, these changes are aimed at finding a greater measure of happiness, health or fulfillment in our daily lives. So, what should we decide needs changing? Even more importantly, how will we decide to implement those changes? On the surface, this may sound easy, but for the vast majority of us, it is not. Life tends to get in the way, along with old habits and second thoughts. Then there is our old friend, our comfort zone! Why would we want to leave that, as it is so, well...comfortable? What can we learn from the Scriptures to help us actually implement God-honoring life changes?

Theme Scripture: Luke 2:10-11
When Jesus came to earth 2,000 years ago, he came to pay the price for Adam’s sin by willingly offering himself as a just and equal ransom price to redeem Adam - and therefore the entire human race - from sin and death. To prepare for his coming as a man, God sent the angel Gabriel to deliver preparatory messages to John the Baptist’s father Zacharias, and to Jesus’ mother Mary. Joseph would be guided by spiritually driven dreams. When Jesus was born, a whole host of angels made the announcement to some lowly shepherds who were in the fields with their flocks. When this angelic announcement came, it was prefaced with some beautiful words of assurance, "Fear not!" This reassuring “fear not” sentiment would echo repeatedly throughout Jesus’ entire ministry!
 
 

Theme Scripture: Matthew 9:35
Jesus was here 2,000 years ago. His message was clear, as he had come to pay the price for Adam’s sin. He preached, he healed, he called some to follow him, and he gave people hope. Jesus called himself “the way, the truth and the life” and announced that the “kingdom of God was at hand.” Fast forward 2,000 years, and we have to ask, where are we? It’s plainly obvious that the world has not come around to follow Jesus. And to be blunt, it is also obvious that much of the history of Christianity does not reflect well on the principles Jesus lived by and taught. So, what conclusions should we draw from all of this? Has the gospel message failed? Has the redemption Jesus promised the world just gone by the wayside, or is the gospel message doing precisely what God had always intended it to do?

Theme Scripture: John 6:44
How does someone become a follower of Christ? Does it begin by becoming curious about this Jesus person and all of the world-changing influence he has? Perhaps we are living in fear and are searching for a kind of security that is different and higher than anything else we know. Maybe we’re overwhelmed with despair in our lives, and we’re searching for powerful hope and encouragement. Or maybe we've been awakened to the realization that there is more to life than what this world has to offer - much more. While any and all of these things can play a role in coming to Christ, the one common factor in all cases of true discipleship is beyond us. It is God drawing us to Him through Jesus. So, how does that work? How can we identify the drawing of God and differentiate it from our own emotions?

Theme Scripture: Genesis 2:9
This may sound like an oversimplification, but I’m going to say it anyway: God is intentional. He always knows what He is doing and what it will eventually lead to. While this knowledge should serve as a great comfort to us, it can because of our limited and imperfect minds, have the exact opposite effect. We may see things in the Bible that on the surface just don’t seem to click. We start wondering, why would God do it THAT way? It doesn’t make any sense! Take the two trees mentioned in the creation account. Both the Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil were placed in close proximity to each other. They were both in the center of the garden. Why two trees? Why have one there to eat from daily and the other there to avoid?

Theme Scripture: Matthew 10:7-8
Life is forever busy. Whether it’s a holiday season or tax season or baseball season or following this, that and the other influencers on social media, we always have too much to do and not enough time or energy to do it. With all of this being said, how often do we stop and think about being generous? You know - just giving of our time or resources because we see a need. Built on the question of giving generously is the matter of how to go about it. How do we know what to give, how much to give and when to stop? Is generosity always appropriate? What if there is no appreciation for a gift? Is that an indication that we should focus our giving elsewhere? So many questions! It looks like the subject of freely giving needs some "generous" consideration!

Theme Scripture: Hebrews 13:20-21
Doing God’s will should be a given for any and every Christian. After all, the mere fact that we are called "Christians" implies that we follow in Jesus’ footsteps and are therefore obliged to do God’s will as Jesus did God’s will. While this all sounds pretty straightforward, the big question has to do with knowing. How do we know what the will of God is? Answering this question may be harder than we would like to think. It would be easy to assume that because we love and worship God, He will in turn show us His love by giving us the good things we want. After all, that IS what it says in Psalm 37:4: "Delight yourself in the LORD, and He will give you the desires of your heart." Sounds exciting and almost easy, but as you might have guessed, it's not. So, how do we know what God wants for us?

Theme Scripture: Luke 17:10
Every Christian will tell you that Jesus is the embodiment of righteousness, compassion and mercy. We all agree that his impact on the world came through his uncompromising actions of selfless love that led to sacrificing himself as a ransom for all of humanity. Couple these actions with his words of encouragement and uplift to any and all who would listen, and you have a model of how God’s love should unfold within humanity. It is with this resume in hand that we need to examine Jesus’ Parable of the Unprofitable Servant. It sounds like the exact opposite of all that Jesus stood for. In this parable, he seems to tell his followers that whatever they do in God’s service is what is expected of them and nothing more. What did Jesus mean? How does this harmonize with the rest of his teachings?

Theme Scripture: Hebrews 13:11
The Old Testament Law given to Moses after Israel’s deliverance from Egypt was filled with rituals and sacrifices. All of this was designed to teach God’s people two very basic principles. These principles are fundamental for any civilization that seeks to perpetuate itself. The first principle is to comply with righteous and just rules that transcend human desires. For Israel, this meant they could have the favor, protection and leadings of God if they remained in harmony with His commands. This required sacrifices. The second principle is to live with humble gratitude for the freedoms that righteousness and justice provide. Israel was to learn this power of thankfulness by practicing heart gratitude towards God for all of His mercies. This also required animal sacrifices. Why?