47: Step Away From the Boat | Listener Feedback

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Today’s episode and the next where sparked by listener comments and questions from Brandon in Louisville, Kentucky.

Brandon writes:

Hey guys. I’m a casual listener. I might have gotten through the first 10 or 12 podcast so far. Great job producing so much content consistently. A couple things.

Early on Gregg mentioned a book he was looking forward to reading by some one who was an expert in near east history. At the time I tried to google the name but couldn’t find anything. Now I have forgotten it altogether.

So, the reason for my correspondence. I’ve often been frustrated with Christian books that call for total commitment…like we are just supposed to stand there and strain every muscle and tendon in our body thinking about Jesus. I haven’t read anything by Kyle Idleman nor did I know anything about him other than what you guys have mentioned in the podcast. I recently moved to Louisville KY, and haven’t had much luck finding a church in the first couple weeks. So I decided to give Southeast Christian (the local megachurch) a try. Guess who was preaching? It rhymes with smile shy dill man. Anyway, I was really touched by the sermon on humility and I wanted to know what you all think.

In a subsequent follow-up Brandon also wrote:

also, I’d reallly love to hear you all define “love” in relationship to God and man.

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Notes from Kyle Idleman’s “The Inside-Out Way of Jesus: Humbled To Be Exalted”

These are John’s notes as he listened to Kyle Idleman’s message titled The Inside-Out Way of Jesus: Humbled To Be Exalted (week 2) from May 25, 2014.

John’s goal was to capture Idleman’s presentation in text to make it easier to analyze and think about. These notes reflect what John understood Idleman to be say (absent any of John’s thoughts or opinions about Idleman’s presentation).

Kyle Idleman’s message and these notes serve as the backdrop for the conversation John and Gregg have in Episode 47 and Episode 48.  Listen there for their thoughts and opinions.
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46: Defining Worship

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In this episode John and Gregg discuss Christian worship.  Gregg relates a discussion on worship he recently participated in.  Many of the participants were focused on the problems of hyper-subjectivity (where I equate my perceptions with reality and deem my feelings to be 100% accurate).

Yet we must likewise be careful not to say that “what I like” or “what works for me” is unimportant.  Further, as the notion of worship continued to broaden the discussion moved towards seeing worship as all-encompassing.  Yet Gregg objects: as Christians we are not supposed to be just worshipers of God. Rather, our identity and the kernel of our being is found in rightly relating to God, which is: loving God entirely (and out of that, loving ourselves rightly and loving others likewise).
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45: How and Why | Chap 4-5 of The Misunderstood God by Darin Hufford

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This week John and Gregg discuss Chapters 4 and 5 from Darin Hufford’s book The Misunderstood God: The Lies Religion Tells About God. While Gregg generally sees the book going in the right direction he expresses concern that Hufford has potentially mis-formulated or not formulated certain aspects of his message. This risks confusing or alienating the audience he’s trying to reach. For example, on page 43, Hufford states his view that our hearts are the centre of God’s attention whereas Gregg’s view is that God seeks our entire selves.

Gregg argues that understandings about God, based on personal experience in the context of Christianity, must be matched with understandings via good exegesis. Yet Hufford barely references a Bible versus, let alone demonstrates any exegetical rigor.  Gregg is concerned that given Hufford’s target audience (those who are miserable and frustrated in their spiritual lives) his approach seems somewhat self-defeating.
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44: Defining Love

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In this episode John and Gregg discuss what it means to love / be in love with God, and the nature of the “greatest commandment.”  They begin by referencing a previous conversation in Episode 40 about a Christianity Today article by Matthew Lee Anderson that is critical of “radical Christianity” in the style of Francis Chan, David Platt and Kyle Idleman.

Gregg appreciates how Anderson’s more academic perspective compliments Idleman’s more popular focus but disagrees with Anderson’s conclusions.  Particularly, Gregg notes that “embracing the providence of God in our witness to the world” (i.e., the notion that God is overseeing what goes on in the world, to good results) is legitimate yet overemphasized: things don’t always turn out well.

More so, emphasizing God’s providence closely parallels emphasizing God’s sovereignty, where the one focuses on “What God is doing” and the other typically on “Why God can do as God wishes.”  Yet not everything is about God.  So in both cases the human component (one’s choices and their benefits / consequences, the upshot of situations and choices for divine / human relationship) is essentially marginalized.
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