Lighthouse Faith

There's a biblical narrative that mirrors today's war in Iran and cannot be ignored. The Jewish holiday of Purim commemorates the Bible story of Queen Esther of 2,300 years ago, when the young Jewish woman confronts the Persian King Xerxes about the plot to kill all the Jews hatched by his high official Haman. The king then allows the Jews to protect themselves against their aggressors, which becomes a bloody conflict.   Today, many Jewish leaders are noting the parallels in Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who frequently touted "Death to Israel" and was killed just days before Purim began on March 2. On this episode of the Lighthouse Faith podcast, Rabbi Josh Joseph, Executive Vice President and COO of The Orthodox Union, discusses how Purim serves as a continual reminder for the Jewish people to remain diligent in their faith and identity. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

"I Can Only Imagine" is recognized as the greatest-selling Christian record of all time. Adapted into a movie of the same name in 2018, it tells the real-life struggles of MercyMe's lead singer, Bart Millard's complicated relationship with his father. Now, a sequel to the film has just been released. "I Can Only Imagine 2" digs deeper into the song, "Even If", about Millard's struggles and pain dealing with his young son's diabetes. On this episode of the Lighthouse Faith podcast, the multiple Dove Award-winning MercyMe's lead singer and songwriter, Bart Millard, talks about the film, his unshakeable faith, and the reckless love of God that endures all. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Is the Devil sexist? Yes, and No.  Satan has a war chest of spiritual deceptions in his arsenal; some are tailored specifically for women, says Christian author and speaker Emily Wilson Hussem.   It doesn't matter the age, the enemy tries to destroy women with discouragement, sorrow, and even despair in life against the particular light that women bring to the world. On this episode of Lighthouse Faith podcast, Hussem talks about her book Sincerely, Stoneheart. It's modeled after C.S. Lewis' famous book The Screwtape Letters, about a senior devil agent named Screwtape, writing to a junior agent about how to corrupt and discourage God's image bearers. While Satan attacks both men and women, there is a very specific way he goes after women. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The prophet Jeremiah warned about putting too much reliance on the heart, saying, "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?"And yet in today's nomenclature, the heart reigns supreme as the purveyor of truth, that its feelings equate with reality.  But what if the heart is filled with darkness? What if the heart leads you into spiritual depression and anxiety?   On this episode of the Lighthouse Faith podcast, Pastor Nate Pickowicz talks about his book, "Overcoming The Darkness", and his own battles with anxiety and spiritual darkness, and how the Bible has long offered solutions. This conversation differentiates between a battlefield of the mind and spiritual warfare.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Always feisty. Always blunt. The Catholic League's president, Bill Donohue, is not terribly fond of New York City's new Mayor, Zohran Mamdani. And it's not because Mayor Mamdani is Muslim. He doesn't care about that. What he cares about is the observation that Mamdani has excluded traditional religious practices, specifically, Judeo-Christian heritage. On this episode of the Lighthouse Faith podcast, Donohue unleashes a laundry list of complaints he's logged that prove his points. He also has some words for the state of Catholic higher education and how he believes they're moving from traditional Christian values to adopt a more secular agenda. Believe him or not, Bill Donohue always does his homework and has the facts to back up his claims. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The hidden war against Christians living in Nigeria is being brought to light. On this episode of Lighthouse Faith podcast Lauren is joined by CEO & Founder of Across Nigeria, Brad Brandon to raise awareness the massacre of Christians living in Nigeria, the immense violence being inflicted by dominant Islamic-based regimes living in the area and his organizations efforts to mediate the crisis. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

There are many films and documentaries about World War II and the grim reality of the Holocaust of the six million Jewish lives taken at the hands of Nazi's, and the subsequent allied victory that brought it all to an end. Or did it?  The documentary "Among Neighbors," shows the lingering effects of the cruelty of the Third Reich, when even six months after the end of the war, as Jewish survivors of the death camps returned to their homes  and villages, they found that life could never be the same with the neighbors with whom they once enjoyed a blissful co-existence. For seventy years one woman, who witnessed the brutal killing of five Jewish neighbors, kept her silence.... until now. On this episode of Lighthouse Faith podcast , filmmaker, writer and director Yoav Potash, talks about the making of the film, and why so little is known of these precarious days of supposed peace, which brought so little of it to so many. And how the malignancy of Hitler's hate continued to spread for years. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

TED Talks are 18-minute videos of influential speakers. So, here's a question: What would Jesus say if he gave a Ted Talk? Turns out, He already did some two-thousand years ago, and it's probably one of the most, if not the most, influential and profound speeches of all time. It's called the Sermon on the Mount, found in the book of Matthew. Many people may not know its name, but they know many of the golden nuggets of Jesus's core teachings that come from it, like The Lord's Prayer, "Our Father who art in heaven..." and the Beatitudes like "Blessed are those who mourn for they shall be comforted." Lauren revisits a conversation with Dr. Robert Jeffress, Senior Pastor at First Baptist Dallas, on the philosophies and Divine guidance of the Sermon on the Mount in his book, "Eighteen Minutes with Jesus: Straight Talk from the Savior about the Things that Matter Most."  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

No matter what your professed faith is, it has to be lived through relationships. It's unavoidable. Faith without interaction with other image bearers will inevitably be weak. But it's in the most intimate and close relationships that we are tested and tried to our very limits. Best-selling Christian author Lysa TerKeurst bares her soul in her books, bringing to light our greatest wants and needs. She's been frank and open about her divorce from the man who just a few years ago, she renewed vows with after the union of two decades went sour. On this episode of the Lighthouse Faith podcast, Lauren revisits her conversation with Lysa on her book, "Good Boundaries and Goodbyes: Loving Others Without Losing the Best of Who You Are." Love is complicated. It's the one lesson any spouse or parent learns, oftentimes, the hard way. But it can also bring us closer to understanding who we are, while strengthening and loving who we are meant to be. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The start of a New Year often brings a desire to renew your faith, and The Rosary in Year podcast is the perfect way to get started. It's a ten-to-fifteen-minute devotion hosted by a Franciscan monk to help people to draw closer to Jesus Christ. On this episode of the Lighthouse Faith podcast, Lauren revisits a conversation with The Rosary In A Year podcast host, Fr. Mark-Mary Ames, of the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal, who talks about the spiritual hunger in the world that's making more and more people turn away from the unsatisfying pursuits of worldly wealth and draw closer to the God who made them.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

When the white smoke billowed from the Sistine Chapel chimney Thursday evening, Fr. Roger Landry, like millions around the world, waited to see who among the 133 cardinals had just become the 267th successor to St. Peter. He knew to listen for the Latin version of the Cardinal's birth name in order to translate to a media outlet. He knew there were only four Cardinals with the first name Robert. But he was listening for "Petrus," but instead, he heard Robertus... And was shocked! This is the drama that unfolded in St. Peter's Square as tens of thousands packed into the piazza and the Via della Consilienza, cheered as the Basilica's bells peeled with joy, knowing Habemus Papem, "We have a Pope!" On this episode of the Lighthouse Faith podcast, Lauren reflects on her journey to Rome, Italy, covering the momentous event when the first American-born pope had just been elected. Fr. Landry, the National Director of Pontifical Mission Societies USA, discusses the moment that captivated the world. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

More than two thousand years ago, God broke through the barrier separating sinful humanity from a Holy God and took on human flesh in the form of a tiny baby. Christianity says all of human history had been building to that monumental event that separated time. Why did God, the creator of the universe, decide to enter our world, not as an avenging angel, but as a vulnerable and innocent baby? It's because of love. On this episode of the Lighthouse Faith podcast, Lauren revisits a conversation with best-selling author Pastor Max Lucado to talk about the true meaning of Christmas. Christmas, says Lucado, "begins what Easter celebrates." The two highest holy days of the Christian calendar are eternally linked. While Christmas has become much more commercialized with shopping and Santa taking center stage, it hasn't changed the reality that the peace and joy we talk about on Christmas cards and ad slogans flow only from this one event, the birth of Jesus: "For God so loved the world!" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In 1996 Bishop W.C. Martin and his wife Donna Martin, from the small town of Possum Trot, Texas, adopted four children out of foster care. They inspired their entire congregation of Bennett Chappell Missionary Baptist Church to adopt every available child in the county's foster care system. Twenty-two families adopted all 77 children. Many of those children were some of the hardest to place, victims of sexual and physical abuse, neglect, trauma, and unsafe living situations. Their story inspired the movie, "Sound of Hope: The Story of Possum Trot."  On this encore episode of Lighthouse Faith podcast, Lauren revisits her conversation with the Martins to discuss the film and how God's plans and purpose for our lives is far greater than we good ever imagine. The Martins highlight the role adoption and foster care played in their lives and ministry, affirming that answering the call of Jesus to look after the orphans, the least of these, is true religion. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Musician and Pastor Tauren Wells has a passion for teaching people about the joys of knowing and serving Jesus Christ. On this encore episode of Lighthouse Faith, Tauren highlights his new book Joy Bomb: Unleash Jesus's Explosive Joy for an Extraordinary Life, affirming that true joy is "rooted in God's unchanging character and boundless love for us." The book explores the Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew, revealing how happiness comes not from external things but from a changed heart, a heart that's growing in closeness to Jesus.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today marks the beginning of the Advent season, the time leading up to Christmas and the joy of Jesus' birth. Christmas and the joy of Jesus' birth. Woven through the Bible's Old Testament are hundreds of prophecies that tell of a Messiah who will be born sometime in the future. Many of the prophecies, like those in Isaiah, were written centuries before the birth of Jesus. Cumulatively, they predict the conditions of the birth, the location of the birth, who he will be born to, what he is coming to do, and so much more. Jesus fulfills every one of those prophecies. On this episode of the Lighthouse Faith podcast, Lauren revisits her conversation with Evangelist Anne Graham Lotz and investigative filmmaker Tim Mahoney delve into the prophecies of the Old Testament and the archeological evidence that shows that the core tenets of Christianity are grounded in the historical record. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday, Lauren revisits her conversation with Author and Historian, Dr. Jerry Newcombe, on the faith-steeped history of the holiday and the Pilgrims who landed in the New World. Fleeing from Europe to the New World in search of religious freedom in 1620, the Pilgrims initially intended to settle in northern Virginia, near Jamestown, where an established community already existed. But their ship was blown off course and landed instead at Plymouth, Massachusetts. And because they were in unsettled territory, the Pilgrims (before disembarking the Mayflower) created a document that became the prototype for America's Declaration of Independence and Constitution.  Lauren and Dr. Newcombe discuss the very first Thanksgiving, as the Pilgrims sat down with the Indians to share a meal, which was always about giving thanks to an Almighty God, through whose Providence they were brought to a new land.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

With season two of the Martin Scorsese production of "The Saints" now streaming on Fox Nation, Lauren revisits her conversation with the series creator, Matti Leshem, on the inspiration behind the show and the delicate storytelling behind each episode. Matt, who is Jewish, talks about working with Academy Award-winning director Martin Scorsese and how even people who aren't Catholic or Christian can be inspired by these stories of regular men and women, whose faith compelled them to unimaginable heights of bravery and courage. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Most politicians tend to write books about their accomplishments while in office. But Scott Morrison, a former Prime Minister of Australia, wanted to write about what God has done and continues to do for him. Morrison is candid about how God brought him through some of the most harrowing days of his leadership of Australia, a country not known for its religious fervor. And that's what makes Morrison's faith all the more interesting.  On this encore episode of Lighthouse Faith, Lauren revisits her conversation with former Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison on his memoir "Plans For Your Good: A Prime Minister’s Testimony Of God’s Faithfulness." It's based on the Old Testament prophet Jeremiah's prescient words to the children of Israel, and to us, "' For I know the plans I have for you,' says the Lord. 'They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.'”  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

There's a hunger in this world for God. You may not know it; you may not feel it. But the insatiable need for a transcendent love that surpasses all understanding is at the root of all our angst and anguish. Just think about the 2024 Grammy Song of the Year, "What Was I Made For?" It may be the Billie Eilish tune for the movie Barbie, but it may as well be the soundtrack of this generation's burning question: What's the purpose of my life? Why am I here? People crave answers and direction, and the path is simple: look to God. On this episode of the Lighthouse Faith podcast, I look back at a conversation with theologian, author, and Christian defender Dr. Alex McFarland to discuss my book "⁠Light For Today⁠: A 365 Day Devotional from the Lighthouse." I've rarely inserted myself as the subject of these podcasts, but I wanted to let listeners know that God is Love. And whatever needs we have, He can meet. It takes a daily walk with Him. Reading His word and listening to His voice. God works in the natural, everyday existence; in the simple, even in the seemingly mundane. God is with us. He is our refuge and strength. Original Air Date: February 24, 2024 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Born without arms or legs, Christian author and ministry founder Nick Vujicic knows what it means to be brokenhearted. After nearly taking his own life as a child, God’s grace transformed his pain into purpose. Now, 20 years into his global ministry, Vujicic discusses his new book Champions for the Brokenhearted, a call for the Church to recognize the suffering in its own pews and truly become a hospital for the hurting. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices