Guitars and Theology Podcast

I am chosenI am blessedI am brokenI am given

We are to love and to be loved. We need love, desperately.This is not a flaw. This is God's design.Receiving healthy love gives healthy identity. Not receiving healthy love damages identity, creating so many issues that drive us in life.

What's the best part of Easter Sunday? We get him back.

When we say "Christ died to save sinners," what do we mean?What are we saved for?What are we saved from?How does his death save us?Really, this message is about God's love.

When we know whose we are, then we know who we are, and why we are. Then we finally have a stable place to stand.Who am I? I am God's dearly beloved son, who brings him great pleasure.

Psalm 104 and God's total emotional openness to his entire creation.

I can't stand those kinds of peopleEveryone's got problemsThere but for the grace of God go IThere go I

This chat is about going through hard things in a way that helps God access our depths. It's really a talk about intimacy with God.

1 From the depths of despair, O Lord,    I call for your help.2 Hear my cry, O Lord.    Pay attention to my prayer.3 Lord, if you kept a record of our sins,    who, O Lord, could ever survive?4 But you offer forgiveness,    that we might learn to fear you.5 I am counting on the Lord;    yes, I am counting on him.    I have put my hope in his word.6 I long for the Lord    more than sentries long for the dawn,    yes, more than sentries long for the dawn.7 O Israel, hope in the Lord;    for with the Lord there is unfailing love.    His redemption overflows.8 He himself will redeem Israel    from every kind of sin.

Psalm 91 Those who live in the shelter of the Most High    will find rest in the shadow of the Almighty.2 This I declare about the Lord:He alone is my refuge, my place of safety;    he is my God, and I trust him.3 For he will rescue you from every trap    and protect you from deadly disease.4 He will cover you with his feathers.    He will shelter you with his wings.    His faithful promises are your armor and protection.

God, according to Deuteronomy 4:24, is "a devouring fire," yet he invites us to draw near. Let's explore this theme!

When we don't press in to know the Lord, we starve inside. We need to get in touch with our hunger and thirst for God..."I have food to eat that you don't know about...My food is to do the will of Him who sent me." (John 4:32, 34)

This chat was really about surrender and relationship with Jesus.Jeremiah 2:13 “My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water."Colossians 2:3 "Christ, in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge."Acts 4:13 "When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus."

This Wednesday Whiteboard is about a voice crying in the wilderness: John the Baptist. But it's also about us. It's about how we are likewise called to come away and find ourselves in God."And now, by God's grace, I shall become myself." (Kierkegaard)

Vague and generic isn't very powerful. But when we get specific and deal with the nitty gritty, that's when we make headway. Why? Because God is in the details!

So we did. Kind of. And other stuff too.

A short thought on Genesis 41:52, "God has made me fruitful in the land of my suffering."

I told this story from 2nd grade to the kids on the way home from school this afternoon.

This very story-driven autobiographical chat is about the reality of God being better than I dared hope. It's based on Psalm 37:4 which invites us to delight in the Lord and he will give us our heart's desires.

It is hard to swim upstream.