Homebrewed Christianity » » LectioCast

Welcome to the Surviving the Bible podcast. This is a lectionary podcast not just for pastors or preachers, but for Bible nerds everywhere. Each week Christian and Amy Piatt (from the Homebrewed CultureCast) and Tripp Fuller (from the Homebrewed Christianity podcast) explore the bible readings for the week. You’ll get three different perspectives on three different texts to help you survive reading the Bible. This week is Trinity Sunday. Christian takes a look at Isaiah 6:1-8, John 3:1-17, and Romans 8:12-17. He explains why he hears more of a Pentecost message in these texts, gives us an overview of the themes in this Sunday’s texts, how we are similar to Isaiah and what Isaiah can teach us today, not second-guessing God, leaving the ways we have viewed ourselves and others behind to make room for new life, the rebirth of Isaiah into a spiritual calling, Jesus inviting people into a similar calling, Paul’s explanation of the need to transcend the cycle of inheritance, and the breaking down of divisions and hierarchy. Plus, the connection to the Pentecost message, being mindful of our role as path-forgers, not gate-keepers, and tearing down barriers between humanity and the divine. Amy tackles John 3:1-17 and shares what Michaelangelo’s process for sculpting has to do with Nicodemus, the important context for John 3 which a lot of people overlook, what it means to be born of the Spirit, the uncertainty of God’s Spirit, and the shame that prevents us from being reborn.

Welcome to the Surviving the Bible podcast. This is a lectionary podcast not just for pastors or preachers, but for Bible nerds everywhere. Each week Christian and Amy Piatt (from the Homebrewed CultureCast) and Tripp Fuller (from the Homebrewed Christianity podcast) explore the bible readings for the week. You’ll get three different perspectives on three different texts to help you survive reading the Bible. This week is Pentecost. Tripp kicks of with a look at Acts 2:1-21. First, he gives some context for the text (just in case you haven’t been using the Acts texts the past few weeks), then explains how the Kingdom of God has always been the agenda of the Spirit in Luke-Acts, the ongoing investment of the Spirit in the world, how easy it is to get distracted by what Pentecost has come to mean, and our responsibility to the Spirit’s mission. Plus Tripp helps us not to get too freaked out about speaking in tongues by giving us 4 observations about glossolalia that help us in these divisive times. Christian takes a different look at the Pentecost moment. He shows the similarities between Pentecost and the Last Supper, the openness of the disciples to something from God happening to them, the commissioning of reconciliation, and Christian shares his own Pentecost moment. Amy is focusing on the Holy Spirit in John 15:26-27 and 16:4b-15. She draws upon 4 of her favorite sources for articulating the experience of and relationship to the Holy Spirit: Romans 8, her daughter Zoe, Richard Rohr, and Frederick Buechner, and asks – will we allow ourselves to be moved by the Spirit, or not? will we allow it to become a part of who we are?

Welcome to the Surviving the Bible podcast. This is a lectionary podcast not just for pastors or preachers, but for Bible nerds everywhere. Each week Christian and Amy Piatt (from the Homebrewed CultureCast) and Tripp Fuller (from the Homebrewed Christianity podcast) explore the bible readings for the week. You’ll get three different perspectives on three different texts to help you survive reading the Bible. This week is the seventh Sunday of Easter. Both Amy and Christian take a look at John 17:6-19 this week, but from very different angles. Christian focuses on the moment when Jesus asks the gospel messengers to be sanctified and asks: what’s so special about this moment? He talks about the challenge to dualistic thinking, the inseparability of the physical and the divine, where we seek wisdom, meaning, and purpose, accepting our divine role, and what happens when we treat morality like the spoon in the Matrix. Amy focuses on the very human experience of longing for wholeness. She talks about our desire of being one with God, the struggle we all have for wholeness, living out our unity with God, the highest calling for followers of Jesus, and the obstacles to unity and wholeness. What will make us whole? How do we grow into belonging?

Welcome to the Surviving the Bible podcast. This is a lectionary podcast not just for pastors or preachers, but for Bible nerds everywhere. Each week Christian and Amy Piatt (from the Homebrewed CultureCast) and Tripp Fuller (from the Homebrewed Christianity podcast) explore the bible readings for the week. You’ll get three different perspectives on three different texts to help you survive reading the Bible. This week is the sixth Sunday of Easter. Tripp looks at Acts 10:44-48 and explains why this is such an important turning point in the life of the church. First, he helps to set the stage for this text by looking at Peter and Cornelius – the first conversion of a gentile who didn’t have to convert to Judaism first. Then, he gives us some historical context for the inclusion of gentiles and how it disrupted the life of the church, discusses how the Spirit of God moves against tradition and the assumptions of the community (including privileged assumptions about who is included), and what Peter’s courage can teach leaders today. Christian gets psychological this week. The theme? Growing up and living into the fullness of what we are made to be. Jesus is modeling and inviting us into this life. what defines being a grown-up? why are we pursuing an obedience to God in the first place? what is our motivation? Christian also talks about the shift from from focusing on bettering ourselves to improving others and the world, self-actualization, meta-cognition, and learning to introspect. Amy asks if it is possible to be a true friend and not also a servant. In John 15:9-17, Jesus calls his disciples friends. Amy looks at what is significant about this, the both/and of friendship and service, the challenge of true friendship in our society today, the covenant of love, and the consequences of choosing to live a life of love.    

Welcome to the Surviving the Bible podcast. This is a lectionary podcast not just for pastors or preachers, but for Bible nerds everywhere. Each week Christian and Amy Piatt (from the Homebrewed CultureCast) and Tripp Fuller (from the Homebrewed Christianity podcast) explore the bible readings for the week. You’ll get three different perspectives on three different texts to help you survive reading the Bible. This week is the fifth Sunday of Easter. Tripp takes a look at Acts 8:26-40 – the story of Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch. This is the first salvation story of a Gentile and demonstrates to us that the very heart of the gospel reorganizes our relationship to organized religion and tradition and pushes us into a more life-affirming stance. Tripp also offers some context for this story in the larger biblical narrative, the ways we justify excluding people, what this encounter is demonstrating, and how we sometimes serve the text before we serve the spirit. Christian addresses 1 John 4:7-21. Love, life, Jesus, and God are all intertwined in this passage. Christian draws out some connections between this text and the gospel text, the symbols of the grape vine and branches, and the vulnerability of God and God’s dependence on us, the importance of not just saying we love, but living it out, and helps us understand what perfect love might really mean (and a brief lesson in Greek). Last week Amy talked about sheep, and this week she’s talking about grapes and wine in John 15:1-8. Amy tells us about the importance of pruning for good fruit, how new vines are planted, and why that is important for reading this passage. Plus, she shares about times in her life when she’s been pruned, what happens when we focus on just one grape instead of the whole vine, and what it means to abide in God.

Welcome to the first episode of the Surviving the Bible podcast. This is a lectionary podcast not just for pastors or preachers, but for Bible nerds everywhere. Each week Christian and Amy Piatt (from the Homebrewed CultureCast) and Tripp Fuller (from the Homebrewed Christianity podcast) explore the bible readings for the week. You’ll get three different perspectives on three different texts to help you survive reading the Bible. This week is the fourth Sunday of Easter. Tripp looks at the Acts 4:5-12 story of Peter healing the lame man. He suggests that if you pay attention to the Acts passage from last week, this story becomes so much larger than how the last verse is usually understood. When understood in its context, it asks some pretty powerful questions, like, what does the word “saved” mean in this text? It brings to the surface the problems of empire Christianity, how the healing itself confronts ritual purity laws, the sociological category of “sinners,” and challenging to the content of faith, not the form of it. Christian gives us an overview of this week’s texts and points at some larger themes found therein. We just got through Easter – after a long slog through Lent – and yet here we are, already getting texts about death and darkness. He talks about the shift of leadership and how the sheep have now become the shepherds, disciples performing miracles and deemed a threat to the state, and how there’s so much more to Psalm 23 than just feeling comforted.   Amy tackles John 10:11-18. She gives us a quick lesson about sheep, explores social science about kids on playgrounds, and explains why that’s relevant. Plus, how challenging the boundaries is different than having them removed altogether, why having fewer choices might not be what we need, dismissing people as sheep, and the boundaries of the church (both the good and the bad).  

It’s Holy Week, and Tripp, Amy and Christian are here on the LectioCast to help you survive Easter. John 20:1-18 | Amy shares the Easter message she would preach, the calling out of Mary’s name and the importance of the act of naming, the significance of Jesus the gardener, opening ourselves to truth, being broken open by suffering, what we’ve missed about the resurrection, and how it relates to Genesis 3. 1 Corinthians 15:1-11 | Tripp shares his frustration with this passage and how this (and others) are used to kick people out for not ‘believing’ the correct thing, the invitation to be resurrected, the urgency of the message, and can you believe God really does anything? Acts 10:34-43 | Tripp tries to convince Amy that this is the text she should preach on Easter, the resurrection as the rupture of Peter’s understanding of the gospel, how the proper affirmation of the resurrection removes the barriers to our embodied existence, and being witnesses to transformation. Plus, Christ is risen, he is risen indeed? Who are our Easter services for? And don’t forget you can enter to win some sweet new bibles from our friends at the Common English Bible.

This week is the Palm Sunday Edition of the LectioCast: the Triumphal Entry versus the Annunciation. Christian tries to convince Amy and Tripp that they should preach on the Annunciation texts, and not the triumphal entry, by showing how they’re connected. In Isaiah 7:10-14, Christian tells us about the scandal of particularity, and being participants in Easter without making it about us. Then Tripp and Amy turn to the triumphal entry in Mark 11:1-11 and how we’ve lost the significance of Palm Sunday, the messianic secret and the turn towards Jerusalem, the contrast between Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem and the Roman Army’s entry before Passover, the real threat Jesus poses, and the conflict of two different types of power. Plus, how throwing a party that celebrates our ignorance is good news, David and Goliath as the opening match for Jesus and Pilate, the power at play in re-reading a text, and the anxiety surrounding our own agency and the possibility of transformation. And don’t forget you can enter to win some sweet new bibles from our friends at the Common English Bible.

This week on the LectioCast Tripp gives you your Bible-nerd fact of the day, you’ll hear about why David is like the Harvey Weinstein of the Hebrew Bible, what Mandy Moore has to do with the Psalms, and our avoidance of suffering. First up, Jeremiah 31:31-34. Tripp once again gives you many options for preaching this text: who has access to God in the new covenant? the tension between institutions and movements, the democratization of God, the deep political divisions latent in the passage, and how new life is stymied by needing to be right in that divide. In the Psalm (51:1-12) we see David’s internal struggle and our uncomfortability with God using someone like David for something good. For Hebrews 5:5-10, Tripp helps explain how the text can short-circuit latent penal-substitutionary atonement interpretations by noticing what it doesn’t say, how Jesus’ faithfulness helps re-frame our understanding of sin and salvation, and how Jesus changes the job description of high priest. Lastly, in John 12:20-33, Christian and Amy talk about our inability to recognize the truth right in front of us, the requirements of transformation, what is truly necessary to be born again, and hurting for the right reasons. Plus, Amy gives some advice and reasons for engaging in contemplative practices. And don’t forget you can enter to win some sweet new bibles from our friends at the Common English Bible.

This week on the LectioCast you’ll hear about snakes on a stick (Numbers 21:4-9), Eddie Izzard, and Princess Leia. Christian and Amy Piatt join Tripp to talk about some of the problems of reading this passage literally, the role this text plays in the relationship between God and Israel, those wilderness times in our lives, and what this has to do with a cake or death decision. They’ll also tackle the most important verse in the whole bible: John 3:16. Plus, those other ones nearby: John 3:14-21. Why do we so often life this passage out of context and use it as a test of faith? How can we avoid using this text to harass people? Plus the way John connects the cross with the snake in numbers. Lastly, Ephesians 2:1-10. What is the difference between grace and mercy? Do we often miss the really radical part of grace? How does this text help us shift our economic understandings of how grace and mercy work? And don’t forget you can enter to win some sweet new bibles from our friends at the Common English Bible. If you want to join the Surviving the Bible for Lent group, it’s not too late! Sure, we all know Bible verses and may have even tried to read the “whole Bible,” maybe even more than once. But it can be confusing, contradictory and – if we’re being honest – really freaking boring in places. But there’s another way to approach scripture that can actually make sense, and might even be enjoyable. Join the CultureCast’s Amy and Christian Piatt, along with Tripp, in figuring out how to “Survive the Bible” together this Lent.

This edition of the LectioCast is from the second live session of Surviving the Bible for Lent, with Tripp and Christian and Amy Piatt. They take a look at the texts for the second Sunday in Lent (Exodus 20:1-17; Psalm 19; 1 Corinthians 1:18-25; John 2:13-22). Tripp gives you 3 different sermons you can preach for Lent using this text, Amy helps us find our true selves, and Christian helps us see the Good News, but difficult news, of Lent. The 10 commandments – what are we supposed to do with them? What if they are descriptive not prescriptive? Is Jesus cleansing the temple righteous anger or something else? Did Jesus break one of the commandments? Plus, the importance of giving up the rules, our identities, our titles – anything we’ve created that we’re attached to, the completeness of God’s law in the Psalm, and the transrational nature of the crucifixion. And don’t forget you can enter to win some sweet new bibles from our friends at the Common English Bible. If you want to join the Surviving the Bible for Lent group, it’s not too late! Sure, we all know Bible verses and may have even tried to read the “whole Bible,” maybe even more than once. But it can be confusing, contradictory and – if we’re being honest – really freaking boring in places. But there’s another way to approach scripture that can actually make sense, and might even be enjoyable. Join the CultureCast’s Amy and Christian Piatt, along with Tripp, in figuring out how to “Survive the Bible” together this Lent.

This special edition of the LectioCast is from the first live session of Surviving the Bible for Lent, with Tripp and Christian and Amy Piatt. They take a look at the texts for the second Sunday in Lent (Mark 8:31-38; Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16; Romans 4:13-25) plus a brief look at last week’s texts. They talk about the Transfiguration, Peter as object lesson, the willing surrender of control, and Christus Victor. can we reconcile a Christus Victor christology with a willingly vulnerable God/Christ? what does it mean to call Jesus the Christ? was Jesus really tempted? They also cover the ways these texts have been used to justify suffering, oppression, and abuse, the covenant between God and Abraham, the genesis of the Genesis passage, how the mistranslation of one of the proper names of God radically changes our understanding of the passage, and the importance of the maternal lineage and parental role of God in these passages. Plus everyone wrestles with Paul about the difference between Law and Covenant And don’t forget you can enter to win some sweet new bibles from our friends at the Common English Bible. If you want to join the Surviving the Bible for Lent group, it’s not too late! Sure, we all know Bible verses and may have even tried to read the “whole Bible,” maybe even more than once. But it can be confusing, contradictory and – if we’re being honest – really freaking boring in places. But there’s another way to approach scripture that can actually make sense, and might even be enjoyable. Join the CultureCast’s Amy and Christian Piatt, along with Tripp, in figuring out how to “Survive the Bible” together this Lent.

The lectionary this week is daring you to dodge Genesis 22. I talk about the other texts, but how do you pass on Genesis 22! In this episode I mention… Kierkegaard’s Fear and Trembling Derrida’s The Gift of Death Gerhard von Rad’s Genesis, Revised Edition: A Commentary James Kugel’s The Bible As It Was

This week on the lectiocast I took some advice from twitter, which is tantamount to a genius, and attempted to sing the introduction to the episode. If the Good Dr. Daniel Kirk returns early to the podcast you will know why… he wants to sing. The texts for the week include Jesus getting hardcore with his disciples in Matthew 10:24-39, Paul talking about participation in Christ in Romans 6:1-11, and one of the most terrifying texts of all scripture, Genesis 21:8-21. If you dare to tackle the Genesis text then you really need to go read the Phyllis Trible chapter on it in the book below. It’s so good you might cry. During the episode I mention a couple of books including… Romans (Chalice Commentaries for Today) by David Lull and John Cobb Matthew and the Margins: A Sociopolitical and Religious Reading by Warren Carter Texts of Terror:Literary-Feminist Readings of Biblical Narratives by Phyllis Trible

Just because you might be rocking a green stole doesn’t mean you have to dial back the sermonic nerdiness. After all this week you get one of the most important texts in the entire Bible – Genesis 18:1-15. On top of Abraham’s transformation of hostility to hospitality with the three strangers you have Matthew 9:35-10:8 in which Jesus sends the disciples out to a less than hospitable Israel, Romans 5:1-8 where Paul starts theologizing about justification, and Psalm 116:1-2, 12-19.  

this is NOT the good Dr. Kirk The good Doctor Daniel Kirk is on a road trip across the country with Clan Kirk, but no need to fear your Lectiocast is still here! It is an honor to fill in for Daniel and talk some lectionary goodness. We will see how long it takes before Daniel quits his trip and gets me off the show, but for now I am excited. During the podcast I discuss the four lectionary texts for the week and the questions I imagine inspiring my sermonizing…if I was still working in a pulpit.

The Spirit enables Jesus’s followers to speak to all the devout Jews, reconfiguring our understanding of “devout,” forcing us to reimagine who it is that belongs to the inner circle of the people of God. Acts 2:1-21 The Spirit of God comes as an image of eschatological judgment and of eschatological salvation, surprising us all with its redefinition of the people of God. 1 Corinthians 12:3b-13 God’s disassembly of our presumed social hierarchies begins with God’s own involvement with the people and extends through our being united to each other and transformed in the body of Christ. Numbers 11:24-30 The uncontrollable nature of the Spirit of God has always been a characteristic of its work. As much as we might want to control it, God wants it to burst beyond our expectations. So, of course, it does. Psalm 104:24-34, 35b God’s spirit is the breath of life. God’s presence is an earth-shattering event. John 20:19-23 In John’s “Pentecost,” the disciples are equipped by the Spirit for a mission of self-giving love and representation of God to the world.  Daniel Kirk is a writer, speaker, and blogger who lives in San Francisco, CA where he is currently Pastoral Director for the Newbigin House of Studies. His third book A Man Attested by God: the Human Jesus of the Synoptic Gospels, is hot off the presses. Daniel holds a Ph.D. in New Testament from Duke University and is the author of, Unlocking Romans: Resurrection and the Justification of God and Jesus Have I Loved, but Paul? He blogs regularly at StoriedTheology.com  (http://patheos.com/blogs/storiedtheology). You can follow him on Twitter @jrdkirk and on Facebook at Facebook.com/jrdkirk.

After Jesus got that resurrection body, God wasn’t done. The resurrected Jesus is exalted, enthroned, and glorified. Because Jesus receives God’s glory, we get to as well.  Acts 1:6-14 God might not be restoring the kingdom to Israel, but God is restoring the kingship of the earth to humanity. The disciples will know it when they receive the same power Jesus had at their baptism by the Spirit. Psalm 68:1-10, 33-35 The idea of God having enemies to conquer doesn’t sound that great, until we realize that they’re the ones who kept the orphans homeless and the widows penniless. The God who rides on the clouds finds echoes in the ascension of Jesus. 1 Peter 4:12-14; 5:6-11 People who follow Jesus should expect to embody the Jesus story. That means suffering and resurrection. That means having to trust God when we would otherwise be anxious. Same thing. John 17:1-11 God restores Jesus’s glory. The heavenly future comes down into the present. And we, too, get to bear the glory of God in Christ. We, too, get to know the oneness of the divine union.   Daniel Kirk is a writer, speaker, and blogger who lives in San Francisco, CA where he is currently Pastoral Director for the Newbigin House of Studies. His third book A Man Attested by God: the Human Jesus of the Synoptic Gospels, is hot off the presses. Daniel holds a Ph.D. in New Testament from Duke University and is the author of, Unlocking Romans: Resurrection and the Justification of God and Jesus Have I Loved, but Paul? He blogs regularly at StoriedTheology.com  (http://patheos.com/blogs/storiedtheology). You can follow him on Twitter @jrdkirk and on Facebook at Facebook.com/jrdkirk.

Jesus has been raised. I think this means we don’t have to worry about crazy passages from 1 Peter.  Acts 17:22-31 Paul unravels the narrative of polytheism, claiming for one God a unique place of sovereignty and honor. And then he pulls in a Jesus juke at the end to call for repentance. Masterful. Psalm 66:8-20 God gets a lot of credit here, maybe more than we’re comfortable ascribing to a loving deity: bringing us through nets and piling up burdens before finally delivering. But it works well as a story of Jesus. Try it on. 1 Peter 3:13-22 For the second time this week we have to dodge models for doing apologetics. Fortunately there are some good distractions: like stories of fallen angels going to prison and being taunted by Jesus, stories told to provoke confidence that God will be victorious over his people’s enemies. John 14:15-21 Get ready to have your brain scrambled by a Jesus/Spirit/Father/follower mind-meld. And all of it is known and done through a Christological reorientation of what it looks like to be the people of God.  Daniel Kirk is a writer, speaker, and blogger who lives in San Francisco, CA where he is currently Pastoral Director for the Newbigin House of Studies. His third book A Man Attested by God: the Human Jesus of the Synoptic Gospels, is hot off the presses. Daniel holds a Ph.D. in New Testament from Duke University and is the author of, Unlocking Romans: Resurrection and the Justification of God and Jesus Have I Loved, but Paul? He blogs regularly at StoriedTheology.com  (http://patheos.com/blogs/storiedtheology). You can follow him on Twitter @jrdkirk and on Facebook at Facebook.com/jrdkirk.

Jesus. This week is all about Jesus. Jesus reconfiguring the identity of the people of God. Jesus receiving God’s vindication in the face of humanity’s rejection of him. Jesus holding the identity that we get to share in: living stones, the one in whom the father is at work so that the father might be glorified. Acts 7:55-60 Stephen relives the Jesus story: condemned as a blasphemer of the Temple, he raises the ire of the leadership by proclaiming Jesus as the son of man at God’s right hand. He entrusts his spirit to God even as he forgives his persecutors in the face of death. Jesus’s followers are little Christs.  Psalm 31:1-5, 15-16 Shame is found in abandonment. Honor and exaltation are found in deliverance. The New Testament’s boldest move is to claim honor and exaltation for those who go to death in service of God. 1 Peter 2:2-10 Children who long for the milk that begot them, little Christs who are living stones like Jesus, priests who minister spiritual sacrifices that replace the Temple. A multi-faceted articulation of our identity as the people of God, with a little supersessionism thrown in for good measure. John 14:1-14 Knowing Jesus is knowing God. And knowing Jesus is knowing the one and only way to God. And knowing Jesus being made into the likeness of Jesus and God so that God will be glorified by what we do. It’s all very confusing.  Daniel Kirk is a writer, speaker, and blogger who lives in San Francisco, CA where he is currently Pastoral Director for the Newbigin House of Studies. His third book A Man Attested by God: the Human Jesus of the Synoptic Gospels, is hot off the presses. Daniel holds a Ph.D. in New Testament from Duke University and is the author of, Unlocking Romans: Resurrection and the Justification of God and Jesus Have I Loved, but Paul? He blogs regularly at StoriedTheology.com  (http://patheos.com/blogs/storiedtheology). You can follow him on Twitter @jrdkirk and on Facebook at Facebook.com/jrdkirk.