GospelLife360 Podcast

If we have been crucified with Christ and we are a new creation, what is that supposed to look like? If we are in the process of being transformed into the image of Christ, what is that supposed to look like? I'm not sure we are looking into that spiritual mirror of our lives, and asking the right questions. There is so much more that happened on that day of our salvation than our names being written in the Book of Life! God didn't save us so that He may create a better version of ourselves. He is in the process of transforming us and preparing us for our entry into His glorious Kingdom. He is transforming us from one stage of glory to another! This is not an idle or casual process that we are involved in with our Heavenly Father! But when we gravitate to the comfortable and convenient, we will see very little transformation and miss out on what the Lord is desiring to do in us, and through us! Open up the gospel and join me in discovering the transforming work of the Holy Spirit in our lives!

2023 Is coming to a close, and as we look back on where we have come from this past year, what have we experienced of God's purpose and activity in our lives? Have we been too busy just managing our everyday lives to have noticed what God had planned and prepared for us? One of the major questions Christians ask themselves over and over again, is what is God's will for my life? As the new year approaches, and we make our New Year's Resolution, is God's will for our lives even a consideration? Are we willing to pay the price and make the necessary sacrifices to discover His will for our lives? We can only experience God's glory as we live within the middle of God's will! Jesus said, "I can only do what I see the Father doing." This coming New Year, make it your resolution, your conviction, and your commitment to be in the middle of God's will! God's will for your lives is your sanctification! To be set apart for His glory! To humble yourself that He might through the word of God and the power of the Holy Spirit transform you into a vessel of honor, useful for what He has already prepared for you!

rel·e·vant

/ˈreləv(ə)nt/

closely connected or appropriate to what is being done or considered.

appropriate to the current time, period, or circumstances; of contemporary interest.

"critics may find themselves unable to stay relevant in a changing world"

This is how the world defines "relevant". It gives the appearance of being very open-ended and up for interpretation.

But for those who are followers of Jesus Christ, what is relevant? Is Jesus relevant? Is God's love relevant? Is the gospel relevant? Is God's grace relevant? 

You see, if there is no absolute truth then nothing is relevant. If truth is what you want it to be then you determine what is relevant in your life. But tomorrow when that all changes so does your relevancy!

If the truth sets us free and there is no absolute truth, then freedom is not relevant! If God's grace is no longer sufficient, then God's salvation is no longer relevant!

So, how can we as followers of Jesus Christ remain relevant in a non-relevant world? Let's open up the relevant gospel and find out!

There seems to be even among many Christians the idea that happiness and joy are the same or at least similar. Not!

Happiness is a worldly pursuit that depends upon something happening to make us happy. It requires our circumstances and expectations to be met. How much could go wrong there?! Happiness requires us to be able to control our circumstances and the people around us. Again, not happening! (Pun intended)

Happiness requires our feelings to be the determining factor. The heart is deceitful above all else, right?

Joy on the other hand is based upon our relationship with Jesus Christ! The fruit of the Spirit is love and one of the by-products of that love is Joy! When we rest in His love for us and our love for Him there is Joy! And, the joy of the Lord is our strength! When we lose our joy we are left with the strength and abilities of our own flesh! The mind set on the flesh and our dependence upon that flesh is death! Our flesh cannot save us and our flesh cannot produce Joy!

Join me in this journey through the gospel and discover the abundant life of Joy!

The days we live in seem to be getting darker with each passing day. We attempt to ignore it in order that we might not be overwhelmed by it. In John 3:19 God's word tells us that this is the judgment, that light is come into the world and men loved the darkness rather than the light for their deeds were evil. Men fear exposure!

But there is a darkness that we find that belongs to us, and we must not allow it to rule our lives. We don't have to fear exposure, for our God sees all and has provided the grace and freedom for us to deal with our darkness. We must come into the light of His presence. 

Shame, guilt, and fear were never meant for us to carry very long. Sometimes our shame, guilt, and fear have been brought on by those who have hurt us deeply. We've attempted to deal with those painful sins on our own, only to create a deeper darkness with our weak substitutions. 

Sometimes our darkness is of our own making. We've allowed our own sinful choices to become a growing cancer that permeates our body, soul, and spirit. 

Jesus calls us to, Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest, I am gentle and humble in heart!

How would you define faith? Hebrews defines it as the assurance of things hoped for and the conviction of things not seen.

But Jesus described people's faith as little faith, no faith, and great faith. None of us can remain on the mountaintop of faith every day, so how would you rate your faith right at this moment? How would you rate it over the last 3 months or year? 

How is our faith impacting our lives, our family's lives, our neighborhoods, where we work and play, and the church we attend? 

There are some Scriptures I would like to share with you today that I hope will take you from where you are in your walk of faith to a place that will allow you to see the glory of God in a way that you have never seen it before!

In Ezekiel 22 God tells us that he was looking for a man to stand in the gap and build up a wall to stop the oppression and the wrong that was being done to the most vulnerable of their time, but Scripture tells us that He found no one!

When good men do nothing evil prevails! When good men do nothing our children who are among the most vulnerable in our society are allowed to be swallowed up in the darkest of evils!

We know these things are going on, but we choose not to think about it. We close our eyes to it and it continues to become even darker day by day!

In Ezekiel 16 we are told that God destroyed Sodom, not because of sexual immorality but because they lived in arrogance, abundance, and careless ease, and did not help the poor and needy!  

This problem of human trafficking is a huge monstrous problem, and it will not go away overnight! But we as followers of Jesus Christ can do something! We can find the most vulnerable in our community and begin to build walls and stand in the gap, being faithful to what Jesus died for and gave to us: FREEDOM!

Even as believers and followers of Jesus Christ, we struggle with who we are as a new creation in Christ. We are constantly wrestling with who people think we are and what we attempt to tell ourselves that we are that the reality of who Christ says we are gets lost in the noise.

Being in the world but not of the world can many times confuse how we see ourselves. For all believers, no matter how long you have been a believer, this battle is real. Our desire to fit in and be accepted messes with our identity. We want to be successful in this world and success distorts our view of who we are in Christ.

Scripture tells us that we have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer we who live but Christ who lives within us, but most of us still remain living under our old identity. 

It was for freedom that Christ died, but we find ourselves living under the bondage of our old nature and identity. 

Paul describes his new identity this way; I am who am I by the grace of God! God's grace was what defined his new identity. Let's look at some other Scriptures and discover an identity that allows us to live as new creations and walk in the freedom of the Sons of God!

Over the past couple of years, I've had numerous casual conversations that ended up gravitating toward church and faith. I didn't guide them that way, that's just where they went to. 

In those conversations I've heard the same story told with differing circumstances, but the same end result. People leaving the church or giving up on God. The pain, disappointment, and frustrations are real. The wounds and scars are visible. 

I believe the church as a whole has chosen to focus on the low-lying fruit. The Ministry of Reconciliation for the above folks will cost too much for most churches to commit themselves to over the long haul. 

I'm looking for people who like me find this disconnection heart-breaking and desire to see how God could use them for His glory and Kingdom. 

I'm finishing up a website called Vagabondfaith.com. A place to share their testimonies, find encouragement and find resources to start afresh in their journey of faith.

My hope and prayer is that we can help people find their "Oikos". The Hebrew word for family. Family in this sense meant anyone within the household and those outside the household that we did business with or lived life with. 

These "Oikos" were small enough (20-50) to know one another, yet not so small we didn't have the resources to serve one another or serve our communities in a loving way.

We should only be doing what we see the Father doing, and this is what God is showing me right now!

Any questions or comments contact me at myvagabondfaith@gmail.com

Where is our faith if we do not trust in the sovereignty of God? 

Romans 8:28 is shared with numerous people when they are going through difficult times as words of encouragement. But the verse begins with the words, "And we know". What do we know? We know that God causes all things to work together for good! Do they? Well, that depends on whether you believe God is in control and is working through your difficult circumstances for His glory and eventually for your good! 

Is God sovereign if you do not see the good in things until you enter His glory? Is God sovereign if your circumstances get worse before they get any better? 

Can you say with Joseph, what others meant for evil, God meant for good? When we quote Romans 8:28, we must keep it in context with the Scriptures that surround it, in order to understand the promise He is making to us. 

Let's open up that Scripture once more together and let the promise become fresh and new to us once again for the days that lie ahead!

The Church is still trying to rediscover itself after the Covid-19 pandemic. I'm not really sure if we've learned all that God intended for us to learn through those difficult days. 

Many churches have made some adjustments when it comes to social media and adding online digital services to reach out to those who have found church online to be more necessary or convenient.

But, where is the real fruit of the gospel being planted in the lives of those listening? Are we still counting the numbers that are showing up in person and online for our indication of fruitfulness?

God builds His church! He adds to the church day by day as we faithfully make disciples who make disciples, who go into all the world with the gospel!

What is the overall soil situation in our churches? Is the seed of the gospel falling on good soil? Are we equipping the saints for the work of service or are we managing volunteers who have shallow rocky soil? 

We will see the fruit when we start cultivating the soil with the whole gospel!

The words that we speak and the promises that we make may be well-intended and spoken with the utmost sincerity, but in reality, they can fall short of expectations as well as our own.

But when God speaks there is no wavering from His intended purpose. Because His ways and our ways are not the same, we can sometimes misinterpret the final outcome, because it didn't happen as we expected or in the time frame we thought to be appropriate. 

When E. F. Hutton speaks, the commercial says that people listen. They do until their investments take a nose dive. 

When God speaks, not everyone listens. But the rest of His creation does. Think of the story of Jonah. God spoke and the waves, big fish, and a worm carried out His bidding. 

Let's open up the gospel and discover the importance of us listening to God's voice, and trusting that what He has spoken will accomplish everything that He intended for it to accomplish!

We have questions thrown at us every day. Some of those questions are insignificant, but there are a few that become life-changing in our lives. They set the course of direction and purpose. These life-changing questions usually have a high price tag attached to them. 

The Scriptures tell us that God's Word is living and active. But we should not think that we can casually read His word and maybe memorize a few key verses and think we have all the understanding we need.

We need to look intently into the Word of God and as we do we must be honest with what we see and ask the difficult questions of what God is desiring to do in our lives. Then by faith, we must be obedient to the answer to our questions. We are going to look at a few sections of Scripture where we might discover the questions and answers that will transform our lives into the image of Jesus Himself. Join us!

Faith! Is that which is hoped for the conviction of things not seen! We can make it so simple sometimes, but is it? Salvation is a free gift of God, but faith is not just simple trust, but a total surrender to the One who is the object of our faith. There is no such thing as "faith in faith."

Saving faith comes to us from God! It's an extension of His amazing grace. Each one of us has been given a measure of faith. But is the faith you claim to have "enduring" faith! It's the endurance of our faith that will eventually indicate whether we had genuine faith, to begin with.

Allow the Word of God to speak to you on this issue of enduring faith!

We can easily find ourselves becoming so confident in what we do that we forget that Jesus said we can do nothing without Him. We live most of the majority of our days without the least acknowledgment of God's presence or purpose.

Even when we are faced with circumstances that are beyond our ability to perform, we forge ahead and do the best of our ability to accomplish the task anyway. 

Though we are part of the Body of Christ we live and breathe our lives in prideful isolation. 

God's word has plenty to say to us concerning our thinking more highly of ourselves than we ought to think. 

The Body of Christ is suffering and our personal lives are unstable due to our attempts to live life outside of God's sovereignty. 

How much of your life is lived outside of God's sovereignty?

Many times we come across someone that looks very familiar and we ask, "do I know you?" They may look familiar, but sometimes people may have familiar features and mannerisms, and not be the person we know! 
We may know intellectually someone that we have read about in a biography or history book, but that does not mean we know them. 
We claim to have 500 friends on social media, but again that doesn't mean that we know them. 
So, the question arises, do you know God and does He know you?
Let's open up the gospel and examine whether or not we know Him and whether He knows us.

WHAT'S GOOD ABOUT IT? We do a lot of good things in the Name of Christ, but are they really God's good things or just good things that we have done in our flesh for our flesh? 

Seems like an easy question to answer doesn't it? Our flesh can easily justify "good" things and place them under the heading of God's things. 

I believe if we look at the Gospel we will discover that there are certain qualifiers that define what things are good and come from God and are for God!

Only the brave should enter here! Let's get serious about being faithful to what God has created and called us to do!

The wisdom of the world is unstable and unreliable, but the majority of people today, including many within the church put their trust in it.  A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways and the man who attempts to follow after Jesus Christ and trust in the wisdom of the world will live an unstable life. 
The wisdom of God is Jesus Christ Himself! This wisdom is a mystery to the world we live in.  This wisdom comes to us through the Holy Spirit as we walk in reverence with our Savior and Lord. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
The wisdom of God is pure, peaceable, gentle, reasonable, full of mercy, and good fruits, unwavering and without hypocrisy! The wisdom of the world is earthly, natural, and demonic. 
Are you living according to the wisdom from above?!

What does it really mean to live? And in what sense does it mean, to die is gain? 

Before God in His grace pursued us in His love, and saved us we were dead in our sins. We may have been breathing and our heart was beating, but we were dead spiritually. We may have by all practical purposes looked successful to the watching world, but without Christ, we were still dead in our sins. 

Many professing Christians believe in what Jesus did for them on the cross, but the reality of the life that was brought forth because of the cross and the resurrection is a mystery to them.

If you have put your complete trust in the finished work of Jesus Christ; He has become your life! Life is no more defined by who you think you are, the status or title you have, or what the world has labeled you to be. 

To live is Christ, and to die is gain. We must as Paul put it, to die daily that we may gain Christ who is our life!

Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me. Whoever came up with this quote couldn't be more wrong. Words hurt! Words have brought more divisions and wars than anything else we could talk about. 
Scripture tells us that words bring forth death or life. A child's life is formed by the words they hear growing up. Marriage is strengthened or destroyed by the words each spouse speaks into it. Businesses grow or collapse by the words spoken over a period of time. Churches thrive or close their doors because of the words spoken by their members.
Entering another election year the words that we are hearing through media outlets and social media platforms are so divisive and filled with hate. And much of the words we are hearing that are so hateful are coming from those proclaiming to be followers of Jesus Christ.
If you are a follower of Jesus Christ, all that I ask is that you take a few minutes to listen and right down these Scriptures, and allow the Holy Spirit to reveal to you how we should use our words, making the most of every opportunity for the gospel.