Seeing Jesus with Paul Miller

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[DISCIPLESHIP] 2. The Medium is the Message Apr 17, 2024

Show notes

Paul, Jon, and Liz continue their conversation about discipleship, looking at active vs. passive posture in discipleship, and how Jesus discipled the 12.

"Marshall McLuhan famously said, 'The medium is the message,' calling attention to the shaping power that our method of communicating has over the content of the message. If the sermon sits at the center of our imagination for discipleship, we risk having an overly passive view of growing as a disciple. This isn't a critique on the sermon – listening to sermons is an important way to grow. But we want to get our imagination for discipleship from how Jesus does this work…"

"The heart of Jesus' ministry is mentoring the twelve."

"Jesus often takes as much time in an incident or interaction as he does in interpreting the incident for others. Sometimes he goes through two layers of people, interpreting for the larger group of people, and then again specifically for the smaller. This slows him down a lot, but he's doing Christ formation with his disciples. He's not just on a healing ministry; he's pivoting between a healing ministry, a teaching ministry, a discipling ministry, and his own prayer time. This pattern is all through the gospels. The discipleship of the 12 is the organizing structure of his day-to-day life."

[DISCIPLESHIP] 1. Enlarging Our Imagination for Discipleship Apr 03, 2024

Show notes

Paul, Jon, and Liz start a new series looking at the topic of discipleship.

"We are quite serious about what the Apostle Paul calls the mind of Christ. That's Philippians 2:5, where Paul said, 'Let this mind be in you which is also in Christ Jesus.' Paul then goes on to describe the story of Jesus' life: going down into death and up into resurrection. He's driving for something; don't learn this in the abstract, but let this mind be in you."

"Within the world of Christian ministry, formation tends to be a little vague: we are learning the Bible, learning doctrine, learning holiness, and all of those are important, but what you see in Paul, in the whole New Testament really, is this sharply defined telos or end goal: Christ's formation."

"The Apostle Paul's call to discipleship aims so high – it's like he's training Olympic athletes. What's so daunting and enchanting about it is that he's not just saying this to the elites or the most naturally 'athletic' of the church. It's for everyone in the church, and he has this expectation that the Spirit who makes Christ present is so powerful that Christ's formation is realistic and it's doable, not in our own strength but in the spirit of Jesus."

[FAITH] 6. Faith is a Habit of the Heart (POJ 4.4) Mar 20, 2024

Show notes

Paul, Jon, and Liz continue their conversation about faith with an episode that looks at faith as a habit of the heart that turns to Jesus.

"This is a little bit of an inference on my part, but what I think Jesus is irritated about, here in Mark 8 with the disciples, is that when they come across a problem, they don't turn to him. They turned inward, and I'm sure started getting irritated with each other. We can easily imagine the discussion, 'You said you're going to bring the bread! Why didn't you?' When all along, as they've seen already, they have this bread factory in the boat with them!"

"Faith is a habit of the heart where you look away from yourself, your wisdom, and your resources and turn to Jesus."

"Oddly enough, a strong faith person is weak as they look to themselves. Strength of faith is measured by your ability to turn away from yourself. It's not looking inward to see if you have enough faith, but looking outward to the object of your faith. Faith, in that sense, is without energy. It's this is a habit of the heart where you look away from yourself and turn to Jesus."

[FAITH] 5. Faith Looks at Jesus (POJ 4.4) Mar 06, 2024

Show notes

Paul, Jon and Liz continue their conversation about faith, looking especially at how Jesus develops the disciples' faith.

"Right after the feeding of the 5000, Jesus dismisses his disciples. It's the only time he does this, and it's a situation where it would appear he could use their help. But when you put all three of the gospel accounts together, you realize Jesus had to act fast. It was almost like he was getting them out of the drug world… the 'drug' of 5000 people shouting for Jesus to be King. It's an intoxicating crowd that could sweep up the disciples, and so Jesus sends them off alone in the boat."

"Jesus doesn't rescue Peter until Peter says, 'Jesus save me!' It's classic Jesus: he leaves space for us to move towards him."

"Peter looks at Jesus by faith, and then he loses it and goes back again. All of the disciples take steps of faith and then show their weakness of faith. It's like Jesus has them in a faith coaching camp. Every time he permits stress in their lives, he builds faith in them and points them to faith."

[FAITH] 4. Faith Surrenders (POJ 4.3) Feb 21, 2024

Show notes

Paul, Jon and Liz continue their conversation looking at the development of faith in Jesus' followers -- this episode looks at the story of Peter rebuking Jesus and at Jesus' words to the Rich Young Ruler.

"What we're thinking about now is the object of our faith. The object of Peter's faith is a traditional first century off-the-shelf messiah who has an army that destroys evil in Israel and throws the Romans into the sea. So it's very concrete. And what Jesus has just told Peter seems like crazy talk."

"The object of Peter's faith is Jesus, but it's the wrong Jesus. It's a Jesus who's going to make his life pain-free. It's not a Jesus who draws you into his death and resurrection."

"There's some beauty to John Mark walking away. He doesn't try to stop being himself immediately. Jesus is separating the wheat from the chaff. You either have to be hot for Jesus or cold. You can't be in the middle or lukewarm. John Mark is coming, in a sense, asking, 'How can I be hotter for Jesus?' Jesus' answer is helping John Mark to see that he's actually cold."

[FAITH] 3. Be Careful Getting into a Boat with Jesus (POJ 4.2) Feb 07, 2024

Show notes

Paul, Jon, and Liz continue their conversation about faith by looking at how the disciples learned about faith in the context of two boating adventures with Jesus.

"To understand God, as Calvin says, you can either begin with yourself or with God. Because a true knowledge of yourself will lead to a true knowledge of God, and a true knowledge of God will lead you to a true knowledge of yourself. You see that dynamic happening here. Jesus hasn't said anything like, 'You're a sinner, Peter.' It's just this encounter with the immense warmth and love and kindness of God -- His sheer goodness to us – that makes Peter turn and think of his sin."

"Peter is profoundly seen. He's encountered life at a level he never has experienced before."

"In the scene on the boat in the storm, what we're looking at as Jesus sleeps is his faith. He rests completely in his Father and his Father's love for him. He is without fear; the disciples fear because they don't have that rest in the Father. The faith that allows him to sleep is as helpful for them as the miracle itself!"

[FAITH] 2. 24 Hrs with Jesus: Faith Empowers Love (POJ 4.1) Jan 24, 2024

Show notes

Paul, Jon, and Liz continue their conversation about Jesus' faith, looking at how he loves the disciples and the crowds over the course of a 24-hour period in his ministry.

"This pattern of Jesus is all through the gospels: he sees a large crowd, has compassion on them because they're like sheep without a shepherd, and then he begins teaching and healing. So this vacation that Jesus and the disciples are taking is interrupted by 25,000 people…"

"A life of faith will be filled with surprises and unexpected things!"

"The reason Satan has no hold on Jesus is because the only thing Jesus wants is the love of his Father. So there's no hook, no crack in Jesus' armor; Satan has no leverage over him. I've often thought of that during times of suffering. If I surrender my job, my family, my career, my spouse, and my health, then Satan has no hold on me. He can't tempt me with something that I don't own. That's why suffering is so powerful in the Christian life; it strips us of something we might be tempted to own."

[FAITH] 1. The Love of God in Our Hearts (POJ 4, intro) Jan 10, 2024

Show notes

Jon, Paul and Liz begin a new series looking the central role faith plays -- in Jesus, in the disciples, and in us. These conversations will be framed around lessons in The Person of Jesus Study, Unit 4, Faith.

"Jesus has a lot of conversations about the disciples' faith, and there are many fascinating nuances to it. But what you hardly ever hear anybody talk about is Jesus' own faith. That can wind up making Jesus kind of plastic. The reason that we don't talk about Jesus' faith is because we're so aware that he's God. In a sense, we think 'what on Earth does he have to believe?' But the reason that we've not really reflected on this is because we've not really reflected that much on how serious the embodiment of Jesus is."

"Faith is everything. Without it, love is just so difficult."

"Luke tells us that as Jesus is praying, right after his baptism, he hears this voice from heaven. 'This is my beloved son with him I am well pleased.' That's the Father building faith in his son. If you hear the voice of your heavenly Father saying, 'I am completely satisfied with you in Christ Jesus.' There's no other better place to be. It's not a temporary state -- it's unending. There's nothing that can separate you from the love of God..."

[SPECIAL] Mangers Aren't Clean: Jesus Comes in the Midst of Manure - with Jill Miller Dec 06, 2023

Show notes

Jill Miller joins Paul, Jon and Liz for this conversation about what we can learn from the barnyard about how Christmas lands among everyday saints.

"The ministry of the church happens through the hands and feet of everyday saints. So as we turn to Christmas, we thought it would be fun to both think about the Christmas story and also this idea of the saints. As we look at the Christmas story in Luke, we see that Christmas lands down among the saints."

"The manger was so dirty, but Christ as a baby was laid in that. And now the Holy Spirit is in my heart, which so many times, is dirty just like the manger. He still dwells in manure!"

"We were talking about Mary with the gang [our local Bethesda group for people affected by disability], and how there was no room in the inn and what one of the kids next to me whispered, "Kind of like there's no room for me. There wasn't any room for me in school." And then another kid said, "Yeah, it's kind of tough to get into church." They're used to low places and one day, hallelujah, they will be raised. I'll be the one washing the feet of these kids in heaven. It was really encouraging to them to see how Jesus entered the world and experienced what they feel!"

[RUNS ON PRAYER] 4. We Are a Resurrection People Nov 22, 2023

Show notes

Paul and Liz are joined by Colin Millar, seeJesus's European Coordinator, to talk about how the Spirit and Jesus work together, and how that working union energizes faith and prayer.

"The post-resurrection incarnate person of Jesus walks into that room with the disciples and he says ,'Peace be with you.' He breathes on them, and says, 'Receive the Holy Spirit.' That is something that he never did before the resurrection in his incarnate body. We see him praying at his baptism, and as he prayed, he received the Spirit from the Father to empower him to go out and to do his public ministry. So, like us, he had to pray to receive the Spirit before the resurrection. But after the resurrection he has the fullness of the Spirit given to him by the Father; a working union. And so now he can walk up to the disciples and breathe on them and breathe the very fullness of the Spirit into them. It's a beautiful little preview of what he did for the whole church at Pentecost!"

"My faith grew because he's not just out there running the universe. He's actually down here in all of this mess…"

"There's a relational reality which I think often we lose when we just leave Jesus up there at the right hand of the Father. He's distant. He's far away. He's not really down here in my life with me. When I began to understand these truths about how Jesus and the Spirit work together, suddenly, I got excited again. My faith grew because he's not just out there running the universe. He's actually down here in all of this mess or whatever is going on in my life all the time, and so suddenly, prayer becomes personal and real. As I pray and I talk to him, I'm participating in his resurrection life and the coming of his kingdom and he will do things. So now I look around and watch for little signs of resurrection."

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