The Joshua Victor Theory

  Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. A blessed Pentecost! Or should we say, Happy Birthday, Christian church? In a way, Pentecost is the birthday of the Christian church, the day when Jesus poured out the gift of the Holy Spirit, so the church would begin to grow and spread around the world. What does the word “conviction” mean to you? Do you think of a “man or woman of conviction”, taking a courageous stand on the truth? Or a court room conviction, like someone sentenced to jail? A convict has been convicted of a crime. An ex-convict has “done the time” and is out of prison. Conviction…has someone ever hauled you into court? Today Jesus uses the word “convict” to describe the work of the Holy Spirit. Before He left, Jesus explained to the disciples that He was sending the Holy Spirit to “ convict the world concerning sin, righteousness, and judgment”. The Holy Spirit hauls us into court. Are you “convicted” by t...

  Christ is Risen! He is Risen indeed, Alleluia! So far in 1 John we’ve discussed how we are “Raised for Fellowship,” how “We Shall Be Like Him”, and what “Resurrection Love” looks like. Today is not so much of a “resurrection theme”, but John calls us to distinguish truth and lies. This week I shared an essay in the Midweek Encouragement by the Nobel prize winner Alexander Solzhenitsyn, titled “Live Not by Lies.” He was exiled in 1974 from his homeland in Russia, for criticizing the communist regime, and paid for it by serving a sentence in the gulags—prison labor camps for political prisoners, dissidents, and common criminals. His crime was to think different and to speak out. He witnessed firsthand the horrific power of lies to subjugate a nation and spoke against it at great personal cost. A Christian who chose not to live by lies, he chose to live by the truth. From the Garden of Eden to today, the deadliness of the devil’s countless lies remains the same. The devil is alway...

  In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen. Today is the Transfiguration of Jesus, a glimpse of Jesus’ glory shortly before His death on the cross and the resurrection. After the glory fades from the spectacular transformation, Peter, James and John are left with Jesus only. And that’s not a let-down—it’s the point. Having Jesus only, is having everything we need. The Total Jesus. The One to heed and hear, the Only One we need and fear. With a newfound reverence for God’s Beloved Son, they descend the mountain where Jesus resumes His path to the cross. But we have the Total Jesus; He is our “ all in all ” (Eph. 1:23; Col. 3:11). The Transfiguration shows several ways how we have the Total Jesus. When we have Christ, we lack nothing. Let’s consider four ways He is the “Total Jesus.” His Transfiguration shows His Total Authority, Total Truth, Total Purity, and Total Glory. It was quite extraordinary to see these living saints and biggest heroes of the O...

 Sermon outline: (Listen to full audio on the podcast app) ·          This is God’s work: the Sower, and the Seed (Word) which has the power to grow. ·          Hindrances are the work of the devil, the world, and our sinful nature. ·          Our job is to hear; to listen. Hear the Word of the Lord b/c faith comes by hearing. ·          This is God’s work—gracious and reckless (throw seeds) “Though some be snatched and some be scorched and some be choked and matted flat, the sower sows; his heart cries out: “‘Oh, what of that and what of that?’” Not stingy or selective of who receives the Gospel—God knows His Word will be rejected—this is why Jesus taught in parables. Those who would hear and understand would be blessed. o    This is God’s work—the seed that grows is God’s powerful word. Not from us. The...

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. There’s a hard lesson about division and judgment in today’s Gospel: Jesus talks about how He did not come to bring peace, but a sword. Divisions in the world, the family, and ultimately divisions from ourselves. Divisions are a tragic symptom of our sinful condition. Selfishness, rivalry, divided loyalties, and much more come from our sinful refusal to put God and His ways first. By contrast, God’s peace comes to those who trust and follow Jesus, even while they are divided from those who won’t follow Jesus. Ultimately Jesus must divide from sin, error and unbelief. There must be a parting of ways between God’s way and the world’s way—between the devil’s lies and God’s truth. Thank Jesus for rescuing us from lies and bringing us into truth. So where does Jesus divide and where does He unite? Jesus must divide us from lies and unify us with the truth. Lies are incompatible with the tru...

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen.  A rapidly growing technology in our everyday lives is Voice Recognition, which tells one person’s voice from another. They say that our “voiceprint” is unique, just like our fingerprints.  The technology is rapidly being developed, even though it’s been around since the dawn of mankind. God designed our brains to be incredible information processing systems, and all of the mind-boggling “technology” of Voice Recognition is programmed into your mind, and works without you even having to understand how!  Just because it's so ordinary and common to us that we recognize so many unique “voiceprints”--we don’t ever really stop to be amazed by the huge processing and identification task that our brains go through instantaneously when we recognize, oh, that’s mom, or dad, or my sister or my friend from work or church or wherever. Not only do we need a finely tuned and worki...

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen. “Freedom” is, at least in principle, highly prized by Americans. Judging from the attitudes and answers of the Jews who listened to Jesus’ teaching in John 8, 2,000 years ago, they also highly prized freedom. The question is, do we truly understand the nature of freedom Jesus teaches, any better than they did? Freedom and slavery are opposites. To understand one, you need to understand the other. Jesus is talking to new believers in the crowd, when He says “ If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” The word “abide” or remain, talks about continuing in something, or living together with someone. When Jesus calls His true disciples to “ abide in my word ”, He’s saying His Word is their continuing life. Jesus calls this vital relationship being living branches connected to the Vine. Outside the vine, disconnected from Christ and His Word,...