Red Letter Episodes

It's probably the most well-known of all the parables. The Prodigal Son is often reduced to a story about the youngest son. If you do that, or understand it that way, you miss so much about what Jesus is teaching. We are goin...

You know it as the parable of the lost cost. The title of the podcast will become more clear as we continue with these three parables: 1. The Lost Sheep, 2. The Lost Coin, 3. The Prodigal Son. You may never look at a found pe...

I'm betting if you look back at your own redemptive history you can recognize when it was that you got off track. I know I can. Perhaps if you're listening to this podcast and you can't think of a time when you strayed, you m...

Have you been to Chick-Fil-A lately? Those long lines! Or see what happens at the general admission doors at a concert for your favorite artists! What you might not see is that the guests of that artists don't have to deal wi...

We are on the last leg of Jesus' ministry, heading for Jerusalem. At this point in our Red-Letter journey, seeing Jesus confront the Pharisees about healing on the sabbath is not a new thing. So you, as a disciple, gathered a...

So much has transpired in Luke 10. In this episode, the 70 disciples have returned exceedingly joyful. This section of Luke really covers complete gospel theology including: Sovereign sending — Christ initiates the mission. S...

We are in Luke 10: 1-16 On its face, Jesus sending out the 70 is a straightforward mission. Or so I thought until I started asking questions! This is one of the deepest rabbit holes I've ever been down. I'm far from digging m...

Luke 14:25–33 stands among the most penetrating and demanding teachings of Jesus. After decades of studying this concept (not always in the Bible - I lived most of my adult life as an atheist), its weight still presses deeply...

I think we fall into this trap more than we're willing to admit. Factions within the church is one thing but we all want to believe that we are in the "right" church. As we jump back on the Red-Letter journey today, we see th...

As we continue following the Red Letters chronologically, we arrive at Peter asking Jesus how many times he must forgive his brother. How Jesus responds is profound and as we dig into this, we start to see real evidence of ho...

Just when all appears lost, Jesus opens the door. Jesus has just sunk the person who leads another to stumble, quite literally with a millstone around his neck. But then he turns to the one who stumbles and that picture doesn...

Jesus has just issued woes against the person who causes one of his children (one of the believers) to stumble. That doesn't mean the person that stumbles get a pass! Notes on the Stumbler

After Jesus has held a child up as an example of who is the greatest in the kingdom, he expands the meaning of "child" to cover all believers. You are indeed a child of God. We're reading Matthew 18:6, Matthew 18:10, Matthew ...

If you want to destroy a kids soccer game, load the benches with their parents! If you can picture the concept I'm reaching for, you'll also be able to picture what Jesus was teaching his disciples about being Child-Like. Jes...

Yesterday, in Church, we covered 1 Corinthians 9. In our Red-Letter journey, we encounter Peter being asked if Jesus pays the temple tax. It turns out that these two scriptures dovetail really well! So today, we launch off th...

What we heard in parables is now fully out in the open. Coming off the transfiguration, in the disclosure of His death and resurrection, Jesus now spells it out in plain English. What is fascinating is not the revelation itse...

How does your discipleship look? Are you seeing comfort in your relationship? Are you holding back until such a time when you'll have enough time to be fully committed. Are you straddling your commitments to the world and you...

We have just witnessed the Transfiguration of Jesus on the mountain, and the pieces should be falling into place both for us and those that witnessed the event. Sometimes the best way to read the Bible is to put yourself in t...

We've followed the disciples on this chronological red-letter journey so far covering a period of a little over a two year of Jesus' ministry. Through all of that, we have the benefit of the Bible, the New Testament and 2000 ...

There's a subtle lesson I'm slowly beginning to learn. Start your day in scripture and the rest of your day will follow you. Start your day in the world, in your email inbox, on your phone or social media and you're the follo...

We just left Caesarea Phillipi where Peter proclaimed Jesus as the Messiah. Shortly after this, Jesus has a discussion to let His disciples know what MUST now happen. It is news the disciples are not quite ready for... though...

I loved resting on this passage and digging into it. The full weight of what is happening comes to life when we understand the context and the setting of Caesarea Philippi. We spent some time tracing who they really thought J...

Sometimes the fly on the wall gets the best perspective! We're in a synagogue on a Sunday, of course, and a woman has been coming to this place for 18 years. Everything we see here smacks of cliche'. Jesus healing on the Sabb...

We took the opportunity today to step back and look at how we read scripture. Jesus has just come from the Decapolis. He's healed a woman's daughter, a deaf mute, fed 10,000 people on the mountain without only 7 loaves of bre...