God’s sovereignty revealed by Jesus through cruciform, self-giving love, the nature of trust, intimacy, and union, and the transforming truth that there is no shadow of turning with God, in this podcast the guys explore Jason’s upcoming book, Leaving (& Finding) Jesus. This conversation juxtaposes an inclusive, reconciling, self-giving, unconditional view of God’s love against an excluding, hierarchal, punishment-focused, conditional view of God’s love. 

Brand, quietly at first, but then with greater conviction says, “Maybe it means something more, something we can’t yet understand. Maybe it’s some evidence some artifact of a higher dimension that we can’t consciously perceive… Love is the one thing we’re capable of perceiving that transcends dimensions of time and space. Maybe we should trust that even if we can’t understand it yet…”

But love and I had the wit to win: We drew a circle and took him In!  

That is the gospel of Jesus on a cross; that no matter the circles drawn to shut people out, Love draws bigger circles, Love says, “We all belong, we become!”

This was a miracle as big as blind eyes opening, as cancer leaving. Jesus said this kind of miracle would be akin to a camel crawling through the eye of a needle…

He came and he walked beside us, He said, “I will never leave you, I will never forsake you; you are not alone, you belong.” When we discover this love, we are transformed and we begin to love like He does. On Palm Sunday Derek speaks about the cross and how we are invited to live surrendered and sure in love. He talks about laying down our loves, loving our enemies, and seeing the kingdom come.

The idea that God saw me as a spiritual giant seemed too good to be true…