Sheep Among Wolves: Recent Episodes
Jeff Werkheiser and Danny De León
Casual conversations about discipleship, with two ministers from the Conestoga Valley Church of Christ in Lancaster, PA.
In this episode, Jeff flies solo to tackle a Christmas classic on the 75th anniversary of its release. He does drone on a bit about some of the movie's background (feel free to skip to around the 24:30 mark if that doesn't interest you) before getting around to the worldview discussion. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from Sheep Among Wolves!
Danny and Jeff lay out why they're discussing a movie...and how they plan to go about it...before attempting their first worldview-centric movie review, Pixar's 1994 classic, The Incredibles.
Jeff and Danny bring Lewis' book in for a landing, focusing on the last two chapters. Topics include: how living by faith should affect behavior; how sometimes those who are not Christians have unreasonable expectations of how well-behaved Christians should actually be; how God is actually interested in something greater than just altering our behavior (he wants to produce new kinds of people!); how becoming "new people" is the process of becoming like Christ.
Thanks to anyone who made it this far in our podcast. We had a great time with this discussion, and hope it will encourage you to read Lewis' book. Even more, that it will encourage you to seek Jesus in the Word of God.
Yep, it's only episode 9 (Jeff and Danny are still confused). Among the topics of conversation in this episode: the importance of "counting the cost" of following Jesus; what it takes to answer Jesus' call to "perfection"; how the command to “be perfect” is neither idealistic nor impossible.
In this episode, Jeff and Danny begin Book 4, the last in Mere Christianity (and they get the episode number wrong yet again). They discuss: what it means to "put on Christ" (including the idea that a certain amount of "positive pretending" might be involved); how Christ working in us begins to turn our "pretending" into reality; how attempting to become like Christ helps us to realize quickly just how rotten we really are at our core; how "putting on Christ"--what we today typically call "discipleship"--really is the core of what it means to be a Christian; and how this process is both challenging and gradual.
In this episode, Jeff and Danny cover two chapters in which Lewis focuses on different aspects of faith: how faith is defined; the role of "reason" in faith formation; some things that battle against faith and reason; the need for faith to "trained"; achieving faith in a "higher" sense in which we fully recognize our own limitations; the need for faith and works to function together in order for God to do his best work within us.
Despite what Jeff and Danny tell you in their opening comments, this is actually just episode 6. Here, they discuss what Lewis describes as being in contention (along with chastity) for the least popular of all the Christian virtues, forgiveness: the biblical call for us to love and forgive our "enemies"; how our ideas about grace sometimes bump up against the notion that the way we forgive others will affect the way we will be forgiven by God; an acknowledgement that while forgiving is hard, it's learned behavior; some steps we can take to learn it; some misconceptions about the idea of "loving others as we love ourselves"; how our ideas of vengeance and justice and forgiveness need to be shaped by the realization that each of us is fundamentally unlovable.
In the second part of this discussion, Jeff and Danny talk about God's interest in what kind of people we are, and how that should shape our views on sexuality (chapter 5) and marriage (chapter 6): how the Bible speaks more objectively about "chastity" than "modesty"; how culture feeds our struggle to live by God's standard; the importance of marriage to God; flawed cultural ideas about "love" that lead to flawed ideas about sex and marriage; the notion that there should be two kinds of marriage available to people.
In this first part of episode 5, Jeff and Danny discuss: some of Lewis' ideas about morality; his decision to focus in Book 3 on the area of morality in which Christians most often disagree with non-Christians ("how humans relate to God"); the "cardinal" virtues (as opposed to the "theological" virtues); that God takes an interest in what kind of people we are.
In this episode, Jeff and Danny elect to proceed as though Jesus is neither a liar nor a lunatic. From there, they discuss: some explanations for how Jesus works to "put us right with God"; the need for us to be put right, since in our fallen nature we find ourselves in a "hole" from which we cannot escape on our own; Lewis' belief that there are three primary things that spread new life into us and help us to maintain it (baptism, belief, Lord's Supper); some common objections sometimes heard as to "why God chose to do it this way."
Jeff and Danny's book club focused on "Mere Christianity," by C.S. Lewis.
In this episode, Jeff and Danny discuss: rival conceptions of God; the problem of the existence of evil (and several questions it naturally leads to); an argument that Christianity provides the best explanation for the existence of evil; and the emergence of Jesus as a possible long-term solution to the problem of evil.
Jeff and Danny's book club focused on "Mere Christianity," by C.S. Lewis.
In this episode, Jeff and Danny discuss:
- The existence of a standard of "right and wrong," and what that says about the universe.
- Lewis' point that: a) a largely agreed-upon universal standard of right and wrong exists for all humans (call it the "moral law"), and b) none of us follows that standard very well.
- Some general ideas as to where this "moral law" might have come from.
- That the most reasonable conclusion is that there is "someone or something" behind this "moral law."
Jeff and Danny begin a book club focused on "Mere Christianity," by C.S. Lewis.
In this episode, Jeff and Danny discuss:
- An overview of their intentions for this podcast series.
- A brief definition of "apologetics."
- Whether or not apologetics is still relevant today.
- How Lewis' classic work still clearly speaks to issues of faith and reason, despite being published 70 years ago.