All tagged practical applications

399 Jesus said. . . That?! (12) Hate Your Parents

"Unless you hate your parents and siblings, and even your own life, you cannot be my disciple," Luke 14:26. What a harsh statement! We have to hate our parents? Our sisters? Children? Why was that utterance even more severe in the first century than it is today? Was Jesus being literal? How does that square with "love your enemies"? We're to love enemies but hate our own family? That seems upside down, absurd even. We first explore this brutal statement in its literary and historical context. Then we show what it can mean in our own world today. At the show's beginning I reflect, again, on consciousness and mind. Do computers think? Do they remember? Experience? What has caused us to view computers with such awe? And, why do so many hope for an A.I. utopian future? All of that is unpacked in this rich episode. Give the Lord your mind and come and think with me!

392 Jesus said. . . That?! (8) Don't Give Pearls to Swine

In the same sermon wherein he told us, "love your enemies," Jesus said, "do not give what is holy to dogs; and do not throw your pearls before swine." Why would a loving Jesus teach us to call someone a pig? In this episode I work through the Old Testament, First Century Jewish, and Jesus-ian layers of this strange onion of a saying. There are several practical for-the-now applications of Jesus' meaning here. More, it shows us something about whom Jesus really was. At the show's opening I work through the burgeoning transhumanism movement. What is it about? What does it want? Who comprises the transhume crowd? What are their philosophical commitments? Is it theological or more narrowly spiritual? Come laugh and think with me.