The UnSunday Show Website Makeover

I'm excited to announce the recent improvements to the UnSunday Show website. The URL hasn't changed but the look and feel of the site certainly has. Among other things, it now includes several tools to make interacting with me easier. Here's a sample:

• An easy-to-use contact form.
• Leave me a rating and review. You can leave me a review on the website or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Podchaser - all from the UnSunday website.
  
• A Follow button to easily follow the UnSunday Show in your favorite podcast app or RSS reader.
•  Leave me a voice mail. You read that right. This is huge! Click the microphone icon in the bottom right corner of the website to leave me a voice mail. Your voice mail can be up to 2 minutes long and can be a comment, a question, a topic suggestion for a future episode, or anything you like. Comments left may be used or referenced in future episodes. Be nice!
• Comment on Episodes. This has been missing for a while but it's back now.
  

So head on over to The UnSunday Show and check it out for yourself. While you're there, leave me a rating and review. You'll see that option in the top menu bar. Leave me a voice mail and let me know what you think of the new design.

-Mike

https://unsunday.com

Is Faith Without Works Dead?

Is faith without works dead? Are we justified by faith alone or by a mixture of faith and works? And if there is a mixture, what's the right mixture? When do I know when I've arrived or when I'm outputting enough? In James 2:24, James said, "You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone." But in Romans 3:28 Paul said, "For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law. This much is certain: one of these is not like the other. If we let the text say what it's saying without trying to make them agree, James and Paul are saying two completely different things. James: We're justified by faith + works. Paul: We're justified by faith apart from works. 

If you're like me (and I wouldn't wish that on anyone) you may have spent a lot of time trying to reconcile these two divergent statements of James and Paul and come up with clever ways to convince yourself and others that they're saying the same thing but in different ways. I did that all the time. I would reword what James said and put a spin on it to make James sound more like Paul. But an honest look at the whole of what James and Paul believed concerning justification reveals that one of these is not like the other. If we let the text say what it says without manipulating it we're forced to consider the possibility that James and Paul believed something different regarding how a person is justified. That scares some of us. It might scare you. It scared me for years and years which is why I would put words in James' mouth in a noble attempt to make him say something he didn't say. After all, we can't have two New Testament writers disagreeing. Or can we?

Paul, James, and their views on justification is the topic of discussion in the latest episode of The UnSunday Show podcast as I'm joined by Mike Kapler and Joel Brueseke from The Growing in Grace podcast. Listen in as we take a candid look at the New Testament passages surrounding this controversy.

The Law: Fulfilled and Abolished, My Conversation with Joel Brueseke

One of the things that's been on mind since coming into a better understanding of grace and the New Covenant is why do we think the Old Covenant law of Moses needs to still hang around? There is solid evidence in scripture that it's been both fulfilled and abolished, so why are we hesitant to say that? Why was I hesitant for so long even though I've been questioning its need for years now? If I'm not under law but under grace, why did I think the law needed to hang around in the bushes nearby? Why? If the law is a ministry of death (2 Corinthians 3) and an obstacle that's hostile to the New Covenant body of Christ (Ephesians 2), what remaining purpose can it possibly have in this age of the Spirit? If Jesus cancelled it by nailing it to his cross (Colossians 2), why was I holding on to parts of it?

Most of us in the grace camp would agree that we're not under law but we still have a tendency to keep a grip on it and we're hesitant to let it go. Most of us would agree that the law was given only to the Jewish nation under a different covenant (the Old Covenant) and that Gentiles (non-Jews) were never under the law in the first place. So what is the purpose of the law today for believers in this New Covenant age? 

Join Joel Brueseke and me as we open scripture together and explore what it has to say about the law of Moses. This is a recent episode from The UnSunday Show: