Episodes

  • Det. J. Warner Wallace Weighs in on New Orleans Terror Attack and the True Nature of Religion

    Det. J. Warner Wallace Weighs in on New Orleans Terror Attack and the True Nature of Religion
    Jan 5 2025
    For former cold-case murder detective J. Warner Wallace, the horrific New Year's Day terror attack in New Orleans followed an age-old pattern of why people kill. He says of all the homicides he's worked, there are only three reasons why people commit crimes: sex, money, power. There's no fourth reason. And those three reasons fall into the larger bucket of Pride. Authorities say the suspect, 42-year-old Shamsud Din-Jabbar, had been radicalized into a distorted view of Islam, and was inspired by the terror group Isis, a power obsessed group. But Wallace, a former atheist who used his forensic skills to try to debunk Christianity and came away a believer in Jesus, has a much more nuanced view on the nature of religion. On this episode of Lighthouse Faith podcast, Wallace talks about his book, "The Truth In True Crime: What Investigating Death Teaches Us About The Meaning Of Life." Wallace says most religions, except for Christianity, are performance based; perform these rituals and services and God -or the world- will bless you. Even an atheistic worldview does this. However, that form of religion or belief falls prey to the greatest of deadly sins, pride. The only antidote to pride is humility, and humility is nothing anyone can achieve by works. And studies show, says Wallace, that humility leads not to the taking of life, but to human flourishing and the giving of life. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    43 mins
  • The Chosen's Amanda Jenkins: Grateful For Success, But Staying Humble

    The Chosen's Amanda Jenkins: Grateful For Success, But Staying Humble
    Dec 29 2024
    The Chosen is the widely popular television drama about the beginnings of Christianity. It is now in its fourth season, and no one is as surprised at its success than Amanda and Dallas Jenkins, the show's creators. They were skeptical of Angel Studio's crowd-funding business plan and thought they could raise at best $800; They ended up raising $10 million. But the career success has been accompanied by personal sadness with a chronically ill child. However, Amanda says, this has kept life and all its ups and downs in perspective- and that's God's plan. On this episode of Lighthouse Faith podcast, Amanda Jenkins talks about her book, "God's Goodness For The Chosen", and explains how they learned that God allows success in our lives but that He allows struggles also to help us stay close to Him. For her, the bottom line is that "God is doing a new thing." That He is "drawing people around the world back to Himself." And that The Chosen is all part and parcel of that grand plan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    38 mins
  • Pastor Max Lucado: Christmas Means God Is Telling Us He Loves Us

    Pastor Max Lucado: Christmas Means God Is Telling Us He Loves Us
    Dec 22 2024
    More than two thousand years ago God broke through the barrier separating sinful humanity from a Holy God and took on human flesh in the form of a tiny baby. Christianity says all of human history had been building to that monumental event that separated time. Why did God, the creator of the universe, decide to enter our world, not as an avenging angel, but as a vulnerable and innocent baby? It's because of love. On this episode of Lighthouse Faith podcast, Pastor Max Lucado, best-selling author and preacher, talks about the true meaning of Christmas. That Christmas set into motion the life-altering cosmos calamity that closed the chasm between God and sinful man."Christmas", says Lucado, "begins what Easter celebrates." The two highest holy days of the Christain calendar are eternally linked. While Christmas has become much more commercialized with shopping and Santa taking center stage, it hasn't changed the reality that the peace and joy we talk about on Christmas cards and ad slogans, flows only from this one event, the birth of Jesus: "For God so loved the world!" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    36 mins
  • Bible Answer Man Hank Hanegraaff On The Incarnation: What Separates Christianity From Every Other Religion

    Bible Answer Man Hank Hanegraaff On The Incarnation: What Separates Christianity From Every Other Religion
    Dec 15 2024
    While religions of the world have some similarities, like the importance of family or mercy, Christianity makes a claim no other religion makes; that the founder of the faith is God in human form, Jesus. Every other religion tells followers, "this is the way to God." But Jesus says, "I am the way." Christianity says God has come to us. That means Christmas is all about the doctrine of the Incarnation, God taking on human flesh, born of a woman, entering into our world and the conditions under which we live, in order to save us from ourselves. The secular culture is very eager to have Christians pay more attention to superfluous trappings of the season, the glitz and glamour, rather than the real meaning of Christmas. On this episode of Lighthouse Faith podcast, Hank Hanegraaff, the Bible Answer Man, explores what the Incarnation should mean to us, and why the Virgin Mary should be understood in the fullness of the gift she gave the world in saying "Yes" to God's invitation to be the mother of the Savior. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    37 mins
  • The Saints Creator Wants Audience Suggestions About Which Saints They Want To See Next

    The Saints Creator Wants Audience Suggestions About Which Saints They Want To See Next
    Dec 8 2024
    The Martin Scorsese production of "The Saints", now streaming on Fox Nation, is wrapping up its first four episodes this week with Maximillian Kolbe, a Polish priest who sacrificed his life in a Nazi concentration camp so that another prisoner could be spared. The series will continue in the Spring, during the Lenton season, with four more stories of extraordinary people of faith: Francis Of Assisi, Thomas Becket, Mary Magdalene and Moses the Black. And after that, the creator of the project Matti Leshem, wants audience input about who they want to see next. The Catholic Church recognizes more than ten-thousand saints, so there's a lot to choose from for future episodes. On this episode of Lighthouse Faith podcast, Leshem, who is Jewish, talks about working with Academy Award-winning director Scorsese, and how even people who aren't Catholic or Christian can be inspired by these stories of regular men and women, whose faith compelled them to unimaginable heights of bravery and courage. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    43 mins
  • Advent: Anne Graham Lotz and Tim Mahoney Discuss the Old Testament Prophecies Predicting the Birth of Jesus

    Advent: Anne Graham Lotz and Tim Mahoney Discuss the Old Testament Prophecies Predicting the Birth of Jesus
    Dec 1 2024
    We are now in the Advent season, the four weeks leading up to Christmas and the joy of Jesus' birth. Like Advent itself, the birth of the Savior has a lot of back story. Woven through the Bible's Old Testament are hundreds of prophecies that tell of a Messiah that will be born sometime in the future. Many of the prophecies, like those in Isaiah, are written centuries before the birth of Jesus. Cumulatively, they predict the conditions of the birth, the location of the birth, who he will be born to, what he is coming to do and so much more. Jesus fulfills every one of those prophecies. On this episode of Lighthouse Faith podcast, evangelist Anne Graham Lotz and investigative filmmaker Tim Mahoney delve into the prophecies of the Old Testament and the archeological evidence that shows that the core tenets of Christianity are grounded in the historical record. Mahoney's Patterns of Evidence production house has investigated the archeological evidence biblical prophecies and events from the Exodus to his most recent on Israel Dilemma that explores the Israel's covenant with God and the land. Lotz, well-known author and Christian speaker, is the daughter of the late evangelist Billy Graham. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    48 mins
  • Historian Dr. Jerry Newcombe: Thanksgiving Was Created to Acknowledge the Providence of Almighty God

    Historian Dr. Jerry Newcombe: Thanksgiving Was Created to Acknowledge the Providence of Almighty God
    Nov 24 2024
    Fleeing from Europe to the New World for religious freedom in 1620, the Pilgrims intended to settle in northern Virginia, not far from Jamestown where there was an established community. But their ship was blown off course and landed instead at Plymouth, Massachusetts. And because they were in unsettled territory, the Pilgrims (before disembarking the Mayflower) created a document that became the prototype for America's Declaration of Independence and Constitution. On this episode of Lighthouse Faith podcast, author and historian Dr. Jerry Newcombe explores the faith steeped history of Thanksgiving and the Pilgrims who landed in the New World and created the essence of the American experiment, the agreement for self-government, a civil body politic under God. The very first Thanksgiving, as the Pilgrims sat down with the Indians to share a meal, was always about giving thanks to an Almighty God, through whose Providence they were brought to a new land. Unfortunately, the education system in this land of the free has worked to erase God from the history books. But Newcombe, the Executive Director of Providence Forum, is pushing back. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    41 mins
  • N.T. Wright On One of the Most Subversive Books in the Bible: Acts

    N.T. Wright On One of the Most Subversive Books in the Bible: Acts
    Nov 17 2024
    The book of Acts seems to sit benignly in the Bible, following the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. It's presented almost as a travelogue of what happens to the apostles and the growing community devoted to a man named Jesus who was crucified. But Acts, if read properly, is quite subversive, and a potential source of great fear for the kings and rulers of the world because it directly challenges their authority, says Dr. N.T. Wright. Acts, written by the Apostle Luke, announces that the Kingdom of God has been launched, and that Jesus is its head. Why is this a problem for us today? Because the Western world's 'Separation of Church and State' is a wobbly philosophy if in fact Jesus is King, and really can't be lived out to its most extreme manifestations, that they are on a collision course we can in fact see today in politics and the culture. On this episode of Lighthouse Faith podcast, Dr. Wright, author, theologian, scholar, and Anglican priest, explains his new book, "The Challenge of Acts: Rediscovering What the Church Was and Is". Wright says, "Acts is a dangerous book; and if people take it seriously, it's still dangerous today because the powerbrokers don't like the idea that actually there is this thing called the Kingdom of God." Luke also wrote one of the two Gospels that includes the narratives of Jesus's birth. Luke describes it as the Royal Birth, of a King that will be at odds with all the Kings of the earth. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    40 mins