Send us a text This is a replay of Episode 31 with a brief new intro. Jesus tells a parable about a demon exorcism which results in a situation worse than the original demon possession. Those who read the Bible at surface level (and somehow don't seem to notice all the problems that presents) tend to read this passage literally, but Jesus is clearl…

Send us a text For many modern Christians, especially in the West, the miracles of the Bible are such an uncomfortable subject that we often pretend that they are not even there in the text. We ignore them. But they are key to understanding the message of the Gospel.By Bert Newton

Send us a text What is the intersection between the "hidden things" and "secrets" of Matthew 13 and the recent conspiracy theories that have played significant role in U.S. politics? If you need to review Matthew 13, click here. If you want to watch clips of Palestinian American comedian Sammy Obeid, click here.…

At Making Housing and Community Happen, we work with people of all faiths and anyone who wants to work for housing justice. As we work with people of faith, we urge everyone to draw deep from their faith tradition for inspiration and motivation and ways to speak to others in their faith community to organize them for the work of housing justice. Mo…

The intersection of racial justice and housing justice in the United States his huge, and a lot of our work highlights and addresses this intersection. This episode is a short talk that Pastor Len Tang, of Missio Community Church in Pasadena, gave at the May 8, 2024 gathering of the Clergy Community Coalition at First Baptist Church of Pasadena. Th…

Send us a text Could the Gospel of Matthew have been written to address the aftermath of a genocide, much like the one happening in Gaza right now?By Bert Newton

Send us a text I recommend to my listeners the amazing documentary, Gaza Fights for Freedom. You can find it free on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HnZSaKYmP2s It centers on the 21 months of nonviolent demonstrations by Gazans at the border with Israel in 2018-2019.By Bert Newton

Send us a text The story of my short sojourn in Palestine 22 years ago and what I learned from the Palestinians. This is a slightly revised sermon that I delivered at Pasadena Mennonite Church in August of 2001.By Bert Newton

Send us a text The Gospel overturns not just the order of society but our conception of God as well. When Jesus cries out, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" we should be shocked. We should not just gloss over the implications of such a statement in this story about God revealed in a human Palestinian Jewish peasant. It may be an earth sha…

Send us a text This episode is a sermon that I delivered at Pasadena Mennonite Church on September 17, 2023. In this sermon I connect the dots between U.S. military and economic aggression abroad with domestic housing justice. The passages cited are: Matthew 12:46-50 Mark 10:29-30 Matthew 6:19-21By Bert Newton

In this episode, I interview Brendan Poon, an amazing high school student who interned with us to work on Pasadena's rent control campaign, and also Jill Shook, the co-founding ED of MHCH about Pasadena's rent control campaign and other tenant protection campaigns in Pasadena. We are very thankful to the Pasadena Tenants Union who led the campaign …

Send us a text The Making Housing and Community Happen (MHCH) Podcast has launched, telling stories of social transformation and housing justice! You can listen to the first episode here. You can also search for "Making Housing and Community Happen" on your podcast app. You can visit the Making Housing and Community Happen website here.…

Dr. Jill Suzanne Shook tells stories of how she got into organizing and advocating for housing justice and how we got inclusionary housing in Pasadena. Visit our website.By Bert

Send us a text In this episode I revisit the text about Jesus' interaction with the centurion to focus more than I did in episode 16 on the "banquet" (NRSV) that Jesus refers to. What is this "banquet" of which Jesus speaks? How does it evolve in the writings of ancient Israel, and what form does it take in the Gospel of Matthew?…

Send us a text Some new research and connections in these two passages that occur together in Matthew 19:13-30.By Bert Newton

Send us a text In this special episode, I interview Dr. Timothy Lewis, creator of the Podcast Matthewlinity, and author of the upcoming book, The Poetics of Matthew One. Through poetic/literary analysis of the Gospel of Matthew, Dr. Lewis has found a pattern in which the narrative consistently undermines patriarchal structures and customs, challeng…

Send us a text I've often thought about what I would say were I to be invited to participate in an on stage "debate" with an atheist. Well, here is my opening statement.By Bert Newton

Send us a text Why does Matthew divide up the genealogy into 3 sets of 14 generations? What does this signify? Link to Dr. Timothy Lewis' podcast, Matthewlinity: https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/matthewlinity/id1398795694By Bert Newton

Send us a text Revisiting the theme of Jonah in Matthew. The "big fish" ain't just a big fish!By Bert Newton

Send us a text The text is Matthew 4:23-25. This special episode is mostly a recording of me, Bert, doing a workshop (as the sermon!) at Pasadena Mennonite Church, but I added a 10 minute introduction.By Bert Newton

Send us a text Jesus' resurrection brings the victory of the future into the present, and Jesus gives his disciples a nonviolent commission to counter the imperial violent domination of the powers and authorities of this present age.By Bert Newton

Send us a text Jesus experiences abandonment by God, but the apocalyptic signs reveal the victory of the cross.By Bert Newton

Send us a text We look at two important passages, the suicide of Judas and the release of Barabbas.By Bert Newton

Send us a text Jesus goes on trial before the Sanhedrin, but who is really on trial? Those with eyes to see can see as through the vision of Daniel 7.By Bert Newton

Send us a text In these passages, Jesus is more human than we have seen him; he is afraid and doesn't want to go to the cross, yet he still rejects violent resistance, even by angels.By Bert Newton

Send us a text A woman anoints Jesus, and Jesus becomes the liberating sacrifice for the nation (and all nations or people).By Bert Newton

Send us a text I did the whole series on The Little Apocalypse in Matthew and did not comment on the use of the term "the elect." So I did this little addendum to give my thoughts on the matterBy Bert Newton

Send us a text Jesus tells two parables that demonstrate what "staying awake" or "keeping watch" looks like.By Bert Newton

Send us a text In this second section of Matthew's "Little Apocalypse," Jesus starts talking parabolically, calling for his audience to "Stay Awake" for the "Coming of the Son of Man." But what does he mean by "Stay Awake," and what is the "Coming of the Son of Man."By Bert Newton

Send us a text I thought I'd address an issue that might come up for some listeners regarding the accuracy of the prediction of the destruction of the temple/Jerusalem, and also express some additional thoughts I had, after recording the episode, about Jesus' statement, "This generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place." T…

Send us a text This is the first in a three part series on Matthew's "Little Apocalypse" in chapters 24-25. This first episode is considerably on the long side because there is so much imagery to unpack!By Bert Newton

Send us a text More episodes in the New Year!By Bert Newton

Send us a text In chapter 5, Jesus gave 9 blessings. In chapter 23, he gives 7 woes.By Bert Newton

Send us a text The Pharisees join forces with the Herodians and Sadducees to try to stop Jesus from plundering the house. They engage him in public debate...but that never ends well for them.By Bert Newton

Send us a text In chapter 12, Jesus talked about binding the strong man and plundering his house. In this episode, Jesus does that. Please consider making a donation to the Immigrant Worker Safety Net Fund.By Bert Newton

Send us a text My good friend, Susan Cameron, who is a lawyer as well as a seminary graduate, gives us insights into the divorce text in Mark, which is different from but similar enough to the two divorce texts in Matthew that her work gives greater depth to the work that I did on the Matthew passages.…

Send us a text Please consider making a donation to Christian Peacemaker Teams for the work in the West Bank, in Hebron/al- Khalil in Palestine. You can read more about their work and make a donation at https://www.cpt.org/.By Bert Newton

Send us a text Why did Jesus drive the money changers and people selling animals out of the temple? Also, ancient people had their sacrificial rituals, but do we? What are the rituals of modern capitalism, and do we even know that we are performing them?By Bert Newton

Send us a text Part of the title for this episode, "Making and Ass Out of Rome," is borrowed from Warren Carter, who entitled the section on this passage in his commentary with those words. In this episode, I mention The Yes Men, modern tricksters who expose some of the more absurd and cruel aspects of capitalism. To find out more about them and se…

Send us a text Equality is extremely difficult; there are always people who want to put themselves in positions of power and authority over others. Different accounts of the conquest of Jerusalem by David, Joshua, and Judah: https://www.thetorah.com/article/the-israelite-conquest-of-jerusalem-in-the-bible-when-and-who…

Send us a text Jesus warns against meritocracy in this often overlooked parable. A couple of resources mentioned in the podcast are: Clifton Mark's article, "A Belief in Meritocracy is Not Only False, It's Bad for You," can be found here. The PBS video about Paul Piff and his experiments about wealth and meritocracy can be found here.…

Send us a text The rich young man man comes to Jesus. He's more sympathetic to the movement for a new society than we might think.By Bert Newton

Send us a text Jesus finally leaves Galilee, on his way to Jerusalem, and enters Judea. Pharisees ask him about divorce, and Jesus ends up talking about eunuchs. Good stuff!By Bert Newton

Send us a text This interview is focused on hearing the Gospel in today's context. I interview a local pastor of a bilingual Spanish-English congregation, Pastor Marcos Canales. Pastor Canales hears the Gospel as one who has lived the effects of colonization as Jesus did. Also, his congregation just finished a study of the Gospel of Mark, a major s…

Send us a text One of our listeners gives a brilliant modern-day analogy to help us understand and interpret "The Parable of the Tyrant King and the Unforgiving Servant." Also, Time magazine came out with an article on air conditioning, and one place in Canada recorded 121 degrees Fahrenheit!By Bert Newton

Send us a text The parable at the end of chapter 18 of Matthew is usually called "The Parable of the Unforgiving Slave" because it is understood to be about the behavior of one character in the parable. But a closer examination of the parable in its historical context reveals that it is not just about one person's behavior but also about systemic a…

Send us a text In this episode, I make the case that what normally has been understood as a passage about "church discipline" is actually about an alternative criminal justice system. The language used is language of ancient judicial proceedings in both Judea and the wider Greco-Roman world. So those who are today talking about abolishing the curre…

Send us a text This episode starts a new section of Matthew, chapters 18-20, in which Jesus talks about the structure of the New Society, specifically how power, honor, and authority are distributed.By Bert Newton

Send us a text The Gospel story has been used as a pretext for horrible persecution of Jewish people in the West. This persecution led to the modern state of Israel, perceived, for good reason, by many Jews as the only way to escape this persecution. The result has been the dispossession of the Palestinian people. In this episode, I try to grapple …

Send us a text Fresh off the mountain of the transfiguration, Jesus counters the interpretation of the temple establishment, casts out a Roman demon, and cleverly undermines the authority of the temple system of the empire.By Bert Newton