NOT YOUR SAFE, STAINED-GLASS JESUS

•    religious icons stylized, remote – can’t relate
•    Luke’s Jesus challenges us: full of questions
•    “lets the volcano of His own heart burst forth”
•    not namby-pamby sentimentalism, but virile righteousness

NO CONCORD ABOARD CONCORDIA

•    ruptures in social fabric akin to stricken ship
•    echoes of Micah’s day 700 BC: powerful corrupt, neighbours deceptive, children dishonouring
•    Pompeii houses of ill repute preserved for all to see
•    people ought to be capable of judging what’s right using inner moral compass
•    abusive relationships messy to extricate; institutions suffer from resource / governance lacks

THE WRECKED NEED A RECONCILER

•    significance of Jesus’ ministry should have been as obvious as weather signs
•    dragged off to prison: urgency of making things right with one’s adversary
•    Jesus’ baptism of the cross necessary for our debt to be ‘finished’ / paid-in-full
•    came to bring fire – God’s judgment, and Holy Spirit

BAD COPIES OF BAD COPIES – NEED A TRANSPLANT

•    BGEA “My Hope” excerpt: illusionist with fatal illness given new life