Sinners In the Hands of a Loving God with Brian Zahnd

Rector’s Cupboard is pleased to welcome Brian Zahnd. Brian is the founder and lead pastor of Word of Life Church in Saint Joseph, Missouri.

Brian has been somewhat of a trailblazer in contemporary expressions of hopeful theology. His books, including Sinners in the Hands of a Loving God and Beauty Will Save the World, outline a thoughtful, positive, and beautiful understanding of Christian faith and belief. Brian’s work has informed the work of Rector’s Cupboard and Reflector Project. As our reach has grown, we have consistently encountered people who have been helped by Brian’s writing.

We were pleased, in this episode, to include a couple of friends we’ve met through our work who have also followed Brian’s work. Neil and Peter start the conversation with Brian by opening up some of their key questions.

Brian is one of those writers and speakers that people who hold rigid and fearful understandings of faith sometimes warn you about. One of the problems for such accusations is that Brian knows his stuff. He opens a consideration of the history of Christian faith and theology and of Biblical interpretation in a way that shows us how, often, the fearful or divisive ways we have understood theology and the Bible are the distortions, not the life-giving truth.

Brian does this in a way that is direct, but not accusatory, thoughtful, but understandable and relatable.

Enjoy the episode.

Tasting Notes:

Our tasting for this episode comes all the way from Lviv, Ukraine. Piana Vyshnia, or Drunk Cherry in English, is a not too sweet cherry liqueur that we would highly recommend, if you can find it.