Christ is Victorious Podcast

In the Gospel of Luke 15:8–10, Jesus tells a short but powerful parable:From a universalist perspective, the Lost Coin reveals the heart of God; persistent, intentional, and unwilling to accept permanent loss.In this trilogy of parables in Luke 15, the Lost Sheep, the Lost Coin, and the Prodigal Son, the emphasis is on divine initiative. God is not passive, waiting to see who makes it back. God is active, searching.For those who hold to universal reconciliation, this word shines brightly. The persistence of divine love is not temporary. It does not grow tired. It does not stop at difficulty. It continues until restoration is accomplished.When she finds the coin, the woman calls her friends and neighbors together and says:“What woman, having ten silver coins, if she loses one coin, does not light a lamp and sweep the house and seek diligently until she finds it?” “Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.” As Heaven rejoices over one sinner who repents. Luke 15:10Visit. www.patristicuniversalism.com

Welcome to the Podcast. If you listened today, let us know by visiting our visitor page. The early church often understood the atonement as a great act of divine rescue. Christ came not to satisfy divine anger directed against humanity, but to heal, restore, and liberate humanity from corruption, death, and bondage. His victory was not merely legal; it was transformative.The ransom-for-all view takes seriously passages such as:"For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive." (1 Corinthians 15:22)"Therefore as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men." (Romans 5:18)"And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself." (John 12:32)These passages present Christ's work as universal in scope. The same humanity that was affected by Adam's fall is the humanity Christ came to redeem.This does not mean that judgment is absent. Scripture clearly teaches divine judgment and correction. Yet judgment itself serves God's redemptive purpose. God's discipline is not aimed at endless destruction but at restoration and reconciliation.The ransom accomplished by Christ is not ultimately limited by human weakness, ignorance, or rebellion. If Christ truly gave Himself as a ransom for all, then the purpose of God is the liberation of all. The victory of Christ is greater than the fall of Adam, and the grace of God is stronger than sin.From a patristic universalist perspective, the cross is not merely about saving a few from a lost humanity. It is about God entering into the human condition to rescue, heal, and restore the entire creation. Christ becomes what we are so that we may become what He intended us to be.The atonement reveals a God whose love does not fail, whose mercy endures forever, and whose saving purpose extends to every person He has made. The ransom has been paid. The Good Shepherd will not cease His work until every lost sheep is found and every captive is finally free."For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be glory forever. Amen." (Romans 11:36)

Did Jesus Save Us from the Father?Hebrews 2:14-15Many Christians have been taught that Jesus came to save us from the wrath of the Father. Yet the New Testament presents a different picture. Jesus did not come to rescue humanity from God; He came to reveal God.Jesus said, "Whoever has seen Me has seen the Father" (John 14:9). Christ is the perfect image of God's character and love. The Father was not the enemy of humanity. Rather, "God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself" (2 Corinthians 5:19).What, then, did Jesus save us from?The Scriptures repeatedly teach that Christ came to save us from sin, corruption, and death. Humanity had fallen under the bondage of mortality through Adam. Death reigned over the human race, bringing fear, suffering, and separation from the life God intended.Through His incarnation, death, and resurrection, Jesus entered into our condition and defeated death from within. As the Apostle Paul declares, "The last enemy to be destroyed is death" (1 Corinthians 15:26). By rising from the dead, Christ shattered the power of the grave and opened the way to eternal life.The early Church Fathers often described salvation as Christ's victory over death. Humanity was held captive by corruption and mortality, but Christ conquered these enemies through His resurrection. As Hebrews 2:14-15 explains, Jesus partook of our humanity so that "through death He might destroy the one who has the power of death" and free those who were enslaved by the fear of death.The cross reveals God's self-giving love. The resurrection reveals God's triumph over death. Together they proclaim the good news that God is not against humanity but for humanity. In Jesus Christ, God has entered our darkness, defeated death, and is drawing all creation toward life, restoration, and reconciliation.Christ did not save us from the Father. Christ revealed the Father and saved us from the power of death.

There comes a time in many believers’ lives when questions begin to rise—deep questions that touch both the mind and the soul. These moments are not necessarily signs of rebellion or failure. Often, they are signs of awakening.Many people have been taught that faith means never questioning, never struggling, never wrestling. But Scripture shows us something very different. Throughout the Bible, we see men and women crying out to God in confusion, sorrow, frustration, and longing.The Lord Himself says in Isaiah:“Come now, let us reason together, says the LORD.”God invites us to think. He invites us to seek. He invites us to bring our whole selves into His presence.#deconstructing #faith

In this episode we discuss a topic that often comes up. Does Universalism lower the Bar of Accountability? Many believe we are rewarded simply for good behavior, but the Gospel teaches something deeper. God is not merely seeking outward obedience — He desires transformed hearts. Biblical Universalism teaches that all people will face God’s refining judgment, not for endless punishment, but for healing, correction, and restoration. God disciplines those He loves so that every soul may ultimately be purified and brought into the fullness of Christ. #Universalism #Heresy

Starting a restored relationship with God begins with turning our heart toward Him. It is not about becoming perfect , but about trusting the God who created us, loves us, and desires communion with us. Through turning to God (repentance), we move away from darkness and toward His light, peace, and truth. Jesus taught that God is like a loving Father who welcomes us home with open arms. When we seek Him sincerely, invite Him into our lives, and ask Him to guide and transform us, we begin a new journey of healing, grace, and restoration. God desires not only to be our Savior, but also our friend and Father. see our links to our social media and website. https://linktr.ee/patristicuniversalism

This message includes our choir and worship songs, a message to encourage and uplift the heart and soul. Together we explore Scripture and compare the views of Eternal Torment and Annihilation in light of the love, mercy, and compassion of God. Join us as Wendy Burnfield presents a biblical message of grace, hope, and restoration that points us toward the heart of Christ. Come worship, reflect, and be encouraged.

Many who deconstruct feel condemned. But we learn an important lesson from John Wesley: "Condemn no man for not thinking as you think. Let every one enjoy the full and free liberty of thinking for himself: Let every man use his own judgment." Scripture also welcomes our questions, and thinking. “Come now, let us reason together, says the LORD: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.”-Isaiah 1:18The Lord welcomes our questions and thoughts, let us be lights for those who have questions, who wrestle with doubt. And as our faith grows, we likely will have the same struggles. This is not the end, but the begging of our faith growing stronger than we can ever imagine.

“Restoring Human Will is the idea that humanity can recover its sense of purpose, freedom, and moral direction by embracing principles that unite rather than divide. In a world shaped by fear, isolation, manipulation, and conflict, universalism emphasizes the shared dignity, worth, and interconnectedness of all people regardless of nationality, religion, culture, or background. By encouraging compassion, critical thought, cooperation, and personal responsibility, it seeks to restore the human will — the capacity to choose meaning, pursue truth, and shape a better future together.

Many who hold to eternal conscious torment focus so heavily on punishment that they can miss the deeper point of the Gospel: reconciliation, transformation, and union with God. In a universalist view, hell is not about God endlessly sustaining suffering for its own sake, but about exposing darkness so healing and restoration can occur. The fire of God is understood less as revenge and more as purification.Throughout the teachings of Jesus Christ, the emphasis was often on the condition of the heart. He warned religious leaders about hypocrisy, hardness, greed, lack of mercy, and spiritual blindness. The warnings about judgment were not merely threats about the afterlife, but calls to awaken to love, truth, humility, and compassion now.Eternal conscious torment theology can sometimes create an image of God where justice overshadows mercy, and fear overshadows love. But Scripture repeatedly says God desires all to be saved, seeks the lost sheep, leaves the ninety-nine for the one, and commands us to love our enemies. A universalist perspective asks: if humans are called to radical forgiveness, would God possess less mercy than the love He commands from us?Universalism does not deny judgment. It takes judgment seriously. But judgment is seen as purposeful rather than pointless. Like a refining fire, it burns away evil, pride, hatred, and falsehood so that truth and healing remain. The goal is restoration, not endless torment.

What Is Retributive Justice?Retributive justice is the idea that wrongdoing must be repaid with punishment.It focuses on penalty, vengeance, and giving someone what they deserve.Human systems often operate this way:You hurt someone → you suffer.You fail → you are cast out.Justice becomes mainly punitive.There are certainly consequences for sin in the Bible. God is holy and takes evil seriously. But Scripture also reveals that God’s ultimate goal is not destruction — it is redemption.Restorative justice seeks healing, reconciliation, and transformation.Instead of asking:“How do we punish the offender?”It asks:“How do we restore what was broken?”This is deeply biblical.Throughout Scripture, God continually pursues restoration:restoring Israel,restoring sinners,restoring relationships,restoring creation itself.The heart of God is not endless abandonment, but redemption.What Is Restorative Justice?

A Universalism perspective vs. eternal conscious torment theology, universalism generally believes God’s judgment has a redemptive purpose, not endless revenge.Many universalists point to verses where God’s judgment is connected to purification:“For our God is a consuming fire.” — Hebrews 12:29“He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver.” — Malachi 3:3“Mercy triumphs over judgment.” — James 2:13In this view, hell is not ignored or minimized. It is still serious, painful, and something to avoid. A universalist would often say:Sin destroys us.Darkness has consequences.We can harden our hearts against God.Judgment is real.But they would also believe:God never stops loving His creation.Christ came to save the world, not merely part of it.God’s justice and mercy ultimately work together.No one is beyond redemption.Some early Christian thinkers associated with hopeful or restorative universalism, like Origen and Gregory of Nyssa, viewed divine punishment more like spiritual healing or purification than eternal torture.

Why do we judge others when we have our own logs in our eye? Why are we so quick to point out the failures, weaknesses, and struggles of another person while ignoring the broken places within ourselves?Too often, assumptions become our version of truth. We see a moment, hear a rumor, or notice someone’s flaws, and we build an entire story about who they are. But only God sees the whole picture. Only God knows the battles people carry silently, the wounds they hide, and the prayers they cry out when no one else is around.Jesus warned us about this very thing when He spoke about the log in our own eye. Before trying to remove the speck from someone else, we must first allow God to deal with our own hearts. The message was never about condemnation — it was about humility, mercy, and transformation.It is easy to judge.It is harder to love.It is easy to criticize.It is harder to show grace.It is easy to assume the worst about someone.It is harder to look in the mirror and honestly ask God to change us first.Every person we meet is someone Christ loves deeply. The person we misunderstand, the person we disagree with, the person who falls short — they are still loved by God. And if God continues to show patience, mercy, and compassion toward us in our failures, how can we refuse to extend that same grace to others?Instead of labeling people, let us learn to pray for them.Instead of assuming motives, let us choose understanding.Instead of tearing others down, let us become people who restore, encourage, and love.The truth is, none of us stand righteous by our own goodness. We all need mercy. We all need forgiveness. We all need God to continually shape our hearts.So before speaking judgment over another person, pause and look inward. Ask God to reveal pride, bitterness, hypocrisy, or hardness within your own heart. Let Him remove the log from your eyes so you can see others not through condemnation, but through compassion.The world already has enough critics.What it desperately needs is people who reflect the love of Christ.Let God be the Judge.Let us be people of grace.

Universalism isn’t the gospel. What often gets missed is that the heart of the gospel is reconciliation—the restoring of a broken relationship between humanity and God. It’s not about focusing on reward or punishments, but about transformation, renewal, and connection. This podcast centers on what truly matters here and now. Relationship comes first. The heart of the gospel is reconciliation—being brought back into right relationship with God—and its ultimate goal is restoration, where what was broken is made whole again.

A podcast episode inspired by DC Talk—especially their song What If I Stumble?—explores a difficult truth: sometimes the behavior of Christians can push others away from faith. The conversation reflects on how judgment, hypocrisy, and lack of compassion have led some, like the perspective of an atheist, to walk away from Christianity. Rather than attacking faith itself, the episode challenges believers to examine how their actions represent Christ, asking whether love and humility are being overshadowed by criticism and arrogance.

The Website of Dr. Harold Moses About Us - Higher Vibrations MusicJoin us we discuss Grace and harmony with music composer Dr. Harold Moses. The Symphony of Grace explores how music, harmony, and divine beauty point to a deeper truth: God is restoring all things. Join Dr. Harold, composer and teacher, as he reveals how grace moves like a melody through creation—healing, transforming, and bringing every note back into perfect harmony. This podcast invites you to hear faith not as fear, but as a symphony of restoration, where love has the final word.

Scripture often reveals God’s purposes through patterns of three, a theme woven throughout the Bible from Genesis to Revelation. In this conversation, author Jim Strahan shares how he believes the Holy Spirit revealed these patterns in Scripture, showing a beautiful harmony between the writings of Moses, Paul, and John and God’s unfolding plan for humanity.Moses, in the Torah, lays the foundation through the biblical feasts, which unfold in a threefold rhythm—spring, summer, and fall. These feasts prophetically point to God’s redemptive work. The spring feasts foreshadow Christ’s death and resurrection, the summer feast represents the harvest, and the fall feasts look ahead to the completion of God’s plan and the gathering of all people to Him.Paul builds on this pattern in 1 Corinthians 15, where he explains the order of resurrection: Christ the firstfruits, then those who belong to Him, and finally the end when Christ brings all things under God’s authority. Paul reveals that resurrection unfolds in stages, pointing toward the ultimate restoration of humanity.Finally, John, in the book of Revelation, gives the closing vision of God’s purpose. His imagery of resurrection, judgment, and the renewal of heaven and earth leads to the healing of the nations and the restoration of creation.In this conversation, Jim Strahan explores how these three witnesses—Moses, Paul, and John—form a consistent biblical pattern. Through the pattern of three, the biblical feasts, and the teaching on resurrection, Scripture points toward God’s final goal: the restoration of humanity and the reconciliation of all creation to Himself. Visit his website Home | Author Jim Strahan

Join us for a powerful and uplifting conversation with author Robby Atwood, as we discuss his book Fascinated: Living in Awe of the Father. In this episode, Robby shares what it means to rediscover childlike wonder in our walk with God and to move beyond fear-based faith into a deep, abiding awe of the Father’s love.We explore how fascination with God transforms our spiritual life, restores joy, and reshapes the way we see ourselves and others. If you’re longing for a faith that feels alive, intimate, and rooted in the goodness of the Father, this conversation will encourage and refresh your soul. Visit his website and ministry, at Robby Atwood Listen to Robby Atwood's worship Music on Spotify. #Robbyatowood #salvation #grace #fatherofall

In this episode, David Burnfield, author of Patristic Universalism, explores why the restoration view of hell is often excluded from modern conversations about eternity. He explains why this perspective—rooted in the early Church and the writings of Church Fathers—should not be considered heretical, and why it deserves thoughtful consideration. David also provides a brief exploration of restorative hell: a vision of divine justice and mercy where souls are ultimately healed and reconciled, rather than eternally condemned. Join us as we dive into a conversation that challenges common assumptions and sheds light on a hope-filled understanding of God’s ultimate plan for all. Visit the website: www.patristicuniversalism.com #Rethinking hell #restorationhell #Patristicuniversalism #Christisvictorious

Welcome to Christ Is Victorious. Today we’re honored to welcome author Jim Strahan, writer of The Third Heaven. In this episode, we’ll talk about the heart behind The Third Heaven, what it means to encounter deeper dimensions of God’s presence, and how these revelations shape the way we understand Scripture, eternity, and the victory of Christ. Jim shares insights from his journey, the inspiration behind the book, and how believers today can grow in spiritual awareness and intimacy with the Father. Also visit his website at ⁠⁠Home | Author Jim Strahan⁠In this book, I will demonstrate how the writings of Moses, John, and Paul, speak to three resurrections, and I will connect them to Paul’s experience when he was caught up to the third heaven. I will also present twenty-one other scriptural references that reveal how this underlying pattern of “threes” spans from Genesis to Revelation. David Konstan, professor of Classics at NYU following three decades at Brown: You know that what you have to say is important, and you invite your reader to carry on a dialogue. You defend the idea of a third resurrection with due citation of texts, and make a very strong case for it.Boyd Purcell, PHD: I am highly impressed with Jim Strahan’s ability to logically and systematically analyze The Holy Bible in depth, from historical, mathematical, and scientific perspectives. Even if readers do not agree with this author on the three resurrections and the third heaven, they can learn a lot by carefully reading and studying this book, seeing that the Bible is even more symbolic than what they may have ever heard or thought.Michael Riley, Electrical Engineer, and co-author of “Is God Fair? What about Gandhi?”: To the prospective reader, I would like to encourage you to drink deeply from the ideas and arguments in Jim’s book, for you have likely never heard or seen them before–a merging of Scriptures into a belief that today’s Christianity in general, not only does not teach, but likely has never even considered. The number three appears predominantly throughout Scripture. In this amazing book, you will learn of a novel use of this number that explains Paul’s use of the phrase, “each man in his own order.” Intrigued? Well, the answer this book gives is a solid and meaningful explanation of it. And there is more, much more. May you enjoy the exploration.