What do you mean God speaks?
Paul Seungoh Chung
A series that reconstrues and retells key ideas, insights, and stories in Christianity for the skeptics who want to understand religion, Christians with questions about their own beliefs, and everyone in between. I am Paul Seungoh Chung, the author of God at the Crossroads of Worldviews, a university lecturer, and a pastor. I invite you to explore with me the world shared by 2.4 billion people--one that inspired our ideals, imaginations, and intellect, for better or for worse. (Note: I recommend listening to the episodes in order--from the first to the latest.)
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Goodpods has curated a list of the 10 best What do you mean God speaks? episodes, ranked by the number of listens and likes each episode have garnered from our listeners. If you are listening to What do you mean God speaks? for the first time, there's no better place to start than with one of these standout episodes. If you are a fan of the show, vote for your favorite What do you mean God speaks? episode by adding your comments to the episode page.
S3E9: Why God called Abraham to sacrifice his son
What do you mean God speaks?
09/28/22 • 35 min
Why did God call Abraham to offer his son, Isaac, as a burnt offering?
The story of the "Binding of Isaac," is not simply about a story of a man obeying God to the point that he will sacrifice his own son. It is about a call that everyone who speaks with God eventually hears. And we hear this call because all of humanity has been waging a one-sided Cold War with God, and to offer Isaac was to bet on peace.
2:22 Would you be at peace if God spoke to you?
7:57 Trouble with heirs - Ishmael and Isaac
14:48 Why what God spoke to Abraham is so perplexing
18:38 Humanity is waging a Cold War on God
26:07 Why Abraham needed to offer his son to God
33:05 Peace Child
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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/whatdoyoumeangodspeaks/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Paul_Seungoh
website: https://whatdoyoumeangodspeaks.buzzsprout.com/
* Please review or rate this series on Apple Podcast and other platforms!
* You can financially support this show by clicking the "Support the Show" line above.
S3E8: Faith in Ambiguity - Miracles, Promise, and Time
What do you mean God speaks?
09/07/22 • 35 min
What is faith? What is a miracle? And how are the themes of promise, time, and ambiguity related to all of that?
Has God truly been speaking with us? Is Reality personal? Christians believe God speaks to them and walks with them, but what we’ve explored so far still remains open to the question on whether this is merely one possible way to relate to reality, a subjective way to perceive what reality unfolds in our lives. It is only with the narratives of God’s promise and its fulfillment repeated throughout the Bible that the belief in the truly personal reality of God is established in Christianity. It is in this context, that miracles have any meaning in Christianity.
Thus, the narrative of God making a promise with people and how that promise unfolds is central to Christian account of humanity’s relationship with God. And that is the life-story of Abraham and Sarah.
This leads to the related question of faith. Faith has a dimension those of us today seldom notice, yet is probably the most important: time. Because promise implies waiting, and waiting implies time.
2:03 Ambiguity, not absence, of God that confronts us
9:40 God breaks through the ambiguity with a Promise to Abraham
16:48 What is a miracle? How people today misunderstand
24:28 Faith and personal trust
29:43 Why Time is essential to Miracles and Faith
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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/whatdoyoumeangodspeaks/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Paul_Seungoh
website: https://whatdoyoumeangodspeaks.buzzsprout.com/
* Please review or rate this series on Apple Podcast and other platforms!
* You can financially support this show by clicking the "Support the Show" line above.
S3E6: Why would you think that God is good?
What do you mean God speaks?
08/01/22 • 37 min
Is God good? And if God is good, why are moral laws and commands in the Bible, sometimes not so good? And of course, why do bad things happen, if God is good?
But, before we can ask those questions, we should've asked this more basic question: Why would you think that God is good?
What does it mean to say that God is "good"?
We will begin to explore this question in this episode. Then, we can start asking what the Bible is trying to teach us about morality and goodness.
[ Update: the previous version of this episode has been split into 2 episodes. The new version of this episode expands on the first half, and explores the Genesis account of the city of Sodom and its destruction. The next episode (S3E7) will expand on the second half. ]
1:56 Morality, evolution, and gods
9:55 God, as Being, Truth, Goodness
18:24 Judgment of God, revisited
23:00 The account of Sodom’s destruction
29:19 The meaning of Sodom’s destruction
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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/whatdoyoumeangodspeaks/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Paul_Seungoh
website: https://whatdoyoumeangodspeaks.buzzsprout.com/
* Please review or rate this series on Apple Podcast and other platforms!
* You can financially support this show by clicking the "Support the Show" line above.
S3E5: Let's start thinking about the personality of God
What do you mean God speaks?
07/08/22 • 34 min
For ages, people have ascribed personality to their deities. What was their reasoning?
And what would be the personality of God that speaks forth all things? How should we start thinking about this? And what about Abram, Sarai, and their family? What was the personality of God that spoke to them? How did they begin to learn Who God was in their lives, and what did they experience?
2:12 Our cognitive predisposition to belief in gods
8:40 How we ascribe personality to gods
14:39 What would be the personality of “God”?
19:00 The role of Promise in personal relationship with God
25:50 Abram and Sarai try to fulfill God’s promise themselves
30:25 God makes a separate promise to Hagar
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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/whatdoyoumeangodspeaks/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Paul_Seungoh
website: https://whatdoyoumeangodspeaks.buzzsprout.com/
* Please review or rate this series on Apple Podcast and other platforms!
* You can financially support this show by clicking the "Support the Show" line above.
S3Extra1: Where this series is headed, and what it's been doing
What do you mean God speaks?
06/24/22 • 41 min
The first extra episode for Season 3; the next main episode (S3E5) will go live early July.
(update: there were more delays, so I couldn't complete the new episode by the end of June as I had originally planned. I apologize for the delay!)
This episode addresses the more "meta" question about this series that I wanted to go over before releasing the next episode--what this series has been doing, how it has approached the questions and issues it has explored so far, and where this series is now heading. It also drops hints of future plans, and some long overdue thanks at the end.
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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/whatdoyoumeangodspeaks/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Paul_Seungoh
website: https://whatdoyoumeangodspeaks.buzzsprout.com/
* Please review or rate this series on Apple Podcast and other platforms!
* You can financially support this show by clicking the "Support the Show" line above.
S3E4: How Abram learned Who was speaking to him
What do you mean God speaks?
06/01/22 • 34 min
To hear God speak to you, is to be presented with truth; they are the same thing. And God speaking to you often begins with uncertainty, because we don't know whether what is being presented to us really is true.
Abram and Sarai hears God speak to them in how they are moved, or inspired, to follow an inner call. "Something" guides them, and that "something" unfolds events in their lives that enable them to follow the call. Because of this, they learn that what this Voice speaks, is really true.
But, something more happens, and they gradually learn Who is speaking to them. Let's follow their journey (or for this episode, Abram's portion) to explore what happened.
2:02 Why there is uncertainty in hearing God speak
8:25 What Abram learned in Egypt
14:28 Abram's developing inner strength shown in Canaan
23:25 Abram's fateful meeting with Melchizedek
29:14 Abram learns that "God Most High" was speaking to him
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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/whatdoyoumeangodspeaks/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Paul_Seungoh
website: https://whatdoyoumeangodspeaks.buzzsprout.com/
* Please review or rate this series on Apple Podcast and other platforms!
* You can financially support this show by clicking the "Support the Show" line above.
S3E3: Why Genesis won't say -how- Abram heard God
What do you mean God speaks?
05/10/22 • 33 min
The Genesis account of Abraham, Sarah, and their children, invites its readers to follow in their path, and continue their journey toward God. There's one, big problem: it doesn't tell us how to start. Their journey begins with God speaking to Abraham (Abram), but Genesis does not describe how God first spoke to Abram, and how Abram heard God for the first time. So, can we get an answer?
This episode will explore and consider what it means to say Abraham, Sarah, and their family were real people, and what it was for them to begin their journey with God.
2:04 What can we say about Abraham as a real person?
6:54 What Christians are concerned about regarding the Bible
13:17 The silence on Genesis about how God spoke to Abram
19:10 How God speaks to all people according to Genesis
22:01 The voice that spoke to Abram
27:58 Did Abram know it was God speaking?
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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/whatdoyoumeangodspeaks/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Paul_Seungoh
website: https://whatdoyoumeangodspeaks.buzzsprout.com/
* Please review or rate this series on Apple Podcast and other platforms!
* You can financially support this show by clicking the "Support the Show" line above.
S3E2: Is Abraham a "historical" figure? No... and Yes.
What do you mean God speaks?
04/21/22 • 33 min
Abraham, Sarah, and their family--are they "historical" figures?
The simple answer? No... and Yes. (Ok, so it's not a simple answer)
Another answer is the actual title of this episode:
"Historical in/significance of Abraham's story"
This odd title can refer to four things.
1) The "insignificance" of Abraham as a "historical figure" for historians
2) The significance of Abraham's story in history
3) The historical dimension "in the significance" of Abraham's story
4) The significance of Abraham in how history has unfolded ever since.
And all of that leads us back to God's original promise to Abraham in Genesis, to bless him, to make him great, and to make his name significant, so that he will be a blessing to all people.
1:33 Primeval History in Genesis versus...
8:29 ... the Ancestral History in Genesis
13:02 Who wrote Genesis and why?
21:12 The question of Abraham as a "historical" figure
27:35 Historical in/significance of Abraham
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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/whatdoyoumeangodspeaks/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Paul_Seungoh
website: https://whatdoyoumeangodspeaks.buzzsprout.com/
* Please review or rate this series on Apple Podcast and other platforms!
* You can financially support this show by clicking the "Support the Show" line above.
S3E1: (re) What do you mean, "There's no God"?
What do you mean God speaks?
04/01/22 • 35 min
What does it mean to say, “There’s no God?”
What it means for us today, to say, “there’s no God,” is quite different from what it meant for people living just several centuries ago, to say, “there’s no God.”
That's because people back then did not merely believe that God exists. They perceived God in their world. Then, some time ago, God disappeared from our perception. We forgot what it meant to hear God speak, or see God in our lives, and so, one day, ‘God’ was no longer "there.”
* Revised on April 3 for greater clarity and flow in the 2nd half.
3:00 How the ancients perceived their gods
10:10 What it means to perceive God
20:58 A metaphor made God disappear from the cosmos
27:53 A metaphor made God disappear from our lives
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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/whatdoyoumeangodspeaks/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Paul_Seungoh
website: https://whatdoyoumeangodspeaks.buzzsprout.com/
* Please review or rate this series on Apple Podcast and other platforms!
* You can financially support this show by clicking the "Support the Show" line above.
S3Extra2: Examples from my personal experience
What do you mean God speaks?
10/18/22 • 55 min
A bonus, unscripted(!) episode. We'll see how this episode turns out.
So, we've been exploring "ideas, insights, and stories in Christianity." But, where am I in all this? Have I ever experienced some of the things I describe in this series, especially in the third season--God speaking personally to people, making promises, and unfolding miracles?
Now that I've wrapped up the main life-story of Abraham and Sarah (and I'm in the process of moving), I decided to share a few examples from things I experienced in my life. Just a few, but you'll get to hear a bit more of the person behind this series.
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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/whatdoyoumeangodspeaks/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Paul_Seungoh
website: https://whatdoyoumeangodspeaks.buzzsprout.com/
* Please review or rate this series on Apple Podcast and other platforms!
* You can financially support this show by clicking the "Support the Show" line above.
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FAQ
How many episodes does What do you mean God speaks? have?
What do you mean God speaks? currently has 82 episodes available.
What topics does What do you mean God speaks? cover?
The podcast is about Skeptic, Culture, Christianity, Theology, Society & Culture, Faith, Society, Religion & Spirituality, God, Podcasts, Religion, Philosophy and Bible.
What is the most popular episode on What do you mean God speaks??
The episode title 'S3Extra2: Examples from my personal experience' is the most popular.
What is the average episode length on What do you mean God speaks??
The average episode length on What do you mean God speaks? is 30 minutes.
How often are episodes of What do you mean God speaks? released?
Episodes of What do you mean God speaks? are typically released every 15 days, 2 hours.
When was the first episode of What do you mean God speaks??
The first episode of What do you mean God speaks? was released on Dec 7, 2020.
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