The Goodness of God

Hosted by Trey Comstock

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Episodes

212

Latest episode

Nov 2026

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About the show

Every week, Pastor Trey and Pastor Emily talk about Scripture and what it means to try and be the Church in the 21st Century. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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60 recent

November 4, 202634 min

Matthew 25:1-13

We seem to want to focus on the end. What will the end look like? Who wins? Who loses? Jesus and the other voices of the New Testament have a very different idea of what we should care about. Consistently, they tell us to live our lives staying focused on God, loving and serving others, and holding onto our faith. We want to think about the fireworks, but what we are called to in discipleship. Yes, we need to be alert, but stay alert by staying connected to God. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

October 27, 202645 min

Matthew 23:1-12

It is good to believe in God. God calls on us to live our beliefs out loud, to be a light in a dark world, and to let our actions be a meaningful point of invitation. For some folks, they connect with God in elaborate and formal rituals. For others, something more akin to modern concert creates the right environment. All of that can be good and faithful. All of that can be a show to show off how religious and cool that we are and not really point to God. It's not about style. It's about the substance. It's a question of why we do it. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

October 23, 20261 hr 5 min

TV Show Review: Death of the Pastor's Wife

(Content warning for intimate partner violence and self harm) Netflix's Death of the Pastor's Wife details a relationship between a pastor and his wife and ends in the death of the wife. It's a tale of abuse, weaponized religion, and a lack of protective structures. This story is an extreme example of something that keeps happening. An unhealthy Christian leaders leverages their institutional power for their own ends rather than God's. The institution doesn't have strength to resist. Someone gets deeply harmed. It doesn't have to be like this, but it does mean that we have to reckon with our deeply unhealthy relationship with authority. Resources: Porn and Sex Addiction - pornaddictsanonymous.org National Domestic Violence Hotline - Text 88788 or call 1-800-799-7233 Houston Area Women's Center - https://hawc.org/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

October 15, 202640 min

Matthew 22:15-22

If you're the Roman Emperor, you probably expect to dominate people's thoughts. They certainly dominated a huge percentage of the known world. A whole image of the Messiah grew up around said Messiah kicking the Romans out of the promised land. Yet, Jesus doesn't seem to care at all. Sure. Pay taxes to Caesar. Who care? God is doing something completely different - something much larger, more powerful, and long lasting. Petty earthly empires just don't rate. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

October 7, 202641 min

Exodus 32:1-14

God performed some truly amazing miracle: parting the Red Sea, unleashing plagues on Egypt, sending mana from Heaven, bringing forth water from a stone. Still, the people, when left alone for a few days, create an entire separate religion based on a powerless golden object. We can easily think that we are not like that. We know that's there's only one God. But, do we act like it? Or, do we act like there are a lot of competing priorities, of which God is on on the list? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

October 1, 202644 min

Philippians 3:4b-14

Paul had all the right and proper religious credentials. He was born the right way. He studied the right way. He had all the right opinions. He followed the Law. If anyone had a right to boast, he did. Paul earned it. However, compared to his encounter with Christ and the power that held for him al of his hard earned correct check boxes were basically trash. They didn't matter because it turns out that Christ is the most important thing. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

September 17, 202640 min

Jonah 3:10-4:11

Jonah is hilarious. It's pure comedy with the deeply profound point. Jonah acts in ways that constantly subvert your expectation, while God subverts his. He wants a God that will zap Nineveh, or at least, if he's going to have to go declare some zapping, he wants there to be zapping. Instead, God shows mercy and grace in light of their redemption. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

September 10, 202642 min

Exodus 15:1b-11, 20-21

All of the Bible can feel equally ancient to us. It's all more than 2,000 years ago from our perspective. What's the difference. Well, the distance from the first New Testament writer and the last Old Testament writer is the same distance as we are from the English settlement at Jamestown. It goes even further back to the song celebrating the defeat of Pharoah by God in the parting of the Red Sea. It's difficult to date it, but it's probably more than 3,000 years old, or for the New Testament writers, about the same distance as we are from the Crusades. This first song that we have record tells of God's power, might, and care for God's people. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

September 1, 202636 min

Exodus 3:1-15

If you got asked, "Are you like Moses?" You would probably say, "No." Statically, not that many of y'all are Biblical prophets with massive beards, walk with a cool staff, and have murder on your rap sheet. So, in those ways, at least not that many people are like Moses, but that misses the point of the story. We are like Moses in the critical dimensions - our innate humanity, our connection to God, and our receipt of a piece divine power. In those ways, we can all be EXACTLY like Moses. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

August 27, 202645 min

Romans 12:9-21

Turns out, with God's help, we can be good. We can take the high ground. We don't have to stoop to their level. We are not destined to repay violence with violence. Instead, we can see even our enemies as humans. Paul instructs us to do this in Romans echoing Jesus's words and actions in the Gospels. These instructions aren't meant to be abstract aspirations. They're a concrete guide to action. With God, we be legitimately better. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.