Forefront Podcast

WHAT IN THE...Forgiveness

We're excited to welcome the first Guest Speaker from our "Forefront Preaching Bootcamp". Frank M. Espinal, a long time Forefronter, took to the stage and opened our new series "What in the...??" Frank explores the difference between forgiveness and redemption.

SEX POSITIVITY: ”Pro-Life”

Can you be Pro-Choice and still be a Christian? Jonathan Williams tackles the church and their role in politicizing women's bodies. We're talking about abortion, which has become a Christian rallying point in the past 30 years. Our Pro-Life theology is actually way more political than Godly.

SEX POSITIVITY: ”Sex Workers”

Sex Workers and their prominent role in the Bible There is an active movement going on nationally and in New York to decriminalize sex work, and I think as a church we have to participate in this movement due to how purity culture has contributed towards the criminal punishment of sex workers and how our own Scriptures call us to honor sex workers. During this Sermon Series “Sex Positive”. Sarah Ngu explores the role sex workers played in Scripture and how we as a society need to come to grips with this today and respect sex workers.

SEX POSITIVITY: ”Marriage and Sex”

Do you want to know what the Bible really says about marriage and sex? There is no biblical definition of sex and marriage unless you count sleeping with your father in law, marrying your brother, having 700 sex slaves, or becoming a eunuch for the sake of the gospel. So what does healthy sex look like? Here's Jonathan Williams preaching about Marriage and Sex in our "Sex Positivity" Series.

Forefront Conversations with Jo Luehmann

As a Colombian woman, Jo has experienced firsthand how quickly privileged identities are to demonize marginalized identities, preferring comfort and power to creating safe spaces for people with experiences outside of their own. After alienating the leadership in her church with her all or nothing approach and working through personal deconstruction and decolonization, Jo boldly and unapologetically arrived at a conclusion: "Marginalized identities do not have an obligation to make privileged identities comfortable. At all." Jo speaks out against power structures that the Church upholds between "first class Christians" - white, hetero men - who preach about the comfort of their identity and "second class Christians" who sit down to listen about how their stories and experiences are invalid. She expresses the importance of forming safe spaces for marginalized voices who are the only ones who can truly speak to what it takes to crawl out of hell to in order to move towards heaven. ABOUT JO Jo Luehmann is a Colombian born and raised pastor who moved to the US to participate in an internship and then get her master's degree in ministry and theology at Point Loma Nazarene University. After 10 years working inside of churches, developing curriculum, and teaching classes on theology and doctrine, Jo quit her job and alongside her partner started a non-profit to help faith spaces consider and evaluate issues of equity and racial literacy. In the summer of 2020 alongside a group of victims and survivors of church abuse, Jo started @doBetterChurch an online space for victims of religious abuse dedicated to peer support and sharing tools for healing, as well as an initiative to invite churches to do better. You can follow Jo on Twitter @JoLuehmann You can follow Jo on IG @joluehmann

SEX POSITIVITY: ”Erotic poetry in the Bible”

In our second Sermon in the series "Sex Positive", Sarah Ngu walks us through the Song of Songs, the book medieval Christians commented on more frequently than any other book in the Bible. The Song of Songs uncomfortably dares us to hold all our human experiences, including our sexual ones, as a mirror by which to see God and ourselves. The relationship between the two lovers in the Song of Songs can be seen as an allegorical metaphor of the relationship between God and God’s people.

SEX POSITIVITY: ”Unlearning Purity Culture”

Unlearning Purity Culture and Shame. How do we move from Sex Toxicity to Sex Positivity? Many outside of Christianity are moving towards a sex positive way of life. Churches can and need to catch up. Watch Makenzie Gomez speak to this important topic as she starts off our new Series: "Sex Positive." Purity Culture and The Purity Movement is an Industry that came about in the 1990s. It's a predatory theology that has distracted us with controlling rules and restrictions to keep women quiet for the sake of men's egos, resulting in toxic sexual ethics and shame that blocks us from truly connecting with God.

Forefront Conversations with Christine Pae & Lisa Asedillo

It may seem like the rise in recent anti-Asian hate crime is new, but the choking weeds of anti-Asian bigotry and hypersexualization of AAPI women in America were planted generations ago. The mission of Pacific, Asian, and North American Asian Women in Theology and Ministry, or PANAAWTM, is to contribute to transnational feminist theological conversations and to constantly challenge the Christian church and the interpretations of scripture that have proliferated division and hatred. PANAAWTM board members K. Christine Pae and Lisa Asedillo utilize their staggering intellects to help decolonize status quo tradition, construct community, and preserve what is liberating. As Lila Watson said, "If you have come here to help me, you are wasting your time. But if you have come here because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together.” ABOUT CHRISTINE Keun-Joo Christine Pae is Associate Professor and Chair of Religion at Denison University. As a Christian social ethicist and transnational feminist ethicist, her interests include feminist peacemaking and interfaith spiritual activism, transnationalized militarism with focus on intersection between gender and race, transnational feminist ethics, and Asian/Asian-American perspectives on post-colonial racial relations. ABOUT LISA Lisa is a PhD candidate in the Religion and Society area at Drew University with a concentration in Christian Social Ethics. She's currently finishing a dissertation on the Theology of Struggle and Ecumenical Women's Movement of the 70s-90s in the Philippines, teaching Global Ethics at Phillips Exeter Academy, and living at the Mutual Aid Society in the Catskills, a new utopian experiment with fellow artists, theologians and writers. For more information about or to support PANAAWTM, please visit the following links https://www.panaawtm.org/ https://www.youtube.com/c/PANAAWTM/featured https://www.panaawtm.org/support-us IG: @panaawtm Where to read Sarah Ngu's article, "How purity culture and anti-Asian racism intersect in some white evangelical circles" https://tinyurl.com/3en4ak8f

THE GOSPEL OF: ”Community”

Guest speaker, Venida Rodman Jenkins, joins Forefront for the first time and speaks on "The Gospel of Community". The Gospel of Community is about bringing people in rather than excluding them. Here's something to ask yourself: "How can you work with others to be an agent of change?" Venida C. Rodman Jenkins is committed to providing visibility, encouragement, love, and brave spaces to underrepresented groups. She has carried out this work for many years as a minister, educator, and advocate. Venida is the Director of the Speicher-Rubin Women’s Center for Equity and Diversity at New Jersey City University, and she is the founder and pastor of EMBRACE Church (IG: @embracechurch2020). Venida is also an Adjunct Professor at Syracuse University and New York Theological Seminary.

THE GOSPEL OF: ”Heaven”

What if heaven isn't an escape chute? Heaven isn't a place we're whisked to after we die; it's God's order of justice and mercy coming towards us. In this, we know that God cares about community, God cares about suffering, and God is actively pursuing our good. In this 5th sermon in our EasterTide series, Guest Speaker Shay O'Reilly discusses the coronavirus pandemic, its uneven impacts, and the pressure to move on. Shay is a graduate of Union Theological Seminary with a concentration in Christian Social Ethics. After graduating, he has worked in the climate movement for six years, including five years in his current position as an organizer for the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal Campaign. He lives in Flatbush with his husband, daughter, and cats.