Thursday, October 20, 2016

Back in the Studio...

Well, I'm back in the studio, recording more 
exciting, informative, messages to be aired soonly,
on the Lost and Found Today radio station! 

We are so excited to see the listener-ship from around the world!
Germany, The Caribbean, UK, Europe, the USA, 
the Middle East, Africa, Canada, China, Japan and Canada.
God is reaching out to so many through our station.
It's nice to see such a positive reception.

Looking forward to delivering you more of the 
quality messages and music you are used to from us.

If you would like to send us an email, you can send that to
radio@lostandfoundtoday.org. If you want to send us a prayer request or other correspondence, please send that here too.
If you would like to contact us by phone, call us at 
+1-901-848-9721, 24 hours a day. We take prayer requests by phone as well.

Looking forward to hearing from you!

Blessings,
Rev. Joseph Holmin

JH/jh

Thursday, September 8, 2016

Good News! We are up and running!

Our radio station is now LIVE!
We can be found at:
lostandfoundtoday.airtime.pro

Our current format is set for music, 
but I will be scheduling teachings and talks as well.

In the meantime, enjoy this teaching on the prayer of agreement.

http://lostandfoundtoday.airtime.pro/rest/media/58/download/TSL38cU5wJuI.mp3

We look forward to seeing you soon.

Blessings,
Bp. Joseph Holmin

Monday, August 29, 2016

The wait is almost over!

Our new home for our 
radio programs is almost ready.

We look forward to broadcasting 
on the Airtime.Pro Radio Network.

More info to come, very soon!!

Monday, August 1, 2016

Break Time is over... AGAIN!


We are pleased to announce, once again, that our break from radio programs is just about over, again! We are working on several new messages to share with you, via our new platform and radio station. More to come!

Stay tuned for more information on upcoming programs and schedules.

We encourage listener interaction during LIVE broadcasts.
Listeners can also access our programs via the archives after the original air date.

Our link to our older, now in syndication programs, can be found at: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/josephholmin

Enjoy!

Rev. Joseph Holmin
Host
Lost and Found Today

Monday, October 21, 2013

Break Time is over...

We are pleased to announce that our short break from radio programs is just about over. We are working on several new messages to share with you, via BlogTalk Radio. Stay tuned for more information on programs and schedules.
We encourage listener interaction during LIVE broadcasts.
Listeners can also access our programs via the archives after the original air date.

Our link to programs at: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/awebpastor


Enjoy!

Rev. Joseph Holmin
Host
Lost and Found Today

Wednesday, September 18, 2013

Break Time

Dear friend's, and visitor's...

As you may or may not know, we are taking a break from our internet radio broadcasts. Our vision and goals remain the same. Bring the gospel of Jesus Christ to the world, and show the principals lived out in our relevant examples and lives.

Rest assured, we will return. Our format may get changed, as we only bring our program in a limited 30 minute time slot. This will also change the times for our programs, to be aired either before 6PM, or after 10PM; in the Central Time Zone.

If you have any suggestions for future programs, we'd love to hear from you. Send us an email at radio@lostandfoundtoday.org and listen to our archives at
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/awebpastor.

We look forward to seeing you all again, real soon.

Blessings,

Rev. Joseph Holmin
Host
Lost and Found Today

Monday, September 2, 2013

The Cost of Being A Disciple for Christ

It seems that Christians are obsessed with counting sheep. How often do you hear Christians of all stripes asking each other about the size of each other's congregations? Often we hear folks asking, €œHow many do you have on a Sunday morning? We marvel at so-called mega-churches. We feel good when we see a large crowd in church on Christmas or Easter and wish that it was like that every Sunday. 

A large crowd at a worship service is considered a success.


In our gospel teaching today, we hear that €œlarge crowds were traveling with Jesus.€ If Jesus were a good church programmer, he would have dispatched some of the apostles to get everyone'€™s name, phone number, and home address. He would have made sure everyone felt welcome. Perhaps he would have fretted over his sermons, making sure that each one was a practical, uplifting message that the crowd would come back for again and again. If they were singing psalms, he would have made sure the tunes were easy and appealing to the largest group possible.


Jesus wasn'€™t a good church programmer. This is because Jesus wasn'€™t calling crowds; he was calling disciples. Jesus wasn'€™t concerned with being popular; he was concerned with helping people transform their lives. Jesus knew that no matter the size of the crowd, it was all temporal anyway. It didn'€™t matter in the larger scheme. Jesus was leading people toward eternity, not temporal things like material success.


When Jesus sees the crowds, his instinct is not to wow them. His instinct is to make each person aware of the cost of being his disciple. It is this awareness of the journey that brings about transformation. He tells the crowd that unless they can detach completely from everything they are holding onto emotionally and physically, they can never really be his disciples. He tells them€“ and us, that we have to detach from our family systems, from our very lives as we know them. We have to be ready to take up a cross.


This is a familiar message to Christians. We know that this is what Jesus keeps telling us, but when we get overly concerned with our institutional success, we lose sight of the heart of the matter: discipleship.


Jesus is calling us again to consider the cost. When we do not consider the cost, then we are like a builder who makes no budget for a project or a king who makes no contingency plans for a battle; we are bound for lackluster results and frustration.


When we consider the cost of following Jesus, then we will deepen our spiritual lives. We will hold in front of our prayers our need for discipleship, not membership in an institution. When we make discipleship and not the size of the crowd the number-one priority of our life as a church, then we are about making disciples, not growing membership rolls.


When we are counting the crowd and not the cost, we get into the dangerous habit of thinking we are in control of the movement of the Holy Spirit. We begin to think that we can grow€ the numbers. We become proud in our endeavors to draw and keep a crowd instead of trusting in God with all of our hearts. We also get trapped in our frustrations at not being able to draw and keep a crowd. This becomes the major focus of our life together as a church.


God sends Jeremiah down to the potter's house to make a point: God is the potter, we are the clay. We and our endeavors to be the church are in God'€™s hands. We are not called to manipulate and manufacture the outcome; we are called to be faithful as baptized ministers of the gospel.


We are to be the kind of ministers that Paul is asking Philemon to be: putting aside our past grudges and our need to be in control. Paul is asking Philemon to begin anew with Onesimus. Paul asks Philemon to do even more than he is asking him to do.


It's our spiritual and religious task to become good, pliable, usable clay. God makes the pottery. We become good usable clay when we put scripture and tradition at the core of our community. We gather to study life-matters found in the gospel and the teachings found in our Catechism and Baptismal Covenant. When a community places these things at the center of its common life, it can't help but grow and be fashioned into a beautiful and sustainable piece of pottery made by the Creator.


We also become workable clay for the potter when we apply reason to our study. We study in community so that we can hear and experience other points of view. This will make us grow inside; as we grow inside our discipleship blossoms. As our discipleship blossoms, we become more and more attractive to others. We become pieces of art made by our Creator that others admire and wish to become part of.


If we work primarily on our discipleship, then we will be prepared to minister to the crowd. Then we have something to offer them. Then we will begin to imitate Jesus. In the Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 9, Jesus sees the crowd and has compassion for them. He sees that they are helpless and harassed like sheep without a shepherd. He reminds the disciples that the harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few.


We are called to be those laborers. We reach out to the crowd with compassion. When we encounter the crowd, we let them know that we are offering them the Good News: God in Christ has reconciled us to each other, to God, and to all of creation. We are new creation. We are the priesthood of all believers. We invite the crowd to join us on our pilgrimage. We show them, not tell them, how our lives have been transformed by the gospel and by the sacraments we celebrate. Each of us becomes a catechist. This is the cost of our discipleship. Drawing a crowd this way takes time. Many will turn away. But those who engage will engage deeply and profoundly.


Maybe then we can stop asking each other about numbers and start sharing with others the depth of our discipleship.


This is where we are headed with Jesus: eternal life. Eternity is a long time. Eternity puts all of our anxieties about numbers on Sunday into perspective. Jesus is calling us on a great adventure. It'€™s an adventure that is full of tension, healing, bold thinking, and new life. It goes beyond our Sunday worship out into our everyday lives. So, indeed, we seek out the crowds not to count them but to have compassion for them. Counting the crowd doesn't make them stay engaged; showing the crowd our transformed lives brings them to Jesus.