Posts from 2022 (Page 6)
“Doing What You Do”
DISCUSSION Imagine that you are standing on the banks of the Jordan River, when you see a large man wearing a coat of camel hair wade into to water. “Repent!” He says in a loud obnoxious tone. “Repent! Repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand”. The more he talks, the louder and more animated he becomes. You stand in awe of not only how he looks, but with what…
“The Childhood of Jesus”
DISCUSSION The Bible gives us everything we need to know about the life of Christ, yet there is a great deal about His life that we do not know. It reminds me of John’s concluding remarks in his Gospel “Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the…
“The Three Women”
DISCUSSION After Jesus was crucified in Mark 16, we read of his resurrection. We also read of three women that were there when Jesus was crucified, and when he was resurrected. These women were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome. In vs 2 we see the day after Jesus was buried in the tomb, they got up very early in the morning to anoint him with spices. They loved Jesus and were true followers of…
“The Promise of God”
DISCUSSION While on this earth, Jesus made several promises. In John 10.10 He promises an abundant life to all His followers. In John 15.14-15, he promises us His hand in friendship if we do whatsoever He has commanded us to do. In Matthew 28.20, He promised to be with us always. All these promises (along with many more) are wonderful for us today and offer us motivation to continue to…
“Subtle Hints”
DISCUSSION Jesus knew that there would be some people that would not fully buy into Him being the Son of God. He knew that it would take time for them to see that He was the complete fulfillment of prophecy and that it would even take the resurrection before some would become disciples. To help encourage their faith along, Jesus would leave a few subtle hints throughout His ministry about things…
“The Damage of Divorce”
DISCUSSION Divorce is one of the most difficult issues that plagues our society. No matter what the situation, God hates divorce (Malachi 2.16). The reason for that hatred, is because divorce never just affects the man and the woman. The ripples of divorce affect the children, the extended family of both sides, not to mention the friends of the couple as well. The world wants us to…
“The Voice of One Crying in the Wilderness”
DISCUSSION The reading today introduces us to another colorful character of God’s providential story… John the Baptizer. Hope for the Jews was continuing to grow with the empire of Rome seizing control of the world. There were those devout Jews, who we are aware of in Daniel’s interpretation of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream, and a realization that within the Roman kingdom, God would establish His kingdom that would last forever. This prompted many people like…
“The Great Commission and Me”
DISCUSSION As Matthew closes his account of the Gospel of Jesus, he leaves us with what has been called the Great Commission. A Commission is an instruction, command, or duty given to a person or group of people. In this case, the instruction is given by Jesus and the group of people who are commissioned are His disciples. It is referred to as “Great” in the sense of how important…
“Is It Possible to Stop Jesus?”
DISCUSSION In Matthew 27.1-2, the chief priests and the elders have taken counsel against Jesus to put Him to death. Something very interesting happens before they lead Him away to Pilate the governor. The text says that they “bound” Him. The word “bound” simply means to “tie up” or to “put in chains”. I guess the idea was that they were going to tie Jesus up so that He would…
“The Last Supper ”
DISCUSSION The disciples of Jesus had not been strangers to the Passover meal. In fact, they were all good Jews and had taken part in the Passover feast ever since they were children. However, this Passover was different. It was different in the fact that this would be the last Passover they would share with Jesus in the flesh. This was also different because Jesus…
“Do Your Job”
DISCUSSION Last week I heard a preacher give a lesson on his favorite person in the Bible. He gave people an opportunity to guess who it could be, of course you got the standard answers like: Jesus, God, Moses and Peter. However, none of these possibilities were even close. His favorite Bible character was a man that did not even have a name; we simply refer to him as…
“Unprepared?”
DISCUSSION Several years ago, a classmate of mine was scheduled to speak in our high school chapel at Mars Hill Bible School. It isn’t unusual for people to get nervous before giving a lesson, especially in an audience of your peers, but on this day the speaker looked extremely uncomfortable. As he stood up to deliver his lesson, there was an awkward silence in the auditorium. The speaker…