Confrontation and Repentance

In a couple of weeks, our children’s Sunday School classes are going to host a rally to celebrate the fifth Sunday of this month. On fifth Sundays at our church, our adult Sunday School classes all meet up in the sanctuary for a Fifth Sunday Rally. We encourage and challenge all of the classes to reach out to the community before the next fifth Sunday and do some kind of ministry that draws in new people. We discover some creative ideas as each class shares an experience. We are going to launch the same plan among our children. After our Bible lesson, the kids are going to break up into small groups and stuff Trunk or Treat bags with information about our church and Gospel tracts. These bags will be used during our major outreach on October 31. I am so excited to see the children serve in their own capacity. Before we do the service project, we are going to study II Corinthians 7:8-12. I want to share that message with you here in this article.

Complicated King Ahab

I finished off the last article with a cliffhanger. Elijah confronted the sins of wicked King Ahab and there was a showdown between the false prophets and God’s prophet, Elijah. Elijah had the wicked, false prophets put to death for their actions. Then, he was sent to pursue King Ahab and his wicked wife, Jezebel. That is how the story ended. King Ahab and Jezebel must pay for their deeds. They rebelled against God and murdered the prophets of the Lord. They led the people in idolatry. The rest of this story unfolds in I Kings 20-22. These are some fascinating chapters in the Word of God.

Elijah Confronts Sin

Once again, I am sitting to write out my lesson for this coming Sunday. At Southern Calvert Baptist Church, we are walking through the entire Bible over a three year period. Last week, we covered the lesson on Elijah and the widow woman from I Kings 17. Jesus actually uses this woman’s faith as an example of what genuine faith looks like. She heard the Word of the Lord and she chose to trust the Word of the Lord, even when it meant putting her life and future on the line.

Elijah is a man of faith. He has a very difficult task ahead of him. He was called by God to take a very difficult message to the leadership of Israel. He publicly rebukes King Ahab for his wicked ways and then he prays according to the Word of God. As a result of that prayer, it does not rain in Israel for three and a half years. There is a severe famine in the land and everyone is suffering. The widow from the previous chapter was suffering because of this event. King Ahab is enraged and his wife actually begins putting to death the prophets of the Lord. One of King Ahab’s own servants, a man who fears the Lord, hid one hundred of the Lord’s prophets in two different caves so that they could not be put to death. He also provided food and water for them. King Ahab does not know about this. Elijah has survived the persecution but he is on the run. Things are bad in Israel physically, politically, spiritually etc. This is where our story picks up in I Kings 18.

David experiences mercy, grace, and forgiveness

As we continue looking at the life of David and his walk with the Lord, we are reminded of why he is called a man after God’s own heart. He has a teachable spirit, a servant’s heart, and he was quick to obey. David is a man who has experienced God’s mercy and grace and he has been quick to extend that mercy and grace to others, even his enemy, King Saul.

In this lesson, we are going to see how David experiences God’s forgiveness. David, although a man after God’s own heart, was not perfect. Like all of us, David was born with a sin nature. His heart was inclined to sin, just like my heart is and just like your heart is. As we study this, just remember, no matter what you have done, God’s mercy, grace, and forgiveness is available.

Grow to maturity in your FAITH

Yesterday, I had a great opportunity to meet with our Sunday School teachers of Southern Calvert Baptist Church and study our up coming lesson on the importance of growing to maturity in our faith. This week, we are going to study the Apostle Paul’s first epistle to the church in Corinth. This church was very near and dear to Paul’s heart, even though this church gave Paul many headaches and sleepless nights. All of the epistles that we have in the New Testament come as a result of conflict(s) among the new believers. I love to study and teach the epistles because they give us a great opportunity to learn from the mistakes of others. I smart man learns from his mistakes and I wise man learns from the mistakes of others. I want us all to be wise people because God wants us all to be wise people. In the last lesson, we learned about the problems in the churches in the region of Galatia. God exposes the problems and then offers the solution. Pointing out problems without offering solutions is just complaining. People who do this are a dime a dozen. There are very few who have the desire to point out problems and then offer wise solutions. The Apostle Paul was one of those rare people who pointed out problems and then offered wise solutions.

Church Discipline is needed

Dear friends, this is a difficult subject that is not covered much in our modern church. I have written on the subject of Biblical correction and you can read it here. The way that you handle correction reveals your heart. Discipline is a major part of our Christians life. God disciplines us for our own good and for His glory. His discipline conforms our character to the character of Jesus Christ. God has given us His Holy Spirit that responds to His discipline. God also places spiritual leaders in our lives who are to apply discipline for the good of the individual and the entire local body of Christ, also known as the Church. The Apostle Paul was one of those spiritual leaders whom God called to discipline the individuals in the body of Christ in Corinth, along with the local church. We learn about this subject in II Corinthians. Let’s take a moment to read the following verses and then, we will examine two examples from the Old Testament, two men whose sins were confronted and the two very different responses. You probably have guessed the two people. One was the first King of Israel, Saul. The second is the second King of Israel, David.

Confronting sin according to the will of God

One of the most widely misquoted verses from the Bible will be the topic of this article, a lesson that I am going to teach to my staff this Wednesday as we continue digging down deep in to the Sermon on the Mount. Last week we covered the overview of Matthew 7.

Most church goers can quote parts of, if not all of John 3:16 yet it seems to me that every man on the street knows Matthew 7:1 by heart. They have no clue who is speaking and what the subject matter is, but they will be quick to quote Matthew 7:1, and way out of context, not to mention, not understanding what they are saying (meaning wise).