Jesus: Our Lord and Savior

I have the honor of meeting with our elementary aged kids this week during our AWANA program at Southern Calvert Baptist Church. The kids have been learning about Jesus over this past quarter. Tonight will be a review where we put several passages together and get a clear view of who Jesus is. Many people in the Western world grow up hearing something about Jesus. Some of what they hear comes from the Bible while other aspects come from popular culture. I have ministered to a tribe in Myanmar where the majority of the people had never heard the name Jesus.

We have THE WORD of God

I am preparing to teach during our AWANA program this evening and the theme for the night is the Word of God. The Bible is a unique book in human history. It is the very hear of God, communicated to us in a language that we can understand so that we can discover what God wants from us. Many people have asked throughout the ages, “what does God want from me”? Many others have tried to answer that question. The definitive answer is found in the pages of the Holy Bible. Parts of the Bible were written by different men over a 1,600 year period time. These people lived on different continents and came from vastly different cultures. Yet, the central message of the Bible is the same. Other parts of the Bible were written by God, Himself.

Christ’s Resurrection and Commissioning

I have been teaching through the Gospel of Mark with a group of men and it has been amazing to see the ministry of Jesus Christ, especially how relevant it is today. This is the final lesson in a 3 part series on the Gospel of Mark. I began teaching it back in the Fall of 2018. We are currently in the Summer of 2019. It is the shortest Gospel in the New Testament but, it is powerful and full of amazing information that stirs up life transformation. If you have not been following along through the entire study, the following 16 articles will be very helpful in helping you catch up.

Sin Nature is Contentious

As we continue to walk through the book of Exodus, we continue to see the character of God, His working out of an eternal plan, as well as His personal interaction with humanity. While walking through Genesis, we discovered that all of us have been born with a sin nature and that sin nature wants to master us. God’s plan is to rescue us from our sin nature so that we can master it. In Exodus 17, we are going to discover that God is our victory over our sin nature. God reveals this character trait to us through His Name, Jehovah-Nissi. The Lord is our banner of victory. Victory over our sin nature is already ours, we simply must choose to walk in that victory. God shows this to us with His interaction with the children of Israel in the wilderness. Sin nature is never satisfied, ever. The more that it is fed, the more it wants. The children of Israel were hungry, so, by grace, the Lord fed them manna from heaven. They then wanted meat. God gave them meat until it spewed from their nostrils. In Exodus 17, now they are thirsty. Let’s take a look at how their sin nature manifests itself when squeezed.

Run the Race to Win

The title of this article is what the Apostle Paul wrote the the Christians in Corinth. One of the things that I really like about Paul is the fact that he was a very practical teacher. As the old pastor says, “that guy likes to go down deep but, he comes up dry”. The Apostle Paul was not like that. He does not get lost in the weeds. He is what we call a “prac app” guy today. In I Corinthians 9, the Apostle Paul deals with the importance of sharing our faith with the people around us. The final command that Jesus left for His disciples was, “go and make more disciples”. This command has rung true throughout the generations. As followers of Christ today, we are also called to make disciples. In order to make disciples, we have to share our faith, in other words, preach the Gospel with the people around us. This is true for every generation and this is something that has to be taught to each new generation. Let’s discover how the Apostle Paul uses himself as an example, the analogies that he uses to challenge the Corinthians, and then take a look at the practical advice for us today. First, take a moment to read I Corinthians 9:19-27.

Freedom in Christ

I am excited to prepare and teach this lesson during our Connect Group meeting this coming Sunday. As I have mentioned in previous posts, we are walking through the entire Bible over a three year period, from Genesis through Revelation. Last Sunday, we jumped into the book of Exodus. Genesis was amazing and I am excited to see what Exodus holds for us. We just saw how Moses answered God’s Great Calling in Exodus 3-4. This week, we are going to see how God extended that Great Calling to the children of Israel through Moses and how God extends that Great Calling to us today, through Jesus Christ. Our passages for consideration today are Exodus 7 and Exodus 12.

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.

Appreciate your spiritual leaders

I just listened to a wonderful sermon preached by my mentor, Vasile Filat. I am currently listening to it again so that I can translate it into English for this article so that you can be blessed by it the way that I was.

How much do you appreciate your spiritual leaders? Do you have spiritual leaders/mentors? God has orchestrated the Christian life to be one of a person having a mentor, being  a mentee, and then becoming a mentor while still being mentored. This process is laid out for us in Matthew 28. We see it explained by the Apostle Paul in II Timothy 2:2. Paul was mentored by Jesus. Paul mentors Timothy. As Timothy is being mentored, he begins to mentor others. Those whom Timothy mentors begin to mentor others. Jesus –> Paul –> Timothy –> new disciples –> their disciples. Unfortunately, there are many in the church who have never experienced God’s amazing plan of being discipled. Even if you do not have a direct mentor, you have a spiritual leader if you are part of a local church. Paul explains this in Ephesians 4. The spiritual leaders pour into the lives of the members and the members serve one another and together, reach out to the community to make disciples.

Resurrected to different rewards

Contrary to popular belief, heaven will not be equal for all. Heaven will not be a communistic dream where everyone receives the same, no matter what they did on this earth. I would like to examine a couple of Jesus’ teachings on the kingdom of heaven. After that, we will take a look at what Paul teaches about the rewards that await us after this life is over.

If you will take a look with me at Paul’s writing to the church in Ephesus.

The Fruit of the Spirit is love

I am excited about this summer series that I am beginning to teach this Sunday during our children’s worship service called theROC. ROC stands for Reaching Others for Christ. Our kids are learning to know God through His Word, how to walk with God by faith, and how to share that faith with the people around them. It has been neat to see the way that the Word of God has changed the hearts and minds of these kids.

This summer, we are going to study the fruit of the Spirit. I love how fruit is singular. The fruit of the Spirit is love. The rest of the attributes mentioned after love are the characteristics of love. Our goal this summer is to study this fruit and its characteristics to learn what love looks like and how we can attain it and live by it. Our main passage for the summer is Galatians 5:19-23. Now that you have had a chance to read the passage, let’s see what we learn.