Goal: To help adults evaluate their spiritual condition and decide to live in personal relationship with the Lord

Background Passage: JEREMIAH 30:1-33:26

Promise of New Life (Jer. 31:27-28)

Individual Responsibility for Sin (Jer. 31:29-30)

Transformation of the Heart (Jer. 31:31-33)

Personal Relationship with the Lord (Jer. 31:34)

a GROW lesson

Focal Passage Outline and Scripture Passages:
Accept Your Responsibility (Josh. 1:1-5)
Hear God’s Command (Josh. 1:6-9)
Act Courageously (Josh. 1:10-11,16-18)

Background Passage:
Joshua 1:1-18

Focal Passages:
Joshua 1:1-11,16-18

What This Lesson Is About:
This lesson is about identifying and overcoming the fears that prevent us from being the spiritual leaders God wants us to be.

How This Lesson Can Impact Your Life:
This lesson can help you learn God’s ways to overcome the fears that prevent you from being the spiritual leader God wants you to be.

Money is a litmus test of our true character. It is an index of our spiritual life. Our stewardship of money tells a deep and consequential story. It forms our biography. In a sense, how we relate to money and possessions is the story of our lives.

If this is true of all men in all ages, does it not have special application to us who live in a time and place of unparalleled affluence? Take a man or woman who works from age twenty-five to sixty-five and makes $15,000 a year. In his lifetime this person of modest income by our standards will handle well over half a million dollars. He will manage a fortune. And if Scripture is true, and men must give an account of their lives to God (Rom. 14:12), then one day this man must answer these questions:

• Where did it all go?

• What did I spend it on?
• What has been accomplished for eternity through my use of all this wealth?

In the account of the poor widow, Mark wrote, “Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury” (Mark 12:41). Notice we are not told, “Jesus happened to see….” No, it seems he deliberately watched to observe what people were giving.

Jesus was interested enough in who was giving what to make an immediate object lesson to the disciples about the true nature of trusting God as demonstrated in sacrificial financial giving.

If we stop to think about it, this passage makes all of us who suppose that what we do with our money is our business and only our business feel terribly uncomfortable. On the contrary, it is painfully apparent that it is God’s business-that God makes it his business. He does not apologize for watching with intense interest what we do with the money he has entrusted to us. If we use our imaginations, we might even peer into the invisible realm to see him gathering some of his subjects together this very moment. Perhaps you can hear him using your handling of finances as an object lesson. The question is this: what kind of lesson?

a GO lesson

Focal Passage Outline and Scripture Passages:
Are You Convinced of the Gospel’s Power? (Rom. 1:14-17)
Should You Be Concerned About the Lost? (Rom. 9:1-3; 10:1)
What Are You Doing About It? (Rom. 10:14-15; 15:17-20)

Background Passages:
Romans 1:8-17; 9:1-5; 10:1-21; 15:14-33

Focal Passages:
Romans 1:14-17; 9:1-3; 10:1,14-15; 15:17-20

What This Lesson Is About:
This lesson is about Christians’ responsibility to share the gospel with all people.

How This Lesson Can Impact Your Life:
This lesson will help you recognize that all people need to know Christ and determine to share Him with others.

Background Passage: Galatians 6:1-18
Lesson Passage: Galatians 6:1-18

LESSON PASSAGE
OUTLINE
1. Shoulder Burdens (Gal. 6:1-5)
2. Do Good (Gal. 6:6-10)
3. Avoid Selfish Motives (Gal. 6:11-15)
4. Seek Peace (Gal. 6:16-18)

BIBLICAL TRUTH
Believers are to meet biblical expectations of being responsible Christians.

LIFE IMPACT
To help adults do what is expected of a responsible Christian

Ephesians 5:27.  that He might present it to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish.
 5:28.  So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies; he who loves his wife loves himself.

The recurring theme of the passage from Ephesians 5:21-33 is that we need to model the marriage relationship after Christ.  There is a direct comparason with Jesus as the head, and the body of Christians as his body. The husband is the head, with the wife as the body. Jesus holds the position of respect and honor while the body submits to doing as the head orders. The wife is the body that responds as the husband orders. Jesus loves the body, cares for it, cleans it, and provides to keep it healthy. The husband also needs to tend to the needs of his wife to keep her cared for, cleansed and healthy.

Now for the big question. Why?

It’s simple, to show off and be proud of it. Jesus wants his church, or body of believers, to be a thing that makes him proud to present. Literally ‘present’ means to ‘stand next to’. Jesus wants his body to be stain free, wrinkle free, freshly washed, fluffed and buffed. A finely tuned instrument that is well maintained and taken care of.

Husbands, can you say that about your own wife? Why not? Guess whose fault that is. Here’s a hint, look in the mirror. Your body is busy each day being the life support system for you, the head. When was the last time you took care of your body, that means your wife. If you love yourself, start by taking care of her first. Throttle back, pull off at the next off ramp of life, and do whatever it takes to tune up, maintain and restore your wife.

It’s time to show your wife the same attention that Jesus gives to his body, the church. He wants to be proud to stand by his church. Make that the exact same goal that you have for your wife.

Ephesians 5:25.  Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for it,
 5:26.  that He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word,
–NKJ

Feminist groups often get bent out of shape by that one little verse that preceeds this passage about wives submitting to husbands. Check this out though. After that little verse about the duties of a wife, we get verses 23 through28 concerning all the responsibilities and expectations of husbands.

Wives are simply told to submit. Men are told that we need to look to Jesus as our model as the head of the body. We have to be reminded in this passage that as a head, we should love our body, that means our wife. What does that mean exactly? Verse 26 has an interesting word picture.

By the word, Jesus sanctified, cleansed, and washed his body.

Can you imagine spending the afternoon playing hard at your favorite sports event, getting all hot and sweaty, and just skipping the part about hitting the showers? Our body served us well. We had a great work out. We had fun in our competition and in honing our skills. Now it’s time to show some love to our bodies. Please, hit the shower.

Sanctify your body. With your wife as your body, take time to set apart to give her attention. Mark out some time devoted to uninterrupted care.

Cleanse. Remove the sweat and dirt that life splashes on your marriage. Get back to basics and renew the things that inspired you to choose to be married to each other. Do this daily, not just every once in a while, or for an anniversary, or the even rarer event of a ceremony to renew marriage vows.

Washing in water. Litterally bathe in water. Don’t just stand at the sink and splash on a little water and deodorant on the parts that are particularly stinky. Just as you would in taking a bath, make elaborate plans to wash, renew, your relationship with your wife. Soak in the tub. Splurge on the Mr. Bubble, toss in the scented bath beads. Forget about time and enjoy the hot water and let it relax all those tensions. Live a little. Make your wife, your body, forget that part about having to submit. It’s time to minister to her and make it worth her while.

By the word. The word here is one where we get our word ‘rhetoric’. Not logos, which might mean to give a deliberate speech or saying. Rhetoric is idle chatter in general. Say those sweet nothings. Cleanse and wash by talking about things in general, about nothing in particular, about whatever may come up to give each other those much needed strokes.

Wives may need to be reminded to submit, but guys need specific instructions. Arm yourself with the ideas in these verses and get busy out there husbands.

Ephesians 5:23.  For the husband is head of the wife, as also Christ is head of the church; and He is the Savior of the body.
 5:24.  Therefore, just as the church is subject to Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything.
In the verses that come before this passage, we learn that we are to submit to each other, that a wife is to submit to her own husband. With all this submitting going on, we find out today that the buck stops here, with the husband. The husband is the fall guy who has to take responsibility before Jesus.

In the New King James the first word is ‘For’, it is actually a word that literally translates ‘so that’. What this means is that we really need to take into consideration what has just been said. That wives are to submit. Because the wife has submitted, the man can do his intended function. When the wife submits, which means that she is just sticking to her man, filling in all the details and defining who they are together, the man becomes the head. It is a model of Jesus himself and how the body of Christians fit together.

As Christians, we should be modeling the submissive nature of the duties of the wife. Stick to Jesus. Support and define who we are in that relationship, while he is allowed to be the head, and represent us before God.

The husband has the big role of being the head, the part of the body to represent the marriage of his union with his wife before the face of Jesus.

Jesus is the savior of the body. Husbands pay attention. Are we saving our wives? Are we rescuing them, revitalizing them? Or are we trampling and abusing them? Jesus is our model. Being the head doesn’t mean we are nnot to give anything back. If the body is sick, the head is sick. If the head chops off the body, neither will survive. If you are the head, and you’re sick, first look how to make your body well.

Verse 24 is simply a call for the model of Jesus and his relationship with the church to be reflected in the marriage relationship. Jesus is the head. Collectively we all, men and women,  are his body. We are to submit to him as he returns favor and takes care of us. Jesus the head is the source of strength and honor. Men, be strong and honorable. Make your body as healthy as you can take care of it. Women, you are that body, the life support structure for the head. Both need to work together and act as a functioning unit.

The institution of marriage is a microcosm of the picture of Jesus, and what his kingdom is like. It is a single, self sustaining cell that requires a wife and a husband. Notice the lack of pairing two husbands, or two wifes. A wife has special characteristics that a husband does not have, cannot have, and will never have. Likewise for husbands having traits that a wife does not have. It takes a complete set of those elements to be a self sustaining, reproducing, and healthy unit.

A woman is not lesser, or greater than a man. Both need each other as two parts to make up a complete unit. They both have their own ways of submitting and nurturing the other.

James 3:1-4.
3:1.  My brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment.
 3:2.  For we all stumble in many things. If anyone does not stumble in word, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle the whole body.
 3:3.  Indeed, we put bits in horses’ mouths that they may obey us, and we turn their whole body.
 3:4.  Look also at ships: although they are so large and are driven by fierce winds, they are turned by a very small rudder wherever the pilot desires.

Learn Self Control

The call of this passage is to be careful about being a teacher of the scriptures to others. To do so requires to be in full control of our lives. Being the teacher places a load of responsibility on that person. Being in charge can bring an amount of glory and honor, but when things go wrong the blame has to end with the person in charge.

James begins to allude to how to control a huge, powerful vessel, namely a horse, or a ship. There will be more on that topic in a later passage. For now, just consider how controlling a ship applies.

Not many of us should be teachers. On a ship there is only one captain, and for times when the captain is off duty, there are only a small amount of officers. Even a smaller amount of officers who have any direct control over steering the ship. Onboard that ship are probably hundreds of people. They all have their own jobs to do to make sure the ship keeps on sailing, but they can’t all be captains. That would lead to confusion.

A sailor doesn’t have to agree with the captain, just do what he says. The best a person can do is to take charge of the small task he is given. As each little, and often unrelated task gets done, the shipkeeps sailing and arrives in harbor. With all these individual jobs functioning under the unity of the captain, everybody benefits from the blessings. Should something go wrong, the crew is rarely to blame, but the captain always is.

As Christians, we should strive to do what God has called us to do. Act in faith to do that task, but as long as there is another who is teacher, or captain over us, follow in unity, rather than try to take that position for yourself. We all will benefit from that persons leadership, but if there are problems, it will be that person that will have to stand before God and answer for it.

James 1:13-18

 1:13.  Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone.
 1:14.  But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed.
 1:15.  Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death.
 1:16.  Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren.
 1:17.  Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.
 1:18.  Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures.

Don’t Blame God.

It’s a fact of life, sometimes bad things happen, even when we don’t deserve it, or when we didn’t do anything to bring on those trials and sufferings. Then there are those other times. We, by our own doing, commit a sin, break a law, and now it’s time to pay the price.

God has defined certain actions as good or bad. His purpose behind doing that is to encourage us, to lure us, closer to him, and in becoming the humans that he desires for us to be. The Devil may play a part in drawing our attention to the bad things, but temptation is about all he can really do. You can’t blame him either. It still takes our own action before it is a sin. We each have the power to choose, or not to choose to act on a teptation. It boils down to our choice, and our responsibility.

Consider this model of sin, Eve and the snake, and the forbidden fruit. Eve knew it was something that God said not to eat. She hadn’t been. The serpent draws her attention to it. Did the snake pick it and hand one to her? No. Did the snake cook up a yummy meal of fruit and spoon feed it to Eve? No. All that was done was to draw attention to it. To put questions of doubt in Eve’s mind. She could have just said, “That’s nice,” and walked away to some other part of the garden. The snake is now out of the picture, and Eve is left there to gaze upon the fruit. To let her imagination go wild and desire it. To rationalize that it can’t be as bad as all that. Finally she acted on what her own desire had built up.

Pick a sin, any sin, you’ll find that it will fit into this model. Neither Cod or the Devil make us sin. We make the decision, and do the action. The devil might plant the seed of doubt and tempt us. God defines what the boundary is, but it is always us that crosses it.

What about those times when it just slips out? Maybe you smack your thumb with a hammer, or in responce to a touch of road rage, say a few choice words that break that commandment about taking the Lord’s name in vain. It just slipped out. It was a reaction to instant pain, or rage. I didn’t have time to be tempted, or enticed. It still all takes place in the dark corners of the mind. Those words were already there in the memory banks of the brain. They get there by any number of means. Using language, any language, is a learned practice. Those words may not ever entirely come out of memory, but you can condition your reaction practice to use alternate words, whether real, or jibberish ones just for that purpose. It all starts in the innermost thoughts.

If God is to be blamed for anything, blame him for the good things in life. There are certain things that can always be relied on. This is one of them. God causes good, not sin.