Monday, August 16, 2010

This Is the End

Hi everybody,
If you read the title, you know what decision I've been led to. After lots of prayer and thought, I've come to a few conclusions:
1. God is okay with me not continuing with the Bible Study.
2. I'm not going to have enough time to devote to writing posts, and I won't be giving it enough effort.

Thanks for everybody's support over the past year (yes, it was really a year!). I hope that at some point, something I said helped somebody out. I know that writing it has helped me in my own walk with God.

So, this is farewell.
God Bless,
Joyce

Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Jesus' Authority

Sorry this is so late, my internet wasn't working at all last night or until 4:40ish today.

And the Obscure Biblical Character is... the Centurion (a military officer).

Matthew 8:8-9 NKJV
The centurion answered and said, “Lord, I am not worthy that You should come under my roof. But only speak a word, and my servant will be healed. For I also am a man under authority, having soldiers under me. And I say to this one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and to another, ‘Come,’ and he comes; and to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.”

The centurion was saying something about Jesus' authority. Centurions have 100 soldiers under them. He was telling Jesus that because he had this great authority, he could understand how Jesus also had authority. They could both just speak a word, and it would be done.

As Jesus said, this is great faith, to understand that He only needs to say a word and it'll happen. We need to have that same kind of faith in our own lives.

In His Service,
Joyce

Response Question: What does the story of the Centurion say about experience and faith?

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

They Knew It Was Wrong

Matthew 26:3-5
Then the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders of the people assembled at the palace of the high priest, who was called Caiaphas, and plotted to take Jesus by trickery and kill Him. But they said, “Not during the feast, lest there be an uproar among the people.”

They say that if you want to hide something from others, its probably a bad idea, or a wrong choice. If it needs to be a secret, it's not good.

The chief priests, the scribes, and the elders knew that having Jesus killed would tick some people off. They wanted to do it after the feast, maybe so things would calm down and it could happen quieter. Whatever their reason, they were trying to hide it from the people. They knew it was wrong enough to make people upset.

So why did they go through with it? Why kill a man who was innocent that people generally liked, knowing that it was wrong?

Jesus was wrecking their lives. He came in, told them that they were hypocrites and just generally wrong, et cetera, (all in love, though) and they couldn't handle it. That's the major idea, anyway.

What can we take away from this? The people who delivered Jesus up to be killed knew it was wrong. Like I said yesterday, sometimes we don't know when we're screwing up and are completely oblivious about God, and sometimes we know we're doing wrong. Either time, its sin. If we know that something's wrong, we need to not continue in it.

In His Service,
Joyce

Response Question: Why did the priests, etc. want to wait until after the feast?

Monday, June 28, 2010

Forgetting About God

Judges 3:7 NLT (http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Judges%203:7&version=NLT)
The Israelites did evil in the Lord’s sight. They forgot about the Lord their God, and they served the images of Baal and the Asherah poles.

Happy Random Chapter Day!

So this is pretty straight forward. God's people did evil (notice 'did evil' and not 'were evil'). They forgot about God. Its not like they decided 'Oh, I know God doesn't like this. Let's do it!' They altogether forgot about their Creator, who had brought them out of trial after trial!

But we do the same thing, don't we? We forget about God's commandments for us. Sometimes we look at them and knowingly disobey them, but other times we just forget. Which is worse?

We can't make that judgment, only God can, and He considers all sins to be equally bad.

In our lives, we need to remember that forgetting about God is a sin, just like deliberately disobeying Him is.

In His Service,
Joyce

Response Question: What kinds of images do we serve today?