Genesis

A Person to a People, and the balance between God’s Sovereignty and Personal Responsibility

2023-01-28 by bible805

With this week’s lesson, we move from studying one person’s life, Abraham, to how God transforms his people into the nation of Israel, who God will use as His representatives on earth, the ones who will write His Word, demonstrate His worship, and eventually be the family that bears the Savior of the world, Jesus.

The Patriarchs of this family, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, along with Joseph had a huge responsibility and as we look at their lives it is a good opportunity to consider questions about what did God Sovereignly determine in their lives and what were they responsible for.

The lesson goes over both topics. Below is a handout that has the notes, the chart of the 12 Tribes, and questions that go with the lesson, plus the podcast and video.

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Abraham, Hero of the faith, How God chooses and crafts his people

2023-01-20 by bible805

In Genesis, with the life of Abraham, we have a big shift, where God moves from working with all of humanity to a focus on ONE man, who will become the founder of the Jewish nation. Ultimately three major religions in our world today claim him as their founder: the Jewish, Christian, and Muslim religions. As such, he is held in great veneration by all and in Christianity referred to as one of the first “heroes of the faith.”

And though we do want to honor him, we also need to clarify that description of him and here is why—In reality, there is only ONE true hero of the faith throughout the Bible

And it isn’t any human.

The only true hero of the faith in the Bible is our Triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

It is so important that we understand this so that our admiration and praise is in the right place—directed to our God and not inappropriately to any human.

How this worked out in Abraham’s life and its application to us is what our lesson today is about.

Below is a copy of the notes, questions, and a map of the key locations in Abraham’s life plus links to the podcast, video, and audiogram, the text and sound only goof for viewing on your phone:

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A Bible class member wondered why is the story of Abraham, a man who traded his wife for wealth and protection considered a great man in the Bible?—here’s the answer

2023-01-20 by bible805

Abraham sending Hagar away — Abraham was far from perfect in his relationships with the women in his life, especially when seen from contemporary eyes. But reading how God called, saved, and used him can give each of us with our many faults, hope.

Before I share these lessons with you online I teach them to an adult Bible class at my church. Some of the class members are relatively new to following Jesus and have never read through the Bible before. I encourage questions as I teach, and we have discussion following the presentation. I’ve found their questions and comments absolutely invaluable as they help me see things in a new light.

For those of us who have read the Bible many times and with the rose-colored glasses of church interpretations, we can forget how shocking some of the behavior is of the so-called “heroes of the faith.”

I had already planned on discussing this prior to her comments, but I wanted to emphasize in sharing the lesson with all of you that the key teaching I pray people get out of this lesson is that there are NO human heroes in the Bible.

There is only ONE true hero of the faith, and that isn’t a human. The true hero of our faith is our Triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

In this lesson (Lesson #3 in Through the Bible) I use the life of Abraham to illustrate the balance of grace on God’s part in that we did not earn or deserve anything that calls us into the faith and yet our responsibility to take action based on that grace.

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What about people who have never heard of Jesus? Why do innocent people suffer?How can we help people who are suffering? Week Two of Thru the Bible, Genesis & Job

2023-01-14 by bible805

One of the great answers we discovered the first video of this series is the assurance that Life after death is a great promise to those who believe in Jesus. Yet that assurance brings up another question that we will answer in this lesson which is:

“What about those who have never heard of Jesus?”

We have two more questions in this series, “Why do innocent people suffer?”

And along with that one the final question, “How can we comfort those (including ourselves) who suffer?”

We will look in depth at answers to these questions in this lesson.

Below is a PDF of the Notes and Questions, plus the podcast and video and below the video with the podcast is the audiogram, a new version of the lesson.

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Genesis & Job, answers to the Big Questions of Life, part ONE—week #1 of Thru the Bible in Chronological Order

2023-01-06 by bible805

With this lesson, we start the adventure of reading through the Bible in Chronological Order. It begins by reading Genesis and three days into it, we jump to the book of Job.

We will talk about why we read these two books together and you’ll see how Genesis and Job lay the foundation for much of what we will read in the rest of the Bible by starting out with answers to the Big Questions of life—

How did the world begin?
Why are there troubles in this world?
Is this all there is or is there life after death?

God hasn’t left us alone to answer these questions and many more that trouble us in our quiet moments and worst nightmares, as we will learn in this lesson. The material on life after death is especially encouraging as you’ll see in a close analysis of a key passage in Job.

Below is a downloadable PDF of the Notes, the chart talked about in the lesson, Questions, a link to the podcast, and a video of the lesson.

Click on the image of the Handouts to download the files.