I just finished teaching a series on Ancient Prophets, Modern Messages, and two passages stood out to and convicted me as a Bible teacher. They are:
Hosea 4:6, “My people are destroyed from lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I also reject you as my priests; because you have ignored the law of your God, I also will ignore your children.
Malachi 2:7-8 “For the lips of a priest ought to preserve knowledge, because he is the messenger of the Lord Almighty and people seek instruction from his mouth. 8 But you have turned from the way and by your teaching have caused many to stumble;
We don’t need to go back to the Old Testament prophets to see evidence of what happens to the people of God when they aren’t taught the foundational truths of the Christian faith, when they are not grounded in God’s Word and are taught primarily to go it to feel better and be more positive about life.
That doesn’t last much beyond the last praise song.
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Instead of being a living witness of the peace, joy, and service that ought to characterize a disciple of Jesus, we see destructive confusion over political identities, a callous lack of regard for those in need, and personally chaotic lives little different from the rest of the world. Hearts are not at rest, lives are filled with guilt and lack of peace, significant purpose or fulfillment.
As to sharing their faith—it’s not even a consideration when a person isn’t quite sure they trust the God they sing loudly to on Sundays. If they even think about a religious conversation many feel someone might ask a “gotcha question” about the Bible or the Trinity or some other teaching they don’t understand themselves. So, they keep quiet and go to church to feel good for the week and hope their good deeds give them enough heavenly credit for God to answer their prayers when they are feeling desperate.
God does not want his people to live like this.
A core reason for this sloppy, shaky version of the Christian life many live is summed up by Jesus, when He said, “You are in error because you don’t know the scriptures —
God gave us the Bible and it truly is the instruction manual for life. We wouldn’t think about running a complex machine without reading instructions but we attempt to manage our eternal souls in a precarious earthly life and it doesn’t go well.
But there is HOPE! I’ve seen again and again how despair turns to purposeful living when people get into God’s Word, when they really get into it, when they are taught deeply and challenged to read and study it, when they learn how we got it, why they can trust it and learn what it clearly says about the big questions of life, the Trinity, about if there really is life and after death, how we got the Bible, why we can trust it and why it is totally different than other religious scriptures—all topics I’ve shared in my Bible classes and will be sharing with you.
When people learn the truths based on these topics they somehow exhale in their life and faith; they aren’t afraid anymore of questions from their friends or the ones they ask in their dark nights of the soul. Their behavior changes in the ways the Lord wants it to in their particular lives.
One of the truly interesting aspects of this method of teaching—simply presenting the truths of God’s Word, in depth and consistently that I’ve observed over the years and is that again and again I’ve seen significant life change simply from exposure to it. Though I do have suggested applications in my lessons, the lessons are not primarily how-tos (there are lots of good teaching materials out there in those areas)—I simply try to clearly and completely present Biblical truth and then the Spirit applies it in precisely the ways a particular individual needs.
If you’d like to check out these materials, go to the Bible805 Podcast, or the Bible805 YouTube channel or explore the www.Bible805.com website. If you want to teach the lessons, I have free source materials, my PowerPoints, notes, discussion guides and the podcasts and videos without ads available on the www.Bible805Academy.com.
Please take advantage of these materials and may we all grow as teachers so that our people won’t stumble, but joyfully and peacefully grow as disciples of Jesus.