All throughout the Bible we find that God’s response to human sinfulness is redemptive in nature and motivated by genuine, unselfish love. He would have been fully justified in giving Adam and Eve up to Satan’s destructive power; after all, they had made their choice. But God knew that Adam and Eve did not understand … Continue reading –>
Friday’s section of this week’s SS lesson asks the question, “Critics of Christianity will often argue that Jesus knew beforehand that, though He would die, He would be resurrected to life. Thus, they ask, what was the big deal about His death when He knew it would be only temporary?” My mother knows that flying … Continue reading –>
In Genesis 3:19, Adam was told that, at death, he would return to the dust from which he was made. The same thing happens to us. Notice—we do not return to being apes, because we were not made from apes. We were made from dust, and it’s to the dust, at death, that we return. … Continue reading –>
As we all know so well, the first humans, perfect beings created in the “image of God,” fell into sin, which brought death. They had been warned, and they understood what they had been told. Eve even repeated to the serpent what God had said. Yet, they sinned anyway. At times we, like Eve, are … Continue reading –>
Read for This week’s Study: Gen. 3:21; Ps. 104:29, 30; John 1:4; Rom. 5:6-11;Gal. 3:13; Matt. 27:46. Memory Text: “For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive” (1 Corinthians 15:22, NIV). In the biblical account, Adam and Eve were created in God’s image, without any moral defect. But they … Continue reading –>
“God created man in His own image. Here is no mystery. There is no ground for the supposition that man was evolved by slow degrees of development from the lower forms of animal or vegetable life. Such teaching lowers the great work of the Creator to the level of man’s narrow, earthly conceptions. Men are … Continue reading –>
As we look at the mission field, we must look through the compassionate eyes of Jesus. We’re not looking at a target group or mere statistics; we’e looking at real people. They may have given up on church and religion, but they’e open to those who follow Christ and show the love and sympathy of … Continue reading –>
“For the Son of man is Lord even of the Sabbath day.” Matthew 12:8 [Thought questions for Sabbath: A Gift From Eden March 13, 2013] 1. The creation of the Sabbath. What was the final work of Creation Week? Why did God take the time to set aside one 24-hour day after everything that He … Continue reading –>
Read Psalm 92. What does this tell us, at least in part, about what the experience of Sabbath keeping should be like? Why, when thinking about the Lord, should we express the kind of joy expressed in this psalm? The psalmist obviously knew the Lord, knew what the Lord was like, knew what the Lord had … Continue reading –>
“The sacrifice of Christ as an atonement for sin is the great truth around which all other truths cluster. In order to be rightly understood and appreciated, every truth in the Word of God, from Genesis to Revelation, must be studied in the light that streams from the cross of Calvary. I present before you … Continue reading –>
It has been more than 150 years since Darwin published his theory of evolution, and many bookshelves could be filled with books discussing evolutionary theory as it has subsequently developed and giving purported evidence to support it. But when the scientists who write these books analyze the evidence that might tell us something about the … Continue reading –>
Read 2 Peter 3:3-7. Compare the description of the last day scoffers with our contemporary society. What do the scoffers deny, and why? The scoffers claim that nature has continued on without interruption, a claim known among scientists as “uniformitarianism.” This is equivalent to denying that miracles occur. This claim is then used to deny that … Continue reading –>
Key Thought : God gave us the Sabbath as a tool to help humanity remember who they are and establish their relationship with Him.. [Teaching plan for Sabbath: A Gift From Eden March 11. 2013] 1. Have a volunteer read Mark 2:27,28. A. Ask class members to share a short thought on what the main idea … Continue reading –>
Read Mark 2:27, 28. What crucial truth about the Sabbath does Jesus reveal here? How can we take this principle and apply it to our own Sabbath experience? Jesus and His disciples had just walked through a field of grain, and the disciples, hungry, had picked some of the grain and eaten it. The act of picking … Continue reading –>
Read Deuteronomy 5:12-15. How does the emphasis of the Sabbath commandment here differ from Exodus 20:8-11? Here Moses reminds the Israelites that they should keep the Sabbath, and he states that they should do this because God delivered them from Egypt. The texts say nothing about the six days of Creation or about the Sabbath being God’s … Continue reading –>
In Exodus 20:8-11, the fourth commandment refers directly to the Creation week. This is important, because it points back to Eden itself, to a world without sin, a perfect world coming fresh from the Creator. “The Sabbath is not introduced as a new institution but as having been founded at creation. It is to be remembered … Continue reading –>