Bible Study

2 Peter 1:5-7

[5] For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, [6] and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, [7] and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.

Hebrews 10:36

[36] For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised.

Romans 5:3-5

[3] Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, [4] and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, [5] and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

1 Peter 1:7

[7] so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

What Does Real Love Look Like?

“And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him.” 1 JOHN 4:16

 

PONDER THIS

We need to give our kids unconditional love. I’ve often noticed that men who had fathers who did not love them do not know how to love to their kids—they must be taught. We need a generation of men to mentor other men who never had fathers who taught them unconditional love. We must break that cycle.

Unconditional love doesn’t mean you give a child everything he or she wants. That’s not really love at all. True love is not giving others what they want, it is giving others what they need. There must be unconditional acceptance, regardless of the child’s behavior. I may not accept what you do, but I accept you. Children need to know that so deeply that when they are in trouble, they won’t be afraid to come to you. If children don’t have a sense that their parents love them no matter what they do, they’re not going to share their mess-ups with you, and you won’t have the opportunity to help them through their greatest challenges.

Who are the people who were there for you in your hardest points of life? How have you learned love from them?

What are some things that make it challenging to love others unconditionally?

PRACTICE THIS

Thank someone today who loved you unconditionally while you were growing up.

LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers 

God’s Plan for Martyrs

They were each given a white robe and told to rest a little longer, until the number of their fellow servants and their brothers should be complete, who were to be killed as they themselves had been. (Revelation 6:11)

For almost three hundred years, Christianity grew in soil that was wet with the blood of the martyrs.

Until the Emperor Trajan (about AD 98), persecution was permitted but not legal. From Trajan to Decius (about AD 250), persecution was legal. From Decius, who hated the Christians and feared their impact on his reforms, until the first edict of toleration in 311, the persecution was not only legal but widespread and general.

One writer described the situation in this third period:

Horror spread everywhere through the congregations; and the number of lapsi [the ones who renounced their faith when threatened] . . . was enormous. There was no lack, however, of such as remained firm, and suffered martyrdom rather than yielding; and, as the persecution grew wider and more intense, the enthusiasm of the Christians and their power of resistance grew stronger and stronger.

So, for three hundred years, to be a Christian was an act of immense risk to your life and possessions and family. It was a test of what you loved more. And at the extremity of that test was martyrdom.

And above that martyrdom was a sovereign God who said there is an appointed number of martyrs. They have a special role to play in planting and empowering the church. They have a special role to play in shutting the mouth of Satan, who constantly says that the people of God serve him only because life goes better. That’s the point of Job 1:9–11.

Martyrdom is not something accidental. It is not taking God off guard. It is not unexpected. And it is emphatically not a strategic defeat for the cause of Christ.

It may look like defeat. But it is part of a plan in heaven that no human strategist would ever conceive or could ever design. And this plan will triumph for all those who endure to the end by faith in God’s all-

John Piper 

Bible Study

Revelation 5:9-10

[9] And they sang a new song, saying, 

    “Worthy are you to take the scroll

        and to open its seals,

    for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God

        from every tribe and language and people and nation, 

    [10] and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God,

        and they shall reign on the earth.”

Genesis 15:16

[16] And they shall come back here in the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.”

Hebrews 11:39-40

[39] And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised, [40] since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect.

Revelation 7:9-10

[9] After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, [10] and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!”

How to Manage Your Mess-Ups

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.”GALATIANS 5:22-25

 

PONDER THIS

We all mess up. Nobody is perfect. Our kids want to know how do you manage your mess ups? How do you manage your failures? How do you manage your problems? That’ll be better for them than your phony perfectionism. Share with your kids. Give them an example. The two hardest times of life are middle age and teenage years, and somehow God puts them together in a family. You can still teach others, even as you are struggling. Your kids are going to learn more from your example than from your words.

What are we interested in with our kids? Many parents focus on sports, grades, physical health, popularity, and ability. But there are bigger values for them to learn. Think about the fruit of the Spirit. Is that something the next generation sees exemplified? Where are they going to learn about the fruit of the Spirit? These things are not taught as much as they are caught. We owe those who follow us an example.

What values did you learn from your parents? What values did they prioritize teaching you?

What are some values that are important to you to pass on to the next generation? Why are those important to you?

PRACTICE THIS

Talk to a parent or grandparent and ask what values he or she is teaching to children. Listen for, and note, godly insights shared with you.

LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers 

Why We Don’t Lose Heart

So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal. (2 Corinthians 4:16–18)

Paul can’t see the way he used to (and there were no glasses). He can’t hear the way he used to (and there were no hearing aids). He doesn’t recover from beatings the way he used to (and there were no antibiotics). His strength, walking from town to town, doesn’t hold up the way it used to. He sees the wrinkles in his face and neck. His memory is not as good. And he admits that this is a threat to his faith and joy and courage.

But he does not lose heart. Why?

He doesn’t lose heart because his inner man is being renewed. How?

The renewing of his heart comes from something very strange: it comes from looking at what he can’t see.

We look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal. (2 Corinthians 4:18)

This is Paul’s way of not losing heart: looking at what he cannot see. What, then, did he see when he looked?

A few verses later in 2 Corinthians 5:7, he says, “We walk by faith, not by sight.” This doesn’t mean that he leaps into the dark without evidence of what’s there. It means that for now the most precious and important realities in the world are beyond our physical senses.

We “look” at these unseen things through the gospel. We strengthen our hearts — we renew our courage — by fixing our gaze on the invisible, objective truth that we see in the testimony of those who saw Christ face to face.

“God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:6). “The light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” We see this as it shines in our heart through the gospel.

We became Christians when this happened — whether we understood this or not. And with Paul we need to go on seeing with the eyes of the heart, so that we not lose heart.

John Piper 

Bible Study

Romans 7:22-25

[22] For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, [23] but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. [24] Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? [25] Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.

Acts 20:24

[24] But I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.

Romans 12:2-3

[2] Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

[3] For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.

Isaiah 40:30-31

    [30] Even youths shall faint and be weary,

        and young men shall fall exhausted; 

    [31] but they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength;

        they shall mount up with wings like eagles;

    they shall run and not be weary;

        they shall walk and not faint.