It is not usual to do a bible study on records, so today’s passage may be strange to us. However, our conviction is that all of God’s word is useful for teaching, even this record of the tabernacle. Let us thus consider a few things: What can we learn from this? How do we worship?
The way and manner and attitude in which we worship a holy God has everything to do with how we obey. Let us consider how are we obeying as we worship, and what does our worship say about our obedience. If we hear God’s word and we walk away unchanged in actions, then we have wasted our time. We need to know how to apply and obey!
What we hope to see from this section of Scripture is that we can read God’s word and be encouraged by it. We tell our friends that God is faithful, because that is our assurance. When they hear this, they want to know how God is faithful, but sometimes we don’t know how to answer. What we want to do tonight is look at God’s faithfulness in this passage.
These 6 verses in Exo 34:29-35 have value not only in the narrative in Exodus, but in order to fully understand it, we will need to also read a New Testament passage in 2 Cor 3. We need the NT to understand the OT fully, and vice versa. The Bible is to be read as one coherent whole.
When was the last time you were really hurt? How long did you take to forgive this person? In this study, we’re going to see how God responds to being wronged and spurned by a people that He set His affections towards.
If you think back to how you know someone today, you probably remember how you met them in real life or saw them on social media. Back then, how did the Israelites know God?
The text today from Exodus 33 lays out the forces and key dynamics that serve as the DNA of the Bible. We can think about it in terms of our human bodies: if we were to take a sample of tissue, of flesh, of blood, we will see the same DNA within these cells. Similarly, if we dive deep into all parts of the Bible, if we "take the DNA" from all parts of the Scripture, we will see the Gospel. The DNA of the Bible is the Gospel: the Good News.
This passage shows us a rare occasion where the Israelites’ actions are worth our emulation. Remember the context: In Exo 32, Israel was caught doing something they shouldn’t. The golden calf was a problem and in this text, we are going to see why it was a problem, what the consequences of it were, and how His people responded to these consequences.
In the previous passage, God knew about the calf that the Israelites had made and was burning with anger. It’s not an easy passage to read. Yet in Exodus 32:1-15 we also have a beautiful passage of Moses interceding for the people.
We’re back in our series through the book of Exodus, but chapter 32 is a really random place to begin if you’ve never read the previous chapters. The summaries for the rest of the chapters are available on this site, but let us focus on the immediate context.
Paul ends his second letter to the Thessalonians with a very short benediction. He opens it by calling God “the Lord of peace”. Today, we get peace from many things, such as going overseas and being away from work and responsibilities. Yes, there is peace in that, but this passage speaks of peace in a different way and brings into question: What is true peace?
Beginning with Matt 2:1-12, we see that the arrival of Christ demands a response. We will read of different responses in this passage. There are those who actively searched for Christ (i.e. wise men) and a passive one (i.e. Herod). When we talk about the arrival of Jesus, both then and now, it demands a response. This is the mindset that we should have as we read 2 Thess 3.
1 and 2 Thessalonians is a book for our times, for it shakes us up from the drudgery of work and from the stupor of social media, and wakes us to our cosmic reality. After the previous chapters that contained thanksgiving, exhortations, and warning that we enter today’s text. Paul is finally ready to get incredibly practical. After labouring to help the Thessalonian church understand the urgency of living in the end times, Paul dives straight into the most practical course of action in the face of our eschatological reality.
In this Christmas season, we wait on God’s good promises that Jesus is coming again, just as the people in the OT longed for a Messiah, we are to stand firm on God’s word today as we wait for Jesus’ second coming.
In light of the lawlessness and false teaching that is already at work (2 Th 2:7), how can we live our Christian lives faithfully? What hope is there for us not to be deceived or deluded by the false signs and wonders of Satan? How can we stand firm in our faith as we wait for Jesus’ second coming.
These 12 verses are heavily disputed but tonight, we are going to observe the passage in the most commonly agreed sense. We are going to let the text point us to mainstream interpretation. Our goal tonight is to see the pastoral and applicatory value of the text.
In Christian circles, we are often more interested in the juicy, contentious bits, and overlook the common aspects of truth that most Christians agree on. Why is this important for us to know? We are incredibly susceptible to false teachings if we don’t know the basic fundamentals.
How can Christians make sense of persecution and what hope we have, in the midst of it? We must understand that suffering is a part of the Christian life, lest we be surprised or blindsided by times of trial and tribulation that may come. And this passage prepares us for that, while pointing us to the hope that we have, amidst such suffering.
When was the last time we got into a fierce debate about the centre of the Christian life? A discussion about doctrine? When was the last time you got into a serious debate about how Christians live? How many of you said that you were offended by was the lack of thankfulness in the lives of Christians? Issues of thanksgiving and gratefulness are not high on our priority list. This is the problem in our lives that Paul is trying to address. Thanksgiving is supposed to be a healthy normative priority.
How do you usually end your letters to others? By wishing them well? Maybe you remind them of your love for them? Maybe by saying something to the tune of “May God bless you…” This is exactly how Paul ends his letter to the Thessalonian church. However, before he does that we see him giving a list of exhortations to the church, and this is what we are going to look at today as we wrap up this study in 1 Thessalonians.
How did you wake up this morning? Did you wake up thinking about the “Day of the Lord”? Or did you wake up reading your phone notifications, thinking about work, planning your next vacation? Paul here states that the Christian is to think about the day of the Lord and it should be weighing on their minds.
This series in 1 and 2 Thessalonians has been titled “With the end in mind” and as we’ve been studying, virtually every other verse in this letter is about the eschaton (the end times). But before you balk at the mention of “end times”, let’s take a look at what exactly Paul says to the Thessalonian church and why he says these things.
What is the worst thing that can happen to you? For many of us, it could be death. What about death? Sometimes, it is not your own mortality that you have to consider. It is the mortality of others that we fear. Our parents could be growing older and we could be struggling with our parents’ health. Or maybe, it could be our own deaths. What will happen to those we leave behind — wife and kids for some, our parents for others, friends for all?
