Tag: Bible challenge

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Bible Challenge Week 47: The Church – By Faith Alone

“The plain things are the main things” in the Bible, but the plainest things present the church’s greatest challenges.  Last week, we looked at “Christ as the Center,” which is the theme of the entire scripture.  So why is it so hard to keep him there?  Mainly because we keep putting ourselves at the center.  The question of faith versus works, which has vexed the church from the beginning (we’ll be looking at Acts 15), is still an issue today.  What does “justification by faith” mean?  Why do Christians keep slipping off on one side of the other, toward legalism (attempting to earn heaven by good works) or antinomianism (living as we please while claiming to believe in Jesus)?

It would take more than one Bible lesson to do justice to that subject, but this week we’ll at least look at the root of the problem and the primary scriptural support.

For a download of this week’s challenge, with scripture references, key verse, discussion questions, and activities, click below:

Bible Reading Challenge Week 47: The Church – By Faith Alone

(This is a continuation of a series of posts about the “whole story” of the Bible.  I plan to run one every week, on Tuesdays, with a printable PDF.  The printable includes a brief 2-3 paragraph introduction, Bible passages to read, a key verse, 5-7 thought/discussion questions, and 2-3 activities for the kids.  Here’s the Overview of the entire Bible series.)

Previous: BRC Week 46: The Church – Christ the Center

Next: BRC Week 48: The Church – God’s Family

 

 

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Bible Challenge Week 46: The Church – Christ the Center

We have one more month of this series to go!  This week, we move out of the historical record (Matthew – Acts) and into the part of the Bible known as “Epistles,” or letters to the very first churches established in Asia and Europe.  I find it interesting, and significant, that the historical record does not come to a strong, ringing conclusion.  The book of Acts ends with Paul in Rome under house arrest, arguing the claims of Christ with anyone who came to visit   That’s not the conclusion we’re looking for–what happened to Paul, and Peter, and the other apostles?  Where’s the big victory at the end, the soul-stirring, confetti-flinging, music-swelling ending?

What we need to remember is that the story does not end with Acts 28:31,  The story is ongoing.  We are the story now.  The Bible does come to a ringing conclusion in Revelation, which we’ll get to, but that ending is not yet.  We are living in the in-between time, where God’s story is still being written in our hearts and lives.  From that perspective, Romans – Jude are like author notes for the major themes of the story.  What are those themes?  The greatest comes first, and we’ll look at that one this week.

For a printable download of this week’s reading challenge, including scripture references, discussion questions, and family activities, click here:

Bible Reading Challenge Week 46: The Church – Christ the Center

(This is a continuation of a series of posts about the “whole story” of the Bible.  I plan to run one every week, on Tuesdays, with a printable PDF.  The printable includes a brief 2-3 paragraph introduction, Bible passages to read, a key verse, 5-7 thought/discussion questions, and 2-3 activities for the kids.  Here’s the Overview of the entire Bible series.)

Previous: BRC Week 45: The Church – to the Uttermost Parts of the Earth

Next: BRC Week 47: The Church – by Faith Alone

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Bible Challenge Week 10: The People – Deliverance

The stage is set for a great contest between the God of Israel and the many gods of Egypt.  Almost all cultures at that time worshipped many gods, and each deity was limited to control of a particular land, city, or natural phenomenon–not one of them was in control of everything.  But the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob was about to draw a line in the sand, so to speak, and challenge the “gods” of Egypt to come out and fight.

Pharaoh thinks he is in control–he owns Egypt, doesn’t he?  He’s put his mark on the people of Israel, and they belong to him.  But God will override Pharaoh’s claim with an indelible mark of His own, ensuring that these people will never be erased from His mind, or from history.

An 80-year-old shepherd is on his way to Egypt with a thundering message . . . .

Click here for the printable download of this week’s Bible Reading Challenge:

Bible Challenge Week 10: The People – Deliverance

(This is a continuation of a series of posts about the “whole story” of the Bible.  I plan to run one every week, on Tuesdays, with a printable PDF.  The printable includes a brief 2-3 paragraph introduction, Bible passages to read, a key verse, 5-7 thought/discussion questions, and 2-3 activities for the kids.  Here’s the Overview of the entire Bible series.)

Previous: Week 9: The People – Moses

Next: Week 11: The People – Sinai

 

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Bible Challenge, Week 6: The Promise – Isaac

What’s there to think about Isaac?  A promised child, a near-victim, a weak husband, a gullible father . . . meh.  He fades into the crack between Abraham and Jacob. and we see very little of his actions, even less of his inward thoughts.  The defining moment of his life may well have been the instant when, somewhere around 15 years old, he lay bound on a stone altar gazing up at a knife held by his own father.  Trustingly? Fearfully? Incredulously?  Maybe all those things at once, and the experience could have scarred him for life.  But now he enjoys an eternal existence as one-third of the patriarchal triumvirate, the “Abraham-Isaac-and-Jacob that the God of Israel would identify Himself by.

It turned out okay for him.  However colorless he appears, being a vital link in the chain of God’s covenant blessing is no small thing.

 

Click here for the pdf download:

Bible Challenge, Week 6: The Promise – Isaac

(This is a continuation of a series of posts about the “whole story” of the Bible.  I plan to run one every week, on Tuesdays, with a printable PDF.  The printable includes a brief 2-3 paragraph introduction, Bible passages to read, a key verse, 5-7 thought/discussion questions, and 2-3 activities for the kids.  Here’s the Overview of the entire Bible series.)

Previous: Week 5: The Promise – Abraham

Next: Week 6: The Promise – Jacob

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Bible Challenge, Week Five: The Promise – Abraham

We like to say God has a sense of humor.  (Though I suspect it’s not like ours.)  He may also have a sense of irony, or why would a man who was childless until the age of 90 come to be known as “Father” Abraham?  But then, what seems ironic to us might just be a splendid dichotomy for him.  He loves shaking up the system: the younger supplants the older, the weak overcome the mighty, the last shall be first, and the meek (eventually) inherit the earth.  Likewise, a old man (75 when we meet him) becomes a major point person in our Hero’s quest to resolve the central conflict of the Bible.

Our Hero, remember, is God himself.  We’ve talked about our problem: rebellion, judgment, and separation.  His main problem is us: how to be reconciled to people he loves even though they reject him.  The answer will begin with one person; and from one person, one family; and from one family, one nation; and through one nation . . . but we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

So here’s Abraham, great father and great receiver of a foundational covenant.  And here’s the download:

Bible Challenge, Week Five: The Promise – Abraham

(This is a continuation of a series of posts about the “whole story” of the Bible.  I plan to run one every week, on Tuesdays, with a printable PDF.  The printable includes a brief 2-3 paragraph introduction, Bible passages to read, a key verse, 5-7 thought/discussion questions, and 2-3 activities for the kids.  Here’s the Overview of the entire Bible series.)

Previous: Week Four: The Problem – Separation

Next: Week Six: The Promise – Isaac

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Bible Challenge, Week Four: The Problem – Separation

Something is wrong; everybody knows it.  The world is not as it should be.  Some great religious traditions look forward to a future when all our frustrated desires will be subsumed into a blissful oneness.  Others look back to a long-lost paradise and speculate on a leader (or system) who will return us to that ideal state.

Last week we talked about judgment, admitting (perhaps grudgingly) that God has a right to judge.  But there are times when his judgment doesn’t seem . . . well, right.  We can accept bad things happening to bad people (which doesn’t include us, of course).  That’s only just deserts.  But bad things happening to good people is the main problem doubters have with a supposedly “good” God.

The Bible meets that problem head-on.  It’s part of the problem, and no figure shows it better than the long-suffering, pitiful character of Job.  The man has a lot of complaints, and they seem perfectly reasonable to us.  But underneath all the apparent unfairness of the way he’s been treated, Job is most hurt about this:

I thought we were friends.  I thought You were on my side.  But now it seems I never knew You, and we don’t even speak the same language.  Is there anyone who can come between us? Or will we be eternally a universe apart?

Click below for the download:

Bible Challenge, Week Four: The Problem – Separation 

(This is a continuation of a series of posts about the “whole story” of the Bible.  I plan to run one every week, on Tuesdays, with a printable PDF.  The printable includes a brief 2-3 paragraph introduction, Bible passages to read, a key verse, 5-7 thought/discussion questions, and 2-3 activities for the kids.  Here’s the Overview of the entire Bible series.)

Previous:  Week Three: The Problem – Judgment

Next: Week Five: The Promise – Abraham

 

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Bible Challenge Week One: The Setting

(Today we begin a series of posts about the “whole story” of the Bible.  I plan to run one every week, on Tuesdays, with a printable PDF.  The printable includes a brief 2-3 paragraph introduction, Bible passages to read, a key verse, 5-7 thought/discussion questions, and 2-3 activities for the kids.)

Every story has certain elements in order to be a story.  We often think of characters first–somebody has to act in the story, and there’s usually a hero, or protagonist.  Usually, though not always, there’s also an adversary, or antagonist.  And then, of course, something has to happen.  Some kind of problem develops, or a conflict arises, that the hero has to solve or resolve.  The plot develops around this conflict and resolution, working its way to a climax.

But there’s another story element that we often overlook, and that’s the setting.  In some contemporary stories, the setting is not especially consequential: it could be any modern city, or Midwestern small town.  But in historical fiction, or science fiction, or regional fiction, the setting leans in, shaping a plot that couldn’t take place anywhere else, or in any other time.  (I wrote about the importance of setting in great westerns on my other website.)

The Bible story also starts with setting: the heavens and the earth.  We often pass over it in order to get to characters and plot, but for this week, let’s linger and think about what the setting means for this particular story.  What meaning is packed into the very first sentence of the world’s greatest story?

Here’s the download for our first week:

Bible Reading Challenge, Week One: The Setting

I neglected to add a Key Verse to the download, so I’ll put it here: Genesis 1:31–

And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good.

Next: Week Two: The Problem – Rebellion