This Weekend's Teachings

From Friday to Sunday I end up teaching at least three separate times and it's amazing how each time God allows me to teach, He continues to lay on the lessons for me as well.

On Friday, we finished our study through Acts at Jinja SS. Studying Acts 27-28 and recognizing the truth of God's promise, "Never will I leave you, never will I forsake you" in how God was with Paul through the storm. In the storms of life, God is there, even when we don't see Him, when as it said in chapter 27, "all hope was lost". But God is there. That's a truth I constantly have to remind myself of. We are called to live by faith and not by sight, something we say so often yet very rarely put into practice.

On Saturday, the youth group made their way through chapters 17 and 18 in Revelation in our series Race to Revelation. God blew my mind as it had rained HARD right before youth group was to start and as I was sitting there with my worship team drinking tea and watching the rain praying for blue sky, I had no clue God would bring all of the student that He would. We had as many students last night as we do when we have a special event, it was really cool! As we studied those two chapters the emphasis was on the archetypal Biblical theme that God wants our complete devotion and us to depend on Him alone. We were challenged looking at our lives and what we spend our time and thoughts on to see what we really "worship" instead of the only One who truly deserves it.

Then today, with my students who I used to call kids but are now past that stage, we are in Leviticus 13:24-28 and Daniel chapter 3. We do Leviticus because my students are determined to make it verse by verse through the whole Bible (I promise it was their idea) and so we're trying to take it little by little through these more difficult to apply passages. Today's passage in Leviticus is about burns becoming infected and the lesson we will talk about is that the "uncleanness" came from something painful and for us in the same way, suffering may prove to be a temptation for sin to enter into our lives (gossip, bitterness, anger, etc...) but we have to look at what that suffering is there for and why God has allowed it. One thing I have tried to drill into my students heads is that WE HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO EXCUSE FOR SIN, God ALWAYS provides a way out (1 Corinth 10:13). With Daniel chapter 3, we will look at Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego and how they refused to worship anything/anyone else other that the one true God. We will discuss what things we may feel tempted to do that are against God, the ways people may try to make us do those things, and the way we should stay strong and be faithful to God, no matter what the consequences may be.

I continue to be amazed that from Genesis to Revelation, God's Word is living and it's just so so cool to see students learn powerful biblical truths that can give them a strong foundation as they continue to grow and seek to live a life devoted to Him.