Sunday, May 12, 2013

May 19, 2013 - Actually these scriptures are for Trinity Sunday

Scriptures for May 19th (technically for May 26th) Proverbs 8:1-4,22-31; Psalm 8; Romans 5:1-5; John 16:12-15 Theme: Pulling what we know about the Father, the son, and the Holy Spirit all together; Song: Holy, Holy, Holy Romans: We live in a broken world, we are broken people. No matter how Christian we say we are, things go wrong in our world. No matter how hopeful we may be, things still happen that we were not expecting. Paul speaks of having faith in things we cannot see all throughout the book of Romans. In Romans 5 he explains that a Christian faith is not easily earned, it comes through suffering. We all suffer, but we don’t all have to accept suffering as the final word. Trajedy comes to all life, but when Christ is with us, we look beyond the darkness and know that the light always comes. We have a chance to use our Christian faith when we suffer. He says that suffering produces endurance, endurance produces character, and character produces hope. Christ came into this world to give us a sense of hope in the midst of all suffering. John: This is the last of our lessons from John, we go back to Luke next week. This is the very end of Jesus farewell speech. He explains that he has said all that he can say. This fits in well with the lesson from Romans. In this life, no one has eternal life, not even the Son of God. He has poured out his heart and soul so that we will understand. But there are some things that we will never understand, unless we go through them ourselves. If we preach the gospel, we will experience the persecution that Jesus experienced. But it is only in his absence that the Holy Spirit comes to bring us comfort and guidance. It is only in his absence that it all comes together for us and we understand the trinity – the Father, the son, the holy spirit. Now it is our turn to be Jesus for the world. Questions: When are those times when you faith is the strongest? When are those times when your faith is the weakest? What is it that gives you hope? What happens to you when you have to suffer? How have you experienced the presence of the Holy Spirit in your life? What does the trinity mean to you? How do you feel about Jesus leaving earth and returning to heaven?

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