Tuesday, October 18, 2005

Good Morning!

I think that we are generally beginning to settle on Purpose Driven Life as our next study. Note that that is a 40 Day study, which would work out well from this perspective -- we have about two weeks left in this study, which would leave us about 8 weeks till the end of the year. That would allow us to finish the Purpose Driven Life by the first of the year, when we can start a new study. Any thoughts from anyone on that schedule?

ALSO -- completely different topic -- Sunday School Party this Friday night at Monica and Joey's house. I'll send along some more details today once I get to work, but they are providing the chicken fingers, and we are each supposed to bring something else, which is in her email at the office. It would be great if everyone can come -- we have somewhat of a virtual class, and I think that everyone would like to put faces to the names that show up here in the email.

The new unit for this week is Unit 25, God's Love and Ours

Focus Scripture for the Week:

1 John 4:19

We love because he first loved us.

Today's Scriptures: Matthew 5:43-44

Today's Discussion:

-- ok, this is a tough scripture to rally behind. Love your enemies? That is tough. I think that it is actually a lot tougher than we think, because our first impression is that we don't have that many enemies. But we have conflicts with more people than we realize -- from the co-worker that you have a long period of hostility with, to the anoymous stranger who cuts you off in traffic.

-- if you think that this is tough, remember the set up of the scripture, that we should love everyone, even our enemies, because God loves everyone.

-- when we talk about 'moving on to perfection" and the idea that being a Christian is a process that we learn over time, this is one of the big proactive things that does take time to learn how to do -- how do you use your spiritual maturity and knowledge to react to the day-to-day conflicts that occur in everyday life. The better we become at that, the more we are "moving on to perfection".

Question for Sunday:

-- do you believe that love can overcome evil? in all cases? in some cases? what are the limits?

Today's prayer request: Someone you have conflict with at your office

Let's put the scripture to practice. Think of someone at your office that you have a conflict with - either personality-wise, or maybe someone who isn't very nice. Now here's the tricky part -- Jesus didn't say how to pray for them. Here's my suggestion, based on the idea that you praying to overcome the conflict:

-- Pray that you do everything possible in your power to eliminate the conflict -- in other words, examine honestly whether you are the source of the conflict, and to have the courage to change whatever you are doing that contributes to the conflict

-- Pray that that the other person be honest with themselves about the conflict, recognize their contribution to the conflict, if any, and have the courage necessary to change whatever they are doing contributing to the conflict.

-- Pray for the strength and wisdom to deal with the other person with love and gentleness, in an effort to overcome the conflict with love.

-- Pray for the other person to respond in love and to the love that you show.

Today's class member prayer:

Michelle Ray

Have a great day.

Jay