Our Sunday Morning Bible Class begins at 10:15 am. We are located in the classroom behind the sanctuary's balcony. Whether you are investigating Christ or seeking to grow in your relationship with Him, this class should help you move forward on your spiritual journey.
Request to become a friend with the "ECBC College Ministry" on Facebook! This is where you could read announcements about upcoming events as well as receive daily Scripture references to help you engage with God. Each week you would have a consistent intake from OT History, Poetry/Wisdom, Prophecy, Gospel/History, Paul's Letters, and the General Letters.
On May 16th, the Sunday Morning Bible Class lesson was on "Making the Most of Your Summer".
On May 23rd, the Sunday Morning Bible Class lesson was on "Who is God?" We covered the first point: He is Trinity.
On May 30th, the Sunday Morning Bible Class lesson was on "Who is God?" We covered the second point: He is Sovereign.
MAY 30TH LESSON:
God is Sovereign
Read Exodus 3:13-14.
“I AM WHO I AM”: Most often in our texts: “Yahveh” or “Jehovah”.
“I AM WHO I AM”: I don’t need an explanation.
“I AM WHO I AM”: “…means that God depends on nothing, while everything depends on Him. God needs no explanation and no origin, but everything less than God needs an explanation and an origin” [Dr. Douglas F. Kelly Systematic Theology: Volume One (Scotland, Great Britain: Christian Focus Publications Ltd., 2008), 280].
Read John 8:58 and 18:4-6.
Ralph McInerny: “…God alone is such that he cannot not be. He is, in short, a necessary being. Whatever other than God exists does so, not because it is of its nature to exist, a definitional necessity, as if it were, but because it has received existence” (Ibid., 283).
Sovereign as Creator:
Gen 1: God spoke the world into existence.
Matt 8:8: When God speaks people are healed.
Heb 1:3: All things are held together by His word.
Sovereign as Law-Giver:
Read Exodus 20:2.
Walter Kaiser: “…the standard of moral measurement in deciding what was right or wrong, good or evil, was fixed in the unwavering and impeccably hold character of Yahweh…. His nature, attributes, character, and qualities provided the measuring stick for all ethical decisions. But there was, by the same token, an environment of grace – the free loving act of deliverance from Egypt. Israel did not need to keep the law in order to be released from Egypt. On the contrary, since she was so dramatically redeemed, the lever of obligation could not be easily removed” (Ibid., 287).
Sovereign as One God:
Novatian of Rome (c. 250): “For we read that He contains all things, and therefore that there could have been nothing beyond Himself” (Ibid., 288).
Read Colossians 1:16-17.
St. Athanasius: “Since then, there is everywhere not disorder, but order, proportion and not disportion, not disarray but arrangement, and that in an orderly perfectly harmonious, we must needs infer and be led to perceive the Master that put together and compacted all things, and produced harmony in them” (Ibid., 289).
St. Athanasius: “For we must not think there is more than one ruler and maker of Creation…” (Ibid., 289).
Richard of St. Victor: “…it is impossible for several all-powerful Beings to exist. Because He who is really all-powerful would be able easily to reduce the others to impotency; otherwise, he would not really be all powerful” (Ibid., 290).
MAY 23RD LESSON:
What is the greatest thing Christianity has to offer?
Answer: God Himself.
God is the Supreme Reality.
There is nothing better to talk about in impacting the culture than Him.
Questions:
1. What does it mean for God to be Trinity?
2. What are the repercussions of wrong belief about God?
He is Trinity
Richard of St. Victor, 12th century Scottish theologian: “One never says that someone properly possesses love if he only loves himself; for it to be true love, it must go out towards another. Consequently, where a plurality of persons is lacking, it is impossible for there to be love.” [Dr. Douglas F. Kelly Systematic Theology: Volume One (Scotland, Great Britain: Christian Focus Publications Ltd., 2008), 274]
What is the opposite of love? Not hate. It’s self-absorption.
If God was a monad, He would not be a Person.
Read Eph 3:14-15. The fact that we come from and want to be in a family shows that we come from God. Relationship is evidence of the Personhood of God.
Warning: The mistake people make in trying to understand God is to start with their earthly father. Don’t start with paternity to try to understand the Trinity. Start with the Trinity to understand paternity.
There is something about the Father that He wouldn’t be the same if He didn’t have the Son.
T.F. Torrance: “The Father is in himself the whole divine nature, but this is true also of the Son and of the Spirit. The Father is not Father apart from the Son, and the Son is not Son apart from the Father, nor are they what they are as Father and Son apart from the Spirit, while the Holy Spirit is not what he is as Holy Spirit apart from the Father and the Son, for they all coinhere consubstantially and inseparably in the one Being of God. The Godhead is intrinsically Trinitarian and the Trinity is essentially one, Unity in Trinity and a Trinity in Unity.” [Dr. Douglas F. Kelly Systematic Theology: Volume One (Scotland, Great Britain: Christian Focus Publications Ltd., 2008), 274]
The Trinity is distinct but not separate. When the Holy Spirit comes, the Father has come. When the Spirit lives in you, Christ lives in you. In this life, marriage is the closest relationship. But even there the two persons are separate.
To be a Christian is to be in Someone else, in another reality. Reference Eph 1:3-13.
To be a Christian is for Someone else to be in you. Reference Gal 2:20.
Read Eph 2:6-7. C.S. Lewis says that when we get to Heaven it will feel like home b/c we were already there.
MAY 16TH LESSON:
Write down 8 things you desire for your life.
Psalm 73:1-28
2 Things I want to take note of.
1. This is a changed man. Something drastic has taken place.....SOMETHING HAPPENED IN THE SANCTUARY
compare VERSES 2and18,
compare VERSES 3and25
compare VERSES 4-5and26
this drastic change happened in the sanctuary.
I think we could say without doing any injustice to the text, that a sanctuary is any place and time you set aside to experience God...then your mind gets screwed on straight and He becomes your desire. Your daily time with the Lord...so crucial over this summer. Accountability and fellowship.
2. This is not desire as we would think of it.....ASAPH'S DESIRE BECAME SINGULAR
1-16....seemed to wrestle with his desires...sometimes saying that God was a desire, or He was not even a desire at all. Then the sanctuary....the battle reaches it's climax....i imagine that God went from a desire to his greatest desire. Then realizes the desires are w/o value (18-20), and he was stupid for being jealous / wishing to trade places (21-22). Then, because of this experience in the sanctuary, God is no longer His greatest desire...but his ONLY desire!!! Most Christians say God is their greatest desire, but God is looking for men who have Him as their only desire!! Asaph doesn't just desire to have God....God IS His desire.
This summer, you and the people that are joining us will enter the sanctuary. We bring a lot of desires. Make no mistake....God may be your greatest desire. Of all the things that you want, that you delight in, that you find pleasure in, or would find pleasure in....
1. health
2. popularity
3. mate
4. a family
5. comfort
6. a great ministry
7. people to disciple
8. a knowledge of the Word
....of all these things you desire, God may be very well at the top of the list. BUT, if we take the 2nd part of Verse 25 literally, Asaph would say "I don't even have a list". God is my only desire. His ONLY desire. He doesn't desire God AND popularity, God AND a mate, God AND a great ministry. Just God. Kind of simplifies things doesn't it?
This summer...why are you going? Some of you may list things that you want to grow in or accomplish....
1. leadership skills
2. evangelism
3. discipling skills
4. prayer life
5. knowledge
....all good things, but if you really want all of this...the best want to get it, the best way to experience them, the fastest way to grow....is to really just stop focusing on these things, stop wanting them, and just look for God, just seek Him, let Him not only be your top priority but your ONLY priority. Then...when you finally stop trying to dress yourself with these qualities, God does it for you. By seeking Him not just first, but seeking Him ONLY, God makes you into this great leader, who evangelizes as a lifestyle, who is a discipler of men, a prayer warrior, much wisdom, etc.
3 REASONS WHY THIS SUMMER IS SO IMPORTANT FOR YOU AND THE KINGDOM
1. I hope this summer will affect your lifelong standards....from what movies you watch, to what kind of person you will marry, to what career you will take, to how you spend your money.
2. I hope this summer will affect your vision....from how you view people, to how you view prayer, to how you view God's Word, to how you view God Himself.
3. I hope this summer will affect your character...turning discontentment into patience, turning pride into humility, turning frustration into love.
In summary...
Let's revisit for 2 minutes HOW GOD BECOME ASAPH'S DESIRE
1-Circumstances made him desperate.
Apparently, he didn't have great health, maybe he didn't have much money. But these things caused him to wrestle in the sanctuary.
There are things already built in that will make you desperate...to make you wrestle with God in the sanctuary.
-Job you don’t want.
-Roommates you don’t like
-Parents who are too controlling
-Broken relationship
-Classes
2-Asaph put himself in the sanctuary.
Just being here is not enough….the sanctuary is not just church. It’s not just a mission trip or a project. Each morning you are to put yourself in the sanctuary.
Acrostic: MOSTSUMMER
Meet with God daily
Open up to others
Share the Gospel consistently
Turn everything over to Him
Serve others (parents, roommates, less fortunate)
Use your job for ministry and money
Make up for lost time
Make the meetings / events
Eradicate the sin that plagues you
Reposition for the fall