Day of Pentecost Year A

Here's the handout content plus the texts I typed out for myself as the group leader—thought I'd post all of it (actually, in the other Years A I hadn't included the scripture texts so they didn't get blogged).

• Pentecost | 50 days after Easter
• In the Jewish calendar, Pentecost commemorated God's giving the Sinai Covenant - the Mosaic law
• The Christian Pentecost celebrates the fullness of the Spirit unleashed on all creation, enabling us to keep the new law of life in the Spirit and restoring all creation
• Whitsunday - British Isles term, white robes worn by those baptized on Pentecost
  
• Feast of Weeks or Harvest | Exodus 23:16; 34:33; Leviticus 23:15-16[17-22]; Firstfruits: Numbers 28:26; Deuteronomy 16:10, 16; 2 Chronicles 8:13
• Disciples = taught
• Apostles = sent

Psalm 104:24-34, 35b – this is a creation narrative!

²⁴ How many are your works, O Lord! In wisdom you made them all; the earth is full of your creatures.
²⁵ There is the sea, vast and spacious, teeming with creatures beyond number—living things both large and small.
²⁶ There the ships go to and fro, and the leviathan, which you formed to frolic there.
²⁷ These all look to you to give them their food at the proper time.
²⁸ When you give it to them, they gather it up; when you open your hand, they are satisfied with good things.
²⁹ When you hide your face, they are terrified;
when you take away their breath, they die and return to the dust.
³⁰ When you send your Spirit, they are created, and you renew the face of the earth.
³¹ May the glory of the Lord endure forever; may the Lord rejoice in his works—
³² he who looks at the earth, and it trembles, who touches the mountains, and they smoke.
³³ I will sing to the Lord all my life; I will sing praise to my God as long as I live.
³⁴ May my meditation be pleasing to him, as I rejoice in the Lord.
³⁵b Praise the Lord, O my soul. Praise the Lord.

1 Corinthians 12:3b-13 | 1 Corinthians 12:8-10—Gifts of the Spirit:

1. a word of wisdom - Sophia v.8a
2. a word of knowledge - gnosis v. 8b
3. faith, trust - pistis v. 9a
4. gifts of healings - v. 9b
5. workings of powers [miracles] v. 10a
6. prophecy v. 10b
7. discerning of spirits v. 10
8. types of tongues - glossolalia v.10
9. interpretation of tongues - once again, glossos v.10

1. The Spirit has come to the church and into the world in particular and collective senses, enabling the community as the body of the at once Crucified and Risen Christ to bear fruit in word and deed; without the Spirit there is no witness!
2. How does this congregation demonstrate the variety of the various gifts of the Holy Spirit Paul describes? How do we complement or complete one another?

Acts 2:1-21

• Acts 2:3, 4, 11 "tongues" is glossos
• Acts 2:6, 8 "tongues" is dialect, as in languages.
• Acts 2:15b It's only nine in the morning, third hour of the day; in the New Testament Day Watch the Third hour is from 6-9 a.m.
• Peter referred to the Hebrew prophet Joel 2:28-32 to substantiate this event as the arrival of the Day of the Lord when everyone, men, women, slaves, free - everyone, including even the "least of these," would experience God's abundant and impartial grace through the Spirit's reign.
• Name of the Lord - to know a person's name is intimacy with them and a kind of power over them.

1. in all of these texts for the Day of Pentecost, Spirit is Pneuma rather than the Paraclete Jesus promised in last week's (Easter 7) text from John 16:7; but John 16:13 Jesus speaks of the Pneuma=spirit of truth
2. The Spirit came to individuals gathered in community, "all together in one place."

John 20:19-23 - this is Easter Sunday evening

¹⁹ On the evening of that first day of the week, when the disciples were together, with the doors locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, "Peace be with you!" ²⁰ After he said this, he showed them his hands and side. The disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Lord.
²¹ Again Jesus said, "Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you." ²² And with that he breathed on them and said, "Receive the Holy Spirit. ²³ If you forgive anyone his sins, they are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven."

Locked doors for fear of... - any ideas on this? Secrecy, hiddenness and shame - how does Jesus unlock doors, hearts and minds and open up lives?

Or John 7:37-39

³⁷ On the last and greatest day of the Feast [of Weeks, the spring harvest feast corresponding to the fall harvest Feast of Tabernacles or Sukkoth, Leviticus 23:33-36], Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, "If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. ³⁸ Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him." [Or If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me. And let him drink, ³⁸ who believes in me.] ³⁹ By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.

Feast of Weeks or Harvest: Exodus 23:16; 34:33; Leviticus 23:15-16[17-22], (Firstfruits Numbers 28:26), Deuteronomy 16:10, 16; 2 Chronicles 8:13

The Feast of Weeks celebrates the time of the grain harvest, from barley through wheat. John's version of the gift of the Spirit emphasizes the authority the gift of the Holy Spirit imparts to the church. What observations can you make about the Pentecost account in the book of Acts, especially reflecting on the Psalm and the Corinthians texts?

Easter 7 A | Sunday after Ascension Thursday

...another "recently rediscovered" handout I prepared for the study group I facilitated during spring 2005, which, after all, was lectionary year A. This particular one is not at all typical of me; maybe I was tired?

Acts 1:6-14

• Acts 1:6-8 “Will you now, at this time, restore the kingdom to Israel? Jesus’ reply: “The question is wrong!!!!!”
• Not about recapturing and re-appropriating specious past grandeurs, but about the work God call us to right here and right now.
• “What you’ll get is the Holy Spirit!” You’ll receive the Holy Spirit so you can be Jesus’ witnesses and live as Jesus’ presence in the world; from now on, the world will discover Jesus’ presence within the presence of the community of the church, in our living as Jesus’ witnesses “as far as the ends [eschaton] of the earth.”
• Acts 1:10-11 “why do you stand looking up at heaven?!” Like us at times, the disciples wanted to gaze at the heavens, to wait for Jesus’ Second Coming, and forget God calls us to transform this world, living as the presence of the Risen Christ in the heaven of right here and right now.
• We need to remember it’s all God’s activity—we have the Holy Spirit and don’t need to imagine accomplishing all of this under our own steam.
• Regarding Jesus ascendancy to the Father’s Right Hand of sovereignty, as Martin Luther insisted, the “Right Hand of God” - God’s sovereignty - is everywhere: in Wittenberg, Marburg, London, San Diego, Tokyo…absolutely everywhere, all the time. God’s heaven is right here and right now.

John 17:1-11

• Jesus prayer for one-other-ness among God, Jesus, and disciples of all generations in the continuity and unity of the community of the church. Last Sunday, in John 14:18, Jesus promised he would not abandon the church; in the lections for Easter 6, Jesus promised to send the Spirit to accompany us and indwell all creation.

Acts 1 and John 17

• Jesus gave the gospel to the disciples (including us!), who still communicate the gospel to the world through the church.
• Within this community of the church, we can help one another experience eternity in the midst of time and discover the eternities of God’s sacramental self-revelation in the ordinariness of everyday life.
• In God’s arrangement, it always is about the community—both Acts 1 and John 17 are about the person’s nurture, sustenance, challenge and transformation within the faith community, continuing the pattern in the earlier Old Covenant communities, in which peoplehood happens as God forms and re-forms a community for Himself and for the world.

Easter 6 A

More Bible study notes I prepared for the adult class I facilitated during spring 2005; I'll try to get the rest of the notes, etc., I found this afternoon formatted and blogged in a couple of days.

Acts 17:22-31; Psalm 66:5-20; John 14:15-21

Earlier in the Acts 17 narrative, Paul and Silas had been released from jail and gone to Berea, where Timothy and Silas remained; all the while they'd been preaching Christ and resurrection; verse 17:6b is the famous "turning the world upside down!" Immediately before this speech to the Areopagites, Paul had been talking with Epicurean and Stoic philosophers—and Paul constantly has been preaching resurrection from the dead! Contrast this with Paul in his epistles determining to "preach only Christ crucified."

Acts 17:23 unknown god by Epimenides, from Crete; 17:24 Lord of sky and land—Lord of all creation!

Acts 17:26b The Message: "Plenty of time and space for living!"

Acts 17:28 We live and move in him; quoted from Aratus of Cilicia, Paul's native province; Aratus was born in 310 b.c.e., and he "said it well: 'We're the God-created.'"

In the John 14 text, the word for love consistently is agape; Jesus calls us to love with the same love with which God loves us!! Here, Jesus says to fully live in God's way of agape love we must know and keep his commandments; in order to make this possible, Jesus promises the Spirit of God. In this text, the you pronouns all are plural! The New Testament always is about the faith of the called-out and gathered-in community; for each of us, our faith is rooted in the community, nourished in the community and lived out in the community.

A paraclete - literally called alongside - stood up with someone who was on trial in a court of law. The paraclete did not speak to the judge at all but spoke only with the person on trial to support and guide them through it. Jesus assured the people when they loved with God's impartial and all-embracing agape love, the Paraclete, this Spirit of Truth about the person and work of Jesus Christ would be with them and in them.

Here are some English-language versions of the Greek parakletos:

• advisor
• advocate
• comforter
• consoler
• counselor
• encourager
• friend
• helper

Easter 5 A

Well, yes—we're currently in lectionary year C and not even in Lent yet, but this afternoon I found notes I'd prepared for several Bible studies I facilitated during spring 2005. Whenever time allows, I virtually always have notes for the class and myself to follow. Somehow it proves I've prepared and also gives us something concrete to work through.

Easter 5 A: Rock; The Word in the World!

1 Peter 2:1-10 | Stones, Rocks, Bricks, and Other Substantial Building Material

• Stones: hard, heavy, smooth, rough, impenetrable, permanent, won't easily decay; there also are many different kinds of stones. Is anyone here a geologist?
• The solidness, safety and security of rock, brick, concrete or any kind of masonry as walls or building foundations.
• 1 Peter 2:4 Living Stone, Source of Life.
• 1 Peter 2:5 "present yourselves" (that's us!) as building stones for a sanctuary [holy place, dwelling for God, community in which the Holy Spirit of God dwells in the world: Shekinah] vibrant with life! What aspect of being "living stones" do we offer this faith community and the greater community?
• 1 Peter 2:6, 7 Jesus Christ the cornerstone; foundation [Isaiah 28:16] [Matthew 21:44; Psalm 118:22]
• 1 Peter 2:8 Stumbling block, stone to trip over, boulder in The Message version - the stumbling block, "scandal" of the cross! Paul says preaching "Christ crucified," is a stumbling block, scandal, to Jews and foolishness to the gentiles [1 Corinthians 1:23]
• 1 Peter 2:9 Our royal, prophetic priesthood [Revelation 1:6]; different versions or translations of this text?
• Jesus assertion he'd build the Church on the rock of Peter/Rocky's confession of faith!

John 14:1-14 | Jesus Christ and the Church: the Word in the World

John's "many mansions—many rooms" text often is considered a parallel to Matthew's Sermon on the Mount and Luke's Sermon on the Plain; just as in those homilies, this text is not about a future eventual location but about a here and now commission to respond in the Spirit to opportunities and situations God keeps offering us along with the relationship we need to remain in to do the Word. How can we live as God's Word in the world? For starters, let's try thinking about contrasting attitudes and behaviors: scripture versus popular culture or scripture versus the media. On the internet I found a few ideas to get us started:

The world encourages: "Seek your place in the world."
Scripture says: "Seek first the kingdom of God."

Popular culture says: "Find yourself."
Scripture says: "Lose yourself, so you can find life!"

The self-improvement industry says: "Be your own self-made person."
Scripture says: "I call you to become members together of one body."

Advertising tells us: "Look to your own needs and interests."
Scripture says: "Take on the attitude of Jesus, who took on the nature of a servant."

The world out there insists: "Be at the top of your game."
Scripture says: "Be crucified with Jesus."

A Treasure in Earthen Vessels

¸.•´¯*)¸¸,ø¤* ¸.•'´¯) A Treasure in Earthen Vessels: An instrument for an ecumenical reflection on hermeneutics | Faith and Order Paper 182 | November 1998 ¸.•´¯*)¸¸,ø¤* ¸.•'´¯)

This afternoon while I tried to organize and throw away some stray papers, I discovered hard copies of several things from a couple years ago (not unusual), but I did find it unusual that I hadn't blogged any of them! Unlike now, in those days I wasn't quite so quick to blog almost everything for storage and safekeeping. However, I'm delighted I discovered them, and here's the first. File properties gave Monday, 14 March 2005 as the date I created the original, which I did to help prepare for moderating the discussion at Faith, Order and Witness.

Some of my ideas:

A friend who'd seen the traveling Dead Sea Scrolls exhibit emailed me she felt she'd touched "the hand of God!" In 2 Corinthians 4:7 Paul explains, "We have this treasure in earthen vessels…" During the Coronation ceremony the British monarch receives a Bible, given with the words: "to keep your Majesty ever mindful of the law and the Gospel of God as the rule for the whole of life and government of Christian Princes, we present you with this Book, the most valuable thing this world affords. Here is wisdom; this is the royal law; these are the lively oracles of God." Touching the pages of scripture with our own hands, actually feeling the pages of God's grace-filled rule for covenantal living, the commandments, together with the Gospeled Good News, in a tangible intimation of the way Jesus of Nazareth's birth, life, death, resurrection and ascension brought the Good News texts into real-life! We can look at Divine wiseness, living revelation and prophecies in the same way we'd read any current book or magazine, and in a way concretely and actively related to our actual everyday world.

As someone recently observed on a theology site I belong to (my paraphrase):

The Church is in fragments; the contemporary situation of the church reminds me of our faithful predecessors in biblical times carrying those earthly treasures necessary for daily sustenance (water, wine, grain, etc.) in earthen vessels. Sometimes one of the vessels would fall and break; under similar circumstances, we would throw the shards away, but they found a use for them: with paper not yet invented, and papyrus expensive, they used the fragments as writing material! Those fragments, which we call ostraca, still exist until this very day, providing us with insight into the culture and thought of those early times. We might say: "The jar is broken, long live the pieces!"

My own notes, continued:

In the Reformation tradition an objective and sensible sign is sufficient for the presence of the Church, and that is the Means of Grace—Word and Sacrament; God chooses the Earthen Vessels of Church, Scripture and Sacraments to proclaim His presence in our midst, and within the physical pages of a book we find a living witness of God's past activity at the same time we discover hope for our future--a Word of resurrection from death: a Word of Life! The Holy Spirit creates Christians by acting upon the subject – as in the relationship between Potter and clay – by our living in a community formed by Word and Sacrament.

Theology of the Cross Course Description

Today, on the Feast of the Epiphany, I'm moving right along with my proposed Lenten course...

For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1 Corinthians 2:2
A theology of glory imagines a view of God's essence and activity that parallels human aspirations to obvious, spectacular and excessive displays. A theology of the cross builds upon God's own self-revelation – particularly in Christ crucified – and seeks to discover God's characteristically hidden and frequently paradoxical, sacramental presence in the commonest things, situations and people.

This 6-part Bible study series will explore what it means to be a people who live under the cross of Jesus Christ for the world God calls us to serve, and particularly ways God leads and enables us to be a crucified – and risen! – people here at this church and in our families, neighborhoods and places of employment.

We will begin by contrasting the ever-popular theology of glory of immediately apparent divine intervention and activity with God's most typical manner of self-revelation in unassuming and concealed ways. After an overview of parallels and similarities found in the Hebrew Bible, the class will look at reading and interpreting several texts in the shadow of the cross of Calvary and through a cruciform lens. Weeks two and three will focus on the Cross in New Testament writings of Paul and Mark, in Reformation documents, and in more recent persons and situations. Some ways cross and sacraments are connected and intertwined will comprise the fourth week. Finally, the last two classes will be a time for the participants to discuss "what, then, are we to say about all of this?" What does this information and this manner of interpreting scripture, sacraments and our daily lives mean for each of us, for this church community and for the world we live in? In 1 Corinthians 1, Paul says "Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God." How about us? What's our take on all of this?

In addition to a printed course outline and related passages of scripture, I will bring a few short articles from various sources and even some things I've written myself!

© Leah Chang 2007

Theological Essentials

A few summers ago I proposed this for Adult Sunday School but one of my other options got picked instead. Nonetheless, I'm posting it here for safekeeping.

01. Hebrew Bible Introduction

02. New Testament Introduction

03. The Bible is canonized

04. Early Creeds

05. Augustine, Aquinas, the Late Medieval Church and "pre-reformers"

06. The Reformation and Reformation Confessions

07. England and Scotland

08. Continental Anabaptists and the Radical Reformation

09. Puritans, Pilgrims, the New World and Zion

10. Enlightenment Thought and Influence

11. The 100 Years' War

12. Schleiermacher and his progeny

13. Fundamentalism, Dispensationalism, and Restoration Movements

14. 19th Century Reason

15. Great Awakenings, Revivals, and Frontier Religion!

16. Barth, Bultmann and Brunner: neo-orthodoxy

17. Barmen Declaration and denominational confessions

18. Process Theology

19. Neo-Evangelicalism

20. A flurry of factions!

21. The Jesus Seminar and its offspring

22. Ecumenism and Ecumenical Theology

23. Interfaith Dialogue

24. Wrapping it up!

Lent 2007 Study Outline

6-part Series for Lent 2007 – Bible Study Outline

Theology of the Cross | Leah Chang

1 Corinthians 1:20-25

²⁰ Where is the smart stuff of this world? Where are the world's heavy thinkers?... ²¹ Since in God's wisdom the world did not know God through their worldly kinds of smarts, it pleased God through foolish proclamation to save anyone who trusts Him. ²² Jews demand signs and Greeks crave wisdom, ²³ but we proclaim Christ the crucified one, a scandal to the Jews and moronic nonsense to the gentiles: ²⁴ But to those called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ--God's living dynamic power and God's kind of wisdom. ²⁵ Because God's foolishness is wiser than humanity's intellectual cleverness, and God's weakness is stronger than human strength!

1 Corinthians 2:2

² For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.

God is here! As we God's people meet to offer praise and prayer...
Here are symbols to remind us of our lifelong need of grace;
Here are table, font and pulpit, here the cross has central place...
—Fred Pratt Green~ © 1979 Hope Publishing Co.

Theology of the Cross: what does this mean for the Church's and this congregation's (these congregations' in the case of OSLC) life and mission?

Week One

1. Theology of glory vs. theology of the cross
2. Hebrew Bible roots/wellsprings
3. Reading and interpreting scripture through a cruciform lens

Week Two

4. Paul, Mark and Jesus of Nazareth
5. Mark, Paul and Jesus the Christ

Week Three

6. Saul/Paul of Tarsus; Martin Luther
7. Some familiar theologians of the cross: Bonhoeffer; Dorothy Day; Gandhi; MLK; Desmond Tutu; Mother Teresa; us! Who else comes to mind?

Week Four

8. The cross and the sacraments:
          a. A theology of baptism and
          b. A theology of the eucharist

Week Five

9. What does the cross mean for each of us as individuals?
10. What does the cross mean for this church community?
11. What does all of this mean for our nearby neighbors?

Week Six

12. What does the cross mean for the world in which we live and serve?
13. The cross of Jesus Christ: Foolishness to the Greeks and foolishness to us?
14. Concluding questions, observations and loose ends

© 2006 Leah Chang

Lent 2007

Sundays in Lent 2007 Bible Study Proposal: Theology of the Cross | Leah Chang

1 Corinthians 1:20-25

²⁰ Where is the smart stuff of this world? Where are the world's heavy thinkers?... ²¹ Since in God's wisdom the world did not know God through their worldly kinds of smarts, it pleased God through foolish proclamation to save anyone who trusts Him. ²² Jews demand signs and Greeks crave wisdom, ²³ but we proclaim Christ the crucified one, a scandal to the Jews and moronic nonsense to the gentiles: ²⁴ But to those called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ--God's living dynamic power and God's kind of wisdom. ²⁵ Because God's foolishness is wiser than humanity's intellectual cleverness, and God's weakness is stronger than human strength!

1 Corinthians 2:2

² For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.

God is here! As we God's people meet to offer praise and prayer...
Here are symbols to remind us of our lifelong need of grace;
Here are table, font and pulpit, here the cross has central place...
by Fred Pratt Green © 1979 Hope Publishing Co.

6 Sundays in Lent – adult Bible study

Theology of the Cross: what does this mean for this church's life and mission?

Preliminary Ideas:

1. Theology of glory vs. theology of the cross

2. Hebrew Bible roots/wellsprings

3. Paul, Mark and Jesus of Nazareth

4. Mark, Paul and Jesus the Christ

5. Saul/Paul of Tarsus; Martin Luther

6. Some familiar theologians of the cross: Bonhoeffer; Dorothy Day; Gandhi; MLK; Desmond Tutu; Mother Teresa; us! Who else comes to mind?

7. The cross and the sacraments:

a. A theology of baptism and

b. A theology of the eucharist

8. What does this mean for each of us as individuals?

9. What does this mean for the community here at this church?

10. What does this mean for our nearby neighbors?

11. What does this mean for the world in which we live and serve?

12. The cross: Foolishness to the Greeks and foolishness to us?

© 2006 Leah Chang

God's Most Important Law, Love

This may be the last of the saved(!) Release Time lessons I'd kept over these many years, so I'm wondering what'll be next on this blog?

Mark 12:28-31

28 One of the scribes came near and heard them disputing with one another, and seeing that he answered them well, he asked him, "Which commandment is the first of all?" 29 Jesus answered, "The first is, 'Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; 30 you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.' 31 The second is this, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these."

Luke 10:27

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.

Because God loves us and wants the very best for us, he has given us laws, rules and guidelines to help us live our lives I the best way. A long time ago, long before Jesus came to live among us, God gave commandments, or laws to his people. God also began showing them in special ways through some of his leaders how he wants people to live.

A lot of times we get confused about the right way to do something. The people in Jesus' day also got confused. Some very sincere people had the idea that God's way was too simple, so they added hundreds of rules of their own to God's rule. Following these human-made rules became so important and difficult that they forgot God's most basic commandment: to love God, your neighbor – or other people – and yourself.

So that everybody, everywhere, could live their lives together according to God's way, God came into the world in the person of Jesus Christ. God sent Jesus to teach and show all of us how to live. Because of Jesus' birth and life among us as one of us, his death on the cross of Good Friday and God's raising Christ to new life on Easter Sunday morn, we can be forgiven if we break God's law. When we are forgiven for doing something wrong, it means we can make a brand new beginning.

As we read the Gospels and learn about Jesus' life, we see and read about God's most important law or commandment of love, which is kindness in action and attitude. Jesus showed us that:

1. Love has nothing to do with how we may feel at that moment;
2. Love means we try our best to see the other person and his/her needs clearly;
3. When we love, we sometimes have to forget about what we want;
4. When we love, we help bring about God's reign or rule on earth. We also show other people what God's love is like, and help bring them closer to him.

Let's talk about:

1. How does God want us to act toward each other?
2. What one word tells us God's most important commandment?
3. Why does God want us to treat each other this way?
4. Who showed us how to do this commandment?
5. Name some ways we can love each other.

Draw a picture that shows people helping, listening, being friends—showing each other God's love in some way.

Free in God's Kingdom

This may be the very last Release Time lesson, but at any rate, it's among the last. I love the Cosmic Christ of Colossians! In some texts indisputably by him, Paul of Tarsus is so into the Servant Jesus, while this deutero-Paul guy(?) presents us with the Pantocratur. Talk about phenomenally evocative imagery! In some ways this lesson is almost trivial, but again the longish scripture passage became an opportunity for words and Word to resonate.

Wordspin:

• Strong

• Power

• Rescue

• darkness

• free

• Death

• redemption

• forgiven

• kingdom

• image

• created

• visible

• dwell

• reconcile

• peace

Colossians 1:11-20

11 May you be made strong with all the strength that comes from his glorious power, and may you be prepared to endure everything with patience, while joyfully 12 giving thanks to the Father, who has enabled you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the light. 13 He has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; 16 for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers--all things have been created through him and for him. 17 He himself is before all things, and in him all things hold together. 18 He is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything. 19 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20 and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.

What does it mean to be free? Can you think of a time you couldn't do what you wanted? Couldn't go where you wanted? Couldn't dress the way you wanted to dress? In some ways you weren't free at those times.

God tells all of us in his Word, the Bible, that we need to know him in his Son, Jesus Christ, if we really want to be really free!!! The Bible tells us that as long as we do, say, or think unkind and unloving things we are not living like people who know Jesus and are followers of Jesus. The Bible tells us that when we act unloving and unkind we are unfree because we're not acting in the way that God says is best for us and for those around us. If we don't try our very best to treat each other with kindness and love, people will be afraid and unsure of what's going to happen to them. They'll want to protect and defend themselves, which will give them little time for caring about others. Can we live together and trust one another in that kind of world?

• How do followers of Jesus act?
• Are we following Jesus?
• How do we act in different situations? Give some examples.
  

Jesus showed us how to live in this world so everyone is free because they've learned to live together in kindness and love. Jesus also gave us another very important kind of freedom; he gave us forgiveness of all our sin. Because we are forgiven, everything we've ever done wrong in the past is completely wiped out. It's as if we'd never done it, so we can live our lives right here and right now without even thinking about those parts of the past we'd just as soon forget.

Jesus gave us forgiveness by dying on the cross for us on Good Friday and by being raised from the dead to new life for us on Easter Sunday. In Jesus Christ's birth, life, death and resurrection God's plan for us to live close to him and to each other was fulfilled, or completed. Because of Jesus' death and resurrection we are free from the past mistakes and sins that separate us from one another.

When God forgives us and makes us free, we also become part of God's family, or Kingdom, the Reign or Rule of God here on earth.

• What is a Kingdom?
• Who is the Ruler or King in God's Kingdom?

New Life in Jesus Christ

Another Release Time offering; I know it's a l-o-n-g passage from Romans, but I figured it was worth it so the kids could begin to become familiar with the text.

Romans 8:1-11

1 There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death. 3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do: by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and to deal with sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, 4 so that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. 5 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. 6 To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. 7 For this reason the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law—indeed it cannot, 8 and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

9 But you are not in the flesh; you are in the Spirit, since the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. 10 But if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. 11 Since the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit that dwells in you.

• Did you ever do something a teacher, parent or someone else in authority told you not to do? What was it? Why did you do it? Did that person find out about it? What happened? How did you feel?
• Did you ever do something against one of God's commandments? Why? What happened? How did you feel?

Because God loves us and wants the best for us, he gave us Commandments or guidelines for living. The Bible reading from Paul's letter to the church at Rome calls the commandments the law. Sin, or separation from God and others, happens whenever we disobey God's law. Whenever we sin, for us to be made righteous, or right again in God's sight, we need to be forgiven. In addition, God's holiness demands punishment for any sin or wrongdoing.

Because God loves us, God did what we couldn't do for ourselves; God came into this world in the person of Jesus Christ, lived a perfect life, and took the punishment for our sin. Jesus died on the cross on the day we now call Good Friday to bear the punishment for everything that separates us from God and to forgive us, so we could live reunited with God, one another and all creation. On the first Easter Sunday, God raised Jesus from the dead to a brand new life. Jesus died on the cross so our sin and the cost of sin would be wiped out; he rose from the dead so that we could be right again in God's sight. Because God raised Jesus from death to new life, each one of us can have that new Easter life; no longer are separated from God and from one another, but we have been reunited or reconciled with God, our neighbors and all creation.

• What does it mean to be forgiven? (Hint: think of the word "give.")

When we believe that God loves us and wants to give us new life in his son, Jesus Christ, we become members of God's own family, the church. In Romans, Paul says we begin living "in Christ." We begin living as God wants us to live.

• How does God want us to live? Why?

When we believe God has forgiven us and given us new life in Jesus' birth, life, death and resurrection, God's Holy Spirit comes to live in us. The Holy Spirit helps us obey God's commandments. The Holy Spirit also helps us receive God's free gift of forgiveness and new life we need whenever we disobey and sin.

• What does it mean to you to be forgiven?
• Do you believe God loves you and forgives you?

Miscellaneous Romans notes

Despite having a handful more of Release Time lessons for this blog, today I'm posting these Romans notes from a couple years ago. Most probably I've already posted them in long form on Desert Spirit's Fire, but I figured storing the short version here would be cool...as I'm listening to Steve Winwood's "Higher Love" on the radio. Does that song not relate well to the message of extravagant grace we find in Romans—and in Paul, in general?

Miscellaneous Romans notes

Romans 2

Neither gospel nor law - innocence

Habits of the heart – 3 "heart" references in Romans 2:5, 15, 29

God's Word imprinted on the hearts of all, in "an echo of God's personality." As usual, I'll say that's love, creativity, community, passion, risk – somewhere else I've made a long Pauline-style list of our in-God-createdness. God's reputation? People I formed for myself...

Anders Nygren: Romans is about the "inward heart, not satisfied with works."

Heart: center or seat of emotions; also, an organic metaphor and a spatial one

Romans 2:12-16 Imperial particularism—along the lines of the taxonomy that came from, did I ever mention I consider myself a revelatory particularist?

Despite a lingering sense of Jew/Gentile, in Paul, as in Christ Jesus, chosen-ness has expanded way far.

2:29 "mercy, not sacrifice"


Romans 3:9-26

Righteous; justified; account-able; apart from the Law?!

Romans 3:18; Psalm 36:1 Upright in heart = God-seeking

1 – consumer/material – artifacts and antiquities

2 – extreme athlete – does all the sports and does all the sports well, defying human limitations

3 - scientist – knowledge: think of technologies out of crisis

4 – philosopher – post-modern, nihilistic existentialist: angry, cynical and sarcastic

5 – Paul, the Christian – also a legalist! Paul, the Jew, has lived the commandments as well as anyone every could. Blameless as to the Law!

Choose Life!

One more Release Time lesson from ages ago. For anyone who didn't scroll back to where I began this series, these are lessons I wrote during the last century for 4^th and 5^th grader inner-city youngsters. By the way, the kids in the program who attended church were from the African-American free church tradition and most of them were excellent theologians, meaning great discussions for me as one of their teachers!

• Life! Life?! Life.
• What is it?
• Where is it?
• How do we get life?
• How do we know we have life?
• How do we give life?

From the first moment of creation, God has acted to give us life. God made us to be completely alive. Whenever God does something it's always in ways that will give us the very best kind of life there is.

From the book of Genesis in the beginning of the Bible, through the last book of the Bible, Revelation, we read about God giving us, his people, everything we needed for life to be complete. One of the most important facets of life we read about in Genesis is the very close relationship people had with God and with one another. After those relationships were broken by sin, there was no way in the world people could come back together with each other and with God. Only God could mend his broken world.

Because of Jesus Christ's death on the cross of Good Friday and his rising from death to new life on Easter dawn, all creation can live in brand-new life. For comparison, here are three different translations of Deuteronomy 30:19-20:

Deuteronomy 30

19 I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Choose life so that you and your descendants may live, 20 loving the Lord your God, obeying him, and holding fast to him; for that means life to you and length of days, so that you may live in the land that the Lord swore to give to your ancestors, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. NRSV

19 "I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. So choose life in order that you may live, you and your descendants, 20 by loving the LORD your God, by obeying His voice, and by holding fast to Him; for this is your life and the length of your days, that you may live in the land which the LORD swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give them." NASB

19 I call Heaven and Earth to witness against you today: I place before you Life and Death, Blessing and Curse. Choose life so that you and your children will live. 20 And love GOD, your God, listening obediently to him, firmly embracing him. Oh yes, he is life itself, a long life settled on the soil that GOD, your God, promised to give your ancestors, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. MSG

Choose life! In the birth, life, death and resurrection of Jesus, God already has given us life, but God doesn't force it on us. The Bible passage says that by loving and obeying God, we choose life. In God's Word, the Bible, and in God's Son Jesus Christ, we see and learn that loving and obeying God is something we do in our daily lives with one another. It means being kind, considerate, generous and thoughtful to other people. Loving God and obeying God also includes means being a caretaker of the earth and of all creation.

Since God gives us life, we are able to love God and obey him by loving other people. We give them life by being open to God's way and by walking the paths God shows us.