Remember this classic train wreck scene from the Fugitive?
1.- Go get him! They had a search range of 6 miles to find their man. Your search range to find the God-Man is between chapters 3 through 10 of John. Squad 1, cover ch.5. Squad 2, search ch.6. Squad 3, scour ch.7. Squad 4, comb the woods of ch.7. Squad 5 fan out over ch.10. And Squad 6 (Pastor Mike), please double back and check out ch.3. To narrow down our search, I want you just to focus on finding anything that our subject reveals about his relationship with his Father. Each of you jot down one of your sightings. Write out a verse or phrase where Jesus speaks of his relation with his Father.
The Father/Son relationship is a big and important theme in the gospel of John. I will take all your findings and pull them together into one list and share it with you soon. By the way, what we are doing is called systematic theology. You take all the theological teachings you can find on a given subject and organize them (systematize them- thus the name, systematic theology.) We are limiting our search to a very small area- a few chapters in John. Imagine if you had to scour the entire terrain of the Bile to search for all the teachings on what it revealed about Jesus' relation to His Father? Now imagine you had to do that for everything else the Bible teaches about Christ. That would be a huge undertaking! Thankfully scholars have already done such. It's called Christology (the study of Christ). Other branches of systematic theology go by funny Greek names like anthropology (the study of man), hamartiology (the study of sin. Many of us have personally done that already:), soteriology (the study of salvation), pnuematology (the study of the Holy Spirit), ecclesiology (the study of the church). Then there are a few you would recognize like angelology, demonology, Israelology, bibliology (the study of the Bible) and eschatology (the study of the end times). By the way, if you wanted to take a seminary course on the study of God himself, that course would be called Theology Proper (Theos means God). No, there will not be a pop quiz on those Greek words. If you wanted to buy the writings of bible scholars on systematic theology, do you want to buy a single volume or would you like a multi volume set, like this set my sister gave me by Dr. Lewis Sperry Chafer?
But why buy such, when now there is so much for free online? Here's the link to a one volume tome by Louis Berkhof- http://ift.tt/1KIjpzy (I just gave you a great resource book for free. Ain't I generous? :) Bookmark that link and add that book of theology to your online bookshelf. You are building a great library of resource tools.
2.- Today, I just want you to become aware of what's in your new theology book. So click the above link and then click on a doctrine (teaching) you are interested in. You'll need to click on the topic on the left side for it to open up. Then click as needed to narrow your subject. Now just copy and paste one brief statement you came across from Berkhof's writings. Thanks for enriching me and your brothers.
Here's a good outreach opportunity Gary saw and took- "Just recently I was washing clothes at the laundromat. An older lady approached me and started a light discussion. She was reflecting on how people would rather avoid conversations or would not respond to small talk at all. I mentioned to her there is a great joy in conversing and just speaking to one another. She was grateful for the talk. I stepped to my car to get one of the mini movie cards and I handed it to her. She said, 'Thank you very much.' So I also prayed for her before I left the place." That's excellent Gary! You even prayed for her!
2.- Today, I just want you to become aware of what's in your new theology book. So click the above link and then click on a doctrine (teaching) you are interested in. You'll need to click on the topic on the left side for it to open up. Then click as needed to narrow your subject. Now just copy and paste one brief statement you came across from Berkhof's writings. Thanks for enriching me and your brothers.
Here's a good outreach opportunity Gary saw and took- "Just recently I was washing clothes at the laundromat. An older lady approached me and started a light discussion. She was reflecting on how people would rather avoid conversations or would not respond to small talk at all. I mentioned to her there is a great joy in conversing and just speaking to one another. She was grateful for the talk. I stepped to my car to get one of the mini movie cards and I handed it to her. She said, 'Thank you very much.' So I also prayed for her before I left the place." That's excellent Gary! You even prayed for her!
See you Sunday at 2:00 sharp for our M3 meeting at Jack's home- 10747 Cherrywood Dr. Palos Park. It will be great to meet with brothers from other locations. We've got some special people and things to present, so see you there. Thanks for financially contributing to the cause.
Thanks also for remembering to put your points on the board. You lighten my load by faithfully doing that.
No comments:
Post a Comment