Tag: Repentance

Ahab’s Repentance

Lesson Theme: Who is beyond hope?

Who here feels we are a fairly advanced, modern society? Would you at least say that we HAVE made SOME progress as a society, overall, over the past 1,000 years?

For example, without using the internet:

  • Do you know where SILK comes from?

  • Do you know where cotton comes from?

  • Do you know where we get dairy MILK?

  • You know where MEAT comes from?

  • You know what Social Media/Facebook is?

  • You understand what decorating is?

So let me get this straight… By your own admission, you acknowledge that we adorn ourselves with worm excrement and plant fibers, guzzle cow mucus, mine animal carcasses for food, chatter and clatter in steady, documented streams, while surrounding ourselves with bits and bobs we’ve found scurrying about the nooks and crannys of our environment.

… Now, who here feels we are fairly advanced and modern society, making strides of progress overall?

If it is true that you can learn something from anyone, let’s see if King Ahab has anything to teach.

Note:  No PowerPoint lesson today. Let’s just use our Bibles and make some notes in the margins.

Ahab’s Repentance Lesson

 

“And Ahab said to Elijah, Hast thou found me, O mine enemy? And he answered, I have found thee: because thou has sold thyself to work evil in the sight of the LORD.”

— 1 Kings 21:20

The Whited Sepulchre Syndrome

Lesson Theme:  Can Jesus Change A Pharisee?

In Matthew 21, the Pharisees demand to know by what authority Jesus operated. Jesus said He would tell them if they first answered by what authority John the Baptist baptized.

“Q: What would Jesus have answered the Pharisees if they had just picked one of the two options He presented them in his famous counter-question?”

Am I asking a question, or am I posing an answer?

The first defense of a Pharisee is to pick out hypocrisy in someone else. You see, as a pharisee, if you can trip someone else up in their own words, anything said prior by that person is now NULL and VOID to your conscience.

This lesson focuses on Nicodemus, and the impact Jesus had on his life when he came to Jesus with some of his own questions…

… and about the mercy of God that offers a way of redemption, even for us modern-day pharisees.

The Whited Sepulchre Sydrome – PowerPoint

The Whited Sepulchre Syndrome Lesson – PDF

“The baptism of John, whence was it? from heaven, or of men? And they reasoned with themselves, saying, If we shall say, From heaven; he will say unto us, Why did ye not then believe him?” — Matthew 21:25