Use one or both of these questions to introduce the lesson: 1. What is your opinion about what will happen in the future? Would you describe the world of tomorrow as unknowable, bleak, or promising? Defend your opinion. 2. A popular science fiction theme is an impending “extinction event”—the looming mass destruction of humanity. Can […]
Week 33 Study | Christ Is Preeminent
Our oldest son had a T-shirt that read, “There are two things you can be sure of: 1) There is a God. 2) You are not him.” The Colossians needed an 18-wheeler full of those T-shirts. After Epaphras had planted the church in Colossae (1:7) the church experienced a heresy that threatened to undo the […]
Week 33 Application | The Leaning Leader
Using white marble, in the year 1173 builders began constructing the bell tower we know as Italy’s famous Leaning Tower of Pisa. The tower was supposed to stand 185 feet high, about one-third the height of the Washington Monument, but the soft subsoil on which it was built caused one side of the structure to […]
Week 33 Study Questions
Use one or both of these questions to introduce the lesson: 1. Consider the words, “Who do you think you are.” Do they make up a question or an exclamation? Under what circumstances could they be one or the other? 2. Nineteenth-century poet William Ernest Henley ended his classic poem “Invictus” with these often-quoted words: […]
Week 32 Study | Giving Justly
Three activities occupied center stage for the earliest church in the book of Acts. Those three activities were preaching the gospel, baptizing the converts, and planting the church. But running under the radar of those three was the collection for the saints. Jesus had taught his disciples to care for the poor (John 12:5-8). The […]