We continue our series, "Letters from the Mailbox". Students submit their question, verses, topic, etc. and then we build a lesson and small group (POD) discussion around their submission.
The above question above was a good one. We had students write down their parent's rules on a piece of paper and then talk about the rules. Discuss the "why's?" of the rules. Then the students, in their PODs, wrote down "Christianity rules". Most of the rules that they came up with were Biblical, some were not, some were but they didn't realize that they were a "rule". I shifted the term from "rules" to "expectations".
We started with the question, "Am I still a Christian?" first. It was obvious that the student who submitted the question thought that salvation was dependent on us and who we are and what we do rather than salvation being totally dependent on God. We took some time and ruled out "works". If I don't live by my parent's rules am I still their child? If I don't live by society's rules am I no longer a human? If (assuming a person has put their faith in Christ) I don't live by God's rules am I no longer his child?
We boiled it down to this:
- I’m saved because I put my faith in Jesus. (not because I obeyed rules)
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God has guard rails. (His expectations protect us)
- So the question isn’t “Am I still a Christian?” The question is, “Do I love God?”
- The question is not “Am I still a Christian?” The question is, “Am I grateful to Jesus Christ?”
- Our love for God and gratefulness to Christ will motivate us to live by His expectations.
1 comment:
This is great stuff. I was just talking with someone about this today... think I will point them to this post as well - thanks!
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