Active Love
Isaiah 29:11-19 – New International Version (NIV)
11 For you this whole vision is
nothing but words sealed in a scroll. And if you give the scroll to
someone who can read, and say, “Read this, please,” they will answer, “I can’t;
it is sealed.” 12 Or if you give the scroll to someone who
cannot read, and say, “Read this, please,” they will answer, “I don’t know how
to read.”
13 The Lord says:
“These people come near to me with their mouth
and honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
Their worship of me
is based on merely human rules they have been taught.
14 Therefore once more I will astound these people
with wonder upon wonder;
the wisdom of the wise will perish,
the intelligence of the intelligent will vanish.”
15 Woe to those who go to great depths
to hide their plans from the Lord,
who do their work in darkness and think,
“Who sees us? Who will know?”
16 You turn things upside down,
as if the potter were thought to be like the clay!
Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it,
“You did not make me”?
Can the pot say to the potter,
“You know nothing”?
17 In a very short time, will not
Lebanon be turned into a fertile field
and the fertile field seem like a forest?
18 In that day the deaf will hear the words of the
scroll,
and out of gloom and darkness
the eyes of the blind will see.
19 Once more the humble will rejoice in the Lord;
the needy will rejoice in the Holy One of
Israel.
What does the person ask to read the scroll say (verse 11)?
What does the person who cannot read who is asked to read the scroll say (verse 12)?
In your opinion, why do people whose “hearts are far from me” come near to the Lord with their mouths and honor Him with their lips (verse 13)?
How will the Lord “astound
these people” (verse 14)?
Who will have “woe” (verse 15)?
How do the people “turn things” (verse 16)?
What will the deaf hear (verse 18)?
Who will rejoice (verse 19)?
In your opinion, what is the basic message of this
passage?
In your opinion, what does this passage teach us about the
difference between words and actions?
Matthew 15:1-9 - New International
Version (NIV)
1 Then some
Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Jesus from Jerusalem and asked, 2 “Why
do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They don’t wash their
hands before they eat!”
3 Jesus
replied, “And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your
tradition? 4 For God said, ‘Honor your father and
mother’ and ‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to
death.’ 5 But you say that if anyone declares that what
might have been used to help their father or mother is ‘devoted to God,’ 6 they
are not to ‘honor their father or mother’ with it. Thus you nullify the word of
God for the sake of your tradition. 7 You hypocrites!
Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you:
8 “‘These
people honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
9 They worship me in vain;
their teachings are merely human rules.’”
Where did the “Pharisees and teachers
of the law” come from (verse 1)?
What did they accuse the disciples of not doing in “the tradition of the elders” (verse 2)?
What did Jesus suggest the Pharisees and teachers of the law broke “for the sake of your tradition” (verse 3)?
Who said “honor your father and mother” (verse 4)?
Who said that if something is “devoted to God” that it can’t be
used to “’honor their father or mother’ with it” (verses 5 and 6)?
Why do they “nullify the word of God” (verse 6)?
Who did Jesus say was right about the “hypocrites” (verse 7)?
Where are the people’s hearts (verse 8)?
What are “their teachings” (verse 9)?
In your opinion, what is the basic message of this passage?
In your opinion, what does this passage teach us about the difference
between words and actions?
In your opinion, how does the prophecy in Isaiah 29:11-19 help Jesus
expose a problem in Matthew 15:1-9?
Romans 14:10-19 - New International Version (NIV)
10 You, then, why do you judge your
brother or sister? Or why do you treat them with contempt? For we will all
stand before God’s judgment seat. 11 It is written:
“‘As surely as I live,’ says the Lord,
‘every knee will bow before me;
every tongue will acknowledge God.’”
12 So then, each of us will give an
account of ourselves to God.
13 Therefore let us stop passing
judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any
stumbling block or obstacle in the way of a brother or sister. 14 I
am convinced, being fully persuaded in the Lord Jesus, that nothing is unclean
in itself. But if anyone regards something as unclean, then for that
person it is unclean. 15 If your brother or sister is
distressed because of what you eat, you are no longer acting in love. Do
not by your eating destroy someone for whom Christ died. 16 Therefore
do not let what you know is good be spoken of as evil. 17 For
the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of
righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, 18 because
anyone who serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and receives human
approval.
19 Let us therefore make every effort to
do what leads to peace and to mutual edification.
Where will we “all stand” (verse 10)?
What will “every tongue” do (verse 11)?
Who will “each of us” give an account of ourselves
to (verse 12)?
What should each of us make up our minds not to do (verse 13)?
What was Paul convinced of (verse 14)?
Who is something unclean for (verse 14)?
What shouldn’t we let our “eating” (or other
activities) do (verse 15)?
What shouldn’t be spoken of as evil (verse 16)?
What is the kingdom of God “a matter . . . of”
(verse 17)?
Who is “pleasing to God and receives human approval”
(verse 18)?
What should we “make every effort to do” (verse 19)?
In your opinion, what is the basic message of this passage?
In your opinion,
what does this passage teach us about the difference between words and actions?
In your opinion, how
do both Isaiah 29:11-19 and Romans 14:10-19 reveal problems with adhering to
human rules only?
In your opinion, how
do both Matthew 15:1-9 and Romans 14:10-19 help us identify heart problems?
2 John 1:4-9 - New International Version (NIV)
4 It has
given me great joy to find some of your children walking in the
truth, just as the Father commanded us. 5 And now,
dear lady, I am not writing you a new command but one we have had from the
beginning. I ask that we love one another. 6 And this
is love: that we walk in obedience to his commands. As you have heard
from the beginning, his command is that you walk in love.
7 I say
this because many deceivers, who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming
in the flesh, have gone out into the world. Any such person is the
deceiver and the antichrist. 8 Watch out that you do not
lose what we have worked for, but that you may be rewarded fully. 9 Anyone
who runs ahead and does not continue in the teaching of Christ does not
have God; whoever continues in the teaching has both the Father and the
Son.
What has given John “great joy” (verse 4)?
When did we
get the command to “love one another” (verse 5)?
What is love (verse
6)?
Who “is
the deceiver and the antichrist” (verse 7)?
How will
those who “watch out” be rewarded (verse 8)?
Who “has
both the Father and the Son” (verse 9)?
In your opinion, what is the basic message of this passage?
In your opinion,
what does this passage teach us about the difference between words and actions?
In your opinion, what solution does 2 John 1:4-9 provide
for those whose “hearts are far from” the Lord as in Isaiah 29:11-19?
In
your opinion, how does 2 John 1:4-9 help us understand why those in Matthew
15:1-9 who declared their possessions were “devoted to God” actually
did not have God in their lives?
In your opinion, how
does Paul’s discussion of eating in Romans 14:10-19 help us understand the what
John means by walking “in obedience to his commands” in 2 John 1:4-9?
In your opinion, what do these passages from Isaiah,
Matthew, Romans and 2 John teach us about looking at the ways we treat and
think of others?
In your
opinion, how can we walk in love today?
(sprucewhispers.blogspot.com)
