A youth bible study on Ecclesiastes 12:1-2 for both individuals and groups

Remember your Creator while you are young, before the days of trouble come and the years

when you say, "I find no pleasure in them." When you get old... (New Century Version)

You know the saying, “You don't bend an old tree”. You know what a bonzi is? It is those miniature replicas of large trees. In essence they're the same, just kept small by trimming the roots. You don't make a bonsai from a grown tree. I have a friend who's a missionary to Japan. As a boy his parents were also missionaries to Japan for a few years and made him accustomed to the land. The missionary organisation they are working for know that if they don't get a child in church, they won't do it as an adult. You don't make a bonsai from a grown tree.

In the western world it is not much different. Most conversions take place before adulthood.

Why do you think this is the case, according to our Scripture? (When a group bible study first discus and get a consensus, before turning to the answer. The same implies for the following questions.)

The first reason is because 'Remember' can become complicated. Once the demands of life kick in, the quantity of things to remember quickly quench the 'Remember' of God and His world, in a world that has actually no place for God and faith – only reason and reasonableness. To remember God as the 'Creator' is not easy in a world where human reason is in control and creation is marginalised in the swelling of technology and scientific answers. In the Dark Ages it was easier to remember God, as creator, because one needed God to create here and right now in day-to-day provisions. God was needed to give bread and clothes and health today.

Do you see that this remember has to do with faith? Faith in a God quickly becomes abstract when the answers of technology and science do an apparently better job, in the pressures and evidences of life. This is only to be persuaded by rhetoric, the same as what happened with Eve in the Garden of Eden. The truth in rhetoric is not what is right and wrong, but how something is being said. Right is what is persuasive, like the apparent right of the lie of the snake in the garden of Eden.

What are the days of trouble and what contradiction is hidden in it?

The contradiction is that trouble days actually create faith, like the example of someone in the Dark Ages as stated above. You know the saying “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church”. In trouble days of persecution, in e.g. former Russia or China today, the church grows the fastest. The Trouble days of our text can't then be difficult days per say.

The trouble days of our text are when the voice of the world, and the voice of reality, calls one to make sense of life. Sense is the love of money, the excess accumulation of possessions, status etc. As a young person life is still in the future and the voice of the world is to take hold of this future with a this-worldly-paradise mentality. To get the best job possible, to get the dream house build, to drive a neck-turning car. Trouble days are when God is not necessary in a carefree world or in a man made system that solves all problems.

When will one not find pleasure in God anymore and what is the warning?

In short, one will not find pleasure in God anymore when the sacrifice to follow Jesus becomes to demanding. When the first love for Jesus demands a death to self and its desires. The warning is that there is an invisible line when one finds no pleasure in God anymore. Once one has crossed this line, turning back becomes almost impossible. The most dangerous lie, out of hell, is “Later”. “You can decide for Jesus later, after you have done this and that”. “Later, on your deathbed you can turn to Jesus, like the thief on the cross”. My friend, later you will have no desire.

When is one old?

Old is very relative. For you, as a teenager, I might be old, but you know I don't think so. I still think I have a few years left in my body and I rather think people in an old age home are old. My previous supervisor is 66 and doesn't think he is old; both his parents turned 100 before they died. On the other hand, I once heard of a drug addict in Amsterdam, who at the age of 21, said her life is over and she's just waiting for death. She was older than my previous supervisor.

Old is relative, but very much has to do with lifestyle as well. Old has to do with this world, but

Personal Bible Study

Most of us need some guidelines to help us to have fruitful personal bible study.

The approach for personal bible study differs from that for group bible study. This article is a small effort to help all of us to have a real meeting with God when we do bible study.

Psalm 119:33-40(The Message).

GOD, teach me lessons for living so I can stay the course.

Give me insight so I can do what you tell me-- my whole life one long, obedient response.

Guide me down the road of your commandments; I love traveling this freeway!

Give me a bent for your words of wisdom, and not for piling up loot.

Divert my eyes from toys and trinkets, invigorate me on the pilgrim way.

Affirm your promises to me-- promises made to all who fear you.

Deflect the harsh words of my critics-- but what you say is always so good.

See how hungry I am for your counsel; preserve my life through your righteous ways!

The over all approach to personal bible study is as follows:

• Pray before you start your bible study
• Read the passage you plan to do your bible study on
• Think about the passage you have read and have chosen for your bible study
• Consider the application of your bible study in your life
• End your bible study with prayer asking god to lead you through the Holy Spirit

This is the broad guidelines for your bible study. We shall now consider everything in more detail.

Pray before you start your bible study:

If bible study is not approaches prayerfully the presence of the Holy Spirit may not be felt completely. Remember you want God to really show you what He wants to teach you today. Ask for guidance and wisdom when you are thinking about these passages.

Read the passage you plan to do your bible study on:

The first and most important point to be stressed is not to read randomly in the bible and expect God to speak to you. God can speak to you in any way, that is true, but normally it is best to approach bible study systematically to be very sure in your mind that you are not reading something into a passage that is not really there. Spend enough time in reading the passage slowly a few times to make sure you are completely sure of exactly what is said in it. Allow the Holy Spirit to reveal everything to you during this part of your bible study.

Think about the passage you have read and have chosen for your bible study:

During your bible study there are a few principles to keep in mind:

1. Teach yourself to ask questions all the time. Questions like, who, why, what, when. When you do this you’ll discover things in the scripture you missed before. You’ll become aware of the richness of the scripture.

(Psa 119:18 MSG) Open my eyes so I can see what you show me of your miracle-wonders.

2. Write down everything you have discovered. This helps you to really make the scripture your own, to really understand what God is saying to you, in your particular circumstances. Always keep your notebook handy when you are doing bible study and refer to your previous notes regularly. In this way you will be able to see clearly the road God is leading you on.

Consider the application of your bible study in your life:

At this stage you have to consider the applications of your bible study to your life. Really try and think what it is God wants you to do. Without this vital last step you won’t get the full blessing from your bible study. Make it your own and go out there and do what God wants you to do. Keep it personal and do not try and find something in a piece of scripture nobody else has discovered yet. That is not your purpose; you need to find out what God has in store for YOU.

End your bible study with prayer asking god to lead you through the Holy Spirit:

In this final prayer ask God to lead you on your way as He has shown it to you. Ask for the continual awareness of the Holy Spirit as you apply this in your life.

Doing bible study in this way will make it a wonderful blessing and very precious time spent in the presence of our Lord.

Passages to consider:

Deuteronomy 30:1-32:28

St. Mark 5:1-10

Psalm 119:41-48

Proverbs 17:17

A youth bible study on the letter to the Hebrews in the second half of the New Testament:

To be young is to be optimistic about life. To be young is many times to have eye flaps on, when only the role models worthy of imitation are being seen. To be young is to only see those that are 'more than'

the others, the normal, the common man. The heroes. A hero mentality is to be young of spirit; if it wasn't so wouldn't half of Hollywood’s movies be absolute? In short, they would be boring and out of touch.

In the letter to the Hebrews Jesus is this picture of the God-Man 'more than':

1. Jesus is more than the angels (Chapters 1&2),
2. Jesus is more than Moses (Chapter 3:1-6),
3. Jesus' Rest is more than the Rest of the Promised Land in the Middle East (Chapters 3:7-4:13)
4. Jesus is more than the Aaronic Priests and especially the High Priest (Chapters 4:14-7:28),
5. Jesus established a New covenant 'more than' the Sinai one (Chapter 8:1-10:18)

In the story of the Bible, and the cosmic war between good and evil, God and the devil, Jesus is the hero, bringing salvation and the heavenly Promised Land to His people.

For young people a few prominent lessons should pop out:

1. When Jesus' word is more than that of the angels,

For if the message spoken by angels was binding, and every violation and disobedience received its just punishment, how shall we escape if we ignore such a great salvation [spoken by Jesus]? (Hebrews 2:2-3 NIV)

then Jesus' word should be more than that of our peers. How shall we escape if we ignore God's word for the sake of our friends and cultural pressures?

2. When Jesus is more than Moses, who was part of God's House while Jesus actually built the house,

Jesus has been found worthy of greater honor than Moses, just as the builder of a house has greater honor than the house itself. (Hebrews 3:3 NIV)

then Jesus is more than the church or preacher etc., in today's terms. Don't understand me wrong, there's nothing wrong with the church, or preacher, per say, but only a relationship with them (and nothing else) will not get you to heaven. You need to know Jesus, in the church with the preacher, to get to heaven. Jesus has to be your life 24/7 and not only an hour or two every week.

3. When one is young rest is not as vital yet as when one is old and worn-out, but what about peace? We all want and need inner peace of ease, don't you? The inner peace of Jesus is rest, where stress and anxiety is left to Jesus.

There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; for anyone who enters God's rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his. (Hebrews 4:9-10 NIV)

Are you anxious about choosing a career, or how you'll find the right partner etc.?

4. Fortunately we don't have to slaughter an animal anymore to enter the presence of God. Fortunately the veil is torn and we may enter the most holy, heaven, through Jesus. God is only a simple prayer away and not on the other side of a whole lot of rituals and procedures one first needs to work through. Fortunately we can have a clear conscience of sin being forgiven and forgotten, once we have accepted Jesus Christ as our personal saviour and renounced our sins.
5. How do we renounce our sins? Easy, because Jesus' instituted a better covenant where the Holy Spirit lives in us and empowers us to love God and our neighbours with all of our hearts. Remember the sin of the New Testament is not, in the first place, what we do, but what we don't do. The New Testament sin is the sin of omission, not to love and do to others as you want them to do to you.

Is Jesus your hero? For the closing, please read chapter 11 and observe how faith in God turned normal people into heroes. You're young, become a faith hero of God, rather than a hero in the eyes of the world who is one day there and the next day/generation forgotten.

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A free online bible study on Romans 6

                                                                              From Amazon

                                                                                             

The biggest problem in this world isn't poverty or illness or anything of the many things politicians would hammer on. The biggest problem is sin. The sin problem is the cause of all problems. If there was no sin, there wouldn't have been any problems. That's why heaven is going to be problemless, because no sin can be found in the presence of God.

The NIV Study Bible puts Romans 6 under the heading Freedom from Sin’s Tyranny, and isn't this marvellous? Of all bible study topics, deliverance from sin should be at the top of the chart as the key theme. The great news of Romans 6 is that we can already taste deliverance from sin even this side of the grave, although the great freedom awaits life after the grave. Sin and (spiritual) death in the Bible are synonymous word and in Romans 6:9 we read:

We know that when Jesus was raised from the dead it was a signal of the end of death-as-the-end. Never again will death have the last word (The Message)

After the grave the resurrection of all believers will follow, one day when Jesus comes back and we'll experience what Jesus experienced on East Sunday. But before that we can already enjoy the resurrection power in the end of sin's tyranny this side of the grave.

After Paul extensively dealt with salvation through grace in the previous chapters, he begins this chapter with the hypothetical question if we are now allowed to continue in sin so that grace may abound? (See King James Study Bible) If only grace can wipe away sin, then more sin would mean more grace and who wouldn't want more grace? Isn't grace to get something you don't deserve (like a $1 000 000 you haven't work for)? The futility of this argument Paul exposes in the next verse, since grace already units us spiritually with Christ in His death and resurrection this side of the grave. This happens at, what Paul calls, baptism:

Or don't you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?... If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. (Romans 6:3&5 NIV)

The sin problem thus stops this side of the grave in both the power of sin ruling over us, but also in the hope of the Promised Land (called heaven) where there will be no tears or sorrow or sin anymore. This brings us to the pivotal verse of Romans 6:

So you should consider yourselves dead to sin and able to live for the glory of God through Christ Jesus. (Romans 6:11 The New Living Translation)

The word consider (logizomei The Complete Word Study New Testament) is a mathematical term. One plus one is two, the sinful nature + death on the cross and resurrection = the end of Sin’s Tyranny. The extend we find in Romans 6:6:

And we know that our old being has been put to death with Christ on his cross, in order that the power of the sinful self might be destroyed, so that we should no longer be the slaves of sin. (The Good News Translation)

The key word is destroyed,which means sin became paralysed (Word Meanings in the New Testament).

When sin is paralysed, what could stop us not serving sin as slaves anymore? Only our own stupidity. Paul says in Romans 12:12:

Therefore do not let sin reign [rule] in your mortal body [anymore] so that you obey its evil desires [like stupid slaves]. (NIV)

Remember sin is a relational word, we sin against God. Also remember the New Testament concept of sin is not, in the first place, what we do, but what we don't do. To love God and you neighbour means action. When I never hit my wife it doesn't mean I love her, but when I bring her flowers and do all the nice things she expects she will know I love her. If we never commit a murder or lie or steel etc. it doesn't mean we love God. We love God by worshipping Him in prayer and whole-life-devotion, while doing to others as we want them to do to us.

Driving it home:

1. Is this your personal experience?
2. Can't it be that you don't understand sin as Paul meant it in this chapter when you can't actually point it out, but believe you always sin in words, deeds and actions?
3. What sins of omission can you come up with in your sphere of influence and society?
4. Are there any sins that have surfaced while working through this Bible Study you know you have to deal with?
5. What can you do to make sure you will always consider yourself dead with Christ, and not forget it with the first temptation that wrestles you down?

A personal Bible study on the birth, life and death of Jacob

For an Old Testament bible study the life and history of Jacob can but nothing else than to speak to everyone and is to be found in the first book of the Bible, called Genesis. Genesis means 'the beginning' (see The Hebrew-Greek Key Word Study Bible) and therefore indicates that Jacob is one of the Biblical fathers out of which Israel, and latter Christianity, flows. In short, to study the life of Jacob, and breach the gap of a few thousand years, we have to read ourselves into the shoes of Jacob wherever they fit (for a similar endeavour see the NIV Life Application Study Bible). The life of Jacob is in the three clear stages of growth and development, as given to us by the NIV Study Bible. These stages are:

1. Jacob at home (25:19—27:46)
2. Jacob abroad (28–30)
3. Jacob at home again (31–35)

Jacob the deceiver lived up to his name, as a boy back at home, by deceiving both his brother and father. Jacob was the picture of someone only interested in enriching his own life. He was the picture of the consumer fattening himself on the behalf of others. Are many of us not in the same shoes by needing and wanting at the expense of others? Is selfishness not at the heart of capitalism, except where God has changed personalities? We only have to look at little children to know selfishness is part of the human nature.

Jacob's selfishness cost him to flee from home when his brother intended to kill him. That took Jacob abroad and into hardship at his uncle Laban. There he had to work under an unfair boss who demanded what he wasn't willing to pay for. Jacob was contracted under harsh terms and conditions, worsened by inhumane weather beatings, for peanuts. This changed Jacob and stripped him of his consumerism and selfishness. In all of this, we read, God was with him and blessed him. Isn't hardship, most often, a blessing and the place where we find God? Isn't that the place where needs and wants, for self, are exchanged for needs and wants for others? Isn't that the place where my money becomes money for others, my time becomes time for others; because the true value of life had at last simmered through? Have you ever stood at an open grave, or a cancer bed, and suddenly realised that there is more to life than what we see?

In the last stage Jacob went back home. On the way back God changed his name to Israel to confirm his personality and attitude change. Only now could he be a real blessing to other people and per implication all people through Jesus. When reading ourselves into his shoes, are we a blessing to others or rather a burden, or even a curse? The brother he deceived, by stealing his birthright, he now approached in total meekness, expecting and preparing for the worst without dodging his responsibilities of restitution. Dr. Andrew Murray once said “Humility is the beauty of Holiness”. Humility is what empowers us to make right where we have wronged.

Driving it home:

1. Please look at Genesis 25:29-34. Isn't this the picture of the platonic relationships of today where the value of someone is in what he or she can do or give, rather than who he or she is as someone created in the image of God? Esau was Jacobs brother, but actually rather looks like a customer of his deceiving business.
2. In Genesis 27, who do you think was really the culprit in Jacob's steeling of Esau's blessing? Jacob or his mom? If it was his mom, could Jacob have had anything for it that his mom influenced him? Could Jacob have been the victim, rather than the culprit?
3. Jacob worked 14 years for his two wives, as we read in Genesis 29, what was the time between receiving them as wives?
4. Carefully study the testimony of Jacob in Genesis 31:38-42. Would you have stuck it out with a boss like Laban?
5. What was Israel's mood approaching his brother in Genesis 32:1-20 (especially verses 7-12)? Would you have been willing to go through that to restore a broken relationship and so do restitution for wrong you have done?
6. Do you think Israel found peace at the end of his life and died a fulfilled man? Read Genesis 47:30 for a possible answer.
7. What other bible study lessons can you find in this rich testimony of Jacob's life?