Pass It On by Laura Williams

Do you ever find yourself struggling to retain what you read in the Bible? Or even to remember what you learned from a Sunday sermon or message? There are so many times that I have been deeply moved by a particular message at church, and months later I’ll find my notes from that message and realize I forgot all about the special thing the Lord spoke to my heart.

It can be embarrassing sometimes to recognize my inability to recall something that sincerely spoke to my heart. It’s not that I didn’t hear God speaking to me and desire to remember and apply what I learned. It just never found solid footing in my life, and I let it sit on the back burner of my heart long enough that it was simply forgotten. Don’t you wish we could find a way to remember and retain all of the beautiful truths we learn and keep them close in our hearts?

Something that has helped me tremendously in this area is the importance of SHARING what God is teaching me with someone else. When you teach the very things you are learning and pass them along to another person, those truths sink deeper into your own heart.

If you can teach it to someone else, your own understanding of that truth grows and becomes easier to remember.

When you read your Bible and God teaches you through it, share that with someone! You will mature in your knowledge and faith when you are able to teach someone else what God has taught you!

“Teaching the Bible” is an intimidating idea for most of us. Most of us would probably never describe ourselves as Bible teachers. You may feel you don’t KNOW enough, or perhaps you might be asked a question you won’t know the answers to! It is true that you cannot teach what you do not know and understand yourself, but what is different about teaching the BIBLE, is that the Holy Spirit Himself is able to speak through you and give you words to say! And also, it is completely normal and okay not to have all the answers!

Our faith grows when we step out and put our trust in God’s ability to speak through us! And once you do this a few times, you will begin to see that it is, in fact God who does the teaching, and you are simply his vessel—his voice—to speak to others.

Don’t be afraid to share what God has been teaching you, no matter how simple you may think it sounds!

Those truths will sink themselves deeper into your own heart, and you will get to see God use you to teach others!

And this can look different for each of us. You may want to find a friend who can be that person you share with on a regular basis—maybe you both can meet up during the week and share what God is teaching you that week. Or maybe you and your spouse can make an effort to share more with each other about your personal walks with Jesus. Another way that can be very helpful in maturing us and expanding our knowledge of the Bible is through teaching children! Teaching kids causes us to study the simple and foundational truths of Scripture in order to pass them along in a clear way. Pray about how God might want to be using you to teach someone else this week!

However you feel that this applies best to you, let me encourage you to start now! Be confident that God will use your willingness to share with others for both your own good and the good of others! Preach His Word, encourage one another, and watch how Jesus uses you!

“I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom:  preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching.” -2 Timothy 4:1-2

Our Power Source For Godliness by Travis Sinks

“Most of us are knowledgeable beyond our level of obedience."

Have you heard that before? It’s true isn’t it? We know what is right. We know what God’s Word says about our marriage, relationships, finances, lifestyles, thoughts, words, actions, and more… But we don’t seem to live it out.

We’re called to be “living sacrifices” offering our lives to God in surrender and thankfulness. In obeying Him, we are simply doing what is glorifying to Him and is also best for us. But the problem with “living sacrifices” is that they tend to run away when they're not being watched. When we take our eyes off of Jesus and onto ourselves and what we see around us, we can get caught up doing the very things we know aren’t best. We can run away.

So, how do we break the cycle? It surely isn’t by acquiring on more knowledge. The whole problem is that we already know what’s right and we don’t do it. Paul shares this very issue with us in Romans 7, expressing frustrating that he does the very things he knows he shouldn't, but he brings a solution for us in the very next chapter.

“If Christ is in you [as He is in anyone who believes and trusts in Him], although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you."

The way we can break this cycle of disobedience is exactly the same way we came to salvation in the first place: by the grace of Jesus. It’s not by reminding ourselves of what is right and wrong if we already know it, and it’s not by putting ourselves down or punishing ourselves in some way, as Paul even reminds us earlier in chapter 8, there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Instead, we can find the power for godly change in our actions and words through the Holy Spirit.

I don’t say this to mean that there’s no decision to be made. There is constantly a decision to choose Jesus over our sin, but rather than trying to be better and stronger by constantly trying to lift a weight too heavy for ourselves, we need to choose to give that weight to Him instead.

In prayer.
In humility.
In surrender.

And as the saying goes:

"It’s never the wrong time to do the right thing.”

So start today. As we begun, “most of us are knowledgeable beyond our level of obedience.” What is that for you? In what way have you chosen not to obey God, and where do you need to surrender your life to Him? Let us keep looking up instead of in. And when we fail we need to remember God’s promises, like this one found in Jude 24-25, and draw near to Jesus.

"Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy, to the only God, our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen."

Meals as Ministry (pt1) by Daniel Williams

Once you have known the love and mercy of Jesus in your life, there is no greater joy than sharing His love with someone. Jesus commands us to go into all the world and make disciples, and nothing brings greater fulfillment than stepping out and helping a person grow in their relationship with Jesus. (Matthew 28:18-20, John 20:21) I want nothing more than to obey my Savior and tell someone else about how much He loves them and what God has already done for them! But have you ever found yourself feeling ill-equipped or maybe you just don’t know where to start when it comes to discipling someone or even sharing Jesus? 

When my family came to Florida to start a church, we did not know anyone. We had no team, no church to invite people to, and wanted a way to form relationships and share Jesus with people who so desperately need Him. We had always loved having people over to our house to eat, and we decided to continue using this approach to building relationships and see what God would do through it! 

Meals are a practical and powerful means of connecting with people. 

Jesus used meals as an opportunity for ministry throughout His life. Robert Karris said, "In Luke's Gospel Jesus is either going to a meal, at a meal, or coming from a meal.”

Luke 7:34-35 says, “The Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Look, a glutton and a winebibber, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ But wisdom is justified by all her children.” 

God is constantly using the everyday world around us to show us things about who He is. So, it makes sense that Jesus used every opportunity to teach those around Him, including meal times. It is amazing to note the number of times we hear some of the greatest teachings of Jesus come from a time sitting around a dinner table. 

The act of inviting someone into our home is becoming more rare as people are busier and connecting more and more through social media and texting rather than face to face. We have had many people tell us that our home was the first “real home” they had been to in years! Tim Chester wrote a book on this subject called “A Meal with Jesus.” “Few acts are more expressive of companionship than the shared meal….someone with whom we share food is likely to be our friend, or well on the way to becoming one.”    

We eat an average of 21 meals per week. 

It is a reasonable and attainable goal to plan out 1-2 of these meal times each week to connect with someone for the sake of discipleship! In a natural setting, eating a meal is an intimate and comfortable environment for real conversation.

So be encouraged that this is something you can do! Sometimes we may feel like what we are doing is not enough, or we feel at a loss in how we can better pour into someone’s life. This is a great starting point. Just as Jesus used meal times to pour into those around Him, we can begin to look for ordinary opportunities to do the same!

Be blessed,

Pastor Daniel 

Recommended Resources:

Recommended Reading: “A Meal with Jesus” by Tim Chester

Listen to a message I taught at Redemption Church on this subject: “Be On Mission with Meals”