Praying the Psalms: Getting Honest with God, Psalm 73 (Randy)

So often our prayers are either rote or laden with a self-serving wish list.  We treat prayer as a perfunctory exercise or a chance to ask a genie in the bottle to grant us our every wish.  At the same time, we are afraid to be really honest with God.  We bottle up our emotions or vent them on others, but we feel guilty taking them to God in prayer.  Yet that is exactly what he wants us to do: to pray honestly and work through our emotions with him.

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Praying the Psalms: The Sovereignty of God, Part 1 (Chris)

The Psalms are a guide to prayer to and to effective Christian life.  This lesson begins by exploring how the Psalms offer a unique perspective on God and human experience.  We also consider how Jesus is at the heart of each Psalm as he inspired them, prayed them himself while he was on earth, and walks beside us as we seek to harness their power.  Using Psalms 8, 13, 18, and 19, we then take an initial look at how God’s sovereignty as Creator and Giver of the Law is reflected in the Psalms.  The word for us in response is “confidence.”  The Psalms should make us confident in the ultimately positive outcome of whatever we face in life.

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Praying the Psalms: Psalm 2 (Randy)

While Psalm 1 warns us about the danger of being overly attracted to the world, Psalm 2 reminds us not to be intimidated by the world.  We all have authority figures in our lives who pressure us, from parents to government officials.  Yet we must recognize that Jesus is Lord of all, and by serving him we can both honor and respect authorities without being threatened by them.

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Praying the Psalms: Introduction to the Psalms with Psalm 1 (Randy)

The Psalms were Jesus’s prayer book.  He prayed constantly to the Father, and very often quoted the Psalms when doing so.  Today, we tend to be more perfunctory in our prayers, or focus on physical health and well being over spiritual health and well being.  With the Psalms as our guide, we can learn to pray more honestly and meaningfully to God.  In this introductory lesson, we examine Psalm 1 as the “main entrance to the mansion” of the Psalms.

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Farewell Discourse: Summary Lesson (Randy)

Some people have said that if you want to understand the heart of Christianity, you only need to read the book of Romans and the gospel of John.  And if you are truly pressed for time, you only need to read the Farewell Discourse and Final Prayer of Jesus as found in John 13-17.  These are Jesus’s final words to his disciples and one of his last prayers to his Father in heaven.

 This past fall, we explored the Farewell Discourse and Prayer of Jesus as he prepared his disciples for his impending death.  Knowing what was to come, Jesus brought this ragtag group of disciples together for one final meal – the Last Supper – and shared his message one more time.  Would the disciples listen? Would they get it?  Would they carry the message forward?  Now we know that Jesus knew the answer all along.

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Farewell Discourse: Prayer for Future Believers (Randy)

Jesus prays for future believers at the very end of his final prayer.  In these final moments, he asks God to help us live in unity and love so we may come to know his glory – the glory of God dwelling in our hearts and the glory of God in heaven – and so that the next generation of believers will come to know Christ.

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Farewell Discourse: Prayers for the Disciples (Randy)

In his final hours, Jesus prayed for both himself and his disciples.  In that prayer, he revealed his true purpose on earth – to sacrifice his life as the ultimate act of love so we may know God have eternal life – and asked God to protect us from the evil one so that we may be one with God and one with each other.  By being one with God and having a personal relationship with him, we receive eternal life and experience a full measure of joy. 

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