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Prayer: Lesson 5 – The Lepers Cleansed
Heavenly Father, bless our teachers today as they begin a new year of ministry for you. Help them and their students never to lose their gratitude and wonder for the grace you have bestowed on us. Amen.
What Resolutions should the Sunday School Teacher Make for a New Year?
It is a new year, and many are considering New Year's resolutions, hoping to make lasting changes this year. Others are doing their best to avoid the subject, having already concluded that any commitments would be short-lived. We will leave the question whether it is most effective to make a series of resolutions at the beginning of the year to others to answer, but we would suggest that it is important to regularly evaluate where one is in life and where God wants us to be.
With that in mind, consider some areas in which you might seek improvement this new year...
- Preparing for lessons
Regardless of how long you have taught, there is always more to learn or practice in teaching. If not careful, we can become "set in our ways" presenting our lessons in a familiar (and boring?) manner. Or due to busyness and stress, we can do the minimum to get ready, relying on quick wits and charisma instead of careful study and the direction of the Holy Spirit.
- Discipling your students
Resolutions in this regard are important simply because this aspect of teaching Sunday school is so often overlooked. An important part of your ministry is shepherding your students spiritually. Do you minister to your students throughout the week or only one hour on Sunday?
- Following up on guests
With the stress of leading a lesson and the busyness of the Sunday morning worship ritual, it may be tempting to think it is someone else's responsibility to follow up on guests in your class. Yet as the teacher you are the most visible person in your class. Do you make certain to let guests know their presence was welcome, to gain contact information, and to invite them back the next Sunday?
- Growing spiritually
A common temptation for preachers and teachers is to combine sermon/lesson preparation with one's personal devotions. Making this a practice, however, can lead to spiritual malnutrition. And, if you are not growing spiritually and maturing in your faith, how will you be able to lead your students to "higher ground"?
These are just a few areas in which you, as a Sunday school teacher, may want to make a "New Year's Resolution" ... or just a commitment to Christ that you will seek improvement. (David Woods)
What spiritual resolutions would God have you make for this new year?
"Study to show thyself approved unto God... " (2 Timothy 2:15).
What causes us to become too familiar with God to worship Him?
In "Biblical Perspective", Dr. Gayle Woods writes:
Were there not ten cleansed? but where are the nine? Do we hear a note of disappointment in the words of Jesus? Is there an indication that He seemed to be somewhat puzzled by the fact that nine of the ten men who had been healed did not seem to place great value on what He had done for them?
This account should be a serious reminder to the people of God that we must be careful not to become familiar with the work of God to the point that we lose the sense of wonder and amazement. When the awesomeness of His glory begins to dim, we need to fall on our faces at His feet once again to renew our commitment of love to the one who made the difference in our lives.
Discussion: List possible reasons why the nine lepers failed to show gratitude to God.
Discussion: What are ways we today become too familiar that we fail to worship?
Source: Miracles of Jesus: Adult Teacher's Insights, page 31.
Who is the "leper" in your life?
In "Word Focus" William Sillings writes:
Jesus touched (hapsato) the leper. Not only that, but He also stretched out His hand (ekteinas — aorist participle). The literal meaning of this word might read something like this, “When He had stretched out His hand,” signifying that this was a very intentional action. We think little about the fact that Jesus touched a leper, because we have heard it so many times. But think about what it meant to the first-century disciples. According to Leviticus 13, anyone who had leprosy was to be declared unclean, and they were to be quarantined from their families and the rest of the camp of Israel.
For Jesus to touch a leper was to transgress the traditions of Israel as well as to cause Himself to become ceremonially unclean. In the eyes of His disciples, Jesus was rewriting the tradition. He was taking drastic steps to make His point that people are more important than ceremonial cleanness.
Discussion: Who are the people our community are unwilling to touch? Who are the people our church is afraid or unwilling to touch? Who are you unwilling to touch?
Discussion: How should we change our attitudes and actions toward our "lepers"?
Source: Miracles of Jesus: Adult Teacher's Insights, page 28.
Devotional: Put Away Defilement
Read Numbers 5:1-4
“Both male and female shall ye put out, without the camp shall ye put them; that they defile not their camps, in the midst whereof I dwell” (v. 3).
Cosmo, our beautiful Bouvier Des Flandres dog, got too close to the kitty cat with a beautiful white stripe down its tail. The kitty, not quite as happy about playing, raised that fluffy tail and unleashed a spray, covering poor Cosmo. The odor of burnt coffee, rotten eggs, and burning rubber seeped from every part of him. My mother firmly refused to allow him inside the house. If she could have put him outside the “camp,” I know she would have. Why? She did not want her carpet, clothes, sofa, or even the porch to take on Cosmo’s odor.
In Bible days, God directed the Children of Israel to place the defiled outside the camp. While my mother was concerned about the odor, God was concerned about walking in His holiness in the midst of defilement. Even for His special people, the Israelites, if they touched a corpse, contracted leprosy, or hemorrhaged, God wanted them out of the camp. He wanted to ensure they would not contaminate others.
Today, the blood can deliver us from the defilement of sin. “Its saving virtues ever are the same. It cleanseth still, and always will” (Phoebe Palmer). Are we spraying bad attitudes, ungodly speech, and sinful be- haviors in the camp? Cleanse yourself in the blood of Jesus! (Pamela Kuhn)
A rotten stench does not stop with its source; it permeates the atmosphere of anything in his circle of influence.
This devotional is the Monday, December 28, 2015 entry of Opening the Word.