Adult Bible Studies Winter 2020-2021 Student

By Taylor W. Mills and Batchelor-Glader, Bruce M

Winter Theme: Hope
This winter, our lessons develop the theme of “Hope.” The writers of the student book lessons are Taylor Mills and Bruce Batchelor-Glader; the teacher book writer is Stan Purdum.

The Good News
These lessons continue a unit that began with the last Sunday in the fall quarter, encompassing the Sundays of Advent and the first Sunday after Christmas. They call us to consider the Incarnation and what it means that God sent Jesus into the world in human form, as one of us. Thus, the lessons invite us to think about the relationship God wants to have with us and how God’s sending Jesus makes that relationship possible.

The Hypocrites and the Holy
The lessons in this unit challenge us to examine ourselves in light of the examples we see in the individuals in Scripture. Where do we find instances of hypocrisy or holiness? And how do these tendencies contribute to or diminish our hope? Lesson 5 focuses on John the Baptist, preparing the way for Jesus, the hope of the
world. Lesson 6 tells of Jesus commenting on John’s ministry and announcing the good news. Lessons 7 and 8 help us think about how the hope Jesus brought functions in our lives. And Lesson 9 looks toward the ultimate fulfillment of that hope, with the full coming of the kingdom of God.

Holy Living
This unit embraces all the Sundays of February and March; and, as such, it continues into the next quarter. The eight lessons of the unit invite us to think about what it means to be the people of God and to pursue holy living. The four lessons in this quarter help us look at how we deal with one another; how faith is expressed action; the sort of “fasting” God wants from us (whether or not we abstain from certain foods); and how, in fact, Christians are the temple of God. During this unit, Lent begins, which is an especially appropriate time to think about holiness.

Hundreds of thousands of people each week have transformative encounters with God through Adult Bible Studies—Bible-based, Christ-focused Sunday school lessons and midweek Bible studies endorsed by the Curriculum Resources Committee of the The United Methodist Church. In fall 2019, based on feedback from hundreds of readers, we made exciting changes designed to benefit Bible study groups. For 2020, in response to additional feedback, we are reintroducing printed focal Bible passages in both the Student and Teacher books. Lessons follow the church seasons, including Advent and Lent, and include suggestions for developing spiritual practices to help nurture your faith.

Published quarterly, each week's Student Book lesson lists background Scripture, features key verses, provides reliable and relevant biblical explanation and application, and more, in a readable font size that is accessible to everyone.

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• Language: English
• Publisher: Cokesbury
• Release date: Oct 20, 2020
• ISBN: 9781501895227

Taylor W. Mills

Taylor W. Mills has been the pastor of United Methodist churches in Williamston, Raleigh, and Durham, North Carolina. He recently became the pastor of Ann Street United Methodist Church in Beaufort, North Carolina. His wife has worked in the school system, and neither she nor their two daughters share Taylor’s taste for Led Zeppelin music. taylorwmills.com

Book preview

Editor’s Perspective

When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, the late Fred Rogers said, my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.’ ¹

I’ve thought a lot about Mr. Rogers’s statement lately. The Bible lessons for this quarter were written months before words such as coronavirus and COVID-19 became part of our daily lexicon. But in the weeks just before we sent this book to the printer, everyone around the world had not only heard of the virus, but we had all been affected by it, some more directly and tragically than others. We may have seen examples of selfishness and hoarding at first; and, at times, neighborliness may have been eclipsed by greed.

But as the days and weeks progressed, something greater emerged: quiet examples of caring and sharing. People didn’t always know exactly what to do, so they did what they could that was helpful, in the process, building a worldwide community of helpers.

One of the most beautiful things about help is the hope that it instills. An archaic form of the word help that persists in some regions is, in fact, holpe, which is indistinguishable in pronunciation from the word hope. When we help, we provide hope. We shed light in places that were once dark, fearful, and uncertain. Help often meets an immediate need, but hope lasts longer and runs deeper. Help feeds hope, and hope grows.

Perhaps your hope has wavered at times recently. Our Bible lessons are unified around the theme of Hope and remind us that hope is one of the marks of a Christian’s life, part of our spiritual DNA. When we persevere during difficult times, when we act on our faith, people see Christ in us, and we spread hope.

When you light the candle of Hope this Advent, hold it high for those who are still plagued by anxiety, insecurity, and hopelessness. Fan the flame of hope within you, and, with it, point others to the source of our hope. This hope doesn’t put us to shame, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us (Romans 5:5).

Jan Turrentine

[e-mail]

¹From goodreads.com.

Daily Bible Readings (Unit 1)

November 30

Psalm 150:1-6

December 1

Job 25:1-6

December 2

Job 7:11, 17-21

December 3

Daniel 4:28-37

December 4

Hebrews 2:5-9

December 5

Luke 12:22-32

December 6

Psalm 8:1-9

December 7

Matthew 11:25-30

December 8

1 Peter 2:19-25

December 9

2 Corinthians 4:1-6

December 10

Matthew 20:23-28

December 11

Philippians 1:27-30

December 12

Philippians 2:1-11

December 13

Philippians 2:12-18

December 14

James 1:16-18

December 15

1 John 1:1-5

December 16

1 John 3:1-6

December 17

1 John 4:1-6

December 18

John 1:1-8

December 19

John 1:9-13

December 20

John 1:14-18

December 21

2 John 7-11

December 22

John 5:41-47

December 23

John 10:22-39

December 24

John 12:44-50

December 25

Matthew 17:1-5

December 26

John 14:1-7

December 27

John 14:8-14

Unit 1

God With Us

This unit couldn’t come at a better time. Advent and Christmas focus our attention on the birth of Jesus. In Bethlehem, a miracle would take place. The Word through whom everything came into being would be born among us. The God in whose image we are created would share our humanity.

We call this miracle the Incarnation. The word incarnation comes from Latin: In for into, and carn for flesh—in the flesh. Jesus is God in the flesh. Or, as a child once put it, God with skin on!

God’s Christmas gift to the world is God’s own self. In Jesus, God experienced what it is to be human. That’s a huge part of why the Incarnation is so amazing! The Incarnation was God’s journey to us.

Once God had journeyed to us in Jesus, the journey took God in Jesus all the way to the lowest point of our humanness, as we will learn in Philippians 2. Jesus emptied himself and humbled himself to the point of death on a cross, but death would not hold the Son of God!

And at the conclusion of Jesus’ earthly ministry, he ascended to the heavens. That was God’s journey back, taking our human-image into the heavens.

It all comes full circle in this unit! God created us in God’s image. Jesus, the incarnate God, experienced our full humanity and came to be God with us. God punched a way for us through death by Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection. And now we can follow Jesus through death and out the other side as beings created in the image of God!

Focal Passage: Psalm 8:1-9

Background Text: Same

Purpose Statement: To explore what it means to be made in God’s image

Psalm 8:1-9

¹LORD, our Lord, how majestic

is your name throughout the earth!

You made your glory higher than heaven!

²From the mouths of nursing babies

you have laid a strong foundation

because of your foes,

in order to stop vengeful enemies.

³When I look up at your skies,

at what your fingers made—

the moon and the stars

that you set firmly in place—

⁴what are human beings

that you think about them;

what are human beings

that you pay attention to them?

⁵You’ve made them only slightly less than divine,

crowning them with glory and grandeur.

⁶You’ve let them rule over your handiwork,

putting everything under their feet—

⁷all sheep and all cattle,

the wild animals too,

⁸the birds in the sky,

the fish of the ocean,

everything that travels the pathways of the sea.

⁹LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name throughout the earth!

Key Verses: What are human beings that you think about them; what are human beings that you pay attention to them? You’ve made them only slightly less than divine, crowning them with glory and grandeur (Psalm 8:4-5).

Occasionally, in the course of providing pastoral counseling, I encounter people with low self-esteem or damaged self-image. They do not have a healthy sense of self-worth. Maybe you know someone like that.

I’m no psychologist, but I know that low self-esteem can stem from a variety of factors. Some people have been abused and told that they are worthless by someone significant in their lives. Others may have been weighed down with shame, explicit or implicit.

In our pastoral conversations, I try to tell them that they are fearfully and wonderfully made (Psalm 139:14, NRSV). And I add that they are made in the image of God. I believe this is better than empty praise or a pep talk.

The image of God is an important theological concept. To know that you are made in the image of God is to know that God put attention and care into creating you. It is to remember that, as the old preachers used to say, God don’t make no junk! That’s powerful! That’s no mere self-help message.

Psalm 8 is so central to our self-understanding that it shows up in other parts of the Bible. Take a look:

If any character in the Bible had a reason to wrestle with low self-image, it would be Job. He had lost everything. At Job’s low point, he lambasted God for paying attention to human beings: What are human beings, that you exalt them, that you . . . test them every moment? (Job 7:17-18).

Many interpreters believe that Job was parodying Psalm 8 here! But the preacher of the Book of Hebrews quoted Psalm 8 to praise God. He also indicated that Jesus was the one who was made lower than the angels¹ but is now crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of his death (Hebrews 2:5-9). (If you have time for even deeper study, take a look at how Psalm 8 seems to be echoed in Matthew 21:16; 1 Corinthians 15:27; and possibly Ephesians 1:22.)

But for now, you are likely busy here at the start of December preparing your home and your heart for Christmas. Advent has begun, and you are looking forward to the observance of the birth of the Savior.

In all this preparation and expectation, don’t forget that the great miracle of Christmas is how God had contracted to a span to be born in Bethlehem, as Charles Wesley put it in his hymn Let Earth and Heaven Combine.² The Creator was born into creation, into the humanity that was made in the image of God. What a profound mystery!

So as we start today’s lesson, we will begin by reading and examining Psalm 8 on its own. We should consider what it tells us about God, about ourselves, and about our relationship to God and to one another.

What do you long to hear God say about you?

What Are Human Beings?

You’ve read Psalm 8. How would you describe it? I would use words such as praise, glory, wonder, and majestic. It’s not hard to figure out that this is a psalm of praise, praise, and more praise.

When I discuss worship with people, I am sometimes struck by how they think that praise songs (as opposed to hymns) are a relatively recent innovation in the church. I remind them that they sing a praise song in their traditional church every Sunday: Praise God from whom all blessings flow. Praise God all creatures here below. Praise God above, ye heav’nly host. Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.³

But Psalm 8 is a little different from most of the other praise psalms. Most of them begin by calling the congregation to praise God. This one begins and ends by delivering praise straight to God’s ear: LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name throughout the earth (Psalm 8:1, 9)!

We are drawn in right away! The psalmist’s words become our own words. They give voice to a deep desire we have to praise God. Is that by chance? Not at all. Christians believe that we were created to praise God. It’s what we do. This psalm just draws the praise out of us.

The psalmist’s primary way of drawing the praise out of us is by filling our mind’s eye with wondrous images of nature. Skies, moon, and stars. Cattle, wild animals, birds, sky, fish, and ocean. It’s all here. These are what your fingers made, sings the psalmist (verse 3). It’s as if the natural world itself is praising God. Like Jesus said, even the rocks and stones would sing his praises (Luke 19:40).

We all know what it is like to be transfixed by something amazing in nature. Anyone who has seen the Grand Canyon says pictures just can’t do it justice. Those who have looked upon the Victoria Falls say it can hardly be described. Astronauts often speak of how life-changing it is to look back and see the earth from space.

In John Wesley’s time, he took Psalm 8:3-4 as his Scripture for a sermon in which he considered the great sweeping size of creation. He even wondered about the other planets in our