10/9 Heart & Attitudes

Looking up a few verses and thinking about the heart and attitudes we approach the Bible with.  These attitudes will reveal the heart condition necessary for meaningful Bible study.

 

Summarize the attitude of each verse:

 

Psalm 119:18 NIV

Open my eyes that I may see wonderful things in your law.

 

As disciples, we are followers – that is, students of the Word and the behaviors/actions of Jesus Christ and others who have lived out their faith filled life before us.  A few thoughts about this verse:

Ø Implies God is the revealer of truth (he will open my eyes/heart to understanding)

Ø Humility

o  Be clothed in humility – Colossians 3:12 NIV

o  God is the giver of grace to the humble – 1 Peter 5:5 NIV

Ø Faith

o  Lack of faith – Mark 6:6 NIV

o  Increase in faith – Luke 17:5 NIV

o  Belief or Expectation to receive – FAITH – Hebrews 11

Ø God’s Word is complete (wonderful), not burdensome

o  Gods word judges my heart and attitude – Hebrews 4:12 NIV

 

1 Corinthians 2: 6-16 NIV

We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing.  7No, we speak of God’s secret wisdom, a wisdom that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began.  8None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.  9However, as it is written:

 

“No eye has seen no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him”

 

10but God has revealed it to us by his Spirit.  The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. 11For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the man’s spirit within him?  In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.  12We have not received the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us.  13this is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words.  14The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned.  15The spiritual man makes judgments about all things, but he himself is not subject to any man’s judgment:

 

16”For who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct him?”  But we have the mind of Christ.

 

Hebrews 11:1-2, 6

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.  2This is what the ancients were commended for…………..6And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.

 

James 1:22-25 NIV

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves.  Do what it says.  23Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror 24and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.  25But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it – he will be blessed in what he does.

 

Ø Caution – do not merely listen.

Ø Command – do what it says.

Ø Renewed strength – Isaiah 40:31; Romans 12:2; 2 Corinthians 4:16

Ø Freedom – from bondage of sin (doing what you know is against God’s perfect law

Ø Blessed

Ø Progression of doing (daily) – results in God blessing our actions

o  Bearing fruit – Matthew 7:16; John 15:5, 16: Romans 7:4; Galatians 5:22; Colossians 1:10

 

For Next Week:

Let’s read Ephesians Chapter 1.  We will study this book in depth over the next several weeks.  Let’s study this chapter and the circumstances surrounding it.

Whenever you begin a study of an entire book of the Bible, you should ask five questions:

 

1.  Who wrote it?

 

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2.  To whom was it written?

 

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3.  When was it written?

 

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4.  Why was it written?

 

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5.  What’s the main message?

 

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