DATE: – SUNDAY, 2ND OCTOBER 2022
TOPIC: – OCCUPY TILL I COME (Part 4)
BIBLE PASSAGE: – Matthew 25: 14 – 30
MEMORY VERSE: – “And unto one he gave five talents to another two, and to another one; to every man according to his several ability; and straightway took his journey” (Matthew 25:15).
INTRODUCTION: – A talent represents our abilities, time, resources and opportunities to serve God and humanity while on earth. God has entrusted all of these things to us, and He expects us to use and apply these gifts in the wisest possible way so that Christ can see a return on his investment.
LESSON OUTLINES
1) Signs Of Our Times
God teaches us that each age of the world has its special significance, and when He Himself walked the earth, He severely blamed the men of His generation that they did not understand the signs of the times. He expects us to understand the meaning of our generation, the meaning of our age and like David to serve our own generation by the will of God.
The Holy Spirit is promised to give us discernment of spirits, to catch the meaning of out surroundings and the thought of Jesus, our Master as He leads us in the work of today and the conflicts of the present age.
Our times, like Esther’s are times of great activity on the part of the adversary.
The devil was busy seeking to destroy the hope of the Jews, the chosen race; and Haman had almost accomplished the termination of the Hebrew people.
Had his plan been unhacked, in a few weeks the promised line through, which the Messiah was to come, would have been wiped off; and the hope of the redemption of the world would have been wrecked.
It was, therefore as indispensable that Haman should be counteracted as it was that Jesus Christ should come in the flesh. It was a momentous issue. Satan had some conception of it, and had brought forth his masterpiece of cunning and cruelty; but he has outwitted and more than matched by the infinite wisdom of God as He worked through the instrumentality of Esther’s life.
So, today, the devil is busy, busier than ever, because he knows that his time is short. He is trying to destroy the Bible and the Church of God. He is turning the Church into a working club, the ministry into an ambitious profession.
And outside the Church, he is giving birth to various forms of evil on the one he did, while on the other hand he is absorbing the hearts of man in the pursuit of pleasure, the love of money, the strife of politics and the ten thousand dazzling objects of human ambition and false desire.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
The great object of Satan is to destroy the spiritual life of the Church of Christ and to take a living, supernatural Christ out of our Christian faith. God help us to understand Him, and to host fast our Christian faith; of power, of holiness and hope. And, armed with the panoply of God, may we be able to withstand the hosts of darkness in the evil day, and having done all to stand! (Eph.6:10-20).
QUESTIONS
- What are the strategies of the devil against God’s kingdom?
- What are the resources of God for us to thwart devil’s strategies?
DATE: – SUNDAY, 9TH OCTOBER 2022
TOPIC: – OCCUPY TILL I COME (Part 5)
BIBLE PASSAGE: – Esther 4: 1 – 17)
MEMORY VERSE: -“Go, gather together all the Jews that are present in Shushan, and fast ye for me, and neither eat nor drink three days, night or day: I also and my maidens will fast likewise and so will I go in into the king, which is not according to the law; and if I perish, I perish” (Esther 4:16).
INTRODUCTION: – Esther was willing to go any length even to the giving of her life in an attempt to save her people. She would do what was right and trust the outcome to God. The Lord will not honour those who remain silent or shy away in times of persecution to save themselves, or their positions. He will honour those who, for the sake of God and His Word, speak the truth at the risk of their own loss.
LESSON OUTLINES
1) Strangers To God
Like the times of Esther, this is a time when souls are in peril. Her people were in danger of perishing.
Are there not those around us on every side who are in greater danger? Are there not those in our families now who are perishing without Christ? Are there not those in our social circles who are strangers to God, and dying without His heavenly love?
And are there not; in the wider circle of the world billions of immortal souls passing one by one with every breath we draw, unsaved into the presence of the Judge, while their blood is sprinkled upon our luxurious, and the dark shadow of their curse, falls upon our selfish brows, if we have not done all in our power to save them?
Are these not the times to which prophecy has looked forward, when the tidings of the Gospel shall be borne on flying wings, and He shall come quickly? (Matt.24:14).
2) We Are In The Closing Hours Of This Age
God has been striking with a mighty hand the sins of the nations. He is preparing highways through some countries unparalleled in the history of the world.
He is marching on. There is a sound of a going in the tops of the mulberry trees and of a voice that bids us bestir ourselves, for the Lord is gone out before us to deliver the Philistines into our hands (2Sam.5:24). Knowest thou that thou art come to the kingdom for such a time as this?” awake to meet the meaning of the age and the fruit of a lifetime, and let us be found workers together with God in what is perhaps the last campaign of the Christian dispensation? (2Corint.6:1-2).
Like Esther’s, it is a time of crisis. All men are conscious of a strange stirring in their hearts today a looking for something that shall happen; and the students of prophecy are interpreting this deep cry as the answer back from the holy page that its signs are converging to a focus in this solemn decade (Matt.25:6).
Oh, what a privilege to be permitted to live in such a time as this! What a responsibility it involves to walk with Him in white, with heedful mind, obedient will, uplifted ey and humble, holy confidence.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
The unsaved are appealing to us and He who hears their cry is looking to us also. Oh! Shall we be found listening and responding; for how knowest thou, brethren “whether thou are come to the kingdom for such a time as this? Beloved, are you using the glorious opportunities which other generations would have prized and hailed with delight? And, day by day; are you watching for opportunities, recognizing them when they come and gladly hastening to meet them?
Let us arise to meet His highest expectation. Let us claim our responsibility and service in full; let us be found worthy of the glorious times in which our Master has allowed our lot to be cast!
QUESTIONS
DATE: – SUNDAY, 16THOCTOBER 2022
TOPIC: – THE LOVE OF GOD
BIBLE PASSAGE: – 1John 4:1 – 27
MEMORY VERSE: – “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten son; that whosoever believeth in Him, should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16)
INTRODUCTION: – Go does not simply “Loves” us but He love itself. Love is not just one of the attributes of God, but love is His very nature. The better we are acquainted with His Love – its character, fullness, blessedness – the more will our heart be drawn out in love to Him.
LESSON OUTLINES
The Characteristics of God’s Love
1) The Love Of God Is Uninfluenced
By this, we mean there was nothing whatever in the objects if His love to call it into exercise, to attract or prompt it. The love which one person has for another is because of something in the object, but the love of God is free, spontaneous, uncaused. God did not love us because we loved Him, but He loved us before we had a particle of love for Him (1Jh.4:19).
2) The Love Of God Is Eternal
God loves us with everlasting love (Jer.31:3). What praise should this evoke from each of His children! How tranquilizing for the wants, since God’s love toward me had no beginning, it can have no ending.
3) The Love God Is Infinite
Everything about God is infinite. His wisdom is illimitable, for He knows everything of the past, present, and future. His power is unbounded, for there is nothing too hard for Hi, so His love is without limit. There is a depth to which none can fathom; there is a height to which none can scale, there is a length and breadth to it which defies measurement, by any man’s standard. (Eph.2:4; John 3:16).
The Love of God is so transcendent it cannot be estimated (Eph.3:19).
4 The Love Of God Is Immutable
As with God Himself there is “no variableness nor shadow of turning” (James 1:17),so His love can never change nor diminish (Songs of Sol,v8:7). Nothing can separate us from it (Rom.8:35-39).
5) The Love Of God Holy
God’s love is not regulated by caprice, passion or sentiment, but by principle. Just as His grace reigns not at the expense of righteousness, but through righteousness (Rom.5:21), so His love never conflicts His holiness. “God is light” (1Jh.1:5) is mentioned before “God is love (1Jh.4:8). God’s love is no mere amiable weakness or effeminate softness. The Bible declares” whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth” (Heb.12). God will not wink at sin even in His own people, His love is pure, unmixed with any weak sentimentality.
6) The Love God Is Gracious
The Love and Favour of god are in separable (John 3:16). Christ died not in order to make God love us, but because He did love His people.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
Calvary is the supreme demonstration of the love of God. Whenever you are tempted to doubt the love of God, simply go back to Calvary.
QUESTIONS
- Enumerate the characterized of God’s love?
- What is the supreme demonstration of God’s love?
DATE: – SUNDAY, 23RDOCTOBER 2022
TOPIC: – LET THE FIRE FALL (Part 1)
BIBLE PASSAGE: – 1 Samuel 3: 1 – 10
MEMORY VERSE: – “And ere the lamp of God went out in the temple of the LORD, where the ark of was, and Samuel was laid down to sleep” (1Samuel 3:3).
INTRODUCTION: – If there is anything the Church of this age needs, it is the fire. A lot of things have surreptitiously into the lives of believers, a lot of “it does not matter” have taken over many lives and Church denominations today, that only a fresh fire on the Holy Ghost can purge away. If we must be readily prepared for the coming of the Master, than we need the fire now.
LESSON OUTLINES
1) Why We Need The Fire
The need for the fire of the Holy Spirit afresh is urgent on the Church and should be our utmost prayer point these days. Who needs the fire?
I need the fire, and that now!
The following and more are the reasons why we need fire (1Sam.3:1-4).
- When your love for God and His kingdom is diminishing, you need the fire!
- When the things of the world begin to appeal to you more than the things of God and His Kingdom; you need the fire.
- When your prayer life has gone down, you need the fire (1Sam.3:1-2).
- When there is spiritual lethargy, laziness and lukewarmness, or outright coldness; you need the fire! (Rev.3:21)
- When there is no more difference between you and unbelievers, when you begin to do what they do, speak their language, dress the way they dress, transact your business the way they do, when there is compromise between you and unbelievers, you need the fire! (Corint.6:14-7-2).
- When your zeal for evangelism has gone down, you need the fire!
- When you begin to pursue the things of the world and have little or no time for God, and the things of His kingdom; you need the fire!
- When carnalities and worldliness are manifesting in your life; you need the fire!
- When the walls of your life, family, community and nation are broken down; you need the fire!
- When prayers become more of a religious exercise and not a spiritual, earnest and fervent; you need the fire! (Neh.2:17).
- When spiritual things are being neglected for worldly things, love of believers waxing cold, you need the fire!
- When the enemy seems to be prevailing, you need the fire to withstand (Isa.64:1-2; Ps97:3).
- When prayers are not being answered, testimonies becoming rear, discouragement prevailing, you need the fire! (1Kings 19:1-15).
- When the Spiritual things of great value like the Word of God, holiness, prayer and fasting are being placed with fake, like worldly pleasures, entertainment, worldly music and dances etc; then the Church needs the fire! (1Kgs.14:25-27).
- When sinners are not getting converted, souls are not been won into the kingdom; the Church needs the fire!
- When iniquities are increasing all round us, then we need the fire!
- When the Word of God becomes scarce and there is not open vision and true prophecies; then we need the fire! (1Sam.3:2)
- When the world begins to reproach the Church; then we need the fire!
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION
The present day believers in the present day Church are such evidence of the great need for the fire of revival. O LORD, let the fire fall again!
QUESTIONS
- What are the characteristics of a life without the fire of the Holy Ghost?
- What should be the utmost prayer of the present day Church?
DATE: – SUNDAY, 30THOCTOBER 2022
TOPIC: – LET THE FIRE FALL (Part 2)
BIBLE PASSAGE: – 1 Kings 18:17 – 40
MEMORY VERSE: – “Elijah said unto all the people, come near unto me. And all the people came near unto them. And he repaired the altar of the LORD that was broken down” (1Kings 18:30).
INTRODUCTION: – God hates coldness and lukewarmness in spirit (Rev.3:15-16). This is because a lukewarm Church is apathetic and negligent about personal devotion to Christ, half-hearted and lazy in service to God. Lukewarmness breeds a lot of compromise and worldliness. All there hinder the move of God in His Church. Thus, God requires us to do the needful before He can send down the fire again.
LESSON OUTLINES
1) Requirements For The Fire To Fall
– Draw near to God so that He will draw near to you (1Kgs.18:30, James 4:3)
– Hear the undiluted Word of God and tremble (Heb.3:2)
– Remove the strange others of mammon, worldliness and self, break up your fallow ground Hosea 10:12)
– Repair the altar of the LORD broken down (vs.30).
– Repentance from sins, get rid of all offences, bitterness and unforgiveness.
– Restore orderliness and decency (1Corint.14:40).
– Renew the covenant and commitment (vs.31).
– Resubmit yourself, humbling yourself under the authority of God’s Word daily (Isa.58:6; James 4:7).
– Rebuke publicly all sinners, compromisers, confront false teachers and false prophets (1Kgs.18:21-27).
– Resolutely seek the face of God to send down the fire again (vs.36, 38; Heb.3:1-3).
– Refuse to back out but be unrelenting in prayers till the fire falls.
– Read, study and meditate regularly and daily on the Living Word of God (Josh.1:8;2Tim.2:15).
– Resist steadfastly the devil with his devices (James 4:7).
– Reignite your first love for Christ and His kingdom (Rev.2:5; 3:18-20).
– Rededicate your life, your all upon the altar daily as a living sacrifice (Rom.12:1-2).
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
The present day Church is in the Laodicean age. The atmosphere of prosperity which had led to spiritual laziness and lethargy. The Church is no longer hot enough spiritually to respond to the Holy Spirit’s guidance and promptings, and the Church is not quite cold enough to realize the need to repent and return to dependence on God. There is a lot of compromise in the Church today that the Church is becoming more worldly while the world is becoming more Churchy. There is the urgent need for the Church to arise out of the dust of sins and worldliness, cry aloud to God for the fall of true fire upon the Church again.
QUESTIONS
- What are the steps to take for the fire to fall?
Why is Lukewarmness dangerous?