Guitar Jim

Q3. What are the implications for governments that Yahweh is the King of kings and Lord of lords? Rather than using Divine appointment as a license to do whatever they want and to treat it as Divine approval, governments should instead govern according to Biblical principles. Don't oppress the poor, look after the helpless, etc. The ideal government in my view would be Christian Socialist. That view puts me at odds with most Christians who lean far to the right in their political bent. What are the implications of removing God" from a nation's currency and pledges, and ardently secularizing national life? Taking God out of a country's way of life is effectively denying a country the blessings God is willing and wanting to give. We've got governments legislating away God's blessings, all in the name of political correctness! So what if someone from another culture comes into our country and doesn't approve of how we do things? Why do the citizens of a country have to change their ways to suit people who come in of their own free will? Here in Australia we had an athiest Prime Minister before the election and now we have a sociopath purporting to be a Catholic in charge. There is an inner circle of extreme right wing, old money conservatives here who sincerely believe that the rich should rule the poor with an iron fist. They have placed their people in key political positions and the media is behind them all the way, whitewashing everything they do to make it pallatable to the public. And Christian church leaders, in their blind acceptance of everything politically conservative, have endorsed them! The very things the Bible teaches about fairness to workers and helping the poor and those who can't speak up for themselves because they have no advocate, are the things our government is pushing aggressively through parliament at an alarming rate. Where does that put a nation with regard to God the King? It puts a nation at odds with God, that's where! Quite a few countries are becoming Muslim because God, the Christian God, has been taken completely out of mainstream life. They won't need terrorists soon. The governments of many Western countries are just letting it happen.

Q2. What are the personal implications of Yahweh being your King and of Jesus being the Messiah sent from God? In our personl lives it means that decisions are based not on our own will or desires, but on Biblical principles and on what we know of God's plans for us. We are to be mindful of Jesus' sacrifice for our salvation and we should be careful not to grieve the Holy Spirit by rebelling against God's will. What are the advantages of being the subject of Yahweh as King? God ALWAYS knows what's in our best interests and by subjecting ourselves to His rule and His will for our lives we will be blessed in the way God desires to bless us. What does it mean for you to submit to the King on an everyday basis? Submitting to God as the King of my life means that I should consider everything I do in the light of His Word. How does a person reject Yahweh from being King over him or her? By willfully going our own way in opposition to God's will when we know full well what we should be doing.

Q1. Read 1 Samuel 8:15 and Malachi 3:8-10. How did tithing relate to a person's acceptance of God being their King in the Old Testament? Tithing was instituted by God so that the Levites, the tribe which served Him in His tabernacle, and later His temple, would be provided for since they were given no land allocation in the promised land. So if the people of Israel didn't tithe they were actually not only short-changing God, but their fellow Istaelites as well. Tithing was regarded by God as a measure of His people's faithfulness. How about for those of us who live under the New Covenant? What place does tithing have for us? As Gentiles we're not obliged to tithe. We are told by the apostle Paul to make up our minds what we will give to God's work and to His appointed ministers and stick to it. Many Christians do tithe, and that's because they've decided to follow the Old Testament example. Every time the annual budget review is due at church, out come the sermons about giving. We've all heard them and I think we should all take more notice of what is being said. Our pastors rely on what goes into the collection plate each Sunday! A 10% tithe is a good place to start, following the time honored example in the Old Testament. When I was married, it was to a hard stingy woman. She begrudged giving five bucks a week! I wanted to give 10%. One of the biggest arguments we ever had was when I forced the issue with her. After a two hour screaming match we agreed on a compromise. We settled on 5%. I pressed the point that we had to be faithful in giving that and to not shirk from it. We were living on my truck driver's wage, which wasn't all that much. She was a full time stay at home mum to our daughter until Jess turned 5. Money was tight but I stuck to my guns. You know, we never ran short. We even saved some each week, despite giving money every week to the church. I stopped attending church in 2000 for various reasons, not the least of which was there was no one there remotely like me who could relate to me and I to them. At 43 I still had long hair and a beard, was still pumping heavy iron, and I was a pro musician playing music the wowsers didn't like. I was aggressively excluded from the youth programs despite my many offers to help with the music in case I became a negative influence on the youger generation. I don't drink, smoke, or use any narcotics, I'm a really clean living guy, but still I couldn't get the time of day from my own peers, to the extent that I felt I had no peers. With my not going to church my giving stopped as well. When I left my marriage in 2007 and went out on my own the first thing I did was to start giving 10% or more of my income to God's work. I donated every week to a ministry I had a connection with. In the six years since my separation I've gone broke! In the book of Malachi in the chapter before the tithing chapter there is a chapter on divorce. God hates divorce. Now my ex was unfaithful and I had the loophole that I believed was God inspired in Corinthians but I've continually gone backwards for six years now. The promised blessing for faithful giving never came. I may be speaking prematurely, because for the first time in ages things are looking a bit more promising and I hope that's gonna be the case. We're told to remind God of His promises and I've started doing that when I pray. That's enough personal stuff for now . .

Q4. Define "justice," "vengeance," and "mercy." Justice is letting the punishment fit the crime. A reasonable punishment for an offense or crime committed. Vengeance is paying someone back for a wrong inflicted on me and/or mine. It's all too easy to go over the top when we seek to exact vengance. We're told to let God handle it. Mercy is the act of NOT seeking justice and/or vengeance for a wrong committed against us. Can a Holy and Righteous God forgive sins justly without punishing them? No, He cannot. That's why even in Old Testament times God provided a sacrificial system by which His people could still worship Him even though they were sinners. Even though God set that up, He still knew and communicated through His prophets that the old sacrificial system was flawed. The perfect sacrifice was God's own Son, Jesus Christ, who although he knew no sin was made sin for us to pay the penalty for our sins. This was a once for all sacrifice that is in force forever. What is the significance of the cross in God's righteousness? The worst criminals of the day were nailed to the cross to die. It was the ultimate punishment. Jesus died on the cross to pay the ultimate price for our sins and to reconcile us with God the Father. God is totally holy and righteous and cannot look upon sin. Only by paying His own prescribed penalty for sin could God accept us as His people. This is the ultimate act of love. God stayed His own vengeful hand by allowing Jesus to be punished in our stead. What is the significance of the cross? Without it we wouldn't be Christians.

Q3. (Psalm 68:5) Since our God is the Helper of the Fatherless and the Protector of Widows -- that is, the poorest and weakest of society -- what does this say about a Christian's commitment to social justice in our communities? How should it affect our actions? We should also make looking after disadvantaged people our priority. If they don't have their own families to help them they become the responsibility of the church or the state. The church needs to set the example here.

Q2. If we believe that truth and morality are all relative to one's culture, how can we know and understand the Righteous and Upright God? To some extent morality IS relative to one's culture. Women covering their heads, men not shaving beards, the use of jewelry etc, are all culturally neutral to God, I believe. We still see some devout Christian women refusing to wear makeup and jewelry and dressing really dowdy, as if that brings them closer to God. If they believe it does, who are we to judge? Then there is the little matter of divorce. One in two marriages fail. Read the book of the prophet Malachai for God's views on divorce. Are we to exclude the divorced from out churches? It is necessary to hold SOME Scripture up to the light of present day culture. If we don't, we'll be as dogmatic as the Islamic extremists! But having said that, we really need to get the core principles of Godly living into our daily lives. We can't arbitrarily choose which Biblical teaching we'll accept and which we'll reject. I truly believe that God Himself will give us understanding and insight into how we should best apply Biblical teaching to the modern world. I'll give an unrelated example here: Cheating on our tax returns. Jesus said to give to the Emperor what belongs to the Emperor and to give to God what belongs to God. That means paying your tax. That was the context there. The Bible says homosexuality is wrong. Yet do we condone it because it's culturally popular? We shouldn't. The jury is still out as to whether homosexual people are born that way or if they're the product of their culture and experiences. I used to believe only the latter was true, yet we have people born with all kinds of problems like down's syndrome and autism. Who are we to say people aren't born with a bent to same sex relations? I realize I'm asking more questions than I'm answering but these are all complex issues. A guy asked me once if I believed in sex before marriage. I asked him to define marriage. In the modern world we can live with our girlfriend and in the eyes of the law of the land we're legally a couple, common law marriage. A church wedding is a joke to the atheists. Even Christian people are being married by civil celebrants in parks and on beaches. The authority to marry people as a civil celebrant is granted by a government NOT under the auspicis of God, but elected by an unbelieving populance. Extra credit for present-day evangelists: How can we declare God and his Son Jesus Christ in a relativistic world? What is an effective approach? (There is no simple answer here. What is an effective communication strategy in your community?)

Q1. (Isaiah 6:1-8) How does a realization of God's holiness affect Isaiah? Isaiah becomes acutely aware of his sinful existence and that he is not worthy to be in the presence of God. Why is Isaiah afraid? It was commonly believed that no mortal man could see God and live to tell of it. He is deathly afraid that God will kill him outright because he is a man belonging to a sinful people. How does God make Isaiah holy? One of God's seraphim touches Isaiah's lips with a hot coal from the fire on the altar and declares Isaiah forgiven and cleansed. His sin was also declared atoned for. What is the symbolism of the coal from the altar? Fire it often regarded as a purifier. Isaiah's confession that he is a man of sinful lips prompted God to have the seraphim touch his lips with a coal from God's own holy altar. Now made holy -- dedicated to God -- how does Isaiah respond to God? When God asks whom He should send to the people of Israel, Isaiah immediately volunteers.

Q6. (Isaiah 66:22-24). Why do you think eternal punishment is mentioned at the end of such a glorious prophecy as Isaiah? It's there as a sobering reminder that there are two sides to every coin. In this case, Paradise and hell. Everlasting happiness and everlasting punishment. Why is the enduring, eternal kingdom mentioned? The whole point of the entire Bible is the establishment of God's Kingdom. Read as a huge book from go to whoa, the whole history of how God created the world, sin entered, measures were put in place to work around sin that really didn't work, the rebellion of God's people, Jesus's sacrificial death and resurrection, the spreading of the Gospel, and the final culmination of everything set in the future . . . it's an epic. The enduring eternal kingdom is the end result, the happy ending. Who will be included in this kingdom? People who accept the invitation to come in, whose lives are lived in accordance with God's requirements of faith in Christ and obedience to the Word of God. Who will be excluded from it? All those who continue to rebel against God and rely on their own righteousness and worse, who don't want to know about righteousness.

Q3. (Psalm 95:1-7) How many names, titles, and metaphors of God can you find in this passage, both explicit and implicit? The Rock of our salvation The great God The great King Creator (implied in v5) Our Maker Our Shepherd (implied in v7) What does the Psalmist call on us to do in response to God revealed in his Names? Worship and revere Him Why are these actions appropriate? Because He's our Rock, our God, our King, our Creator and Maker, and our Shepherd. How else should we respond to God?

Q5. (Isaiah 66:1-4) If God prescribed temple worship in the Pentateuch, why does he seem to prohibit it in 66:3? God is not prohibiting temple worship; He's condemning the people who display an outward godliness while their hearts are far away from God and concerned only with self-advancement. God is saying through Isaiah that they're better off not worshiping Him at all than showing up every week and going through the motions of their religion. What is missing from their worship? A heart longing for God and a humble and contrite spirit. Have you ever had this element missing from your worship? I'd be lying if I said no. What kind of heart is God looking for (66:2)? God is looking for a heart that trembles at His word and earnestly seeks Him. God wants people who will walk humbly with their God. He doesn't want proud arrogant people who think they're doing God a favor by worshipping Him

Q4. (Isaiah 65:17-25) Why do you think the final state is referred to as the new heavens and the new earth? The present world is corrupted by sin. God is going to make all things new. Unlike it was at the time of the flood, when everything was simply washed away and then grew again on the existing world, when the time comes God will "Make everything new". What is new about them? The new Jerusalem, the dwelling place of God and mankind together, will have God for its light. The splendor will be unbelievable to mortal eyes, but when that time comes we'll be immortal together with Jesus, inheriting all this as God's adopted children and Jesus' adopted brothers and sisters. So what's new about them . . . EVERYTHING! Which verse talks about the end of pain and sorrow? Isaiah 65:19 Which verse mentions instant communication? Isaiah 65:24 Which verse illustrates the peace of this Kingdom? Isaiah 65:25

Q3. (Isaiah 63:7-64:12) What is the basis of Israel’s expectation of salvation according to this prophecy? The only appeal Israel can make to God for salvation is that He is their Maker and therefore their Father. This prophecy effectively throws Israel on God's mercy and compassion as would a child to its father after punishment for wrongdoing. Even after punishing his child, a father still loves him/her . . . or at least a good father does. What does 64:5-7 teach us about the quality of our righteousness? Our own righteousness is as filthy rags. We can't save ourselves by doing the right thing because we're really incapable of that. We all fall far short of being righteous enough. How are we to see our relationship to God according to 63:16 and 64:8-9? God is our Father and we are His children. We appeal to God as our Father to have mercy on us. What does this passage teach about grace? We totally rely on God's grace because we can do nothing of ourselves to effect our own salvation. The ultimate act of grace on God's part was to send His only begotten Son to pay the penalty for sin that we are incapable of ever paying ourselves. He did this while we were yet sinners and undeserving of such grace.

Q2. (Isaiah 62) The Jewish people have been humbled, scorned, and persecuted through the ages. According this passage, what will be their final state? At the time of Jesus' return and thereafter the Jewish people will be blessed by God. It will be a never ending golden age. Will Christians be included in these blessings? (Hint: Romans 11:11-24). Yes. Christians are adopted into God's family through their belief and faith in Jesus Christ. If God has purposed to restore his people, why is intercessory prayer called for in 62:6-7? God chooses to work through the prayers of the saints, the believers. He calls for the faithful (here the watchmen) to pray for the things God has purposed to do, to be done. Where in the New Testament are we told to pray for what God has purposed? (Hint: the Lord’s Prayer). Well, thanks for giving us the answer, Pastor Ralph! Seriously: throughout the New Testament, Paul and other writers ask for prayer to support their endeavours. God had purposed to use Paul and the other Church founders to build His Church. But He still expects the believers to pray to Him and ask HIm to help and support those He has annointed to the task. And yes, the Lord's Prayer kicks off with us asking God to bring about His Kingdom and for His will to be done on earth as it is in Heaven.

Q1. (Isaiah 61:1-3) Are words like “captive” and “prisoner” used literally or figuratively? In a way, both literally and figuratively. When Isaiah wrote this, he was prophesying about both Jesus' ministry and the second coming. We humans are captives and prisoners of sin and we need Jesus to free us from that. At times also, Christians could be held captive because of their faith and at the second coming they will be physically released. How did Jesus intend them to be understood when he read them and spoke of their fulfillment? Jesus' mission was a spiritual mission, to free the world from its bondage to sin. He didn't free any captives or prisoners in the physical sense, but He accomplished His mission in providing freedom for anyone who believed in Him from their captivity to sin in the world. Jesus also, by His sacrificial death and resurrection, heals the brokenhearted and releases from darkness those held in bondage to the dark powers of the spiritual realm. And let's not overlook His preaching of Good News to the poor. In His time on earth Jesus ministered mainly to the ordinary people, the poor and needy . .the sinners! Remember His words to the people who criticized Him for doing that: People who are well do not need a doctor . . . But Jesus came to the people who did need Him, right where they lived! How are you personally doing in adopting Jesus’ agenda here? I don't have much, but I do what I can. How is your congregation doing? Don't belong to a congregation at present.

Q6. (Isaiah 58:13-14) In these verses what positive actions align themselves with a true keeping the Sabbath? The prophet tells us to delight in the Sabbath, to enjoy the time of rest and to contemplate God. We should honor God on the Sabbath and not just do no work. The whole do no work thing is about not pursuing your own interests and agendas. I mean, if you're in business maybe you can't work on a Sunday because that's the way it is with other business houses being closed etc, but if you stay at home and formulate your business plan or work actively on your business on Sunday even though you're doing it at home and not officially open for business, you're still pursuing your own interest and agenda. I fully realize I'm condemning myself by writing this. What negative actions should be avoided in a true keeping of the Sabbath? Isaiah talks about going our own way, doing as we please, and . . surprisingly to me at least, idle talk. Sitting around shooting the breeze is something we should avoid on the Sabbath . . . apparenlty. In all the times I've read Isaiah I must have missed that one every time. Like a lot of people I often have to work Sundays. Professional musicians who make their living performing have a limited window of opportunity to actually perform . . . Friday night, Saturday afternoon and/or night, and Sunday afternoon. That's it. Occasionally Thursday night work becomes available and even Wednesday work happens for the lucky few. Monday and Tuesday? Only if you're so consistently lucky you can put your hand into a bucket of manure and pull out a gold watch! So Monday is the day I do as little as possible. I sleep off the weekend. Three days of touring and doing it with insufficient sleep each night a lot of the time means it's very hard to get my head off the pillow at the best of times on Monday mornings.

Q5. (Isaiah 58:9b-10a) In what ways are people injured by backbiting, judgmental attitudes, and harsh criticism? When the criticism isn't true it will drive people away. Sometimes folks never fully recover from the hurtfull things people say about them. If we do need to criticise someone we need to do it firstly to them and not to everyone BUT them, and we need to do it in love. How are they injured by false accusations and slander? Speaking purely personally here, a person can be scarred for life by false accusations and slander if it's severe enough. I've had my business ruined completely by that. Fair enough it wasn't Christians who did it, but it was still done. Spreading false accusations to gain an advantage over someone in business is a contemptible way to conduct business. Even at Church I've seen people ruin someone's reputation to enbance their own. How can we change our church cultures to banish this kind of behavior? I wouldn't know where to start. I've seen congregations come under the conviction of the Holy Spirit and superficially repent for the backbiting that was going on, only to see it re-emerge a few weeks later. What would it require of us to really “spend ourselves in behalf of the hungry”? That too is a foreign concept for most church congregations. I have seen that in action back in the early 1970s at a church I attended back then. The pastor, his wife, and his friends lived on the smell of an oily rag while helping up to 15 people at a time who were homeless, coming off drugs, etc, and all living at the manse! That guy knew all about spending ourselves in behalf of the hungry. What would this look like for an individual? For a congregation? I'll use that church alluded to above because it's the only one I ever saw do that. It was like what I imagined the early Church would be like. Every one pitching in and helping everyone else. Bearing each other's burdens and praying for those in need as well as providing very real physical support in a selfless loving way.

Q4. (Isaiah 58:6-7) What kinds of injustice does Isaiah condemn in these verses? Letting the poor and needy go hungry, exploiting employees, not helping the homeless. What excuses do we use to rationalize not being generous to the poor – in our communities or in our families? I suppose some would say they just can't afford it. Some would say they made their bed, they have to lie in it. There are lots of rationalizations people use to absolve themselves of their social responsibility. I've heard people blame the poor for being poor. Then there are whole countries that beglect their own poor. The one's whose religion teaches reincarnation for starters. If you're well off and born into privelege you must have been a good person in your previous life. If you're scraping a living off the rubbish tip you must have been a bad person in your previous life. They leave the poor to their own devices because they reckon they're just getting what they deserve. Then it's up to Christian missionaries to pick up the slack, like Mother Theresa. In what ways is “tough love” important to help people? Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach him to fish for himself and you've enabled him to feed himself for many days. It's easier to give a man a fish than to take the time to teach him and help him. That sort of tough live is hard on the lover as well as the lovee (is that a word?) Some people need to be tough loved otherwise they just keep on holding out their hands for . . . handouts. In what ways could it hurt them? Sometimes tough love can be too tough. We have to be sensitive to how the recipient of our tough love is responding. It never hurts to give someone a hug when they need it.

Q3. (Isaiah 57:15) What things do we learn about God in this verse? We learn that God is with the humble and contrite people who call on Him for help and who desire Him to be their portion. What is the great paradox here? We have the great Creator of Heaven and Earth willing to live with (in the form of His Holy Spirit) the humblest people who, by the world's standards would be beneath His notice. Jesus once said: "I thank you Father that you have shown the unlearned what you have hidden from the wise and learned. Yes, that is how you want it to be." God is no respecter of persons. All the worldly knowledge we can attain in our own strength won't advance us in the Kingdom of God. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Why does God care so much about the downtrodden and the contrite? Because He is a God of love. Right through the Old Testament, in the prophetic writings there is a theme that God is pleased when His people care for the widows, orphans, aliens, etc, that are left behind in the social system. Do you and your congregation care for the downtrodden and contrite with the same intensity? I don't currently belong to a congregation. When I did, I must say they picked and chose whom they'd care for. With a wife and an 8 year old daughter to support, I was made redundant from my truck driving job that I'd had for 15 years. The pastor came to me the Sunday after that happened and asked me if I'd gotten a redundancy payout and I said yes. He literally turned his back on me a walked away! . . . in haste I might add. When when I got another job straight away, I'd been working there only 7 weeks and tore the bicep tendon off the bone in my left shoulder. In Australia we drive on the left side of the road and my left arm is my gear jammin' arm. I couldn't drive. No one offered to assist me in getting an alternative job. No one offered my wife an office job. Yet a guy who DIDN'T have long hair and a beard lost HIS job and the whole church family rallied to get him another job within a week! That's all I'm gonna say about that. I've forgiven that congregation in Christ but I wouldn't go back there.

Q2. (Isaiah 56:2) Why does keeping a sacred day of rest honor God? Well, for starters it's the fourth of the Ten Commandments. Christians practice this different ways: (1) Sabbath worship and rest, (2) Sunday worship and rest, (3) Sunday worship, no rest, or (4) no worship, no rest. Which of the various options might best honor God? (1) and (2) each honor God. The choice of the rest day is a denominational option. Which of these might dishonor God? No worship, no rest. In our time, today, things are going on 24/7. We have to work weekends sometimes as a matter of course. I remember various Christian sports persons many years ago who refused to play their sport on Sundays. I'm going out on a limb here and saying that instead of being a witness for Jesus by doing that, they opened up Christians to ridicule because the world in general didn't understand the whole Sabbath concept even though in those days many more people attended Church than do today. It's very rare for even devout Christians to actually do nothing in pursuit of their own interests on the Sabbath. I forget where it's written in the Bible, but the pursuit of your own interests on the Sabbath was something God spoke against through one of the prophets. That was how God viewed breaking the Sabbath law. Which of these keep the spirit of one “who keeps the Sabbath without desecrating it”? Options (1) and (2) keep the letter of the law. Keeping the spirit of the law could involve taking time on Sunday to worship God without actually resting completely for the rest of the day. As I wrote above, in our modern world we sometimes have to work on the weekends just to keep our jobs. I know I have to. As a musician I work when EVERYONE else is not working. It's just what I have to do. This lifestyle is something I have to work around as a Christian. My contact with people and the opportunity to interact with them as a light in the black, so to speak, happens on the weekends.It's actually a very lonely life, the way of the itinerant touring Bluesman. What I do is to have my devotional first thing every day. "Seek first God's Kingdom and His righteousness and all these things (daily requirementsof food, clothing, etc) will be added unto you." Thanfully Pastor Ralph has provided me a way to do this by offering his online Bible studies which I have been using now for a few years. Over my morning coffee I do my daily Bible study, then go about my day. It's not ideal but it'll have to do. I worked a day job when I was able to, before work injuries ended that as an option for me and I was led into music as a career but The Lord Himself. Whether I'll always play bars and clubs remains to be seen.

Q1. (Isaiah 56:3-8) What is the significance of God’s welcome of believing and ethical foreigners and eunuchs to full status in his temple? This is a fulfillment of the promise God made to Abraham in that He would bless the whole earth through him. Even though the Israelites are God's chosen people, He always meant to bless the whole world through them. What are the implications of that for the church? If God accepts anyone who comes in faith, we should too. Incidentally, I disagree that God accepts people who continue in sexual orientation that is contrary to Biblical principles. If a homosexual or a paedophile comes to Christ they MUST be counseled unto repentance. If that requires a life of celebacy after conversion, isn't that better than going to hell? If they continue to attend church and continue in their perverse ways they should be asked to leave. That's a hard line stance, but a Biblical one nonetheless. Who does your congregation tend to exclude from its fellowship – if not explicitly, then by emphasis and focus? At the moment I don't have a congregation. But I remember clearly when I got divorced I asked my best friend who was a cabler with a major telco company to cable my new residence for the internet. He did the job and then couldn't wait to leave before he caught divorce off me. There seems to be more prejudice against divorced people than many others. It's like: Oh dear! Jim's divorced. My marriage isn't anything to write home about either. I better stear clear of him in case I catch divorce as well. You find out who your friends are. You have none. What could you do about this? Lead by example and fellowship with people even though they don't meet your high standards of exactly what a Christian should look like and act like. I stopped attending a Presbyterian Bible study group because a couple of old guys knocked me continuously for being a Rock and Blues musician. For them it was classcial or nothing. I don't need THAT kind of fellowship.

Q2. What inherent rights does a Potter, Creator, or Maker have over what he has created? He has the right to use what He has created for whatever suits His purpose. How should that effect our lives, our self-image, our sense of purpose? Well, it should keep us humble for starters. In the book of James we're told to rejoice if God lifts us up AND when He brings us low. God isn't beholden to any man. If we're in a position of privelege it's because of the grace of God. He's allowed us to prosper, or helped us to prosper, and if that's the case we owe it to God to use such a priveleged postion to further His Kingdom. If we're not so well off, we still owe our very existence to God and should be available for Him to work through us.

Q1. (Isaiah 45:9-12) Why is it ridiculous for a pot to second-guess the Potter? Even if the pot was granted sentience and could question the potter, it has no right to do that. What the potter makes is his business and the pot is just the result. How do we Christians do this? We do this in so many ways it beggars the imagination. Too often we regard God as a genie who will do for us what we want if we ask it in Jesus' name. We also try to tell God how we want our prayers answered. We complain bitterly to God whenever things don't go our way. What is a better attitude and behavior before our Creator? We need to keep in mind that we're here to do God's will and not the other way around.

Q5. (Isaiah 53) Which single New Testament passage best sums up for you the lessons of Isaiah 53? Why did you chose this passage? (Select from Matthew 26:38-42; Luke 22:37; John 1:29; Romans 3:24-26; 2 Corinthians 5:20-21; 1 Peter 2:24-25; 1 Peter 3:18; Philippians 2:5-11 – or any other passage you can think of.) Of the passages suggested, 1 Peter 2:24-25 best sums it up, I think.

Q4. (Isaiah 53) In addition to our sins, the Servant also bears the punishment deserved by sinners. In what sense, if any, did Jesus bear the punishment due you when he died on the cross? Jesus didn't just die from natural causes. He was flogged nearly to death first! He was bruised for my iniquities and pierced for my transgressions. The chastisement that brought me peace was upon Him. By His wounds, inflicted on Him at His crucifixion I am healed. In addition, His death was the punishment I deserved for my life's sins. Jesus was raised to life again by God the Father and as a result of my belief in and acceptance of that sacrificial gift I too will be raised to life in the Kingdom of God. I don't deserve that but God provided it anyway.

Q3. (Isaiah 53) Isaiah 53 teaches what theologians call “the substitutionary atonement.” In what sense does the Servant act as a substitute to bear our sins? Put it in your own words. Just as sin and death entered the world through the actions of one man, Adam, so forgiveness and eternal life have been procured by the actions of one man, Jesus. God made Him the perfect sacrifice to atone for the multitudinous sins of the entire human race. Without the shedding of blood there is no remission of sin. God instituted that long ago. But the blood of animals is not sufficient to fully buy total forgiveness, once and for all. God paid the penalty He Himself had declared was necessary in the body of His only Son. Only the sacrifice of a completely sinless man can accomplish true lasting forgiveness. That man is God the Son, Jesus Himself who was God in human form.