Tina

Our lives and words should be presented as holiness before the world because we have God as our father living within us. When we use God's Name in vain, we dishonour and disrespect the meaning of His Name. We should respect Him, honour Him and magnify Him with deep intensity and sincerity

We should still pray because prayer is about fellowship with our Lord. In order for us to develop as mature Christians, we need to spend more time in the presence of the Lord and speak to Him, getting things off our chest, telling Him about our worries and hurts and thanking Him because He has listened to us. We should also hear His voice as well. That is true two way conversation. We do talk for our own edification and encouragement because we hear our words, we can quote God's word to Him and we feel stronger in Him because we know that what we said, (our burdens, etc), has been left at the cross

We are told to pray in secret because it is then only between God and ourselves and there is no chance to show off in our eloquence or let others hear what we have to say in order to gain recognition. Public prayer with vain repetitions and a wrong attitude will hinder the work of the Holy Spirit. Flowery prayers are not always from the heart. Sometimes short, honest, everyday speech prayers will be more beneficial

I need to give to the poor with a heart of love, understanding and a willingness to help them wherever I can. In other words, I need to treat the poor as I would treat the Lord. I prefer not to give money as I'm not sure if some of the poor would use this to buy alcohol, for instance. I would rather buy them something to eat, and more,,,,spend time with them, witness and pray for them. Sometimes we don't give to the poor because we feel they should be doing something to earn money. We often neglect to think about their possible circumstances that may have held them back from doing this, e.g. ill health, addictions, out of work, etc It's not a good enough reason. If we don't try to help them until their problems can be sorted out, we will be witholding giving something to God as well.

We are to do things, e.g. fasting, praying, giving to the poor in secret with God, not openly for others to see. The antidote for pride is to spend more secret time with God. It is in these times we are free to receive His word, and listen to what He has to say to us, without being bombarded by "audiences" who see our good works They may print that person's name and photo for everyone else to see or they may manipulate them by telling them they will only put a plaque in their name if they give a certain amount or more.

V. 48 to 45 speaks about love. We are to be Christ like in our thinking and in our living. We need to grow in Christ so as not to be babes drinking the milk, but eating meat instead. Sinless perfection is what we aim for though we will never be perfect on earth. We aim to live in a state of confessed sin and not deliberately sinning over again

Yes, when we are being physically attacked, when we are face to face with danger in the form of gangs, intruders, etc

Love others as you love and care for yourself

Jesus is showing us to have love and mercy instead of retaliation. It would be evil if we sought revenge. This should be taken as an example not literally.

The purpose of the law was to fit the crime to the punishment, not for personal retaliation but in the judicial system.

It means to be open, honest, to the point and final. This has a positive impact on others and they see the truth of our lives lived before them as a testimony

Be loving and understanding. Be a good listener and don't judge them, regardless of what went wrong in the marriage. As a body of Christ, we should be aware of the hurt in the other members and in order for His body to function effectively, we should be there for the hurting and depressed people by spending quality time with them, praying with them, offering counselling from God's word and interceding for them as well. God wants us to serve each other.

I believe that if that person confesses, God forgives and the second marriage can be blessed by God No, it is better to be separated than to get together for the sake of pleasing God. Pleasing God and doing His will should come from the heart, not because of any other motive Confession of any sins as a result of the divorce will enable people to have a clean start with God.

Because they probably liked the idea of having their own freedom of choice and not be limited by laws. I don't think they misunderstood any of these teachings. They were probably also trying to find an easy way out in the event of something going wrong in their marriages.

Divorce was never a commandment. It was allowed. Divorce was allowed by Jesus because people's hearts were hardened and they would probably have walked out on each other and there would be no divorce papers signed, to say that the man or woman was free to marry again. God's original plan was for married couples to be united as one flesh and not taken asunder, in other words, not divorced.

NO, people don't need to be Christians to be joined together as one flesh although the Bible says we should not be unequally yoked. Joining the two would probably be a natural law. 100% of couples of opposite sexes have been declared by God to be joined together

Jesus would have sided with Rabbi Shammai because he believed that divorce could be granted in cases of unfaithfulness and not for any reason, however petty. Divorce is granted for unfaithfulness. This related to Deuteronomy in that God's rule was that unfaithfulness could be the one cause for couples to divorce.

**** is serious because it is the stepping stone to adultery, which is sex outside of marriage and God forbids this. Agape love helps us to have the love and mindset of Christ for members of the same sex instead of ****.

Firstly I would stand on the word of God and use scripture to show my brother that ***********, which is sexual **** and addiction, is wrong. I would then pray with him and rebuke these things that come against him in the Name of Jesus and ask him to ask the Lord for forgiveness. I would also adviser him to do the practical things such as getting rid of all tempting materials and objects in his home, block the 900 numbers, don't download offensive material on the net, and continue therapy with a Christian counsellor if he still finds it difficult to get through this on his own.

*********** violated the women who are used as sexual objects. Morals are lowered and this can lead to lawlessness in many other areas as for e.g. *********** is criminal. Young children are abused, women are raped and men demand more perversive *********** to satisfy their cravings. It breaks up homes, causes suffering to people with life long consequences in a lot of cases. Going to prostitutes is wrong because not only is it sex outside of marriage, but women are used as objects and **** is involved instead of the love and natural sexual desire between a man and wife.,

God-given sexual desire is natural when it involves a married man and his wife. Forbidden **** is wrong because it is adultery or sexual immorality outside of marriage.

Adultery and **** are similar in that the desires of the flesh are involved. Adultery is the act of that **** carried out, **** is the leading steps to what could become the act. **** breaks the tenth commandment in that whatever you covet of your neighbours is sin.

The theme is to live by the law of Christ, i.e. to forgive those who have wronged us and to seek reconciliation, even if they haven't wronged us because there should be no dissention between people. We should also love others as we love ourselves. If we do this then we are returning love for anger, patience for impatience, peace for factions, meekness for pride and so on.

Settling out of court in this parable means that we should settle any outstanding debt so that we are not accountable to anyone for anything loaned. Today, it refers more to sin that has not been settled with Jesus, in other words, we owe Jesus our repentance because the debt He paid for us remains outstanding otherwise. We should settle with people we have wronged or those who have wronged us. In today's terms as well, we should settle with God and leave our sin at the cross and be reconciled to Him. Settling means reconciliation - wiping out the old slate and starting a new one with no debt or sin outstanding. We should settle for financial reasons because we could land up in a small claims court and we should settle with God so that we have no unconfessed sin in our lives.

We can't worship God whilst there is something that needs to rectified between him and the us because God sees the inner parts as being dirty due to unconfessed sin, yet we wear a white, pure mask in front of the world. He wants us to get rid of the obstacle in our lives that keep us from effective worship, keep us from the working of the Spirit within our lives and keep us from closeness to God. If there is something that needs to resolved, we need to try to mend it with the other person by asking forgiveness. Sometimes even if we don't feel that we caused the problem, we should aplogise because it may even draw that person close to God when they see our Christian character in action. If we can't resolve a situation, as long as we have tried to mend the breach, hand it over to God if the other person doesn't want to meet you halfway and continues to try to make you feel wronged. Confess your sin before God as well. Whatever the negative outcome, don't hold a grudge. It only sets you back and you won't feel liberated