Participants:
Series Code: SSP
Program Code: SSP180045A
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00:30 Hello, I'm Shelley Quinn, and we welcome you to
00:34 3ABN Sabbath School Panel. 00:36 We're very excited - this is a wonderful Quarterly! 00:40 We are studying, "Oneness in Christ," 00:42 so far we have talked about... "Creation and Fall," 00:45 "Causes of Disunity," "That They May All Be One," 00:50 "The Key to Unity," "The Experience 00:51 of Unity in the Early Church," 00:53 and today we will talk about "Images of Unity." 00:57 We're very happy that you have joined us, 00:59 and we hope you have your Bible and a pen and paper... 01:02 And hope you also have the Sabbath School Quarterly 01:07 with you - if you do not, you can go to your local 01:11 Adventist Church, visit with them - they will be happy 01:14 to give you one of these Quarterlies, 01:16 and even study with you OR if you want to download 01:19 this to your computer, iPad or phone, just go to: 01:22 ABSG.Adventist.org 01:26 so you can really study along with us. 01:29 Well, it is my great privilege to introduce my brothers 01:32 and sisters who are making up this panel today. 01:36 To my left I have Brother John Dinzey - Pastor 01:39 we're so glad you're with us - It's a blessing to be here. 01:41 Oh and we're very thrilled, 01:43 Mollie is able to be back with us again today and 01:46 we always love your teaching, Mollie - Thank you, thank you. 01:50 And our dear Sister Jill Morikone who is also 01:54 general manager of 3ABN, thank you for being 01:57 here - Thank you. And my own pastor, 01:59 Pastor John Lomacang. 02:01 What I would like to do, Brother Johnny, 02:04 we always like to start with prayer, 02:07 how would you like to have the prayer for us. Oh, sure. 02:09 Our Loving Heavenly Father, We come before you in 02:13 Jesus name and we ask, Lord, that You will be with us, 02:16 that You will bless us with Your Holy Spirit.. 02:18 that we may speak Your words. And Heavenly Father, we also 02:22 ask that You will bless all those that are joining us 02:24 wherever they may be. We pray for Your holy angels 02:27 to draw near to them and draw their minds to search the 02:31 Scriptures - that they also may be blessed. 02:34 We pray, Father, for a blessing upon all, 02:36 and we ask for these blessings. 02:38 In Jesus Holy and blessed name, Amen, Amen. 02:42 Haven't you been enjoying this study, and especially, you know 02:46 if there's anything that the church needs today, 02:48 it is unity because when we are united, we reflect 02:55 the love, the light and the life of Jesus Christ. 02:58 Well this lesson, we are going to look at "Images of Unity," 03:02 that are presented to us in the Bible and our memory text is 03:06 from 1 Corinthians 12:12, that says, "For as the body 03:11 is one and has many members, but all the members of that 03:16 one body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ." 03:23 So what is it saying - Christ is the head of the church, 03:26 the body of Christ is the church, many, many members. 03:30 You know, the Bible is filled with symbols and images 03:34 that point to something greater than what they're actually 03:39 referring to and when we think about the Old Testament, 03:42 God had them build a sanctuary so that He could 03:46 dwell among them and the sanctuary was theology 03:51 in physical form and we have all of these beautiful 03:54 symbols and images, but what did they point to? 03:57 What did everything about the sanctuary point to? 04:01 To Jesus Christ... so what we find is that there's different 04:06 symbols and images in our study that we'll look at today. 04:12 For example, sometimes the Holy Spirit is referred to as wind... 04:16 That makes sense because in the Old Testament 04:20 "ruach" was spirit and in the New Testament it's "pneuma." 04:24 Both mean "breath" or "wind" or "spirit." 04:27 And in John 3:8, it says, this is Jesus speaking... 04:31 "The wind blows where it wishes, you hear the sound of it, 04:34 but cannot tell where it comes from or where it goes. 04:38 So is everyone who is born of the Spirit." 04:41 So we see wind and Spirit are associated. 04:45 And then in John 7, again Jesus speaking in verses 37-39... 04:50 It says... "On the last day, the great day of the feast, 04:54 Jesus stood and cried out, saying, "If anyone thirsts 04:58 let him come to Me..." 04:59 "He who believes in Me, as the Scripture hath said, 05:03 out of his belly will flow... (out of his heart) will flow 05:08 streams of living water, and it says, "This He spoke 05:13 concerning the Spirit." 05:15 So we see now "water" is used as a symbol of the Holy Spirit. 05:20 And in Matthew 3:11, John the Baptist said that 05:26 "I baptize you with water, He'll baptize you 05:30 with the Holy Spirit and fire." 05:33 So we see fire and when the Holy Spirit fell on them at 05:36 Pentecost, it was with tongues of fire - so we see that 05:40 as a symbol as well. 05:42 And God even said through Jeremiah or to Jeremiah, 05:45 "Is not My word like a fire, it's like a hammer that 05:50 breaks the rocks into pieces." 05:52 So the Bible uses various terms to describe the unity 05:59 that the New Testament Church has. 06:01 It says that, "We are the household of God," 06:04 you know, we're living stones. 06:06 We're the temple of the Holy Spirit; 06:08 we're the body of Christ. 06:10 It refers to us as "sheep," and Him as the Shepherd, 06:16 and I'm laughing because if anybody has ever herded sheep, 06:19 you know you gotta be smarter than the sheep! 06:22 And, sheep can be pretty stubborn little critters, 06:25 but combined all of these symbols and images 06:29 what they represent is the church's relationship 06:33 to God; the members' relationship to one another, 06:38 and the church's relationship to the community as a whole. 06:42 So God is calling us to manifest this unity to the world. 06:48 And in this week's lesson, we're going to look 06:50 at some of those images and what they reveal 06:53 about the unity of the body of Christ. 06:56 So Sunday is: "The People of God" 07:01 We're going to look at the special status 07:03 of the people of God. 07:05 We'll begin with 1 Peter 2:9, Peter writes saying... 07:10 "You are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, 07:16 a holy nation, his own special people, (for what purpose?) 07:21 that you may proclaim the praises of Him who 07:25 called you out of darkness into His marvelous light..." 07:30 In the Greek, "chosen generation" is literally 07:35 "an elect race," we are spiritual Israel 07:40 through the new birth - that is who we are as a corporate 07:46 unity. 07:47 "A royal priesthood," who is our king? 07:50 Jesus Christ is the King, and collectively, the church... 07:56 we are a company of priests who are called to offer up 08:01 spiritual sacrifices of praise and worship. 08:05 This is a supreme privilege, but we're also to do 08:09 the intermediary work as a priest; working, praying 08:13 for others, bringing them... you know, among the nations, 08:17 this is what the purpose of the church is, but what is Peter... 08:21 Turn to Exodus 19:4-6... because we see when Peter 08:26 is saying, "You're a chosen generation," he is 08:31 referencing an Old Testament Scripture - one that I love... 08:35 Exodus 19:4-6, and what I love about this passage is 08:41 it shows the covenant love of God. 08:44 Listen to what He says - this is before He even speaks 08:48 the Ten Commandments to His people. 08:50 He has opened the Red Sea; they have passed through, 08:53 they're out at the foot of Mount Sinai. 08:56 And listen to what He says... "You have seen what I did 09:01 to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings 09:05 and brought you to Myself. ( boy, this is covenant 09:09 love language - He saved them before He even spoke 09:15 the Ten commandments to them) 09:16 And He says, "Now therefore, if you will indeed (they're 09:21 saved - they're out of Egypt) ... if you will indeed 09:24 obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be 09:30 a special treasure to Me above all people; 09:34 for all the earth is Mine. And you shall be to Me a 09:37 kingdom of priests and a holy nation." 09:39 (sounding familiar - do we see where Peter gets this from?) 09:43 These are the words which you 09:45 shall speak to the children of Israel." 09:48 So now turn to Revelation 1 and we'll look at verses 5-6 09:53 because we see that the privileges and responsibilities 09:57 of Israel in the Old Testament had been transferred 10:01 to the church - now all of us united - Jews, Gentiles, 10:07 no race barriers - now we are all that holy nation 10:12 in the kingdom of priests. 10:14 And this is Jesus speaking in Revelation 1:5... 10:18 It says, "...from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, 10:21 the firstborn from the dead, the ruler over the kings 10:24 of the earth. To Him who loved us and washed us 10:26 from our sins in His own blood, He has made us 10:30 kings (and it's John speaking, but he's talking of Jesus) 10:34 He has made us what? Kings and priests to His 10:39 God and Father, to Him be glory and dominion 10:43 forever and ever. Amen." 10:44 So halleluiah! We are a chosen generation, 10:49 a royal priesthood - what does it mean to be a holy nation? 10:53 What does it mean to be holy? 10:55 To be holy means to be set aside for God's purposes, 11:00 so He is saying that not only He has separated us from sin, 11:05 but He has separated us to worship the one true God. 11:10 And, you know, we're not separated by boundaries. 11:16 I think someone said this, I think it was you, John, 11:19 and I feel the same way or maybe it was you, Johnny, 11:22 that in a previous lesson you mentioned that as we 11:27 travel around the world to speak, no matter where we go, 11:31 we find part of our church. 11:34 We would go to an Adventist Church anywhere in the world, 11:38 and there's this common unity and there's family, I mean, 11:42 immediately you walk into the place filled with strangers, 11:46 but they're your brothers and sisters in Christ, 11:49 and we're a holy nation... this overcomes cultural 11:53 and the language barriers. 11:55 His own special people! 11:57 Now the King James version says... "peculiar people," 12:00 but it's not peculiar in the means of strange. 12:05 The literal Greek here, when it says "His own special people," 12:09 it means we are a people, we are God's possession. 12:15 See, you are bought with a price, you were bought with 12:19 the precious life-blood of Jesus Christ and that makes 12:24 you God's possession. 12:26 In Isaiah 43:20-21, God is talking about giving waters 12:32 in the wilderness, rivers in the desert and He says... 12:35 "To give drink to My people, My chosen and He says, 12:41 "This people I have formed for Myself 12:43 that they shall declare My praise." 12:46 And we were called out of darkness into His marvelous 12:50 light, you know - you have to agree, we walked in 12:53 darkness - the darkness was also in us - was it not? 12:57 So we are children of the light; 13:00 we are to walk as children of the light. 13:03 That means we should have a holy and useful life; 13:07 a life with purpose to serve God. 13:10 And this is something that if you don't 13:14 know what your purpose is... and you may be sitting at 13:17 home and you say, "I'm too old to go out and serve God." 13:21 You know what the greatest ministry is? 13:24 It is the ministry of intercession because that is 13:27 the ministry of our risen and exalted Savior - He stands 13:31 at the right hand of the Father making intercession 13:34 for us - so this is something that you can do. 13:38 Now when God brought His people... and I'm going to have 13:42 to skip through some of this. 13:45 When God chose the people of Israel to be His own 13:52 special... Did He do it because they were special? 13:55 No, the reason He did it, Deuteronomy 7:6-9... 13:59 God tells us why, He says... "The Lord did not set His 14:04 love on you, (this is verse 7) nor choose you because 14:08 you were more in number than any other people 14:10 for you were the least of all the people, but because 14:15 the Lord loves you." Amen! 14:18 So He looked down in love and He chose a group of people 14:24 that - they weren't supposed to be separated to themselves, 14:27 just huddled together, keeping all of these wonderful 14:30 covenant blessings to themselves and the 14:32 wonderful truths. 14:34 You know, there's nothing worse than seeing a church 14:36 that doesn't grow; there's nothing worse than 14:38 seeing a church where people are just coming together 14:41 and it's like a little country club or something 14:44 and they don't reach out to others. 14:47 He brought them, He selected them so that they could go out 14:53 and spread His light, that they could reflect 14:58 His love, light and life in the community and that they 15:02 could introduce people to the promised Messiah, 15:08 the promise of the Messiah. 15:10 And God is calling us today to do the same thing, 15:15 we are the body of Christ and that means we are His 15:19 expression here on earth to others. Pastor Johnny... 15:24 Praise the Lord! You know, it's truly a blessing 15:27 to be here in the Sabbath School Panel because you 15:29 get to hear how the Lord has instructed others 15:34 that are on the panel! Yes, Amen! 15:36 It's a blessing to hear all these wonderful things. 15:38 And I have the portion for Monday's lesson and it is 15:43 entitled, "The Household of God," 15:46 a very interesting title. 15:47 And when you think about the word "household," 15:50 a household is defined as a house and the occupants 15:55 that are in it and regarded as a unit. 15:58 And Paul uses this word, "household," at least it's 16:02 translated as "household" in English. 16:05 We'd like to ask you to follow us in the Scriptures in 16:09 1 Peter 2, we have the Scripture 16:15 that we'd like to share with you... 16:17 1 Peter 2, and I'm going to begin reading in verse 4, 16:21 and this is what the Bible tells us... "Coming to Him 16:24 as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men, 16:30 but chosen by God and precious," 16:33 but you also, as living stones, are being built up a 16:39 spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up 16:43 spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ." 16:48 I'd like to stop there for a moment... 16:50 And so we have here a continuing of what you were 16:53 sharing about priesthood and Jesus is a lively stone, 16:59 and we are said to be lively stones here. 17:02 You know, you think normally a stone is... well, it's 17:04 just a stone - it's dead, you know. 17:05 People kick it around, people throw it, 17:08 but the Bible uses a "lively stone," 17:11 and a spiritual house and we are a household 17:15 of believers in Christ. 17:17 Now when you think of a stone and a house, 17:21 and today we would say "Well, bricks," you know. 17:24 If you were to build a house and just put bricks 17:27 one on top of the other and you don't put anything 17:29 between them, nothing holds them together... 17:32 And you think of brick and mortar, 17:37 this is helping us to understand that we are united together 17:43 through Jesus Christ and together, we are a 17:46 household of believers. Amen! 17:48 Brothers and sisters in Christ, sons and daughters 17:51 of the Lord, you know, kings, queens, priests, 17:56 holy, holy people - why? Because of Jesus. 18:00 And we are lively stones and what are we to do? 18:04 The Scripture said to us in in verse 5... 18:07 "As living stones, being built up (uses the word 18:12 "being built up)" a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, 18:16 to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable 18:19 to God through Jesus Christ. Amen! 18:21 Now this gets us to the next verse which is verse 6... 18:24 "Therefore it is also contained in the Scriptures, 18:27 "Behold, I lay in Zion a chief cornerstone, elect, 18:33 precious, And he who believes on Him will by no means 18:38 be put to shame. Therefore, to you who believe 18:40 He is precious; (Jesus is precious to us) but to those 18:44 who are disobedient, "The stone which the builders 18:47 rejected has become the chief cornerstone," 18:50 and, verse 8, and a stone of stumbling and a rock of 18:54 offense." So to us, who are believers, 18:57 Jesus is precious, why is Jesus precious? 19:00 Oh man, I could spend a long time talking about this 19:05 because Jesus is precious to us - when you think about 19:07 what He has done for us... to come to this wicked world, 19:12 you know - I remember a few years ago, they were talking 19:18 about - I'll mention the country because this is happening 19:20 practically everywhere now... 19:22 There was a lot of violence taking place in Mexico for a 19:27 while and it was dangerous, it was dangerous! 19:30 And then I remember one speaker saying, "I'm not 19:33 going over there," well because he was thinking 19:36 ..."well, it's dangerous over there." 19:38 But Jesus Christ came to this wicked world, 19:41 a world stained with sin and He lived among us, 19:45 and walked among us... Well, you know, walked among 19:48 us human beings and He lived and suffered and died here. 19:53 When you think about how holy and wonderful He was, 19:57 the praise and adoration of angels and He chose to 20:00 come to this world to save us... that we think the Bible 20:07 describes that all our righteousness 20:08 are as filthy rags. 20:10 But then Jesus takes us, who our righteousness was 20:14 as filthy rags and makes us holy, blameless and undefiled 20:20 because of His precious blood! 20:22 And then, not only that, He brings us in and we become 20:26 part of the family. 20:28 This is something so marvelous to consider that 20:32 anyone and this is something that anyone... 20:34 You know, and I ask you, maybe you're not a Christian yet 20:38 and maybe you haven't come into the household of God, 20:42 and God is inviting you... you know - come! Amen! 20:44 Because Jesus is still seeking to save those that are lost. 20:51 And He uses us, and He's using us here and we hope that you 20:55 will make a decision for Christ as you listen to every 20:57 part of this lesson. 20:58 And so, Jesus Christ is the chief cornerstone; 21:03 Jesus Christ is the lively stone and what is a church 21:07 to do... what is the reason? why does the church exist? 21:10 Why do we exist? Because Jesus Christ is the 21:14 foundation - He is the cornerstone. 21:17 We exist to worship the Lord and to be part of His family. 21:23 And so I am just praising the Lord - when you talk about 21:28 church, when you talk about the building, 21:32 the church is not just a building, the church is the 21:34 believers in it. Amen! 21:36 And when you think about a church, you know, people 21:41 pass by and they see the Thompsonville Seventh-day 21:44 Adventist Church - people pass by, but in here are lively 21:48 stones - people that worship the Lord and we just 21:51 we just need to shine for Jesus. Amen! 21:55 We are to let our light so shine before men, that they 21:58 may see your good works and glorify God in heaven. 22:00 The time has to come when the believers in Christ, 22:04 as they mingle in the world with people, 22:08 and they realize that... "Hey, there's something 22:12 different about you, what is it?" 22:14 "Oh, it's because Jesus is in my heart. 22:18 and He has made a difference in my life." 22:20 That will attract people to Jesus, 22:22 that will draw people and not only this, I come back to 22:25 that Scripture because Jesus said, "By this shall all men 22:29 know that you are My disciples 22:30 if you have love one for another." 22:32 The testimony of the believers being united is an undeniable 22:37 testimony or argument to say... "God has made a difference 22:42 in the life of these people," 22:44 and I just want to encourage you to be a part of God's 22:48 family - the church's agenda is Jesus! Amen! 22:52 To bring Jesus to the world, as the answer to the 22:55 problems of this world. 22:57 You know, you talk about presidents of nations, 23:00 kings of nations, representatives and senators, 23:03 and mayors and governors... they get together 23:07 to try to solve problems, but the solution is Jesus. 23:11 This world needs Jesus and as believers in Christ, 23:14 it is high time, as people say, to awake out of sleep, 23:18 to come together, pray together and bring such a 23:23 picture of Christ to the world that people will be drawn 23:27 to the church. "I need to go there!" 23:29 Those people are happy. 23:30 Those people have peace in the 23:31 midst of the corruption that is in this world. 23:33 These people have something that the world needs, 23:36 and that's one of the strongest arguments that 23:39 we could have for the Christian faith. 23:42 The image of a household is also a very meaningful one. 23:45 The relationships that are among us is to be a 23:50 blessing to the world. 23:52 Not only the picture of the family at home, 23:55 but when we come together, we are one family, 23:59 one household of believers. 24:02 And the lesson is bringing out imagery that we 24:05 need to look at when we talk about unity. 24:07 What does the word "u n i t y" mean? 24:10 What does the word "unity" mean? 24:12 United is like one - a unit is one, so as believers 24:17 we are of one accord through Jesus Christ. 24:20 Jesus Christ brings us together and there's this... 24:23 as Paul says, "There is no Greek, there is no Roman, 24:27 there is no Jew, there is no... Christ unites us, 24:31 and this unity that we have in Christ, again... 24:35 it's an argument to the world that Jesus Christ 24:38 is the solution to this world's problems and through 24:42 Jesus Christ, we have hope... not only do we have hope, 24:46 we have life and peace. Amen and Amen! 24:49 And you know, I always say that the church building 24:53 is a piece of real estate; the church is who 24:57 goes in and out of that building - it is us. 24:59 But we have to take just a short break. 25:02 We'll be back in one minute. 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Revised 2018-11-07