Wednesday Evening Bible Study 6/14/06

I just wanted to say what a blessing that Bible study is to me. Today I was pondering for awhile whether I would stay for it or not because I really needed to catch up on sleep, and get stuff done. But I stayed for it, and I thank God that I did. We talked about prayer. And at one point we were talking about the part of the Lord's Prayer where it says, "And forgive us our debts and we forgive our debtors," and then how after the prayer Jesus says that if don't forgive our debtors, God won't forgive us our sins. The question was brought up, would we have been in the same place we are physically and spiritually if we had not made the mistakes we had made? You know, what would've happened if we had done what we knew the Lord wanted us to do? Would we have lost more by not falling into sin then we did by falling into the sin? You know? Considering where we are now, what did we lose by messing up?

You know, we'll never know what we missed out on. Which I think is a good thing, because the Lord would not let us "miss out" by following Him and not falling into sin. And in the end Preston made the point that, when we're brought back to God, it doesn't matter anymore, what's past is past. He said, "When you totally mess up and get to a place you were not meant to be, was something lost? Sure! Was the greatest thing lost? No, never. God really wants us to have the greatest thing, which is a relationship with Him." And you know, it's a waste of time to debate what things would've been like if we hadn't sinned. Yeah, God does use mistakes, and that doesn't mean He wants us to make them -- but, considering the past, it's the past. It's done. What matters is whether or not you have that relationship with God. In the end that's all that matters. "It's who you know, not what you know" that matters in the end.

Then, totally different subject almost, we started talking about how we had had division on some things, like whether or not you could lose your salvation, and then we questioned whether it was really important and needed to be talked about, because it was kind of causing some friction, you know? And, again Preston made a very good point, that I agree with: "I think these things do matter, but they're so low on the list, there are so many things that are more important," and I definately don't think God wants there to be division in the family over such things as that. "A house devided against itself cannot stand." Man, Preston said a lot of good stuff tonight. He makes a good leader. (He was the leader tonight because Dr. J. had gone home for some much needed family time). So yeah. It was worth staying up late, yet again, to rave about all this stuff.

Lord, I pray that You would continue to bless this Bible study, continue to teach us all, plus those who were not able to make it tonight, and please, let the sleep I get to be what I need, no matter how little it is. Amen.