TEACHING AND TRAINING

Good Friday afternoon! Hope you all have had a good week! (Don't you get a kick out of how I talk to you as if there are hundreds. Seeing things as though they were!)

Grab your Bibles and let's get to lookin!

1. Look up the following three verses and read them. What is the topic of all three?
Matthew 4:19
Mark1:17
Luke 5:10

I am going to use the scripture from Mark for our study purposes. The main reason for this is because it says "become". I think if we look through the gospels, we can safely say that few of the disciples, if any of them, immediately became fishers of men.They were trained and taught. Every day, every opportunity, every parable was intended to teach them and us about the Lord Jesus Christ. The Sermon on the Mount, the Lord's Prayer, the Last Supper, all intended to teach and train us in the ways of God. One of the Holy Spirit's many jobs is to teach us (John 14:26, 1 Corinthians 2:13).
In week 2 we talked about training the children we have influence over. We also go through training. I think we can try to follow God and miss the training. My children can follow me but that does mean they are trained to do what I do when they are on their own. Training takes time and effort. Training is painful at times.

2. Look up Hebrews 12:11. Restate it in your own words.

Remember the other day when we were talking about the fruit? Fruit vines require training to grow in a manner that maximizes the yield. We raised watermelons every summer when I was a kid. We planted the seeds in rows. However, the plants tried to grow in a big circle, encompassing the whole area. We had to go back and place the watermelon vines within the row. Those vines had to be trained as to where to go. If they were out of the row, they would be damaged when my dad plowed around them or when we tried to harvest them.
We need to be trained as to the narrow way to walk (Matt. 7:13-14). When the ground around us gets stirred up a little we don't want to get torn up. When the harvest comes, we want to have yielded the most fruit we could have for the Kingdom.

So how do we do that?

3. List some ideas on your paper as to how we can be trained.

Christ trained Himself in the ways of the Father. He trained the twelve to know His methods and how to utilize them to draw others. From your list today, pick a couple of things you are going to do to up your training. Circle them and write out beside them your plan to implement them.

Have a great weekend and a great time in the Lord!