August SOED Campaign
Week 1 Foundation Scriptures:
Acts 2:38-41... 38 And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39 For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.” 40 And with many other words he bore witness and continued to exhort them, saying, “Save yourselves from this crooked generation.” 41 So those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about three thousand souls.
Philippians 2:15&16... 15 so that you may be blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and perverse generation, in which you shine as lights in the world 16 as you hold forth the word of life,...
4 Takeaways:
1. As believers...we should always be willing to try to persuade nonbelievers to “repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of their sins”.
The message of who Jesus Christ is should include exhorting people to "repent and be baptized". Jesus was sent for this reason and this reason alone; the reconciliation of mankind. Everything that Jesus spoke, taught and did was done so that those who would hear, understand and see would "repent and be baptized in His name for the forgiveness of their sins. Every parable. Every miracle. Everything was done with reconciliation in mind.
2. We are to also be willing to advise them to “save themselves from this crooked generation”.
*crooked: bent or twisted; warped, distorted; dishonest; illegal...unlawful, dishonorable, amoral, crafty, deceitful, corrupt
This is at times hard because it begins with our ability to see the generation as in fact crooked. We have to be able to recognize with our own eyes that the crookedness of this generation is destroying the lives of people, even those that we know daily.
With this in mind, we must ask ourselves, "Is my view of the current conditions of this age in agreement with what the word of God has said about the state of this generation?" The word of God says it is "crooked".
3. Bare Witness...
The scripture says that Peter "bore witness and continued to EXHORT" those whom he was speaking to saying “save yourselves from this crooked generation”.
This means that he himself had seen and or knew something about the “crookedness of this generation" which makes him a witness and able to speak on it.
We too must be able to do as Peter did, but we have to first be able to recognize that ulitimately what we see and or know about this generation (the world) is crooked.
So another question that we must ask ourselves is, "how have I myself experienced the crookedness of the generation (the world)?", because if we have personally experienced it, then our testimony is that much more powerful. Peter "bore witness" to what he knew.
4. The Word Of Life...
As we EXHORT people to “save themselves from this crooked generation”, we have to make sure that we are "blameless and pure children of God without fault in this crooked and perverse generation"...this we do by holding forth the word of life.
Again, we can't effectively bear witness to the crookedness of this generation if we ourselves aren't "blameless and pure children of God without fault in this crooked and perverse generation". And yes, that is a hard task but if we truly see and know the actual destruction of this generation then purposing to remain as we are called to be will be a worth while task that we are successful at doing by "holding forth the word of life".
God's word declares to us that the generation is crooked and if we hold on to that then not only will we be "blameless and pure" in this generation but our testimony and exhortation will be packed with the power of God to save many souls from this perils of the age.
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