Review of Session 12: Making Other Disciples·
. In the Great Commission Jesus commands His disciples to do 3 things: 1) make other disciples, 2) teach them His commandments, and 3) baptize them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit (i.e., the Trinity)
· Paul points out that the Gospel is not readily received by the wise of this world, but can only be accepted by virtue of the work of the Holy Spirit in the hearts of believers
· Understanding this fact allowed Paul to overcome the fear of rejection as he became “all things to all men” in order to obtain the prize of fulfilling the Great Commission in his ministry, looked upon as a spiritual discipline: the discipline of evangelism.
Thought Questions
1. Has someone close to you died—spouse, parents, children, siblings, etc.?
2. Are you able to conceive of your own death?
In order to allow sufficient class time for filling out the end-of-course survey, we will study only a single passage in this session:
II Cor 4:7 – 5:10
1. What is Paul referring to when he uses the phrase “jars of clay”?
2. What does he mean when he says in verse 10 that he is always carrying about in his body the death of Jesus? How does that reveal the life of Jesus?
3. What does the resurrection of the dead have to do with all of this (verse 14)?
4. What do you suppose Paul is speaking of when he says “we are wasting away” (verse 16)? Is he speaking of aging? Of persecutions? Of illness?
5. Other translations of verse 17 use the phrase “eternal weight of glory,” which is also the title of a famous sermon by C. S. Lewis. Recall what we learned in an earlier session was Lewis’s definition of glory.
It is written that we shall “stand before” Him, shall appear, shall be inspected. The promise of glory is the promise, almost incredible and only possible by the work of Christ, that some of us, that any of us who really chooses, shall actually survive that examination, shall find approval, shall please God. To please God..to be a real ingredient in the divine happiness…to be loved by God, not merely pitied, but delighted in as an artist delights in his work or a father in a son—it seems impossible, a weight or burden of glory which our thoughts can hardly sustain. But so it is.
6. How do our troubles in this life bear on our glory in the life to come?
7. Beginning in Chapter 5 Paul refers to a home, or dwelling or tent, 7 times over the course of 9 verses. What is his point in these references?
8. Often, after the death of a saint, we hear the phrase: “absent from the body, present with the Lord?” What do people mean when they say this? Is it justified by this passage?
9. How does being “present with the Lord” in verse 8 relate to the resurrection mentioned in 4:14? Are these the same event, or different ones?
10. What happens when we die in the Lord?
Review of the Course
1. We set out to compare 3rd Millennium discipleship with that of the 1st Millennium. How are they the same? How are they different?
2. What stands out as the central goal of our discipleship?
3. What is the cost of discipleship and what is its reward?