“Warriors for Christ, Part 2 Built to Win | Stephen Riley”.Kirjoittanut admin

We began our verse by verse study of Ephesians. We began by looking at how the church in Ephesus is addressed by the Lord in the letters to the seven churches in Revelation. What we see in Revelation gives us a little window into the church in Ephesus. Honestly, the church in Ephesus sounds like a pretty solid church theologically. As a matter of f…

We worked through an overview of the book of Ephesians. We laid out the people and context of the area it was written to. We explored the ideas of the book in a broad overview. And we looked at the unique aspects of the letter. How Paul wrote in a general sense and this makes the letter very relevant for Christians of all times and ages. It was pro…

We are going to consider Mary and how her role as the one chosen to bear Jesus points us to His greatness. In the Biblical picture we are betrothed to Jesus. That means the commitment to marriage has been made and we are for all intents and purposes married but not yet united. This is part of the reason scripture speaks with anticipation of the gre…

“Warriors for Christ, Part 1 Prepare the Warrior Stephen Riley”.Kirjoittanut admin

Kirjoittanut Church of Living Water

In particular the highlighted person was Bathsheba. But in this instance she is not mentioned by name. She is referred to as the wife of Uriah. She is the mother of Solomon by David. What this does for us as readers is it highlights David as a sinful man. David is and was almost always thought of as the greatest king of Israel. As we looked at last…

The story of Ruth continues to show the idea that the women talked about in this passage were pagans and mainly gentiles. Yet God chooses these women to be the women in the line of Christ. Ruth was a Moabite woman who ends up coming to Israel because she had married an Israelite man. Boaz shows favor to Ruth because of what he's heard Ruth has done…

“The Author-The Finisher-The Joy | Philip Whitehead”.Kirjoittanut admin

Kirjoittanut Pastor Chris Nafis

Kirjoittanut Church of Living Water

The story of Rahab continues to show the idea that the women talked about in this passage were mainly pagans and gentiles. Yet God chooses these women to be the women in the line of Christ. Which is particularly striking since Matthew was written to Jews. This is very important because grace to gentiles is poured forth in even the line of Christ. R…

The story of Tamar continues to show the idea that the women talked about in this passage were pagans and mainly gentiles. Yet God chooses these women to be the women in the line of Christ. Tamar loses her first two husbands because of their wickedness before the Lord. Tamar appears to be 'tainted goods' and Judah doesn't want to give his youngest …

“The Power of the Resurrection | Stephen Riley”.Kirjoittanut admin

Today we looked at how Babylon came and conquered Jerusalem. How Zedekiah was made ruler and how he rebelled against the King of Babylon. Destruction followed this rebellion as Nebuchadnezzar came and destroyed Jerusalem and carried into exile a great many of the people. The remaining people left in Judah, flee to Egypt after Gedaliah the governor …

We worked through the section of Kings which describes how Judah came to be under the authority and rulership of Pharaoh Neco the king of Egypt. The people of Judah had made Jehoahaz king when his father died even though he was not the oldest son of Josiah. We don’t know why this was and there is no good explanation given. He only reigned 3 months …

“There were Three Crosses | John Conti”.Kirjoittanut admin

We worked our way through the reforms brought about under the reign of Josiah. He was a righteous king which had been prophesied about at the beginning of the separation of the Judah and Israel. He brought reforms with real passion for turning the people back to God. No other king before him or after him had been as passionate for the exultation of…

We worked our way through the beginning of the story of Josiah. He is a remarkably good God honoring king over Judah from a very young age. He begins to reign at 8 years old. He fulfills a prophecy given to Jeroboam at the very beginning of his reign over the newly separated 10 tribes of Israel. A prophet told Jeroboam that a king named Josiah woul…

“Perfect Love Casts Out Fear, Part 4 | Stephen RileyKirjoittanut admin

We worked our way through the story of Manasseh. In typical fashion the writer of Kings is most concerned with the broader brush strokes of the story. We don’t hear in Kings about Manasseh becoming repentant when he is taken captive or the fact of his attempt to make things right after his return from captivity. While these were important personall…

We walked through the near death of Hezekiah. It is a really serious illness and he is really incapacitated by it. Isaiah comes to him and tells him to prepare to die. Hezekiah believes him and it grieves him because he is very sick. Hezekiah cries out to God from his deathbed asking for healing and restoration. Isaiah soon returns with the message…

“Perfect Love Casts Out Feark, Part 3 | Stephen RileyKirjoittanut admin

We worked through the last part of Hezekiah’s conflict with the king of Assyria. In chapter 18 we ended with a very dark scene, Hezekiah and his leaders are in sackcloth before the Lord facing a grim and dismal threat from the king of Assyria. In chapter 19 we witnessed the Lord’s deliverance. It is a supernatural intervention as the Lord sends an …

We followed the opening story of Hezekiah and his reign as the king of Judah. He is one of the most God honoring kings of the kings of Judah. He is one of the only kings to remove the high places where people worshipped. He destroyed the idols people worshipped including the bronze serpent Moses had made, since people had come to worship it as well…

Kirjoittanut Pastor Chris Nafis

“Perfect Love Casts Out Fear-Our Home | Stephen Riley”.Kirjoittanut admin

Examples of times when peopled prayed to God. We look at the contexts of when peopled prayed and what they prayed about. Continuing this study of prayer is the focus of this Sunday. Ezra's confessionary prayer and Nehemiah's silent prayer of heart are two examples we looked at. Nehemiah also prays for protection and we see Job praying on behalf of …

We worked through the last half of chapter 17. We see the pagan people the Assyrians moved into the land of Israel dealing with attacks by lions. The response is, “We don’t know how to appease the God of this land!” and so they send word to the king of Assyria for help. He orders a priest to be sent back to the land to teach the people about God. T…