For each chapter, read the section in Discovering God first. If you are leading a group you must consider whether or not your members will do the reading outside the group. If you suspect members have not read the chapter, you can read either the chapter or relevant sections in the group by taking turns reading aloud. Then compare answers to selected study questions.

We notice that Christian students often feel they don't need to study Christology. These questions help them see they don't have all the answers they need.

Divorce is a painful and difficult subject for any community. In fact, it is usually accompanied by ongoing, excruciating, and often sinful relating by both parties. The concept of marriage as a lifelong commitment has almost disappeared in our culture. In the United States, not only do most marriages fail, but more people are starting families without even bothering to get married.

There are a number of prophecies in the OT which have a primary application to the millennial kingdom or the eternal kingdom but are fulfilled in part in the church age. Furthermore, there are prophecies that seem to focus on the immediate historical context of the prophet, yet there is a more complete fulfillment later.

This tendency to speak of events that are separated by time, as though they were not, is called the principle of double reference.

We are examining the early German Lutheran Pietists' understanding of justification. Specifically, the teaching of Johann Arndt, Philip Jacob Spener and August Hermann Francke will be studied. Three specific areas of their view of justification will be examined: the basis of justification, the relationship between justification and sanctification, and the role of baptism in justification.

An effort has been made to identify and study the primary sources of each of the above Pietists in these doctrinal areas. Direct quotations of their works accompany and substantiate any assertion concerning their teaching. Secondary sources have also been evaluated for additional interaction in the interpretation of the primary sources.

"Effective!" Is that how you would describe your meetings? Do you even have leaders' meetings or believe they are a waste of time? It is difficult to imagine how a leader can effectively communicate to the home church – verbally and by modeling – excitement and direction for evangelism and discipleship without healthy leaders meetings that evaluate the success and direction of the group. Here is a brief guide on how leaders' meetings can help a home church "stay the course."

The need for effective small-group ministry is implied in the New Testament. If the local church is to develop the spiritual gifts of its members, mobilize the terrific power of the Holy Spirit to work through a trained and experienced laity, and facilitate true relationship-based community, it will need to organize smaller groups.

Dwell Community Church, an independent fellowship in Columbus, Ohio, has centered around lay-led home church ministry since beginning in 1970. Using this focus, Dwell has grown from a handful to roughly 5,000 today. Home churches have also resulted in good morale among the hundreds of lay leaders, all graduates of a two-year graded training course.

A personal crisis nearly led Peter Scazzero to resign as lead pastor of the church he and his wife Geri started. His journey of restoration inspired him to write Emotionally Healthy Discipleship (EHD). For anyone who has been leading for some time, Scazzero’s story resonates. His commitment and all-out drive for growth and ministry success eventually led to burnout.

How should we treat fellow human beings? Then there are legal questions about what should be prohibited or sanctioned in human genetic research. But a more basic and all too often ignored question must also be explored: What is a human person? Indeed, without an answer to this question, moral and legal reflection is almost pointless. How, for example, can we speak of protecting human rights without identifying the bearer of those rights?

Recognizing human rights has always been an explosive business. In the 19th century, the issue was to whom do the constitutionally protected "inalienable rights of men" apply? This question so divided our republic that it was resolved only by civil war. In recent historic experience, we can turn to the death camps of Auschwitz or one of the thousands of "family planning centers" in America for further evidence of the scale of this question's lethality - and, tragically, of social ambivalence to it.

Critics of the Bible have drawn attention to various seemingly cruel or immoral rules or events in the Pentateuch. The following principles should be kept in mind when assessing such problems.