#46 Live with Dr. Neil T. Anderson and Matt Massingale - "Discernment"

For those of you who are Christians the gift of discernment is so very necessary as these two men discuss.

Freedom in Christ

I came across the ministry of Neil T Anderson and his associates a few years back now.

I thought that it complemented what I had already been learning over many years.

I believe that people struggling with being a Christian will find this helpful.

There are tools, mainly the "Steps to Freedom " that are used in this ministry.

FIC ministries will emphasise that there is no "magic" in this tool but just a tool that enables you to get yourself to Jesus.

 Your full self not just the self you present to the world.

Here is a link to vary good series of presentations on how the steps work and the essential message of the Gospel and how you can use them in your own Church.

https://ficm.org/gfd/welcome.html

I am currently working my way through these.

Mutual Ministries-Gifts of the Spirit and other studies

Back in the 1970's my wife and I received excellent teaching from our pastors on the Gifts of The Holy Spirit and indeed on the Holy Spirit's role in our Christian lives.
We had study guides presented on
1. Mutual  Ministries-Using and discovering our gift or gifts in the Church
2. The Young Church in Action-Studies in the book of Acts.
3.The Holy Spirit
4.Spiritual Warfare
5. The Battlefield-in depth study on spiritual warfare.
6.The School of Prayer
7. Establishing and keeping a Quiet Time
8.Studies in the Gospel of John
9. Baptism
10.The men Jesus won, the men He did not win.(A guide to effective evangelism)
11. Miscellaneous truths from the Bible
12. Emotions and feelings.
13. After decision, then what?

In addition there were many audio tapes produced on topics such as
The New Man
Renewal
The Second Coming of Christ
Love

Some of these studies have already been posted on this blog and my Christian sermons blog. and on youtube(pembridge house) as audio tapes.

The New Man tape 3 by Frank Hunting is one of the most telling studies you could listen to if you suffer from rejection,are introverted, feel defeated, have low self esteem and many other things crippling you as a Christian.
Below is the link to it on my youtube channel.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CY4VbTYMveE

Before listening to this audio you should determine that you will perservere to hear God speak to you.Blot out any judgements about the topic,the speaker or the audio quality.
I welcome any discussion or email about this message from genuine enquirers.

I am prepared to scan and make pdfs of some of the material mentioned above as an aid to you fully becoming a new creation in Christ.

Please note I am not a "qualified" academic type Christian. I am a layperson who understands well the battles we have as Christians from personal experience and know that my acceptance  of who I am rests entirely on the sacrifice Jesus has made for me on the Cross.
His acceptance means I can accept myself.
.

"Go to Jesus" by Frank Hunting

This is a podcast from a taped address by Frank Hunting given in the 1970's. See other titles by Frank on this blog and the post about Frank Hunting.
In this sermon Frank mentions the booklet "Looking Unto Jesus" by Theodore Monod.
There is a link below to the text of this booklet.
http://geoffthompsonsblog.blogspot.com.au/2009/08/about-fank-hunting.html

http://geoffthompsonsblog.blogspot.com.au/2012/08/looking-unto-jesus.html

Christian Counselling by Frank Hunting

Below  is an extract from a Churches of Christ provocative pamphlet from 1955 by Frank Hunting.Over the length of his lifetime and ministry Frank counselled and helped hundreds of people including myself.
The Church desparately needs people doing what Frank has suggested here.
If Frank were alive today he would also be endorsing that not Just Christian "Ministers" have the responsibility to counsel but also appropriately equipped lay people.
There are organisations which have developed programmes for equipping lay people.
Two that I recommend are Grace Fellowship International(Charles Solomon is the founder) and Freedom in Christ Ministries(Founded by Neil Anderson)

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"Spiritual Counselling.
      Spiritual counselling is not being seriously undertaken in our churches. It is still regarded as the work of specially trained or specially gifted men. It ought to be the normal thing in every congregation. For this work spiritual insight is more important than psychological training. Every minister, if he follows the practice of his Master, would give hours of his time every week to this important work, but the average minister is so overtaxed by the demands of organising a modern congregation that he completely throws out any suggestion that he may need five or six hours in any week to sit at leisure to give spiritual counselling to people who need it. Nor, do the deacons and members realise how important it is that their pastor should do this work.
      Homes are breaking or are in trouble, individuals carry, crushing personal problems, nervous breakdowns crop up here and there, good Christian people are developing neurotic tendencies, and all these should be receiving special spiritual counselling. There is need for guidance and counsel on all aspects of living which the minister out of his growing store of wisdom and experience should be giving, and in any church where the work of the Holy Spirit is in evidence there should be individuals becoming dissatisfied with their Christian experience who want to grow spiritually--these and other aspects of living demand that churches should see to it that their minister has adequate time to give all the spiritual counselling needed. People, whose problems have a spiritual origin are going to doctors and psychiatrists; they should be going to Christian ministers skilled in spiritual counselling.

The Equipment
      God can train a man in spiritual counselling and the following personal equipment is essential. A man must himself quite obviously have an increasingly growing experience living Saviour, He must know from first-hand personal experience the power of Christ to change men. To undertake spiritual counselling should be to enter into a secret compact with God to pray in faith for Christ's cleansing and delivering power in the life of the one we are counselling.
      The basic requirements of the spiritual counsellor are:
      * The counsellor must have faced all his own sin, failures, defeats and share these with another.
      * He should live in the open with others about his pride, sin, victories, prejudices, self--all that the Holy Spirit is showing him to be when measured against the life of Jesus.
      * He must obviously be finding Christ to be the answer to his own life, circumstances and situations.
      * He must be willing to share any part of his life with another as God directs him.
      * He must be practising God's guidance and leading in his own life and affairs. Only as God leads will some unravel the tangle of their lives. The spiritual counsellor to help such people must have complete confidence in the Holy Spirit's guidance and leadership in such matters.
      * He must have unbounded confidence in Christ's power to meet and solve the problems and needs in any person's life. There are no exceptions to this.
      * He must never take sides either for or against people, but always take God's side, God's part in every situation.
      * He must be an unfailing channel of love and patience.
      * He must give all the time needed even if this extends over years.
      * He must see more than the situation as presented to him; he must see origins, causes, reasons.
      * For this he will need deep penetration into motives and the self-deceptions we all deal in. This demands constant reliance upon the Holy Spirit for the insights which liberate.
      * We must learn not only to detect the causes of trouble and upset, we must also learn to help people build into their lives the positive power that lies in faith in God,
      This word from Oswald Chambers must be the conviction of the counsellor: "The Lord seems to come to us in every individual case we meet--'Believest thou that I am able to do this?' Whether it be a case of demon possession, bodily upset, mental twist, backsliding, indifference, difference of nationality and thought--the challenge is to me: Do I know my risen Lord? Am I wise enough in God's sight to bank on what Jesus told me? Am I foolish enough according to the wisdom of the world to do it? or am I abandoning the supernatural position, which is the only one for a missionary (or Christian), of boundless confidence in Jesus?"
      Let us not try to be psychologists. We come to offer men and women Christ. His cleansing for their sin. His all sufficient grace for their defeats and failures. His never failing presence for their confusion and frustration. His guidance and solution on all matters. Christ is Himself the answer and He alone has the answer. Many people want help but they don't want it in the only way they will ever get it. Till they want help in the way He can give, we may need to stand aside watching them try all the approved failures until they are willing to believe that Christ alone is the way, the truth, and the life.

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F. C. HUNTING--
      Graduated from the Federal College of the Bible in 1933. After graduating, he served the churches at Blackburn and Prahran, Victoria, then followed three years as Youth Director for our New South Wales churches. On the expiration of that term he served the church at Ann St., Brisbane, for a period, and has been with the Dawson St. church, Ballarat, Victoria, for the past six and a half years."

My footnote.
 In semi retirement Frank came to the Church of Christ at Grote Street in Adelaide as a colleaugue of Pastor Harold Long.They were in tandem ministry for 5 years.
He then moved to Noarlunga Centre Church of Christ in 1980 where he finished his official ministry.
Frank also gave considerable assistance to the Murray Bridge Church of Christ while in Aelaide.
He was a counsellor to many in Adelaide and Victoria and beyond in his lifetime.

See also the link below to an extract from Frank's booklet on Christmas about Jesus as Counsellor.

http://geoffthompsonsblog.blogspot.com.au/2011/07/his-name-is-counsellor.html

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"From Darkness to Light" by Frank Hunting

This is a taped sermon plus optional slideshow.See post about Frank Hunting the Preacher of this sermon.
http://geoffthompsonsblog.blogspot.com.au/2009/08/about-fank-hunting.html

It was given at the Church of Christ Grote St. Adelaide in the 1970's. The Church now continues as The Market Place Church and meets at Flinders Park Primary School in South Australia.The current Minister is Bronte Stanford. Frank Hunting went to be with his Lord several years ago now.
Activate the slide show to hear the message.

Forgiveness again?

A common thread you will see on this blog is the need to forgive.
I have been prompted to write because of articles I have come across about Meagan Kunert on the internet. A young woman who started a wedding photography business and cheated using other people's photos and blogs and posts and information to promote herself.
She was caught out and is now attempting to recover from her demeanors.
It seems an organisation called People of The Second Chance (POTSC) reached out to her with compassion and grace.
Here is link to Meagan's confession on the POTSC website.

http://www.potsc.com/potsc/how-i-ruined-my-career/

Many of course are quick to condemn what Meagan did.
It was bad!

But I am reminded of verses in the Bible like:

"Judge not lest ye yourself also be judged!"

"He who is without sin cast the first stone."

"All have sinned, all fall short of the glory of God."

" Forgive  us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us."

I applaud POTSC for what they are trying to do.

I started to read some of the personal testimonies on their website.

I was taken by one who's Pastor Husband cheated on her.

She chose to forgive her Huband, and the telling thing in her story is that she realised after no response from the other person involved, after she herself had offered forgiveness to her, that she needed to forgive from the heart not just because that's what is expected of Christians.

See Trisha Davis' story below.

http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4473676857916103027#editor/target=post;postID=4707499569134340934

I would re direct my readers to the earlier post on the Cross of Christ.

None of us, if we are Christians, have a right to withhold forgiveness and we cut ourselves off from knowing the fullness of God's Salvation if we don't forgive from the heart.

http://geoffthompsonsblog.blogspot.com.au/2009/09/cross-of-christ.html

I have had my own brushes with not forgiving and the stress that has brought me and others and of course we can all easily recognise where others are at fault in this but it's what we do that is paramount.

What would Jesus do?

The new man Tape 3 Frank Hunting

Below is a a slide show of some of my pictures accompanied by a sermon on the New Man by Frank Hunting.
The pictures should point you to the creator.
How can we deny there is a God when we look at the beauty of the Natural World.
When we have recognised there is a God and we can know Him through Jesus Christ and have responded to that, we need to then start the Christian journey towards maturity in Christ.
We are not instant new creations when we become Christians  although in a sense that is true.
Our position has changed and our disposition can become the disposition of Jesus.
Sadly, many of us never know the fullness of our Salvation.
The sermon is one of the many that I listened to in a five year period when Frank Hunting was our Pastor.
His colleague Harold Long preached the Gospel that God used to bring me to Him.
Frank was the one God used to keep me there when I could easily have faded away.
So the pictures are meant to compliment the message not distract you.

Dealing with Depression

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I originally wrote this article in nov 09.I have reposted it in order to encourage those trying to cope with Depression. I am no longer suffering depression.  I was taking anti depressant medication for 2 years.
I am sure it helped in the early stages but I had to make a decision to say no more at the end as it was difficult to tell if it was helping or hindering after a while.
As one who was totally anti drugs for depression in the first place I believe there is a place for them in treatment of severe depression.
As one who has now had 3 bouts of  depression in my life , at age 20 age 33  and again in my 60's I can honestly say you never know when something might trigger this off but I am very confident that as a Christian trusting Jesus, in spite of our feelings, is the answer to our Depression.
I don't say that lightly and I am well aware that many Christians go through life never getting on top of their depression.
We do often need someone to show us how to do that.   

      DEPRESSION

Some thoughts by Geoff Thompson

I have recently , since June 2009,through family circumstances, fallen into a state that 2 psychiatrists said was a deep state of major depression. I saw the first one at near the height of my anguish and the second about a month later when I was considerably improved. During the early stages of the depression I could not read  a newspaper, could not watch television even my much liked football and cricket telecasts.

I did not watch all the way through one complete football match for the whole season of 2009.

I didn’t watch the AFL Grand Final.

I could not go into shops without feeling oppressed. In fact I knew I was in trouble when I was trying to buy a vacuum cleaner for my wife’s aunty and could not work out where I had to pay for the item in the shop.

As a keen photographer I found it difficult to even think about taking a photograph.

I could no longer listen to music of any form on radio or cd or vynil record player.

I could not sleep at night.

I missed several weeks of work.

I lost 2 stone in weight which was a good thing.

I walked away from people during conversations without warning.

I had all sorts of random feelings in my limbs and body and often a thick cloud in my head.

One night I had a strange experience of a severe trembling starting of in my head an proceeding down my limbs and legs. I got out of bed and walked around and it did not stop for about 5 minutes,

On a holiday to central Australia in july 09 I felt like I wanted to walk off into the vast desert and perish.

I could go on with some of the other symptoms and feelings including bursting into tears in front of various people as I tried to talk about what had happened and explain why I was so distressed.

I had read some time ago of the Late Harry Lauder who was a world famous entertainer whose only son was killed in the war.He had then decided he had 3 options to Commit suicide, to drink himself to death or to serve God and live by Faith in Jesus Christ, He chose the latter, This is how he described the impact of hearing of the death of his son in an article I found on the internet.

                  Harry was performing in London at the Shaftesbury theatre. He spent part of New Years Eve 1916 at Tom Vallance’s place. Harry was tired and retired early to his hotel room in London.

January 1 1917 dawned and a loud banging wakened Lauder. He sleepily arose and saw a porter standing at the door with a telegram in his hand.

Capt John Lauder killed in action, December 28.

Official. War Office.

Harry was devastated.

‘I felt that for me everything had come to an end with the reading

of that dire message. It seemed to me that for me the board of life was black and blank. For me there was no past and there could be no future. Everything had been swept away, erased, by one sweep of the hand of a cruel fate.’

          That is exactly how I had felt.

           At the time of writing this article I don’t know whether 
           the crisis that I reacted to will be resolved with everyone reconciled and               happy or the opposite.               

                I do know that  MY LORD JESUS CHRIST AND HIS GRACE
                 AND LOVE WILL BE SUFFICIENT TO ENABLE ME 
              CONTINUE IN LIFE AS IT PROVED TO BE TO HARRY LAUDER.

I                 I have been re-visting everything I have learnt in my
 jou              journey of faith and  the postings on this blog are some of those 
 thi               things 

It is             It is my prayer that some may find comfort in these words.

Ge              Geoff Thompson  

A

G

      

Group Praying in Agreement and Authority when someone is addicted to Drugs.Foundations

Group Praying in Agreement and Authority when someone is addicted to Drugs. Transcript from tape. Side 1: Frank Hunting

This  is a study on group praying for for those afflicted by drugs prepared on july 27th 1978.

 In this study we are going to look at how we can pray as a group for   those who are afflicted by or addicted to drugs.

In the first place we know our enemy.

No. 1 We know our enemy.

If you would turn to or write down and look it up later,
if you turn to Ephesians Chapter  6 verse 12, in the Living Bible there you have it set forth for us very clearly and very plainly.

It says. "For we are not, we are not fighting against people made of flesh and blood but against persons without bodies, the evil rulers of the unseen world.Those mighty satanic beings and great evil princes of darkness who rule this world and against huge numbers of wicked spirits in the unseen world .

 Now let's have a little look, just for a moment at how the devil is able to rule us in this world.
It says there "The great evil princes of darkness who rule this world."

In the case of drugs something like this happens.

The person feels depressed, maybe Christian or otherwise, may feel insecure, they may feel rejected,they my feel inferior.

Now those feelings have become strong, and there may be plenty, as they look at life, as they've seen life,  as they have reacted to life there may seem to them to be plenty of good reason why they have these emotional feelings.

Now nobody likes to feel depressed, nobody really likes to be insecure, and none of us are particularly happy at feeling ourselves to be inferior to everybody else and certainly none us enjoy feeling that we have been rejected, we are being rejected by people.
Now to compensate this and easy way that is being taken today to try to compensate or to try to combat or change, or to make different these feelings is to turn to drugs.

And the very words that are used explain this.

That on drugs you go "high" , on drugs you have good ,lovely feelings, while the effect of the drug lasts.

So that's the reason why people turn to drugs and when they do, the evil one, because drugs and all those sort of things associated with them belong to his kingdom.

And when they do, instead of turning to God for the answer, to their depression or their inferiority or their security, or their rejection, instead of turning to God for His answer to these things, turning to drugs they do in fact, without knowing it in most cases, open their lives to the control of the evil one.

And through their minds, through their bodies, sometimes through the chemistry in their bodies, he is able to control them in the way that we call addiction and is often able  to do  what he is always seeking to do, destroy them.

We in the first place know our enemy!

In the second place we know our victory!

Number 2 . We know our Victory!

And you will find this given for us very clearly, in the 3rd chapter and verse 8 of  John's 1st letter.
 1 John 3:8

This is what it says.

"The reason the reason the son of God was made manifest visible , the reason why the Son of God came to this earth and lived among us as a human being was to undo, destroy, to loosen and destroy the works of the devil, the works the devil has done. "

Now the reason Jesus came to earth in one area of our living was to undo the works of the devil through drug addiction.

The power that the devil comes to have over people through their turning to drugs to alleviate some feelings that they have had some time or other.

So we know our victory.

Jesus came to undue those works, that power that the devil has.

If we look again we see where He did this,where the victory of Jesus took place.

And its found in Colossians and other places too for that matter,but a verse that sets it forth very clearly, is in Colossians Chapter 2 and verses 14 and 15.

I am reading to you now from the Revised Standard Version.

It says in verse 14. "Having cancelled the bond which stood against us with its legal demands,this He set aside, nailing it to the cross."
That's simply saying that everything in your life and mine,everything about us that would separate us from God, that would mean we are unable to come to God, these have been all of them set aside.

They have all of them be nailed to our Saviour's cross.

And then he goes on to talk about the devil, "He disarmed the principalities and powers and made a public example of them,triumphing over them in Him, in Jesus or,  in His cross.

Now Moffatt translates that this.
It's a good thing to look up the various translations because they are really needed to get all the meanings that are encompassed , contained, in the Greek.

This is what Moffatt says verse 15, "When He nailed them to the cross, when He cut away the angelic rulers and powers from us.
The angelic rulers and powers, Jesus cut them away from us exposing them to all the world and triumphing over them in the cross."

That's Moffatt's translation.

Now the same wonderful truth comes out in Barclay's translation.

"He stripped the powers and authorities of all their power, at the cross."

Now the devil claims to have power, he bullies that he's got power, he threatens that he has power, he lies and deceives and makes people believe he has power, he gets us looking at the situation, in this case he gets us looking at the person, and he'll say "that person is addicted, there's no power on heaven or earth that can set that man free.he is addicted! There's nothing you can do about it!"

And so we believe his lie.

And our God shrinks to the size that you could put him in a match box.

And we believe the devil's lie.

Not God's truth.

"He stripped the powers and authorities of all their power.
and publicly put them to shame and through the cross led them captive in His triumphal train."

No2. We know our victory.

Number 3. We know our authority.

This is made very clear in chapter 10 of Luke verses 17-20.

And this was a battle that the Disciples had in a head on confrontation with the powers of the evil one in the form of demons.

"The seventy returned with joy saying  "Lord, even the demons", the demons from very hell itself, the demons who are the slaves and servants of the devil,the demons who are evil,evil active agents of the devil in this world,"these demons are subject to us, subject to us in your name "

" In your name" and He, Jesus said to them " I saw satan falling like a lightning flash from heaven.Behold I" who? Jesus! " I have given you authority and power to trample upon serpents and scorpions and physical and mental strength and ability over all the power, all the power that the enemy possesses and nothing in anyway shall harm you."

There we have our authority delegated to us by the Lord Jesus Christ but only made to operate as we believe the Word of God as we assert our authority.
As we in our assertion of the authority, make the devil submit to what is true, that he is defeated, he must yield, he must give way when the power and the victory of the cross is brought down on him.

Number 3 . We know our authority!

Number 4. We know our weapons!

We know our weapons!

And we turn now to 2nd Corinthians Chapter 10, verses 3 to 5, and it's very admirably spelt out for us, what this passage is saying,in the Living Bible.

 Here is what it is saying. Now this ought to give you a lot of comfort what it is saying and teaching.

'It is true that I am and ordinary, weak human being,(now I guess you're feeling that way about yourself, that you are an ordinary weak human being, so was Paul, but the difference between him and so many other Christians was this) but I don't use human plans and methods to win my battles.(He knew he wasn't fighting against flesh and blood so he didn't use human plans and methods)  I use God's mighty weapons , not those made by men, to knock down the devil's strongholds.(Now we are concerned about the stronghold that the devil has in the life off a human being through drugs) These weapons can break down every proud argument against God and every wall that can be built to keep men from finding Him.With these  weapons I can capture rebels and bring them back to God, and change them into men whose heart's desire(the deep down desire) is obedience to Christ."

Well as far as I know there are 8 of God's might weapons.

You may use one singly at one time or several or all of them according to the need.

Hère they are.

God's mighty weapons.

1. Faith that brings God into the situation.Faith that brings Almighty God into the situation.

2. The Word of God. The Living Word of God.

3. The Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit controlling, leading and giving insight.
The Holy Spirit.

4. Intercessory prayer.Now intercessory prayer is prayer that identifies with God's will, God's purposes in the life of that person for whom we are praying.And in the case of someone afflicted by drugs is God's will that that person be free from the power that drugs have in the person's life.
We are in intercessory prayer to identify with God's purposes in the life of the person for whom we are praying.

5. The realisation of and the exercising of our delegated authority and power over the devil.We've already had a look at that in Luke 10: verses 17-20.

6. The word of our, or my testimony.Revelation Chapter 12 v11.now in this case  if you are a bit baffled as to what the word of your testimony is to be it is this.
The word of your testimony is to be in this case, is to be the actual power of God to set this person free.

That Jesus is victorious that whatever the power,that the devil has in this life through drugs,Jesus has defeated the devil , Jesus has made the devil yield his power,and we are declaring that.
We are saying that, we are believing that and we are saying what we believe.

7.
The 7th mighty weapon that God has given us is the Cross and the Resurrection of the lord Jesus Christ.
The Cross and the Resurrection of the lord Jesus Christ.
Brought out in passages like Hebrews ch2 v 14.
Colossians ch2 v 14 and 15,
Revelation Ch:12 v11,
1st John 3:8 , passages that you have already had.

8. And the 8th mighty weapon that God has given us is The Power and Authority of Jesus name.
The Power and Authority of Jesus name.
And the passages that we are to soak right in to very depths of us are John 14:13,14.
John 15:16,
Ephesians 1:21,22.
Phillipians 2:9-11.


So in the 4th place we know our weapons.
We know our weapons.
The invincible weapons of God.
And in this case as we apply them,to somebody afflicted by drugs we are learning how to use the weapons God has put into our hands.


5. We know God's power.

God's power is greater than anything we see.

It is greater than the power of evil in any life that we see.

God's power is greater than any circumstance, any situation we see.

It is greater than anything that we look at.

All to often, all to often, when we look at some person who is being controlled by some evil,when we look at some person who in one way or another is being pushed around by the devil, or by their circumstances or by their past life or whatsoever, we get to looking at the person and we look so hard at the person,and their problems and their needs becomes so big that we cannot see God and our God shrivels up into a tiny little God that you can put in a matchbox.
And the devil wins his victory.
We cannot exercise the faith , we do not exercise the mighty weapons that God has given us.
Now one of the contributing factors to that is,usually we can only see one or two or three ways at the most that God can do anything.

Noe God has a million ways we know nothing at all about,whereby He can exercise His power.
What He needs is not us knowing how He is going exercise His power but our Faith.
When we give Him our Faith then He works in ways of which we may know nothing.

So we are to give Him our Faith and let Him work it out in His way.

I'm going to turn over now to the other side(cassette tape) and we are going to look specifically at the one for whom we are going to pray.

What I've said are the general principles , the general basis from which we operate.

The foundation, foothold if you like Victory from which we are to operate in the life of particular persons who are afflicted by drugs.




Foot note: Please see my earlier blog introduction to this topic.
http://geoffthompsonsblog.blogspot.com.au/2011/08/group-praying-in-agreement-and.html

I will be presenting side 2 of the tape on how we actually are to pray in this situation as soon as I can set aside the time to transcribe from the tape with my 2 finger typing. I welcome any emails from people if they want more information about this subject and other relevant subject matter.
Side 2 link
http://geoffthompsonsblog.blogspot.com.au/2011/08/group-praying-in-agreement-and_27.html

geoff thompson

EMOTIONS-BAD AND GOOD

Fenced in by more than barbed wire.What is he really thinking as he notes the unknown stalker a few yards away. "Will I run(hop) or pretend there is no danger?"

       

      a bible study by Frank Hunting

 this was developed for people to study over a weekend 

Study 1

EMOTIONS ARE IMPORTANT

How important are emotions? Are they important enough to devote   a weekend to studying them?Usually when we talk about emotions in the way we shall over the weekend some Christians will pipe up: “Oh you’re having Psychological studies! I want studies from the Bible.”

If the word emotion doesn’t appear in the Bible, what we call emotions are spoken about again and again in scripture.Indeed they play a most important part in scripture teaching.

Modern Psychology backs up the emphasis given by the Bible to our emotions.Our emotions can cut us off from God…..and from our fellow men….and that is very, very serious.

EMOTIONS CAUSE

Emotions are the root cause of a whole range of human experience ……..good and bad…happy and unhappy…..delightful or miserable.

Emotions out of control cause splits in families,rows in churches,tummy ulcers,tension headaches and an amazing range of psychosomatic ailments…. And a great deal of personal unhappiness and misery… and we have hardly started on the list of troubles caused by having wrong or bad emotional reactions.

PERHAPS WE SHOULD TAKE MORE NOTICE

Perhaps as Christians we should take more notice of our feelings.

It is clear from experience that many Christians have feelings about which they do nothing(they may even justify them) but which the bible says is sin……..and in some cases, very black sin.

IGNORANCE

Ignorance is always a tool which the devil uses . And ignorance about our feelings is certainly used by the devil. This alone should make us concerned to understand our emotional reactions.

DISCUSSION

At this point your group could have a general discussion about the role our feelings play in our general living. perhaps the discussion could be based on the premise: The more we know about our emotions , the more quickly we can detect and deal with harmful ones: and so the more we can seek to have good emotional reactions. The more we handle our feelings correctly the more mature are we likely to be as persons.

GOOD AND BAD

Feelings may be good or bad. They may contribute to our general well being( and also to others) or they may be destructive in their effects on us.

Generally speaking the fewer bad feelings, negative feelings, destructive feelings we have, the more good feelings we have, the better for us and every body around us.

WE NEED TO KNOW

Thus we need to know how to correctly deal with bad feelings and how to cultivate good feelings.

Some people have developed habits of feeling negatively . other people have developed habits of feeling positively. They have made a habit of positive responses.

DISCUSSION

Your group may look at general topics or situations , or ways of reacting to people in which habits of negative feelings are developed.

Your group may look at ways we can develop habits of positive feelings.

Feelings, good or bad are like a lot of things about us, we have them because we have formed the habit of having them. So the let your group look at the ways we form good and bad habits of positive feelings.

BY NOW

By now if your group has got its teeth into the subject of our feelings you should be realising what important things our emotions  are.They are very much part of our lives. And we are very much controlled by our emotions, this whether we are realising it or not.

DISCUSSION

1 We stop short of letting Jesus convert our emotions.

         Could your group discuss this statement?

2. There are feelings we have but we try to hide them from others.

         Could your group list the most common feelings we want to hide.

         What results from doing this?

DISCUSSION

Most of us think that we make our decisions on common sense or because we have carefully weighed up the pros and cons , or that we have very carefully worked out the logic of the situation, or action to be taken .

More times than most of us would care to admit it is not our common sense , or the pros and cons , or logic but the way we feel about the matter that determines what we do or the decision we take.

Would your group like to to examine this?

EMOTIONS

By Frank Hunting

Leaders notes for study one. Emotions Bad and Good.

In this series of studies we are dealing with the more common emotions- bad and good.Good emotions which help us all , bad emotions which can be quite destructive to to any one of us.

There are some emotional conditions for which people need to be helped in depth and this help may need to be given by someone skilled in spiritual counselling.

One of the things which makes us seem irrational  or quite inconsistent is that we all tend to believe what we feel.

You may have very strong feelings about someone and your feelings are based on totally wrong facts or information or prejudices.

No matter how wrong the basis of your feelings you will believe what your feelings are saying to you.

This why we have so many unreasonable  and opposite attitudes held by by people who are supposedly looking at the same circumstances or situations.

Thus feelings like hate or resentment or dislike or envy distort the truth and  colour things being said  or done . How we feel frequently determines how we think-especially about people ….and this is serious.

So our study of negative feelings and how to get rid of them ---even replacing them with good feelings---is most important for every level of living.

CHRISTIANS SEEM TO

Very often  Christians seem to talk as though the only thing Jesus was dealing with on the Cross was sin.

But there are other things from which we need saving that we don’t usually list under the headings of sin. Our feelings is one of these.Yet for far too many Christians their feelings have never been converted.

IT SHOULD BE REMEMBERED

We should recognise that the conversion of our feelings does not necessarily take place at the beginning of our Christian life when we are “born again of the Spirit of God”.

Like our thinking (our thought processes ) our emotions (the way we habitually feel- especially towards people) usually needs a process of conversion.

(the above notes are background up to and including the first discussion)

GOOD AND BAD

The point of this section is :The way we feel may have been habitually cultivated by us.

For many it is normal for them to worry.They do so because they have made a habit of worrying .

Some normally criticise (adversely) why ? Because they have made a habit of doing so.

Habits or feelings should be picked up by the individual.

Perhaps one of the most helpful things you can do for the members of your group at this point is to get them started  looking at (privately) their negative, habitual feelings..

DISCUSSION

“{We stop short of letting Jesus convert our emotions”

One of the greatest things in the Christian Church to come to light in the last 50 or 60 years is that our salvation is for the WHOLE MAN(OR WOMAN)

Surely passages like Matt 5:48; 2 Corinthians 3:17-18;  2 Corinthians 5:17 have a lot to say about the conversion of our feelings. How can we become new people altogether if our emotions remain unconverted.?

“There are feelings we have but we try to hide them from others..”

We don’t hide them from people we intensely dislike.

We do tend to hide then from people we want to have a good opinion of us.

Why do we do this?

One reason is, our feelings reveal the kind of people we are at the depths . And if there is something nasty, or petty ,or evil or  selfish at the depths, we don’t want this to be revealed by our feelings to people we want to think well of us. Rather than do the right thing ,get rid of the wrong  feelings, we try to hide them.

How much hypocrisy is there in this?

Freedom in Christ

Jesus will set you free

Over the last few years I have been following the Ministry of and learning the principals of being free in Christ through the teaching of Neil T. Anderson. Unfortunately Christians are so often caught in the enemie's web. If you are a Christian who is serious about your faith you will be attacked by the evil one, satan.Neil's teaching is very similar to many of the principals I have already learnt. We must never drop our Guard and as Paul says in Ephesians 6 use God's Mighty Weapons.
Below is a link to Freedom in Christ Ministries. If you are reading this Blog and caught up in besetting sin take some steps today to do something about it. If you are not a Christian and are caught up in things that give you fleeting pleasure but have you in an addiction I recommend you take some steps to Jesus also. Don't delay. Time is short.What you may think is good, and your right to do whatever you want, will probably destroy you.

Neil and others on his team have authored and produced some wonderful videos and books that I thoroughly recommend.



http://www.ficm.org/TheMessageAndMinistryMovie.htm