Key Thought: Abraham, suspended between a lost past and a future he can’t see, is reassured by God, and exemplifies faith. He is one of the most mentioned figure from the Old Testament.
May 7, 2022

1. Have a volunteer read Genesis 12:1-5.

1. Ask class members to share a short thought on what the most important point is in this passage.
2. Why did God tell Abram to leave his country? How did he respond?
3. Personal Application: What might be God calling you to leave behind? What part of your life might you have to abandon to heed the call of God? Share your thoughts..
4. Case Study: One of your relatives states, “Abram was seventy five years old? Why did God call him to be the father of many nations? Wouldn’t it have been better to choose a younger, stronger person to lead out and have many children? Why did He choose an older man?’” How would you respond to your relative?

2. Have a volunteer read Genesis 12:10-20.

1. Ask class members to share a thought on what the most important point in this text is.
2. Why did Abram leave the promised land to go to Egypt?
3. Personal Application: What should this tell us about how easy it is to stray from the correct faith? Share your thoughts
4. Case Study: One of your friends states, “Is it ever the right thing to do in some circumstances to not follow the commandments of God or to be disobedient to what we know we should do?” How would you respond to your friend?

3. Have a volunteer read Genesis 13:7-12.

1. Ask class members to share a short thought on what the main idea of this text is.
2. Why did Abraham give his younger nephew the choice of land when there was strife between them?
3. Personal Application: What does this story teach us about the importance of character? Share your thoughts.
4. Case Study: One of your relatives states: “Why should we be kind and generous to others, even when they are not that way toward us? Someone said kindness is weakness. Why should I be nice to someone who is not nice to me or others?” How would you respond to your relative?

4. Have a volunteer read Genesis 14:1-17..

1. Ask class members to share a thought on what the most important point in this text is.
2. What is the significance about this war taking place just after the gift of the promised land? What does it tell us about Abram?
3. Personal Application: What kind of influence do our actions have on others? What do our actions show about our faith? Share your thoughts.
4. Case Study: Think of one person who needs to hear a message from this week’s lesson. Tell the class what you plan to do this week to share with them.

(Truth that is not lived, that is not imparted, loses its life-giving power, its healing virtue. Its blessings can be retained only as it is shared.”Ministry of Healing, p. 148).

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A Dream Marriage

By Yulia Bondarenko

The day Ruth took her first step toward becoming a missionary was when she gave her life to Jesus and was baptized while in the seventh grade in the U.S.

In the eighth grade, she was asked to clean her Seventh-day Adventist church. She knew nothing about cleaning churches, so instead she sat at the piano. As she played and sang about her Savior, she imagined people from various countries sitting in the pews, and a prayerful desire formed in her mind to marry a man who would play and sing with her. But who?

Image © Pacific Press

When she was 15, Ruth watched her newly married sister, visiting home from her honeymoon, slip into her wedding gown, put her hands over her eyes, and sob. Ruth resolved that a similar situation would not happen to her and started to make a list of desirable traits in her future husband. Her mother, learning about the list, wisely said, “Ruth, you also have to become the kind of woman whom that man might want.” Ruth prayerfully began to seek to acquire these traits that she expected in her husband. But who?

Just before attending Andrews University, Ruth briefly was engaged, but she broke it off. A few months later, she ended another relationship after learning that the man was dating someone else at the same time.

That winter, Ruth was in the women’s residence hall, waiting to go Christmas caroling, when a friend exclaimed, “There’s Emil Moldrik! Let’s get into his car!” “Who?” Ruth said. “Don’t you know?” her friend said. “He sings, plays the organ, and wants to be a pastor“. Ruth thought, “That’s who!”

For the next few hours, Ruth sang soprano and Emil sang tenor. She felt a new joy in her heart, and couldn’t stop looking at his eyes. She believed that eyes are the windows to the heart, and his eyes were so kind and pure. Emil returned Ruth’s gaze as they sang, and the next evening he called for a date.

Today, Emil and Ruth Moldrik have been married nearly 60 years and have served God in more than 15 countries, singing and playing musical instruments as missionaries. Emil plays 12 instruments, including the saw and autoharp. The couple has visited Ukraine alone 10 times, conducting marriage and English-language classes and Bible meetings.

As Ruth remembers the day she sang and played in the empty church, she praises God for fulfilling her dream. “I did sing and play around the world, so God answered my prayers,” she says.

This mission story illustrates Spiritual Mission Objective No. 7 of the Seventh-day Adventist Church’s “I Will Go” strategic plan: “To help youth and young adults place God first and exemplify a biblical worldview.” Learn more: IWillGo2020[dot]org.

Produced by the General Conference Office of Adventist Mission. Find more mission stories at adventistmission[dot]org

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Source: https://ssnet.org/blog/inside-story-a-dream-marriage/

Further Thought:

Read Ellen G. White, “Abraham in Canaan,” Pages 134-136, in Patriarchs and Prophets.

“Christ’s church is to be a blessing, and its members are to be blessed as they bless others.

Image © Stan Myers from GoodSalt.com

The object of God in choosing a people before all the world was not only that He might adopt them as His sons and daughters, but that through them He might confer on the world the benefits of divine illumination. When the Lord chose Abraham it was not simply to be the special friend of God, but to be a medium of the precious and peculiar privileges the Lord desired to bestow upon the nations. He was to be a light amid the moral darkness of his surroundings.

Whenever God blesses His children with light and truth, it is not only that they may have the gift of eternal life, but that those around them may also be spiritually enlightened … ‘Ye are the salt of the earth.’ And when God makes His children salt, it is not only for their own preservation, but that they may be agents in preserving others …

Do you shine as living stones in God’s building? … We have not the genuine religion, unless it exerts a controlling influence upon us in every business transaction. We should have practical godliness to weave into our lifework. We should have the transforming grace of Christ upon our hearts. We need a great deal less of self, and more of Jesus.” — Ellen G. White, Reflecting Christ, p. 205.

Discussion Questions:

<–Thursday

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