Key Thought: Crucial to the gospel is repentance: acknowledging our sin, being sorry for it, and ultimately turning away from it. Repentance is a central part of our Christian existence.
November 27, 2021

1. Have a volunteer read Deuteronomy 4:25-31.

1. Ask class members to share a short thought on what the most important point is in this passage.
2. What did the Lord say that the people would do after they had been in the land promised them?
3. Personal Application: How is repentance, in reality, a return unto God? Share your thoughts.
4. Case Study: One of your relatives states, “Why would God warn people about idol worship, which they then did anyway, and then offer to forgive them? Shouldn’t He be looking for a more faithful people?” How would you respond to your friend?

2. Have a volunteer read Deuteronomy 30:1-10.

1. Ask class members to share a thought on what the most important point in this text is.
2. What was required in returning to God in repentance?
3. Personal Application: Is the act of repentance what makes us right with God? What is the only way we can be right with God? Share your thoughts
4. Case Study: One of your friends states, “What is the difference between being sorry for the consequences of our sins, and being sorry for the sins themselves?” How would you respond to your friend?

3. Have a volunteer read Matthew 5:1-8.

1. Ask class members to share a short thought on what the main idea of this text is.
2. What is John telling the people to do that reflects what is found in Deuteronomy?
3. Personal Application: Why wasn’t Judas’ actions of sorrow and throwing the thirty pieces of silver down not regarded as true repentance of sin? Share your thoughts.
4. Case Study: One of your relatives states: “Why did John refer to the Scribes and Pharisees the way he did? Didn’t he want them to truly repent? Why was he so hard with them?“ How would you respond to your relative?

4. Have a volunteer read Deuteronomy 5:22-29.

1. Ask class members to share a thought on what the most important point in this text is.
2. Mi-yitten is the question, “Who will give?” What does it mean that the word “Oh” comes from Mi-yitten in verse 29.
3. Personal Application: What are some choices you are going to face in the next few days? How can you learn to surrender to God to make the right choices? 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).

Amen!(0)

The post 9: Turn Their Hearts – Teaching Plan appeared first on Sabbath School Net.

Source: https://ssnet.org/blog/9-turn-their-hearts-teaching-plan/

Biblical Hebrew, like most languages, is sprinkled with idioms, when specific words are used to mean something different from what they actually say. One idiom in the Old Testament is “Mi-yitten.” “Mi” is the question “who?” and “yitten” means “will give.” So, literally, “Mi-yitten” is “Who will give?”

In the Old Testament, however, the phrase expresses the idea of a wish, of a desire, of someone wanting something badly.

Image © Krieg Barrie from GoodSalt.com

For instance, after their escape from Egypt, the children of Israel, facing challenges in the wilderness, exclaimed, “If only we had died by the LORD’S hand in Egypt!” (Exodus 16:3). The phrase “if only” came from “mi-yitten.”

In Psalm 14:7 David utters, “Oh that the salvation of Israel were come out of Zion!” The Hebrew doesn’t say “Oh”; it says “mi-yitten.”

In Job 6:8, when he exclaims, “Oh, that I might have my request” — “Oh” is, again, from “mi-yitten.”

Read Deuteronomy 5:22-29, focusing especially on verse 29. What does it mean that the word translated as “Oh” comes from “mi-yitten”?

Here is the Lord — the Creator God, the One who made space, time, and matter, the One who spoke our world into existence, the One who breathed into Adam the breath of life — uttering a phrase generally associated with the weaknesses and limitations of humanity. What an example of the reality of free will! Here we see that there are limits to what God can do in the midst of the great controversy. This use of “mi-yitten” reveals that even God can’t trample on free will; for the moment He did, it would no longer be free.

And just as we humans are free to sin, we are also free to choose the Lord, to choose to be open to His leading, to choose, by responding to His Spirit, to repent from our sins and to follow Him. Ultimately the choice is ours, and ours alone, and it is a choice that we have to make day by day, moment by moment.

<–Sabbath Monday–>

Amen!(3)

The post Sunday: Mi-yitten appeared first on Sabbath School Net.

Source: https://ssnet.org/blog/sunday-mi-yitten/

Image © Pacific Press

Sabbath Afternoon

Read for This Week’s Study: Deuteronomy 5:22-29; Deuteronomy 4:25-31; Deuteronomy 30:1-10; Matthew 3:1-8; Mark 1:15;  Acts 2.37-38.

Memory Text: “But from there you will seek the LORD your God, and you will find Him if you seek Him with all your heart and with all your soul” (Deuteronomy 4:29).

A simple fact of life follows us all: we are sinful. Occasionally we hear some “expert” bemoan the Christian idea of basic human corruption, but all one has to do is look at the news for a day or so or take a quick survey of human history, and the truthfulness of this Christian doctrine becomes apparent.

Or, even easier, all one has to do is look in the mirror; not that far, actually. Whoever has the courage to take a long look deep inside one’s own heart (which can be a scary place to go) knows the truthfulness of Romans 3:9-23, which ends with the words: “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).

Of course, the good news is found in the next verse, about being “justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus” (Romans 3:24). Crucial to this great news is repentance: acknowledging our sin, being sorry for it, asking God’s forgiveness for it and, ultimately, turning away from it. Because we are sinful, repentance should be a central part of our Christian existence. And, this week, we will see the idea of repentance as expressed in Deuteronomy.

Study this week’s lesson to prepare for Sabbath, November 27.

Sunday–>

Amen!(0)

The post Sabbath: Turn Their Hearts appeared first on Sabbath School Net.

Source: https://ssnet.org/blog/sabbath-turn-their-hearts/