Closer To Heaven
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Join the HIt the Mark panel as they discuss Sabbath School Lesson 4 – God Is Passionate and Compassionate. It’s the fastest hour of the week!
(0)Source: https://ssnet.org/blog/god-is-passionate-and-compassionate-hit-the-mark-sabbath-school/
Inside Story for Friday 24th of January 2025
By Andrew McChesney
A drunken man accosted the 21-year-old missionary woman on a public bus and tried to hug and kiss her. As she struggled against his advances, the other passengers looked the other way until an elderly woman yelled something to the bus driver. The bus stopped, then under the guidance of the elderly woman, several passengers threw the man off. She came over to the sobbing missionary, patted her arm, and said something that the missionary couldn’t understand.
This was the nightmare that Joanne (Park) Kim seemed to face nearly every week in Mongolia. It was the early 1990s, and she was a single American woman serving as one of the first Seventh-day Adventist missionaries in impoverished, post-Communist Mongolia.
Image © Pacific Press
On another occasion, a drunken neighbor mistook Joanne’s apartment for his own. He kicked down her flimsy wooden door with his steel-toe boots and started to beat her. Joanne grabbed a broom and, screaming, fought back. It was a losing battle until Joanne used the broom to bang on the ceiling and her fellow missionaries, a married American couple, heard from their apartment above, and rushed down to rescue her.
The last straw for Joanne came when she and a fellow missionary were waiting at a bus stop on the outskirts of Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia’s capital. A mother had invited them to her child’s first haircut, which called for a big celebration in Mongolia. Joanne was instructed to wait at the bus stop because she would never be able to find the ger home on the unmarked streets, so she and the other missionary sat on the curb and waited for the mother to arrive.
Then four drunken men sat beside them and tried to hug and kiss Joanne.
Joanne and the other missionary moved away, but the men followed. Everyone at the crowded bus stop looked away. The men dragged the women to a deserted alley. Joanne screamed and kicked and fought back, but she was no match for the four men. Then the men threw the women onto the ground. Joanne thought it was the end.
Suddenly, the men’s faces turned pale. They turned and ran away.
Joanne looked around to see who had come to save them. No one was there. At that moment, Joanne knew that the men must have seen an angel.
This mission story offers an inside look at American missionary Joanne (Park) Kim, who helped start the Seventh-day Adventist work in post-Communist Mongolia and continues to serve as a missionary there. You also can participate in the mission work through this quarter’s Thirteenth Sabbath Offering, part of which will help open a recreation center where children can grow spiritually, mentally, socially, and physically in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. Read more about Joanne next week.
(1)Source: https://ssnet.org/blog/25a-04-inside-story-attacked-by-drunken-men/
Daily Lesson for Friday 24th of January 2025
Image © Stan Myers from GoodSalt.com
“All who have a sense of their deep soul poverty, who feel that they have nothing good in themselves, may find righteousness and strength by looking unto Jesus. He says, ‘Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy-laden.’ Matthew 11:28. He bids you exchange your poverty for the riches of His grace. We are not worthy of God’s love, but Christ, our surety, is worthy, and is abundantly able to save all who shall come unto Him. Whatever may have been your past experience, however discouraging your present circumstances, if you will come to Jesus just as you are, weak, helpless, and despairing, our compassionate Saviour will meet you a great way off, and will throw about you His arms of love and His robe of righteousness. He presents us to the Father clothed in the white raiment of His own character. He pleads before God in our behalf, saying: I have taken the sinner’s place. Look not upon this wayward child, but look on Me. Does Satan plead loudly against our souls, accusing of sin, and claiming us as his prey, the blood of Christ pleads with greater power.”—Ellen G. White, Thoughts From the Mount of Blessing, Pages 8, 9.
Discussion Questions
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(1)Source: https://ssnet.org/blog/25a-04-further-thought-god-is-passionate-and-compassionate/
Daily Lesson for Thursday 23rd of January 2025
The God of the Bible is compassionate and passionate, and these divine emotions are supremely exemplified in Jesus Christ. God is sympathetic (compare with Isaiah 63:9, Hebrews 4:15), deeply affected by the sorrows of His people (Judges 10:16, Luke 19:41), and willing to hear, answer, and comfort (Isaiah 49:10,15; Matthew 9:36; Matthew 14:14).
Image © Review & Herald Publishing from GoodSalt.com
We long to be in relationship with persons who exemplify the kind of love described in 1 Corinthians 13:4-8. But how often do we seek to become this kind of person toward others? We cannot make ourselves long-suffering and kind; we cannot make ourselves not be envious, conceited, rude, or self-seeking. We cannot muster a love in ourselves that “bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things,” and “never fails” (1 Corinthians 13:7-8, NKJV). Such love can be exemplified in our lives only as the fruit of the Holy Spirit. And praise God that the Holy Spirit pours the love of God into the hearts of those who, by faith, are in Christ Jesus (Romans 5:5).
By the grace of God and the power of the Holy Spirit, in what practical ways might we respond to, and reflect, God’s profoundly emotional, but always perfectly righteous and rational, love? First, the only appropriate response is to worship the God who is love. Second, we should respond to God’s love by actively showing compassion and benevolent love to others. We should not simply be comforted in our Christian faith but should be motivated to comfort others. Finally, we should recognize that we cannot change our hearts, but that only God can.
So, let us ask God to give us a new heart for Him and for others—a pure and purifying love that elevates what is good and removes the chaff from within.
Let our prayer be: “may the Lord make you increase and abound in love to one another and to all, . . . so that He may establish your hearts blameless in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all His saints” (1 Thessalonians 3:12-13, NKJV).
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Why is a death to self and to the selfishness and corruption of our natural hearts the only way to reveal this kind of love? What are the choices that we can make in order to be able to die this death to self? |
(0)Source: https://ssnet.org/blog/25a-04-compassion-and-passionate/
Join It Is Written Sabbath School host Eric Flickinger and this quarter’s author, John C. Peckham, as they provide additional insights into this week’s Sabbath School lesson.”
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