In case you didn’t already know, LSC holds a lively and informal Bible Study at lunchtime each Monday 12:15 – 1:15 pm. We meet in the HUB near Sbarro and read over the texts for the coming Sunday’s worship. Bring or pick up your lunch and join the conversation! It is a good chance to explore questions, share your thoughts and hear waht others are thinking. If you have trouble finding the right spot, just text Alicia 814.360.0601 to find the right place.
Here are the readings and some questions for Monday, January 28th. These will be the readings for worship on Sunday, February 3rd.
Luke 4:21-30
21Then he began to say to them, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” 22All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth. They said, “Is not this Joseph’s son?” 23He said to them, “Doubtless you will quote to me this proverb, ‘Doctor, cure yourself!’ And you will say, ‘Do here also in your hometown the things that we have heard you did at Capernaum.'” 24And he said, “Truly I tell you, no prophet is accepted in the prophet’s hometown. 25But the truth is, there were many widows in Israel in the time of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six months, and there was a severe famine over all the land; 26yet Elijah was sent to none of them except to a widow at Zarephath in Sidon. 27There were also many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, and none of them was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian.” 28When they heard this, all in the synagogue were filled with rage. 29They got up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they might hurl him off the cliff. 30But he passed through the midst of them and went on his way.Note: this passage is immediately after last Sunday’s passage where Jesus reads from Isaiah in the synagogue in his home area. The stories he refers to are about God helping foreigners or outsiders rather than Israelites (1 Kings 17:1, 8-16; 18:1; 2 Kings 5:1-14).
Questions:
-What do you notice in this story?
-What do you think brought the change of heart in Jesus’ listeners?
-Why do you think a prophet isn’t accepted in their hometown?
-What messages/teachings of Jesus are hard for you and me to tolerate and to follow?
-Why do you think this happens?
Jeremiah 1:4-10
4Now the word of the LORD came to me saying,
5“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,
and before you were born I consecrated you;
I appointed you a prophet to the nations.”
6Then I said, “Ah, Lord GOD! Truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy.” 7But the LORD said to me,
“Do not say, ‘I am only a boy’;
for you shall go to all to whom I send you,
and you shall speak whatever I command you.
8Do not be afraid of them,
for I am with you to deliver you,
says the LORD.”
9Then the LORD put out his hand and touched my mouth; and the LORD said to me,
“Now I have put my words in your mouth.
10See, today I appoint you over nations and over kingdoms,
to pluck up and to pull down,
to destroy and to overthrow,
to build and to plant.”Note: Here God calls Jeremiah to serve as God’s prophet. The messages Jeremiah brought were primarily tough ones for Judah and Jerusalem.
Questions:
-What do you notice in this passage?
-What do these passages lead you to think/know about God?
-What do these passages show us about God’s connection with Jeremiah and with us?
-What connection do you see with this passage and the Luke or the 1st Corinthian readings?
1 Corinthians 13:1-13
If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
4Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant 5or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. 7It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
8Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end. 9For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part; 10but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end. 11When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. 12For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. 13And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.Questions:
-What do you notice in this passage?
-What contrasts are there with the love we see in media or music and this kind of love?
-Where have you experienced love something like Paul talks about?
-How important is this love-thing for people of faith?
-What connections do you see between the Luke passage and the 1 Corinthians passage?