Week 5 — Word & Water

November 13, 2022

Start off by watching this video on the authority of the Bible, produced by Luther House of STudy.

Discuss:

This video shows the right posture toward the Bible, the posture of faith in what the Bible says. For what reasons is it frightening to have a faith posture toward a static writing? What challenges in your life make faith in the Bible’s ancient, unchanging message scary? And… is the Bible actually a static writing?

As you watch this video for the song “Thy Strong Word” by the church band Koiné, be praying to God that the others in your group would be built up in faith through this song’s strong claims.

Watch the following video by Bible Project on chapters 3-9 of Luke’s Gospel.

Discuss:

What thoughts do you think would be going through your mind if you were there and seeing all these connected things happening in Jesus’ life?

Prepare your mind for the most heady part

of today’s Digital Spotlight.

Pick a reader for the following handful of verses from Matthew’s Gospel, chapter 3.

The basics: The law is what God says is good living, and it shows us how far we’ve fallen from goodness and what the devastating consequences are for that. The gospel is the good news of God’s forgiveness in His Son, Jesus Christ, who died and rose to get skin-close to our sin so that it’s completely removed from us.

The teaching on Jesus’ baptism: At his baptism, Jesus told John the Baptizer that it was proper for imperfect John to baptize perfect Jesus so as to “fulfill all righteousness”. Many Christian faith traditions demote baptism to law, as though it’s something we are supposed to do. Our approach is to promote baptism to gospel, showcasing that it’s something God does and we are mere recipients of baptism’s gracious blessings. It’s an honor to keep baptism in the gospel category. But if we look at verse 15 above wrongly, we can turn baptism into law. So, here’s the key: It wasn’t so that John could do a great job that John had to baptize Jesus. The baptism itself didn’t fulfill all righteousness. That would be law, to fulfill all the righteous stuff. It was proper for John to baptism Jesus so that Jesus could get the benefits of baptism so that he then could fulfill all righteousness with his perfect life and sacrificial death. In other words, it’s not only us fallen people that need baptism. Jesus needed baptism, too. Jesus gained from his baptism. Why? Because baptism does that. Baptism blesses. Baptism equips. Baptism strengthens. Baptism helps. Why? Because through baptism, God gives us his Holy Spirit. Jesus didn’t need the Holy Spirit to forgive his sins, since Jesus never sinned. But Jesus needed the Holy Spirit to build him up for his big life-work. So, to compare our baptism to Jesus’ baptism, the two baptisms (ours and Jesus’) had the same effect to meet different needs. Baptism had the same effect of gifting the Holy Spirit to the baptized person. Jesus’ need was to be the perfect sacrifice. Your need was to be brought out of your imperfection into relationship with God.

The really, really good news based on all of that: Your baptism helps you to the extent that it helped Jesus. Did Jesus reach his goal, complete his big life-work? Then it’s guaranteed that baptism helps you as enormously as it helped Jesus. Different need, same effect: the arrival of the Holy Spirit into your heart.

Discuss:

Who in your life do you think needs to hear about how perfect Jesus had need and had his need met by his heavenly Father? Why is that really, really good news?

Watch one final video, a snippet of GVT’s most recent teaching on Word & Water.

Discuss:

What ceremonial goals would you like the others in your group to pray about for you, that they would ask God to help you with those goals?

Upcoming Events @ GVT

• Youth Group - Sundays 5pm-7pm

• Saturday, October 21, 2023, 4pm-6pm — next year’s Fall Family Fun Night

  • Lots of ways to help out with this outwardly focused event in which we see more newcomers to our campus than any other yearly event