The morning Manna
will be provided at 6am. Thanks.
Studying Ephesians in
the SSnet.org series Lesson 6, may the Holy Spirit be the speaker to your
heart.
The Topic today
is: “Prisoner for Christ and Mystery of God’s Agape love for Morning Manna of
the Sabbath School Lesson Ephesians”.
The Opening Hymn
will be 229 "Spirit of the Living God."
The Sabbath School
Quarterly, downloadable from SSnet.org in the Teacher's Edition is on page 73-4.
The SSnet.org site
allows anyone, anywhere to read the lesson in their own language. Choose your
own language to see God speaking also to your heart.
Why do you not
click on this now?
https://www.adultbiblestudyguide.org/pdf.php?file=2023:3Q:SE:PDFs:EAQ323_06.pdf
---Or
try in alternative this one: https://ssnet.org/lessons/23c/less06.html
---Let us clear
up some things first to properly understand Paul the Prisoner of Christ and
also the mystery hidden now revealed. ---The mystery hidden
now revealed is what Jonah could not understand. The mercy of God for repented individuals,
Hebrews or Heathens alike! ---Who was
wrong? God or Jonah? God did not change His approach. ---He always
wanted anyone to repent not only Hebrews. ---So why was
hidden? Because of human machinations by cutting out some from worship. ---God’s rule
was that faith gives you a license for full membership. Not so with Jonah. And…and…the
time of Jesus and the Samaritans…and Paul’s mention of the access issue to the
temple. ---The Agape
love of God is the thread of the whole Bible and the mystery that unfallen
worlds cannot fully understand without wonder and amazement. ---Now Paul as a
prisoner of Christ. ---Ellen White
cited in Acts of the Apostles page 393
the Book of Acts by Luke where Paul and Luke knew about the Holy Spirit that
told Paul that it may be his last trip to Jerusalem and that his future is
going to be to be in “bonds”. Prisoner. ---So how did
Paul react to this news? “I belong to Christ and He knows my beginning and my
end. So if prisoner is my end then I am a prisoner of Christ”. Nice. Correct? ---Conditions
were not very welcome when a person is placed in a prison. It was to wait for a
court session or to be executed. ---Jerome
Carcopino wrote a book on the Daily Life
in Ancient Rome in 1938. Source:
https://archive.org/details/dailylifeinancie035465mbp ---From pages
183ff he is dealing with the court systems of Rome. ---Normally,
everyone else working goes home in the afternoon about 3 o clock. Job done let’s
go home. Slaves could go to the baths very early in the afternoon. ---Not for the
lawyers. The Court started at candle-light in the morning and sessions run
until dawn. ---It was
popular and the public could attend. ---Pliny the
Younger was a lawyer and at one time he was talking 5 hours without stop. When
he finished, the emperor told him “spare your voice and hold your breath”. ---The Romans
were fascinated by rhetorical speeches. That is why Paul is also rhetorical in
his defenses in Acts. It was fashion and expected. ---Pliny the
Younger came out of his long court sessions and wrote to a friend: “"You
will easily conceive,. . the fatigue we underwent in speaking and de- bating so long
and so often, and in examining, assisting, and confuting such a number of
witnesses; not to mention the difficulties and annoyance of the defendants'
friends: Concipere animo poles quam simus fatigati = You can imagine how tired
we are!" ---Carcopino the
modern scholar said then in 1938: “We can indeed conceive it, but what seems
inconceivable to us is that the Romans should have tolerated this exhausting
system with no attempt to modify or lighten it. Are we to believe that their
heads and nerves were more resistant to strain than ours?” ---So a system
of boring court cases with people half asleep during procedures were used in
Paul’s day to try him. He had to wait his turn too. ---Other
emperors were interested in Court sessions. But what about Nero? ---Carcopino
says page 137-138 that Nero used the Christians to light his gardens. ---He said that
if one’s faith was blocking them to serve the idols and polytheism then
Christians were accused of atheism by Nero! ---If Christians
are particularistic about their religion and refuse to be ecumenical or accept
the equity of religions principle in jurisprudence and life, then they were
imprisoned and killed. Thus Paul. ---Is you pastor
preaching that there are many roads to heaven? That all people will be saved
because God loves everyone? Then move. When? Now.