There’s a story I’ve started using at the end of my teaching times with groups of women. For me, the story cuts the tension in what is, for me as a teacher, always a tense few minutes, for I’m wrapping up my topic, but I’m also probing my learners’ response.
For the believer:
- What has the Lord been talking to you about?
- What one thing would he have you do that’s different?
- Will you do it?
For the unbeliever, it comes down to one thing:
Will you step over the line, placing your trust in God and displacing your trust in yourself?
It’s a Matter of Trust
The story that helps me communicate all this is short and direct because the woman in the story was no-nonsense and all business regarding spiritual matters. She was everything you would expect a conservative Christian woman born in the 1930s and raising a family in the 1960s and 70s to be, so when someone from her community was in the hospital, she would, naturally, visit.
Sailing into the hospital room on one of these visits, she found the patient sitting in a chair, so she knelt close beside the chair, called the woman by name, and, dispensing with all pleasantries or small talk, asked the most consequential of questions: “Are you trusting in Jesus?”
It’s that simple, isn’t it? For everyone, seasoned believer or confirmed pagan, it’s a matter of trust, because every day is a new opportunity to hand ourselves over to God.
God invites us to commit ourselves to believing everything he has said about himself and about humanity. And he has said plenty!
In fact, I’m about to begin studying seven of Jesus’s most vivid and metaphorical incidents of self-disclosure with the women of my church. As a guide, I’ll be using Behold and Believe, a Bible study on the “I Am” Statements written by Courtney Doctor and Joanna Kimbrel.
As an eyewitness to Jesus’s life and ministry, the Apostle John would have heard all seven declarative statements, each one a literary device in which Jesus broadens our understanding of his role and his identity by using something concrete to open up his listeners’ imaginations.
For everyone, seasoned believer or confirmed pagan, it’s a matter of trust, because every day is a new opportunity to hand ourselves over to God. So… let me ask you: Are you trusting in Jesus?
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Jesus’s Self-Disclosure
For example, with his claim to be the bread of life, “what Jesus promised is so much greater than a free meal and a full stomach. To feast with faith on the bread of life by believing in Jesus is to receive life that lasts forever. Our bodies may die, but Jesus is the food that sustains our souls forever.” (18)
The “I Am” statements are also a bold declaration of Jesus’s deity. God is the only Person who can legitimately say, “I am,” for he is a fixed reality. The rest of us are always in flux, constantly changing; growing or regressing; truth-telling or hiding behind a lie; persevering one day and passive the next.
Doctor and Kimbrel guide readers through comprehension, interpretation, and application with daily questions, memory work, and helpful grounding in whole-Bible context. The goal of each lesson is for the learner to walk away with new reasons to love Jesus while also committing to life changes in response to the truth.
Seeing Jesus as he described himself is an invitation to a particularly intimate beholding. As with any relationship, we learn the most about someone when we listen to their words and pay attention to their ways. My prayer for my class is that we’ll be surprised by Jesus’s self-disclosure and discover truth about him that helps us to trust him in new ways.
And while we’re on the topic, let me ask YOU the all-important question: Are you trusting in Jesus?
Holding You in the Light,
Behold and Believe by @courtneydoctor and Joanna Kimbrel explores Jesus’s unique self-disclosure in his 7 “I am” statements. @crossway @TGC
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Michele, it truly does come down to that one question doesn’t it? And every day provides an opportunity for us to trust in Jesus. That is such a powerful question, for only when and as I am trusting in Jesus, am I then trusting myself less. May I grow ever dependent on Him for all of my days. Bless you, friend, for sharing this challenging question!
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You’re right! I think we do miss the opportunity to trust Jesus when we place our trust in our appearance, our abilities, our stuff—even our kids or our husbands! When we step over the line for the first time and displace our trust in ourselves and place our trust in Christ, it’s the beginning of a lifetime of big and little choices to trust.
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God does indeed provide new insights to discover in his Word, new opportunities to hand ourselves over to Him, new reasons to love Jesus, and new ways to trust–all providing hope, strength, and joy for the day! Praying your study includes all that and more, Michele!
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I’m really looking forward to getting back into the room with the women’s class. We’ve been combined for Sunday school since July, and it was a great study on biblical worldview, and I loved team teaching with my husband, but it will be nice to get back to normal again.
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I hope this will be a blessed study, learning more about and falling more in love with Him. I like that thought that every day—every new problem, unknown situation, causes for concern—are all reasons to trust Him.
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And isn’t it wonderful that his self-revelation is actually evidence on the side of placing our trust in him—and displacing our trust in ourselves!
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Knowing the safe places to put our trust is so valuable for our peace and security. I was with my uncle last night when he found out that, instead of pneumonia, he may have lung cancer. It was a sobering moment for all of us in the room and an opportunity to really draw on our faith in the middle of a harrowing diagnosis.
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That’s so hard—we do need that firm foundation.
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I love the book of John. We spent a year diving into the seven “I Am” statements – and so much more in my bible study class. It you truly believe His words, you know you can trust Him no matter what. He is all that we need.
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I’m so excited to begin!
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[…] it’s because I recently led a Sunday school class through the seven I Am statements of Jesus that my mind immediately went to the seven images the Apostle John collected, seven metaphors from […]
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