by Melinda Cox
Our Bible Study Class meets in room 221 at 9:45 AM. Recently, the Friendship Class has conducted sermon-based lessons, doing an in-depth analysis of the sermon preached the week before at Trinity Baptist Church. But, beginning in June, our class shifted gears and began a unit of study on the topic of eschatology, entitled “The End is Near—or Is It?” This will lead into a series of lessons on the topic of Heaven beginning sometime in July.
Our Bible study follows the method known as “Con-Con-App,” or Content, Context, and Application. With this method of study, the class begins with an in-depth analysis of the actual Biblical text (often with emphasis placed upon key words from the original languages—Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic). Then, the Biblical passage being studied is placed within its original historical and cultural context. Only after completing these steps, do we apply the Biblical passage to our current life situation (you can’t properly apply the Bible to the present without first understanding what the text actually says and what it meant to its original audience).
Prayer is another very important aspect of our class. Prayer requests are received from class members, prayed over during class time and subsequently also sent out via email to class members and certain TBC staff members for prayer reminders during the week. If an emergency situation happens during the week and the class needs to be notified, another prayer request will go out to this group so that these needs will be lifted up to the Lord as soon as possible.
Acts 2:42 states that the early Christians “continuously devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and prayer.” Koinonia, or fellowship, is an important part of the Christian life. Whenever we gather together as a group, we are imitating the early church. Fellowships for our group include lunch at the TBC Café after church services or at a class member’s home.