Burns Church of Christ

Good luck and study hard! Here’s this week’s test.

I know several of you were at different VBS locations this week — so I hope you’ve been studying. This quiz is mainly from the questions that Harriett, David, and Leighann submitted… Of course, I changed a few of the wrong answers to see if you’d miss your own questions! :)

Good luck on Bible Bowl web quiz 3!

It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions. Titus 2:12

This is the age when people want us to build character: “Character Counts.” We want our children to learn good character traits and be able to apply them at the opportune time. There is little question that bringing character into play in our world would be a move in the fight direction.

The D.A.R.E. programs attempt to teach our children to “just say ‘no’”  They are talking about tobacco, alcohol and drugs. Again this is a supper idea.

Learning to say “no” may not be that difficult if we could learn to say “yes” to the right things.  Learning to set priorities is a must if we and our children are ever to make a success out of living.  Saying yes to the right things doesn’t leave as much room to necessitate saying a lot of “nos.”

In a most unusual way the grace of God teaches us to say “no” to the things that lead away from God and “Yes” to the things that lead to God.  By doing this we can overcome the worldly passions and streets of desire that drown men in perdition.  Losing priorities can make us go after thins that end in destructive lives and dead in streets. People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. (I Timothy 6:9)

When we say “yes” to the important things we will say “no” to the less important things that clamor for our attention.  We are always saying “no” to something.  We must learn to say “yes” to the better things of life and the “nos” will come easier.

Having trouble saying “yes” to the more important things in life?  It might be time for you to let the Lord come in and make a difference in your day.

This week’s quiz covers chapters 1-6 (mainly 4-6)….and it will give you feedback at the end to show you how you did… Good luck!

Take Quiz 2

Marriage should be honored by all, And the marriage bed kept pure. Hebrews 13:4 NIV

Let’s hear it for Marriage for Life! Let it echo through the churches and communities of our nation.  Let the redeemed say so!  It matters!

• Married couples are less likely to suffer from depression than unmarried or cohabiting people.
• Of all sexually active people, married couples who are faithful to one another experience the greatest satisfaction with their sex lives.
• Couples in lifelong marriages accumulate 63% more wealth than do unmarried people.
• Married and widowed women have the lowest rates of violent abuse by spouse.  Divorced and separated women have the highest rates.

Children from broken homes are:

• Twenty times more likely to have behavioral problems.
• Eight times more likely to go to prison.
• Five years after a divorce, children were not doing well.
• Ten years later, 41% were still doing poorly. (Judith Wallerstein)

As Christian we must defend marriage.  We must also work to make our marriages better.

There is no marriage that cannot get better.  Working on our own marriage will make it work better and let the next generation see something good that they would like to imitate.

This test is from 2 Samuel 1-3 NKJV. Be sure to click the right arrow at the bottom until you can’t click it anymore. This is not an open-Bible test and you need to work on your own. Good luck! :)

Bible Bowl 2008 Test 1: 2 Samuel 1-3

Be not deceived! Galatians 6:7

When was the last time you became obsessed with something that happened to you that turned out to be very small?  You blew up over some small thing and remained alienated for a period of from someone who really loves you.  Relations are strained and sleep is lost and friends and brothers are failing to grow in the Lord.

Do you find that you take things far too personally? How often do you use the words always and never?  Do you feel and think later?

It is easy to distort things and then the Devil comes in and exploits things worse.  In out perceptions we often distort reality. It becomes the foundations of most of the lies we tell ourselves. These distortions and the lies they feed are:

Magnification – the “mountain out of molehills” lie.
Personalization – the “taking everything personally” lie.
Polarization – the “black/white” lie
Selective abstraction – the “missing the forest for the trees” lie
Overgeneralization – the “history always repeats itself” lie
Emotional Reasoning – the “don’t confuse me with facts” lie.

It can easily happen to any of us.  We can distort our thinking over and over to warp daily events and conversations out of truthful proportions.

All of us do some of this.  We must learn to work on our thinking process so we can avoid the devil’s trap.  Want to read more? Chris Thurman, The Lies We Believe is a good book on the subject.