Today’s reading drops us right into the middle of John’s vision of the end times.  There have been seven seals broken followed by seven angels blowing seven trumpets.  It has not been pretty for mankind or the world in which he lives as each of these angels has brought destruction and disaster.

Chapter 12 brings us a vision of a pregnant woman giving birth, a great red dragon seeking to devour the woman’s baby and war between Michael and the dragon, supported by their respective angels.

The book of Revelation is a difficult book to deal with for lots of different reasons, the primary reason being that it is a vision, a dream, and a second is that it is a dream dealing of future events, with the end of the world as we know it.  It is also the one book of the Bible that people who know nothing about God or the Bible will at least have heard of and probably will have an opinion about, which makes it important that we, as believers, at least be familiar with Revelation and have some kind of understanding of what it is what John and the Holy Spirit are trying to tell us through it.

Questions:

1. What do you see as you read through this chapter of Revelation?  What strikes you as important in these verses?  What are the questions that come to mind as you read?
2. Have you ever had a particularly vivid dream and then tried to relate that dream to someone?  What are the problems that you had in relating that dream?  How did the person that you were telling understand what you were saying?  Did they understand what you were trying to tell them?
3. Who is the dragon?  Why do you think the significance of the dragon being crowned with seven crowns might be?  Why would he be seeking to devour the woman’s child?
4. How are the woman and her child protected?  Who is the one doing the protecting?
5. What is the result of the war in heaven?  Where do the dragon and his angels end up and what is there new intention?
6. What does the voice from heaven say (12:10-12)?  Who do you think this voice is speaking to and what do you think His purpose in speaking is?

Please post your observations, comments, and questions and move through this study of what the Bible says about the supernatural.

Daniel is a Jew who has spent nearly 70 years in the service of the kings and rulers of the kingdom of Babylon and is now in the service of Babylon’s conquerors, the Persians.  He was taken hostage from Jerusalem as a young man by Nebuchadnezzar (Daniel 1:1-6) in 605 BC.  It is now 537 BC and he has received a revelation of a coming war that, for whatever reason, has really rattled his cage.  His response to this revelation is to go into mourning and fasting, which is where he has been for three weeks; all in order seek an understanding of just what this revelation means.  As Daniel stands on the bank of the River Tigris, he finds himself confronted with the answer to his prayers and fasting, a supernatural being that has been dispatched to bring him the understanding that he is seeking.

The angel first tells the tale of his journey and adventures in reaching Daniel’s side.  He has been in personal combat with the ‘king of Persia’ for the three weeks that Daniel has been fasting, praying and waiting.  It is only when Michael, one of the ‘chief princes’ comes to his aid that he is finally free to come to Daniel.

In the chapters that follow our reading for today, this angel relates a series of prophecies that are at the heart of why Daniel is such a controversial book.  The wars that are described are essentially the wars between two of Alexander the Greats generals, Ptolemy and Seleucus and the kingdoms that they established in the wake of Alexander’s death in 323 BC.  What makes these chapters so controversial is their uncanny accuracy.  If Daniel is who the Bible says he is and he truly received these prophecies in 537 BC, it becomes very difficult to deny God and His supernatural kingdom.

Questions:

1. This chapter is chocked full of descriptions, clues and observations to be made about the supernatural.  Don’t let our questions limit your observing the text and thinking about what the Holy Spirit is trying to reveal to us here.  What is that you see in these verses?  What are the questions that come to your mind as you read?
2. Daniel was a man who had faced monarchs at the height of their powers and rage, spent a night in a den of hungry lions and presumably lived through the capture and sack of Babylon by the Persians.  Yet his initial response to his supernatural visitor is one of abject terror.  What does this tell you about what it means to meet the supernatural face-to-face?
3. What is the angel’s response to Daniel’s terror?  And Daniel’s to the angel’s touch?
4. What part do Daniel’s prayers play in the supernatural?  What events are set in motion by his response of fasting and prayer to the revelation that he has been given?
5. What do these verses tell you about our role in events in the supernatural?  What do they say about the impact of the supernatural on our natural world and the interaction of the two?  How does this understanding change how you think about the supernatural?  About prayer and fasting?  About the role that God would have us play in both this world and the supernatural and the conflict that seems to be raging there?
6. Is your desire for God’s Revelation and Understanding great enough that you would fast in order to obtain them?

Please post your observations, comments, and questions and move through this study of what the Bible says about the supernatural.

Ezekiel was a prophet who lived and prophesied in the late seventh and early sixth century BC, immediately proceeding Jerusalem’s destruction by the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar.  He was most likely taken from Jerusalem and into exile in Babylon along with King Jehoiachin in 597 BC.  The specific prophecy we read in chapter ten of Ezekiel is dated to 592 BC (Ezekiel 8:1) and was written from Babylon to those who remained in Jerusalem.

In Exodus 25:17-22, God shows Moses the design for the atonement cover or mercy seat of the Ark of the Covenant.  It would have two cherubim with wings stretched upward to overshadow the mercy seat.  This was the central place of the entire Old Testament structure, as it was here that God would meet with Moses (and subsequently, the high priest); He would speak from between these two cherubim and it would be here that the high priest would offer the sin offering for the nation of Israel.  The atonement cover with its cherubim was the heart of the relationship between God and His people.

However, in our reading for today, Ezekiel sees a vision of living and breathing cherubim, the reality of what the atonement cover represented.  He sees four cherubim on wheels; their entire bodies, including their backs, their hands and their wings, are completely full of eyes, as are each of their four wheels.  Each of the cherubim has four faces: one face is that of a cherub, the second the face of a man, the third the face of a lion, and the fourth the face of an eagle (10:14).  In the expanse over the heads of the cherubim, Ezekiel sees the throne of the God of Israel.

The Lord has descended to the temple to give instructions to a certain man in linen to scatter over the city the burning coals from among the wheels beneath the cherubim.   Obediently one of the cherubim reaches out his hand into the fire that was among them.  He takes up some of coals and puts them into the hands of the man in linen, who takes then and goes out (10:7).  Then the cherubim rise upward, with the glory of the Lord above them.  They stop at the entrance to the east gate of the Lord’s house.  The Lord God of Israel leaves His temple as a result of Israel’s sin and no longer protects them from other nations punishing and scattering them.  Yet all hope is not lost as the Lord promises the return of Israel (11:16-25).

Questions:

1. What do you see as you read this vision of Ezekiel?  What stands out to you as being important?
2. Why would God be literally ‘picking up’ and leaving the Temple?
3. Cherubim are supernatural beings.  What kind of mental picture do you get of them from these verses?  What is there purpose here?  Compare this with cherubim elsewhere in the Bible; Genesis 3:24; 2 Samuel 22:11 (cherubim is the plural of cherub) and Psalm 18:10.  How do these creatures compare to the ‘four living creatures’ we saw in Revelation 4?  What kind of general observations can you make about what these creatures are and what their purpose is?
4. In western culture, we have this idea of cherubs being these cute, chubby, cuddly, ‘baby angels’ that hang around the edges of Renaissance paintings and Valentine’s Day cards.  Is this an accurate image of what these creatures really are?
5. What other misconceptions might you and our culture at large have about the supernatural and the creatures that populate it?  How does your current understanding of the supernatural and its creatures impact your day-to-day thinking?

Please post your observations, comments, and questions and move through this study of what the Bible says about the supernatural.

Job 1 places us once again in the presence of God.  This time we get a different picture of what goes on in that Presence.  The angels (literally ‘the sons of God’) have presented themselves before God and Satan is among them.  God singles out Satan and engages him in a dialogue concerning Job, whom is ‘blameless and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil’ (1:1,8).  The upshot of this discussion is that God gives Satan permission to do with as he will with all that Job has, but not with Job himself.

What Satan would do is destroy all that he can lay his hands on.  Everything that Job has, Satan destroys; herds, flocks, servants and even Job’s children are killed.  Job’s response is to tear his robe and shave his head in mourning and fall on the ground to worship.  ‘In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing’ (1:22).

To say that this chapter raises some thorny questions and issues is an understatement.  God instigates a contest between Himself and Satan that is a test of Job’s faith, with the question being ‘Will Job curse God to His face?’  The rest of the book of Job is the answer to that challenge which questions and deals with the issues of evil, suffering and Job’s (and by implication, our own) response to it; not exactly your comfortable, fireside read.

The bottom line question is one of dominions and principalities, who is really is charge and whose authority will we recognize and follow?  Satan is powerless against Job until God gives him permission.  From the perspective of the Throne Room of God, the answer to the question of who is in charge is a no-brainer, but from the world’s perspective, the answer isn’t so clear cut.

Questions:

1. What is it that you see in this chapter?  What are the significant points and interactions that seem important to you?  What are your questions as you read through these verses?
2. Before you read these verses, would you have said that God was capable of doing what He did in the case of Job?
3. How would you characterize the conversation and relationship between Satan and God?  What do you see as God’s purpose and Satan’s purpose in this contest?  What do these observations tell you about the character and nature of both?
4. Put yourself in Job’s place.  What would your response to the loss of everything you have, including your children, have been?  What does that response tell you about whom you think God is and what He should be about in His relationship with you?
5. What does Job’s response to the disasters that have befallen him tell you about the true nature of worship and our relationship with God?
6. What does v.22 tell you about the nature and reality of sin?

Please post your observations, comments, and questions and move through this study of what the Bible says about the supernatural.

The theme for this week’s readings is ‘Dominions & Principalities’ and deals with rulers, their power, authority and the areas over which they exert that power and authority.  We begin our tour in heaven.

John is writing from a Roman penal colony on the island of Patmos, located in the Aegean Sea, about 35 miles off the southwestern coast of ancient Asia Minor or what we know as modern Turkey.  He has been swept up into a vision of heaven and in the first three chapters of the book of Revelation, he relates specific messages and prophecies to seven of the churches in Asia Minor.

In chapter four, our reading for today, John is shown a doorway that leads to the throne room of God and asked to enter to be shown what must take place.  John enters and chapter four is a description of what he sees.

Questions:

1. What do you see as you read these verses?  What is it that stands out to you as significant?  What are the questions you have as you read what John describes here?
2. Make a list of the different beings that are described here and what they are doing.  Is there a common theme among the activities that John describes here?
3. John states that ‘At once, I was in the Spirit…’ (4:1).  What do you think that he means by this statement?  What are the implications for John’s normal activity that he immediately recognizes this state of being?
4. Look at what the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders say as they are before the throne of God.  How would you characterize what they are saying and doing?
5. What is worship?  How do you see worship in your day-to-day life?  What do you see as the implications for what worship is in these verses?

Please post your observations, comments, and questions and move through this study of what the Bible says about the supernatural.

The issue Paul is addressing in this chapter is the physical resurrection, which is an issue we saw in yesterday’s reading in 2Corinthians 5.  This was a cultural issue for the Greeks and Romans, who saw the afterlife as one of ‘shades’, bodiless souls who populated the underworld of Hades.  They then very naturally translated that concept of a less than physical afterlife, either consciously or unconsciously, to their own understanding of the Gospel and resurrection.  Paul takes exception to that understanding of the resurrection and sets about correcting it in this chapter.

This brings to light two fundamental concepts of Bible Study 101.  The first is repetition, a tool you use as you observe what Scripture says.  If you see an author repeatedly using the same words, phrases and addressing the same concepts multiple times, then those words, phrases and concepts are important.  Paul obviously thinks that this concept of the resurrection as physical in nature, that Christ was and we will be raised with physical bodies, is important and foundational to a proper understanding of the Gospel.  Because Paul, and the Holy Spirit through him, thinks this concept important, it behooves us to spend some time looking at the concept and it’s implications for our own understanding, not only of the immediate texts in front of us, but our faith and understanding of the Kingdom of God as a whole.

The second concept is an issue to be warned and aware of, that of cultural perspective.  Projecting our own assumptions and understanding into any situation, whether it is Bible Study or life in general, is one of the easiest and most natural, and therefore unconscious, things we do.  In that process, we run the risk of misunderstanding what is happening or being said.  This is exactly what the Corinthians did.  They took their understanding of the afterlife and projected it into the Gospel and their understanding of the resurrection and missed Paul’s point that the resurrection includes a physical body, a point that Paul considers important to, if not critical to a proper understanding of the Gospel.

If we hope to properly understand and apply the Word of God concretely to our everyday lives, we must read that Word carefully and actively.  To fail to do so will inevitably lead us into the kind of error that Paul is addressing here with the Corinthian church.  We come to the Word already having a fundamental understanding of how the world around us works and that understanding is most definitely not that of our heavenly Father and His Kingdom.  The point of reading and studying the Bible would be to recognize and root out those misconceptions and allow the Holy Spirit to re-educate us and replace those misconceptions with the proper ones founded in the Kingdom.  Repetition and perspective are two of the many tools that we have at our disposal to be used in this process and we must use them if we hope to come to possess an understanding and faith that approaches that which Christ walked out while He was on the earth.

Questions:

1. What do you see in these verses?  What are the words, phrases and concepts that you see being used multiple times?  Do you understand what those words, phrases and concepts mean?  Do you think that your understanding is the same as Paul’s as he uses these words and concepts?  How would you go about finding out more about those words as well as your own and Paul’s understanding of them?
2. Have you ever had a conversation that ended up in a misunderstanding?  Did you go back to look at and think about where that misunderstanding stemmed from?  Is the source of that misunderstanding always the fact that someone else failed to understand you?
3. Paul obviously thinks that the physical aspect of the resurrection is critical to the Gospel and he goes into a lengthy explanation of why he thinks it is important.  What are the conclusions that you come to as to why Paul thinks this concept is so important?  What are the questions that come to mind as you try and wrap your mind and understanding around the resurrection and it’s implications for the Gospel?
4. Can you identify your own pre-conceived ideas and understandings of the afterlife that you bring to the discussion?
5. In what ways does an understanding that we will be changed ‘in a flash, the twinkling of an eye’ (15:50-53) impact how you live your life today?  If this body we live in is only a temporary residence, what does that imply for our perspective on today, tomorrow and eternity?

Please post your observations, comments, and questions and move through this study of what the Bible says about the supernatural.

As aliens and strangers, we’re reminded that no matter what happens to our earthly dwelling, we have an eternal house in heaven waiting for us. This is our real dwelling, which our spirits are longing to go back to. After all, we are only here on earth as temporary visitors. We may be burdened in this earthly dwelling, but God has made us for this very purpose while guaranteeing the final outcome through His Spirit. Since we would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord, we need to live by faith, not by sight. We maybe tested, but our goal is to please Him wherever we are.

Not only are we visitors, but we’re called to be Christ ambassadors. He so loved us that He died for us, to reconcile us to the Father and then was raised to new life. Therefore we should live for Him. If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! (5:17) In this new life of faith and as Christ ambassadors, we are called to pass on the message of reconciliation to other aliens and strangers who are lost. We should regard no one from a worldly point of view. If this is our purpose, surely we would please Him and satisfy our longing for Him in faith and looking forward to our eventual real home with Him.

Questions:

1. What is your goal and purpose in this life?  Is the purpose of that goal to please yourself or your Father in heaven?  How would you know the difference?
2. How does knowing that your life in this world is temporary and that your heavenly Father has a specific purpose for this visit impact how you handle life’s burdens?  Given this assumption, what do you think the purpose of the Holy Spirit is in your life?
3. How would you define what it means to be an ambassador?  What are the responsibilities and powers of an ambassador sent by the United States to a foreign country?  How does the fact that they are an ambassador for the United States of America impact their thinking and behavior?
4. How does your understanding of Christ’s sacrifice for you and Father’s specific purpose for your visit here on earth impact how you see other people?  Does it change your motives for helping those whom you may know and others you may meet?
5. Evaluate your relationship with Christ.  Do you see the new life that Paul speaks of in v.17?  What do you think the world around you sees?  Would you want to be invited to share that relationship and new life?
6. Do you see our impending return home as something important enough to be shared with those around you?

Please post your observations, comments, and questions and move through this study of what the Bible says about the supernatural.

Again, we run across this idea of ‘aliens and strangers’ in today’s passage in 1Peter.  Peter is writing to the churches of Asia Minor, what we know today as Turkey, who are suffering grief as the result of some type of trial (1:6).  In his greeting, he addresses them as ‘strangers in the world’ and then goes on in chapter 1 to lay the foundation for exactly why they are strangers.  Again, this foundation is of a spiritual, supernatural character.  They are ‘born again to a living hope’ (1:3 NASB) through the resurrection of Christ with an inheritance waiting for them in heaven.  He encourages them to prepare their minds for action and to fix their hope completely on the grace to be revealed to them in Christ (1:13).

Having laid this foundation, Peter goes on in chapter 2 to encourage them in how to live in these times.  ‘Therefore, rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy and slander of every kind.  Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk (pure milk of the word; NASB) so that by it you may grow up in your salvation, now that you have tasted that the Lord is good’ (2:1-3 NIV).  He then points again to this idea of being ‘aliens and strangers’ in the world, encouraging them to abstain from the sinful desires that wages war against their souls (2:11) and to submit to the authorities who are over them and who are most probably persecuting them.  Chapter 2 ends with Peter setting the example of Christ on the Cross before them.

The whole point of this idea of ‘aliens and strangers’ is that we are not of this world, that we follow a different path as we face the trials that the world throws at us, so that even in the middle of those trials, people will see a palatable difference.  Even as the people of the world accuse us of wrong doing, they will see the good deeds that we do because of the hope that we have and when crunch time comes for them, they will glorify God as well.

Questions:

1. What is it that you see in these verses?  What does it seem to you is what is important in what Peter is saying?  What are the questions that you have about what Peter is saying here?
2. The first thing Peter points to in our quest to rid ourselves of all the ‘junk’ of our previous way of thinking is to crave the ‘pure milk of the Word’ so that we may grow up in our salvation (2:1-2).  Do you want to grow in your salvation?  Have you developed a craving for the Word of God?  What can you do to cultivate this craving?  What can you do begin satisfying this craving?  What can you begin to do today?
3. Have you tasted that the Lord is good?  If not, this may be why your craving for the Word is not what it should be.  What can you do to get a sample to taste?
4. Are you familiar with this ‘combat’ being waged against your soul (v.11)?  What are the weapons and tactics that are available to you as you fight this battle?  How successful are the natural weapons that you have used in this fight?
5. Read through vv. 13-25 with an eye towards how the world reacts in those situations.  Is that reaction yours as well?  How do you score on the ‘aliens and strangers’ index?
6. What is your reaction to authority?  Do you willingly submit?  How does your reaction change if that authority is persecuting you?  What value do you see, if any, in this kind of submission?
7. What kind of grasp do you have on the supernatural reality that Christ bore your sins on the Cross that you might die to those sins and live for righteousness?

Please post your observations, comments, and questions and move through this study of what the Bible says about the supernatural.

Paul is in jail as he writes this letter to the Ephesians, most probably as part of the judicial process that started in Caesarea when he appealed to Caesar in his trial before Festus, the Roman governor of Judea (Acts 25:9-12).  His audience is the church at Ephesus, one that he is very familiar with (Acts 19:8-10; 20:13-38) and most probably the churches in the surrounding area.

Ephesians 1 lays out the spiritual blessings that God has given believers because of Christ (1:3), the fact that He chose us from before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless (1:4), He predestined us to be adopted as His children through Christ (1:5), He has provided redemption and forgiveness of sins through the blood of Christ (1:7) and marked believers with the seal of the Holy Spirit (1:13).

Chapter 1 continues with Paul’s prayer for the Ephesians.  He prays that Father might give them the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in order that they may know Him better (1:17), that the eyes of their hearts might be enlightened to know the hope to which He was calling them and that they might know the power which raised Christ from the dead and seated Him at the Right Hand of God (1:19-23).  Essentially, Paul is establishing that the important stuff that happens in a believer’s relationship with Father happens in the supernatural, spiritual realm.

Chapter 2, our chapter for today’s reading, turns to the believer’s side of the equation, what happens to us when we come to that saving faith in Christ and again, they are supernatural, spiritual consequences.  We were dead in our transgressions and sin as we followed the ways of the world and the ‘ruler of the kingdom of the air’ (2:1-2), those acts are contrary to the will of God and violate the boundaries that He sets up for us as we followed, knowingly or not, another spiritual, supernatural, authority.  He gives us new life, a life we cannot earn, but one that is given to us.  We are saved by grace so no one can boast (2:6-10).

Once we are made alive, given a new life in the supernatural realm, God sets into motion the process of our being made to be one, unified with Christ, by His Spirit (compare 1:20-21 with 2:6-7).  Even though we were far away from God, following another authority and faith, we are now brought near by the Blood of Christ which destroyed any separation, the wall of hostility that resulted from our sin and transgressions, and made one with Him (2:13-16).  The result of which is we now have access to Father supernaturally by one Spirit (2:18) and are being created, along with other believers, as a dwelling in which God Himself can live by His Spirit (2:22).

Questions:

1. What is it that you see in these verses that stands out to you?  What is that you see as the important ideas and concepts that Paul is emphasizing to the believers in Ephesus?  Are those ideas and concepts applicable to believers today?  Why or why not?
2. What are the relationships between the natural and supernatural, the physical and spiritual that you see in these verses?
3. Do you buy the idea that you were dead and followed a spiritual authority known to Paul as the ‘ruler of the kingdom of the air’?  Why or why not?
4. Do you buy the idea that you have been given a new life by the grace of God alone through the Blood of Christ?  Do you buy the idea that you have actually been seated at the Right Hand of God along with Christ?
5. What do you think is the evidence of that new life is as it manifests itself in the physical life that you live today?  Do you see that evidence?
6. How does this understanding of this new supernatural life you have been given impact how you see the physical world around you?  How does it change the priorities that you have for this day?

Please post your observations, comments, and questions and move through this study of what the Bible says about the supernatural.