Do you believe that university life is about more than classes, assignments, studying and weekends? Are you interested in finding more meaning and purpose in your life? Do you enjoy listening to and sharing ideas with others? Then, please join our weekly Bible discussion group.

Campus Bible Talk meets every Monday during the school year (except during holidays and during Reading Week Breaks) at Athabasca Hall, Heritage Lounge, at 6:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m.

You may also email us anytime at campus.bible.talk@gmail.com

Monday, September 26, 2016

Fervency

James 5:16b: "The prayer of the righteous is powerful and effective." (New Revised Standard Version)

Whatever it's right for us to do, it's helpful if we do it fervently.  Surely there is already enough halfheartedness in the world; can't we improve upon the status quo by being wholehearted?  And since the word "fervency" comes from the Latin verb "to boil," can't we boil a little more often and be a little less lukewarm?  Misguided fervency, can of course, be a dangerous evil, and the uninformed zealot is a well-known source of trouble in any society.  Zeal, or fervor, without knowledge is rarely anything but destructive, so we need to inform our fervency with things like accurate information and wisdom.  In a perfect world, we would never be "all fired up" about anything except on the basis of truth.  As William James suggested, "The union of the mathematician with the poet, fervor with measure, passion with correctness; this is surely the ideal."

But the dangers of ignorant or unbalanced zeal shouldn't scare us away from the rightful use of fervency.  We don't solve the problem of blind fanaticism by never being fervent about anything, but by opening our eyes, double- and triple-checking our facts, and always willing to be corrected.  The person who thinks he is just too intelligent and rational to be fervent is being rather foolish.  There is no good reason why a person can't be a mathematician and a poet too.

The fact is, we honor the ideas that we choose to be fervent about.  Julia McFolliard, under whom I studied oil painting as a young boy, taught me by her passion to respect the discipline of art.  And Robert Winstead, my high school calculus teacher, pulled me into an admiration for numbers by his eagerness for them.  Similarly, we all confer honour upon the causes that we devote ourselves to fervently.

But what can make us fervent about things in life?  Well, many forces can move a person to be fervent, but none does it better than love.  When we come to love a thing that is worthy of being loved, it is no trouble at all to be fervent about it.  Healthy, balanced fervor is simply an outgrowth of having come to love a thing in a truthful way.

~ Originally from WordPoints.com by Gary Henry

Friday, September 23, 2016

Love Part 2 - Loving Yourself (2)

1. Believers can love themselves as taught in 1 Corinthians 13

1 Corinthians 13:4-8: Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up;  does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no
evil;  does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth;  bears all things, believes all
things, hopes all things, endures all things.  Love never fails. But whether there
are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there
is knowledge, it will vanish away.

What does it mean that love is kind? How can we be kind to ourselves?  What does it mean that love thinks no evil?

How can we be evil to ourselves?  Negative self-talk? Thinking low-esteeming thoughts about ourselves: "I can’t do this.  I’ll never change.  Nobody loves me!"

We need to cut ourselves the same slack that we do to others. We can allow ourselves to make mistakes (and learn from those mistakes or better learn from mistakes of others).  And others will try to cut us down, so we shouldn’t do that to ourselves.

Here’s a list of other things related to what we just read in the verses above. Listen and think about what are some things in this list that you have done or do to yourself:

- Are you patient with yourself?
- Do you wish you had something or some attribute someone else has?
- Do you get angry with yourself, keep record of wrongs you have done, beat yourself up, do you not accept yourself, denying yourself the joy you should have?
- Do you loose hope in yourself?
- Do you give up on yourself?
- Do you lie to yourself?
- Do you fail yourself by being too hard?

2. How do we learn to love and put these into practice?

A. Meditate and discipline - Review Bible verses that discuss love and apply
them to ourselves. Philippians 4:8: Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things.

What happens if you work outside in the dirt?  You get dirty!  On the contrary, we need to stay focused on true, pure, lovely things if we are to be like those things.

B. 3Rs - Recognize, Remove and Replace (The Power of Biblical Thinking, Dr. Ken Wilson)

Recognize the lies or misbeliefs we have in our life about actions, reactions, or overreactions.  Remove them and replace them with positive, true thinking.

In the stage of Replacing comes the realization (maybe this process should be called 4Rs) that in Christ, we are beautiful, sons and daughters of the King, perfect, pure, lovely, and worthy to be called
children of God.

C. Balance – look at our emotional, physical, spiritual, and mental needs and look
for ways to balance them.

How can you balance Godly rest with Godly work?
Balance school with taking time to read the Bible, pray and enjoy the blessings God has
given you.

Wednesday, September 14, 2016

Love Part 1 - Loving Yourself

Mark 12:28-31: Then one of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, perceiving that He had answered them well, asked Him, “Which is the first commandment of all?” Jesus answered him, “The first of all the commandments is: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.  And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ This is the first commandment.  And the second, like it, is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”
In verse 31, Jesus is quoting Leviticus 19:18: "You shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the children of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord."

A. Negative Aspects

What does it mean to take vengeance? How does it happen? What does it mean to bear (hold) a grudge? What happens when you hold a grudge?

B. Positive Aspects

1. Believers can have joy and peace in the Lord
John 15:10-12:  If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love. “These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.

What is this verse saying about joy? We need to be joyful for joy is full in Christ! People will not want to become Christians if they think it is full of rules, stress, and self-loathing.

John 14:27: Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. 


John 16:33: 33  These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.”

What are these verses saying about peace? Jesus gives us HIS peace. We have nothing to worry about, fear and stress over – including our behavior and how “well” we are doing. Can we find peace any other way according to John 16:33? No, as Jesus says “in me you may have peace” and John 14:27 says Jesus does not give as the world gives. We can find peace only in Jesus and when we accept His peace and His joy we will be calm, sure, content, joyful and accepting of ourselves.

2. Believers are the temple of the Holy Spirit

1 Corinthians 6:19-20: Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.

The context here is that the writer is speaking to those Christians who have obeyed the gospel. Who do believers belong to?  God!

What is a temple? How is the temple treated? Clean, holy.

What are believers? Temple of the Holy Spirit – the dwelling place of God Himself.  This signifies a very important role and need to respect and care concerning the temple where God resides. If left to our own we could choose not to love ourselves or love ourselves to the exclusion of others. But because of God we are not our own – we need to love ourselves and others as it is commanded.

3. Believers are living sacrifices

Romans 12:1: I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.

What are we to be? Living sacrifices. How does that relate to loving ourselves? We need to sacrifice our own evil wants and desires, but that also means sacrificing our evil desires of worrying, not caring for ourselves, not loving ourselves because we think we are unworthy, we sacrifice all bad thoughts, motives, deeds, words that would separate us from the love of God and instead be thankful, joyful and at peace to show the world we are satisfied and content when we belong to God.

In the next lesson, we will be looking at how we can do these things, have joy, peace, be holy and pure as we look at more Bible verses.