Sunday Scripture

 

 Time for another Sunday Scripture post!   As I mentioned last Sunday, I worked on a Bible study of Ephesians for the month of January and so I thought I would use this study to write some Sunday Scripture posts for the remainder of the winter.  

The study I've been working on is the Ephesians Bible study from Good Morning Girls.  For the Scripture Sundays, I'll just select some of the verses I have worked on and share how I used the SOAP method of Bible study.  For today's lesson, we were to look at Ephesians 1:3-10, but I chose to write out only verses 3-7.  Here we go:

S=  "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ,
"According as He hath chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love
"Having predestinated us unto the adoption of sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will,
"To the praise of the glory of His grace, through which He hath made us accepted in the Beloved;
"In whom we have redemption through His blood, even the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace."  (Ephesians 1:3-7)

O = There is so much here!  We bless God, for He has blessed us with so much:
* He has given us all spiritual blessings
* He has chosen us before the foundation of the world
* He desires for us to live holy, blameless lives
* It was His good pleasure to adopt us into His family
* He wants us to live to the praise of His glory
* He has made us accepted in the Beloved
* Through His blood we have redemption and forgiveness of sins
* His grace abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence
* In His timing He will bring all things to completion.

A= The spiritual blessings enumerated in this passage are just a few of the blessings God has showered upon us.  We should be so very thankful for all that He has given us and blessed us with.  The very idea that we could be adopted into God's family is mind-boggling.  Of course we would want to praise and bless Him for all that He has done for us.  Of course we would want to live in a way that brings praise and glory to Him.  I liked this thought that the author shared in the Reflection Question: "If we minimize what God has done for us, we will not have much of an outpouring of love back to God."

P= "Lord, I do praise and bless You for all that You have done for me!  You have given me new life.  You have redeemed me with the precious blood of Your own Son.  I've been adopted into Your family.  And there is so much more!  I pray that You will help me to live every day to the praise of the glory of Your grace!  In Jesus' name, Amen."

And that's our simple study for this week!