Plan a Bible Lesson

This is how I love to plan a Bible lesson. I sit down, pray for wisdom and enlightenment, and begin to read. Depending on the scope or my mood or familiarity, I may read a wide context or a smaller one, focusing eventually on about half a chapter. Then I read each verse, trying to remember that the verses go together, are in there for a reason, where they are for a reason, to their audience for a reason, and being read by me today for a reason. Whenever some connection strikes me, or there is some remarkable expression that I would underline, I try to write a question that would provoke potential students to see the significance and want to likewise underline it in their Bibles. Or there might be a keyword, carefully chosen to clue me in on the author’s themes.

I was at Village Inn the other night, and a friend in frustration asked, “What does the star mean?” She pointed at a dish on the menu, beside which was a little asterisk, with no explanation to be seen. After several more minutes’ exploration, pages later on the menu we discovered a star was a warning about eating undercooked eggs or meat. Great. Like we needed to be told that. The biggest problem was that the menu was covered in symbols. Beside almost every dish was a heart, or a shield, or something else. There were four or five different symbols. Some items were featured with multiple symbols. I’m all about getting the maximum information efficiently presented, but that seemed a little ridiculous. The authors of the menu seem to have been unable whether to advertise their meals for the Atkin’s diet, low-fat, sugar-free, heart healthy, smaller portioned, new, local favorite, or whatever, so they put all at once.

Sometimes my Sunday school lessons are like that, and I don’t like it. I don’t want a fad of man’s opinion blitzing me with interpretations and applications. I miss pizza places that only sold pizza, burger joints that were for burgers (instead of salads, chicken, subs, soups, wraps…). I miss the word of God driving its own point home.

To God be all glory.