That Reminds Me Of...

I am having a great time teaching a study plan based upon  a combination of how I think we naturally learn and basic old school hermeneutical methods. My thought is that very few of us think like old school theologians. Not that I have a problem with what they come up with it's just that not many of us think that way. It's just like most educational systems are actually only designed for a very small group of people (in my opinion). The rest of us have to just sort of muddle our way through trying to figure out what we are supposed to learn and what the teacher/professor is trying to say and how they want us to communicate to them what we think we learned. 

That said, I have broken down a process that takes advantage of the way most people naturally learn. The first thing we do is connect to what ever we are reading. We are reminded of things we read, we did, or we heard about (or saw like a TV show or movie). For example last week we studied 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18. 

13But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. 14For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. 15For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord,^d that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. 16For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first.17Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. 18Therefore encourage one another with these words.

When I read these verses verse 17 Reminds me of John 14:2, My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you. 

The whole section reminds me of the world today in that I have heard many different views about what happens to people when the die. From when you die you die and no longer exist to when you die you become one with the cosmos. 

But Paul wants us to know, to be assured that death, as a Christian, is more like falling asleep. In that we have hope because we will meet the Lord and those who have already fallen asleep in him. The truth that we will be with the Lord forever, with every tear wiped away and knowing fullness and completeness, being how we were created to be is real hope, real encouragement.