The Reflecting Pool
Read Acts 11:18.
- What does this passage teach about the ultimate origin of repentance?
- Is repentance ultimately a result of man's unilateral decision to turn to God, or is it a result of God's regenerating work on the human heart?
Read Genesis 6:5 and Romans 8:7.
- Describe the state of the human heart under sin.
- How does the Bible represent man's ability to please God or to decide on his own to turn to Him?
Read Ephesians 2:1-10.
- God effects a great change in our hearts upon conversion.
- How does this passage represent that change?
- Is this something that man could, by great effort, produce in himself?
Recent polls report that professing evangelical Christians in America today have a divorce rate that is higher than the national average.
- What could be one reason for this?
- What does the Bible teach are some of the evidences, or "fruits" of a regenerating work of the Spirit of God in a person's life?
In previous centuries, believers were baptized more normally as they began adulthood (e.g., ages 17-20).
- What might account for the drop of that age among baptistic Christians in this last century?
- Why would that be significant?
