Category: Teaching Notes

Desperate People: Personal

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This is a lesson I prepared for a Sunday School class series titled, “Desperate People of the Bible.” The lessons are meant to be a mix of teaching and interactive discussion in the group. This is an outline of my presentation that guided the teaching and discussion.

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Psalm 23

Desperate People – Sunday School Winter 2025
Sunday School Lesson | February 23, 2025

For the lesson today, we’re going to look at the familiar Psalm 23 in maybe an unfamiliar way. This Psalm has been a source of tremendous comfort and encouragement in the midst of my own personal desperation and I know I am probably not alone in this area. During the last holiday season from Thanksgiving to Christmas, I spent every day meditating on a portion of this Psalm. I wrote 9 journal entries during this time that helped me take my ongoing meditations throughout the day and brought them to the Good Shepherd as a personal prayer. I am still reaping the benefits of this deep engagement.

Psalm 23 is a beautiful Psalm of the goodness of God in the lives of his people. A Psalm of meeting us exactly where we are and providing the tender sweet mercies we so desperately need.

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Encounter with Thomas

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This is a lesson I prepared for a Sunday School class series on Encounters with Jesus in the Book of John during the Fall of 2025. The lessons are meant to be a mix of teaching and interactive discussion in the group. This is an outline of my presentation that guided the teaching and discussion.

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Encounters with Jesus – Thomas

Doubt versus Unbelief
What is John’s stated purpose of writing this Gospel?
That you may believe… Believe appears 98 times in the Gospel of John

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Encounter with Peter

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This is a lesson I prepared for a Sunday School class series on Encounters with Jesus in the Book of John during the Fall of 2025. The lessons are meant to be a mix of teaching and interactive discussion in the group. This is an outline of my presentation that guided the teaching and discussion.

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John 21:1-23

John 21:1-14

  • Introduction reading to see the state of Peter’s heart.
  • Why were they fishing?
    • Were they waiting around for Jesus to appear to them again for the third time? Were they aimless and without purpose? Were they just waiting for the next experience of Jesus revealing himself? Just getting on with life?
  • Peter’s personality is one that tends toward the extreme.
    • John recognizes that it is Jesus, but it is Peter who abandons everything in the spur of the moment to go and be with Jesus > ASAP.
    • Jesus asks them to bring some of the fish. Peter goes and brings all the fish.

Question
– Peter is full of passion. What is one thing you can take away from this section and apply to your daily life and walk with Christ?

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Encounter with the Disciples

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This is a lesson I prepared for a Sunday School class series on Encounters with Jesus in the Book of John during the Fall of 2025. The lessons are meant to be a mix of teaching and interactive discussion in the group. This is an outline of my presentation that guided the teaching and discussion.

View Encounters with Jesus Lesson Series

John 1:35-42

FOLLOW 1:35-37
John 1:35 / The next day AGAIN John was standing with two of his disciples, and he looked at Jesus as he walked by and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God!”

  • These two disciples are Andrew and John.
  • They were both consistently around John the Baptist.
  • John the Baptist was consistently pointing people to Jesus.
    • 1:26-28 / One who stands among you
    • 1:29 / Behold, the Lamb of God
  • Thoughts
    • It intrigued me this week to think about Andrew and John being committed to the preaching and teaching of John the Baptist. Here is this Old Testament prophet coming on the scene after 400 years of silence and they are excited about the Word of God being given once again.
    • Now all of the sudden, the prophet is pointing out that the Messiah has not only come on the scene but is literally walking among us.
    • 1:37 / The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus.
    • Jesus was a unknown at this time. No crowds. No followers. Andrew and John decided to leave the comfortable and known for the uncomfortable and unknown.
    • They were the first to follow Jesus.
  • Questions
    • What are Andrew and John are thinking and feeling at this moment?
    • How difficult is it to make this move of allegiance?
    • Would anyone like to share their decision point when you started following Jesus?
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Lesson 1 -Be Strong and of Good Courage (Part 1)

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This is a lesson I prepared for a Small Group series on the book of Daniel in the Spring of 2025. The lessons are meant to be a mix of teaching and interactive discussion in the group. This is an outline of my presentation that guided the teaching and discussion. It was adapted from the Christ-centered Exposition Series – Exalting Jesus in Daniel by Daniel Akin and from Be Resolute (Daniel) by Warren Wiersbe.

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Daniel 1:1-7

Main Idea: Even in times of great trial and opposition, Christians must remain faithful to God and his gospel, imitating Christ’s own steadfastness as he endured persecution and death for our sakes.

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Lesson 2 – Happiness

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This is a lesson I prepared for a Sunday School class series on Ecclesiastes in the Spring of 2025. The lessons are meant to be a mix of teaching and interactive discussion in the group. This is an outline of my presentation that guided the teaching and discussion. It was adapted from the Gospel-centered life in the Bible Series – Ecclesiastes: Life in the Light of Eternity.

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Ecclesiastes 1:12-2:26

Big Idea

“The more we try to find lasting satisfaction in the many offerings of happiness in this world, the more we find we instead need to look somewhere else entirely.”

Just as the Preacher is teaching us that “all is vanity,” so too is the ability to fully explore all that is in this section!

1:12-18 & 2:12-17 Wise living is better than being foolish, but still vanity.
2:1-11 Vanity of indulging in pleasures, acquiring possessions, and achieving success.
2:18-26 Hard work going for nothing

C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity
“If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world. If none of my earthly pleasures satisfy it, that does not prove that the universe is a fraud. Probably earthly pleasures were never meant to satisfy it, but only to arouse it, to suggest the real thing. If that is so, I must take care, on the one hand, never to despise, or be unthankful for, these earthly blessings, and on the other, never to mistake them for the something else of which they are only a copy, or echo, or mirage. I must keep alive in myself the desire for my true country, which I shall not find until after death.”

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Desperate People: Naomi & Ruth

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This is a lesson I prepared for a Sunday School class series titled, “Desperate People of the Bible.” The lessons are meant to be a mix of teaching and interactive discussion in the group. This is an outline of my presentation that guided the teaching and discussion. It was adapted from the ESV Bible Study Series – Ruth and Esther: A 12-Week Study.

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Desolate Context

  • Ruth 1:1 “In the days when the judges ruled”
  • Judges 2:6-10 Death of Joshua
  • Judges 2:11-15 Abandoned the Lord
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Creation

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Westminster Confession of Faith
Questions 9-10: Creation

This is a summary of my notes for a series of Sunday School lessons I prepared and taught during the summer of 2024. I used the following books as resources: The Truths We Confess (RC Sproul) and The Shorter Catechism Explained from Scripture (Thomas Vincent)

Question 9     What is the work of creation?
The work of creation is, God’s making all things of nothing, by the word of his power, in the space of six days, and all very good. (Gen. 1, Heb. 11:3)

Read Genesis 1:1-25

Until the time of the Enlightenment, the most firmly established article of Christian faith in the secular world was that of creation. The article goes something like this, “If something exists, it must either have the power of being in itself or it must come from something that has the power of being in itself. Otherwise, nothing at all could exist.” This is an important point for us to consider because the secular world is assaulting the topic of creation in order to undermine its foundation. If you do away with creation, you do away with the Creator.

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Attributes of God

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Westminster Confession of Faith
Questions 4-6: Attributes of God

This is a summary of my notes for a series of Sunday School lessons I prepared and taught during the summer of 2024. I used the following books as resources: The Truths We Confess (RC Sproul) and The Shorter Catechism Explained from Scripture (Thomas Vincent)

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Before we begin… I want to start with a quote from RC Sproul as he opens his exposition on this section of the Westminster Confession in his book The Truths We Confess. “Humility demands that we understand at the outset that we are like infants struggling to understand a genius who is speaking to us in our own terms. A finite mind cannot attain an exhaustive, comprehensive understanding of the infinite, for we lack any reference to grasp it.” Even more so with us in this room today as we have such a limited amount of time to delve into such a weighty and massive topic. But we will do our best!

My hope for us as we consider these catechism questions, not just today but the whole quarter, is that we will get a taste for using the Catechism and the Confession to help cultivate and deepen our relationship with God. In my preparation for today, I was reminded of just how rich and valuable these two documents are in the life of a believer. I have had questions 4-6 rolling around my head for the last two weeks and it has been an incredible resource to steady my mind throughout the day.

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Sign of Jonah

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Jonah and the Mystery of God’s Mercy
Part 6: Sign of Jonah

This is a summary of my notes for a 6-part Sunday School lesson I recently led. It is an adaptation of my previous posts on Jonah along with some points based on the book, The Prodigal Prophet by Time Keller.

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When the crowds were increasing, he began to say, “This generation is an evil generation. It seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah. For as Jonah became a sign to the people of Nineveh, so will the Son of Man be to this generation…The men of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here. Luke 11:29-30, 32 (ESV)

In our final lesson this Sunday, I want to take some time to reflect on this Son of Man. I want us to think about how Jesus is greater than Jonah by looking at three passages from the New Testament and letting them speak into how we not only read and understand Jonah but how we better understand Jesus himself through the Book of Jonah. There are a lot of passages I could have chosen to look at, but I wanted to focus on three that fit with our theme of why we studied the Book of Jonah. Namely, how our heart sees others, how our heart sees God, and how our heart is drawn to Jesus. To do this, we will have one person for each point come up and share a little bit about what they have learned this quarter in relation to the theme assigned to them before I speak on the passage. I am really looking forward to this time of sharing and pray that the Lord will use it to speak to each of us individually.

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