Suggestions for Adult Sunday School Material

[Close_to_Jesus]

I am looking at some material for my church that our adult Sunday School group could use (they usually come with an instructor manual and then a magazine-style handout for each student that costs about $5-$7 a piece.  They are usually for a quarter (3 months) at a time.

I am looking at the following and just wondered if anyone her had any experience with them or knew of something else:

• Standard Lesson Quarterly (seems pretty interesting, looks like they have an occasional color picture or diagram).  
• David C. Cook Quarterly Bible Study (based on what I can see, seems well formatted for Bible study)
• Wesley Bible Curriculum Quarterly (Looks well formatted and the thickest of the 3, but maybe too lengthy?)

If you have any experience with these (or others) please share!

[tim_from_pa]

In the past, our church used David C. Cook. However, I haven't been following up on that lately so I don't know if this (or any) course has turned rouge in recent years with all this "activism" and other strange ideas out there.  However, the course material was clear and explained things well.  We actually used them more for the children.

With adults, have you thought about ordering books on specific topics?  For example, we once ordered Warren Wiersbe adult bible study books.  They are simple paperback books distributed to each participant with scripture and lessons on the topic, typically enough chapters for 3 months, with a leader's guide book.  We still do that (giving out books) with the adult group as opposed to magazines. The site Christianbook.com has a lot of wholesale stuff that you can have shipped.  Personally, I prefer paperback books to 'hand-out lessons' as they can be a reference source later, they don't seem any more expensive in bulk amount, and lastly, the adults don't feel like big kids when they have such a book and bible.  It's more like a classroom environment then.

Just my "widow's mite"  I hope this helps.

[Who me]

Why not try something totaly different like listening to a podcast and then discussing it.

The leader could listen in advance and prepare some notes and guide questions.

see the 'wintery knight' for a range of contraversal broadcasts.

or do the christianity explored course, or look at the coldcasechristianity web site.

[Close_to_Jesus]

Thanks.  I'm looking this up for the Sunday School teacher to give him some extra suggestions.

Thanks for the advice!

[kwikphilly]

Blessings

I'm just wondering, does he not inquire of the Lord before hand or after he chooses a handout? I'm asking in all sincerity.... I once had a Pastor ( boy do I miss him) that used to come to our Wed evening  group with a stack full of papers he prepared & we'd all laugh as he laid them down ( not handing them out)but we have no Sunday school for adults, adults have Bible Study week nights

He'd always say laughingly that he asked the Lord all week long for the study subject and Direction and it never failed- 10 minutes before he would Receive what God Had for us!!!!

Anyway,some people like to order books & do their Sunday school that way,I dont - I don't like commentaries or guides much either...... I prefer a much more traditional Bible Study ( Cooks Quarterly is okay though) .... Its good for a Sunday school teacher I suppose but the only Sunday school teachers we have teach children while the adults are hearing Sunday sermon

So I suppose thats not very helpful... Sorry. 

In His love,Kwik.  

[JohnD]

On 7/1/2022 at 2:35 PM, kwikphilly said:

Blessings

I'm just wondering, does he not inquire of the Lord before hand or after he chooses a handout? I'm asking in all sincerity.... I once had a Pastor ( boy do I miss him) that used to come to our Wed evening  group with a stack full of papers he prepared & we'd all laugh as he laid them down ( not handing them out)but we have no Sunday school for adults, adults have Bible Study week nights

He'd always say laughingly that he asked the Lord all week long for the study subject and Direction and it never failed- 10 minutes before he would Receive what God Had for us!!!!

Anyway,some people like to order books & do their Sunday school that way,I dont - I don't like commentaries or guides much either...... I prefer a much more traditional Bible Study ( Cooks Quarterly is okay though) .... Its good for a Sunday school teacher I suppose but the only Sunday school teachers we have teach children while the adults are hearing Sunday sermon

So I suppose thats not very helpful... Sorry. 

In His love,Kwik.  

Actually it is very helpful.

Teachings in the faith have gone from home made to industrial. What used to be taught in Church Homes has been cathedralized (for lack of a better word)... institutionalized. ← thanks to my Beloved Bride for helping me remember that word. This includes not only sermons, not only Sunday school, not only revivals, but also the source: seminaries. ← which I personally experienced as being extremely institutionalized and fraught with humanistic doctrines (like anti-supernaturalism).

So the sermons and especially the Sunday schools curriculum centers on familiar mandates.  But the meat of the truth and faith and why we believe what we believe and what we are to do about it in practical daily application... often succumbs to feel good sermons or familiarization with Christianese in Sunday School.

And the best of the best scholars / theologians are merely human and do not take the place of direct translation / inspiration of the Holy Spirit (2 Peter 1:20-21) which we are to know first... because we can only be on the right path from step one by allowing the Holy Spirit who wrote the Bible teach us the Bible. That way there are not contradictions or misinterpretations or even divisions. 

Jesus prayed no less than three times in the High Priestly Prayer (the real LORD's prayer) in John 17 that we in the Body Christian be one... one as the Father and He are one.

There isn't that kind of oneness in a single congregation.

[JohnD]

Revelation 6:2 (AV)
2 And I saw, and behold a white horse: and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given unto him: and he went forth conquering, and to conquer.

• And I saw (in the predictive prophecy vision)
• a white horse
• and he that sat on him
• had a bow;
• and a crown was given unto him:
• and he went forth conquering, and to conquer

White horse (like unto the white hat in the old movie Westerns) symbolizes public perception of purity

He that sat on it is the subject matter.

He had a bow but no arrows. This symbolizes military leader in an act of peace or a time of peace.

He was given a crown and therefore is a ruler

He conquered to the point of obsession. 

The last one to be predictively prophesied about like this was Alexander the Great (long dead by the time of the visions of Revelation circa 90 CE)

Alexander however was not a conqueror without arrows nor offered conquest through peace.

Roman emperor Constantine did circa 4th Century CE. 

Jeremiah 6:14 (AV)
14 They have healed also the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly, saying, Peace, peace; when there is no peace.

Constantine claimed to have a religious experience. A conversion to Christ as had his mother Helena. And essentially coaxed Christians deep in hiding from persecution out

from the underground network that had developed.

The Romans took over where the Jews who rejected Jesus began persecuting the early Church. And the Romans perfected it with atrocities best described in Foxe's Book of Martyrs.

Be forewarned it is extremely gruesome.

Along came Emperor Constantine, whose Empire was crumbling all around him under its own weight... to the point he had to establish a second Capital City Constantinople... and the answer to his plight was under his very nose.

• what invokes allegiance / devotion more than anything else?
• what is the greatest adhesive to keep people committed and single minded?
• what would people willing give their lives for or are even more devoted to than family?

Religion.

And "religion" held up more under the heinous persecution of Rome than burgeoning Christianity.

So out went the cry "Olly Olly Oxen free... come out come out wherever you are... I am a believer too!"

And the Roman Imperial take over of Christianity began under the guise of peace... which Jeremiah prophesied about twice:

Jeremiah 8:11 (AV)
11 For they have healed the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly, saying, Peace, peace; when there is no peace.

Roman Catholicism is the eventual outcome of this unholy merger. The empty shell of Rome's empire is what fell in the meantime. But the adder had already hatched.

Compare:

Capital of the Roman Empire: Rome.

Capital of Roman Catholicism: Vatican City (Rome).

Imperial Senate / Body of Cardinals.

Regional Governors / Bishops.

The Holy Roman Empire may have had a civilian uprising or two down through history but the heart of it never fell or was conquered. For Roman Catholicism is the Holy Roman Empire.

And the Protestant movement had the right idea but did not reform nearly enough.

It carried many of the Roman doctrines into its movement.

Many of the older Protestant denominations are hard to distinguish from Roman Catholicism.

These are things not taught in Sunday school or from the sermon pulpits...

[JohnD]

Also not taught from pulpits or Sunday school podiums...

We in the Body of Christ are all priests of God.

Each and every one of us.

Revelation 1:6 (AV)
6 And hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father; to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.

Revelation 5:10 (AV)
10 And hast made us unto our God kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth.

1 Peter 2:3–9 (AV)
3 If so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious.
4 To whom coming, as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God, and precious,
5 Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.
6 Wherefore also it is contained in the scripture, Behold, I lay in Sion a chief corner stone, elect, precious: and he that believeth on him shall not be confounded.
7 Unto you therefore which believe he is precious: but unto them which be disobedient, the stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner,
8 And a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to them which stumble at the word, being disobedient: whereunto also they were appointed.
9 But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light:

The division of clergy / laity is not New Testament doctrine but Old.

Exodus 19:6 (AV)
6 And ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation. These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel.

But the rebellion of Exodus 32 changed all that. And the one tribe that repented and came to Moses' aid (his own tribe the Levites) were made the priestly tribe because of it. You won't find anywhere in the Bible

why God chose Levites to be the priests, only that he chose them. This is why. 

But this division of the Body Christian in the New Covenant is unbiblical.

And this hinders the exponential evangelism of planet Earth the way God intended it.

[JohnD]

Among the other biblical teachings you will not get through institutional outlets are:

• airtight teaching about the deity of Christ
• the Triune nature of the one God
• the incarnation itself
• who the antichrist was and is not and will be
• when the rapture of the Church will take place (not date setting but season identification)
• the meaning of the millennium and what it actually is
• the purpose for the Great Tribulation (for Israel's sake not to just punish the world)

And more, with the seal of the Holy Spirit as the source / interpreter (eliminating conjecture, opinion, and the traditions of man).