For
week of November 28 - December 4, 2011 - God the Only Cause and Creator
Bible Lesson Notes - Lilian Egwuenu
This week’s Lesson titled: “God the only Cause and Creator”, talks about God being our only source and reason. The Golden Text affirms that there is no other God, or Creator, and that He, (God), made everything, and He did not make it in vain. To me, this means that everything God created has a purpose, and cannot be useless or worthless. So, when thoughts of unworthiness creep in, we can know that God made each one of us for a special and worthy purpose. I really love the Responsive Reading. It focuses on praise. It calls on all of God’s creation, and that includes you and me, to praise Him - to recognize him as the Creator.
Section one gives us more reason to praise Him, because He causes the sun to brighten up our day and the moon, the night. He provides shelter and makes the ground produce good food, and for every living thing. Section one further tells us that God is the only God, the only Creator who made everything both great and small. All his works reflect him in wisdom, intelligence, love.
Section two tells us how God made man, blessed him, crowned him with glory and honor, and gave him dominion over all His other creations. We, (you & I ), are the highest of God’s creations. We are His direct idea, His image and likeness. We are not capable of possessing anything that is not God’s. We reflect just Him, Good.
We should stop viewing the spiritual from a material perspective. I think this is a powerful and wonderful thought which we should all ponder more deeply. Mrs. Eddy in the third section tells us that the earth is matter or material, to a mortal or material sense, but to spiritual sense it is a compound idea. When we try to give matter spiritual power, we are in effect refusing to acknowledge God as All. It implies that we regard Him as the Creator of good and bad, sickness and health, life and death. In Christian Science we are taught that this is not the case. God and His creation is entirely good, as the Bible points out in Genesis 1:31. So, if we subordinate the false testimony of the corporeal sense to the facts of Science, as the Lesson says, we shall see the true likeness and reflection of God everywhere.
The fourth section tells us that God cannot forget us, for He takes good care of the sparrow and we are worth much more than sparrows. He would surely take care of us. It further tells us to have faith, because even the tiniest of faith works wonders.
God is able to provide for all His creations. This is the message of the fifth section where Jesus feeds the multitude with five loaves and two fishes. To the disciples, it seemed as this was not enough food for everyone, but Jesus saw it as an opportunity to prove that that God is the only Cause, even of supply.
In the last section of this week’s Lesson, we are asked to give glory, honor and power to God’s holy name and to make His works known. I think we should.
Bible Lesson Notes - Iyanuoluwa Odetunde
This week's Lesson Sermon is a very beautiful and inspiring one and it makes us realise we can only experience good at all times.
The Golden Text and Responsive Reading make us understand that God created everything good, and that everthing works harmoniously, therefore we should always give Him the praise due to his holy name.
The sun,the moon,the stars, everything in His universe expresses Him. We should know at all times that there is only one God and He fills all space. There is no room for anything unlike Him.
The Lesson also tells us that God has made man in His image and likeness, and therefore man is the pure reflection of God, expressing God's dominion, not only over all the earth, but over all things that belong to His Creator (God).
All things unlike God will pass away, because they are temporal, but His word never passes away. Evil should not be regarded under any circumstances, because it is the direct opposite of God (good).
There is one very important thing as children of God that we should possess, and that is faith and understanding. Christ Jesus, in the Bible, was able to heal a man's son who was lunatic, but his disciples were not able to heal him, because they had no faith. Jesus made us understand in the Bible that, with faith in whatever we intend doing, we shall surely be able to do it, provided we have the understanding, which is a solid foundation that assures victory.
God provides the birds with their food, the lilies are blossoming at all times, how much more we, His dear children? God provided for the multitude in the deserted place, who were listening to Jesus' teachings. Jesus prayed with the available loaves and fishes, and God multiplied it. It fed the multitude with a lot left over. God is always supplying our needs. He sustains us.
I have this beautiful experience to share. Last week I travelled to the university were I had just gained admission, to take part in the Clearance exercise. On geting to the faculty building where I was to be cleared, I heared from people there that the admission officer was a very harsh man, and that if some questions were not answered correctly, the admission will be forfeited without a second chance. When I heard this, I was scared, but before it got to my turn to get cleared, I started thinking that the man I was going to meet is God's reflection, therefore he is nothing short of good. I decided to see him as a sheep rather than a lion. I dwelt on this, and at the end of the day, when everyone had lost hope of geting cleared that day, I got cleared. This made me very happy.
We should only see and expect good at all times, because everything God made and causes to happen, is good. God is the grand Creator, and no other power whatsoever is present. Let us all give God the adoration and gratitude due to His holy name. This week's Lesson Sermon is very practical, and we all should endeavour to apply it in our day to day activities. Try it. You will see how good things start unfolding. |
