So we asked our class to rewrite doctrine. We gave them a short list of scriptures to work with, encouraged them to go wherever else in the scriptures they felt prompted (or inspired) to pursue, and to come up with a doctrinal statement. Here is what our class came up with:
This was the word from the Lord they had been longing to hear. After their sackcloth and ashes, their weeping and mourning, weakened from their fasts, and sacrifices, and prayers, they longed with every fiber of their being to hear some token of God’s love and mercy towards them.
So, why did Peter choose Joel’s prophecy to explain what was happening? Yes, yes, he was saying what the Spirit was giving him to say. But, why Joel, in particular? Because of who were in that upper room, praying and waiting. Because of who were pouring out into the streets of Jerusalem, publicly prophesying and evangelizing in foreign languages. Women
A wise person lives in humility, submitting their life to God, allowing the Holy Spirit to inform and conform their thoughts, their feelings and thereby their words and actions.
For John, Christianity was empowered by the Holy Spirit. The antichrist was the other spiritual movement, fueled essentially by a supernatural force that was in opposition to God.
Peter drew from imagery that could portray the kind of fearless faith, godly character, and much-maligned yet God-affirmed lifestyle that he was seeking to encourage. Noah and his family of eight were a tiny remnant of faithful people in a very hostile world.
Our spiritual DNA is now from above, and as we live in faith, by faith in Jesus, we experience Jesus’ faithfulness in us and to us; we grow and mature into our new being, a being of love.
What would it be like if followers of Jesus, who walk the Way and live filled with God’s love and grace by His indwelling Spirit, were to embrace what that really means?
Peter called attention to God the Father who foreknows, God the Holy Spirit who sanctifies, and God the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ who shed his blood to make atonement for our sins.
Obedience of faith is expressed in exercising great discipline in the power of the Holy Spirit, completely obedient to God’s word, which includes the law and even more, beginning with the law of love.
Grace and Peace, Joanne 