Body Building, Session #1 Good Questions: These lesson Have Groups Talking! www.joshhunt.com

Acts 2:36 - 41; Romans 6:1 - 10 ⁽¹⁾

ACCOUNTABILITY

• What three fellowships do we have planned in the next three months? Who wants to invite every member? Who wants to invite every prospect? Who wants to plan the fellowship? Who wants to be my assistant/ substitute teacher?

OPEN

• Let's each share our name and how you feel about swimming. Do you like to swim? Hate to swim? Know how to swim?

DIG

1. As we read this passage, look for what it teaches about baptism.
2. Look back a few verses. What is the context of this Acts passage? Who is talking to whom?
3. Look at verse 38. How is baptism related to the forgiveness of sins?
4. What road sign communicates the idea of the word "repent"? ⁽²⁾
5. Is repenting the same as feeling badly or being sorry? ⁽³⁾
6. Are both repentance and baptism necessary requirements to receive the gift of the Holy Spirt? ⁽⁴⁾
7. What if someone refused to be baptized, but did repent and believe. Could they be saved?
8. What does the Holy Spirit do for us? What is great about the fact that we get the Holy Spirit?
9. Verse 39. What does he mean by people who are far off?
10. Can really, really bad people ⁽⁵⁾ come close to God just by repenting?
11. How many responded to Peter's message?
12. Do numbers matter to God?
13. Do numbers matter to you? Does it matter to you how many people come to faith in Christ through this church?
14. One of the things God is trying to do in our hearts is to give us a heart like His. Lost people matter to God, as Bill Hybels says it. How do we become people for whom it is true of us-lost people matter to us?
15. Romans 6. Does anyone know the context here? How would anyone draw the conclusion from anything in Christianity that we ought to sin?
16. What is wrong with this argument, "Let's sin that grace may abound"?
17. Romans 6.2. If we died to sin, how is it that we sin at all?
18. How does baptism picture what happened to us in salvation? ⁽⁶⁾
19. Verse 6 says that the old self was crucified. If the old self was crucified, why do we still sin? ⁽⁷⁾
20. How do you find your heart changed when you became a Christian?
21. How do we come to live this, "death has no mastery" kind of life?
22. Let's return to the topic of baptism. We have looked at two passages that deal with baptism. How would you summarize the Bible's teaching on Baptism?
23. Why is baptism important?
24. What does the Bible teach about the mode of baptism, whether by immersion, by sprinkling, or by pouring?
25. What did your baptism mean to you?
26. What would you say to someone that was a Christian but said they just didn't want to get baptized?
27. How can we pray for one another this week?

1. "Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ."

[37] When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, "Brothers, what shall we do?"

[38] Peter replied, "Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. [39] The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off--for all whom the Lord our God will call."

[40] With many other words he warned them; and he pleaded with them, "Save yourselves from this corrupt generation." [41] Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day. Acts 2:36-41 [NIV]

[6:1] What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? [2] By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? [3] Or don't you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? [4] We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.

[5] If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. [6] For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin-- [7] because anyone who has died has been freed from sin.

[8] Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. [9] For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. [10] The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. Romans 6:1-10 [NIV]

2. U-turn.

3. No. Repenting is turning. It is changing your ways. If I stole something you, it would not be enough that I felt badly that you no longer had it. Repentance implies I get it back to you.

4. If this where the only verse we had on the subject, we might think so.

5. Like smokers and drinkers and swearers and democrats!

6. At least two ways, actually. It is kind of like a bath, and kind of like a burial.

7. There is a distinction in the Greek that is not completely clear in the English versions. This word, "old self" is always used with an Aorist tense verb. This is not only past tense, but suggests a once and for all, never to be repeated kind of action. There is another word, flesh, that is sometimes confused with this word. We still have to deal with the flesh. The Old Man is dead. We don't have to deal with it any longer. The import is this. Something fundamentally changed when we got saved. Something changed and will never be the same again. However, Christianity is all about faith. If we believe that not much changed and things are pretty much the way they were, we don't see much victory in the Christian life.