We had our second Men’s Workout session on May 13th.

Pastor Dan began our session by leading a few preliminary discussions:

What is a propositional statement?
1. In our first Workout meeting, we established that truths in the Word can be distilled down to simple propositional truths that can can serve as a platform from which we can lead and teach others.
2. Pastor Den elaborated a bit more on propositional statements.
  1. A propositional statement generally:
    1. Includes a subject that does an action. Note: avoid using “it” as your subject!
    2. Includes a verb that the subject does
    3. An object (sometimes)
  2. A propositional statement should be phrased as a complete sentence.
  3. A propositional statement should describe who the text is about, and what the text is about.
3. The goal of a good propositional statement is to be able to clearly articulate truthful statements to others. In addition, when we can clearly articulate truths to others, we also clearly articulate truths to ourselves. In other words, we are not only teaching God’s Word to others, we are also teaching it to ourselves!
Remarks on personal application
1. When studying the Word, we should not only be considering the objective importance of the text, but we should also be considering how the text personally and actively affects our lives. Scripture ought to shape our reality.
  1. What is reality really like because of truths in Scripture?
  2. If a certain truth is indeed true, then what else can we determine to be true and what can we determine to be false?
2. Think of application not merely as mental knowledge to be stored in our mental libraries, but also as living and active application through our bodies.
  1. Use the body for actively practicing righteousness!
    1. James 1:22 – Be doers of the Word
    2. Romans 12:1 – Present your bodies as living and holy sacrifices
  2. We really do actively use our bodies in many ways that we may not realize or think about. When we dwell on truth and seek to apply it in our lives, we should consider what we listen to with our ears, what we say with our lips, what we think in our brains (our minds), how we spend our time, and how we control our emotions. These are all examples of ways we actively use our physical bodies in our lives. Our aim should be to have all aspects of our lives be used and applied toward righteousness and Christlikeness.
3. Pray!
  1. Prayer is essential for spiritual growth and maturity. Pray through the Scriptures; praise God for truths and plead to God for help to apply and live out those truths.
  2. If possible, try praying out loud. Audible prayer can help focus the mind and prevent wandering thoughts, daydreaming, and otherwise unfocused prayers.
Reminder to “build up one another”
1. We gather in the Men’s Workout to train with each other and sharpen one another.
2. We shouldn’t be afraid to make mistakes or “say the wrong things”!
3. Our times together are meant for the men to share observations in the Word via Leading Devotions. Our times together are not meant to be strenuous, academic Bible studies.

LEADING DEVOTIONS

One goal of our meetings is to practice “impromptu leadership” via leading devotions without prior preparation. To facilitate this, names were drawn randomly out of a hat. A hymn and a Bible passage were also randomly drawn out of hats. The person who had their name drawn was then called upon to lead a time of singing, prayer, and devotional time in the Word.

This week, Nathanael Chang’s name was drawn, and he led the group in the following:

Hymn #411 – “We Come, O Christ, to You”
Prayer
Reading, Observations, and Applications from 1 Thessalonians 1
1. Chapter 1 verse 3 tells us that Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy constantly bear the Thessalonians’ work of faith, labor of love, and steadfastness of hope in their minds.
  1. Nate observed that Paul and his fellow workers are thankful to God for the church at Thessalonica and their influence on believers in other churches
  2. Nate shared a reflection that we can all follow the Thessalonian church’s example and live our lives in a way that can be a blessing to other people and can be a cause of thanksgiving to God’s people. But this doesn’t come easily – it requires hard work!
2. Pastor Dan shared one practical application: it is wise to structure our lives with some rigidity. When we have a schedule and we set aside time to do things that are important to us, we are more likely to actually end up doing them. If we consider priorities that are important to fulfill (such as serving others, being an active blessing to others, ministering to others, etc.), we should structure our lives in order to inject time and opportunity in our schedules for those priorities to turn into real action and results. If we make plans and structure our lives according to those plans, then we allow ourselves to go from hearing the Word to doing the Word.

Afterwards, Peter Chen’s name was drawn and he led the group in the following:

Hymn 35 – “O Great God”
Prayer
Reading, Observations, and Applications from 1 John 1
1. The statement that “God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all” (Chapter 1, verse 5) stood out to Peter.
  1. It is arrogant, deceitful, and wrong to think, by our own estimation, that our sins are not “a big deal”. We need to confess our sins and deal with every level of sin in our lives because God is holy.

MEMORIZATION

Many of us were able to memorize the Beatitudes (Matthew 5:3-10). We recited and reviewed the passage together.

The Beatitudes are not imperatives (commands), but they describe traits of those who are of Christ. We, as disciples of Christ and heaven-bound people, should be exhibiting these traits in our lives, and at the same time we should also be continuing to pursue these traits and grow in them.

Our Scripture selection to have memorized for next week’s Workout is Matthew 5:11-16.

SUGGESTION FORUM

Henry reminded us all to consider timeliness to church gatherings an important priority. As an example, Henry challenged us all to compare our diligence in ensuring that we’d make it to the airport early and on time in order to catch a flight. If we consider such a thing as something that we must be on time for, how much more should we consider our attitudes and efforts for timeliness concerning corporate worship gatherings?

CHILDREN’S MEMORY VERSES

Due to time constraints, we were not able to spend time on reviewing or learning new children’s memory verses. This will be resumed next week.