Hey yall! Here is the text for this week! I decided to send out a basic understanding on how to read the text if your not in a community to join the discussion in person. Try to read it and then throw out your shimmer points here on the blog.

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1 John 3:7 – 24

7Dear children, do not let anyone lead you astray. He who does what is right is righteous, just as he is righteous. 8He who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work. 9No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God’s seed remains in him; he cannot go on sinning, because he has been born of God. 10This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: Anyone who does not do what is right is not a child of God; nor is anyone who does not love his brother.
Love one another
11This is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another. 12Do not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own actions were evil and his brother’s were righteous. 13Do not be surprised, my brothers, if the world hates you. 14We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love our brothers. Anyone who does not love remains in death. 15Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him.

16This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. 17If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? 18Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. 19This then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence 20whenever our hearts condemn us. For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.

21Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God 22and receive from him anything we ask, because we obey his commands and do what pleases him. 23And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us. 24Those who obey his commands live in him, and he in them. And this is how we know that he lives in us: We know it by the Spirit he gave us.
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here is the basics to Lectio Divina (at least the basic way Th3 Waters does it:

Basic Guide to Lectio Divina

5 Step process:

1st Read Scripture out loud (looking/listening for shimmer points) (Remember first time through the shimmer point can be for information)

2nd take 2-5 mins. For silence/prayer/meditation of the shimmer points.. your encouraged to have a discussion with the text. Ask it questions, challenge it.

3rd Read the scripture out loud a second time with a different mindset read it like a Dr. would read it or a lawyer, or even a child, and it would be great to have a different translation to read, as well.

4th Take a second time of silence but this time though be encouraged to not look for information, but transformation (How could this text actually change the way you live your life, or think about life, or treat others?)

5th Then type out your discussion as a comment on this blog post…and please remember that differening opinions are Ok and be respectful of others who read the text and ask different questions than you.

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OK go discuss…..

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 30th, 2008 at 6:27 am and is filed under OG weekly discussion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.