The Gospel of John: Savoring the Peace of Jesus in a Chaotic World
Life. It seems to move at a break-neck pace. Days are filled with noise, screens, and appointments. Sometimes worry and fear are constant companions. The chaos can leave you looking for a place to be still, but that resting spot always seems to be an elusive destination. Jesus offers a different kind of life. He offers peace. He is peace.
Features:
- 7 video sessions, 25–30 minutes each, that illustrate and unpack truths found throughout the study, available via redemption code printed in the Bible study book
- 6 weeks of personal study to be completed between the 7 group sessions
- Extras such as a timeline, maps, and background information to help set the context and provide better understanding of the Gospel of John
Benefits:
- Understand that peace is not a program or perspective; peace is a person
- Embrace the gift of peace Jesus promises
- Slow down your busy life and learn to walk in the pace of Jesus
- Discover the distinctives of John’s Gospel through context and historical insights
Isaiah: Striving Less and Trusting God More
Isaiah served as God’s mouthpiece to the nation of Judah but also to the surrounding nations. His message echoes into our lives today as we read his call to rely on the Lord. Using the genres of poetry, narrative, and prophecy, Isaiah communicated clearly that followers of God could trust in Him.
As you study the chapters Isaiah wrote—from his challenging words to the nation of Israel to his prophecies of the Messiah to come—learn to rest in God's promises and grow in trust. Unpacking Isaiah’s words will reveal that you can trust God more than your own human effort or the counterfeits the world suggests. You won’t be striving harder, but instead trusting more deeply the Faithful One who is so worthy of our utter dependence. In Him you'll find the comfort and peace you need to sustain you.
Features:
- Leader helps to guide questions and discussions within small groups
- 6 weeks of personal study to be completed between the 7 group sessions
- Access to 7 teaching videos, approximately 25–30 minutes per session, available by redeeming a code printed in the back of the study book
Benefits:
- Learn to trust God for who He is and how He reveals Himself in Scripture.
- Grow in understanding of the Book of Isaiah and its prophecies.
- Grasp how Jesus fulfills the promises in the Book of Isaiah.
- Discover peace in God’s commands, character, and comfort.
ACTS: Awakening To God In Everyday Life
Learn to awaken to God’s Spirit today and every day by studying the Book of Acts with Melissa Spoelstra.
Whether it’s because of distractions, busyness, or a case of the blahs, we can experience a drift toward indifference in our spiritual lives. We have a need for an ongoing spiritual awakening if we want to become more aware of God’s presence and activity in our everyday lives.
In Acts: Awakening to God in Our Everyday Lives, a six-week study of the Book of Acts by Melissa Spoelstra, you will journey with the first followers of Jesus and witness the birth and growth of the early church through spiritual awakening to the power of God’s Spirit, message, freedom, grace, mission, and direction.
From their experiences you will learn postures that will help you attune your own spiritual heart to experience God’s presence, hear God’s voice, and see God at work all around.
This study offers a fresh encounter with God to prepare you to:
– Face daily battles
– Be able to discern the messages of our culture
– Be ready to share God’s love with others always
Components for this six-week Bible study, each available separately, include a Participant Workbook, a Leader Guide, and video sessions with six 20 to 25-minute segments (with closed captioning).
Acts Promo Video
The Names Of God
Today’s culture and others’ views, even those of other Christians, can present a distorted view of God. Some suggest God exudes qualities He does not possess such as being unloving or apathetic toward His creation. In a world where we find people creating God in their own image, studying God’s names can remind us that we are created in His. In fact, one of the best ways to know God’s true character and grow closer to Him is to study His names.
In The Names of God, Melissa Spoelstra leads women on an exploration of the many names of our triune God—from El and Elohim to Yahweh and its many combinations to names such as Abba, Jesus, and Holy Spirit…and many others.
Components for this six-week Bible study, each available separately, include a Participant Workbook, a Leader Guide, DVD with six 25-minute segments (with closed captioning), and a boxed Leader Kit containing one of each component.
Names of God Promo Video
Romans: Good News that Changes Everything
We live in a world full of bad news. The media recounts stories of natural disasters, violence, and conflict. In the midst of all this heartbreak, we can’t lose sight of the fact that God has given us good news. We call it the gospel. It reminds us that God loves us and longs to redeem our suffering. He stepped out of eternity and into time to send us His one and only Son. The gospel truths shared with the early church at Rome echo into our day, reminding us that we still have good news to embrace personally and to share with others. In this six-week study of the Book of Romans, we will be highlighting significant concepts regarding the good news about faith, grace, daily life, God’s plan, relationships, and eternity. Whatever bad news we may receive, in Romans we will find good news to encourage and transform us.
Join Melissa in taking a posture of listening and learning as we approach this powerful book packed with good news. Let’s ask God to do a mighty work in and through us as we study so that we might be inspired with a spiritual renewal that spreads to those around us!
Dare To Hope: Living Intentionally
When we look around at today’s world, hope usually isn’t the first word that comes to mind. In many ways we live in an unstable world where marriages fail, bank accounts run low, friendships end, and the everyday demands of a fast-paced life get us down. In the Book of Jeremiah, we find God calling out to His people with a message of hope—a message that intentional living is possible even in an unstable world. In Dare to Hope, Melissa Spoelstra draws upon her best-selling Bible study Jeremiah: Daring to Hope in an Unstable World to examine this hope-filled message, highlighting six guidelines for intentional living that enable us to overcome fear, worry, and doubt as we surrender to God and put our hope in Him alone. This book inspires us to dare to hope, remembering that God is rich in mercy and love and has good plans for us.
Elijah: Spiritual Stamina in Every Season
The struggle is real. It’s just plain hard to find the strength…the stamina…to get through the ups and downs of our daily lives. Sometimes it’s enough to make you want to go hide in a cave. Guess what? Elijah has been there, done that. His life was a string of seriously mountain-top high and bottom-of-the-pit low events, and yet he did extraordinary things for God. In Elijah, you’ll learn the spiritual stamina secrets that helped this great prophet hold on and persevere in faith, including practical habits related to making decisions, caring for the soul, accepting circumstances, mentoring, and finishing well—Elijah’s ultimate legacy. He doubted and struggled just as we do, but he chose to believe God through it all. As you study his life through a combination of study of Scripture with personal reflection, application, and prayer, you will grow in faith and develop spiritual stamina that will help you not only to survive but to thrive in every season.
30 Days of Prayer for Spiritual Stamina
Prayer is essential for developing spiritual stamina, and this prayer guide is intended to help you strengthen your prayer life and faith through a thirty-day prayer challenge. Within these pages you will find prayer exercises offering instruction in a variety of prayer methods and approaches, including praying in silence, praying out loud, journaling your prayers, and drawing/coloring as you pray. Designed to be used as a devotional companion to Melissa’s Elijah Bible study or a separate prayer guide, these prayers will strengthen your faith and increase your spiritual stamina as you draw near to God.
Total Christmas Makeover
Give your Christmas a makeover with this practical approach to help your family learn what it means to truly celebrate their Savior.
In the bustle of the Christmas season, it can be easy to get swept up in all of the things to do. But it’s important to pause and remember that our priority should be to spend time celebrating Christ’s birth and not forget to invite Jesus to his own party.
Christmas is far more than a celebration of an event from long ago or a modern holiday centered around shopping. Mindfully take time to listen to how God continues to speak through the Christmas story as the Gospel narratives centered around the birth of Jesus provide encouragement and revelation concerning the love of God and his wisdom for us today.
In Total Christmas Makeover, author and Bible teacher Melissa Spoelstra provides a practical approach for you and your family to turn your attention toward God’s grace day-by-day as you prepare for Christmas. This 31-day devotional presents key scriptures, ideas to implement with each reading, and questions for reflection to guide you in rediscovering rituals, relationship, and rest to connect you more deeply with Christ this holiday season.
Numbers: Learning Contentment in a Culture of More
Something in us aches for more—more hope, more joy, more freedom. All around us people are dancing to the steps of bigger, better, and faster, and we can easily join in without even realizing it. Before long complaining and comparing accompany our desire for more, yet we’re not any closer to filling the ache inside. God offers us another way.
In this six-week study of the Book of Numbers, we’ll find a group of people that wandered in the desert for forty years, unable to enter the Promised Land because of their complaining, grumbling, and lack of faith. By exploring Numbers we can come to identify the reasons for our complaining, learn contentment while being authentic about the difficulties of life, accept short-term hardship in light of the greater good of God’s ultimate deliverance, recognize the relationship between complaining and worry, and discover how to realign with God’s character and promises.
*Individual Videos for each week are available for purchase and download @ Cokesbury
Total Family Makeover
God calls us as parents to be key disciple-makers in our children’s lives, but if we’re honest, some days it’s a battle just to get them dressed and ready for school on time. How can you mold their hearts when sometimes you can’t even find their shoes?
In Total Family Makeover, author Melissa Spoelstra gives parents a way—a sort of spiritual track to run on—when it comes to building family discipleship.
Disciples are made, not born. Whether your children are babes in arms or teenagers getting ready to leave the nest, making disciples at home starts with you!
First Corinthians: Living Love When We Disagree
Relationships are messy. Sometimes we struggle to get along, especially when there is disagreement. Often we find ourselves divided–even as Christians. How can we work out our differences and disagreements with humility and grace, always showing the love of Christ, while still remaining true to what we believe?
The Apostle Paul wrote to the Christians living in Corinth about this very thing. The cultural backdrop of Corinth was even more overtly sinful than our culture today, yet Paul boldly encouraged the Corinthian Christians not to ridicule one another or outsiders but to work together to show the love of Christ.
In this six-week study we will explore Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians to learn how we as Christians are to deal with differences and divisions–whether in the workplace, neighborhood, school, home, social media community, or church. We’ll discover that the answer is living and sharing the radical love of Jesus Christ, and we’ll unpack what this means and how we can live it out day by day.
Joseph: The Journey to Forgiveness
All of us know what it’s like to be hurt or betrayed. Often it’s a small breach such as being spoken to rudely or overlooked in a time of need. Other times we experience lies, gossip, or harsh words that cut us to the core. Some of us have endured unspeakable pain through abuse, adultery, or abandonment. God knows the pain we cause each other and longs to help us learn to practice forgiveness. Nowhere do we see forgiveness played out more fully in Scripture than in the biblical story of Joseph.
This six-week study explores what God has to say to us about grace and forgiveness through Joseph’s story of trial and triumph found in Genesis 37-50. As we study his dreams, his betrayers, his dysfunctional family, his struggle to forgive, and his journey toward reconciliation, we’ll find truths that echo into our own personal situations.
Jeremiah: Daring to Hope in an Unstable World
Jeremiah offers women hope for living in an uncertain world by learning to navigate the challenges and circumstances of their lives. This six-week study examines God’s words of instruction to His wayward people through the prophet Jeremiah. It provides women six guidelines for intentional living to overcome fear, worry, and doubt as they surrender their wills to God’s and put their hope in Him alone.
Combining rich study of the Book of Jeremiah with practical life application, this study inspires all women to dare to hope, remembering that God is rich in mercy and love and has good plans for us. The DVD contains six video segments of approximately 25 minutes each for use during the group sessions.