Today's Bible study was quite the adventure! V.7 revealed that God the Father has given each of us grace, according to the measure of the gift of Christ! What a wonderful thought for us to meditate upon each day, and in every trial and victory we experience in Christ. God always provides us with the measure of faith we need for our daily lives. Romans 12:3: For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith. 1 Corinthians 12:1-11 reminds us that God bestows upon each of us gifts to be used to minister within the body. The Holy Spirit delivers those gifts to us as we grow in Christ and focus on God's will for us – being conformed to Christ, in our journey through this life. V.8-10 reveal the events that occurred when our Lord and Savior was crucified and was buried. He went to hell and preached to the “spirits” that were imprisoned. 1 Peter 3:18-20: For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water. Jude 1:6: And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day. He not only went to the heart of the earth - hell, but led the Old Testament saints out of their captivity in paradise / Abraham's bosom into heaven, experiencing the first fruits harvest / resurrection of their physical bodies. We will study Matthew 27:50-53 next Sunday.
