As a former doctoral student of Scot?s, I?ve been asked to write about a new DVD Bible study series that I edited called Deeper Connectionsfor the next five days. There are three DVDs (and participant?s guides) in the series: The Parables of Jesus, The Miracles of Jesus and The Prayers of Jesus. Its aim is to help busy pastors, Sunday school teachers, and small group leaders by providing visually exciting and interesting Bible teaching.
Have you ever used DVD Bible study curriculum? What have you experienced as you have used DVD Bible studies in your Sunday Schools and small groups?
The Deeper Connections series aims to help our churches become more biblically literate. Sixty percent of Americans can?t name five of the Ten Commandments. Fifty percent of high school seniors think Sodom and Gomorrah were married! Bible knowledge is also a battle in our churches. Barna research has said that one of the most widely known Bible verses among believers is ?God helps those who help themselves??which is not in the Bible.
Each study begins with an introduction from Israel by Jarrett Stevens (North Point Church, Atlanta), followed by a passage of Scripture taught in various locations (Chicago skyline, California beach, Rocky Mountains, Boston, etc.) by some well-known Bible communicators: Gary Burge (Wheaton), David Garland (Truett), Mark Strauss (Bethel), Michael Wilkins (Talbot), Matt Williams (Biola), and Ben Witherington III (Asbury). The teaching is divided up into 3 sections, so that in a 60 minute group session, there is about 30 minutes of DVD teaching on both the Bible passage and application, including time for 30 minutes of group discussion (group discussion questions are included in the participant?s guide).
In the next four days, we will talk about the introductions from Israel, and then give samples from each of the DVDs.