Your Name Is Safe in His Mouth

In one paragraph

Deborah Buckingham opened the fall Bible study series at First Baptist Jackson with a session on the Father's love. She walked through three actions she believes every Christian must choose to take: understanding God's love, receiving it, and living in it. Her aim was to root out common lies that keep believers from experiencing what she called the love of their Abba Father. Deborah started by...

Read together

1. John 3:16-17 God loved the world and gave his only Son to save, not condemn
2. Philippians 2:12 Paul tells believers to work out their salvation
3. Ephesians 6:11-12 put on the full armor of God to stand against the devil's schemes
4. Jeremiah 29:11 God's plan is to prosper and give hope, not harm
5. Psalm 145:18 the Lord is close to all who call upon him
6. Zephaniah 3:17 God is with you, delights in you, quiets you with love and rejoices over you with singing
7. Romans 8:1 there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ
8. Jeremiah 31:3 God has loved us with an everlasting love and drawn us with loving kindness
9. Lamentations 3:22 God's compassions and mercies never fail, they are new every morning
10. Isaiah 49:16 God has engraved his child on the palm of his hand
11. Romans 8:15 we have not received a spirit of fear but adoption, by which we cry Abba Father
12. Psalm 145:9 God is good to everyone and showers compassion on all creation
13. John 16:33 Jesus tells his followers they will have trials but he has overcome the world
14. 1 John 4:16 John wrote that we know God loves us because we have put our trust in his love
15. 1 Corinthians 13 Paul's definition of love used as basis for closing reflection on what love looks like

Talk about it

1. Deborah described three common lies people believe about God: that He is distant, that He disapproves of us, and that His love depends on our behavior. Which of those three has been the hardest for you to shake, and why do you think that is?
2. Deborah quoted Paul in Romans 8:1, that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ, and connected it to Paul's own past of persecuting believers. How does knowing what Paul had done before he wrote those words change the way you hear them?
3. Deborah said that receiving God's love requires willingness, not worthiness, and that it starts with wanting to know Him rather than asking what He will do for us. What does that kind of intentional pursuit actually look like in your daily life?
4. Deborah shared that a painful season of persecution in her teaching ministry was the time she felt God's love most deeply, and that God used it to grow her in ways comfort never would have. Has there been a hard season in your own life where you later recognized God's love at work in it?
5. Deborah closed by saying that giving love to others actually expands our capacity to receive the Father's love, and that limiting how we love others limits how much of His love we can take in. Where do you see the most room to grow in the way you love the people around you?