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初めの愛を保つ

CCC創設者のビル・ブライト博士は、祈り課題を聞かれる度にいつも「私が初めの愛を失わないように祈ってください」と答えていました。ブライト博士には大きな情熱がありました。それは神を知り、神を深く愛したいという情熱です。

新しい地域チームリーダーとして、こなさなければならない新しい責任がたくさんあります：

新しい人間関係：組織のリーダーとして

新しい仕事：チームと共に方向性を設定、メンバーのコーチ、パートナーシップづくり、障害を取り除く手助け......。

新しい影響力：ビジョンを分かち合い、戦略を練り、足並みをそろえ、動機づける...。

新しいキャパシティ：人材や財務の管理、チームに必要なリソースの開発など。

これらの良いことを多く行っている間に、忙しくなり、聖霊の力で歩まなくなり、初めの愛を失ってしまいがちです。

(適切であれば、主のために働くことに忙しくなり、主との関係がおろそかになったときの個人的な例を話してください)。

Whenever Bill Bright was asked the question “How can I pray for you?”, he always responded, “Pray that I would never lose my first love.” He had one great passion: to know God and love him deeply.

As a new local team leader, there are many new responsibilities to juggle:

new relationships as a positional leader in the organization,

new work of setting direction with your team, coaching others, creating partnerships, helping remove obstacles…

new influence: you are casting vision, formulating strategies, aligning, motivating…

new capacity: as you steward people, finances, develop needed resources for the team, etc.

It would be easy to get busy, fail to walk in the power of the Holy Spirit, and lose your first love while doing many of these good things.

(If appropriate, share a personal example of when you got so busy working for the Lord that you neglected your relationship with the Lord.)

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絵画：「マルタとマリアの家のキリスト」ベラスケス、1618年

この絵について各自気づいたことを書き出してもらう（1０～15個）。

グループで分かち合う。「この絵を見て気づいたことは何ですか？」

分かち合いをまとめるための質問例：

この絵について観察したことは？

絵の中心人物は誰ですか？

彼女の顔や手をどう表現しますか？

マルタ（キッチンにいる人）は何を考えていますか？気分は？

背景には誰がいますか？彼らは何をしていますか？

彼女の後ろにいる人は誰ですか？彼女は何をしていますか？

(正解も不正解もありません。これはただ、考えや議論を促すためのものです)。

(ルカによる福音書10:38-42）

Painting: 'Kitchen Scene with Christ in the House of Martha and Mary', Velázquez, 1618

Have each person take time to write down 10-15 observations about this painting.

Share observations in the group. Ask “What do you notice about this picture?”

Possible questions to organize sharing...�

What observations can you make about the painting?

Who is the central part of painting?

How would you describe her face, hands?

What might Martha (the person in the kitchen) be thinking about that? Feeling?

Who is in the background? What are they doing?

Who is the person behind her? What is she doing?

(There are no right or wrong answers. This is just to stimulate thought and discussion.)

(Story found in Luke 10:38-42.)

Some additional ideas about the painting… (THANK YOU, Jill Patterson, for pointing out this content!)

The plight of Martha clearly relates to that of the maid in the foreground. She has just prepared a large amount of food and, from the redness of her creased puffy cheeks, we can see that she is also upset. To comfort her (or perhaps even to rebuke her), the elderly woman indicates the scene in the background reminding her that she can not expect to gain fulfillment from work alone. The maid, who cannot bring herself to look directly at the biblical scene and instead looks out of the painting towards us, meditates on the implications of the story, which for a theologically alert contemporary audience included the traditional superiority of the vita contemplativa (spiritual life) over the vita activa (temporal life), not that the latter was inessential. Saint Augustine had drawn this moral from the story in the 5th century, followed by countless other divines. In the Counter-Reformation the usefulness of the "active life" was somewhat upgraded by many writers to counter Lutheran assertions of the spiritual adequacy of "faith alone".^[3]

This is the most likely interpretation of the painting. However, scholars have given other readings of it. Some have argued over the identities of the characters, suggesting that the maid in the foreground is actually Martha herself and the lady standing in the background is just an incidental character.

Another point of contention is the representation of the background. On the one hand, we may be looking at a mirror or through a hatch at the biblical scene. If so, it would imply that the whole painting, foreground and background, is set in Christ's time and would perhaps lend weight to the argument that the maid in the foreground is Martha. On the other hand, the biblical scene may just be a painting which is hung in the maid's kitchen.^[4]Given that the bodegones usually represent images of contemporary Spain, many have thought that this is the most likely explanation. However, the National Gallery say that following cleaning and restoration in 1964, it is now clear that the smaller scene is framed by a hatch or aperture through the wall.^[5] The suggestion of other possibilities, especially that of the scene as a painting, may remain as an element in the meaning of the work.

There is a second version of the painting, with significant differences, in an American collection.^[^{citation needed}

Whatever the truth, we can appreciate this as an early example of Velázquez's interest in layered composition, a form also known as "paintings within the painting". He continually exploited this form throughout his career. Other examples of this are Kitchen Scene with the Supper in Emmaus (1618), Las Hilanderas (1657) and his masterpiece Las Meninas (1656)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christ_in_the_House_of_Martha_and_Mary_(Vel%C3%A1zquez)

For those interested in a further study of faith and art, you might want to check out the books by Keith J White on the subject.

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黙示録 2:1-7

新しいローカルチームのリーダーとして、初めの愛を維持するために主が語られる御言葉に耳を傾けましょう。

グループとして、または個人として、この箇所を通して主があなたに語ってくださるように祈り求めます。この領域であなたの心に新たに語りかけ、理解する耳と心が与えられるように。

参加者に個人的にこの箇所を読んでもらうか、誰かに声に出して読んでもらいます。

Let’s listen to the Word of the Lord as He speaks to us about maintaining our first love as a new local team leader…

As a group or individually, pray and ask the Lord to speak to you through this passage; give you ears to hear and a heart to understand and speak afresh to your heart in this area.

Have the participants read the passage individually or ask one person to read out loud for the group.

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エペソの教会にはどのような称賛が与えられていますか？彼らは何をしていましたか？

神様はこの教会に対して何を責めておられますか？

この教会が正しい道に戻るために、神様はどのような解決策を与えておられますか？

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黙示録	キーワード	私たちが行うこと	用いるもの
黙 2:5a 「どこから落ちたのか思い起こし…」	思い起こす	考える	知力
黙 2:4 「…初めの愛から離れてしまった」	悔いる	感じる	心
黙 2:5b 「悔い改めて」	悔い改める	変わる	たましい
黙 2:5c 「初めの行いをしなさい」	もう一度行う	行う	力

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「イエスは、

心を尽くし、いのちを尽くし、知性を尽くし、

力を尽くして神を愛せよ、

と命じられました。

人生において、

これ以上大切なことは存在しないと

私は信じています」。

Bill Bright, First Love