Using This Study Guide

This study guide consists of 11 lessons covering Paul’s letter we know as “Second Corinthians.” Since this letter consists of 13 chapters in our New Testaments, we will need to cover more than one chapter in some of the lessons. If you cannot do the entire lesson one week, please read the Bible passage covered by the lesson and try to do the “Day One Study” of the lesson.

The Basic Study

Each lesson includes core questions covering the passage narrative. These core questions will take you through the process of inductive Bible study—observation, interpretation, and application. It is the best approach for doing Bible Study. The process is more easily understood in the context of answering these questions:

• What does the Bible say? (Observation: what’s in the text)
• What does it mean? (Interpretation: the author’s intended meaning)
• How does this apply to me today? (Application: making it personal)

Study Enhancements

Dependent Living: The focus of this study is choices we make to rely more on God than on ourselves in weakness and in strength. That is called dependent living, meaning we live in daily dependence upon God. Some questions have a DL in front of them. These will prompt you to recognize what it means to live dependently on God and how to apply it to your life.

Study Aids: To aid in proper interpretation and application of the study, additional study aids are located where appropriate in the lesson:

• Historical Insights
• Scriptural Insights
• From the Greek (definitions of Greek words)
• Focus on the Meaning
• Think About It (thoughtful reflection)

Other useful study tools: Use online tools or apps (blueletterbible.org or “Blue Letter Bible app” is especially helpful) to find cross references (verses with similar content to what you are studying) and meanings of the original Greek words or phrases used (usually called “interlinear”). You can also look at any verse in various Bible translations to help with understanding what it is saying. You will have the opportunity to add your own study at the end of every What does it mean? section.

New Testament Summary

The New Testament opens with the births of Jesus and John (often called “the baptist”). About 30 years later, John challenged the Jews to indicate their repentance (turning from sin and toward God) by submitting to water baptism—a familiar Old Testament practice used for repentance as well as when a Gentile converted to Judaism (to be washed clean of idolatry).

Jesus Christ, God’s incarnate Son, publicly showed the world what God is like and taught His perfect ways for 3 – 3½ years. After preparing 12 disciples to continue Christ’s earthly work, He died voluntarily on a cross for mankind’s sin, rose from the dead, and returned to heaven. The account of His earthly life is recorded in 4 books known as the Gospels (the biblical books of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John named after the compiler of each account).

After Jesus’s return to heaven, the followers of Christ were then empowered by the Holy Spirit and spread God’s salvation message among the Jews, a number of whom believed in Christ. The apostle Paul and others traveling with him carried the good news to the Gentiles during 3 missionary journeys (much of this recorded in the book of Acts). Paul wrote 13 New Testament letters to churches & individuals (Romans through Philemon). The section in our Bible from Hebrews to Jude contains 8 additional letters penned by five men, including two apostles (Peter and John) and two of Jesus’s half-brothers (James and Jude). The author of Hebrews is unknown. The apostle John also recorded Revelation, which summarizes God’s final program for the world. The Bible ends as it began—with a new, sinless creation.

Dependent Living

Through this 11-week study of 2nd Corinthians, you will learn how to make plans for your life and rely on God with how you proceed. You will learn how to educate your mind and rely on God to use that knowledge to glorify Him. You will learn how to make money and rely on God to show you how to use it wisely. You learn how to do this as you act in obedience to the Word of God, depend on Jesus Christ for the power to do so, and trust Him with the results. This “dependent living” will make you stronger and more effective in life as you become a God-dependent woman.

As a reminder, you’ll see this main idea at the end of each lesson:

As His child, God transforms your life by teaching you to live dependently on Him in weakness and in strength.