We are grateful for each one of you who regularly follow the “Matters of Life and Death” (MLD) series. Your comments have been encouraging and your questions have been stimulating. We thank the Lord for enabling all of us to learn and grow together in grace and spiritual maturity.

Our first study in the MLD series in 2023 covered the importance of the Ten Commandments. In 2024 and 2025, we surveyed twenty-four Attributes of God as revealed in the Law, the Prophets, the Gospels, and the Epistles, as well as the ways God’s attributes can be applied in our daily life.

An important part of the MLD series has been the accompanying biographical sketches that demonstrate how the truths of God’s Word have been lived out in daily life over the centuries by faithful men of God. We thank you for the many words of encouragement testifying how these biographies have been a blessing to you, adults and children alike, as you have read or listened each week, both in the United States and around the world.

In 2026, for our next study in the MLD series, we believe that the Lord has been leading us toward a survey of the Commands of Christ, specifically how His commands have been obeyed and lived out by His disciples. This ministry has produced many articles, messages, booklets, and podcasts on the Commands of Christ over the years. However, we believe there is fresh ground to cover as we discover how these commands of our Lord have been lived out by men and women throughout history who have loved and served our Savior.

Using the same pattern as in previous years, an article will be released each Tuesday and each Thursday. These articles will correspond to a similar podcast series presented on the same theme on Monday. Our hope is to unify this effort so that both the written articles and the podcast will reinforce one another for God’s glory.

The Tuesday teaching articles that will be posted on our website and distributed to the current mailing list will lay the foundation of a specific command of our Lord. Moreover, the article will also focus on a New Testament character who especially lived out that particular command. We will highlight both men and women, surveying the lives of those who lived during Christ’s ministry on earth as well as those who spread the Gospel alongside Paul and Peter during the time of the Book of the Acts of the Apostles.

What questions might we consider during the Tuesday study? How about: How did the Apostle John “abide in Christ” during the dark days of persecution? Why was it important for Epaphroditus to obey our Lord’s command to “deny yourself” during a stressful time? Who best illustrates our Lord’s command to love our enemies? Who was called by Christ to “feed my [His] sheep” in a life of service that eventually led to martyrdom? Who saw the opening of the Gospel to the Gentile world when he learned to ask in faith that God would do a mighty thing? What couple influenced the culture of their city—and eventually a civilization—by making their home a house of prayer? We hope to answer these questions in ways that will encourage each one of us to be faithful disciples of Jesus in our own generation.

As we consider this particular survey’s focus on Christ’s commands and discipleship, an important question to ask is, “Who exemplifies a disciple of Jesus?” In common understanding, we sometimes limit this term to the twelve men who were called to be apostles during Christ’s earthly ministry. But the word disciple simply means “learner.” Any Christian who learns from the teaching and example of Jesus is a disciple. Studying how the first century disciples learned from our Lord can challenge and encourage us as we live as His disciples in the twenty-first century.

May these Tuesday teaching articles on men, such as Ananias, Trophimus, Onesimus, and on women such as Martha, Anna, Phebe, and Priscilla, be a blessing and inspiration to you and your family in the coming year as together we examine and consider the Commands of Christ.