In The Moment (Part 2): When You're Out Of Options...

TO START

Invite the group to share something meaningful that happened to them this past week.

  • Why was it meaningful? Was it spontaneous or planned? How did it come about?

TO READ & DISCUSS

This week, we continued a series called In the Moment where we are talking about how we can expect to find God in the unexpected. That if we take a moment, we can experience God in the messy, meaningless & mundane parts of life. And this week through a story from Mark, Zane prompted us to consider what Jesus might be doing when we seem to be out of options….

  • Have you ever had an instance where you felt like you were out of options? How did you respond to this situation?

Read Mark 5:21-34 together.

In this moment, we see two people in very different social locations experiencing hardship: an unnamed woman who seems to have exhausted all her resources without healing and Jairus, a synagogue ruler with a child in danger. And yet Jesus finds a way to bring them side by side. We see this specifically through the lens of pain, hardship and grief which we all know in one way or another.

  • Zane argues that hardship creates social distance, have you felt this in your life?

  • When we or others are experiencing hardship, there are two main responses, we can be fixers or shoulders (people who need solutions versus people who are simply present), which is your default?

  • In light of the two possible responses we just discussed, which response does Jesus actually embody?

Additionally, Zane argues that when hardship arises, we are tempted to put distance between us and others/God. And that rather than solutions, we need shoulders which is exactly what Jesus provides for the woman in the story. God sees her pain, hurt and grief, “God wants to name it and know the name that goes with it”.

  • So how do you feel knowing that God knows your pain and that God desires for you to reach out to him? How do you feel knowing that when you reach out to God, God doesn’t let go but rather God helps you to be truly yourself?

One of our core behaviors is to be genuine, telling the whole truth about ourselves to God and others.

  • Is being genuine hard for you? If it’s not hard for you, what has helped you to be your real self with God and others?

Read Mark 5:35-43

  • What do you think Mark is trying to reveal to us about healing in this story? Why do you think Jesus didn’t heal her quicker?

In the sermon, Zane also quoted Kate Bowler from her book, Everything Happens for a Reason which challenges our American sensibilities for healing…

“What would it mean for Christians to give up that little piece of the American dream that says, ‘You are limitless’? Everything is not possible. The mighty kingdom of God is not here yet. What if rich did not have to mean wealth, whole did not have to mean healed? What if being people of the gospel meant that we are simply people with good news. God is here. We are loved. It is enough"

  • How does Kate’s understanding of wholeness and richness hit you compared to the American dream ideal?

To close his sermon, Zane points us to specific phrasing in Mark 5:36, Jesus has the audacity to tell Jairus right after his daughter dies, “do not be afraid, keep believing” — in the midst of the worst news of suffering, faith is simply not giving up and showing up. We have to close the distance between ourselves and others just as Jesus did. We have to reach out to God.

TO CLOSE

I want to encourage your group to spend time in popcorn prayer doing two things (invitation for your group members but not requirement; give them something to write with so they can write it down if they aren’t comfortable sharing):

1) Share something that is really good in your life (a victory, a change, etc.)

2) Share something really hard in your life that you need to tell God about (a sin, a struggle, a pain, something that is difficult, etc.)

Then close with this prayer:

God, grant us the serenity to stop beating ourselves up for not doing things perfectly,

the course to forgive ourselves because we are working on doing better.

And the wisdom to know that You, God already love us just the way we are. Amen.

Matt DeLano