Decide (Part 3): Getting to the Bottom of it...

TO START

This Sunday, we jumped into part 3 of a series called Decide. To start the year, we are turning our focus to what it looks like as a Spirit-filled & Spirit-led people to make Spirit-filled & Spirit-led decisions. To start group reflect on this set of questions:

  • Is it easy or hard for you to change your mind? Give an example of a time you changed your mind on something that was a big shift in your life. 

This week we are inviting your group to choose questions from the multiple options below.  Our hope is that these questions might help you to lead your discussion in a way that makes sense for your group this week as y’all “talk it out” and “live it out”.

TALK IT OUT AFTER READING MARK 10:35-53

STUDY

  • What does Jesus mean by “Can you drink the cup I drink or be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with” (v.38)?

  • What is the relationship between Mark 10:42-44 and Mark 10:45. In other words, what’s the relationship between our serving and Jesus’s serving? 

  • What does Bartimaeus risk by getting louder and not being deterred by the rebuke of the crowd? 

PROCESS

  • Do you find yourself more often seeking out Jesus for safety and security (even if it requires manipulation) or do you seek him for mercy (for the sake of seeing him and the world rightly)?

  • Often we try to seek out safety and security through trying to possess something, protect something or prove something… which of those seems to be hardest for you to gain freedom from? 

  • Share a time when you received  sacrificial love from someone..  

LIVE IT OUT 

PRACTICE

  • If you could ask Jesus to do one thing for you right now, what would it be? 

  • Have you taken on a practice of Jesus now or in the past that radically changed your life and your understanding of following him?

  • What might you have to sacrifice or shift in order to spend more time in God’s presence and relying on his role in decision-making?

PRAY

  • We invite you to pray about a few upcoming groups that the church is launching: Alpha on Wed., starting Feb 28th (opportunity to serve, sponsor & pray) and GriefShare on Sundays starting January 28th. Pray for those initiatives and ask God to show any members of the group if they might need to make a decision to jump into one of these environments.

Matt DeLano