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LIFE GROUP DISCUSSION GUIDE
Wednesday Night, January 10, 2007
“Do We Know Who We Are?”
5 Minutes - Welcome / Prayer
5 Minutes - OPEN
When you are asked to introduce yourself to a group, what do you normally say in regard to your being a person of faith? Do you say things like . . .
( ) I’m a born-again Christian.
( ) I’m a baptized believer.
( ) I’m a member of the Pleasant Valley Church of Christ.
What do you say?
One of the things that would be helpful for us all to do is to more frequently share our “faith story.” Has your LIFE Group ever taken the time to allow everyone in the group to share their faith story? If not, at some point soon that would be an insightful evening of sharing.
By the way, why don’t we share our faith story more regularly?
15 Minutes - DIG
God meant for His people of the new covenant to be people who treasure being connected with other Christians in the church and who understand the significance of our new-found status in Jesus Christ! The word in the Greek for church is “ekklesia” and refers to those who have been “called out.” It is used in two senses in the New Testament:
* Universally – All those who constitute the body of Christ throughout the world (Mt. 16:18; Eph. 5:25);
* Locally – All those in the Lord’s service at a given location (1 Cor. 1:2; 1 Thes. 1:1).
On this point, your LIFE Group would do well to take some time this evening and just read through the Book of Ephesians. It was written by Paul in such a way that the first three chapters tells us who we are in Christ and the final three chapters outlines our calling and what God expects of us as His people.
When you read through the New Testament, more often than not, congregations of God’s people were simply called “the church” (69 times by my count) Paul did once say, “all the churches of Christ send greetings” (Romans 16:16 - NIV). The point I’m making is that the term “church” is most frequently used in scripture to be a descriptive term.
So, when you are asked by people out in the community about your home church, how do you describe the PleasantValley church?
Whatever Jesus does in the world today, He does through the church. We exist to reflect the image and glory of God in the world (2 Cor. 3:18). The goal of the church is to look like Jesus Christ (Eph. 4:13, 15). Our life, love, and unity declare to the world that “we have been with Jesus” (Acts 4:13); that we are truly His disciples” (Jn. 13:34). We are His light, salt, and leaven to declare His glory and to spread the message of redemption.
15 Minutes - REFLECT
As it relates to our local congregation, we are trying our very best (as feeble as it may be) to live up to God’s calling of us. To that end, we have a responsibility to ever keep before this community of believers the real distinguishing marks of New Testament Christianity.
And so at times, it is necessary that we have open discussions about what are the important things that define us as a New Testament church. It would be a good exercise to challenge all of the members of your group to go home this week and draft a list of things which they strongly believe should be defining marks for who we should be (Leaders - - please collect all of these notes and share with us).
Here are a couple of ideas to get your thoughts flowing:
* God called us to be a church that cares about others. We are in the people business.
* God called us to lift up Christ in this community.
* We have good news to share. God called us to learn and share His story with others.
* God called us to use our God-given talents to serve.
5 Minutes - CLOSING PRAYER
Pray together tonight that God will continue to smile on us individually and collectively as we –
1. Center our lives in Him;
2. Recognize our role as life-long learners and discipline our selves to become better students of His word;
3. Humble ourselves in prayer;
4. Reach out to others.
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