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This week at Society we started our new series called Our Living Hope.
Instructions for Community Group Leaders:
These questions are meant to be a guide for you to lead your community group through the Sunday message. They are intended to help your group participants work to points of application through discerning what God is speaking to them about and how that can be applied to their everyday lives.
Do not feel the need to get through all the questions. Pick a couple for each section that seem most helpful and applicable. If you need some help you can always reach out to our Community Groups director at buck@societychurch.com.
Getting to Know You
- Are you more of a listener or a talker?
- If you had one extra hour of free time a day, what would you do with it?
Getting Started
- What does it mean to you that the resurrection of Jesus is meant to be not just a historical moment we look back on but also a transformational reality we experience?
- Have you ever lost hope? What caused or could be causing this in your life?
- In what ways have you been able to rediscover hope in your life & faith?
Digging Deeper
Read Romans 7:4 (NLT)
- What is the Apostle Paul’s “result” of us being united with the one who has been raised from the dead?
Read Romans 8:11 (NLT)
- Where does the Apostle Paul say the Spirit lives?
- What might that mean for your life?
Read 1 Corinthians 15:20-28
- What do you think is meant that Jesus is the “firstfruits” of the resurrection?
- Why do you think Paul talks about “Adam” and compares and contrasts “Adam” with Jesus?
- What do you think Paul is trying to say about Jesus rising from the dead?
- V.25 we live in the “until then” time between Christ resurrection and the resurrection of the rest of us. What is happening “until then”? How does this relate to Matthew 28:19-20?
Read Mark 16:1-14
- Do the people in this story seem a bit confused about what is happening?
- What makes you think that they are confused?
- How does God help bring clarity amidst their confusion?
- How might the time between post-crucifixion and pre-resurrection be a “graveyard of hope” for those who were following Jesus before he died?
- How does Easter become the “birthplace of hope” for those same people?
Application
- What does it mean to you that “Easter is the birthplace of Hope”?
- What might it mean for you to “get your hopes up”?
- What are some areas of life that you have lost hope in?
- What are some areas of life you are discovering hope in?
- How do you cultivate hope as a part of daily life?
- Why do you think hope is important to our faith & spiritual formation?
Close in a time of prayer together
- Pray for the requests of your group.
- Ask everyone to use their words to pray about something, assure them its ok if they don’t know what to say or how to say it. Encourage them to just say what is on their mind and heart to God. This is a great environment for people to practice praying together.
- Pray for those that came to our Good Friday & Easter services.