Session 4: Part 2(pgs 65-89)

Session 4: Part 3(pgs 65-89)

Ice Breaker/Challenge Review:

Share with your group how your attempts to find a prayer partner have gone this week.  Talk about fears, frustration, God’s provision. If you have found someone to be your prayer partner, how has praying with that person regularly impacted your life?

Videos

The Local Church

The Global Church

Discussion/Prayer

Inside the church, this means that we devote ourselves to the members of our church body. We have a responsibility to challenge one another, to love one another, and to serve one another in a variety of ways. When every member takes this seriously, it makes for a healthy church (Eph. 4:16). And when the church functions as God intended, the results are nothing short of miraculous. The church becomes a place of healing, a picture of how God wants humanity to live. But this vision goes beyond the people within a church body. We don’t love and serve the Christians around us solely to maintain healthy churches. God’s plan is bigger than that. It involves reaching out to the whole world. His plan of redemption will not be completed if we are satisfied with those who are already on the inside

Read Luke 19:10

1. How does this passage help you understand the mission of the church and your role in helping the church fulfill its mission?

1. How is community/fellowship an obstacle to the church completing it’s mission?

Read 1 Corinthians 12-13, 1 John 4:19, John 13:34-35

2. How does 1 Corinthians 13 help you understand the guiding principles behind how Christians use their spiritual gifts?

1. How does 1 John 4 motivate you to love others?
2. How does 1 Corinthians 12 give you a better understanding of how you love people in the body of Christ?

Jesus’s prayer assumes that our life together as Christians won’t be hidden from view. Our unity is something that the world will be able to see. Nowadays, church life can become so introverted and privatized that the world never sees the way we 70 Multiply interact with one another. If all we ever do is gather in a private building on Sundays and perhaps meet in someone’s home for a midweek Bible study, the world will never know whether we are united or not.

3. What are the fears you’ve had about bringing lost friends into contact/fellowship with “church” people?

1. How can you minister to your Christian community so that it is more united and engaged in ministry?
2. How can help make your Church and the unity of the body more visible in its community?

Read 1 Peter 2:4-12

4. How does the instruction in 1 Peter 2 change the way you view your role in helping the church complete it’s mission?

1. How does the passage change the way you view the reason why Christians gather?
2. What does this tell us about the purpose of the Church?

Read Gen 3:15, Gen 12:2-3

5. How do the readings in Genesis help you understand why God’s mission of redemption is global?

1. How can you be a catalyst for helping your church connect to God’s global mission?

Read Romans 10:12-15

6. What does Romans 10 tell you about the need for the Church to think globally?

1. What are some of the ways your church can begin helping those who haven’t heard, hear?

Once we start developing a passion for Christ’s glory to be seen around the world, we need to figure out what role we are called to play. Make no mistake, every Christian is called to be involved in spreading the gospel around the world! No one is off the hook... this doesn’t mean that we all need to immediately start packing for the jungle. God may well want you to take His gospel overseas. Too many Christians discount that possibility too quickly.

7. What reservations do you have about genuinely asking God to reveal how you fit into His global mission?  Can you have peace regardless of what God calls you to do in your immediate future?

Read 3 John 1:5-8

8. How does John’s admonishment help you recognize how you can be part of the global mission even if you aren’t able to physically go overseas?

1. What are some scary ideas about joining the global mission of God that you can ask others to pray with you about?

As distant and unfamiliar as the churches in India, Africa, China, and Papua New Guinea may seem, our future is inextricably tied to theirs. When Jesus returns to reclaim this world as its rightful King, we will find ourselves praising God alongside Christians from every age and from every nation on earth.

9. How does knowing that the Church is global change how you pray about the Church? That is how does knowing the Church isn’t just your local body.
10. How can you encourage others in your local church to grow in their prayer life about the global church?

Individual Challenge

Adopt a part of the global church to pray for this month and help others in your church aware of the needs of that group.