Concerns for the Church
1 Thessalonians 3:1-10
Hi All,
I don’t have study questions yet for this week, but check back tomorrow and I’ll try to get some posted. In the meantime here is the sermon from Sunday.
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“Freedom Without Love”
1 Corinthians 8:1-13
- Read 1 Corinthians 8:1-13 and 10:14-11:1. Summarize what you understand Paul to be teaching concerning believers’ interpersonal relationships and idol feasts. What different issues do these passages address regarding believers, their relationships and idol feasts?
- Read 1 Corinthians 8:4-6 and 10:18-22. What is Paul’s theological understanding of idols? What do you think about this?
- Read Deuteronomy 6:4 (keep in mind that it is a key statement of Old Testament monotheism). Read carefully 1 Corinthians 10:6. What is Paul trying to accomplish theologically speaking by this statement? (As you answer this keep in mind that Paul is taking the Gospel and the identity of Jesus to new places and new people and to his own Jewish people along the way) As you consider this think about N.T. Wright’s observation that this is “one of the greatest pioneering moments in the entire history of christology.” Do you agree? Or is he overstating the importance of Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 10:6?
- Do we overvalue our individual freedom as believers? What are the dangers of doing so? Have you ever personally seen the exercise of someone’s freedom cause another person to stumble? What happened?
- What is the difference between being an offence to someone and being a stumbling block to someone? What are some practical areas of application today where the improper exercise of our freedom can produce a stumbling block? Are there any applications in our present context for people coming out of Mormonism?
- Formulate your own question from this text to share with the group.
- Pray for each other to exercise Christian freedom appropriately. Pray for the issue of idolatry, specifically as it grips our own context via the deification of man.
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To Marry or Not to Marry? That Is the Question
1 Corinthians 7:25-40
1. Discuss these questions: Is it better to be single or married? What factors into your decision?
2. Vs. 29-31 mentions five areas where our perspective on life ought to take on new life as we live with eternity in view. How should each take on a new shape:
- Marriage
- Mourning
- Rejoicing
- Purchasing
- Possessions
3. Talk about the section of the message that dealt with the deification of the family. Do you agree or disagree? As you think about this look up the following texts and discuss them: (think about what they are saying in terms of the family and the kingdom of God)
- Matthew 10:34-39
- Mark 3:31-35
- Luke 9:57-62
4. Why is marrying a believer so important? For those of you with children, how will you guide them toward owning this as an essential component in finding a mate?
5. How would you summarize Paul’s perspective on marriage as you reflect on all of chapter 7.
6. Formulate your own question from this text to share with the group.
7. Pray for the marriages represented by the group. Pray for anyone that you know who is making a decision about marriage or in a relationship moving toward marriage. Pray for wisdom in how best to pour into the life of our family and into the life of the church.
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Marriage and Sexual Purity
1 Corinthians 7:1-9
- What are God’s purposes for marriage? Look up the following texts in addition to the one for this sermon: Ecclesiastes 4:7-12; Malachi 2:10-16; Ephesians 5:22-33
- How would you respond to someone who says, “Paul was a sexist”? How would you respond to someone who says, “Paul is down on marriage”?
- Read and discuss Proverbs 5:15-21. What is the message of the text? Why do you think that vs. 21 seems to have such little import into the lives of modern people?
- Talk about the role of sex in marriage. How would you characterize a biblical concept of sex in marriage? In what ways has our culture polluted the biblical view of marital sex? In what ways does marital sex take on a selfish dynamic? What does it mean for your spouse to have “authority” over your body?
- What is the gift of celibacy? How could it be misunderstood?
- Formulate your own question from this text to share with the group.
- Pray for the marriages in the group. Pray that God would make selfless spouses out of each individual. Pray for each to be given to self-control in the sexual arena of their lives.
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“Your Body Matters”
1 Corinthians 6:9-20
- Share some data points and observations from our society that would demonstrate that our culture is rather like the one exemplified by the two Corinthians slogans. Can you trace how we have culturally come to this place we have?
- If I say, “You are not a person with a body, but you are an embodied person,” what if any difference exists between these two perspectives. What is your relationship to your body? What wrong perspectives concerning our bodies do we face in our present culture and from our present vantage point?
- Read through this text carefully, as well as Romans 6:13; 8:9-11; 22-23; 12:1; 1 Corinthians 9:24-27 and Colossians 3:5. How would you put together what they say about the body? As you think about these texts think about the role of the body in human life and the challenges presented with being an embodied creature. How does it affect your spiritual life?
- What does sexual union with another person outside of an appropriate marital context do to you as a person? What do you think Paul is getting at when he utilizes Genesis 2:24 in reference to a man’s union with a prostitute?
- Look at vs. 19-20. Talk about how your body (and you in total for that matter) is possessed (19a), purchased (19b-20a) and purposed (20b).
- Formulate your own question from this text to share with the group.
- Pray for the members of the group to grow in their understanding of how to glorify God with their bodies. Specifically pray for protection from the evil one and your own flesh as you live in a sexually licentious culture
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The Church and Judement
1 Corinthians 6:1-8
- In general, what problems do you think result from taking your brother to a secular court regarding a civil matter? In addition, talk about what underlying issues such an action exposes.
- Read Proverbs 25:8-10. What does it mean? How does it relate to this sermon’s text and the issues in it?
- Why do we often treat relationships within the church body like we could take or leave them? How might they change if we genuinely saw them the way we do family relationships?
- Regarding the judgment of the world, does 6:2-3 contradict what 5:12 teaches regarding outsiders? Can you explain this seeming contradiction? What are the implications of the future role of believers in God’s judgment for their present role as part of the church?
- Talk about the role that personal rights play in our contemporary society? Do you think they play a healthy or unhealthy role today? How are they expressed in the personal lives of believers and in their life together as the church? What impact does this have on our body-life as a church?
- Reflect on John 13:35, 1 Jn. 4:20 and this text. What does our marginalizing of one another communicate?
- Formulate your own question from this text to share with the group.
- Pray for individuals to value others more than their own “rights.” Pray for our church to maintain a great testimony to the world because of the way that we relate to each other.
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An Unholy Church
1 Corinthians 5:1-13
- To what degree is holiness valued in the church today? Explain the factors that you think play into your answer.
- Respond to this statement: The church is supposed to be a different type of community with a different type of culture because they possess a different type of character.
- Why do you think the Corinthian church tolerated this man’s sin? What do you think it says about them?
- Explain the reason for the placement of the statement, “For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed.” In attempting to connect it to vs. 6 and the first part of vs. 7 please read Exodus 13:7 and Deuteronomy 16:4 (and possibly their contexts). How is the Gospel at the center of this issue? (You might recall the three things listed in the sermon.)
- How does Paul think the church should respond to immorality outside and immorality inside the church? Why do these responses differ? What are the respective goals of each?
- Formulate your own question from this text to share with the group.
- Pray for Lifeline to value holiness and restoration. Pray for Lifeline to keep the Gospel at the center of the issues we face as we do life together.
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An Apostle and the Church
1 Corinthians 4:1-21
- What is an Apostle? Characterize in your own words the attitudes of the Corinthians and Paul if all you had to go on was this chapter.
- Think about the metaphors below that Paul uses in this text to refer to himself. What do they tell you about his role and how he perceives that role?
- Under-rower –
- Steward (also read Luke 12:35-48) –
- Father –
- What role does the conscience play in human life? Is it a reliable guide for decision making? How is it fashioned or formed? What are the implications of our conscience’s formation for how we live our lives and for what we allow into our lives?
- Make some notes about the contrast in vs. 8-13 between the Corinthians perception of the Christian life and Paul’s perception as an Apostle. How do they mix with your own perception?
- Explain the contrast in metaphors Paul uses in vs. 15. Vs. 21 is thought to end a major section of the letter: what do you make of the way he ends this section?
- Pray for yourself and all who minister at Lifeline to serve as under-rowers and good stewards of what God has entrusted to them. Pray for each one in the group to have a proper perspective of the task of Christian discipleship.
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Buildling God’s Way
1 Corinthians 3:10-23
- According to this passage what should you consider as you build into God’s church?
- In addition and more specifically, how do we build in ways that are not perishable? (think of specific and individual ways)
- What other foundations do some people try to lay for the church? Can you think of examples where a wrong foundation has been laid and what the consequence has been?
- Share some ideas about how you can effectively communicate and gather support for the $100 challenge as a means of helping Lifeline obtain a permanent facility.
- Look closely at vs. 13-17. What is the difference between the person in vs. 15 whose work is burned up and the one in vs. 17 who is destroyed? (regarding the word used for “destroyed” you might look at the other NT uses: 1 Cor. 15:33; 2 Cor. 7:2; 11:3; Eph. 4:22; 2 Pt. 2:12; Jude 1:10; Rev. 19:2)
- Pay attention to vs. 17, how is the church at large viewed by people who attend it? How is Lifeline viewed? How ought it to be viewed? What does this mean for your actions as part of the church?
- What does Paul mean in vs. 21-23? In what sense are “all things” yours? Why does he speak this way to them? What are the implications of this for the things he mentioned (world, life, death, present, future)? How do these things oppress us?
- Pray that God would help you be a good builder at Lifeline. Pray that we would treat the church as holy/set apart? Pray for our $100 challenge.
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God’s Building
1 Corinthians 3:1-9
- In your own words describe the Corinthians from what Paul has said so far.
- How is the Gospel both milk and solid food? How is this analogous to our ABC’s and language? How does the Gospel find import into all of life? Talk about some specific areas of life and how the Gospel reforms and reshapes them.
- Talk about what it means to “act as mere men.” What is meant here? (keep in mind that the Greek literally says, “are you not walking according to men?” Contrast this to Galatians 5:16-26.
- How are the “laborers” in this text characterized? What do you learn about them and their roles both individually and as they relate to God and His “field”? How have the Corinthians misunderstood the role of teachers in the local body? (keep in mind 1 Cor. 1:10-17; 2:10-16; 12:4-6 and 29)
- How does God build His church? What are some good evaluative questions to diagnose if it is being built well?
- Pray for Lifeline and its leadership. Pray that God would build His church and ask Him to show you how to contribute in the best way possible.
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