Why do you think they were scary? What made these things scary? (note: we want people to get to being out of control/unsure )

Transcription

1 Pilgrim Lutheran Church 1430 North Lake Drive Lexington SC For the Leader: What does it mean to be generous? What does a generous life look like? During this season of exploring how we live The Generous Life this season at Pilgrim Lutheran Church, we start by looking at just how generous God is to us. We hope you will use this study as a jumping off point for conversation around God, gifts, grace, love, hope, and trust and how fear gets in the way. We also pray that this study will encourage each of us to walk in the way of Jesus, a path of Generosity. Thanks for leading this study! What is FEAR? Purpose: The purpose of this study is to explore God s great love and generosity, and our own fear that prevents us from loving and living like Jesus. What blocks us from living generously? Most often, fear. But perfect love casts out fear. (1 John 4:18) Setting Up: You will need bibles, some sheets of paper and something to write with for every participant. You may want to have a poster board, newsprint, dry erase board, chalk board or the like, but this is not necessary. Getting Started: Welcome everyone to the study. (NOTE: If this is a group that does not know each other, have everyone go around and share their name, their daily ministry (aka their work), and where they were born.) Opening Conversation: Leader: Let s start with an easy question: What are things that kids are afraid of? (examples: dark, dogs, swimming, getting lost, talking to new people, etc.) Which of these are things you were afraid of as a child? How did you learn to cope with them? (if you have something to write on, write down people s response) Why do you think they were scary? What made these things scary? (note: we want people to get to being out of control/unsure ) Process: Today we are talking about fear and how fear can lead our actions. We will talk about how wonderful our God is, and how fear can lead us from who God is and who God calls us to be. So let s begin.

2 Bible Study Leader: Let s look first at Genesis. Open your bible to Genesis Chapter 3. It s the first book of the bible, the very front. Can someone read verses 1-7. Have someone read Genesis 1: 1-7 aloud. Leader: Let s break down the story. Who is introduced at the first verse? (serpent) What does the serpent tell the woman? (Did God not tell you you can eat anything?) What does the woman respond? (we can eat anything but the tree) What does the serpent respond? (You will not die but know good AND evil.) Process: In the story, was there evil before this moment? (Nope! All was good) What was the first time you encountered something that was unfair? Maybe you were a child on the playground and someone stole your toy, or someone treated you wrong. There is a usually a time when we realize that things can go wrong, and that everything is not always good. We learn there is evil. This is what happens here. The people have no worries because all is good, but then they learn there is evil and that bad things can happen. What is the result of this? Have someone read Genesis 3: Leader: Let s break down the story again. The Lord comes into the garden. What did the couple do? (hid) What is the reason they gave for hiding? (they were afraid and ashamed) Process: Up to this point everything is good. Their relationship with God, with the world, with themselves, even their own self-image is positive. But then they know evil. What is the first result of knowing evil? (fear and shame) Were they ashamed before? Were they worried before? Did they have fear? Leader: What a trick the serpent plays! They think that they are getting something good, but the first thing they get is fear and shame. This fear is the first reaction away from God. It makes us hide, it makes us ashamed. We believe we are no longer good enough for God, that God would be ashamed of us. It is the first obstacle to a mutual love relationship with God: we think we are not good, so we are afraid and we hide from God. Process: What are things you are afraid of now, as an adult? Write some of these things down on a sheet of paper. If you are comfortable sharing, please do. If not, know that what is written down will not be seen by anyone. (note: this will probably take a lot longer than the first conversation around fear. Give people time to process.)

3 How does fear inform how you behave? (i.e. afraid of cancer so I get tests a lot, afraid for my children so I hover, afraid for my parents so I check in constantly) How can this fear be helpful? (i.e. can help me stay healthy, help my parents) How can fear become a roadblock from good things? Leaders: Let s look at what God does with fear. Open bibles to 1 John 4. Have someone read 1 John 4: 7-8. What is the opening thing John is asking of us? (love one another) Do you find it hard to love? Who is easy to love? Who is hard to love? What are things that get in the way of loving another? Read 1 John 4:9-11 What does this text say about God s nature? (God is love, what we know about God is known in love) What does this text say about how God loves? (God gives his Son for us, not because we loved God but because God loves us. God s love is not conditional on how we love God but simply because of God s amazing love) It says Because God loved us, so we ought to love one another. How would the world look if we loved one another as God loved us? What keeps us from loving this way? Read 1 John 4: 12 Leader: Surprise! This is the only way we can see God! We only see God when we love another. God s love is made perfect when we love another. This is when God becomes visible. Read 1 John 4: How does the text say love perfected among us? (we can be brave on the day of judgment.) What does this mean? What does it mean that we may be bold when we are judged? (We do not need to fear whether or not we will be judged harshly, because we trust in God s love. We trust not in how we love God but how much God loves us. This makes us BRAVE!) Is there any fear in love? What do you think John meant by this? (Fear has to do with punishment. We fear being punished, being hurt, but we know God is love, and not only that but perfect love, and this perfect love casts fear out. We do not fear any more because we trust God s love.) Process

4 Do you fear and worry about your relationship with God? What sort of things do you worry about when it comes to your relationship with God? These things you worry about, are they about God or about you? Are they based in God s nature or your own? Do you believe God brings shame and fear or is this our work? How do we do this? Leader: God s love is greater than fear, greater than any problem that we have, greater than our sin, and, PAY ATTENTION TO THIS, greater than death! Nothing separates us, not our fear, not our problems, not our worries, not our sin, not our mistakes, not our thoughts, not our works, nothing separates us. THIS IS OUR COURAGE- not that we loved God but that God loves us. A Life Without Fear Leader: In the movie Defending Your Life, a man dies and goes to a heaven-like place. There it is decided whether he goes forward or backward. In this place everyone goes to trial, but instead of being judged by doing good things or bad things, they are judged by how much fear they had. He sees his life on a screen and sees how all the ways he did not help because he was afraid of being hurt and in the end it affects his relationships around them when people see him as a coward, or he did not invest because he was worried about his finances and he loses out on a million dollar investment. At the same time he meets a woman there and glimpses her movie. She lives a fearless life, but the fearless life isn t about gain or loss, but simply about joy. She was so happy with every up, every down, not because everything goes well, but because she lives without fear. On a sheet of paper, you wrote down things that make you afraid. Take a look again. (brief pause) On the same sheet of paper, think of things that keep you from a deep and mutual love of God. What worries you about being in relationship with God? What keeps you from falling head-over-heels for God? No one will see these things, unless you feel called to share them. (brief pause) How much of these lists are alike? How does fear shape your relationship with God? Leader: So much of our fear comes from what we project of ourselves on to God. We have a hard time loving ourselves, so we assume God cannot love us. We are aware of the darkness in us, our harsh thoughts, our own sin, and think that God knows and so we cannot be loved. But think again of the 1 John text. God loves us, no matter what. Fear rests in us, not God. Our fear comes from us, not God. SO HERE COMES THE CORE QUESTION: Is God afraid of loving us? Open your bibles to Romans, chapter 8.

5 Have someone read Romans 8: It says in verse 12, we should not live according to the flesh. Thinking of the Genesis text, what is the first result of living by the flesh? (they were afraid) It says that God has given us a Spirit of adoption. When someone is adopted in our culture, what does that mean? (they are sons and daughters, they become family) But this is a specific Spirit. It is not a spirit of slavery but adoption. In the text, it says slavery-spirit leads to fear, but the Spirit of adoption leads us to cry out, Abba Father! We do not cry out SO THAT we are children, but because we ARE children. We do not fear whether we love God so that we are not punished, we love God because God has given us his Spirit, not to be slaves, but to be God s children. We get to be God s own. We can be bold and brave. We can be God s own and not worry about whether God loves us: IT IS SO. FINAL WORDS (READ THIS ALOUD) 7 Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love. 9 God s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. 10 In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us. 16 So we have known and believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them. 17 Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness on the day of judgment, because as he is, so are we in this world. 18 There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love. 19 We love because he first loved us. Leader: Friends, a life of generosity is a life lived without fear. We learn this from God. He gives all for us and he invites us into his life, to live generously as he has lived generously. This is an invitation of the parent to the child, LOVE LIKE I DO, GIVE LIKE I DO, SURRENDER LIKE I DO, ONLY THEN WILL YOU TRULY UNDERSTAND ME. Take the sheet of paper. And crumple it up. Throw it away and say Perfect love casts out fear. In this season, we are seeking how to live a generous life. It starts here: not out of fear, but out of confidence in the one who loved us first. Let us us love generously, giving generously, without fear but because the Spirit cries out ABBA!

6 Closing Prayer. Pray: God, in your there is no fear. In you we have confidence. In you is our trust. In you is perfect love. Cast out our fear that we may love and live generously as you love and live generously. Graciously teach us to be more and more like you, not out of fear but out of our love for you. Teach us to be bold. IN your name. Amen.