Community Group Discussion Guide

The Story We Share – May 5, 2019

I. First and foremost, this week we implore you to make this CG time like few you have ever led in your CG. Make this week practical application week. Devote 95% of your time on practicing sharing the story. This means foregoing prayer time in your traditional way, and teaching in your traditional way. So…

A. How do I share the story? (80% of your time)1. Practice sharing the story of the creation, the fall, the rescue and the restoration.

You may want to show the entire video to your CG https://thestoryfilm.com/share 2. Practice sharing your story (see John’s story below). How did God save you? How

has He transformed your life? Go around the circle telling your story or break in groups of three where each person tells their story.

If this takes the entire hour (or two hours), praise God. If this exposes a lost person in your CG, please lovingly pray for the Spirit to give you wisdom as you shepherd through. This week in CG could be the day, the week that God saves a soul in your CG.

B. Why do I share the story? (10% of your time)1. Out of obedience. I am an ambassador of Christ, not the owner.2. Out of love. I am compelled to share out of my deep love of Christ and my deep

love for the lost.

II. Your Story: We encourage everyone in CGs over the next few weeks and months to write their story (similar to what we read before one’s baptism) and share them in CG. Also, ask the Lord to open a door where they can share that story with “their one”.

John Wohlgemuth wrote his story as an example: “I grew up in a family and a town where God was acknowledged and even revered. I knew from an early age that God had a plan for my life and had good in store for me if I followed Him. But that churched culture also led to apathy in my heart, eventually to the point where I was pursuing the things of this world instead of Jesus. Though I had prayed some prayer at the age of 7, my entire teenage life was about me and my pleasures and pride. Publicly, I was perceived as a believer, but privately I was consumed by sin. My heart was hard toward the things of God, and my life was littered with impacted relationships. Even worse, instead of God’s design of an eternity with Him, my destiny was an eternity without Him due to my sin and rebellion.

Around the age of 20, though, God broke my prideful heart to reveal my sin and its temporary and eternal effects. I finally woke up to the gravity of my situation and saw Jesus’ provision in His perfect life in my place, substitutionary death in my place, and victorious resurrection over sin and death in my place. At that time, I I came through the cross to trust Jesus with my today and with my eternity, to forgive me of my sins and to restore me to a relationship with Him that never ends. What I see Him doing now in my life is that He is changing my desires, affecting my habits, and providing me opportunities to do His good works in the world. And though He is not yet finished restoring me into His image, I can look forward to the day He returns and restores all things and takes away all pain and suffering and sorrow and death for His children by faith. What joy that brings me today!”

Oh, what God could do among us as we all shared our stories with each other and got to where we could confidently share our story in the context of the overarching story of the creation, the fall, the rescue and the restoration.

Thanks for persevering through this series. May God produce eternal fruit!

Question: What anxieties or fears do you have when it comes to sharing the Gospel with others?

Recap: Last week we discussed the process of Biblical restoration – that our temporary dwelling place on the Earth will one day be replaced with a far better reality and that all of creation, including us, points to that end. Have someone share about their experience sharing their story with “their one”.

III. Discussion of Scripture: (10% of your time) Or this could be your second week (next week) to devote in CG to the story.

2 Cor 5:11-21 (ESV)The Ministry of Reconciliation11 Therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade others. But what we are is known to God, and I hope it is known also to your conscience. 12 We are not commending ourselves to you again but giving you cause to boast about us, so that you may be able to answer those who boast about outward appearance and not about what is in the heart. 13 For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you. 14 For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all have died; 15 and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.16 From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer.17 Therefore, if anyone is in

Christ, he is a new creation.[a] The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. 18 All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; 19 that is, in Christ God was reconciling[b] the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. 20 Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Brief Explanation: The basis of all this is the love of Christ that presses us on together -- with Christ and with one another. One has died for all so that all might live for him who died and was raised for them (2 Cor 5:14-15). We no longer need to deny death -- or the sheer pathos of life -- because we know that Christ’s love is stronger than death. We are now free to live for the one who died and was raised for us, embodying in our lives God’s very justice and mercy (2 Cor 5:21)

So we are now ambassadors for Christ. God speaks God’s word of consolation through us and this Word calls us all to be reconciled with God so that we might be reconciled with one another (as Paul sought to be with the Corinthians). For our sake, the one who knew no sin was made to be sin; the righteous one, Jesus, took on all the ways we are hooked in abusive patterns with ourselves or one another, whether as victims or perpetrators. And he did this so that we might become the very righteousness of God, the very spaces where God’s reign of mercy and consoling justice might overflow as grace -- free gift -- for all.

For Discussion:

1. (vs 11) Why does it seem like Paul is saying that the fear of God motivates us to persuade others? Shouldn’t we share out of love?

2. (vs 12) How does preoccupation with the ‘appearance of Godliness’ interfere with the mission to share? Where else does the Bible discuss this? (Luke 20:45-47)

3. (vs 13) Why would God have us be “beside ourselves”? How does this relate to Galatians 2:20?

4. (vs 14) To what extent is the way you live your life compelled or motivated by Christ’s love? What are some other things that compete for control of our lives?

5. (vs 15) How does the death and resurrection on the cross help us live more Christ-controlled lives?

6. (vs 16) What does that mean to regard others by the flesh? How are we to regard people instead?

7. (vs 17) What is created when one becomes saved? What exactly passes away?

8. (vs 19) What is reconciliation according to the Bible? How does it take place? What

other passages of scripture talk about this? (Col 1:21-22, Rom 5:10, Eph 2:16)

9. (vs 20-21) What is the ministry of reconciliation? If reconciliation is required because of the universal problem of sin, why do you think He gave this ministry to us?

10. What are practical things we can do this week to be more effective ambassadors for Christ?

IV. Responding in Prayer:

1. Pray for our church. Pray that this sermon will help us rely on God and not ourselves when it comes to sharing the Gospel with others. Pray that we show both urgency and joy when telling others about the truth.

2. Pray for your group. Pray for individuals who will be interacting with family, friends, and acquantainces who do not know the Lord. Pray for a Christ-filled community to be supportive in difficult times.

3. Pray for “your one”. Pray that God would call them out by name and that we would be used as ambassadors to further God’s ministry of reconciliation.