NOTE: If you missed this week’s message, click here to listen or watch.
Talk about your experience on Sunday morning.
- How did God speak to you during worship and/or teaching this week?
- What have you been reflecting on and/or praying about in response to this week’s service?
Read Acts 4:32-33.
- What strikes you about the level of connectedness the early church experienced with one another?
- Do you feel like you’ve personally experienced this kind of community in the church before? Why or why not? Explain.
- What makes this kind of “connection” so rare in the church today?
Jeff talked about the cultural narrative of “Individualism” and how it prevents & even kills community.
- Jeff described individualism as a belief that “I am the centre of the universe” and “Happy-ness is the ultimate goal in life.” Practically speaking, how does this kind of individualism hurt our relationships?
- How does individualism make us unteachable?
- How does individualism cause us to refuse people’s offers for help?
- How does individualism make us overly private and to keep our inner life hidden from others?
- Why does individualism cause us to walk away and even abandon people & relationships when people make us unhappy?
- In what ways do you see yourself in these different examples of individualism? In what ways have you seen the effects in individualism in your life?
The answer to individualism is the Gospel. Read Colossians 1:16.
- How does seeing Jesus as the centre of the universe challenge and expose our individualist hearts?
- How does clinging to this reality have the potential to change our relationships?
The pursuit of happy-ness in life is futile. Read Philippians 3:11-13.
- What is the difference between happy-ness and contentment? How do we achieve contentment?
- What is Paul’s “secret of living in every situation”?
- How do our relationships have the potential to change when we stop looking to people for happy-ness?
In what ways do you think you may have bought into the cultural narrative of individualism instead of the Gospel? What next steps can you take to move away from individualism and closer to the Gospel in your relationships.
Read this Eugene Peterson quote together:
“Love cannot exist in isolation: away from others, love bloats into pride. Grace cannot be received privately: cut off from others, it is perverted into greed. Hope cannot develop in solitude: separated from the community, it goes to seed in the form of fantasies. No gift, no virtue can develop and remain healthy apart from the community of faith.”
- Discuss the quote together. What is the role of people, friendship and the community of faith in our lives?
