Coastline Bible Church is doing a four-week sermon series called: "Pursue." During this series we are going to study the Scriptures about loving God, loving others, living a holy life, and having a healthy marriage or preparing for marriage. This is a sermon series for everyone who is looking to have a little more love in their life. It seems there has been so much division in our Nation over the last several years. Marriages are growing cold. Dating relationships are falling apart under the stress of the pandemic. For this sermon we had Doug Meye write the small group questions that go along with this sermon. It seemed like a waste to leave them in a file on my computer and not share them with everyone.
Small Group Questions ::: Love for a Lifetime ::: 1 Corinthians 13
Pretty much everyone agrees that “love” is one of the most important concepts in relationships and life. Yet, love is used in so many different ways, to describe so many different things, that it’s difficult to know what love really means. As followers of Jesus, we can begin here: God is the definition of love. Furthermore, God’s love for us shows us how to love others. The deepest and most intense expression of this kind of love is found in the marriage relationship. In this study we will dig into the kind of love that’s needed to make a marriage last a lifetime, and why those who love for a lifetime come to understand God’s love in a richer way. But this study goes way beyond marriage: it’s for all of us who want our everyday relationships to better express and experience a different kind of love.
1) As a group think of as many different phrases/sayings as you can that have the word love in them. (For example – It’s love that makes the world go round.)
Read I Corinthians 13
2) Based on I Corinthians 13, do your best to define love in a single sentence?
3) Many people have noted that you could easily replace the word “love” in I Corinthians with “Jesus.” Try it with some of the phrases. In what substantial ways does Jesus’ love differ from the love you described in question 1?
4) The divorce rate in our culture is very high. What is the reason Jesus tell his listeners Moses grant a certificate of divorce in the OT law (Matthew 19:8)? What different kinds of things can make it so challenging for two people to stay married for the rest of their lives? How does Matthew 19:8 factor into these challenges?
5) In the sermon on Sunday, the following 4 exhortations were given to help marriages last a lifetime: Stay Married, Choose Love, Apply Grace, Invest Generously. What is meant by each of these? Which one spoke the most loudly to you personally? How can you apply it? What would you add to these?
6) Author Gary Thomas has written a (wonderful) book on marriage, called Sacred Marriage. The subtitle of the book is: What if God Designed Marriage More to Make Us Holy than to Make us Happy? How do you respond to this subtitle? Why is the marriage relationship such a powerful instrument in God’s hand for us to become more like Jesus?
7) As a church, Coastline wants to be a community which strengthens marriages, comes alongside those who have experience brokenness, and helps all experience the transforming power of Jesus in their lives and relationships. Having gone through this study, what do you most need from others in your groups.