Welcome to the Mariners Church Life Group Leader podcast. This weekly conversation is designed to equip and resource youth to build a healthy life group community that studies God's word, practices spiritual rhythms and changes the world together. Hello, Life Group leaders. Welcome to another edition of the Life Group Leader podcast.
This is Dallas. I am here today with Kim. Kim say hello to the audience of fans. Hi everybody.
Nice to be with you today, Dallas. Kim is one of our Life Group directors working with 20s 30s young adults groups. She is awesome if you have not spent any time with her. Find her on the patio.
We totally should. You know, we don't see on the patio at any given weekend, but we are jumping into week three of our series, I Need a Miracle. We have our magazine out. We're on page 48, the Life Group Discussion Guide, but real quick, this series, I am loving it.
We've already seen people coming forward for prayer. We've already had people who came forward a week one and came back to us and said, hey, look how God has already answered this prayer. It's amazing. And he thought from the series, anything that you've seen, you've experienced with this series.
Oh my goodness. Last Sunday, my husband and I were sitting in church and all the shepherding elders were out front praying over the people that came. And you could hear it over the music. It was so powerful and it just made us wanted to stop and pray for whoever it was standing up.
They're not even knowing what the needs were, but God's spirit was just working, miraculously working. So powerful. I think that's a great way to engage with the series too. Is it be praying alongside?
Is it be praying for miracles right now? It'd be praying for miracles even in that moment as you see people. So I think that's a really good encouragement for all of us if we are not up there praying for people to be out in the crowd, out in the congregation and praying right there that God would answer prayers in a miraculous way. I'm in a miraculous way.
Don't we have? We've seen him do it and we know he wants to do it again. So good. And I can only imagine there might be people in your group who are going forward or maybe they're a little frayed to go forward.
So I said, I see a leader have a great opportunity to encourage the people in your group. Hey, we see prayer. You should set forward this weekend. So be thinking of that as you lead your group too.
If something gets brought up, you are the leader. Encourage them. Hey, this would be a really great thing for you to come forward in this series and maybe just receive prayer and we're announcing with oil, we're praying bold prayers. So as a leader have that lens too, as you're facilitating conversation.
So good. And if you see them go forward, following up with them, what a powerful moment to know their group is with them in that space, right? So good. But as we turn to the discussion guide, I'm gonna read the teaching summary.
We're not gonna read the scripture. You can go to page just before 46 if you want to to read the scripture, but our teaching summary, Jesus has the power over water, power to walk on water and power to calm it. He has the power to calm the storms in your life too. There will always be storms even storms within.
And Jesus is the one who can bring calm in the midst of chaos. That's our teaching summary. Just quick little, no, actually teaching. How are over water to walk on water into calm it?
That's pretty remarkable. And the storms within and without circumstantial storms, he's just there, he's present. So good. So we have a lean in question.
This is a top question. You leave this with your group. We're gonna answer this because I think it's fun. What is the most tumultuous weather event or other natural disaster you have ever experienced?
Ever. I have a good one, Dallas. I grew up in Illinois and we have tornadoes there. California people don't even know what those are, but I remember being with my third grade class at the park for a picnic day and a tornado came up.
And the whole third class we had to hide under the picnic tables and stay in this little shelter thing until our parents could start picking us up. It was insane. Like today, even to today, I remember the people laying over that and the power of that weather. It was amazing.
Yeah. Oh, mine is also a tornado. Oh, wow. But very different context.
Because me being from California, the first time I ever saw one was I was moving to Michigan. I was driving a U-Haul across country. We got to Nebraska and all of a sudden on the radio, we heard the like the newscast saying, hey tornado warning, this guy's got all dark and two California boys start freaking out. We just pulled over to a random steakhouse.
Of course, because we're in Nebraska, Omaha, just pulled to the side with nobody in there seemed to care because I don't know what's far away. And we were free. We stayed there for like two hours, just even stakes, because we didn't know else to do. Eating stakes, I think the cheese is crazy right.
But that's what I'll know. And what's the goal of this question? To let us know that storms happen. Storms happen.
Storms happen. Everybody has their own experiences. Just get everybody to talk as a leader. Like, who's next?
Who's next? Who's next? Get everybody talking. And then you can look down.
That transition, look down. So we read Mark 435 to 41. Should groups read the passage out loud or do people read beforehand? What are your thoughts on that?
Oh, I love to read it together. Even if you read it by yourselves, it's so great to read the word of God out loud. Even if you go around the room and everybody does a couple of verses or do a couple of translations, it just brings out the discussion a bit. It's really a huge part, I think.
What do you think? Love it. We should be reading Scripture. It's the easy win.
It's the closest thing to the source. I like the idea of reading. Hey, we're going to read the Scripture. Everybody take a verse and just popcorning.
We know some groups have a small army of 22 people. You may have to find other ways to engage. But for most of us, it'd be pretty easy to just let everybody dive in. And it gives everybody an opportunity to talk once in, because that's what we want to do.
So as I'm looking at the Life Group discussion guide, I've kind of taken time and I've marked, OK, what are the questions that I want the group to answer? So if I were leading this group, here's some of the questions that I would like us to answer. And look down, Mark, 435, 4, 3, 4, 1. One of the questions I would ask is what clues are there in this passage that this miracle was witnessed by others.
So kind of start talking about it. One of the things that I really enjoy doing is helping people get an understanding of grasp for the cultural context of what was happening. So give people over there. OK, what do you think it was like?
OK, witnessed by others. What does that mean? What type of people do you think were over there? What do you think they were doing?
What kind of boat do you think they ran? It's not a great white. It's like, these are some really great things to dive in with people. What's your group?
So good. Because it gets the dialogue going. And to be able to picture yourself there, what it might have been like? Who was there?
What were they doing on the boat? It's just a great way to get everybody talking into that conversation. There's no expectation. It's just bringing your thoughts to the table after reading the passage.
Then as I'm looking at look down, they're all good questions. I went to the third one, the last question on the page 48. When the storm was happening, what did the disciples say to Jesus? What was their reaction to Jesus speaking to the wind and the sea?
They kind of get some reactions. And as a leader, I think this is a unique part of leading a group. Sometimes there's some really powerful questions that aren't on the paper but that are in your head, that you have as a leader. So we kind of want to take a moment to what happens when things go off-script.
So for me, as I read this verse, one of the follow-up questions, I'd be like, hey, does the authority of Jesus still impact your life? What does that look like? And just start digging into that with the people in your group. And as I'm looking at this, there's one approach to say, wow, there are so many questions.
Everybody has 10 seconds to answer. Only one person gets to answer each question. So what are your thoughts, Camon? Should we strive to answer every single question?
Or what if an hour and a half in, we only get two questions in? You know, I think that's such a great question. I tend to enjoy and see people talk more when you keep going with a certain question, as you dig down a little bit deeper, because like that question you just mentioned about when the storm was happening with the disciples' say to Jesus, we're not all going to be in boats, literal boats. But these guys needed a leader.
They were like, don't you care we're going to die? I mean, they were fully scared to death, even a little dramatic. But let's dig down and apply that to our lives. We may not be in the boat out in the middle of the water, literally.
But there are lots of things that are happening in our lives. And I always find that that's the richest experience. If you just glaze over the first two or three people that answer the question in the book, and make sure you hit every single question in the order it's given, sometimes we miss some richness in that. Yeah, that's so good.
What I found. Yeah, so don't feel the pressure that, wow, we got to hit all of these and that your leadership anxiety starts to kick in, right? Wow, okay, we've sat on this question for 15 minutes. If the conversation's great and staying on track, stay there.
Like there might be more to pull out, as someone might say, I don't know if Jesus has authority over my life in this area. And you stop, okay, well, Jesus is authority over our entire life. Every aspect, there's nothing in our lives that's off of us to Jesus. So this is a really great way to pull things out of people in which you're doing, you're stretching their faith.
So don't feel that you need to hit every question, live in the moment, study beforehand, walk yourself through it, read the passage, walk yourself through it. I have notes on mine of, as I was answering these questions, that question came to me. So you do the due diligence and do that. And I always mark the questions that I for sure, that I don't want to miss, maybe in the order that I don't want to miss them, just so that if we get in a really great conversation about a certain area, and I know how to get us back, I know how to get us to a place where we can land at the end.
Like the look in section is always a good place to land, I have found, because it applies it to our lives. So the last question here on the page, which do you fear most? Circumstances you cannot control, or the God who controls all of your circumstances? That was a really powerful question as I was going through this, thinking depends on the situation, and how do we have a healthy fear of God, knowing that he's always in control, especially when we're not, playing that out in our lives and being able to pray through that.
I know for sure if I'm leading this, I'm gonna make sure I get to land there at the end. So what I'm hearing you say is, say you get to, when the storm was happening, you spend an hour there, and you're looking at your watch. Like for some, my group, I gotta get home and relieve the babysitter. It's 8.20.
For real? Okay, how do I land this plane? I'm not just gonna jump up to, okay, well last question, Mark 645 to 52, let's read that. It's knowing, okay, let's land on one of these looking in questions.
Hey, we've had a really great discussion. Let's have a final question. Wish you fear most. I think being able to land the planes, these last set of questions are super, super important.
I think that lookout question's beautiful and sets you up for the look in question as well. So that's really great insight to managing leadership, anxiety, living in the moment. I mean, we're dealing with a lot of things when we lead a group getting every on time. In and out on time, starting on time, ending on time, praying for people, hoping conversations great, making sure everybody talks like that's a lot to me.
There's a lot. It's a whole lot. It's a moment of where God's leading, people start to get a tangent and go off. Of course, you bring them back in.
And it's full of people and people are messy. So it may not go always according to the book plan, but it might be far better. Yeah, it might be an even more beautiful, rich experience for the people in your group. For sure.
Oh, I can't wait to do this with my life group this week. These questions are great. They're great. Oh my goodness.
I do want to hit the Mark 645 to 52, because that question kind of stopped me. So real quick, leaders that you're going through that. What does it mean that Jesus wanted to pass by them? So if you choose to do that question, I had to sit in this for a little bit.
And most of the time in group, you don't have time to just sit and pull out resources. So we wanted to provide what we thought. It would be to help you lead through that question. So any thoughts there for that question?
What does it mean that Jesus wanted to pass by them from verse 48? Well, he was on the shore watching them, and he saw them going through this wind and the storm, right? And I think he intended to be seen by them. I'm here.
I'm with you. I'm right here. You can trust me. He wanted to be seen, but not be in the place with them.
Yeah. That's good. What do you think? Yeah, same thing as you look at the Old Testament.
So now you know that I actually went and researched this. This did not come to the top of my head. But the same expression appears in the Old Testament. When he wanted to pass by them, it was God saying, hey, I want to display my glory to the people.
So I want to be seen, reveal himself to his people. So I think that was a really tough question. But I think as a leader, you can help get that out of them. But we just wanted to prepare you for that.
Because I do think that's one of the tougher ones. Some really great questions, great conversation. We pray that your group is just awesome and rich this week. Any closing thoughts?
We just love to hear the stories back about groups, because the people that are going up for prayer, I bet a lot of them are in some of the life groups. And we're praying with you and for you, and cannot even wait to celebrate the miracles that God is doing and is going to do. So good. So good.
Well, leaders, we're thankful for you. And we hope you have a great conversation that got some great things in your group. I think he's been doing. We love you.
We appreciate you. And we'll connect soon. Take care.