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 and welcome to the Mariners Life Group Leader podcast. We are so glad to be with you again.
I am your host once again Kirby Wood, the group's pastor here at Mariners Church. And today I have with me a different host and guest, Dallas Viva, our singles pastor, our singles and young adults, which we are really glad if you are singles and young adult Life Group Leader know that this is your week to feel extra prepared, right? Dallas? Yes.
Or so glad. The last time we were able to talk a lot about what was coming up in the weekends message from Christine Kane, but Eric is back up this weekend. And we hope that all of you were able to attend. This third week is so incredible.
I love the title we've given to it, Christian Amnesia. When we forget our identity, we forget the gospel. And I'm so excited for your group to begin discussion this week. How about you, Dallas?
How are you feeling about this week? I love it. It's a, I love the wording, Amnesia. It draws you in.
Okay. Remind me what that is again. How is this, how is this relevant to the gospel? Absolutely.
I love it. It's great. It reminds me of that amazing movie, 51st States, when she kept forgetting. I mean, maybe I'm just from the rom-com era, but I loved that movie and I thought it was so cute.
Also, one of my other favorite movies was The Vow. That's a more recent one, but always, there's always this fun play on Amnesia that love stories can have. And I think it's so abirpos that as we think of the most important love story in our lives, Jesus loving us first that we too are just like, you know, the girl who has, who forgets her first date and forgets her first love. We are just that.
We forget how important the gospel is and how we need it each and every day. So I'm excited for this discussion to help our reminder groups of the gospel, not just, you know, the one time, the first time we were saved, but actually that we need this every single day. Yeah. And that's what I love about the elements we do at church communion.
Do this in remembrance of me. Remember your salvation. Remember what Jesus did for you. That's our reminder.
And of course, it's not like we planned it at all, but that was what last week was right before. I know. So perfect, so perfect. Our team is so incredible as they think about you as you experience the service, but also we are here to help you as a leader feel equipped for this conversation today.
So if you have your book, open up to 51. If you're, if you're driving or what have you just kind of think along with us, we're going through our normal flow, lean in, look down, look in and look out. So first up, we have lean in, which is our top level, fun top of the funnel, actually, in Dallas's favorite kind of language, top of the funnel. Top of the funnel.
Top of the funnel questions. And so Dallas, what do you kind of see here that you like in the lean in question? Lean in, it's, it's allowing people to be a little vulnerable. Of course.
What's the most embarrassing or hardest to believe thing that you've ever forgotten? I got a couple of those. Even one recently Easter weekend, I was helping out and I was moving boxes and my pants ripped at church. No.
My pants ripped at church. I didn't tell anybody about this because this is an embarrassing moment. Literally a couple weeks ago, my pants ripped at church and I just got up. I knew it happened.
Didn't address it. And I just walked to the parking lot and I was like, I can't do this. And it was an embarrassing moment for me that many, I don't know how many people even noticed, but I left. And it's funny that we can be so embarrassed in a one moment and then we completely forget it.
And then in a question like this, when you ask it to the group, people will start turning into sheets or maybe the opposite they turn and start turning bright red because they've forgotten this really moment that was so embarrassing at that time. But now it's past and I may have forgotten. Imagine if the question was your spouse or a friend in your group, hey, come up with an embarrassing moment for someone else. And imagine that would be much more embarrassing.
But we don't do that group. Absolutely not. Yeah, this is to help everybody talk. And so hopefully you're going to learn some new things about people, but really keep it light and easy as we're starting to think about why we forget things and how honestly, sometimes that's just our some of our nature is that we can be forgetful.
And that's that's where we're kind of setting the bar here that we all play. Nobody is smarter or remembers everything more than anyone, but that we really need to need reminders in our life and needs disciplines in our life. So that's right after this question. That's why we jump in to look down.
We're looking at God's word, what we need to remind us of our identity and of the gospel. So these verses are incredible. Dallas, do you see anything that really jumps out with you with look down? Looking down, I just love that.
And I hope that your group is reading a script shout out. And I think this is a moment where you as a leader, you can invite someone in your group to read script shout out. But you don't have to do it. So you can take maybe who's that quieter person in your group and you can invite them in, not call them out, put them on the spot, but maybe plan ahead, text them today before your group and say, Hey, would you mind reading scripture for us?
How can you invite some of these softer voices into the discussion? Absolutely. Have them read scripture. That's so good.
And I actually heard it. I'm such a talker. So I've never thought of this before. I'm so quick to jump into conversation.
But sometimes I learned that when people are talking a lot, someone who is more introverted will just be like, I am an observer. I'm not an active participant of this conversation. So if you're noticed, someone pulling out, it's not that they're waiting for their time to turn. And then you're going to be able to read them to roll up a server.
So like Dallas said, pulling them into the conversation by asking them to read the scripture and then asking people, what is sticking out to you? And as we read out loud, sometimes different things land differently because of someone else's emphasis on a specific word or they talked a little bit slower than they would have read. It's a really great way where the word of God can really stand out and be bold in these conversations. It's one of my favorite things we do in a pastor's meeting, a staff meeting where we read a passage of scripture and different people have different versions of the Bible.
So you're seeing different words like, Oh, hey, my translation actually says this instead. And it's really fun. And it encourages everybody to bring their own Bible to. I know we have the scripture in here, but it's just fun to see how people emphasize different words and just reading scripture out loud is so good.
Incredible. And you guys know this is one of the most important rhythms that we have as a group is being is our grouping centered around God's word that we are daily devoting ourselves to the truth. And so I'm so glad that this is such an essential part of your group. Now, what oftentimes happens, right?
When we're reading scripture is we start to contemplate our own lives and how the scripture both challenges that affirms that and how that helps us see ourselves rightly. So as we look into ourselves based on these verses, we start to think, okay, how can we help our group really turn from looking up into God, looking down in the scripture, and now look at examining ourselves. There's some really, really good questions here. I really love that third one.
What do you think about that, fellas? For yeah, the third one. Yeah, when you are most likely to forget or set aside the grace of God, what areas of life do you try to earn the approval of yourself of other people or even of God in your own effort? I love a when question, right?
Or what question? Yeah. That feels so over-ended, right? Anybody in the group is able to answer that question.
That's not a there's no right answer. It's really going to be personal, which I absolutely love. Yeah. And as a leader, we set the tone for vulnerability.
Absolutely. So this might be a great question to ask and immediately say, hey, let me share first and jump into that to set the tone for vulnerability and watch out the spirit moves in your group. That's so good. Especially if a group discussion is a lulling, I highly recommend and agree with all this.
You going first, when were you most likely to forget and stepping in and saying, you know, it's honestly every time I get in a fight with my wife, right? Because every time I roommate doesn't forget to clean her dishes and leave some pile up in the sink, right? Or maybe there's some more bigger overarching things. When we were really struggling with that cancer prognosis, wow, we really had a hard time turning to God amidst our frustration.
So I love that those opportunities to be vulnerable are set there and start to see how the scripture and this message this week really starts to apply to our lives. Good. Yeah. Anything else you kind of point out with look in?
No, I'm excited for look out. Awesome. I know you are. That first question on look out on a scale of one to ten, if one, nothing like Christ, ten being perfectly Christ-like, how might your family rate your example today?
Ooh. Your neighbors or coworkers. Talk about convicting. Mm.
Mm. Yeah. I love that too. I think we, these kind of questions are once again a really good all play, right?
Nobody has, you know, I don't have the right words for this. We're asking for a number scale here. You know, we can really start to examine. And also I think instead of it being, you know, how might you rate your family, right?
You, it's like how might your family rate you? Yeah. How might others look and see you? And so again, this is really helping us how, or we really know that some of the best ways we impact our communities, that we help change the world is their own witness.
So by examining ourselves, we are also helping create a better reality for ourselves and also one that's more glorifying to the Lord by really being challenged within ourselves. Yeah. How might the, the waiter at the restaurant you're going to after service, how are they going to rate you? Yeah.
You know, how is the cashier at the grocery store, how are they going to rate you? Right. It's this idea of everywhere you go, you're bringing the gospel, you're representing Christ. You know, it's not like you have to give out tracks and, hey, turn or burn, it's, it's, share the gospel and if you have to use words by your actions.
I know. It's so true. And yeah, I think one of the ways we also really do that well, especially as we encourage one another in group is through unity and grace. I really love that second question because it's thinking, okay, so there's these day-to-day moments, right, that we, that Dallas and I were just talking about the day-to-day people that we run into that see us and that we have, there's negative and positive influences that we might be exerting or others might be exerting on us.
But where are those really tense, tense places in our lives? Where do we really run into some serious opposition and how do we show up in that space? Because if yes, the small things matter too, but yes, the small things matter so much, but also there are these big moments, these natural divisions in our life that we want to be sure we're showing up really, really well. I think often about one of my good friends, she is an elementary school teacher and she works in an Islamic school and she's a believer.
And I was talking with a friend and he was saying, so like, how does she as a believer show up in that school? How hard must that be, you know, to be a believer and be in that school? And I was like, well, but also this is such a unique opportunity in the midst of some serious opposition and division. This is where you can really stand and say, no, I'm going to love these people, regardless of them having a completely different view on God than I do.
Yeah. Just showing unconditional love, not expecting anything in return, which is tough. So tough. But I love to think how are we going to encourage people for a group to see themselves as a part of this, right?
So that might be like when politics come up with family or when, you know, integrity comes to question and you could have taken that extra money at work that nobody would have seen or when, yeah, any kind of situations that people might be kind of held up against their own, yeah, their own kind of demons, you can see how people will really show up. So I love that question a lot. Yeah. And I think that the invitation to holiness God is holy.
Yeah. He extends the invitation, gives us opportunities to be more like him. So good. So true.
Any other things from look out? I know you were really loving it. Yeah. I mean, there's a lot of, there's a lot of good here.
Yeah. You know, what I encourage you to not do is put everybody on the scale of one to 10. Oh, Jimbo, you're only a four. Right.
Janice, you're an eight. Great job. You know, but even maybe this is more of a reflective question for just for you as a leader, you know, on the scale of one to 10, where would you put yourself, who's someone in your life that might be a little bit above you? You know, if I'm, if I'm put myself at a six, who's someone in the seven, eight range that I look up to and how can I be more like them?
How can they invest into me? What are they doing that makes them higher? How can you learn from another human being who's gone before you? That's so good.
Oh, I love that. Bring it back to wise counsel. I know we're going to get into that more as we get into the collision study too. So that's so great.
Yeah. I love these last little questions here as we're kind of around in that far time, but we always like to have this question here. What are their insights from the weekend message or especially timely for you? This is all centered around the scripture.
But sometimes things might stick out to people in your group from Eric's message or one of our other teaching pastors. And so we hope that you're attending services every single weekend, encouraging your group to do so as well. And that will really enforce and create a really robust, dynamic discussion for your group. Everyone's attending and everyone's able to really experience the message first.
Yeah. If you need to find them and someone misses, they're on YouTube, which is also a great resource. If you want to go back and look at other messages that you may have missed, but we hope that you guys will have a great discussion this week. We're praying for you leaders.
We love you and have a great week. Great week.