Welcome to the Mariners Church Life Group leader podcast. This weekly conversation is designed to equip and resource you to build a healthy life group community that studies God's word, practices spiritual rhythms, and changes the world together. Welcome to the fourth and final week of My Inxious Thoughts. We are excited to set you up well for your final conversation as we have gone through this series together.
And as we get towards the end, I'm gonna give you some information about what the next couple of weeks could look like in your group as we are approaching the Thanksgiving and Christmas season. And so stay tuned at the end of this episode. I'll give you some more information about what is to come. But before we get too far, Jeremy, thanks for joining us again.
Why don't you give us the big picture overview? What are we trying to accomplish this week? As we wrap up this series, this week really kind of brings it all to one of the great promises of scripture. You don't wanna say greatest, greatest truth, greatest promise, like how do you rank them?
But one of the great truths of scripture, as Jesus really commands us not to worry, we're gonna see that Jesus, he doesn't just say, hey guys, you shouldn't worry. He tells us, don't worry, don't worry. And it's, you've probably heard before that do not fear and things like that are one of the most repeated commands in scripture. Often that's when people are encountering some kind of miraculous or angelic being, right?
That's the natural response to be afraid. But even in just kind of our everyday lives, which we're about to see here, Jesus goes through some of the most kind of mundane, ordinary things in our day to day lives and says, he commands us not to worry. And he not only gives us the command, but then he gives us the reason that we don't have to worry. And that's because we have a heavenly father who cares deeply for us.
So this great, like one of the great truths of the gospel that we've hit back in the identity series that we are a child of God, we've been adopted into his family and we have a loving heavenly father who knows our needs and desires to take care of us and to bless us. When my wife and I were praying through the scripture verses that we wanted to kind of give as life versus to our kids, this is the one we chose for our daughter. It's just a passage that we, as we prayed, we just knew that we wanted our daughter, as she grows up in a world where social pressure, identity, body image, all this stuff is going to be on constant attack and she's going to be concerned and we got worried thinking about raising the daughter today. And this was the verse that came to mind that we wanted our daughter to be reminded that she is loved by her heavenly father and that that should be the source of all life and beauty and relationship and anything that she has in her life is that to not be disconnected with her being truly loved for who she is, not by all the things that could cause worry and fear in her life.
And so I love this passage. I feel like most in the Bible, this is the one I've spent a lot of time praying through. And so I'm excited that as life groups we'll get a chance to pick it apart for a few minutes. Now, how would you encourage our leaders then to prepare well for this week?
So the opening activity this week is just to really think through the things we've talked about worry. We've talked about the different kind of sources of our worry and try to dig down beneath the surface. And so to really take what they've learned over these past few weeks and really kind of bring that to a point this week where they could say, you know where I found myself still, even as a believer, someone who loves God, wants to follow Christ, I still find myself prone to worry in these areas of my life or about these things. And one of those, you mentioned kind of that prayer for your daughter, like one of those for me too is certainly as a parent, like these things come up that I worry about.
And I don't typically think of myself as a warrior. And so I put in a leader note, if you go through that activity with your group, even as you think through as a leader on your own, for me, I realize that one of the ways that I see that I'm worried or stressed or I have anxiety over something is because I get a lot more impatient or I have a shorter temper. I don't have a big temper, but I'd notice if I'm real impatient or feel irritable, it's usually because I'm worrying about something and I didn't realize it. So as you go through the week, think about those areas of your life and try to just pay attention to where am I kind of short tempered or irritable or do I find myself really kind of clinging to some sort of control and see what the Lord reveals about other areas of stress or anxiety that you might not even be aware of.
So the list that is put there on page 20 under the lean in section, got money, food, clothes, house, car, or other possessions, do you want us in this place to stay at that physical kind of level or what happens if we start talking about the things that we worry most about our abandonment or being judged by others? Like, do you want us to get deeper there? Are we reserving that for a later portion of our time? We've touched on some of those things already.
And so really the intent here with this lesson is going to help us think about some of the things that aren't inherently, you know, things like abandonment, things like that. Obviously, there's a fear, there's something that's very broken in the world that would lead to those sorts of fears and worries. That's a good point that you bring up because my intent here is thinking through those things that are just part of our everyday lives. They're not even necessarily part of the fact that the world is broken itself because of sin.
But just those day-to-day needs that we have, that we go through that we realize, man, I hadn't even thought about this being a worry. Like, these are good things. And we'll see in the text of what Jesus talks about, there's these good things in your lives that everyone has to have taken care of, but there's two different ways of looking at them. So yeah, the intent here is to really to look at those kind of mundane everyday parts of our lives that, it's like, you know what?
I realize there's stress, there's worry here that I hadn't really thought about, and maybe for sure hadn't thought about from a spiritual dynamic before. You haven't hear that, verse 32 is a pivotal hinge portion of this passage for the Gentiles eagerly seek all of these things like that list we just talked about. And your heavenly father knows that you need them. Help us just as leaders, why is that such a critical turning point and is this a way that we can get a deeper conversation starting to go within our group?
Yeah, I'm glad you highlighted that verse because I really do believe it's pivotal. And what I had mentioned there, that there's kind of two ways of looking at these things in the world. And Jesus has mentioned, he's looking around at nature and talking about food and clothing and you know, where you will live, these different things that are just base needs for all humans. But he says, those of you who know you have a heavenly father, you can trust that you have a heavenly father.
And if he knows you need these things and care about them. And he says, Gentiles, meaning those who are not a part of the faith is kind of a generic term used for anybody outside of faith in God. Those people spend their lives kind of trying to secure these things for themselves, trying to take care of their own needs in this way. So I think it's important that Jesus doesn't say, and you don't need to worry about those things.
Like don't, those things aren't important. He acknowledges that they're important, but he says, you can either spend your life trying to take care of yourself in these ways. Like people who don't know that they have, that there is a loving heavenly father. But those of us who are in relationship with him, can trust that God knows that we need those things.
And as we seek first his will, then he's also going to take care of our every need. Yeah, it's a beautiful reminder that out of identity in relationship that we have with God that he's aware. And he's also providing at that deepest level for the things that we truly, truly, really need. This would be a week that as leaders, I would encourage you to read through this leader guide prior to your session.
You should be doing that anyway, you know what I'm saying? Because my guess is that you know your life group well enough that you could probably identify some of the, probably the top worries and anxiety, the concerns that most people have. And I'd encourage you, as you're reading through the leader guide for this week, to put little notes and dots by the specific questions that are gonna get you at a place of deeper conversation as quick as possible. Because there's quite a few questions, and so what would it look like for you to shape your time as a leader as it pertains to your knowledge and understanding of your current group, right?
I mean, anything you'd kind of add in that direction or helping us make sure that we avoid some pitfalls or anything like that? Well, one thing that I thought about though, with this particular discussion and times the group spent here, so just being back out in Orange County, and I love that I kind of get a come and go, but I always get to see things with fresh eyes and thinking about this text in particular. When Christ talks about, you know, you can't serve two masters, you can only serve God or money and don't worry about all these things, but know that tomorrow has enough trouble of its own. He acknowledges these are things that have to be taken care of, right?
But when we trust our heavenly father, and he points to all sorts of things in nature, is what I'm getting at. And when I'm every time I come to Orange County, I'm just blown away by the fact that there is a lot of material wealth, right? But there's also an abundance of natural beauty. And so when you're there all the time, it either of those start to just become normal and you may forget, man, it's such a beautiful place where there's so many material blessings here.
But Christ says, there's nothing wrong with the material blessings, but look around at the natural world. Look at the birds, look at the flowers, look at these things and let those remind you of the way your heavenly father cares for you. And so something that I was thinking would be great. If people have the ability, I don't know, to meet out on a patio or even just to have windows open and just make a reference to kind of natural setting around you wherever you happen to be meeting, that that could just add one of those visual reminders, engage different senses to help people process with, because that's what Jesus is doing.
He's, I can imagine him giving this teaching and almost just kind of waving his hand like, oh, you know, kind of like when a baby cries in a sermon or something and it's like, do I acknowledge it? Do I? And it's like, oh, here's a bird. Like, this is a great example of the way our heavenly father takes care of us.
So something like that can add a dynamic to engage different senses, different parts of our hearts and minds to really think about what Jesus wants to communicate to each of us. Yeah, Jesus always did that, right? He was pointing at trees. He was pointing at streams.
Like as he's walking life with his disciples, he's using life to be great teachers and illustrations for the, you know, the things he wants them to learn. As parents raising kids, that's what we do, right? We use life circumstances to help them learn and grow about what their relationship with God is like. My son had a really tough soccer game this last weekend, and he was super upset.
And we got to sit in the car and have a few minutes and talk about what is that teaching us about relationships and God and all that stuff. And they're trying to overly spiritualize anything, but it's pointing to something that they're experiencing or seeing and saying, this is a chance for us to associate the truth, like the world around us with what God wants us to see. So Jeremy, any final thoughts you have on week four? And then after that, I'll kind of talk about the upcoming weeks ahead.
Now, one thing that I would always encourage leaders to do as we wrap up a series. And so in this case, we just had this four week Mind Just Thoughts series is to take a moment just to think back and to look back and see has there been any progress, any growth? Have you noticed any development? Have any of your circumstances changed?
I talked about that a little bit, even with the prayer segment last week. And so always when you get to the end of a series, kind of look back and say, man, what does my major take away? What have I really learned about God and the way he loves me and I can relate to him and the world around me? And identify any of those answered prayers or personal growth or ways that you've noticed spirits work in your own life.
And if you hadn't done that already with the UR series, I'd say you could pause right now and do a little cardboard testimony if you wanted to. You could think back to mid September and just go, where was I back then? And then that's how I saw the world. And now because of these last 10 weeks or so, where are you now?
What has God shown you, taught you, provided for you, things like that? Just a great opportunity to lift our head up out of our presence, our circumstances and get God of glory for what he's done. So excellent, Jeremy, I really appreciate that. Now, over the next couple of weeks, we are, we're not gonna be providing the group discussion guide or this podcast.
And that is because as we close out my anxious thoughts, we're going to have our annual Thanksgiving service on November 2021. And then the weekend following Thanksgiving, which is the 27th and 28th, that will be a standalone message. And so Jeremy and I are gonna be working behind the scenes a little bit, putting together not only the discussion guide, but this podcast as well for the Christmas series, which will be called Angels We Have Heard On High. And I'm really thrilled about this Christmas.
I love Christmas teaching, but this one in particular, Eric is gonna walk us through the perspective of the angels, the angels that we see in the Christmas story. We're gonna kind of learn it with a different angle from each of those interactions that angels have with people. And so we're excited about putting together this content for you, but just know that you're not gonna be getting anything from us for the next two weeks. Now, what can you do in that time?
I'd say have a meal with your group. Like Thanksgiving is a beautiful time to pause, to slow down, to sit together and to have a meal together. I'd encourage you to do that. And then if you have not yet served this fall, there are so many serve opportunities through our outreach ministry where you can serve together as a group.
This is one of those seven rhythms that we talk about in Rooted and we hope that our groups continue to do beyond Rooted. And so I'd encourage you as a group, spend some time looking at the outreach webpage, seeing if there's a couple of opportunities that are available for you and go serve together. Nothing better that you can do with your group during the holiday season than to pause and to say we're not gonna just read and study God's word, let's go practice it. And one of the things that we see Jesus do continually with his disciples is care and serve and meet the needs of other people.
And so I'd encourage you to go and do that. We are so grateful. Jeremy, thank you for the work that you've put in to this discussion guide and these podcasts. I believe that God will continue to do a good work in our life groups as we address these issues that we're all dealing with for this series, like anxiety and depression.
And we're looking forward to seeing what God will continue to do throughout the rest of this year as we approach the Christmas season. So life group leaders, as always, thank you so much. We will see you in just a couple of weeks. Take care.