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. Welcome back to the Life Group Leader podcast. We're cruising through red letter invitations, and this is week eight.
We're gonna be looking at Jesus' invitation to take and eat. And this is a really personal one. This is one where Jesus is at the end of his public ministry, which also is the end of his life here on earth, and he's with these guys who he has been walking with for three years, and he now invites them into a very personal, very intimate act of really understanding what's it going to be, what's it really gonna look like to remember what this ministry was when Jesus is gone. And so I'm excited for our Life Groups Jeremy, and I think that this as well could be another great week for our Life Group leaders to continue to build the bonds of relational connection inside of our groups, knowing that relational connection really becomes the foundation for how we can be vulnerable and listen and ask good questions of each other.
And so Jeremy, as you've looked at this content, you've prepared our discussion guide for this week. What would be the big takeaway or the thing that we should be aiming at for this week? So I love how you brought up the relational connection because communion right there in the word itself is union, that it's all about unity. And communion is this time where believers come together and were united through Christ and with Christ, and with one another through this act of taking this meal.
And so really this week, the goal is union, it's unity. We wanna come together and rally around Christ. And that happens through remembrance, remembering what he's done for us on our behalf. And then we're also gonna touch on repentance again.
I know we did in the previous week, but we're gonna look at it from a slightly different angle this week. So communion is deeply rooted in the beauty and power of the Passover, where guys, people would remember their liberation from Egyptian captivity. But we're gonna see this week that the meal that we celebrate as communion is even greater as we celebrate our liberation from the captivity of sin and death. Jeremy, that's such a great picture of what I believe we want most in our life groups, is that we really do wanna help people build the relationship and unity that is the foundation of biblical community.
And so like your leaders, this would be a time where I would encourage you, of course we're gonna have communion in a corporate church setting. Why not consider doing this with your group? Why not consider having some people bring the elements together and actually setting a side time in your life group to really do communion together, to take this time to remember what Jesus has done for us, to eat the bread, to drink the juice together, to pray with one another. This is a beautiful ceremony that I think is a beautiful picture of what it really means to be the church.
And so with that being said, Jeremy, is there anything that you would wanna share with our leaders as they prepare for not only this discussion, but also creating the environment where we may take communion together? Yeah, I would say that the environment for taking communion together really is, that it's really all about that. It's about the environment. It's about the tone.
It's less amount, less about necessarily kind of the, the ritual and elements, what I mean by that is exactly how they're presented, what exactly you may have around the home or the group to use. One of my favorite memories was right at the very beginning of COVID. My family took communion together, and I mean, it was a very like homestyle communion. We had like, if it's okay to say, like we had biscuits and sweet tea, like if it's okay.
Of course it's okay. I want communion at your house. That sounds amazing. Yeah, so it's just, but the point was all about pointing people to what it's about, like what we're doing here together, why we're doing it.
And again, remembering that ultimately what Christ did on our behalf is what we're celebrating. And then also mourning what made that necessary. And so we see that both in the text, both what we have to celebrate and then what we have to kind of lament of and repent of. So I would say that it's really about the tone and setting up why are we gonna do this together.
And sometimes just breaking out of the rhythm of the way we may typically experience, like you said, we experience communion in corporate settings, but something about stepping back and taking it in a different way says, this is a sacred space and we can worship in this way and remember what Christ has done for us. And it can really heighten our awareness and cause us to really pay attention to what we're doing. So I think it's really something special. Yeah, I would agree.
If really the how was so important, let's be honest, we wouldn't at church have those little plastic cups with the cardboard wafer, right? Because there's nothing special about that. But what makes it beautiful is that we're using these elements to symbolize and to speak to the much grander thing, which is the body and the blood of Jesus. And so when we do this with our life group community in a home, we can actually make those elements a bit more unique and special.
But I would add probably two elements to this and Jeremy, I'm gonna ask you to build upon this idea. The first is we want scripture to be a real important piece to this. And I know that as we study and we discuss this week in Matthew chapter 26, another passage that I use is 1 Corinthians 11, whenever I'm sort of administering communion, I like to read from 1 Corinthians 11, just allow God's word to speak for itself a little bit as we set up communion. And then secondly, is the preparing of your heart is as important as preparing the environment.
There's a real scriptural evidence that communion is one of those things that we ought to be aware that when we're taking it, it's an invitation that we move towards repentance, which I know is our spiritual discipline or rhythm this week, of course. But Jeremy, just as we're even thinking about taking the conversation deeper this week, where does that fit into the equation, this preparing people for the act of taking communion and how the preparation of our heart might actually dictate how that experience is for us. Yeah, so I love that you brought up that text because in our leader guide, we mentioned 1 Corinthians 11, 23 and 26. And I have it pulled up here, I'll just read it real quick.
Paul is saying to the church, for I've received from the Lord what I also passed on to you on the night when he was betrayed, the Lord Jesus took bread. And when he had given thanks, broke it and said, this is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me. In the same way, he also took the cup after the supper, said, this cup is the new covenant in my blood.
Do this as often as you drink of it in remembrance of me. For as often as you eat the bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes. And he goes on to talk about some things that the Corinthian church is experiencing and saying, in essence, y'all are taking communion. You're coming into this time of worship with unprepared hearts.
You're not taking it seriously. And so what I want to encourage leaders to do, you can look at this text, we haven't noted in their guide, but it's not intended to be a scare tactic, but just a sacred reminder. And we see even in this week's text with Jesus and his disciples, they're all asking, not me, I wouldn't betray you, not me. And even Judas himself says, surely not I, Lord.
And I think it's easy for us to rush past and look at Judas and point the finger at Judas in hindsight. But to remember, we all have that spirit that surely I would never, I would never come in a way that's not prepared to fully recognize who Jesus is as Lord and Savior. And so through the story, we can point people to all the disciples. And we know that they all kind of fell away in different ways.
And Judas clearly had the biggest role in betraying Jesus, but all of us can see that, for honest, we take our relationship with Christ for granted. You pointed out at the beginning of the podcast episode that Jesus has walked with these men for three years and they're still constantly not getting the point. And then here in the final hours, they're all gonna run away from Jesus because it gets too intense. And so to really introduce the fact to everyone in our groups that, you know, for honest, there are times when we all take for granted, the fact that Jesus has invited us into this personal relationship with him.
And that may be expressed in bigger or smaller ways, so to speak, but if we're honest, there's that moment that let's all use this to recognize Jesus for who he is and to remember what he's really done for us in laying down his life so that we can have new life. So use the story to point to that. Yeah, that's exactly right. And that's why I think the spiritual rhythm of repentance is so critical this week.
It's an opportunity in our life group to share those areas of sin, struggle, those things that are continuing to separate us from Jesus and to acknowledge those together. And they may be new strongholds, they may be ones that you've wrestled with your whole life. And the question would be, is it okay if I keep sharing the same one? And of course it is, right?
Because the process of sanctification is the continual outworking of those broken areas of our life. And so it's not a surprise to God if we're still struggling with anger over the entirety of our life. Like it's okay, it's not okay to submit to anger and say, well, this is just who I am, and so I'm gonna just be angry. It's no, this is gonna be our invitation to say, man, anger is still showing up in areas I'm not proud of.
And I need to continually be prayed for by you, my group. Care for me, help me, come alongside me because we do that enough and your anger will start to be overpowered by the Spirit of God and the ability that he has to sanctify, to make us holy and become more like Jesus. And so repentance tees us up perfectly for communion. Now Jeremy, any kind of rabbit trails or things that we wanna avoid in a night like tonight?
Yeah, I would say with repentance, one way that we can kinda help keep things focused if people feel like, man, like you're just, like don't beat me up with repentance. We just talked about repentance last week with loving our enemies. One way that we can kinda help steer the focus here is to say, okay, I know we talked about last week specifically within relational contexts and if we need to talk about that more this week, do we have kind of personal relationships that we need to seek reconciliation and repent of the way of people as enemies? And this week, again, we can focus it even more so, that can still be a component.
They really focus it on just, am I really value in Christ, kinda more directly in my relationship with God and those kind of secret parts of my heart that maybe aren't as easily seen to others? What is the condition of my heart? So I would just encourage people stay focused on your personal relationship with God through what Christ has done for us this week. Yeah, that's good.
There's a woman right now in my rooted group who was sharing just two weeks ago, we were talking about prayer and the role of prayer in our own spiritual life. And she basically said something like, I don't understand the point of it because, by the way, she has a relationship with Jesus for many, many years. And she's like, I don't think that prayer really matters because what could I really say that God doesn't already know? And I'm like, well, that's 100% true, but isn't there power when we voice it?
When we say it, when we almost acknowledge before God that we know too. And it's this unlocking, this opening up of, when we're honest and vulnerable with God and with each other, it creates that environment that we were talking about at the top of the episode where we can truly have this communion, this moment with Jesus, where we can sense his spirit and his spirit gets to do the work in our lives that we desperately need. We can't just brush things under the rug and disregard it and then hope that God's gonna do his best work in our life. We have to invest in it as well.
So with that, Jeremy, I think we kind of get where we're heading in this week. It feels, you know, we're heading towards that idea of confession and communion. Any last notes that you'd have for our leaders this week? I would say just in closing, the text itself wraps up by saying, after this time of communion, that they sang a hymn and they departed.
So this week there is a note just to remind people, there's a Spotify playlist that the worship team puts together each week with songs that they kind of handpicked to say, we really wanna help reinforce the themes each week to prepare you as a leader and to use even in your groups. This week's song is conveniently called Communion. And so give it a listen, if you find it, that it would fit kind of the vibe of your group, like feel free to play that together as a group and use that to begin thinking towards next week. When we talk about next week, we're gonna look at celebration.
And so begin thinking, how can I incorporate a more expressive form of celebration next week in our group? This week we do have a song called Communion, you know, played in the background, well you take communion, if that's what you choose to do as a group, but just a reminder that that's one of those things that unites us and sometimes helps us find the words, like you said in prayer, is through song. So thanks for bringing that up Jeremy about next week. I think leaders, it might be great to discuss with your group about, hey, let's have a little picnic, you know, potluck barbecue next week.
Let's celebrate together. We'll still have discussion questions for you, of course. We'll have a podcast episode too. But let's be thinking about just pausing and thinking, okay, over the last nine weeks, how are you different because of what got us done in your life just in the last month and a half or two?
That's a beautiful thing when we get to pause and worship and praise him for those things. So leaders, we're so grateful for you. We hope that we can encourage you each week with these little episodes that just prepare you for the work that you are doing in the lives of everyone in your group. Do never underestimate what a weekly conversation around God's Word can do.
And we're grateful that you have stepped in and said, ah, that you will be these discussions. So thank you so much for that. We hope that you have a great rest of your week and we will see you next time.