SERMON BASED RESOURCES
Dig into the sermon each week with your life group, spiritual growth partner, or even by yourself! We’ll provide ideas to jump start your group time (Opener Questions: for building community), discussion questions to go deep (Discussion Questions: for fostering Christ Centered community), and ways to apply what you learned throughout the week (Practical Applications: for faithfully following Jesus through your week).
Opener Questions:
- Tell about a time when you went on a trip, adventure, or undertaking that required preparation. How did you prepare? Why was preparation important to a successful outcome?
- What’s your favorite holiday and where does Valentine’s Day fit? How do you best give and receive love?
Discussion Questions:
1. Personal Scripture Recap: Where have you been in Scripture this week? Is there an idea, verse, quote, or question that has been rumbling through your spirit this week that would be beneficial to share with your gathered community?
2. Engaging the Series Resource: Go back and look for where you’ve seen the concepts of revelation, inheritance, and perishable/imperishable in 1 Peter 1:1-12. As we look at Peter’s call to obedience and action in v.13-25, how do these ideas ground our obedience now? How do they provide motivation and perspective to live as chosen exiles?
3. Read through the passage: 1 Peter 1:13-25. As a group exercise, build a chart that explores these three prompts: what was true of you, what is now true or will be true of you, and what are you called to do now.
Add a 4th column that explores this prompt: what is true of God + what He’s done/is doing. How do we fulfill Peter’s calls to action in this passage?
4. How does Peter’s call to holiness challenge you at your home? Work? Community? Church? What might it look like? In what ways is the Holy Spirit calling you to a particular expression of holiness in an area where He has sovereignly placed you as a chosen exile?
5. Why do you think Peter refers to God as both Father and impartial Judge in 1 Peter 1: 17-21? Is it harder for you to identify with one of these ideas of God over the other? How can you bring both of these ideas into balance? How does a healthy fear of the Lord impact the way we live and make decisions?
6. Upcoming Woodlands in the Word:
The Woodlands in the Word reading for next week is Matthew 26-28 and Ephesians 1-2.
The sermon passage for next week is 1 Peter 2:1-3.
You can print the series resource guide or grab one from the Information Center to help you study this passage.
Practical Applications
Dinnertime Discussions: Honestly evaluate what things help you be ready to thrive and what things are stumbling blocks and hinder your ability to thrive.
Gospel in Everyday Life: Several times in 1 Peter so far, we’ve been reminded that the readers can be called ‘chosen exiles’ because someone has preached the good news to them (v. 12 + 25b). Remember/develop/practice articulating the good news of what God has done. Is God inviting you to share the good news with someone? Pray about it and move in the power of the Spirit toward that person with the good news.
Developing Disciplines: What does it mean to be sober-minded in today’s world? What are some of the “intoxicants” (not just alcohol) that can cloud our minds and distract us from our focus on Christ? Spend some time listening to the conviction of the Holy Spirit and confess, turning back to a mind that is fixed on Christ.
Practicing Prayer: Read through 1 Peter 1:17-21, paying close attention to the cost for your salvation. Worship the Lord who sent Jesus, the perfect lamb for your sake. Pray through the implications of the One who has made our hope secure.
Memory Verse:
