How to Get What You Really Want | Week 2

Week 2 - Don’t Be Deceived  

INTRODUCTION   

We’ll never get what we really want until we discover what is most valuable. But choosing what’s valuable doesn’t come naturally. We’ve all had the experience of getting what we naturally want only to discover it’s not what is most valuable—it’s not what we ultimately want. But how do we avoid being deceived by our short-term desires?   

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS   

Read Romans 7:15–19  

I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. 

1. Growing up, how was the internal battle between right and wrong explained to you? What terms did your parents use to describe the internal conflict?   

2. How do you define the internal conflict now? What terms do you use as an adult?   

3. During the message, the Pastor said, “We’ve all gotten what we naturally wanted and ended up with the very thing we didn’t ultimately want.”  

   • Does anything come to mind?   

4. What are some reasons it’s difficult for us to prioritize what we really want ahead of our immediate desires?   

Read James 1:14  

but each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed. 

1. Describe a time when you were dragged away by desire.   

It’s obvious what we are dragged toward, but what were you dragged away from?   

Read James 1:15  

Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death. 

1. Have you ever had a dream relationship or opportunity die because you were dragged away by something you wanted?   

MOVING FORWARD   

What we naturally want is rarely what we ultimately want. Commit as a group to answer the questions the Pastor posed at the end of the message:   

1. What do I really want?  

2. What’s dragging me away?  

3. How long do I plan to let what I naturally want to drag me away from what I ultimately want?   

CHANGING YOUR MIND   

Read James 1:15–16   

Then after desire has conceived it gives birth to sin; and sin when it is full grown gives birth to death. Don’t be deceived my dear brothers and sisters.