Original Recipe | Week 4
Week 4 Original Recipe
Don’t Be Gross
Big Idea:
This Ekklesia movement is defined by how we love through how we serve.
Overview:
The movement that Jesus began and the early church continued, much to the world's amazement, continues today. As amazing as that is, Jesus predicted it, he gave us the countercultural truths to keep it going and invited us to engage with the local church and join him by loving and serving others.
Getting Started:
What is one thing that you have seen, heard, or even participated in where you had that thought, “This will never last”?
Did it last, or were you correct, and it is gone now?
When Jesus began his ministry, it was seen as a cult birthed in the armpit of the Roman Empire, Nazareth.
Eventually, Jesus would be rejected by his own people and crucified.
After the resurrection of Jesus, the first-century church survived and thrived in the face of violent, organized, state-funded resistance.
Secular (Non-Christian) scholars studied this and are dumbfounded that this movement still exists today.
Read John 13:34
“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.
How did Jesus raise the bar of what love should be with this?
Read 1 John 3:16
This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters.
What does this look like in the everyday life of a Jesus follower?
What does this look like in the cumulative body we call the Ekklesia that Jesus began?
How have these counterculture ideas reshaped the world's view of what it means to be a human being?
I Corinthians 12:14-16
For the body does not consist of one part, but of many So it is with Christ. If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body.
DON’T BE GROSS, but if you were forced to remove a body part from yourself, what part would you choose and why?
What position do you believe is the least important position to serve in at church on Sunday?
If Jesus came to serve and not to be served and “saved people, serve people,” is it even possible to not be engaged with the Ekklesia and not serve the community?
If you are not serving on the weekend, why not?
The Church in America is Dying?
Agree or disagree?
Experts are saying this, and statistics are telling us that attendance is dropping across denominations.
Even if you do not believe it, you must admit that the church has lost some of its influence.
If nothing changes, how will this affect the next generation?
Read Matthew 5:14
“You are the light of the world.”
The movement is bigger than just the weekend services.
How can we shine throughout the week?
John 1:5
The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
Moving Forward:
Jesus said nothing can stop his movement.
He invites us to be part by taking his love and a servant’s heart, into the world.
What is one thing you can do this week to drive the movement forward and share Jesus’ love within your world?