6 Subversive Acts: Revolutionary Change
Week #7
Opening Reflections.
Where have you seen God at work in your life this week?
Share any brief examples and encouragements.
Was there anything from Sunday’s message (from Pete Grieg) which resonated with you or that you felt resistance to? Anything you particularly noticed in Pete’s message or the interview with Lindsay?
They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favour of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.
Acts 2:42-47
Romans 1:16
I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes.
1. On Sunday, Lindsay told us the story of her journey to faith in Jesus and how she personally was introduced to Emmaus Rd.
- How important is church to your experience of salvation?
- How were you ‘added to the church’?
2. In 1963 a young American pastor named David Wilkerson published a book, which became a runaway best seller, about his work with New York street gangs (imagine a less glamorous version of the Sharks and the Jets from West Side Story). The Cross and the Switchblade is especially the story of a young Puerto Rican gang leader named Nicky Cruz, who, like the apostle Paul, abandoned a life of violence in order to preach the gospel. It was the ultimate 20th Century testimony. Missional leader, Floyd McClung, who was raised in a Christian home, used to say later that his story wasn’t so much the cross and the switchblade as the cross and the butter knife.
- How would you describe your story of coming to faith?
- Have you ever experienced ‘testimony envy’?
- Pete Greig says that one of the main things he was saved from is boredom! What has Jesus saved you from?
3. Evangelist, Billy Graham, was famous for challenging people to make a decision to follow Christ and to be ‘saved’. Evangelical Christians have often thought of ‘being saved’ as mainly about ‘being sure you will go to heaven when you die’. During the civil rights movement in the 1960s, Church leaders like Martin Luther King Jr, began to emphasise something that had more to do with life now – that ‘being saved’ was about being incorporated into ‘the beloved community’ of Jesus, which we call the Church.
- Look again at Acts 1:42-47; what do you think it tells us about what ‘being saved’ means?
- Pete talked about the idea that, through Jesus, we have been saved for relationship with God. But what does ‘being saved’ mean to you? What have you been saved for?
Closing Reflections.
Is there anything you will take away from this study and discussion?What has stood out that you can take into your week ahead?
Pray together (in pairs or small groups) for each other, in response to your answers.
