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Digging Deeper

26 April 2020

Mark 2:1-12

1. What would you say you’ve been focusing on in this season?  How have your circumstances affected your focus?

2. What specific disappointments have you experienced during this pandemic? How has this interruption helped you to see God’s plan?

3. Kevin mentioned a few “unplanned opportunities” in Scripture. Do any others come to mind?

4. How do you envision a “new normal” on the other side of this season?

5. How might the behavior of the paralyzed man’s friends be an example for us?

6. How is our love connected to our focus?

7. “Faith is something you can see in response to something you can’t see.” How would you respond to that?

8. “God’s greatest invitations often come though interruptions.” How would you respond to that?

9. How has God bypassed your wants to give you what you need?

10.What happens when we “embrace our problems”?

11. Here is the quote Kevin referenced from C.S. Lewis: “Pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pain: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”

C.S. Lewis – The Problem of Pain

How has God used pain in your life to speak to you?

12. How does adversity advance God’s plan? How have you seen this in your own life or the lives of those around you?

13. How did the paralyzed man’s response reveal the miracle?

14. Which of the “four pathways to God’s plan” most stood out to you?

15. How would you respond to the following quote in the light of today’s service?

“Jesus met a person at his point of need. We should, too. If his need is in the area of marriage, God has good news for him. If he is struggling with guilt, God has good news for him. Likewise God has good news for the person who needs love and affection, security or esteem… A caring friend who meets them with the gospel at a point of need is often the only way they will see … the real Christ.”

… Joseph C. Aldrich (1941-2009), Lifestyle Evangelism, Multnomah Press, 1981, p. 88