Waterville Community Church Podcast

The second message in a six week series called "The Way Forward" which is a study of the Old Testament books of Leviticus and Numbers.

The map referenced can be found by clicking HERE.

Discussion Questions:

1. What are the two halves of ritual life?  Using the metaphor of a developing child (toddler) how does each help protect the people of Israel as well as move them closer to a fuller knowledge of the truth? 

2. Retrace my argument regarding what actually makes a person unclean and how the various purity laws relate.  Were you persuaded?  Why or why not?  Had you ever heard Leviticus taught in this way?  What about Jesus’ life and teaching would lead us to draw these conclusions? 

3. What central issue do all the conflict stories in Numbers 11-20 seem to revolve around? 

4. What does God want and how does He seem to be going about producing it? 

5. What role does Jesus play in God’s ongoing process of producing people who know him, trust him, love him, and live with him as they were designed to?

The first message in a six-week series called "The Way Forward" which is a study of the Old Testament books of Leviticus and Numbers.

Use the following links to view the map and chart referenced in the sermon:

MAP

CHART

Discussion Questions:

1. Discuss the Hebrew worldview that God intended to establish a kingdom “on earth as it is in heaven.”  Is this how you’ve been taught to think about God’s ultimate plan?  How have you been accustomed to thinking about the relationship between heaven and earth? 

2. In light of the Hebrew worldview, what is the significance of the law, the ark, and the tabernacle? 

3. What is the purpose of detailing how the Israelites are to camp around, march with, tear down, and set up the tabernacle as they move from Mt Sinai to the promised-land?  What is the author trying to show? 

4. Discuss how both the Bible and archeological evidence from other near-eastern cultures seem to indicate that ritual sacrifice was not something God originally commanded but rather something humans were already doing as a culturally normal expression of religious devotion.  How does that reframe your understanding of the purpose of the sacrificial commands in Leviticus? 

5. What does Paul means when he refers to the law as a tutor or guardian in Galatians 3:24-25? 

6. What is the purpose of the additional Sin and Guilt offerings added in the book the Leviticus to Israel’s already established cultic life? 

7. What does it mean for Jesus to be the true “sacred space?”

 

WCC Youth Developer Mike Strole shares a message today based out of Luke 9 & 10 on loving our neighbors the way Jesus calls us to.

Discussion Questions:

1. Have you ever "reined down fire" on a person or a group of people who hurt or upset you?  What was the outcome?

2. How peaceful and loving would you rate yourself in situations that are hostile?  In what ways could you be better?

3. Is there a person, or group of people that you need to work harder to see their "lovable person"?  How will you do it?

 

This is the third and final message in a series called "The Rhythm Of Life" which is a study of the New Testament book of 1 John.

Discussion Questions:

1. What lead John’s challengers to separate and prioritize the “spiritual” from the moral/ethical?  Does the church still do this today?  How is it similar/different?  Do you notice ways in which you do this? 

2. Discuss the idea that “faith in” God = “faithfulness to” God.  Why do some people push back against this idea? 

3. What does John mean when he tells his church to “obey God’s commands?”  In other words, what is he commanding them to do? 

4. Is the commitment/ability to love the way you’ve been taught (either explicitly or implicitly) to measure your spiritual maturity? 

5. What does it mean for our love to look like God’s love?  Why is it so important to know what God’s love looks like? 

 

The second sermon in a three-week series called "The Rhythm Of Life" which is a study of the New Testament book of 1 John.

Discussion Questions:

1. What has been your experience with things “of the Spirit?”  Have you tended to experience spiritual things (in yourself or in others) as personal/private/mystical or as public/corporate/moral-ethical? 

2. John commands his church to “test the spirits.”  What is the first implication of that command and how have you experienced it play itself out in actual church life? 

3. What is the second implication of the command to test the spirits?  Do you believe you have the capacity to discern truth from lies? 

4. What is the third implication of the command to test the spirits?  Have you ever heard someone suggest that the simple test to verify things of the Spirit is to see if they agree with the living witness of Jesus? 

5. Look up and discuss the following references Jesus makes to the person and work of the Spirit and discuss how they relate to 1 John 5:6-8. 

6. What does John mean when he says “in the beginning?”  What should that mean for us today?

 

This is the first message in a three week series called "The Rhythm Of Life" which is a study of the New Testament book of 1 John.

Discussion Questions:

1. Discuss the concept of “rhythm.”  What does it mean to you to have a life “in rhythm?”  Have you ever experienced what you would call a life “in rhythm?”  What did it look/feel like? 

2. How do you respond to my suggestion that the baseline to human life is a conviction/commitment/belief about God?  Is it possible that much of the disharmony human beings experience in life is because they do not live out of a clear conviction regarding God’s nature/character? 

3. What is Docetism and how did it threaten the early church’s conviction that the eternal God had taken on real human flesh in the person of Jesus (incarnation)? 

4. How are some Christians still docetic in the way they think about God? 

5. What is the difference between a priori and a posteriori reasoning and how does it impact how we think about God? 

6. What sorts of things did John learn about God from Jesus and how did that impact very real beliefs about God at the time? 

7. Discuss the implications of 1 John 5:20

 

This is the second message in a two-week series called, "God In Pursuit" which is a study of the Old Testament book of Jonah.

Discussion Questions:

1. Why might Jesus call Jonah a “law-breaker?” 

2. Have you been taught to measure the “success” of your faith by how well you love?  If not, why not? 

3. How does Jonah’s story serve as a representation of both Israel during his day and much of the Christian church in ours? 

4. Discuss the implication of the truth that you cannot love a God whom you cannot see if you do not love people whom you do see.  Why is that important to this story?

5. What is the purpose of the final parable in the book of Jonah?  What is God trying to do with it?  Does it work?

 

The first message in a two-week series on the book of Jonah called "God In Pursuit."

Discussion Questions:

1. According to Jonah 4:2, why does Jonah refuse to go to Nineveh?  How do you feel about that?  What should that teach us about God, ourselves, ministry, etc…” 

2. What do I mean when I say Jonah is a “running worshipper?”  Do you see any way in which you are a running worshipper? 

3. Discuss the sequence of events that lead to Jonah ending up in the sea.  How have you heard that preached/taught before?  How do you feel about my explanation of it?  

4. What is the purpose of the fish?  Who/what is Jonah being saved from and by whom? 

5. What is significant about Jonah’s prayer in chapter 2, specifically verses 8-9? 

6. I made a couple of parallels between the Jonah story and the life of Jesus in the gospels.  Discuss them.  How do the pictures contrast one another and what does that teach us about God and the Bible? 

 

The fourth and final message from the series on the book of Esther called "A Time Such As This."

Discussion Questions:

1. What is Xerxes’ response when Esther asks him to reverse Haman’s decree?  How did I suggest this relates to our current SIN reality?  What do think about that? 

2. How did I connect the fact that the Jews end up defeating their enemies to the Christian’s battle against SIN?  How did you feel about the connection?  Why do you think more Christians don’t live like they are “more than conquerors?”  

3. Discuss the side point I made about how we read the Bible.  Do Biblical details like Esther asking Xerxes for an additional day so the Jews in Susa can slaughter more of their enemies make you morally/ethically uncomfortable?  If so, how are you to read the Bible so that stories like this can teach, rebuke, correct, and train us in righteousness? 

4. What do I mean when I say the best defense is a good offense? 

5. Why do the Jews go from being a community of fasting to a community of feasting?  How does that relate to our Christian reality? 

6. In light of how Esther ends and we’re using it as an Advent series, what is significant about how Esther ends?

 

The third message in a four-week series called, "A Time Such As This" which is a study of the Old Testament book of Esther.

Discussion Questions:

1. Why was Esther a reluctant savior and how does that contrast with Jesus? 

2. What do you make of Mordecai’s comment, “if you keep quiet at a time like this, deliverance and relief for the Jews will arise from some other place, but you and your relatives will die?”  How does this contribute to the image that Esther was somewhat of a reluctant savior figure?  

3. Discuss the concept that calling, purpose, destiny is no less than always committing to do the good one has the opportunity to do even if it comes at great personal cost. 

4. Discuss the providential circumstances that lead to the banquet where Esther finally reveals Haman’s plot to the King.  What do you make of the purpose of this sequence? 

5. I suggested that salvation is primarily revelation and reversal.  Discuss those two elements and explain how they function in both the Esther narrative and the gospel about Jesus. 

6. If God were positioning you right now to do something to help another person are you more likely to think like Esther or like Jesus?  In other words, would you be looking for a way to accomplish the task without it having to cost you or would you commit yourself to it well knowing it would?