Run With Horses

Where are you going?

23_03_02_wed show notes
 
What are you aiming for?
 
As a Christian we are on a journey. Do you know where you are going? Who is leading the way?How do you determine what to do? Who are you becoming?
 
What?
Direction, aim, purpose, goal – Everyone in world talk about this – meaning to life, goals, etc.
 
Why?
It’s valuable to think about who you’re becoming. You make choices, and your understanding of your goal or purpose affects your decisions. If you don’t have a goal, your choices will be random. If you have a clear understanding of why you’re here, you can make decisions easier. It gives you a reason how to evaluate this choice over that one. Are you moving closer to your aim or not? Choices are related to your purpose. Does this choice move me closer to my goal or farther away?
 
How to?
1. What does the Bible say?
Clear goal of becoming like Jesus. Master and disciple. What kind of person to become.
Who to BE – character traits – patience, kindness, love
-- You could take the Bible out of context, use it to justify what you want to do, make a lesser issue into a major one and lose sight of what’s really important.
 
2. How did God make you?
God has given you concrete gifts – Musical? Not? If not, you won’t be an effective singer! This helps determine how your purpose is played out. Still should be humble, patient, etc., but your path is different.
 
-- Understanding this can help you not to compare yourself with others (I’m better; I’m worse.)
 
3. The church family – around you. You don’t exist in a vacuum. God gave you abilities, your church family has needs. Depending on who you’re around affects your understanding of your purpose. Practical application of what God has given you, to meet needs around you.
 
-- Depending on your church, you may be called to help in a totally different way than if you attended a different church with different needs or ministries or members. (lots of foreigners? Elderly? Children? Special needs?)
 
Examples:
-- Norman didn’t let kids go to Japanese preschool, saw bigger picture. Won’t help us in our parenting endeavor.
-- Random choices can lead you into a corner… feel lost. Have no way to evaluate what’s good, better, or best.
 

A Disciple Maker Needs People

Foundational Relationships for a Disciple Maker
Christianity is about relationships.
 
 
We need to be around people on the same journey. Co-workers in the harvest field.
Why? Encouragement and support.
Where do you find them? Hopefully in your church family!
What kind of relationship do you have? Deep friendship based on mutual foundation of Christ and commitment to His mission.
 
We need to be around people who are new to the journey and those who haven’t started it yet.
Why? These are disciples and future disciples of Jesus. These are the two groups of people we focus on pouring our lives into.
 
What do we mean by people new to the journey?
How do we connect with them?Where do we meet them? What do we do with them? Teach them to do what you do!
Goal is to help them be disciple makers.
 
What about those who haven’t started yet?
Where do we meet them?
What do we do with them?
 
We need to be around people who are more mature and further along the road to Christ-likeness than we are.
Why? We see area that we need to address in our own lives and are challenged to grow.
Humilty.

Serving Others - A Key to Spiritual Growth

Serving Others – A  Key for Spiritual Growth
Why?Part of spiritual maturity is considering others better than ourselves. Serving them is one way that that is done. It requires humility.Serving others uses our spiritual gifts to build up the church.Serving requires some degree of sacrifice on your part. You build new patterns and behavi ors that aren’t natural to the flesh. Who?All believers! If you are a follower of Jesus you have the opportunity and responsibility to serve His church.
How?Be early when the church meets. Showing up late is disrespectful to others as well as often misses crucial times of fellowship and connecting with people.
Smith Family return to USA!

Why Do We Need The Church?

Why The Church?
God knows we need each other.
. For Fellowship
. For Encouragement
. For Direction . For Spiritual Growth – we challenge each other
. For Physical Support/ Help
. For a Testimony To The World – they see our relationship
. For the Mission

Preparing Your Mind For Church!

Prepare your mind for church
 
Church = a diverse group of people at various stages along the way in their spiritual journey toward Christ-likeness.
 
We often have different ideas about what it means to get together with the church. Some of us just want to sing and lift our voice in praise. Others are hurting and just want God’s comfort. Some come just for the time to talk to other believers and share how God is working in their lives. There are as many reasons and ways to show up as there are people in the building!
 
You want to show up to fellowship with your church and focus your heart and mind on Christ as you worship Him. In reality, if you are a mature disciple of Jesus, committed to His church and the mission take the Gospel to all people, your church gathering is a time to use your gifts to encourage, build up and support your church family.
Worship? Absolutely! By humbly submitting ourselves to serving the people that Jesus died to save.
Worship? Absolutely? By submitting our needs to God and turning our thoughts to helping others who are wandering, hurting and needing a friend.
 
Our worship is not hindered by others but magnified as we have the opportunity to live out the truth we believe and practice the unity that the Holy Spirit gives.
 
Good questions to ask about your church family
1. Who are these people? Background, education, skills, struggles, family life, work and hobbies
How well do you know them?
2. Where are these people on the journey? Spiritual maturity, awareness and use of spiritual gifts, how well do they serve each other? How do they connect with the surrounding community and love their neighbors?
3. Is the church on Mission? How aware are they of the call to be and make disciples? Are most people involved in disciple making ministry? Is the church unified around Jesus and what He is doing to reconcile man with God? Is there an outward focus?
4. What is your role in this church? What are your spiritual gifts? How can you use them to build up this group of believers as they carry out the Great Commission? Who can you serve?
 
If you ask and answer these kinds of questions, you can now pray specifically about your unique fellowship with your church. You are called and equipped to serve HERE with these people. Pray about the details! Focus and what you can do to live out the life of Christ in this fellowship.

How Do You Go To Church?

How do you go to church?
Your attitude makes a difference!Many people go to church to be refreshed from the challenges of the week. For fellowship and encouragement, for a good bible challenge and inspiration to make it through another week. All good. 
But there is more to it than that. The church family is not about you. God uses it to change you and to carry out his mission of reconciliation with the world. He is at the center. He leads His church.
Humility is important. Part of having the mind of Christ.Give up trying to control God’s church and let Him lead it. Surrender your will to Him and pursue becoming the person He is making you. 
Humility is needed to prepare out heart to be changed by the Holy Spirit.From reading the NT is obvious that unity is important to God. The goal of the church is to have unity as we carry out the mission of Christ.
We should daily be approaching God and His Word with a desire to be changed. That means seeing ourselves as He does. Letting go of our wants and desires and submitting ourselves to His will. This is a life of denying yourself, taking up your cross and following Him. Not pursue your passion until you get what you want. Surrender your passion to Jesus and let Him change it to worship.  How do you go to church?Other people are there, surprise surprise! What do you do with that fact? How do you approach them? The church gathering IS NOT ABOUT YOU.It is foremost about God. Give Him first place on that day at that time along with every day and all your time.But people are there. Inconvenient I know. But what do you do with the fact that these are people God loves, Jesus died for and He has gifted you to serve?
Consider others better than yourselves. Phil 2:3
Genuinely strive to love the church. People are not always/usually easy to love. They have bad habits, many are immature, hypocrites abound – and that is just in the leadership of the church!But God calls you to love them and gifts you to serve them. 
Pray for a real desire to help your church family grow. Really consider how you can serve the people in your church. Prayer is great, always pray for them, but you need a real relationship and time with them to get to know them and their struggles. Care about them, care for them.
Real humility will allow you to get together with your church family and serve them as you worship God. Serving His family is PART of worshiping Him.
This week, examine your heart first. Approach God with humility and a desire to be like Him. Get together with His family joyfully, with a heart to serve and love these people God is changing to be like Jesus, one day at a time.And give thanks!

You CAN Lead A Bible Study

You CAN Lead A Bible Study - A small group of people studying and learning together provide encouragement and accountability.
How to?Pray. Specifically for yourself – humble, teachable, Spirit’s leading you, motives.Pray for wisdom for who to invite, what mix of people.Pray for the timing of when to start.Pray for the first passages you’ll study. (https://www.dbsguide.org/ for a guide and some recommended passages)Ask your church family, Christian friends to pray for you as you prepare.Pray about the length of time for this initial study. Goal is 6 months to a year.Pray about other leaders who will grasp the vision of every church member being a disciple-maker and leading Bible studies.
Pick a date to begin. Invite friend(s). Determine the location. Determine how often you’ll meet. Weekly or biweekly is best. Pick an easy spot to use based on who will be part of the study. 
If you’re more of an introvert, you’ll have different issues to deal with than if you’re an extrovert.(here is an overview of the DiSC profiles; https://www.discprofile.com/what-is-disc/disc-styles). Know yourself, your tendencies, and the value of engaging each person directly with God’s Word themselves.
Discovery Bible study gathering format
I. Welcome and Introductions – How are you and how was your week?Use questions like these to build relationship and get to know each other:    • What are you thankful for this week?     • What are you concerned or worried about?     • Who needs our help? How do we help them? II. Review Last Meeting    • Have someone retell the lesson from the previous meeting.     • What did you do differently because of this lesson?     • Who did you tell and how did they respond? III. Read & Re-tell the new passage    • Have one person reads the Bible passage out loud.     • Have someone else retell the passage by memory. Once they finish or get stuck others can help fill in the details. IV.. Look and Understand – What is God telling us here?    • Read the passage again.     • Discuss what this passage says about God, Jesus, or His work in the world. V. Look again and dig deeper.    • Read the passage once more.     • Discuss what this passage says about or to humans. VI. Respond    • According to this passage, what am I doing right?     • What do I need to change? VII. Who can I share this with?    • Who else needs to hear this lesson?     • How and when can I tell them?     • Who can I invite to study the Bible? A similar format along with recommended first Bible passages to start with can be found here:   Discovery Bible Study Guide - https://www.dbsguide.org/
You can do it!

Can you Lead A Bible Study?

Can You Lead a Bible Study?
Hopefully most of you answer that question with a resounding YES!
It’s not that hard but it is extremely important.
Basic Bible study, for beginners.
What?What do we mean by a Bible study? What we don’t mean:-- You don’t have to have all the answers.-- You don’t have to go through a devotional book.-- You don’t have to be a seminary graduate or pro.-- You don’t have to have an extensive library of resources.-- It doesn’t mean guessing at the meaning of the Bible passage.
What we do mean:-- You have a group of friends you enjoy being around and are willing to have spiritual conversations with.-- You are reading your Bible and growing. You have learned something from the Bible that has helped you in the past.-- Willing to invest time and energy in other people with the Bible as the center. The Holy Spirit is the teacher.-- Basically, it’s reading the Bible with other people and talking together about what God has to say.-- Being willing to say, “I don’t know. Let’s look into that.”-- Accepting that God doesn’t give you every answer for every question you ask in as much detail as you might want.
Who?Everyone!Everyone who wants to grow in Christ-likeness. Everyone who has Christian friends who you want to see grow.Everyone who has unsaved friends who you’d like to meet Jesus.
How do you define a mature Christian? Certainly being able to talk about God’s Word to others would be a requirement.-- Example: How Dottie Hatfield passed the opportunity on to me, though I didn’t feel ready, was clueless.
Why?The church needs more mature Christians. Having more people to lead Bible studies means more people are actively growing from both sides, as teachers and as students. You grow more when you are the teacher than as a student. It helps you learn to put biblical truth into your own words.
Everyone will benefit from being part of a small group of people who are actively discussing the Word of God.
Often understanding the personal application requires some discussion and thought.

Are You Building a Biblical Foundation

Building a Biblical Foundation
 
If the Gospel is our foundation that we never leave and prayer is a foundational activity of a disciple maker, certainly biblical knowledge and pursuit of obedience to God’s Word is right up there in importance.
 
We know the Gospel from time in God’s Word
 
We Know about prayer, that we can and that we do through the name of Jesus because God has revealed it in His Word.
 
We know who God is
 
We know God’s love of us
 
We know God’s will for our lives. It’s not hidden!
 
Ephesians 5:15-20
 
2 Peter 3:9
 
1 Timothy 2:3-4
 
1 Thessalonians 5:18
 
1 Thessalonians 4:3
 
1 Peter 2:15
 
Hebrews 13:20-21
 
The Bible reveals God to us, as well as reveals God’s plan for us. He wants what is best for us. Trust Him and read His word to know what that will is.
 
He gives us a glimpse of the future in His presence, without suffering, without pain, in a relationship with the creator that we were intended to have with Him.
 
 

The Prayer of a Disciple Maker

The Prayer of a Disciple Maker
 
Personal
God help me grow.
Recognize how much I need you.
Be sensitive to the work you are doing in me.
Be sensitive to the work you are doing through me.
 
Outward Prayer.
 
The Church Family
That I will be an encourager.
That I will grow in my ability to live out the one another’s in my church family.
That I will be a servant to my local church and the universal church, wherever we connect.
 
The World.
That I will be salt and light.
That I will be sensitive and aware of those God is working in around me.
That I will bring glory to the name of Jesus by my life. Actions, Words, Relationships, and Attitudes.
That I will be a good ambassador for Jesus.
 
Pray for specific people.
Men in your church. Men in your community who are believers but part of other fellowships.
Men in your life who don’s yet know Jesus. At work, in your neighborhood, those you exercise with or enjoy your hobbies with.
 
Pray for specific things in their life.
Spiritual growth and maturity but what does that look like in their life? What is their next step? Look up the Engel’s scale. Consider each person in your life and prayerfully consider how you can help them make steps toward Christlikeness.
Pray for the salvation of the unbelievers in your life. Where are they in their understanding of who Jesus is? What is the conversation that they need to have next? Pray you are ready for it!
 
Pray that you will be ready and willing to do your part! Put feet on your prayers!