Last Updated on September 25, 2022 by Rocklyn Clarke
Picture the Kingdom – Part 3
Rocklyn Clarke Sr. – Sunday September 18, 2022
© 2022 Life Church Ministries, Inc.
Sermon Podcast Page (includes links to audio, handout, and slides for all sermons)
Series Passage: Mark 4
Sermon Resources:
- Mark 4:1-20
- Mark 4:1-20; Matthew 13:1-23; Luke 8:1-15; Isaiah 6
- Isaiah 6
- Matthew 13:1-23
- Luke 8:4-15
- Luke 6:40
- Matthew 11:20-24
- Matthew 9:35 – 10:15
- 1 Corinthians 11:1
- Revelation 2:1-7
- Acts 2:40-47 – harvest from Peter’s Pentecost sermon
- Matthew 6:25-34 – “Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness . . .”
- Jesus and His Explosive Parables | The Teaching Series – Walking The Text
- “I’m not a crook!” – Richard Nixon 11/17/1973
- Watch: Listen (Shema) Shema Word Study Video | BibleProject™
- Penn Jillette: A Gift Of A Bible
Life Group Meeting
Life group leaders – pace yourselves. Look over all of the meeting components and make sure you have time to cover all of them.
Welcome (5-10 minutes)
Worship (optional for Sunday breakout sessions)
Word – Discussion Questions (if there are no specific questions use the default questions):
Spend 1 – 2 minutes in silence before you begin each question.
We can define evangelism as telling people to follow Jesus and join his Kingdom. Please use this definition for the following questions.
- How do you feel about evangelism? Discuss your feelings – good and bad.
- How important was evangelism to Jesus? How important is it to you? Discuss.
- How effective are you at moving a conversation in an evangelistic direction?
- How effective are you at building relationships that lead to evangelism?
- How effective are you as part of a team that develops relationships that lead to evangelism?
- What are you doing to become more effective at evangelism?
Witness (check out the Witness section resources below):
How we work together as a team to be “good news” to the people around us.
- Choose a prayer partner from your life group if you don’t have one already.
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What evangelistic opportunities does your life group face right now?
Additional Life Group Meeting Components:
- Reflection – Include a brief time (e.g. 2 minutes) for quiet reflection sometime during your meeting. Potential times for this are:
- Just before reviewing the questions during the Word portion of the meeting.
- Just before prayer during the Witness portion of the meeting.
- Just after prayer during the Witness portion of the meeting.
Immediately after this reflection time, members may want to write down any thoughts or impressions that come to them and anything that they feel the Lord is saying to them or to anyone else. Encourage the members to consider how they might incorporate more reflection in their daily, weekly, and monthly routines.
- Life Group Housekeeping (do this once a month or more often if needed)
- Be familiar with our life group goals.
- Review our connection tools: e-Life & the life group email list
- Does everyone know how to use them?
- Is everyone’s information up to date?
- Is everyone receiving email from the life group email list?
- Is anyone not showing up for Sunday service or life group meetings? If so, who has been in touch with them?
- How will the group onboard the next visitor?
Word Section Default Questions
(Use these when there are no specific discussion questions for the passage:
- Question 1: “What is this passage saying?”
- Question 2: “What is God saying to you through this passage?”
- Question 3: “How can you apply this passage throughout the week?”
Taken from:
- What is the Best Small Group Lesson? (Three Questions that Will Help Revitalize Your Cell Group) – YouTube (00:5:15)
Witness Section Resources:
How we work together as a team to be “good news” to the people around us.
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- Following Jesus: Evangelism
- InterVarsity Evangelism Prayer Cards (PDF)
- InterVarsity Evangelism 2+PrayerISM (PDF)
- Evangelism and Multiplication – Joel Comiskey Group
- Questions For Use In Relational Evangelism
- Small Group Evangelism: Strategies for reaching people for Jesus – YouTube (00:04:50)
- Small Group Evangelism: Why Small Group Evangelism is Essential – YouTube (00:04:25)
- Multiplication: Effective Cell Groups First Make Disciples before Giving Birth – YouTube (00:03:36)
- Multiplication: Myths and Truths about Effective Cell Group Multiplication – YouTube (00:04:35)
Life Groups
Without life groups, we are at the mercy of cliques and people who aren’t in a clique will “fall through the cracks”. Furthermore, even the people who are in cliques will have some of their issues and needs “fall through the cracks”. This is because life groups are organized to please, and be led by the Holy Spirit, whereas cliques develop solely around whatever the people in the cliques find appealing. Life groups are organized to help you grow and overcome your “issues”; cliques simply aren’t! Becoming part of a life group is a major way that we “seek first God’s Kingdom and his righteousness”.
Check out our Life Group Pages for more life group information and resources.
Five Thresholds
Because the Five Thresholds approach to relational evangelism helps us to pay careful attention to the people that the Lord brings our way, it is an excellent way to meet people “where they are”. We want to prayerfully help them move through each threshold and become followers of Jesus. At any given stage, we may be planting a seed or watering a seed that we or someone else has planted. At each stage, we should see ourselves, together with other believers, as a hospital for sick and wounded people.
- Home Page | Evangelism
- The Five Thresholds | Evangelism
- Journey to Faith: The Five Thresholds | Evangelism
- Threshold 1: Trust | Evangelism
- Threshold 2: Curiosity | Evangelism
- Threshold 3: Openness | Evangelism
- Threshold 4: Seeking | Evangelism
- Threshold 5: Following | Evangelism
