8.27 Mind

Facilitator: In advance of the session

Review today’s scripture text and the session activities to help better facilitate the discussion.
Have the Bible Background Video ready to view.
Listen to the song referenced in the Closure section
Encourage your group to listen to the Faithelement podcast ahead of the next session (Share the link via email or social media).

Note: Before you start, you may wish to review previous weeks’ materials to get a better feel for Galatians, taken as a whole.

Begin by asking:

Now that we’re at the end of Galatians, as you think about the things that Paul talked about in this letter, what do you think this document says about Paul as a person and why?
It is said that many people have fallen away from Christianity because they could not accept all the “rules” that seemed to come with it, nor the people who thought about faith in terms of rules, yet could not keep those rules themselves. How do you feel about that and why?
What are some of the “rules” you think your community sets for believers, and which ones do you sometimes question?
If Galatians is an expression of the earliest believers’ frustration in getting beyond a Law-based understanding of faith, why do you think so many Christians, over the centuries, have persisted in legalistic interpretations of their faith?

Read Galatians 6:1-16 , then watch the Bible Background Video

Then ask questions like these:

In what ways is this passage consistent with what Paul has been discussing about following the Spirit and letting love be our new law?
If someone were offering a Law-based approach to life in the Body of Christ, what advice might they give here for the following?
Restoring a person caught in sin?
Bearing others’ burdens?
Sharing spiritual discoveries?
Persevering in doing good, even when we don’t see a reward?
What “burdens” do you think Paul is talking about in verse 2 and following?
In what ways might Paul’s advice about comparing ourselves to others be a tough but necessary word today?
When have you heard of someone who “grew weary in doing good?”
Why is it easy to get tired of such a thing, and what advice does Paul offer us?

Continue by asking:

Given the serious tone of this letter, why is it significant that Paul chose to write this last section himself, rather than through a professional scribe?
What do you think Paul means by “boast about your flesh” versus boasting in the cross of Christ?
In what ways does our practice of religion continue to do this?
Since Paul is talking about the practice of religion, outside of the “Sunday School answer” of “being born-again,” what do you think it means to be “a new creation.”
By what means can we offer other people the chance to be “a new creation” as Paul envisions it without inserting a set of expectations as a prerequisite?

Close with prayer.

Writer: Jon Parks