Advent: Week 1 – Christ the Redeemer
Small Group Questions
from December 3rd
1. Warmups: When did you start listening to Christmas music? What is your favorite Christmas song? Why?
2. Advent serves two purposes: looking forward to the celebration of Jesus’ birth AND anticipating his return. Do you like your current balance of the two? What would be different if we anticipated his second coming more?
3. Read Matthew 5:19 “For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander” We all inherently know we are sinful and need saving. What are some ways people try to satisfy this need of a savior?
4. Read Hebrews 9:12 “He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption.” Jesus came to redeem you! What does this mean – redemption? Do you have a time in your life this fully sank in?
5. Where do we stand now? Read Romans 8:18-22 and dig into it a bit: “I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time.”
- What do you like? What’s hard to understand?
- How does this relate to the Advent season?
- And how does this passage show our need for a Redeemer?
