Can you believe it is August? Most of our lifegroups aren’t getting back into the full swing until the next couple of weeks, but I thought I would try to get back into the pattern of producing lifegroup discussion questions with the beginning of this series, and get a little head start. I’m running really late, though, but I doubt anyone will notice.
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If you missed Sunday’s message, you can listen from our podcast feed here:
You can also always watch and listen to past episodes on our website’s “watch and listen” page.
On Sunday, I tried to make the case that most believers do not experience “wonder,” as Jesus defined it (experiencing “abundance,” having open doors, walking in authority, and unlimited “possibility.”) Instead, we tend to spend our spiritual lives in “wander.” Do you agree, or disagree?
Jesus resorts to reposession?
It seems that Jesus takes this new life pretty seriously… In fact, he describes people who “see, but don’t really see…” who “hear, but don’t really listen or understand.” He says that there will be consequences for being only partially tuned into this new life;
Matthew 13:12 (NLT)
To those who listen to my teaching, more understanding will be given, and they will have an abundance of knowledge. But for those who are not listening, even what little understanding they have will be taken away from them.
Clearly, He doesn’t throw out the WONDER indiscriminately. What do you think this means?
Why did Elisha respond that way?
Elisha could hear every move the king of Aram was planning to make, right? He reported their every move to his own king, so the Arameans were basically unable to attack… Until that one night…
2 Kings 6:11-14 NLT
The king of Aram became very upset over this. He called his officers together and demanded, “Which of you is the traitor? Who has been informing the king of Israel of my plans?”
“It’s not us, my lord the king,” one of the officers replied. “Elisha, the prophet in Israel, tells the king of Israel even the words you speak in the privacy of your bedroom!”
“Go and find out where he is,” the king commanded, “so I can send troops to seize him.”
And the report came back: “Elisha is at Dothan.” So one night the king of Aram sent a great army with many chariots and horses to surround the city.
Yet, the night they came to get Elisha, he was sleeping in his own bed.
Could he not hear those plans?
OR, did he know?
As far as we can tell, he was sleeping peacefully while his town was being invaded.
If I had been in his place, and if I had known they were coming, I would have run and hid. I would have made sure I was OUT OF THEIR WAY. AND, no matter where I ended up hiding, I would have been up all night, sick to my stomach, not getting a bit of sleep.
Yet, Elisha seems to have had a calm night.
Was Elisha just that confident in God? Was there that much wonder in Elisha’s life?
Contrast Elisha’s ability to sleep peacefully during the advance of the enemy with the way we all respond to the crises of our lives.
Why it’s our response to a crisis so different than Elisha’s?
What about the servant? Elisha is known as the prophet of miracles… God did amazing things through this man. And the servant was there all along, attending Elisha’s needs. Undoubtedly, the servant had heard Elisha’s teaching. He had witnessed miracle after miracle. He had seen first hand how God worked through the prophet.
Yet he did not expect wonder.
Is it possible for you and I to be so close, but miss out on it? Is it really that possible for us to see, and not see? To hear, and not hear?
The servant had the natural response… The wander response. He panicked.
Isn’t it true that the WONDER response makes no sense to wanderers? The spiritual response is incomprehensible to the natural man?
1 Corinthians 2:14 NLT
But people who aren’t spiritual can’t receive these truths from God’s Spirit. It all sounds foolish to them and they can’t understand it, for only those who are spiritual can understand what the Spirit means.
So, when you respond in faith to one of life’s crises, by walking confidently into the midst of the enemy forces as Elisha did, it makes no sense to the non-spiritual wanderer.
What keeps us in wander, and keeps us from wonder?