In Explaining Jesus | Experiencing Christ, we will together explore how understanding the historical Jesus can shape our own faith, actions and experience with him today.

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What’s the Issue Anyway?

Failing to change often leads to ____________.

Organizations and individuals can decide what ____________ ____________.

The Tension

There are _________ voices. There are ____________ voices. It’s hard to know _________ voice to listen to.

Not all wise voices of change are ____________.

It may be hard for an egg to turn into a bird: it would be a jolly sight harder for a bird to learn to fly while remaining an egg. We are like eggs at present. And you cannot go on indefinitely being just an ordinary, decent egg. We must be hatched or go bad. –C.S. Lewis

What did Jesus say about change?

Our Anchor Verse: Mark 8:29 “But who do you say that I am?”

The historical Jesus was put into the category of leaders called ______________. A prophet is a person ____________ by God to ____________ for God.

Only about ____% of what the biblical prophets spoke about predicted the future and about ____% was messianic.

The purpose of a prophet was not to ____________ the future but to ____________ it.

If Jesus was a prophetic voice of change...what did he come to change?

1. Their _______________ and _______________ of the love of God. (Mark 12:29-34)

You cannot separate loving God from loving ____________.

If we love God we will love those whom _______ _________. It’s impossible to love God and not love our neighbor because we become _________ _________ what we most love. We are what _______ _________.

The Change: To see that our love for God is not primarily expressed in a ____________ ____________ but rather in service to our _______________.

2. Bring all people _______________ not leave them in their ____________________.

Jesus violated existing ____________ categories and _______________ rules. In any kind of us/them, insider/outsider comparison comes the temptation of _______________ _______________.

It’s _______________ instead of __________________ thinking.

The Change: Become collaborators instead of competitors. See those who we disagree with as _________________ and not ____________—as neighbors not “others.”

If we __________ those who ____________ exclusion, then we’re not loving our neighbors that God loves.

3.The way they _______________ their Bible.

Jesus’ nature is ____________ like God. God’s nature is ____________ like Jesus. (John 14:9, Col 1:15, 19, Heb 1:3)

The Change: We need to interpret this book through _________ and _________ of Jesus, not the other way around.

4.Increase the level of _______ in the world. (John 15:11, 17:13)

The Change: _________ more. ____________ more. Try not to take _______________ so seriously.

What is Jesus inviting us into today?

1. Learn to interpret the Bible through the lens of Jesus.
2. Read A More Christlike God, A More Beautiful Gospel by Bradley Jersak.
3. Initiate a conversation with someone who appears excluded.
4. Play and laugh with a kid this week.

Questions for Further discussion:

1. On a scale of 1-10 (1 = resistant, 10 = fully welcoming) how do you handle change? Tell about a time in your life when you ignored a wise voice in your life (and the result of that) or a time when you followed a wise voice in your life (and the result of that)?
2. If you grew up in or around a church, what were you taught about prophets or prophecy?
3. The historical Jesus came to bring change. Besides the 4 changes from the talk, what else did Jesus come to change and why did he want to change those things?
4. Which one of the 4 changes from the talk do you find the most challenging and why?
5. What is one change that you need to make in your life? What is difficult about making that change? What is compelling about making that change?
6. What is something you’ve been taught about the nature of God that you find difficult to reconcile with the character and nature of Jesus?
7. What have you done (in the past week or two) that has increased the level of joy in your life? If you wanted to laugh more, what would you do to accomplish that?