Holes in a Good World and Pride

Here are some questions to ponder for our meeting on Friday:

Most people tend to think of sin as a thing and not an absence. Do you agree with David's assertion that sin is first a void? Why or why not?

Can anyone escape pride? What does it look like to be truly humble? Jesus was confident, bold and charismatic - so why wasn't Jesus proud?

In what ways does pride destroy our ability to connect with others?

How can recognition of our spiritual poverty lead us closer to God?

Jesus often characterized hell as the darkness outside, as a place of solitude and separation. How is that similar or dissimilar to the way in which we generally characterize hell?

Break Free

In preparation for Friday's Krypton meeting, consider the following questions. 

From the Cage of Responsibility

Which describes you better: irresponsibly responsible or responsibly irresponsible? Why is that? What makes you sad or mad or glad? In other words, what passions has God given to you? What have you been praying about lately that God wants you to quit praying about and start doing something instead?

From the Cage of Routine

How have you been stuck in a rut lately? How has it affected you spiritually? How have your spiritual practices, such as worship and prayer, become predictable to the point of not making much of a difference anymore? What can you do to get back the freshness of relating to an untamed God? 

Bringing our Soul Journey to a close

Two weeks ago Pastor David suggested that most of the people he knows tend to recommend spiritual disciplines in tow categories: those that have been powerful tools for them and those that should have been powerful but were not. What is your response to that suggestion? Do you recommend spiritual disciplines to others? Should we even be in the business of recommending disciplines to others?

Pastor David also suggested that there is a difference between a rule and a tool when it comes to life and to spiritual formation. Discuss the difference between the two and why the distinction is or is not important. Consider asking yourself why we tend to turn powerful spiritual tools into lifeless rules.

Last Sunday Pastor David suggested that getting where God wants us to go on our Soul Journey isn't nearly as important as becoming who He wants us to be. Do you agree or disagree with that statement and why?

What role have delays and detours played in your Soul Journey? Are you as far along as you thought you would be at this point in your life? If not, what has held you back?

Tracking Progress on our Soul Journey

I brought up the subject last Sunday of how we measure progress on our Soul Journey. built into my talk was the assumption that we all measure progress in some form or fashion. Is that a true statement for you? Do you measure the progress of your spiritual formation? Should we even be having the discussion of measurement? Does progress really matter on a  Soul Journey or is it simply about being on the journey with God?

I suggested two categories of measurement on Sunday - inner peace (the presence of peace about the state of my journey) and blessing/success. Do you find yourself using either of these two as measuring devices in your Soul Journey? If so, what have you discovered about them as measuring tools? If not, what other tools do you use to measure your progress? Why have you chosen that measuring system?

A super-majority of our Interactive Response Participants on Sunday identified inner peace as a primary measuring tool for their Soul Journey. I suggested that to be a dangerous approach. Do you remember why? Do you agree with my assertion? If so, why? If not, why not?

I asserted Sunday that success can come from many sources, one of which is the blessing of God. What other ways might be the source of success if it is not always a product of the blessing of God for spiritual progress on our Soul Journey? How often do you find yourself measuring progress on your Soul Journey by success or blessing?

I concluded my message with the statements: the best way to track progress on our spiritual journey is to measure our obedience to the the things God has revealed to us; faith and obedience always matter; result do not. What is your response to those statements? Do you agree or disagree? If so why, or why not?