Week Five

Part 5: Time’s Gonna Tell

Conversation starter

They say time is a healer and they also say that laughter is the best medicine! Are there times in your life that were stressful and hard as you were going through them but that you can now look back at and laugh, or smile with fondness for who you used to be and what you have come through? How has God been with you through the laughter and the tears?

Read Ephesians 3: 14-21

Boundless…

God’s love isn’t available for a trial period, there isn’t an initial offer window, there isn’t an expiry date, there isn’t a cancellation fee, there isn’t a fair usage limit. It’s huge. It’s truly, truly huge. We’re used to looking for a catch, for the rug that will get pulled from under our feet. But Paul’s saying no, this love is bigger than our fear, our doubt, our suspicion.

There’s a funny bit in the text where he urges that the reader might comprehend and know what he then says is beyond knowledge! Why then should we strive to know something that’s unknowable? (And what’s the ‘fullness of God’ anyway?)

Read Psalm 14 and John 6: 1-15

Fast food vs. slow food…

Eugene Peterson’s The Message renders verse 4 like so:

“Don’t they know anything,

    all these predators?

Don’t they know

    they can’t get away with this—

Treating people like a fast-food meal

    over which they’re too busy to pray?"

Contrasting with the callous ‘fast-food’ of the predators in Psalm 14, we read in John’s gospel about some nourishing ‘slow food’. Thanks is thoughtfully given for the food and it is painstakingly shared out until all are full and there are even leftovers.

What can we do to work together towards a society and economy where other people are seen as a blessing able to nourish us, rather than as something expendable to use up and cast aside?

Read Mark 1: 14-15

The very Kingdom of God has drawn near and it is Good News!

How can we share this Good News today?

In the introduction video above Laura suggests that saying, meaning, and living the Lord's Prayer is a great way to share the Good News. You may choose to end your Connect time by speaking the words of The Lord's Prayer aloud.