The Walk: Five Essential Practices of the Christian LifeRev. Adam Hamilton’s Lenten study
Opening directions and questions to consider:
Reminder for those in the Wednesday Night Class: All conversations in class are confidential. If you hear something you might like to share, please ask the person who has shared for permission. If you are participating online, those conversations are open. How do you understand the verbs: to worship and to pray? Do you worship and/or pray? If so, why do you worship and/or pray? If you do not worship and/or pray, what might motivate you to do so?
Week 1: Session Goals:
Through conversation, activities, and reflection, participants will:
Learning Together Video, Study, and Discussion
After we watch the video, these are the question we will contemplate together.
Hamilton will talk about wanting to walk with Jesus wherever Jesus wants him to go. How do you understand Hamilton's explanation that the spiritual practices of worship and prayer make us better able to do this?
What does it look like in your life when you are spiritually winded or struggling?
Hamilton talks about practices that we do as individuals and as a community.
What does he say is the important relationship between these?
Why does he think these are both important? Do you agree?
Describe your experience with daily prayer. How central is this in your life?
How can you take steps toward more or deeper prayer, starting with saying “Thank you” to God?Bible Study and Discussion:
Psalm 95 A Call to Worship and Obedience
1 O come, let us sing to the Lord; let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation! 2 Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving; let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise! 3 For the Lord is a great God, and a great King above all gods. 4 In his hand are the depths of the earth; the heights of the mountains are his also. 5 The sea is his, for he made it, and the dry land, which his hands have formed.6 O come, let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker! 7 For he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand.O that today you would listen to his voice! 8 Do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah, as on the day at Massah in the wilderness, 9 when your ancestors tested me, and put me to the proof, though they had seen my work. 10 For forty years I loathed that generation and said, “They are a people whose hearts go astray, and they do not regard my ways.” 11 Therefore in my anger I swore, “They shall not enter my rest.”
For the next For the next five weeks we will examine five spiritual disciplines.
Please turn to Chapter 1 in THE WALK. Let us read the psalm together.
Now, would someone read the first two verses of the psalm which are calling us to worship?
Questions to consider:
Do you come to worship God with joy and thanksgiving? What other feelings do you bring to worship? Is there value to come to worship even when you have negative or neutral feelings?
Would someone reread verses 3-5?
What do these verses tell us about God’s relationship with all of creation? How does remembering this relationship help us to approach pwrship with joy, even when we are experiencing pain and crisis?
Read verses 4-7
Why does the psalmist give thanks and praise to God? What do these verses tell us about our relationship with God? Why do you give thanks and praise to God?
BOOK STUDY AND DISCUSSION
Metaphors for the Christian Life
New Birth: (John 1.12-13; 3.3)
What does this metaphor teach us about what it means to be a Christian? How does being “born anew” bring about a reorientation of our lives? Repentance: (Mark 1.14-15; Acts 2.38)
What does this metaphor teach us about what it means to be a Christian? How does repentance bring about a reorientation of our lives?
Faith—pistis (Greek): (Romans 10.9)
What does the metaphor of faith and trust in Christ teach us about what it means to be a Christian? How does our decision to place our faith and trust in Christ reorient our lives?
Walking with God: akoloutheo (Greek) (In our text turn to the section titled “Walking with God.” We will read those scriptures aloud. (If you are doing this individually—consider reading them aloud, too.) What do these Scriptures tell us about what is means to walk with God? How is the idea or image of walking with God meaningful to you? Does Hamilton’s reasoning of wanting to be in good Spiritual shape reinforce the importance of practicing Spiritual Disciplines for you?
What are we really doing when we worship?
Hamilton defines worship as the following:
Worship is the primary and appropriate response of the creature to the Creator.
Old English definition of woerthship.
Etymology. The word is derived from the Old English weorþscipe, meaning to venerate "worship, honour shown to an object, which has been etymologised as "worthiness or worth-ship"—to give, at its simplest, worth to something.
How does this word add to our understanding of worship?
Why is it important to worship in community?
Why is it important to worship as an individual?
What is your experience in these two forms?
How do you offer primary and appropriate responses to God through daily prayer?
What do you think of Hamilton’s five-fold method of prayer?
What is your prayer life like? Is the five-fold method appealing?
Do you find you want to renew or refocus your prayer life during Lent?
Is gratitude something you already practice?
Could you refocus or expand in this area?
Are there ways we can be accountable to each other without being legalistic?
Closing Prayer
Let us pray the prayer at the end of the book on page 38.
Link to The Walk: https://www.cokesbury.com/the-walk-lenten-study