Connect (5 to 10 minutes)Come together to build relationships through fellowship and sharing about this week’s worship.

• Take a few minutes to share your thoughts about worship this week. – What aspects of worship did or did not connect with you? – What story or illustration made an impact on you?

• If you had to delete all but three apps from your phone, what would they be?________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Context (30 to 40 minutes)Dig deeper into the videos and scripture for this week through questions and discussion

• Before diving into the scriptures of the videos, how would you define faithfulness in your spiritual life? What about your personal life?

Read Exodus 15:1-18. This is the follow up to the story of Moses and the Red Sea, and God rescuing the Israelites from Egypt. This story shows a bit of the honeymoon period from the Israelites. They have been rescued and are on cloud nine. Nothing could possibly go wrong or be hard from this point onward…

• Do you remember this story from when you were a kid if you grew up in the church? What do you take from this story into your adulthood?

Watch Part 1 of the Connection Group video.• Have you ever thought about the statement that God is a person? What does it mean for God to be a person with feelings and emotions/reactions?

– Does this change how you see God? – Does it change how you feel you should treat God?

• Do you agree with this idea that faithfulness is analogous to loyalty? Can one be loyal without being faithful? Or faithful without being loyal?

– What other words would you use to describe faithfulness? How have you seen God live out those words for us? Are there examples of this from the Bible?

• Jesus remained loyal to God and to humanity in his death on the cross. He could have escaped if he wanted to. What does Jesus’ faithfulness mean for us today?

– Jesus stayed with us even when humanity had forsaken him, at his lowest moment. When you are at your lowest moment, do you feel God’s presence remain with you? How do you feel God in those moments?

KNOWING GOD | Connection Group Discussion Guide | Week 2

• You’ve probably never seen a moment where God parted literal seas for you. But there are ways that we experience this kind of loyalty and commitment from God. Read Romans 8:28-31. Make note of the fact that predestined here is often translated as a way that God has already offered each of us the opportunity to be welcomed into the body of Christ.

– What do you make of this idea that God can work all things for good, and that God is always for us? – Share with members of your group some times that you felt like God was faithful to you? What does that

moment mean for you today?

Watch Part 2 of the Connection Group video for this session.

• What does faithfulness look like for us? How are we faithful to God? How are we faithful to each other? – Job’s friends came in and accused him of wrongdoing when bad things started to happen to him. How has God called us to be faithful and supportive of those in their hour of need?

– Are there ways in which we’ve failed to do that in the past?

• As you experience difficult times, are you able to retain your faith? Or are you more likely to leave your faith behind?

• Are you able to show weakness in times of need and struggle? Why or why not? – Does showing weakness indicate that you aren’t resilient? Did Jesus ever show weakness?– If we were to acknowledge our own struggle, could that improve our faith and strengthen us? In what ways?

• When we become faithful to God, and faithful to others around us, do you believe our actions might change?

– What are some ways in which we might see that faithfulness play out? – Are we more gracious towards God and others when we become more faithful? Allow this question to be a teaser for next week.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Call (10 minutes)We believe that God not only shows us who God is but invites us to participate in God’s ministry by answering unique calls in our own lives. Join together in discovering how we can actively respond to scripture and God’s presence.

• How might your faithfulness be a real and tangible goal this week? What is something you could do over the next seven days as a group that would encourage one another in your faithfulness? How can you be faithful to each other as a group?

• Consider the connection between faithfulness and graciousness. Ponder this throughout the week as you prepare for next week’s discussion.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Closing (5 minutes)God calls us into community by sharing our joys and concerns together in prayer and supporting one another in our walks with Christ. As we share testimony and stories of our lives, let us listen to where God is working within our community and how we can build each other up in Christian love.

• Share joys and concerns with one another.• Close in prayer, either by inviting a group member to pray or by using the prayer provided below.

Closing PrayerFaithful God, we see that you are committed to us. We know that you are loyal to us and our lives, and that through you we have been offered salvation and redemption. We trust that you will never abandon us or forsake us. In this same way, when things go bad for us, let us not turn our backs on you or each other. Let us realize that our faithfulness is what gives us strength and resolve. Let that be our inspiration as we work to encourage others as they come to points where they too need to lean into their faith. Amen.

With Job, we see a story full of faithfulness to God. It almost seems impossible to see Job as a real person because he is so unfaltering in his devotion and loyalty to God. Job even goes so far as to curse the day he was born before he would ever curse God. This faith in God allows for an honest conversation with God at the end of the book, wherein Job relents and acknowledges that he need not know all the details and answers to God’s actions. As we see in the text, there is also a lesson for us to learn as we encounter those going through difficult times, about how our own faith in God might shine through our words, and what others need to see and hear from us as an example of faith.