Community Guides

Kylee Logan 12/5/22 Kylee Logan 12/5/22

Advent Series 2022: Simplicity

Take Communion

For to us a child is born,

to us a son is given,

and the government will be on his shoulders.

And he will be called

Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,

Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Of the greatness of his government and peace

there will be no end.

He will reign on David’s throne

and over his kingdom,

establishing and upholding it

with justice and righteousness

from that time on and forever.

The zeal of the Lord Almighty

will accomplish this.

Read This Overview Aloud Together

All over the Scriptures we find language of waiting and watching. A story is woven from beginning to end about waiting and watching for a Messiah, whether for his first coming or his return. Before and after we learn that this Rescuer is Jesus, the Bible is filled with teachings from wise men and women on how to wait and watch for God’s coming. Jesus’ cousin John was one such messenger, sent to help people recognize God when he showed up in their midst. John offered three instructions to those who wanted to prepare themselves to wait and watch for God. To those with much, he advised simplicity. To the tax collectors, he advised generosity. And to the soldiers, he advised justice. While not many of us are tax collectors or soldiers, in the western context, most of us do qualify as having much.

It seems that one of the means by which Jesus curated joy in his life was by intentionally living a life of simplicity. In his teachings we find a theme of simplifying our consumption as a way of making more room for God in our lives. But consumerism is our default setting. Now, we’ll likely nod our heads in agreement or let that reality produce shame in us. However we respond, though, most of us will go on living our lives the same. But what if we didn’t? What if, instead, we let that reality – that we have accommodated ourselves to the constant, addicting, endless pursuit of more – invite us into something?

Tonight we want to invite the Spirit to show us what is competing with our undivided devotion to Jesus.

Do This Practice Tonight

As we consider the role that simplicity can play in our own lives, let’s remember that simplicity is not about what we do with our leftovers – it’s about our whole lifestyle. Simplicity is about what we do with our money, our stuff, our time, our attention, and so much more.

Throughout the gospels Jesus constantly called people to simplicity, though it entailed different things for different people. Jesus was not worried about stuff or money – Jesus was worried about the heart. Whoever it was, Jesus’ call to simplicity was a call to recognize and release an attachment to something besides God. As we have a conversation around simplicity, let’s keep in mind that everyone comes to this conversation from different backgrounds and that each of us may be invited by the Spirit to take different steps forward.

Have a conversation. We are going to begin our time by having a conversation through the following prompts:

In your experience, how have you noticed consumption getting in the way of or distracting you from your relationships with your family, your friends, or God?
On the surface, the idea of living more simply may sound refreshing, but the idea of buying less, getting rid of some of what we already have, and generally not numbing ourselves with more stuff can bring up anxiety, sadness, or dread. As you sit with it, how does the cost of simplicity actually make you feel?
How might simplicity actually help you make more room for God?
Has anyone experienced the kind of simplicity that makes more room for God? What has that been like?

Pray for each other. Let’s use the rest of the time for our Practice tonight by breaking up into smaller groups of 3 or 4. If anyone is feeling invited by the Spirit to take a particular step towards simplicity, take a moment to share that with one another. And once everyone has shared who would like to, pray for each other. Ask the Spirit for courage in responding to God’s invitation, for creativity in taking steps towards simplicity, and for the fruit of more room for God in our lives.

Read The Practice for the Week Ahead

The Practice for the week ahead is to set aside some time to intentionally consider how we can simplify our consumption in order to make more room for God. Advent is a perfect time to practice simplicity because, beyond the hyper-consumerism of Christmas, simplicity is a practice for freeing our hearts to wait and watch for God’s return. Take some time this week to work through the following questions:

Do I have more than I need?
What has gotten in the way of me sharing what I have?
What are a few ways I could practice simplicity? (e.g. in your home, your appearance, your spending habits, your access to abundance, etc.)
Looking at this list, what is one step I want to take this Advent season to make more room for God through simplicity in my life?

End in Prayer

(Leader: Close your time together in prayer, asking that God would help us become the kind of people who wait for his return with hope by actively practicing simplicity.)

Kylee Logan 11/7/22 Kylee Logan 11/7/22

Vision Series 2022, Pt. 5: Community Commitments

Take Communion

(Leader: Begin your gathering together by taking communion together, whether as a full meal together or some version of the bread and the cup before or after your meal. If you don’t already have a Communion liturgy, take a moment to be still and have people reflect with gratitude on the prompt: Where did God go above-and-beyond today or this week? After some time in silence, have a few people share their prayers of gratitude to God.)

Review The Last Practice

How has Morning Prayer through the Lord’s Prayer been going for you?
How has Midday Prayer for the Lost been going for you?
How has Evening Prayer of Gratitude been going for you?

Read This Overview Aloud Together

Think of our Community like a boat out on the ocean: everyone has a paddle and we’re working together to go somewhere. But that can only work if everyone agrees on where we’re headed. If we all have a different understanding of or vision for where our boat is going, we’ll likely just paddle in circles. To make sure we’re not going in circles, every Fall, during the Vision Series, each Bridgetown Community sets aside intentional time to return to the Commitments and to have a conversation about what’s going well and where we can improve. And tonight is that night!

Do This Practice Tonight

To commit to something is to actively participate in it – to show up in a way that you are engaged and contributing. To that end, the Community Commitments have been organized into 4 categories – active participation in your own spiritual formation, active participation in Bridgetown Church, active participation in your Community, and active participation in Portland. If we are to succeed in our goal of practicing the way of Jesus together in Portland, we will need to each be actively participating in these four categories.

Read Over the Commitments – Let’s all open up the Community Commitments and then I’ll read each out loud to remind us what our Community is organized around.

Discuss the Following Questions – Next, let’s have a discussion about the Community Commitments and our active participation in them:

Reflect on what your commitment to Community has done for you in this last season. How has it shaped you or changed you?
Looking again at the Commitments, what do you feel like we do well as a Community? Where can we improve?
Which Commitments have been more challenging for you, personally, in this last season?
In light of all this, where do we want to grow in these Commitments as a Community? How can each of us, individually, be a part of that?

Read The Practice for the Week Ahead

This week, we want to continue working on two Commitments. First, one of the newer Commitments to join the list: integrating the Daily Prayer Rhythm into your life. We want to build the habit of communing with God in the normal parts of our lives, so that we can grow in intimacy with him and participate in his coming Kingdom in and around us. So even if for a minute or two, try to make time to pray the Lord’s Prayer in the morning, to pray for the lost at midday, and to pray gratitude in the evening.

Second: involvement in your Community’s monthly justice initiative. We want to continue working towards and participating in doing something each month, as a Community, that works towards justice and mercy in our city. As a reminder, if we haven’t picked a mission yet, those can be found at bridgetown.church/proximity

End in Prayer

(Leader: Close your time together in prayer, asking that God would help us train to be the kinds of people who order our lives by rebellious fidelity to Jesus and that we would see his Kingdom break into our lives, our city, and our world.)

Kylee Logan 10/23/22 Kylee Logan 10/23/22

Vision Series 2022, Pt. 4: Moving From Prayers To Proximity

Take Communion

Review The Last Practice

How has Evening Prayer of Gratitude been going for you?
Which part of the Daily Prayer Rhythm have you found the most fruitful in your life? Which one has been the most difficult to keep consistent?
Does anyone have any new creative ideas that have helped them remember or enter into the Daily Prayer Rhythm?

Read This Overview Aloud Together

In prayer, the people of God throughout history have been moved by the Spirit to the margins. The rhythms of prayer and justice become almost an inhaling and exhaling of the church: we inhale the presence and life of God in prayer and, being pushed out of our living rooms and onto the streets, we exhale justice. When you find something beautiful and transformative, the only right response is to share it. And as we become more like Jesus, we begin to see God’s presence in our city – especially in places and spaces that we considered too dark or broken. We begin to become our prayers.

As we heard on Sunday, we believe the time has come for Bridgetown to be mobilized and sent out to serve our city, like Jesus, by becoming proximate to the poor. With this, our Communities are setting out to adopt a monthly rhythm of mission. Now, Communities have tried for years to wait and discern where we should serve, but since most of us have not been in regular proximity with those on the margins, we are not ready yet to discern in the biblical sense. Instead, Bridgetown leadership has asked each Community Leader to pick a missional expression for their Community. And while this is not necessarily our Community’s forever mission, it is one that will get us started. So, tonight, we want to explore this mission and what it all entails practically.

Do This Practice Tonight

With every Community adopting a monthly missional expression, we want to talk tonight about ours. We believe that our church and our Community is ready to take this next step. All the potential energy of our prayers over the last few months and years are transforming us to be a people who follow God to the ends of the earth. And we’re ready to start! Besides all that, we believe that it’s what Jesus is up to in our midst, so we want to yield to what he calls life that is truly life.

As we talk about our mission, let’s acknowledge that whenever something changes, some of us will feel the instinctual pull to critique it and talk about why it won’t work. These aren’t bad things to feel, but they also don’t have to take over the conversation. So, even now, remember that we’re all on the same team and let’s all do our best to lean into our conversation tonight. Instead of thinking about why something won’t work, try to offer creative solutions and ask “How can we make this work?”

(Community Leader: Let your Community know more about which mission you chose from bridgetown.church/justice. Helpful details for them to have might be:

The Organization – If the mission is attached to an organization, tell them about the organization.
The Commitment – What exactly is the commitment? Is it an ongoing commitment? How Long?
Day & Time – Will it be something you all can do the night you meet? Or is it on another day? If it’s another day, feel free to cancel your weekly gathering on the week you’re serving. Start by planning the next few months. If you have dates already for November and December, have everyone put them on their calendar. If the mission you selected is open and can happen whenever, have everyone take out their calendar and find a date for November and one for December.
Questions – Open up the room for questions. What else do people want to know about?
Close in Prayer – When you’re ready, close the prayer thanking God for what he’s done, for what he’s doing, and for how he will continue to be good to us.)

Read The Practice for the Week Ahead

In theory, we worked out the dates and times we are going to serve in November and December. This week take those dates and make a conscious effort to work out your schedule in order to be there each month.

It could help to take some time to reflect on any emotional or schedule conflicts you are experiencing that could keep you from participating. And then, take some time to bring these things before God. Sit with him and list out all the reasons why you can’t do it or don’t want to and ask for his help (whether to change your heart posture or your schedule). God doesn’t need us to bring him to the margins – he’s already there. But he certainly wants us to meet him in the faces, stories, and lives of the poor. Because he knows that the overflowing love of our mutual relationship with those on the margin will change our city forever.

End in Prayer

Tyler Hanns 10/23/22 Tyler Hanns 10/23/22

Vision Series 2022, Pt. 3: Evening Prayer

Take Communion

Review The Last Practice

How has Morning Prayer through the Lord’s Prayer been going for you? How about the Midday Prayer for the Lost?
For those going to the Prayer Hubs, which one are you going to and what has that experience been like?
Does anyone have any creative ideas or suggestions that helped them remember to pray in the morning or at midday?

Read This Overview Aloud Together

The goal of this three-part Daily Prayer Rhythm is for each of us to build the habit of communing with God in the normal parts of our lives, so that we can grow in intimacy with him and participate in his coming Kingdom in and around us. So, as we continue building this ancient Practice into our own lives, the next layer to add is evening prayer. For our Evening Prayer Rhythm, we will set aside a few minutes at the end of each day and pray prayers of gratitude.

The evening is a time for resting and presence. In the evening, we are tired from the events of the day, and the greatest gift we can offer is our undivided presence to other tired people – but we often litter our homes, dinner tables, and relationships with the clutter we carry home from the day. In order to be present to one another at the close of the day, we must first become present to God at the close of the day.

Do This Practice Tonight

Tonight, we want to practice this rhythm together in a way that will help give tangible ideas of how to pray prayers of gratitude each evening.

During the Jewish Passover, Israel would sing a song of gratitude for God’s deliverance in the Exodus called Dayenu. Traditionally, Dayenu means, “it would have been enough.” A more modern translation might sound like, “Thank you God for overdoing it.” Dayenu serves as a historic prompt for giving thanks to God at the close of the day. So, for our Evening Prayer Rhythm, we are going to use this template to reflect on our days with gratitude.

Review the Day. As we begin, let’s take some time to silently review the events of our day: the people, tasks, messages, meals, demands, and surprises. As you make your way back through the day from morning to evening, silently give thanks to God for anything and everything you have to be grateful for.

Pray Gratitude. Now, let’s move to a time of praying these prayers out loud, in the format of the Dayenu prayer. It might sounds something like,

“God, lunch today would’ve been enough, but you provided me with the resources to choose the type of food I wanted to eat.”

“God, a normal day at work would’ve been enough, but you gave me enjoyable co-workers to have fun moments today.”

“God, it would have been enough to just get through the day, but you really helped the kids get along and love each other well today.”

Let’s pray one at a time, so we can build gratitude in the room and share in how good God was to us today.

Close in Gratitude. (Leader: When you’re ready, close the prayer thanking God for what he’s done, for what he’s doing, and for how he will continue to be good to us.)

Read The Practice for the Week Ahead

The Practice for the week ahead is the exact same as it was tonight: take a few minutes each evening to reflect on your day and to pray prayers of gratitude to God. When we end the day in gratitude, we remember the fingerprints of God all across the hours of the day. We enter into the evening present and restful to others in need of restful presence.

End in Prayer

Tyler Hanns 10/23/22 Tyler Hanns 10/23/22

Vision Series 2022, Pt. 1: Morning Prayer

Take Communion

Review The Last Practice

How has Midday Prayer for the lost been going for you?
Who are you praying for? And does anyone have any stories they’d like to share about how God is using that time — perhaps how it’s shaping you or how you’re seeing God respond?
Does anyone have any creative ideas or suggestions that helped them remember to pray at midday?

Read This Overview Aloud Together

The goal of this three-part Daily Prayer Rhythm is for each of us to build the habit of communing with God in the normal parts of our lives, so that we can grow in intimacy with him and participate in his coming Kingdom in and around us. So, as we continue building this ancient Practice into our own lives, the next layer to add is morning prayer. For our Morning Prayer Rhythm, we will set aside a few minutes at the beginning of each day and pray through the prayer that Jesus taught his disciples, what we now call the Lord’s Prayer.

Those closest to Jesus saw and felt the intimacy he had with his Father in Heaven and asked him to teach them to pray so that they could experience God that way too. But Jesus wasn’t after teaching them what to pray — he wanted to teach them how. When we pray through the Lord’s Prayer, we too are being taught how to pray by Jesus himself, allowing his prayers to guide our prayers. Jesus’ words become a jumping off point for our own intimacy with God. He offered a prayer framework that has been and is a model and a guide for the global, historic church.

Do This Practice Tonight

Tonight, we want to practice this rhythm in a way that offers a tangible framework we can use when praying The Lord’s Prayer each morning.

We will pray through the Lord’s Prayer piece by piece. And, as we do, we will allow each line to be thematic, adding our own words to Christ’s words. After I read each prompt, we will be directed to pray silently to ourselves, all out loud together, or just a few of us out loud, one at a time.

Our Father in Heaven – As we begin, we open with prayers of adoration. Jesus reminds us here of three aspects of God: God’s majesty, God’s approachability, and God’s restoration. God is “in Heaven,” incomprehensibly powerful and the true source and satisfaction of every human desire. God is also “Father,” so we come to Him not as beggars but as children and heirs to his Kingdom. But, through Jesus, God is more than just my Father, he is “our Father.” In God, everyone — family, friends, co-workers, and even strangers — becomes sister and brother. Let’s all pray out loud together, thanking God for who he is and what he’s doing.

Hallowed be your name – To “hallow” means to set aside as holy. Let’s spend a moment silently to ourselves recognizing God as holy, as the unique One worthy of our affection. You can recognize and name the blessings in your life to connect the gifts back to the Giver, recite a Psalm to yourself, or sit in silence, savoring the presence of God over all and in all.

Your Kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven – Next, let’s ask for God’s will to be done in our life and world. Releasing our own control, we ask for God’s Kingdom in our midst. Simply, clearly, and specifically, let’s ask that God’s Kingdom would come where our world lacks it. Think of friends not in relationship with Jesus, needs in our city and world, situations (professional, social, and personal), and even emotions within yourself. Let’s all pray out loud together for anywhere and everywhere that comes to mind where God’s Kingdom of love and peace is lacking.

Give us today our daily bread – Now we’ll spend some time praying for specific needs and wants in our lives or that of our Community—a job, healing, or wisdom to make a decision. Let’s again pray one at a time, so that we can agree with the one petitioning God.

Forgive us our debts, as we have also forgiven our debtors – Let’s take some time to quietly reflect on the areas in our life where we have sinned and where we have been sinned against. Let’s ask God for forgiveness for specific areas in your life, and for help to release others into forgiveness.

And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil – Finally, we’ll spend some time praying both against temptation (which can also be translated “trouble”) in our lives and against any kind of evil (spiritual evil, human evil or oppression, natural disasters, systemic injustice, etc.) in our world. Let’s pray all out loud together for God’s deliverance from evil for us or our Community, asking instead for God’s blessing — the divine flow of good things into our lives and Community.

(Leader, simply pray the following words to close.) For yours is the Kingdom and the power and the glory forever and ever. Amen

Read The Practice for the Week Ahead

The Practice for the week ahead is essentially the same as it was tonight: take a few minutes each morning to pray through the Lord’s Prayer.

Again, since good habits can take some time to form, Bridgetown has partnered with 24-7 Prayer to make a free app called Inner Room to help us build this rhythm. The app has the option to set reminders at certain times each day and has the prompts we used tonight (in long and short form) to help us “train” together to order our lives by radical fidelity to Jesus. We are also practicing this Morning Daily Prayer Rhythm scattered around the city for 8 weeks at our Prayer Hubs.

The next time we meet, we’ll start by checking in on how the Morning & Midday Daily Prayer Rhythms have been going for everyone — to share what went well, what was difficult, any cool stories, or any creative or helpful ideas.

End in Prayer

Tyler Hanns 9/25/22 Tyler Hanns 9/25/22

Vision Series 2022, Pt. 2: Midday Prayer

Take Communion

Read This Overview Aloud Together

For millennia and all over the world, the church has been pausing at set aside times during the day to pray – the Israelites, Jesus, the early church, Christian denominations and monasteries throughout history have all done it, and many followers of Jesus today do too. We sense an invitation from the Spirit to participate with the global, historic church by returning to this ancient Practice. Our Daily Prayer Rhythm will have three parts: morning, midday, and evening. And over the next few weeks we will explore this Rhythm as a church on Sundays and practice it together in Communities.

Tonight, we will dive into our Midday Prayer Rhythm: praying for the lost. Practically, this looks like setting aside a few minutes in the middle of your day to pause and lift up to God those in your life who don’t know Jesus, asking him to encounter them in a new way that might bring their salvation. But, more than that, we want to participate with God in these stories, so we will also ask him to send us out to become the answers to our prayers.

Do This Practice Tonight

Tonight, we want to practice this rhythm in a way that offers a tangible framework we can use when praying for the lost each midday.

Read Luke 15v4-7. First, let’s read the story that Jesus tells of a shepherd’s response to losing one of his sheep, a story that reveals to us God’s heart for the lost and invites us to become more like him. (Leader: Have someone read the passage.)

Pray for the lost by name. Next, let’s pause to ask the Spirit to bring to mind people we know who are far from God. We will take a few moments in silent reflection now to let him bring people to mind.

(After this moment of silence) Let’s all pray out loud at the same time for these people by name. Let’s ask God, the Good Shepherd, to go after them, to restore them, and to bring them salvation. Let’s pray together out loud.

Pray for compassion. Next, we want to ask God to give us his heart for the lost: seeing as he sees and loving as he loves. Let’s take some time in silent prayer asking God for compassion. As you do this, feel free to confess to God anything that’s getting in the way of compassion today. Ask God to soften the hard places in your heart, so that it might be made more like his. Let’s pray silently in our hearts.

Pray to be sent. Finally, we want to invite God to send us. As we have asked God to pursue our loved ones, we now ask him to send us out with his empowering presence to the lost around us. Let’s have a few people pray, inviting God to open our eyes and ears, that we might pursue the lost and pray for their salvation in the way our Good Shepherd does. Ask that he would inspire our imagination with ways to love, bring people to mind we don’t expect, and surprise us with invitations to be his hands and feet. Let’s have a few people pray these things out loud individually so that we can agree with them as they pray.

Close in Gratitude. (Leader: When you’re ready, close the prayer thanking God for what he’s done, for what he’s doing, and for all the people we will see come to faith in Jesus through these faithful, daily prayers.)

Read The Practice for the Week Ahead

The Practice for the week ahead is essentially the same as it was tonight: take 5 minutes each midday to pray for the lost by name, to ask God for compassion, and to ask God to send us out and give us opportunities to share Jesus. So let’s all set aside some time at whatever “midday” means for each of us (e.g. lunch break, your child’s naptime, a walk, etc.) to pray for the lost.

Since good habits can take some time to form, Bridgetown has partnered with 24-7 Prayer to make a free app called Inner Room to help us build this rhythm. The app has the option to set reminders at certain times each day and has the prompts we used tonight (in long and short form) to help us “train” together to order our lives by radical fidelity to Jesus.

The next time we meet, we’ll start by checking in on how the Midday Daily Prayer Rhythm has been going for everyone — to share what went well, what was difficult, any cool stories, or any creative or helpful ideas.

End in Prayer

(Leader: Close your time together in prayer, asking that God would help us train to be the kinds of people who order our lives by rebellious fidelity to Jesus and that he would bring many to salvation as we pray.)

Tyler Hanns 8/7/22 Tyler Hanns 8/7/22

Becoming a Dwelling Place

Take Communion

Begin your gathering by taking communion together, whether as a full meal together or some version of the bread and the cup. If you don’t already have a Communion liturgy, pray these words from Paul to the church in Ephesus:

For this reason, I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches God may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

(Ephesians 3v14–19)

Read This Overview Aloud Together

The final three chapters of this letter to the Ephesians are filled with highly practical and specific outworkings of those expansive promises in our everyday lives: the workplace, the home, and the complexity of human relationship and ethics. The bridge connecting the first part of the letter (Eph. 1–3) and the second part (Eph. 4–6) is a prayer written by Paul for the church from behind bars in a prison cell (Eph. 3v14–21).

Notice how Paul begins his prayer: he kneels before the Lord, posturing himself not instinctively, but intentionally as a significant and chosen embodiment of what he’s praying and who he’s praying for. Eugene Peterson describes kneeling this way:

“It is an act of retreating from the action so that I can perceive what the action is without me in it, without me taking up space, without me speaking my piece. On my knees I am no longer in a position to flex my muscles…I assume a posture that lets me see what reality looks like without the distorting lens of either my timid avoidance or my aggressive domination. I set my agenda aside for a time and become still, present to God.”

We don’t kneel in hopes to somehow woo God into responding to our prayers. Rather, kneeling keeps our day-dreaming at bay and helps us to pray with our bodies, to keep ourselves engaged with God’s promises for us. Just as Christ came as an embodied person, there is an appeal to the whole person through Paul’s prayer. We pray, not only with our intellect, but with our bodies. This prayer (Eph. 3v14–21) is Paul praying from prison, but his imagination belongs to Christ and his heart to his brothers and sisters. So, he’s crying out not for relief, but for love—so that we might grasp this love that surpasses knowledge.

In the beginning three chapters, Paul explained the good news of the Kingdom. In Eph. 3, he begins the second part of the letter, praying that we might experientially know the good news of the Kingdom in everyday rhythms of communing with God. While Paul was acutely aware of his own and others’ needs, he begins his prayers by declaring God’s promises. Our prayers, the honest and unprepared ones we pray when we’re alone, reveal to us what we really believe about God. Paul’s prayers indicate his confidence in God’s Fatherhood, in his abundance, and the presence of the Holy Spirit.

What if today, we lived believing that God actually loves us? That his love could anchor you in the face of disappointment, or while being falsely accused and unfairly criticized, or in the wake of betrayal, or enduring injustice and oppression? We don’t have a Great High Priest who holed up in the safety of the Temple, but one who got his hands dirty with every kind of mess we’ll ever find ourselves in – all so that we could find not only ourselves there but Him too, dwelling with and within us. We too can pray like Paul, by remembering the width, height, and depth of God’s love at the mountain top and in the deepest valley. This is the power of the Holy Spirit on glorious display.

Do This Practice Tonight

Read the second half of the letter (Eph. 4–6) out loud and then break into smaller groups and discuss.

Discuss The Following Questions:

What word, phrase, or idea stands out to you in these chapters?
Fear is part of life. What would it look like to pray God’s promises into the areas where you feel fear? What would it look like to “take thoughts captive” in prayer?
What do your prayers reveal about how you see and what you believe about God?
Are there ways God is inviting you into a fuller understanding of his love for you?

Read The Practice for the Week Ahead

Practice Option 1:

In his book, The Attentive Life, Leighton Ford offers an exercise for personal reflection on the dimensions of God’s love. Take time, without distraction, and follow the prompts below to create your own charts indicating how expansive God’s love has been for you. This practice doesn’t require more than a pen and paper – feel free to apply as much creativity as you’d like. The hope is that the Spirit would dwell in you even more fully as you invite him into your inner world.

How Long: Draw a chart, dividing your life into chapters, recalling just how long God’s love has carried you.
How Wide: Trace your life geographically, to the various places you lived or traveled, measuring the width of God’s love for you.
How High and Deep: Draw another chart naming the major emotional and spiritual highs and lows over the years. Where are the peaks? Where are the valleys? And where has God been in all of it?

Practice Option 2:

Read Isaiah 43v1-3, inserting your own name into the blank spaces that stand for you. What is it like to read Scripture in this personal way?

But now, this is what the Lord says –

he who created you, ____________,

he who formed you, ____________:

Do not fear, for I have redeemed ____________;

I have summoned ____________ by name; ____________ is mine.

When ____________ passes through the waters,

I will be with ____________;

and when ____________ passes through the rivers,

they will not sweep over ____________.

When ____________ walks through the fire,

____________ will not be burned;

the flames will not set ____________ ablaze.

For I am the Lord, ____________’s God,

The Holy One of Israel, ____________’s Savior.

End in Prayer

Close your time together by thanking God for how wildly deep his love is – and that it would reach into the darkest valleys so that we may become a dwelling place for Jesus.

Tyler Hanns 7/31/22 Tyler Hanns 7/31/22

New, Unified Humanity “in Christ”

Take Communion

Begin by taking communion together, whether as a full meal or some version of the bread and the cup. If you don’t already have a Communion liturgy, read aloud (by the Leader or all together) John 15v1-5, 8-10. Praying scripture invites God to shape our prayer life through connecting us to the mind and heart of God. Enter in by slowing down to a pace that serves a listening posture. After reading, pause to thank God for his loving presence at the table with you.

John 15v1-5, 8-10

I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. 

Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, 

and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit. 

Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you. 

Abide in me, and I in you. 

As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, 

neither can you, unless you abide in me. 

I am the vine; you are the branches. 

Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, 

for apart from me you can do nothing. 

By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. 

As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you.

Abide in my love. 

If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love

Read This Overview Aloud Together

(adapted from Bible Project’s Ephesians Study)

Paul’s letter to the church at Ephesus is best understood in two major movements held together by prayer (Eph 3v14-21). The first three chapters are pure theological poetry, exploring the expansive promises of reconciliation to God and one another. The final three chapters are the highly practical and specific outworking of those expansive promises in the narrow environments of our everyday lives – the workplace, the home, and in the complexity of human relationship and ethics.

Ephesus was a bustling, cosmopolitan city in the ancient world. It was the center of culture and religion. We know from the book of Acts that Paul spent at least a couple of years there helping to start a community of people who were devoting themselves to Jesus. While we don’t know the details, we know for certain that church communities would have been very diverse. Yet, Paul can write to this diverse group of people and say things like “all things under heaven and earth, can be unified under the Messiah” (Eph chapter 1) or “Take great pain to keep the unity of the spirit through the uniting bond of peace,” there is one spirit, one body, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one God and Father who is over all and through all and in all. (Eph chapter 4)

Through Ephesus, the world would see God’s Kingdom through a unified people. Paul calls this the “new humanity” from chapter 2. A new family was created by the love of Jesus and unifying people across the dividing lines!
So it’s not hard to see how important this message is for us right now, living in a city like Portland.

Core to this letter, we find this question in Paul’s letter to Ephesus: what does it mean to be that new, unified humanity in a culture where followers of Jesus could be found on both sides of any divisive political or cultural issues? And the hope is that our allegiance to Jesus could compel us to reach out to other Christians that we know hold different views so that we can really listen, and share in meaningful conversation.

Surely this is the kind of relational community that Paul envisioned for the Ephesians. He said get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, fighting, or slander, and rather, embody kindness, compassion, and forgiveness towards each other, in Christ, just as God forgave you. Paul emphasizes this point – the most powerful ways that we can experience the Gospel right now is to embody it by building bridges within the body of Christ.

Do This Practice Tonight

Read the first half of the letter (Ephesians 1-3) out loud and then break into smaller groups and discuss.

Discuss The Following Questions

What word or phrase caught your attention?
Reread Ephesians 1:9-10 and 2:11-22 and notice all the words that communicate unity (both, all, together, etc.). What about this communicates the heart of God?
What would a prayer response to this first half of Ephesians look like, when you think about what God is renewing, revealing, and reviving in your life? In Portland?

Read The Practice for the Week Ahead

For the week ahead, establish a time and place that is quiet and free from distractions to set aside 3 – 5 times to practice lectio divina. Any passage of Scripture can be utilized for the practice of lectio divina. Here are a few suggestions with which to start:

Ephesians 3v17-19

Psalm 23

Psalm 100

After selecting one passage, read and move slowly through each of the five movements of spiritual reading.

Prepare to meet with God: Turn your phone off and leave it in another room. Situate yourself comfortably in a quiet, solitary place. Calm your body and quiet your mind before God as you work to prepare your heart to receive what God has spoken through the text, and to respond accordingly. Finally, invite the Holy Spirit to guide your thinking and feeling as you read.
Read (lectio): Read the passage slowly and carefully. Take your time. As you move through the text, pay close attention to what words and ideas draw your attention in unique ways. When your focus is drawn to a particular word or thought, pause momentarily to reflect on them.
Reflect (mediatio): Upon completing the passage, return to the beginning and read again. On your second journey through the text, allow the text to connect with you personally. Which words or phrases assume a particular resonance in your heart, your season of life, your person in this moment. Ask, “What do I need to know, or be, or do in light of the text? What does this mean for my life today?”
Respond (oratio): Talk to God about your experience. If you’re confused, say that. Moved? Express gratitude to God. Upset? Tell him about it. Compelled to worship? Worship. If the text has brought something else to mind, talk to God about that.
Rest (contemplatio): Pause to sit in God’s presence before fleeing from the moment. You might express wonder, awe, gratitude, or praise through words, or you might allow yourself to feel and experience these things quietly before God.

End in Prayer

Close your time together asking for God to awaken your hearts to all the wonder and walking of being alive “in Christ.”

Tyler Hanns 6/12/22 Tyler Hanns 6/12/22

Blessing Each Other

Before working through this Guide, make sure that everyone has caught up through the teaching on June 12, 2022.

Take Communion

Begin your gathering by taking communion together, whether as a full meal or some version of the bread and the cup that proceeds the meal. If you don’t already have a Communion liturgy, pray these words from Paul to the church in Ephesus:

I pray that out of his glorious riches God may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. (Ephesians 3v16-19)

Read This Overview Aloud Together

On the first page of the Bible, we read that God speaks and something happens. Again and again his words directly correlate to something new being brought into existence – land, water, sky, light, birds, fish, people, etc. The ramification of our being made in the image of this God who speaks life into existence is massive: some of God’s life-bringing power exists in our words as well. Our words and what we do with them matters. It’s why Proverbs 18v21 says that “the tongue has the power of life and death.” And it’s why James appeals to followers of Jesus of his time this way: “With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God’s likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be.” (James 3v9-10)

As we read in the stories of the Scriptures, one of the most powerful acts we can do with our words is to bless someone. But a blessing is more than just a few kind words that brightens someone’s day. In the Old Testament narratives, children’s lives are shaped (and reshaped) by the blessing their parents give to them. There seems to be a generative, destiny-creating life force behind the blessings we read about. Like Abraham in Genesis 12, we are blessed in order to be a blessing. God blesses us, so we now bless one another. Mature discipleship, then, is expressed in blessing. It’s why the last thing even Jesus did with his disciples was bless them! With our words and actions, we have the gift and ability to shape and reshape someone’s reality – not just their internal beliefs about themeselves, but the world around them as well. Blessing is a mysterious act of sewing into someone’s life and identity without always knowing what the harvest will look like.

So how do you bless someone? Well, a blessing involves three components: to see and admire someone, to speak well of them, and then to sacrifice for them. “To see someone” speaks to that primal need to be noticed, recognized, and appreciated. “To speak well of them” gets at a whole body acknowledgement of their goodness – using words, body language, attitude, and actions to delight in them. These two components alone, though, only add up to an affirmation. The third component that transforms it into a blessing is “to sacrifice for them.” This refers to giving some of your life away to them. It points to the reality that a true blessing costs something – like a parent who sacrifices to give their children a better life, a teacher who spends countless hours helping a student get caught up, someone who donates vacation time to a coworker with a sick relative, or someone who invites a friend who is going through a hard time to live with them – blessing is a small way of dying for someone. It’s a small echo of Jesus’ own death for us.

Tonight we want to spend some time talking about blessing and working to figure out how we can actively and intentionally bless someone in our lives, as we continue to live in our true selves.

Discuss The Following Questions

Is the concept of blessing familiar or new to you? How could blessing change your own life and reality?
Have you ever been the recipient of someone’s blessing? What did that experience feel like?
Why is blessing important in discipleship? What is the impact receiving a blessing? And what happens when someone doesn’t receive a blessing they need or want? (e.g. a blessing from a parent, etc.)
Have you ever blessed someone? What did that experience feel like?

Do This Practice Tonight

A natural part of early life and discipleship is to seek our own safety, comfort, and wellbeing. As we move more into our true self, though, we come to see that all we have is gift; nothing is earned, everything has been freely given to us by God. With this comes a shift in trust structures that allows us to say with David in the opening line of Psalm 23, “The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing.” Acknowledging that God is the giver of all allows us to move from stinginess and self-preservation to generosity and generativity.

Tonight, we want to have a conversation about each of the components of a blessing and to brainstorm various ways in which we can step into each on behalf of those in our lives we want to bless.

1. Seeing Someone – Really, truly seeing someone requires that we are able to slow our frenetic pace enough to pay attention to their words, disposition, body language, and what the Spirit is saying to you about them. Jesus, whose ragtag group of misfits and outcasts changed the world, was the best example of this. He was consistently really seeing people, beyond the outward appearance or initial judgment. We aspire to be like our Rabbi in this.

Take a moment together and invite the Spirit to bring to mind someone in the last week who you did not really see. Perhaps it was a grocery store clerk ringing you up or your child trying to show you something or a houseless person on the freeway on-ramp. Whoever he brings to mind, ask him for help to really see them. What would it have looked like to really see them?

After you’ve done this, discuss as a group who came to mind and what the Spirit revealed about how to really see someone.

2. Speaking Well of Someone – Oftentimes, really seeing someone naturally pours over into some sort of interaction, which is where speaking well of them comes in. More than just an offhand compliment, this component requires a tailor-fit and intentional acknowledgment of them. So instead of saying, “You’re really nice.” it could sound something like, “I’ve noticed how good you are making every person you come across feel welcomed. I always feel like I belong when I’m around you and that really means a lot to me.”

Take a moment to ask the Spirit to bring to mind something you appreciate about the people in your Community. What is something about someone around you that you’ve noticed and that you really appreciate?

After you’ve done this, open up the room to practice saying these things out loud. What do you notice and appreciate about the people around you? Take some time to share these as a Community. Remember that the more specific it is and the more personal its impact the better.

3. Sacrificing For Someone – Finally, the most challenging component of a blessing, to sacrifice for someone. This requires that we are willing to give up some of our “life” on behalf of someone else. It’s one of the most profound gifts we can give because it implies that we believe that they are deserving of our giving something up. There is an innate dignity given in this practice. Sacrifice becomes blessing when we do it with purpose. It’s something we give without resentment or obligation, but out of deep desire and joy.

Take a moment to ask the Spirit the following questions: Where have I intentionally sacrificed on behalf of someone else? Is there anything keeping it from transforming into a blessing? (e.g. bitterness, apathy, hesitation, etc.) If I have not intentionally sacrificed on behalf of someone else, what could that look like?

After you’ve done this, discuss as a group if there were any invitations you sensed from the Spirit.

End your time by thanking the Spirit for his invitations and asking him for the empowerment to follow through.

Read The Practice for the Week Ahead

Since blessing is a form of mature discipleship, it is not something that should be rushed into, so for the week ahead we simply want to take a step towards it. Spend some time working through the following prompts with the Spirit to figure out who you are being invited to begin or continue blessing and how.

Who? To start, list out the different spheres of your life: work, home, school, various friendships, grocery stores, etc. Once you do that, ask the Spirit to bring someone to mind who he would invite you to lean towards in blessing. Let one person come to mind. It could be someone you have already actively blessed or someone you hadn’t really thought about blessing.

What Could You Do? Next, consider each of the three components of a blessing. Ask the Spirit which step you are being invited to into and what that could look like. Take some time to really dream with God about this here. He wants to use your creativity, personality, desires, and gifts to bless people. Remember that we are blessed to be a blessing, so have a conversation about where you have been blessed and what it is you have to give away in blessing – words, time, a skillset, money, creativity, etc.

Make a Plan: Next, take some time to plan out what you’ve been invited into. When do you want to do it? How?

Thank the Spirit: Dignity is not just given in blessing someone, it is also received. Thank the Spirit for giving you the opportunity to bless someone and for all the ways in which you have been blessed.

End in Prayer

Close your time together thanking God for the ways in which he has blessed each of you and your Community. Ask him to help you really see people, to speak well of them, and then to sacrifice for them, in the same ways that he has done so for us.

Tyler Hanns 5/29/22 Tyler Hanns 5/29/22

Recognizing the False Self

Before working through this Guide, make sure that everyone has caught up through the teaching on May 15, 2022.

Take Communion

Read This Overview Aloud Together

Each human being is totally unique from every other person who has or will ever exist. Think about that for a second. You are wholly different from every other person, whether you’ve met them or not – no repeats, no copies, no mistakes. How can this be? It is because everyone was made in the image of a God who is infinite, so we each reflect different combinations of his infinite nature.

The goal of spiritual formation is not to become clones of each other, but to become our true selves by becoming like Jesus for the sake of others. The best, truest gift you have to offer to the world around you is your own transforming and transformed self. But becoming who we were created to be is easier said than done. It requires that we know God and that we knowourselves. On this journey, we quickly come to find an interconnectedness between these knowings. Knowledge of God produces knowledge of self, since we were made in his image. And true knowledge of self reveals to us the intricacies of God’s beauty and design.

The only way to discover our true self is to do so according to God: his Spirit, his Scriptures, and his community. He knows how we were wired and his truth is a map to unlocking all of the unique complexities that make us us. This is why we’ve been practicing hearing God’s voice; he alone is the way to unravel our true selves.

But crouching around the corner is what the church has for centuries called the false self, the glittering image that we use to hide our brokenness. The false self is the part of us that overcompensates, deflects, and distracts others (and sometimes even ourselves) from the parts of us we’d rather others not see. It is not only the part of us that sins, but also the part of us that tries to hide our sin and shame, to cover it. While the false self attempts to produce its own covering, the true self allows God to be its covering. To really know ourselves, then – our real, true self – requires more than just a Christian personality test or spiritual gifts inventory. It requires self knowledge without deception, without the self-protecting shiny exterior that we use to hide the parts of us we don’t like or feel ashamed of.

This week, we want to begin the journey of recognizing the false self and welcoming it into the light of Jesus’ warm embrace.

Discuss The Following Questions

Why is it important to learn to recognize the false self? What happens if we don’t?
What are some examples of what someone’s false self could look like? How have you seen people compensate for sin, shame, and insecurity?
What is your experience of the fallout of having lived in your false self? (e.g. someone embraced something about you that wasn’t actually true, you had to go back and tell others the truth about what you were covering up, you didn’t get the acceptance you were hoping for, etc.)

Do This Practice Tonight

A big piece of our journey with the false self that we have not yet discussed is what we do with it when we recognize it. Contrary to what you may think, will power, determination, and rigidity won’t make it go away. In fact, those may be part of what gives the false self its power. Instead, we have to face it with an incredible amount of compassion, understanding that it is trying to keep us safe. As one spiritual formation practitioner even suggests, we have to befriend it, to understand what it’s trying to say to us, what it wants to reveal to us, but to still be honest about the fact that it is trying to deceive.

Each one of us will struggle to find the balance between the brutal honesty and the radical self-compassion required in the hard work of telling the truth about ourselves. We will need the Spirit’s help for both.

For tonight’s practice, we will split into same-gendered small groups and explore some questions together around our own journey with the false self. Remember that the journey with the false self will be lifelong, so don’t try to solve it tonight. Press as much into the questions as you feel comfortable to, only sharing what you feel ready to.

Once you have split into small groups, work through the following prompts and questions:

1. Embarrassment: When we begin to feel embarrassment, shame, or humiliation, we can be sure that the false self is going to try and rear its head. Take a moment to think back to the last time you were embarrassed about something, whether at work, with friends, at home, or somewhere else.

What were you feeling in that moment?
How did you respond? Did you overcompensate in some way or try to become invisible?
What can that experience teach you about your own false self?

2. Motives: Proverbs 21v2 reminds us that “a person may think their own ways are right, but the Lord weighs the heart.” If we are paying attention, the Spirit will often reveal to us when we are not doing something out of good intentions. While, in reality, there is no such thing as a pure motive (we’re all a mixture of motives), one way to recognize the false self is by reflecting on our motives. Invite the Spirit to bring to mind a situation in the last week where your motives may not have been as good as you assumed.

Take a minute to briefly describe the situation.
What did you think your motives were? What did the Holy Spirit begin to reveal about your motives?
Knowing what you know now, what would it have looked like to be your true self in that situation?

Close up by thanking each person for sharing and praying for each other. Thank the Spirit that he reveals our false self so that we can hear him reveal our true self.

Read The Practice for the Week Ahead

One way to live into our true self is to become aware of where and how our false self presents. This week, we want to practice reviewing interactions and to work to name the motive behind it. We must have the courage to look through our false self and face our shame and failure if we are going to hear Jesus reveal our belovedness, our true self. Our goal is not just to know ourselves, but to know ourselves without deception and to invite the Spirit to close the gap between how we interact with the world and our true self.

Very simply, take some time near the end of this week to review three experiences you had this week with three different people (e.g. a family member, a co-worker, a friend, your boss, etc.) in the presence of the Holy Spirit. As you call to mind each situation, reflect on the following questions. Remember, journaling could be helpful in this process because we write slower than we think; so journaling allows us to pay attention to more than we can by just thinking through it.

Where in this interaction did you hide yourself in the name of self-preservation? What are the signs that you were doing that? (e.g. embarrassment, feeling caught, guilt, shame, fear, anxiety, etc.)
What were you hiding and how did you hide it?
Our surface motive is usually to cover or hide yourself in order to avoid conflict or attention, to hide a mistake, to be seen as good/right, etc. But there are deeper, purer motives and aches in us when we do this. Sometimes we are wanting to belong, to fit in, to be loved, or to be accepted. What was your deeper motive in hiding?
Looking back on this interaction, how would things have played out if you stayed in your true self?

Spend some time in prayer, acknowledging where you attempted to cover yourself. And then invite the Holy Spirit to meet that deeper ache in you and ask him to be your covering.

End in Prayer

Close your time together by asking for God to continue speaking your belovedness or true self over each of you. Invite him to reveal how your false self is getting in the way and ask him to gently guide you deeper into your true self.

Tyler Hanns 5/15/22 Tyler Hanns 5/15/22

Hearing God’s Voice

Before working through this Guide, make sure that everyone has caught up through the teaching on May 15, 2022.

Take Communion

Read This Overview Aloud Together

As we continue the practice and pattern of learning what God’s voice sounds like by what he has already said and done in the pages of the Scriptures, our next task is to begin learning how he speaks uniquely to each of us. Simply put, God knows how we hear his voice, so he will speak to us in a language we understand. In Psalm 139, David declares that God knit us together in our mothers’ wombs, so God is intimately aware of every single part of us, even more than we are of ourselves.

God made us as integrated beings. Think about how we listen and interact in conversations, as we interpret them in our bodies: leaning in to hear more, eye contact or lack thereof, smiling or scowling, feeling elated or frustrated. Words only make up part of how we understand what people are saying. We watch facial expressions and body language, listen for tone and inflection, note each time they reach out to put a hand on our shoulder or how much distance they keep.

And because we are not just spirits, because we are embodied, our conversations with God will work this way too: when God is speaking to us, we interpret or understand it in our bodies. God will use bodily sensations, an image in our mind, a sense or feeling, an emotional stirring, a memory, or whatever it takes to get our attention so that he can tell us of our belovedness. His words will ground themselves in our bodies.

In the Bible, which is our guardrail and guide in learning God’s voice, we find two foundational and core principles to hold while learning to hear God: 1) more than anything God, our Beloved, longs for us to know our belovedness, and 2) that God wants us to hear him more than we want to hear him.

Oftentimes, the best place to begin learning how God speaks to us individually is by answering the question: Where do you most come alive? Whether it’s out in nature or at home baking, exploring new places or going back to familiar ones, being active or still, journaling or running, we can understand this “aliveness” as something we were made to enjoy, as God’s pleasure in us. The places in you that were designed to come alive are the places where our access to God is most uninhibited. That sense of “aliveness” is often how God is training you to hear his voice. For us to learn to pay attention to what he’s saying, we must, like Jesus, withdraw to these solitary places to be with and engage God (Luke 5v16). This week, we want to begin exploring how God has designed us to hear his voice and to practice doing just that.

Discuss The Following Questions

Have you heard God speak to you? Where in your imagination, body, or emotions have you heard him speak? (e.g. maybe you’ve seen an image in your imagination, felt a warmth in your chest, literally seen a bone be mended, etc.)
What makes it hard for you to trust that what you’re hearing is actually God’s voice? How can you know?
Where do you come alive? How can you look for the ways God speaks to you while you’re in those places or doing those things?

Do This Practice Tonight

Two common barriers that come up for us in learning how God speaks are 1) constantly surrounding ourselves with noise and 2) not knowing what to actually expect God to say.

Much of the time, trying to hear God speak in our lives is like trying to hear someone tell us a story at a concert – there’s just too much going on. For this reason, Jesus often removed himself from the crowds and the busyness and got alone to be with God. We can hear God’s voice more clearly as we allow our outer world to quiet and our inner world to still.

Which leads to the other problem: Sometimes we don’t get quiet because we aren’t sure what God is going to say. Whether conscious or not, we feel like he is disappointed or angry with us. But, in Jesus, we learn that God wants to invite us into friendship with him, he wants us to hear how much he loves us. And as we learn to expect and to trust that, learning to hear him will feel a bit more approachable.

Solitude is the practice of removing ourselves from the noise and learning to hear God whisper our belovedness. So tonight, even though we’re not able to really practice Solitude, we do want to practice listening for God to whisper our belovedness. We will do this by reading and reflecting on Jesus’ interaction with Zacchaeus, a tax collector whose house he invited himself over to have dinner. (Leader’s Note: It can be helpful to read all of the following directions out loud to the group before beginning, so each person knows where the exercise is going.)

1. Settle in & Welcome the Holy Spirit – Go ahead and settle in and get comfortable. It could help to position yourself into an open or receiving posture (e.g. hands open on your lap, eyes closed, feet on the ground or crossed in front of you). Once you’re ready to begin, invite the Spirit to reveal to each person what God is like as you read Jesus’ words. Invite his creativity to stir your imaginations and his comfort to meet each of you.

2. Read Luke 19v1–10 – Next, slowly read Luke 19v1–10 out loud, holding a brief silence afterwards.

3. Read Again, But Put Yourself in Zacchaeus’ Place – Before you read it again, say this to your Community: In Jewish tradition, inviting someone to eat with you was a way of inviting them into friendship. So, as we read through this story again, try to put yourself in Zacchaeus’ place. As you imagine the story, watch the way Jesus approaches you and speaks to you, hear his tenderness, and receive God’s invitation to you of deep friendship.

4. Hold Silence – After the second reading, spend a minute or two in silence as each person dialogues with God. Some may choose to write in their journals or make a note in their phone.

5. Process Together – Finally, after spending sufficient time in silent prayer and reflection, break the silence by thanking God for speaking and revealing himself. After ending this prayer, open a conversation about what stirred in you during that time. Whether profound or totally normal, did anyone hear God whisper their belovedness? What did it sound or feel like?

Read The Practice for the Week Ahead

For the week ahead, there are two Practices to try:

1. Practice Understanding Delight as God’s Pleasure: We want to end where we began: Where do most come alive? This is the question to consider as you plan out your Practice for the week ahead. Spend some time processing that question with the Spirit, being sure to not over-spiritualize it. Once you’ve landed on something, or at least on something to try, make some Solitude time to go to that place and/or to do that thing. Give it however much time you can and repeat it often, remembering that the longer we’re able to practice doing something – in this case hearing God’s love for us – the better we get at it.

While you’re in the place or doing the activity, take a moment to ask the Spirit to translate the “aliveness” that you feel as God’s pleasure and delight over you, as God whispering to you your belovedness. Invite the Spirit to remind you that his base emotion towards you is delight. He longs to be with you, to spend time with you, to teach you to hear his voice. And then just be in the moment; feel the warmth of his deep love towards you.

2. Begin and End Your Day With Truth: Secondly, we can practice hearing God whisper our belovedness by beginning and ending each day with an outloud declaration that reminds us about and trains our minds to dwell on what is true. For example, try beginning each day by saying: Before anything has happened today, I am God’s beloved son/daughter. And try ending each day by saying: Even after all that happened today, I am still God’s beloved son/daughter. After making each declaration, pause for a moment and ask God to root that truth deep inside you.

End in Prayer

Close your time together asking for God to remind you that he delights to whisper our belovedness. Invite him to continue doing so and to draw your attention to it in various moments. Thank him that his affection for us is trustworthy.

Tyler Hanns 5/1/22 Tyler Hanns 5/1/22

Learning God’s Voice

Before working through this Guide, make sure that everyone has caught up through the teaching on May 1, 2022.

Take Communion

Read This Overview Aloud Together

What does God’s voice sound like? And how can you even know? Why does it often feel so difficult to know what God is saying (or if he’s even saying anything at all)? These are some of the most important, confusing questions we can ask in our apprenticeship to Jesus. In John 10, Jesus tells a crowd of curious onlookers that his sheep know his voice. This would suggest that as we grow in discipleship to him, we will also grow in being able to recognize and know his voice. But, if that’s the case, where do we start?

The Bible is a collection of scrolls spanning well over a thousand years that exists as God’s self-revelation to us; meaning, we can learn what God’s voice sounds like by learning what God has already said. In the same way that you can learn the way somebody talks by reading their memoirs, you can study the cadence of their voice by listening to their podcasts, and explore their passions and interests by being close to them, we can learn what God is like by meditating on the Scriptures.

In fact, in his letter to the church in Colossae, Paul writes that Jesus “is the image of the invisible God.” This means that we can understand what God himself is like as we read about, study, and meditate on the stories of Jesus in the Gospels. Jesus, we find, reveals to us what God thinks about us and how God sounds. Through Jesus, we learn significant truths in discerning God’s voice, things like: God’s purpose for us is always “life to the full,” whereas the enemy only ever “comes to steal, kill, and destroy.” So, we conclude, if the voice we’re hearing leads to fear, guilt, or shame, it will always belong to the enemy. God’s voice as revealed through the life of Jesus, though, may bring conviction, but it will always have within it a way forward, a way back into life. The enemy is for our death; God is for our life.

There are so many other truths about God’s voice hidden in and revealed through the life of Jesus – he is tender and compassionate towards us; he is patient and slow to anger; he does not want any to be lost and goes out of his way to find each person; disease and death are always his enemy; and more. The lifelong task ahead of us is to mine the depths of the Scriptures for the treasures revealed there about what God’s voice is like, and to practice again and again to hear God’s voice, to know his will, and to live life to the full.

Discuss The Following Questions

Why would it matter whether or not we can hear God’s voice? What benefit is there in it? Why would God want us to know his voice?
Do you have (or have you had) a rhythm with reading, studying, or meditating on the Scriptures in your discipleship? What is (or was) that? And what do (or did) you notice it do in your life?
What kinds of things or themes have you heard God say to you (or through you to other people)? How do you know they were from God? How do those themes connect with how he reveals himself in the Bible?

Do This Practice Tonight

In Psalm 119, David prays, “I have hidden your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you.” Hiding God’s word in our hearts by meditating on it, excavating it for truth, and (with the help of the Holy Spirit) applying it to our lives, is the way that we follow Jesus. When we study God’s voice, we are more likely to know what his voice sounds like in each moment and less likely to fall prey to the evil around us – which seeks to kill, steal, and destroy.

Tonight, we are going to practice learning what God’s voice is like by meditating together on a parable Jesus tells the Pharisees and Teachers of the Law in order to reveal something about the character of God. (Leader’s Note: It can be helpful to read all of the following directions out loud to the group before beginning, so each person knows where the exercise is going.)

2. Read Luke 15v1–7 & Keep Silence Three Times – Next, slowly read Luke 15v1–7 out loud three times, being sure to spend a minute or two in silence between each reading. This silence will give space for the Spirit to bring the story to life in your imagination, to reveal to you what God is like, and to speak anything else he has in mind to say.

3. Thank God & Discuss – Finally, after spending sufficient time in silent prayer and reflection, break the silence by thanking God for speaking and revealing himself. After ending this prayer, open a conversation about what God revealed. If conversation feels stuck, feel free to use the following questions.

What stood out to you in the story Jesus told?
What was Jesus trying to reveal about God? Is this different from what you assumed? Is this different from your personal experience with him?
How might you pray differently in the future with these attributes of God in mind?

Read The Practice for the Week Ahead

If it’s true that we can learn what God’s voice sounds like through what he’s already said and done, we want to be people who soak themselves in the Bible. Tonight, we practiced meditating on Scripture through contemplative reading. Another way to meditate on Scripture is memorization, which is a way of getting Scripture so deeply into your mind and soul that it is what surfaces in moments where you feel stuck or at a loss for how to pray or think. Whether through contemplative reading or memorization, the invitation this week is to meditate on one of the following passages:

Psalm 130
Isaiah 43v1-3
John 15v1-8
Philippians 2v5-11

Begin Your Day With a Quick Meditation: This week, start your day out by slowly reading or reciting one of the above passages three times. Each time you do, draw your attention to what it reveals about God and what he sounds like. Ask yourself: What does this passage reveal to us about what God is like? How does this inform what his voice will sound like to me?

Reflect On These Truths at Normal Parts of Your Day: Then, set aside normal moments in your day to remember these themes and ask God to help you live in light of them – moments like the short walk from your car into the office, the final moments of your child’s naptime, as you ride your bicycle home, as you make dinner or eat your lunch, as you walk to your next class, as you brush your teeth, etc. Doing this will help us to connect what we are learning about God into the normal and mundane parts of our lives; it trains us to look for God in each moment.

End in Prayer

Close your time together by asking for God to help you all become better students of his voice, learning to grasp how wide, long, high, and deep Christ’s love is for you and our world.

Tyler Hanns 4/11/22 Tyler Hanns 4/11/22

Maundy Thursday

Overview

On the night before Jesus was killed, he had one final dinner with his disciples in which he would sum up much of his life’s message and teaching with a symbolic practice. Jesus — ever the master of using parables to illustrate and emphasize various truths about God, humanity, and the evil one — would use these last moments not to tell one final parable, but to enact one. He would model for his disciples, and for us, exactly what God’s posture towards us was like in sending the incarnation and exactly what our posture, then, must be towards those around us. While this practice dealt with power, it didn’t do so in a way anyone expected.
“Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God…” This was John’s build up to the moment: Jesus knew he had all power and authority, he knew his source and his destiny. At this point, as the reader, we might expect Jesus to stand up and give a rousing speech or lift a sword to the heavens, shout some war cry, or set some covert plan in place to take down Rome — but this isn’t what Jesus does in response to his certainty and strength. Instead, we read that Jesus rose from the meal, only to remove his coat, wrap a towel around his waist, and then kneel before each disciple, washing their feet each in turn.
The Maundy in Maundy Thursday comes from the Latin word maundatum, meaning command, and references the statement Jesus makes moments after he washes his disciples’ feet, when he seems to explain what he was doing: “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” Tonight, we will reenact Jesus’ symbolic gesture together by washing each other’s feet, as a way of remembering God’s love for us and embodying the love he calls us to have for one another.

Take Communion

Before moving onto foot washing, take a moment to read John’s account of this story and take Communion together (whether the symbolic elements or a full meal). As the elements are passed out or plates are dished up, have someone read John 13v1-17 out loud.

Practice for Tonight

Tonight, we will be symbolically washing each others’ feet to remember God’s love for us and our call to love each other. Below you will find some helpful details to keep in mind.

Supplies: Make sure you have the following items.

Some sort of pitcher or large cup or bowl filled with warm water
Some sort of bucket or bin in which to catch the poured out water
A few towels with which to dry feet (and perhaps one on the ground below the bucket or bin)

Process: The Community Leader will be “washing” the feet of each person in your Community. If your Community has co-Leaders, they can split the washing and then wash each other’s feet. If not, select someone who will wash the Leader’s feet at the end. When you’re ready and everyone understands the order, here’s how it works:

To maintain an atmosphere of worship, invite everyone to remain quietly reflective and play some sort of worship or instrumental music. We made a playlist that you are welcome to use.
Have the person whose feet are being washed sit in a chair with their feet in the bin or bucket.
The Leader will “wash” their feet by simply pouring the warm water from the pitcher over their feet.
The Leader will then take a towel and dry the person’s feet.
Repeat steps 2 – 4 until every person has had their feet washed.

Reflection

John’s telling of this story seems to suggest that Jesus washes the disciples’ feet without saying a word until he gets to Peter, who was likely increasingly uncomfortable and embarrassed as he watched his Rabbi move from person to person, getting closer and closer. You may have experienced some similar level of discomfort or awkwardness as you awaited your turn. What was your experience like as you waited, as it happened, and afterwards? Did you notice anything interesting come up in you? (e.g. feelings of unworthiness, humility, honor, love, etc.)
Why do you think Jesus chose foot washing as his enacted parable to teach us to love each other?
Was it easier for you to wash someone’s feet or to have your own feet washed? Why do you think that was?
Foot washing was Jesus’ symbol for radically loving people. What is some way in which you could radically love a person or people in your life in response to his radical love for you?

Practice for the Week Ahead

For the week ahead, spend some intentional time reflecting on God’s love for you and ask the Spirit what you could do to radically love those around you. As you listen, do so ready to respond to what it is you sense him saying. Invite the Spirit to not just speak to you, but to empower you to love the way Jesus did.

Close in Prayer

Before you end your time together, pray, thanking God for his love and asking for his empowering presence to love others in the same way. Take some time to pray for other prayer requests as they come up.

Kylee Logan 2/27/22 Kylee Logan 2/27/22

Lenten Fasting Guide

This Guide is designed to help you more fully participate in the Lenten season through a better understanding of the context of Lent and the practice of fasting.

Overview of Lent & Lenten Fasting

Lent refers to the 40 day period that leads up to Easter, beginning on Ash Wednesday. Corresponding to Jesus’ 40 day fast (Matthew 4), this season was firmly established in the early church by the fourth century to be an intentional season of fasting and renewal. Originally used as a time to prepare new followers of Jesus to be baptized on Easter, Lent was eventually observed by the entire church as a way of recognizing the need for God’s transforming work in us all through prayer, fasting, self-examination, repentance, and meditation on Scripture. Lent witnesses to the power and beauty of our union with Christ and to the daily dying and rising with Christ that this entails.

One of the primary ways that we lean into the observance of Lent is through the practice of fasting. While fasting allows us to enter into the suffering of Jesus, it is also meant to draw and center our hearts on the deeper gift we receive through his death, burial, and resurrection. Simply put, fasting is a way to place ourselves in the way of grace by withdrawing our reliance on earthly things so that we can feast on God’s presence and power. It is an ancient practice of giving up superficial desires to get in touch with our deepest desires.

Lenten fasting begins on Ash Wednesday (March 2) and ends on Easter (April 17). Lenten fasting differs, however, from traditional fasting in that Lent observes “feasting days.” In the Lenten fast, every Sunday remains a day of feasting, in which we pause our fast as a way of stirring up hope for what is to come — our celebration of the resurrection of Jesus on Easter Sunday. So, in Lent we fast and feast as a way of anticipating Jesus’ gift of life.

Participating In the Lenten Fast

The purpose of fasting during Lent is to abstain from things like food, drink, or certain routine actions in order to remind us that only God can truly satisfy our soul-level hunger. We fast from things that bring us comfort in order to feast on God’s presence. Work through the following steps to discern how you will be participating in Lent this year.

Consider the following questions. Take some time to process or journal through the following questions. Pay attention to any invitation you sense from the Spirit.

Have I become dependent on something other than God to attend to the deeper aches of my soul?
What do I use to find pleasure, comfort, or emotional regulation?
What conveniences am I conditioned to automatically use? (e.g. elevators or escalators
instead of stairs, close parking spaces, music/podcasts in the background, etc.)
What could I abstain from that might help draw my attention to my deeper need for
Jesus?

Consider the following list. Below, you will find some frequent things people fast from in the season of Lent. Pay attention to any invitation you sense from the Spirit.

● Foods that are generally associated with feasting: chocolate, all desserts, coffee, caffeine, alcohol, meat, bread, etc.

● Media or Entertainment: cell phone apps, television, a streaming service, movies, radio or music in the car, computer at home, video games, social media, etc.

● Habits and Comforts: shopping (online and/or in stores), using elevators instead of stairs, parking in a spot close to the store, finding the shortest checkout line, surfing the internet when bored, etc.

Spend some time in prayer. Deciding what to fast from doesn’t have to be or feel incredibly ascetic or heavy; it is not meant to be a way of punishing yourself. A Lenten fast is about a fuller experience of our union with God through the death and resurrection of Jesus. So use your responses to the questions and the lists above to spend some time in prayer with the Spirit. Ask Jesus and yourself: What am I being invited into? Pick something you will notice the absence of, but not something that will genuinely cause you suffering.

Finally, commit it to God and share it with others. After deciding what you will be fasting or abstaining from this Lenten season, commit it to Jesus. This could look like journaling about it, writing it on a sticky note to keep on your bathroom mirror, or remembering it in prayer each morning. However you choose, it’s important to enter this journey with clarity and commitment around what God is inviting you to do. Once you’ve committed it to God, share it with your Community and/or a close friend who is also participating in Lent. We do not share as a form of accountability, but as a way to celebrate God’s invitations to us. Continue to celebrate and share with them throughout the Lenten season what you sense the Spirit is doing in and through each of you.

Tyler Hanns 2/20/22 Tyler Hanns 2/20/22

Teach Us To Pray, Pt. 8: For All The Nations

Communion

At some point in your gathering spend a moment taking communion together, whether as a full meal together or some version of the bread and the cup. If you don’t have a plan already, you can have someone read the following passage we’ve provided below and spend a moment in silence before continuing:

Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one.
Yours is the Kingdom and the power
and the glory forever. Amen

Overview

Very simply, spiritual formation is the process of becoming more and more like Jesus for the sake of the world. We are not merely saved from something, but into something. God writes our story in conjunction with all of creation — our neighbors, friends, family, the environment, animals, our enemies, trees, insects. In the Scriptures, God’s eventual vision is for something called New Creation. We read in the Scriptures not about a planet and people who get scrapped at the end, but about everything being made new. One day, when Jesus returns to reclaim and redeem our world, to be made King, we will all be raised again — not into some ethereal immaterial Heaven with harps on clouds, but into our world made whole. We will rise with physical bodies to inhabit our world, but not as we know it now. There will be no more tears and no more pain and no more evil, we will be in bodies with minds and souls no longer corrupted by the fall. We will live in eternity in perfect relationship with God, others, and all of creation.

This week, we want to remember that our formation should have global consequences. And one of the ways in which we partner with God as he makes all things new is prayer.

Discussion

Prayer is an active form of mission. It changes reality around us and moves God’s to action. How do these ideas change the way you think about prayer?
How could believing that God could change things on a global scale when you pray change the way you pray?
What might God be inviting you to pray for individually or as a Community?

Practice for Tonight

Tonight, we want to take some time to pray together on behalf of our world. Spend particular time praying for those on the margins (as Jesus and the prophets in the Old Testament did): Pray for those with different socioeconomic experiences as you; for those who speak different languages than you; for those impacted by violence or displaced by natural disasters; for those who don’t know Jesus; for those who experience the imbalance of a particular system. Pray where God leads you to pray.

And as you pray, remember that prayer is conversation. God wants to speak to you, even as you are speaking to him. So take special care to listen for God’s invitation to you or your Community. Where is he calling you to become the answers to your own prayers? Where could he be inviting you to join him on the margins (individually or as a Community)? As you ask God to intervene and to do something, is he also asking you to intervene and do something as well?

Practice for the Week Ahead

Lent is the 40 day period that leads up to Easter and begins next week on Ash Wednesday (March 2). Historically, Lent is observed by fasting from something for those 40 days, except for Sundays, which serve to remind us of the resurrection of Jesus which will be celebrated on Easter. Traditionally, people fast from indulgences like alcohol, chocolate, meat, dessert, etc.

That said, the day before the Lenten fast begins is called Shrove Tuesday, or Fat Tuesday (March 1). This is a feast day on the church calendar, in which people get together to celebrate all that God has done as they prepare to fast the 40 days before Easter.

As we enter Lent as a church, we want to invite everyone into the feast and the fast!

If your Community does not meet on Tuesday, this may change the way you meet for a week, but if you’re able, we’d love to invite you to participate by meeting up on Shrove Tuesday and feasting together. But not just any feast! Have a feast that includes all the things that people will be fasting from (or things that are symbolic of what people are fasting from) for the Lenten season. Realistically, this may be a meal made up of desserts, bread, alcohol, meat, and fatty foods, so feel free to round it out with other foods as well. While it’s obviously not an excuse to overindulge, it is certainly a time to celebrate.

Spend time this week sitting with the Spirit and having a conversation about what it is you want to be fasting from during the Lenten season. Once you pick something from which to fast, plan to bring it (or something that symbolizes/references it) to next week’s Community to share with everyone!

After that, we would love to have your Community join us on Wednesday (March 2) for our Ash Wednesday gathering.

Close in Prayer

Before you end your time together, pray, asking the Spirit of God to fill and empower you to pray as you can. Take some time to pray for other prayer requests as they come up.

Tyler Hanns 2/13/22 Tyler Hanns 2/13/22

Teach Us To Pray, Pt. 7: Search Me & Know Me

Communion

Overview

Confession is good for the soul, but it can be very hard to do. It is also a terrifying gift, which should sound like a contradiction because it is. We live in a world that is invested in looking like good, moral people. After all, appearing good is one way of dealing with the notion that something is wrong with us. We can put a great deal of energy into maintaining that image, but this very appearance of goodness can be a way we defend ourselves against our sin. When we can’t see our sin we have nothing to confess. The truth is that we all sin, and when shame, guilt, or fear consume our minds, we tend to hide. We’ve somehow universally agreed to sort out our issues in private and keep up appearances in public, which is a tragic mis-step because hiding is an agonizing lie.

So, what’s the only alternative to hiding? It’s the refusal to hide, the terrifying insistence on exposing ourselves to God. That’s the only way to open ourselves up to unconditional love. The curse of sin doesn’t have to define us, even when we make the most massive mess. It’s in that moment of realizing what we’ve done, that we get to run to the Father. The gift from our Creator is that grace, not sin, defines us. And that’s the power of confession. God takes our worst moments and turns them into our triumphs.
In the practice of confession, we excavate down into the layers of our life, uncovering beyond what is obvious on the surface and deeper into the story of our own history.

The reward of believing in grace and practicing confession is that the parts of our stories we most want to edit or erase all together become the very parts of our stories we’d never take back and never stop telling. That’s the kind of author God is: Not an editor, but a Redeemer. He only works with rough drafts, but he only writes redemption stories.

Discussion

What has your experience or practice with confession looked like? Where has it been difficult or not used well? Where have you seen it bring joy, compassion, or even greater self-awareness?
What would help create a safe space or person when it comes to confession? What would take away from a space or person being safe when you think about confessing.
At the heart of God is the desire to give and to forgive. What might God want to give you through the practice of confession? What would you want to receive? (e.g. greater intimacy with God, greater compassion for others, greater knowledge of self, etc.)

Practice for Tonight

Remember that a healthy person is not a person with no sin, it’s a person with no secrets. As you spend time discussing tonight, use the following four layers of sin (used by the early church) as a framework to guide your process.

Blatant – These are sins universally recognized within both secular culture and the Kingdom of God. (e.g. acting on feelings of rage, lust, greed, etc.)
Deliberate — These are sins (usually outward, behavioral sins) recognized in the Kingdom of God, but not within the broader, secular culture. (e.g. sexual expression outside of marriage, overindulgence of food or alcohol, marijuana use, etc.)
Unconscious — The sins are deeper thought patterns that lead or give birth to expressed sin. (e.g. prioritization of productivity over people, codependency, being defined by success, etc.)
Inner Orientations — This category reminds us that sin reveals who or what we really trust. Searching here reveals the motivations behind our actions. (e.g. security, power, control, affection, pleasure, approval, etc.)

Split up into same gender triads. Use the next chunk of time to split into smaller groups and confess to one another the ways that you have failed to love God and others. This could be something you shared on Sunday when you came down for response time or something else. As a way of honoring one another’s privacy and comfort level, you may want to simply share one word or phrase that sums up what you’re wanting to confess (e.g. lust, jealousy, gossip, resentment, rage, over-indulgence, pride, etc.).

Keep in mind that this is not the time to provide counsel, advice, or share a connected personal story. Simply hear the confession, anything else they want to share about it, and then bless them in their honesty before God and others by praying a simple prayer over and with them. Your triad gets to host a space to offer grace, while God is the one who extends forgiveness.

Also, keep in mind that nothing that gets shared in your Triad should be shared outside of it. What is being shared is vulnerable and sacred, so please respect the trust being given by not sharing it with anyone else (even spouses or others in the Community). If something that is shared involves a threat of harm to self or other people, it is appropriate to privately share that concern with a Community or pastor.

Practice for the Week Ahead

Set aside some time for confession and self-examination. In the presence of God ask for light to pierce your defenses. Then consider asking, Who have I injured or sinned against through thoughtlessness, neglect, anger, or so on? As the Holy Spirit brings people to mind, confess your feelings to God. Ask God to forgive you and if need be to give you grace to forgive them. Write an apology, make a phone call or confess out loud, and ask God for help and wisdom to move forward.
Read through Psalm 139 or Psalm 51 or James 5. Be still before God and ask Him to breathe new life into you as you confess your need and dependence on him. Take some time to pray that God would help you desire honesty, which leads to confession, which leads to change.

Close in Prayer

Before you end your time together, pray, asking the Spirit of God to fill and empower you to pray as you can. Take some time to pray for other prayer requests as they come up.

Tyler Hanns 2/6/22 Tyler Hanns 2/6/22

Teach Us To Pray, Pt. 6: Our Daily Bread

Communion

Overview

Many of us feel comfortable singing out to God in praise or asking God to intervene in other people’s lives, but we can get hung up on asking him to do something in our lives. For some, this is connected to an altruistic false humility, but for others it’s rooted in a fear of what might happen if I ask and God doesn’t do it. There are all kinds of psychology and personality structures involved in why we don’t ask. And yet, Jesus insists on it.

There seems to be a correlation between the flowery and formal language of our prayers and our asking God for immaterial, ethereal things. But when the language we use in our prayers stays grounded, our prayers tend to stay grounded too. The example of what to ask for that Jesus uses when he teaches his disciples to pray is bread — which means that God intimately acquaints and involves himself with the normal and most basic details of our life. There is nothing too ordinary in our life to ask God about — parking spaces, our next meal, a job promotion, a good grade, or relationship help. Jesus unmistakably rips prayer out of the sacred, stained-glass, ornate walls of the Temple and places it in the commonness of everyday life, which is likely another reason Jesus also said that we have to become like children if we are going to receive the Kingdom.

If you pray for only big things, exclusively limiting your conversation with God to the objectively noble requests, you live a cramped spiritual life, with little room for the actual God we meet in Jesus. The kind of prayer Jesus had in mind roots us in gratitude instead of control, and moves us deeper into an empowering relationship with God. This week, we want to practice stepping deeper into this empowering relationship with God by praying in a way that wages war on control and plants seeds of gratitude in our soul.

Discussion

Do you find it easier to ask God for big things or small things? Why do you think that is?
What do you think might happen if you begin to ask for the things that feel harder? What risk is involved?
Have you experienced the growth in gratitude and shrinking of the need for control that comes as you pray? Describe that.

Practice for Tonight

As has already been mentioned, praying for our daily bread the way Jesus taught us to can feel odd for some. With the understanding that it likely comes more naturally to some people, we want to practice praying some daily bread prayers together. This will be done in a few simple movements:

If you’re able, break into smaller groups of 3 or 4 people.
Once you’re in these smaller groups, have someone open your prayer time by welcoming the Spirit and asking him to begin to quiet your minds and to tune you into the needs in your life right now.
Then, one by one, begin to pray and ask God for the needs that arise. It doesn’t need to be flowery or formal or long, but could sound as simple as, “God, would you help me on my test this Friday.” or “Jesus, help me figure out when to call and check in on my brother this week.” or “My week feels really full and I know that I’ll need a moment to rest sometime. Can you give me time to do that?” or “God, I don’t know how I’m going to pay rent this month. Could you please make a way?”
End your time together by praying out in gratitude to God, believing as best you can that he heard each prayer and longs to respond to you.

Practice for the Week Ahead

This week, challenge yourself to ask for God’s help or intervention in the small areas of life.

Pray when your setting changes — One option would be to ask God each time your setting changes. For example, if you work at an office, when you wake up you could ask God to help guide your day, then you could ask God while you’re eating breakfast to give you the energy you need for everything going on, then you could pray for a safe journey or parking spot in the car, then you could pray for your meetings at work. Or, if you’re a stay at home parent, you could begin your day the same, but each time you and your child move on to a different activity, you could ask God to bless your communication with each other, your attitudes, that a certain child would be at the park, that nap time would go well, and that you’ll have a really good moment of connection with your child. You can try to pray at each of these changes, or you could pick one that you want to focus on for the week, in which you take a moment to ask God for everything on your mind (e.g. your commute, waking up, lunch time, etc.)

Pray when your feelings change — Another option, for those more in tune with their emotions, is to pray in line with your emotional changes. If you find yourself becoming anxious about something (e.g. a doctor’s appointment, grocery shopping, company coming over, etc.), pause and ask God what you need in that moment. If you find yourself wanting or hoping for something, translate that into prayer. If you find yourself joyful, pause to thank God for providing for your needs in that moment.

Pray out of gratitude — One way to learn to ask God for what you need is to thank him for the ways he’s already met your needs. Whether at meal times or as a way of reflecting on your day each evening, thank God for the ways in which he has met your needs. Then take a moment to think to the next day or part of your day and let these things guide you in asking him for what you might need next.

Close in Prayer

Before you end your time together, pray, asking the Spirit of God to fill and empower you to pray as you can. Take some time to pray for other prayer requests as they come up.

Tyler Hanns 1/30/22 Tyler Hanns 1/30/22

Teach Us To Pray, Pt. 5: Holy Spirit Conference Reflection

Communion

Overview

This Guide will function differently than the others in this series because we believe that God did something significant and beautiful and the Holy Spirit Conference. So we want to spend our time together tonight reflecting on the Holy Spirit Conference.

While the questions are specifically aimed at those who went to the Holy Spirit Conference or one of Sunday gatherings that followed, we acknowledge that the Spirit is not contained by any single gathering, so others are welcome to share their experience of what God’s been doing in their lives during this time. Either way, testimony is a way of asking God to do it again. So spend some time reflecting on the ways God moved in you, our church, and our city this last weekend.

Discussion

Where did you see God move? What are you celebrating?
What did God do in you? What changed in you?
What were you asking God for? Did you sense him answer you in any way?
What hopes were ignited in your for Bridgetown, your family, our city, yourself, or some other are?
What did God do through you? Did you get to participate in anything the Spirit was up to this weekend in someone else’s life?
With all of this in mind, how would you try to name what God did in our church this weekend?
What’s next? Do you sense the Spirit giving you a prophetic imagination for what he might be up to in the coming season?

Close in Prayer

Before you end your time together, pray, asking the Spirit of God to fill and empower you to pray as you can. Take some time to pray for other prayer requests as they come up.

Tyler Hanns 1/23/22 Tyler Hanns 1/23/22

Teach Us To Pray, Pt. 4: The Lord’s Prayer, Pt. 2

Communion

Overview

Prayer is a compelling wonder: God acting on earth in response to conversation with a human being. And yet, prayer is also a confounding mystery: God doesn’t seem to always do what we want when we pray. So, for many, our prayers live paralyzed between wonder and mystery, which can result in our prayers being safe and somewhat passive. In this confusion we can stop praying, let alone praying boldly.

But prayer is also a profound invitation. The Scriptures tell the story of God partnering with humans in managing his creation. More than just giving God a to do list, prayer is the way by which we relationally partner with God to rule and reign in our world, to see his kingdom come and his will be done. In the midst of the communication breach brought about by the fall, prayer becomes the means by which we push back the curse that’s infected the world and infected us. See, while we dream of a God who brings heaven to earth, God simultaneously dreams of a praying people to share heaven with.

This week, we want to talk about and practice a particular type of prayer that involves praying on behalf of other people, called intercession. The motive behind all true intercessory prayer is love for the other. It is the distribution of God’s resources to those around us, as we rule and reign with him. Intercession restores our world and restores the God-given identity breathed into us first.

Discussion

Prayer is a compelling wonder (God’s hand moves to action when we pray), a confounding mystery (sometimes God doesn’t seem to hear us), and a profound invitation (God invites us to help distribute the resources of Heaven). Which of these help name your current experience with prayer?
What is your experience with intercession? Where have you experienced its fruit? (Perhaps you have seen God move through your own intercession. Maybe you’re being here is the result of someone else’s intercession.)
How are you feeling about the Prayer Room for the month of February?

Practice for Tonight

The Practice for tonight has two parts:

1. Pick an hour to go to the Prayer Room together — We would love to see every Community who is able spend one hour together in the Prayer Room during the month of February. Spend a few moments picking an available hour and having someone sign up at bridgetown.church/prayerroom.

2. Start praying together tonight — One of the goals of every Bridgetown Community is to be on mission in some way. Whether or not your Community has an active place that it is serving to see the renewal of our city, we would really encourage you to pray. We believe that prayer changes reality and moves God’s hand to action. It’s a way by which we partner with God to see his Kingdom come and his will be done in our lives and in our world. Because of this, we believe that prayer is a form of mission. Not only does prayer actively change the world, it also changes us: in prayer we can experience God’s invitation to become an answer to the exact prayers we were praying.

Take some time tonight for intercessory prayer. Begin to name the things in our city, in the lives of your neighbors, at your work, in your neighborhood, where you want to see God change reality — and ask him to do it. And, as you pray, also listen for God’s voice, to see if he is inviting you to participate in that distribution of Heaven’s resources.

Close in prayer, thanking God for what he is doing through your prayers and committing to continue praying for the renewal of our city.

Practice for the Week Ahead

The Practice for this week is also twofold:

1. Sign up for the Prayer Room — Not only do we want to see every Community sign up for an hour in the Prayer Room together, but we’d also love to see everyone who is able also sign up for their own slot to spend an hour in prayer alone. Sign up at bridgetown.church/prayerroom.

2. Begin an intercessory prayer rhythm — Consider setting aside some time this week to try interceding for your friends, family, coworkers, neighbors, or total strangers. Whether God brings people to your mind or whether you make a list, take some time and ask for the resources of Heaven on behalf of those in your life.

Close in Prayer

Before you end your time together, pray, asking the Spirit of God to fill and empower you to pray as you can. Take some time to pray for other prayer requests as they come up.

Tyler Hanns 1/16/22 Tyler Hanns 1/16/22

Teach Us To Pray, Pt. 3: The Lord’s Prayer, Pt. 1

Communion

Overview

When Jesus was on earth, he taught his disciples to pray the well-known and ancient prayer we have come to call “The Lord’s Prayer” or the “Our Father.” When Jesus taught his disciples about prayer, he didn’t tell them to pray more or to pray harder, but to pray differently. In doing so, he was showing them how to pray and offering them a model to follow in their own prayers.

During these next two weeks, we will be making our way through the Lord’s Prayer together. Jesus starts it out this way: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.” Simply understood, Jesus is teaching us to begin our prayers by remembering who we’re talking to. God is not a far off, distant Being in the sky. Instead, Jesus uses the word Father, which is meant to call our mind back to the physical and relational nearness of God to Adam and Eve in the Garden. He is asking us to remember that God is good and God is close.

When we remember how close and good God is to us, our only natural response is praise, which is why Jesus’ next line was, “Hallowed be your name.” Powerful prayer is born out of adoration. And as we learn throughout the rest of the New Testament, while hallowing God’s name is easy to do when you feel like it or when things are going well, it is most important and formative to do when it’s a choice—to pray defiantly when you are facing pain that feels impossible or a circumstance that feel inescapable.

Discussion

Is it difficult for you to pray prayers of adoration to God? If so, what are some of your barriers?
Where in your life do you need to pray “in defiance,” or to pray in a way that doesn’t match your current circumstance? Perhaps it feels like an impossible prayer for a loved one, a place of pain or suffering in your life, a situation at work, or something else entirely.
What do you think might change in your thinking, faith, and/or experience of God’s presence if you prayed in adoration of God and in defiance of your circumstance?

Practice for Tonight

Tonight we want to take some time to pray together the way Jesus invited us to. We will work through three movements: remembering who God is, remembering who we are, and remembering who we are to each other.

To begin, have everyone get comfortable and begin by welcoming the Spirit and spend a few moments in silence together. Proceed when you’re ready by reading each section out loud and then doing each in turn together.

Remember Who God Is: Our Father — For the first movement, we want to focus on who God is, remembering that Jesus began his prayer by calling God “our Father.” Spend some time praying together by having people spontaneously name who God is. This could sound like “God, thank you that you are our Defender.” or “Father, thank you that you are Healer.” or something about God as Creator, Father, Provider, Teacher, Redeemer, Savior, etc. As each person prays, invite the Spirit to show you what it means that God is each of these things. Reflect on the personal nature of each name and thank him for that.

Remember Who We Are: Beloved — Throughout the Scriptures, God calls us Beloved. He renames us according to our true identity, and not what we do or don’t do. For this next movement, read each of these verses aloud one at a time, pausing after each to let them sink in. If there is someone who feels comfortable sharing that they have a hard time receiving the promise one of the passages holds, your Community may want to pray for them and ask God to reveal their belovedness in a new way.

Colossians 1v13-14: “For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”
Romans 8v1: “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus…”
Ephesians 3v12: “In him and through faith in him we may approach God with freedom and confidence.”
2 Timothy 1v7: “For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-control.”

Remember Who We Are To Each Other: Sisters & Brothers — All through the Scriptures, followers of Jesus are referred to as sisters and brothers. We’re family. So for the third and final movement of the night, spend some time being open to people sharing their impossible prayers. Where do each of us need help praying in defiance adoration? As people are comfortable to share, bear their burden with them in prayer. Have someone ask God on behalf of each person who shares. Alternatively, if this process has stirred up faith in someone, and they feel compelled, invite people to share something that they believe about God, as a way of building up the faith of others in the room.

When your time is done, close in prayer, asking God to continue to remind you all who he is, who we are, and who we are to each other.

Practice for the Week Ahead

For the week ahead, there are a few options.

1. Remember Again — Maybe the Practice you did tonight was really helpful for some people and they want to repeat it. Simply follow the prompts again, changing them as you need and feel led.

2. Pray Scripture — Sometimes it is really helpful to pray another person’s words when you don’t know where to start, especially when you’re praying prayers of defiant adoration. Use Jesus’ prayer in Matthew 6v9-13 as a template to begin your own conversation with God. Or, perhaps use one of David’s Psalms (like Psalm 139) to start talking with God.

3. Look At Jesus — Sometimes we can get so lost in our circumstances and what we think we should be doing or praying or feeling that our connection in prayer feels somewhat fuzzy. Whether your find an artistic rendering of Jesus online or you simply imagine him, spend some time looking at him and spend some time remembering who he is, what first drew you to him, and what he might say to you were he physically with you.

Close in Prayer

Before you end your time together, pray, asking the Spirit of God to fill and empower you to pray as you can. Take some time to pray for other prayer requests as they come up.