potted proverbs: The main thing is the main thing

What kind of home group leader are you? A hippy, an engineer, a gardener or a schoolmaster?

Over the next few weeks I want to unpack (there's that word again!) some of the different leadership styles we may have, and try to work out what the pros and cons are.

Giving some thought to your style of leadership, and how you relate to others and just "be" with a group of people can be very instructive to working out your blind spots in making your home group go with a zing.

I asked the same question in a parenting seminar I ran with a friend a couple of years ago, and it opened my eyes to some dark truths about myself, and how I influence others.

Let me be up front. I pretty much default to Hippy mode when I'm with groups of people. I just love the journey so much, that I'm tempted to forget the destination. I think people in my homegroup have a great and memorable time, but I need to make sure that I have planned, prepared and have firmly fixed in my mind where we need to get to as we open God's word together.

Because, as I have written here, the key purpose of a home group is that we encourage one another with the Word of Christ. When we look at a passage of Scripture, it is God speaking to us - and he has something very important to tell us. It's important for us as leaders to be committed to that, because our social culture is pushing in exactly the opposite direction. Our culture values the  expressing of opinions and ideas and  does not like saying anybody is wrong - especially in matters of morality and spirituality.

But genuine Christian believers are committed to the truth of the Bible as God's Word. This is the only genuinely Christian position, because our master Jesus was committed to that too -  and a servant is not above his master. John 13:16. So we are committed to the belief that the truth of Scripture is objective. It is not about "what it means to me", but "what it means."[full stop]

That's why the Proverb of the title is so important for you, and for my fellow hippies in particular, as we lead a homegroup. Our job in preparation is to come to a conclusion about the main thing that the passage is saying, and to build our discussion, questions, and programme for the evening around the main thing. The main thing is the destination of our time together. Because it is what God is saying to us right now from the part of scripture we are looking at.

Hippy homegroup leaders may start with a destination in mind - albeit a vague one. But as we set out on the highway in our minibus to visit the doctor, we are intrigued by a sign that says "Museum of curiosities 5 miles" and turn off the road. And after spending some time there, we see a sign for "The world's best Cajun restaurant, 3 miles" and slide off in that direction for a while. And then we stop by a lake because it has a beautiful view, and we watch the sun set together. We had a great time. But we never made it to the doctor, and our problems remain un-diagnosed, un-treated and unresolved.

It can be the same with homegroups. We move from one interesting and absorbing distraction to another, and everyone has a great time. Except we never get to where we were going... If you are on holiday, that doesn't especially matter. But when the destination is hearing something really important that the creator of the universe, your saviour and Lord has to say to you, it is shockingly rude and disrespectful. The main thing is the main thing.


Preparation
Good preparation is always the key here. If you are writing the study yourself, come to a conclusion about the main point, and try to write a summary sentence for what the Bible study is about - your best hit at The Big Idea of the passage.

If you are using a published Bible-study guide, try to choose one that helps you with this. Some studies are just a series of questions that open up the content and logic of the passage, but do not try to focus down onto a single, central idea. The Good Book Guides are a good example of published guides that structure their studies this way.

That's not to say, of course, that you should deny the opportunity to look elsewhere as you work through a passage, and follow some interesting side roads for a while. Nor is it to say that, as you discuss the passage together, you may begin to see that the big idea is a little different from how your first saw it. But the truth is, that if you start without a destination, it is likely that you will end up going nowhere.

Potted proverbs: apply as you go

Lost in translation...

The conversation had been brisk and lively. We'd laughed, puzzled and provoked each other in our discussion. The leader glances at his watch, and bursts out:

"Oh Goodness, look at the time – just before we pray, how are we going to apply all this?"

I've already posted about my hatred of "The Big Bang" at the end of Home groups - when we disconnect what we have heard God say from how we pray to him. But the scene above is just as common in many groups and is just as damaging. (And yes - I was guilty of this for years, and am only just learning to repent of it!)

The problem is that we get so involved in understanding and pinning down the big ideas in the passage, or the theology or the doctrine that's contained in it, that we leave very little time to the application, so that it all happens in a rush at the end. Or to put it another way - it doesn't happen at all!

And there are some who think that this is the right thing to do. If we get our theology right, it is argued, then we will automatically live it out. If we so know and understand the truths of the gospel deep down in our hearts, then the life we are to live will just flow out from us.

Love the theory - but doubt the psychology, practicality and truth of it.

Others may argue that Bible studies should be all application, in other words that every little piece of scripture needs to be applied in detail as you read it.

Again, love the idea - but would probably run a mile from a home group like that.

Head, hearts and hands
As usual, the answer lies in the Bible's creative joining together of the two things, because in their pure form, the first leads to intellectual inaction; and the second to a scary "works religion". The key is to understand how our head and our hearts and our hands relate to each other.

In our culture, we are adept at splitting these three areas of our lives. We think one thing, feel and desire another, and do a third. I know that eating fatty bacon is a bad thing for my health and weight, I desire to be slim and "heart healthy" but, man, when the smell of bacon frying hits your nose in the morning, nothing but the pig will satisfy.

But in the Bible's understanding, these things belong together. When we understand the amazing grace that saved a wretch like me, we want to reach out to other wretches with the message that has brought us new life and forgiveness, and so we see others in a different way - we treat everyone as our equals, because we know we are all sinners for whom Christ died. The message of the Gospel is not do this and live; but you live because of Christ, therefore do this. How we live as believers is intimately connected with our God-shaped understanding of the world and who we are; it is gospel-centred living. It springs from the Gospel message.

Or to put it a posh way ortho-praxy (right living) always comes from orth-doxy (right belief).

socks go together (but please not with sandals)

Or to put it a less posh way - thinking and doing are like a pair of socks*. One is useless without the other. It's why Paul often wrote his letters in this way. A slab of amazing mind-bending theology up front (like Romans 1-11; or Ephesians 1-3), followed by a therefore, then or so (Ephesians 4:1; Romans 12:1), followed by loads of application. (Romans 12-14; Ephesians 3-6).

Back to the study
So, what this means is that we must never stop at studying theology - we must always take it on to application. Particularly as God also suggests that we will never properly understand the truth unless we start to live it out (see Philemon v 6). And that we will never live out our faith with joy if it becomes a gospel-less pattern of living (Colossians 2:22-23). And squeezing "a little bit of application" in at the end is never sufficient to do this.

The answer? You guessed it from the title. Apply as you go. When you have grasped a particular truth, pause to earth it in practical reality. Make it specific, and don't move on until you've grabbed it.

More on how to apply in due course.

* Got this lovely idea from some children's Bible studies I did with my kids called XTB. They're great - check them out here