Welcome to Sunday Fuel! This series of questions is designed to assist your personal reflection and fellowship with others about the sermon from this past Sunday.
Go to This Sunday’s Sermon (Starts at 27:00)
Pastor Kim defined freedom as “freedom in the gospel.” This is not simply the freedom to choose or merely the freedom to do whatever is not expressly forbidden in Scripture. Rather, it is the liberty we have to use our lives to honor God with how we live and love.
In response, ask God “how now should I live?” Pray that he would show you how your freedom in Christ leads you to use your liberties to love others. Below are two possible ways to apply this passage. Choose the one that is most appropriate for you.
“do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh”
- What are some of the gray areas in your life that you deal with? These can be controversial topics or simply everyday issues, like drinking, movies, music, dancing, gambling, clothing, voting/politics, boycotts, free time, how we use money or time, social media, Sunday observance, sharing gospel, designer items…
- What am I at liberty to do in this area?
- Examine your heart for selfishness. How might you be tempted to use your freedom in Christ as an opportunity for the flesh? How do you justify taking the liberty to fuel your own idols or pursue your own agenda?
- What would be the most loving thing to do in this area? What might the highest good for someone look like? This will be fleshed out more in the weeks to come, so try to come up with some ideas to start.
“through love serve one another”
- Think of someone who is difficult for you to love. Why is it so difficult?
- Pastor Kim points out the culprit behind our lack of love is not what they did to us, who they are, or how they act, but the selfish inward bent of our hearts. Consider:
- What idol are they threatening in your life: your sense of fairness, worth, comfort, etc.?
- How is your struggle to love giving an opportunity to the flesh, your passions or your desires? How is my lack of love for others really a greater love for myself?
- How is this attitude devastating and destructive to the body of Christ and its testimony?
- What might love look like in this relationship? What actions, words, choices might you make? This will be addressed more in future sermons but jot down some thoughts. How might loving this person, even if it means sacrifice and loss of our comforts or idols, be the best thing we can do?
Close your time thanking God for the freedom we have been granted in Christ. Meditate on the grace we have in the gospel:
- We have hope, freed from enslavement to sin, no longer required to do its bidding.
- We can love, freed from the inward bent to selfishness so we can love others sacrificially and generously.
- We find joy, no longer bound to the law and its many rituals and requirements.
