Dear Life / Cell group leader,

Hope your week has started well.  This is a quick reminder that we have our next small group leaders training night a week tomorrow (Tue 22^nd May at 8pm).  It’s on the 4 Ws and will include lots of ideas and discussion about each of those four elements of our Life / Cell group meetings (welcome, worship, Word and witness).  Please do remind your group this week and particularly encourage those that you feel are potential future leaders.

I also would like to ask you if you would be willing as a group to pray for a few of our teenagers currently sitting or about to sit exams please?  They are very keen to have this kind of prayer support and I have asked Jane Sanderson to allocate a few young people to each group and to email you all on Wednesday.  I hope that is ok with you all.

Finally, just a reminder that we have an Ascension Day service this Thursday at 8pm in the church.  Please do remind your groups too!

Thanks a lot,

Tom.

Studies on Resurrection Life!  for St Saviour’s Cell and Life Groups

Risen with Christ – Colossians 3:1-17                8/9/10 May

Tonight’s study is taken from Colossians, one of Paul’s letters from prison.  It is addressed to the Church in Colossae (a small town in a fairly wealthy area), but was probably intended to have been more widely read.  It was a church Paul had not founded and probably never visited.  This letter doesn’t rely on a personal relationship, and most of the teaching is directly applicable to the church today.

Welcome

Has there ever been a time in your life when you’ve stepped out in faith and it has ended up being much more than you hoped for?

Worship

Sing together or listen to All to Jesus I surrender and write on a piece of paper something you want to surrender. Sing the chorus again, then place the paper as an offering before a cross or in a basket.

Word – Colossians 3:1-17

3:1-4  – The Inclusion in Christ - United in resurrection

�         What does it mean to say ‘raised with Christ’?  Why does this impact how we direct our lives?

�         What are we to base our values on now? Note that the call to fix our eyes on heavenly things is not a call to see our earthly life as trivial, but to live it for the glory of God.  How is this to be accomplished?

3:5-9a – The Practical Consequences - Things to be left behind

�         What does Paul call us to ‘put to death’?  Why does he focus on these things? How do we hold 2:16-18 alongside these commands?

�         How do we now obey God’s commands?  What impact does this have on your priorities and behaviour?

3:9b-13 – The Universal Condition – Equality in our Position

�         Why does Paul emphasise the difference between the old self and the new self?  How does this unite all believers? Which distinctions does Paul break down? (Nationality; Ceremonial/Ritual; Cultured/Uncultured; Class)  Why is Paul so keen to reduce distinction?

�         Who does he say we are now (v.12)?  How do we as part of St Saviour’s and the wider church live together in light of this (v.12-13)?  What does the set of values Paul lists in v. 12-13 teach us about life together?

3:14-17 – The Bond of Christ – Love one another

�         Why does Paul single out love?  How do you respond to the idea of ‘clothing yourself with love’?

�         What do you make of ‘letting the peace of God be the decider (literally ‘umpire’) of your heart’?  How could you let this happen more?

�         What challenge do you find in v.17?  Are there things that you need to change in order to be able to do this?

Witness, Care and Prayer

�         Pray that St Saviour’s would be held together in love and peace. Pray that we would continue to love and serve one another.

�         Take time to hear if any of the group would appreciate God’s guidance in how they live. Pray for that specifically.  

Resurrection Life!