The Pursuit Of Purity

Goals for this Week’s Study:

  • Reflect on the Challenge from last weeks group meeting. (Knowing truth and obeying it gets you ready for battle. When you know the truth, it will set you free! Take this week and intentionally focus on KNOWING & MEDITATING on God’s truth. See how it will change not only you, but also those around you this week! Be ready to talk about it with your group next week!)
  • Review Sunday Morning’s Message.
  • Help group members (especially new members) get to know one another.

Getting Started:

Open your group with prayer.

SHARE: The past two weeks Pastor Daniel has talked about how the enemy knows what gets us upset, or presses our “hot buttons”, and how the enemy waits until the worst time to do so. What are some of your biggest “pet peeve’s” that aggravate or bother you?

Scripture: “Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. 11 Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. 12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. 13 Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. 14 Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place,” – Ephesians 6:10-14

“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” – 1 John 1:9

“Who may ascend the mountain of the Lord? Who may stand in his holy place? The one who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not trust in an idol or swear by a false god.” – Psalm 24:3-4

Sermon Notes: Take time to let everyone share some of the notes they took or anything that stood out to them from the message. Use this time to get everyone in your group talking (a good tip for this situation would be to go around the room and have everyone share one thing that stuck out to them from PD’s sermon)! Keep in mind, not everyone may feel comfortable talking yet, so try your best to help assist them in any way you can!

Study Questions

  1. When you think of righteousness, what’s the first thing that comes to your mind? Why?
  2. Righteousness means being “right with God”. What are some ways that we can become right with God?
  3. Pastor Daniel talked about two different types of righteousness, Positional and Practical. Describe both in your own words.
  4. Why do you think we have such a hard time with Practical Righteousness?
  5. How do you know when your heart is not pure? (When the things of this world don’t bother you)
  6. Mind pollution is detrimental to a pure heart! Input – Output, What goes in WILL come out! What are some ways you can be intentionally working on becoming more pure this week?
  7. What would change in our lives if we started saying the same thing about our sin that God does?

Final Thoughts:

  • My righteousness is based on my response to His truth (The Bible)
  • Purity is what God blesses in your life!
  • Purity does not mean perfection.
  • You can do the right thing, but be contaminated by the wrong motives.
  • Let your heart be sensitive for the things of God
  • True repentance means you stop doing it
  • Sanctification never ends. It’s a lifelong process!

 

Pray over your group!

Prayer Activity: Hand out little slips of paper and take a minute or two to pray and ask God to reveal to you any impurity you may have in your life and write it down. If anyone feels too uncomfortable doing so, have them just write down a prayer request they may have. Once everyone has had a chance to pray and write something down, gather all the pieces of paper in a bowl, mix it up, and pass the bowl back around. Have everyone pick one paper, and whatever is written on it will be what he/she will be praying for. Pray for the person who put it in (they wont see who put what in or a name), and pray that God will move not only in that person this week but also in the whole group in that specific area. This is a great exercise to get people out of their comfort zones! 

Zach Hacker