Week of September 15
Jonah 2
Opener
- Open your favorite social media app, and scroll or play until you hit the first ad. What’s the ad for? Does it describe something you’re tempted to rely on more than Jesus?
Discussion
We all need to be saved from something. From suffering, from conflict, from self-destructive habits, from our sin. Jonah cried out to God for salvation from the belly of a whale, and God answered miraculously.
- Read Jonah 1:17. What does God’s use of the great fish tell us about Him?
- Read 2:1-4. How has Jonah’s attitude changed since chapter 1? What brought this about?
- Read 2:5-6. Describe a time God took you down into a “pit.” What did he accomplish in your life through that experience?
- Read 2:7-8. Jonah used to think only pagan sailors and evil Ninevites worshiped idols. Now he knows his own idolatry has separated him from God’s faithful love. What idols have the potential to separate Christians in our culture from God’s love?
- Read 2:9. Jonah is finally ready to give up his substitute saviors and rely on God alone for salvation. What keeps us from giving up our substitute saviors (like the ones identified by the ads our apps serve to us)?
- God saves us FROM things, and FOR things (like he saved Jonah for his mission to Ninevah). Can you think of something Jesus might be saving you FOR right now?
Action Step
- Memorize this verse as a group: For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility (Ephesians 2:14)