Before We Get Started

For our discussion today, we will be using the sermon series discussion guides. If you would like to follow along you can access this discussion guide on the website at mosaicchurchaustin.com and then select “community group resources” in the menu options.

Prayer

Because the primary goal of our time together is to establish relationships and learn how to walk with one another in all that God has called us to be and do, we’d like to begin by praying for one another. So, does anyone have anything you’d like us to pray for or anything to share regarding how you’ve seen God moving in your life that we can celebrate together?

This Week’s Topic

The Gospel of the Kingdom

Jesus’s Kingdom, as He himself taught, is not of this world. While His Kingdom influences and transforms people and structures, fundamentally, it does not belong to an individual or ideology. His is the kingdom and the power and the glory, as he taught us to remember in prayer.

Today’s Topic

Finding Rest in God

Discussion Questions

Matthew 11:25-30 

At that time Jesus answered and said, “I thank You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and prudent and have revealed them to babes. Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in Your sight. All things have been delivered to Me by My Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father. Nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him. Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.

Who Should Rest?

Matthew 11:28 

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Exodus 20:8-11

Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God.

Why did God give humans both a command to rest and an invitation to rest?

What circumstances tend to make you feel more weary and in need of rest? 

How do we rest?

Matthew 11:29-30

Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.

Ann Voskamp

Yoke yourself to Jesus. A yoke is a partnership. Jesus takes the heavy end, and we take the light end. 

What does it mean to you to be yoked to Jesus?

What practices or prayers help you share your burdens with God?

What kinds of burdens or responsibilities does God ask us to carry with him?

What does rest produce?

Isaiah 40:29-31

He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.

Hebrews 4:9-11

There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from their works, just as God did from his. Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will perish by following their example of disobedience.

 

Psalm 23:1-3

The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing. He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he refreshes my soul. He guides me along the right paths for his name’s sake.

What reward do we receive when we rest in God?

How can resting in God be a renewing experience?

What part does hope play in resting in God?

Closing Thought

St. Augustine

You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.

Take turns sharing one scripture or truth about God that brings rest to your heart.