Read and Learn -- Adult Study Groups

We started this topic last month with a request for materials used or those needed. One request was for something meaningful for a group of older women. Sometimes the best way to spur a discussion is to throw out an idea and see if something better comes up. So, here goes.

I just finished a group study of, Having a Mary Heart in a Martha World by Joanna Weaver. I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the discussion questions at the back. I wasn't overly enthused by the book, itself; but I did find that women even slightly older than I were much more impressed with it than I was.

I can come up with all kinds of reasons why I didn't care much for this book, but I am not its audience. Women older than I found a great deal of value in what it had to say.

Here are a few examples of questions:

We all face barriers to intimacy with God. Put a check by the one or two you struggle with most, then look up the verses next to that barrier. Circle the verse that is most meaningful to you. Then, it lists 6 things: unworthiness, busyness, Guilt/Shame, Pride, Depression, and Trials/hardships. The verses next to those options come from Isaiah, Ephesians, Psalm, I John, James, John, Hebrews and 2 Corinthians.

The next question is an instruction:

Meditate on the verse you circled, then personalize it in the form of a prayer to God. here is an exemple based on I John 1:9 -- and it gives a short prayer as an example.

For a book that I wrote off early as inconsequential fluff, I was pleasantly surprised by what I found at the back.

Now, I do not think that this solves Becky's request (it was Becky, wasn't it?) for something of substance for a long-standing group of older women. It might, however, make a nice stop gap and, hopefully, in the meantime someone else here will come up with a better long-term solution.

So, any ideas?

JusticeSeeker
JusticeSeekerOK@aol.com