Adultery and Small Group Discussion

Our Sunday School class is working through Adam Hamilton's Making Love Last a Lifetime: Biblical Perspectives on Love, Marriage, and Sex from Abingdon Press. We're using the curriculum as a jumping off point, as we're spending at least a month on each of what are designed to be single lessons.

Today, we started talking about infidelity. We'll spend more time on that in the future. (And this means more challenging lesson preparation for me, since the room was unusually quiet during the discussion part of the class; this is obviously awkward stuff to talk about, at least until I got people started on an I knew this couple who path.)

It's interesting. The Bible is pretty clear:
Matthew 5:27-28 (NIV)
27 "You have heard that it was said, 'Do not commit adultery.'[a] 28 But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

Without getting too bogged down in specific understandings of the Biblical use of "adultery," this raised an interesting discussion.

If adultery was going to happen in your marriage, would you consider your spouse having specific, lustful thoughts about someone else roughly the same threat to your marriage as if your spouse had sexual interactions with that same person?

I'd prefer that neither occur, of course. Matters of sin and being right with God aside, however, I'd prefer dealing with the issues raised by my partner thinking inappropriate lustful thoughts than a physical sexual affair, or even an emotional (but nonsexual) betrayal. That seemed to be the group consensus, as well.

Our discussion fell within the context of working to keep our own marriages healthy and vibrant over time. The thrust (my apologies; I couldn't resist) of this lesson was a frank (I could go on and on) discussion about how putting oneself in situations that increase contact with someone who is an inappropriate titillation or temptation is harmful and dangerous, even if "nothing is going to happen."

The group seemed to get that, but it's a difficult thing, thinking of "harmless" interactions and fantasies - however inappropriate - as being wrong, dangerous, and harmful. Perhaps next time we should engage in a little role-playing. Hah hah.

Read and Learn -- Adult Study Groups

Once again we are highlighting one of our own, Stushie who posts Sunday Devotions here and Daily Devotions on his own blog, Heaven's Highway. For the last few months, though, he has been up to more than just Daily Devotions. He has started a second blog, Church Studies, for the purpose of posting discussions questions for either individual or group use. He has started with The Shack.

The first of each week he posts the next segment of questions to the Church Studies blog. In addition, he emails the questions to anyone who requests them by email. The questions are well written and, more than anything, force the reader to slow down and consider the material in the book as you work through it instead of simply rushing through to the end. I found them far more useful than I generally find the commercially produced study questions at the back of some books.

These would be great to give to a small group wanting to read The Shack but wanting a little direction to discuss along the way.

JusticeSeeker
JusticeSeekerOK@aol.com

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

Read and Learn -- Adult Study Groups

The third Thursday of every month will be dedicated to Adult Study Groups. This will be a time to review study group materials, talk about things that work, mention some things that haven't worked, compare resources, etc. If it has to do with Adult Study Groups and Presbyterian Churches -- this is its spot.

Over the last couple of years Quotidian Grace and I have both reviewed Bible in 90 Days as implemented in our respective churches. More recently Teri at Clever Title Goes Here has been leading a B90 group. I have also reviewed a number of small group materials used by groups of which I have been a member. Quotidian Grace has done the same. So in that respect, this is a continuation of the old; but let's see if we can't make this a more valuable resource for all of us involved in one way or another with Adult Ed.

• Have you used anything lately that you really liked;
• Have you used anything lately that you really didn't like (be nice, now, remember that Decently and in Order thing);
• Are you looking for anything in particular (ok, so we are all looking for small group materials that will convert any group of 12 adults into fully committed disciples ready to step out and change the world in 15 weeks or less -- aim a little lower);
• Has your church created materials you are really proud of and would like to post (consider us free advertising);
• Now for the best part -- any great ideas or materials for small group leader training (preferably something that causes fabulous volunteers to emerge from the woodwork)?
  

Post suggestions, comments, and ideas below.

We will be back next month. In the meantime don't forget Book Club begins this month with The Shack.

JusticeSeeker
JusticeSeekerOK@aol.com