THIS WEEK’S PASSAGE
1 Corinthians 13:1-8
BACKGROUND PREPARATION This session may touch on some issues which are raw for your young people. Be sensitive in how you handle these discussions. You may need magazines, song lyrics, Bibles, a flipchart and pens.
What are you looking for?
10 mins
Hand out some celebrity-based magazines, and print out or project lyrics from current pop songs on the wall. (Choose songs which ask questions about life, purpose and fulfilment.) Give your group ten minutes to take a song or a story and ask, ‘why?’ What is the meaning or the purpose behind the words? What might be going on in the writer’s heart or the background of the story? The idea behind this is to get your group to develop listening and perception skills, and to encourage thought on what the people around us are really searching for. What stories are the group reading and hearing? Bring the group back together for some discussion and reflection.
Jesus’ way
10 mins
Divide the young people into small groups. Ask each group to look at one of the following Bible passages. Have them discuss how Jesus communicates with each of these people. What can we learn from this?
• Luke 18:18-29 – Jesus and the rich man
• John 3:1-21- Jesus teaches Nicodemus
• John 4:1-26 – Jesus and the Samaritan woman
• John 6:1-15 – Jesus feeds the 5000
• John 6:60-71 – Jesus disciples desert him
• John 13:1-17 – Jesus washes the disciples’ feet
The power of love
10 mins
Read 1 Corinthians 13:1-8 as a group. Afterwards explain that love is powerful; it pulls down boundaries between people. When we choose to love people, we begin to connect God’s story with theirs. Love is not easy but it is godly.
Split the group into smaller groups of three or four and discuss some of the issues that may have affected their friends from school or college. Handle this discussion carefully, as some of your group may be working through these issues themselves. Encourage the young people to be sensitive in how they handle this discussion.
Ask the group how we, like Jesus, could show unconditional love and connect with someone who:
• Has never met their real dad?
• Is or has been involved in drugs?
• Is totally convinced their life is ‘all sorted’?
• Has no friends?
• Always has to be wearing the latest clothes?
• Is being bullied?
• Is going through an eating disorder?
• Is self-harming?
• Is an atheist?
• Has had an abortion?
Listening with all your senses
5 mins
Show the image of the Chinese word for ‘listen’ which is available on the links section of the Youthwork website. Explain that the word listen in Chinese is made up of five different parts. These sym symbolise: ‘eyes’, ‘heart’, ‘ear’, ‘undivided attention’ and ‘you’. True listening means being deeply interested in the other person.
Listening tips
5 mins
Ask the group to come up with their top five tips for being a good listener. If you have a large group, divide the young people into smaller groups, then take feedback from each group. Record the young people’s answers on a flipchart.
Life stories
10 mins
Split your group into pairs and ask them to describe in detail the best holiday they have ever been on. The listener must then tell the storyteller all about what they’ve just heard in as much detail as possible. Afterwards, ask:
• How did it feel to listen carefully?
• Was it difficult?
• Did your mind wander?
• How did it feel to be listened to?
• Did you feel self-conscious telling your story?
• Did you feel understood by the listener?
The Holy Spirit
10 mins
Explain that God calls us to reach out to the lost, but he doesn’t leave us alone to get on with it. The Holy Spirit helps us love as God loves and share his truth. Read:
• John 15:26-27
• 1 Thessalonians 1:5
Discuss what these verses tell us about the Holy Spirit’s role in connecting with people and sharing our faith. Take a moment of quiet and pray for the Holy Spirit to guide you as you connect with others.
The key to connection
5 mins
Encourage the young people to keep praying for their non- Christian friends to connect with God during this week. They should write their friends’ names down somewhere noticeable, (e.g. on the fridge door, on the bathroom mirror) to remind them to pray throughout the day.
KEY POINT #1
There are many ways in which people come to faith. Jesus realised this and connected with people in ways he knew they would understand. If we want to share our faith effectively, it really helps to develop this kind of wisdom.
KEY POINT #2
Loving someone enough to listen eventually earns you the right to speak into that person’s life. One of the ways in which we learn more about a person is by learning the art of listening through asking good questions. Check out John 4: 6-26 or Matthew 12:9-14 for examples of listening through questions.
