Life Group Questions

September 9, 2018 – Malachi 1:1-5

Read Malachi 1:1-5 as a group

Read and discuss:

(1) This is no mediocre book of the bible (1:1)

• Three questions I need to ask myself about God’s word, God’s work in my life, and God’s control of my life.
• (1) What’s your view of the Bible? What’s your view of the OT? Does the OT have anything to say to you? Read 2 Timothy 3:16-17 and explain what this means in your own words.
• (2) Do you want God’s blessing? Do you want the filling of his Spirit? Are you willing to do the hard things are do you want the easy path?
• (3) What are you holding back from God? Are you taking the easy path and saying, With God, good enough is good enough?
• What are some areas in your life that you know are not fully surrendered to the Lord?

(2) God’s love is not a mediocre love, it’s a perfecting love (1:2-4)

• Do you want to be punished or do you want to be perfected? How is this question addressed in this passage?
• Scan Genesis 25-36 and look for examples of the rivalry, favoritism, and deceptions that characterized the lives of Jacob and Esau
• How would you feel if you had grown up in a family like this and had parents or a sibling like this?
• Do you relate more to Jacob or to Esau?
• Are you resenting God’s hard work in your life? Do you feel like God doesn’t love you because of challenges he has placed in your life? Do you equate love with comfort and not challenge?
• Discuss:
• I know God loves me because:
• (1) His son suffered and died for me
• (2) He has allowed difficult circumstances to come into my life in order to make me more like Jesus.
• (3) He is allowing circumstances beyond my control to teach me that I need to spend more time with him in prayer and learning each day how to lean on him and trust him.

(3) A great God wants more than a mediocre church (1:5)

“Our burden should be to become everything we can in Christ, to obey everything we find in God’s word, and to share God’s greatness with everyone we meet. Anything but mediocre believers happy to be in a mediocre church.”

• What do you think of this statement?
• I commit to overcome mediocrity by:
• (1) Treating the word with greater respect and reverence
• (2) Allowing God’s refining and purifying love to make me more like Jesus
• (3) Not settling to be like anyone else if that means settling for anything but a passionate love for our great Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

How will you personally respond to these three challenges?

Spend time in prayer, men with men, women with women. Take time to hold each other accountable for true growth and change.