Here we provide space to take notes on the sermon and Scripture text and answer reflection questions that you can discuss with others. When considering the reflection questions, remember that the goal is not to have all the “right” answers―instead, let these questions serve as a starting point for curiosity in your conversation with God and others. See the Appendix of this guide for more resources and opportunities to engage with this study.
Prayer is an act of courage. This series includes weekly prayers, blessings, and images to use as a part of your prayer practices.
NB: Sermon schedule is subject to change at the discretion of the pastors.
Week 1: I Have Overcome the World (John 16:33) – John Mury
Week 2: Courage for the Cross (Philippians 2:5-11) – Meghan DeJong
Week 3: Encourage One Another (Hebrews 10:24-25, 3:13) – Dave Swaim
Week 4: Color-Courageous Discipleship – Michelle Sanchez
Week 5: Ruth & Naomi (Ruth 1:14-19) – John Mury
Week 6: Daniel – Michael Taber (Highrock Online only)
Week 7: Peter – Dave Swaim
We hope that all small group discussions are lively and enriching, but sometimes tough topics will be discussed. The Conversation Covenant* is an agreement to hold respect and grace toward all participants within a small group, no matter the conversation. Please adhere to the Conversation Covenant, or think about how to create one that fits your context.
I pledge:
*Adapted from https://conversational-leadership.net/conversation-covenant/
Throughout this companion you will find selections of poetry, prayers, and images to reflect on your worth and the worth of others. If there is another reading, image, or piece that resonates with you on a given week, you are welcome to share that with your small group.
Bowler, Kate with Jessica Richie. Lives We Actually Have: 100 Blessings for Imperfect Days. CONVERGENT, 2023.
Jackson, Drew E., and Jon Batiste. God Speaks through Wombs: Poems on God’s Unexpected Coming. InterVarsity Press, 2021.
Ruth and Naomi by Kelly Latimore, 2022. https://kellylatimoreicons.com/
Pastor Michelle’s book is Color-Courageous Discipleship.
The following questions are jumping-off points for personal reflection. Engage with them to awaken your awareness to the themes in this sermon series. Pay attention to the questions that stand out to you and look back on them throughout the series to see how God might be speaking to you. Being courageous invites us into vulnerability with God, ourselves, and others.
Before your small group gathering, complete the following and reflect on the discussion questions. These will be the basis for your small group time.
Use these questions as a launching point for your small group conversation. Open with a check-in/getting-to-know-you question. Group opener options are available in the Appendix.
Pray about what came up in your conversation and for the week ahead.
John 16:33 (NIV)
I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.
“for courage when you don’t feel very brave” by Kate Bowler
God, I have no idea what courage is
or how to muster it,
but I know I need it.
Fear is taking up too much space
and I have so little bandwidth left.
God, if courage is a gift, then please give it.
And if it is a thing for me to learn,
then show me how.
For blessed are the brave.
Those who perform big courageous
acts of sacrifice.
Those who move toward fear and danger
so the rest of us feel a little more safe.
May we also learn bravery
in small acts of great love.
We who grieve, even if we feel like
we are doing it all wrong.
We who have received the bad news and take the
next right step toward what must be done.
We who sit in the shards of a
life that has come undone.
We who hold another’s hands
on their hardest days.
We who serve and pour out and keep loving,
no matter the cost.
We who live still,
brave and scared at the same time.
Perhaps fear is not something to be vanquished,
but rather that strange friend who tells us
who we love, and what we can’t live without.
So bless us, God.
In our fear. In our shaky hope.
Because brave looks like that too, sometimes.
Before your small group gathering, complete the following and reflect on the discussion questions. These will be the basis for your small group time.
Use these questions as a launching point for your small group conversation. Open with a check-in/getting-to-know-you question. Group opener options are available in the Appendix.
Pray about what came up in your conversation and for the week ahead.
Philippians 2 (NIV)
2 Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, 2 then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. 3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, 4 not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.
5 In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:
6 Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
7 rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
8 And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death—
even death on a cross!
9 Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
and gave him the name that is above every name,
10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
11 and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.
12 Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, 13 for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.
14 Do everything without grumbling or arguing, 15 so that you may become blameless and pure, “children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation.” Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky 16 as you hold firmly to the word of life. And then I will be able to boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labor in vain. 17 But even if I am being poured out like a drink offering on the sacrifice and service coming from your faith, I am glad and rejoice with all of you. 18 So you too should be glad and rejoice with me.
19 I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you soon, that I also may be cheered when I receive news about you. 20 I have no one else like him, who will show genuine concern for your welfare. 21 For everyone looks out for their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ. 22 But you know that Timothy has proved himself, because as a son with his father he has served with me in the work of the gospel. 23 I hope, therefore, to send him as soon as I see how things go with me. 24 And I am confident in the Lord that I myself will come soon.
25 But I think it is necessary to send back to you Epaphroditus, my brother, co-worker and fellow soldier, who is also your messenger, whom you sent to take care of my needs. 26 For he longs for all of you and is distressed because you heard he was ill. 27 Indeed he was ill, and almost died. But God had mercy on him, and not on him only but also on me, to spare me sorrow upon sorrow. 28 Therefore I am all the more eager to send him, so that when you see him again you may be glad and I may have less anxiety. 29 So then, welcome him in the Lord with great joy, and honor people like him, 30 because he almost died for the work of Christ. He risked his life to make up for the help you yourselves could not give me.
“for friends who hold us up” by Kate Bowler
God, you called me to love
but people are inherently risky.
Telling my story, being known, asking for help,
complaining again about
the thing I worry might sound cliché by now.
Shouldn’t I be over it already?
But something is happening when I am known.
I am becoming stronger somehow.
I am reminded of the pillars I’ve seen
holding up cathedrals.
Flying buttresses, engineered to provide support
for a fragile wall,
allowing them to be built taller, more stunning,
more covered with ornaments
or filled with stained glass,
letting all the colorful light dance in.
The walls would collapse without them there,
but strengthened, they create something beautiful.
God, when I am no longer quite so tall and strong,
give me those who hold me up
and remind me of who I am and that I’m loved.
Yes, I’ll get back up again today.
Yes, I’ll get those kids cereal
and help my parents with an errand.
Yes, I’ll go to work or come up with something
better to do with retirement hours.
I will try again.
I know I will,
because someone else’s absurd faith in me
is fortifying.
So, blessed are our flying buttresses.
For they hold us up
when everything seems ready to come apart,
allowing us to face today-
not because we’re doing it alone-
but precisely because we aren’t.
Before your small group gathering, complete the following and reflect on the discussion questions. These will be the basis for your small group time.
Use these questions as a launching point for your small group conversation. Open with a check-in/getting-to-know-you question. Group opener options are available in the Appendix.
Pray about what came up in your conversation and for the week ahead.
Hebrews 3:13, 10:24-25 (NIV)
13 But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called “Today,” so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.
24 And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, 25 not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.
“Dinner Party” based on Luke 5: 27-31, by Drew E. Jackson
Clink! Clink!
Turn down the music a little.
Let me say a few words as the host.
A toast! To our dear friend who put this evening together.
This spread is amazing!
I’m not even talking about the dinner,
this collection of sinners is splendid!
This is my kind of heaven.
A curator of souls, you are. The most eclectic kind!
Take a look around. Simply Divine!
We are the ones who have longed to be filled.
Others were invited, am I right, friend? But they said that their hunger
was nil.
Their loss. So eat your fill, ladies and gents!
Our friend has promised that there is more where this came from.
The night is young. The party has barely begun!
Cheers to you! Mazel Tov!
Before your small group gathering, complete the following and reflect on the discussion questions. These will be the basis for your small group time.
Use these questions as a launching point for your small group conversation. Open with a check-in/getting-to-know-you question. Group opener options are available in the Appendix.
Pray about what came up in your conversation and for the week ahead.
TBD
“Rise Up My People” based on Luke 5:24-26, by Drew E. Jackson
Rise up!
Rise up, my people!
It’s time to shake the dust.
It’s time to claim your dignity.
Enough has been
enough!
Rise up!
Rise up, my people!
And live in shame no more.
Go strut into the future light.
There’s greatness that’s
in store
Rise up!
Rise up, my people!
And lift your voices high.
Let’s sing the song that freedom brings.
Our sound will
never die
Rise up!
Rise up, my people!
Go on and talk that talk.
Put swagger in your step today.
It’s time to rise
and walk!
Before your small group gathering, complete the following and reflect on the discussion questions. These will be the basis for your small group time.
Use these questions as a launching point for your small group conversation. Open with a check-in/getting-to-know-you question. Group opener options are available in the Appendix.
Pray about what came up in your conversation and for the week ahead.
Ruth 1:14-19
14 At this they wept aloud again. Then Orpah kissed her mother-in-law goodbye, but Ruth clung to her.
15 “Look,” said Naomi, “your sister-in-law is going back to her people and her gods. Go back with her.”
16 But Ruth replied, “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. 17 Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.” 18 When Naomi realized that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped urging her.
19 So the two women went on until they came to Bethlehem. When they arrived in Bethlehem, the whole town was stirred because of them, and the women exclaimed, “Can this be Naomi?”
Before your small group gathering, complete the following and reflect on the discussion questions. These will be the basis for your small group time.
Use these questions as a launching point for your small group conversation. Open with a check-in/getting-to-know-you question. Group opener options are available in the Appendix.
Pray about what came up in your conversation and for the week ahead.
TBD
“for loving someone when differences divide us” by Kate Bowler
God, this is a hard one.
How do I begin to love or even connect
with someone so different from me?
How do I bridge this gap?
It feels just as wrong as the beliefs I abhor.
Blessed are we who want to be a part
of the wild and beautiful experiment
to find a common humanity.
Who desire to come willingly into the gap
that separates human from human,
to love the stranger-
especially the one we really don’t understand
and secretly want to set straight.
Blessed are we, willing to stay in the gap,
in the contradictions of what we can’t understand.
To actively work on disproving
our own intuitions about another,
in order to begin to see what they see.
Blessed are we, swimming upstream
against the current of our own human frailty,
our fears and emotions,
and willing to be wrong for a second.
To reconsider. And hold to our integrity
with kindness.
Desiring to see the lay of the land
and play the course,
instead of the one we wished it could be.
And to discover that humility
is what makes change possible.
Grace is never neutral.
It works backwards and forwards in time,
conspiring to make wrong right.
Before your small group gathering, complete the following and reflect on the discussion questions. These will be the basis for your small group time.
Use these questions as a launching point for your small group conversation. Open with a check-in/getting-to-know-you question. Group opener options are available in the Appendix.
Pray about what came up in your conversation and for the week ahead.
TBD
REFLECTION FOR COURAGE
Prayer of St. Brendan the Navigator
Help me to journey beyond the familiar
and into the unknown.
Give me the faith to leave old ways
and break fresh ground with You.
Christ of the mysteries, I trust You
to be stronger than each storm within me.
I will trust in the darkness and know
that my times, even now, are in Your hand.
Tune my spirit to the music of heaven,
and somehow, make my obedience count for You.
AMEN.