Advent Study - Session 2

RESOURCE: Adam Hamilton's "Prepare the Way for the Lord." eBooks and Kindle version can be purchased and accessed immediately via Cokesbury or Amazon.

Check-out this version of Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence.

General questions:

1. Hamilton says most key decisions in our lives require a leap of faith. Do you agree? Why or why not?
2. Who has been someone in your life that had tremendous influence (mentor) over you - investing in your life, and finding meaning and joy in walking alongside you? Who is someone you have mentored - having tremendous influence over while you found meaning and joy in walking alongside them?

Our study from tonight, "Pregnance, Birth, Circumcision, and Zechariah's Prophecy" allowed for great discussion and far short of covering all the aspects of the key Scriptures:

• Luke 1:18-22:
• "Our brains were wires for questioning, for critical thinking, and doubts that inevitably arise are meant to lead us to dig deeper, to search for answers," writes Hamilton. "We are meant to ask questions. Sometimes our doubts are well founded." When have your doubts about something led you to discover and void trouble? In what other situations can skepticism prove healthy and productive?
• When, if ever, have you or someone you know asked or wanted to ask God, "How can I be sure of this? What happened?
  
• Frederick Buechner said, "Doubts are the ants in the pants of faith. They keep it awake and moving." What does this quote mean? Do you agree? Why or why not? How, if ever, have doubts led you to deeper faith?
• Hamilton writes the longer he lives, the more comfortabl he is with uncertainty and simple trust in God. Do you share this experience? Why or why not?
• "While we, like Zechariah, crave certainty, God gives us mystery..." writes Hamilton. How does or how could your congregation recognize God's gift of mystery - in its worship, in its education ministries, in its service to others, or in other ways - while encouraging people to both trust God and ask questions?
• God was asking Zechariah to talk less and to listen more. When have you found less talking and more listening, whether to God or to other people, the right approach, and why?
• When, if ever, have you heard God speaking to you in and through silence? How? Where do you go when you wnat or need to take time for silence?
• Luke 1:40-45:
• When, if ever, have you heard prophecy for yourself?
• Hamilton points out Elizabeth is the first person to make "the fundamental confession of the Christian faith," that Jesus is Lord. Who was the first person you heard make this confession? If you made this confression yourself, when did you first make it? How can and do Christians make this confession with more than words?
• Hamilton sees Mary's visit to Elizabeth as evidence of a deep relationship that likely formed over many years, beginning when Mary was younger. What long-lasting relationships with older adults have positively influenced you, and how?
• "Everyone needs and Elizabeth," writes Hamilton, "but as we grow older, we also fidn ourselves needing a Mary." When and how, if ever, have you mentored, encouraged, and celebrated a younger person?
• Luke 1:57-64:
• The name, "John," in Hebrew means "The Lord is gracious." The Greek word for grace appears more than 150 times in the Second Testament. Christians believe grace is a defining characteristic of God (along with attributes like love). How do you define grace?
• Hamilton calls receiving and giving grace "the rhythm of the Christian life." What does Ephesians 2:8-10 teach about the rhythm of grace? When was a time you experienced grace? When was a time you extended grace to another person?