Hope Challengers: Uncertainty
[A note to the group leader: I have based most of this study on the passage from Mark, but have given a brief look at the passage from Deuteronomy.]
Ice-breaker
Reflect on a personal situation of acute uncertainty, -a shortish event when you didn't know what might happen next.
Describe your feelings in those moments.
Did you experience them just as thoughts in your head, or did your whole body react to the situation?
Similarly reflect on a longer situation of uncertainty, -perhaps weeks/months.
How did you cope with that?
What were its long-term effects?
From these reflections, how would you describe your response to uncertainty? [e.g.panic; fear; discouragement; anxiety; depression; anger etc]
Did uncertainty influence your faith in any way?
Has anything really good come out of a time of uncertainty for you?
Study
Read Deut 31.1-8
Moses had been called by God for a task: to lead his people out of slavery and into the Promised Land. But many chapters ago God had told him that he, Moses, would not enter the Land himself, because he had allowed the people to refuse to enter, out of fear, when they first reached it. Moses had not challenged their lack of faith and was now paying the price. [Deut 1.37; 3.23-28]
A thought: -is this an adumbration, -a foreshadowing, -of the work of Christ in taking the consequences of the people's sin?
[There is no time in this study to go into the whole question of the morality of what is often seen as genocide, in the taking of the Promised Land. There are strong argument son both sides of the debate. There is also a question mark of the exact historical accuracy of whether such a genocide actually happened.]
Here, in chapter 31, Moses is handing over to Joshua, his successor, and encouraging the people to 'Be strong and bold', even in what appears to be a very uncertain situation. The message here is about trust in uncertain times.
Read: Mark 4: 35-41
This is a wonderful, well-known story, with plenty of detail to think about: graphic, -and has a great outcome!
It's evening, - the end of a day of teaching. How might Jesus have been feeling?
He suggests crossing to the other side of the lake. His disciples leave the crowd behind. Sometimes it's hard to walk away from the reflected limelight of a public figure, into privacy. Have you even felt like that?
And it says they 'take Jesus with them in the boat, just as he was'.
What does that mean? [Tired-out; hungry; a bit sweaty and dishevelled etc? ]
Could it mean that they regard him as 'just the same' as themselves, - 'as he was', -just ordinary? In what ways was Jesus 'just like anyone else'?
And there was other boats with them, too.
Oh what a fascinating little morsel that is, to tempt us to think and question!
Did the other boats get into trouble on the lake? Did Jesus' words to the wind have the same affect on the parts of the lake where the others were? Did the other crews panic, like Jesus' disciples did? Etc Discuss!
The situation changes into one of uncertainty. Share ideas of what it might have felt like to be in that boat.
What might you have said to Jesus when you woke him up?
The actual calming of the storm: what does Jesus use to do it?
What other Bible passages might it remind you of? [e.g.Gen 1. 'and God said'; John 1: The Word]
Imagine you are in the boat, once the storm has gone: how do you feel about what Jesus asks you?
And what about those 'other boats'? Are those the ones we are in as we image all this happening centuries ago?
What factors might help us be less fearful and more trusting of Jesus? [?the Presence of Jesus in 'my boat/my life'?]
Sometimes we can be surprised by the joy that comes out of uncertain situations.
Our relationship with God is one of two-way trust: we trust his goodness and faithfulness to us. He trusts us to be his hands and feet; his mind and heart; his eyes and ears to love his world, each other, and ourselves. Uncertainty is part of the scenery against which we live out that entrusted task.