Tips for a Healthy Small Group Discussion about God’s Judgment/Discipline
A couple of weeks ago I wrote a post about how my small group guys didn’t believe God punishes or judges people. To help enlighten them, last week we did a lesson about this very topic. The text was Amos chapter 2. God used Amos to tell the Israelites they were about to get a smackdown for their choices.
Here are some elements I used for our discussion:
1. As an opener, before telling them what we were talking about, I had them list some famous people. The list they came up with include Miley Cyrus, President Nixon, Taylor Swift and a few others. I told them that they, as a group, get to play God and are going to pass judgment on the people they listed. They came up with goofy reasons for why each person would be sent to heaven or hell. I know that’s not going to sit well with some people reading this post, but it forced them to consider the concept that there is a day of judgment coming.
2. From there, I asked them to get a little more serious and tell me what the criteria is for going to heaven or hell. I got some pretty good answers to this. They shared some great theology which was lacking in their answers just a week earlier. In that small group session, they were convinced God doesn’t punish or judge us. I was kind of relieved that they were “getting it” this week.
3. I have one student who is a little more liberal than most. He stood his ground that God doesn’t judge and that everybody gets to go to heaven. It was good to see the other students stand firm on the truth and make their case with few interjections from me.
4. My closing comment seemed to capture their attention. “Parents who don’t discipline their children can destroy their children’s lives.” I repeated this before moving on to my point. The room got very quiet as the boys pondered the thought. I could see the lights starting to go on in their minds. I followed this comment with, “The same is true with God. He disciplines us because he loves us and doesn’t want to see our lives destroyed.”
5. There are a few teacher take-aways from that discussion
– Don’t get flustered about bad theology from your students. Use it as a springboard for knowing what they need to learn in future lessons
– Since we get to teach them each week, not all issues need to be resolved in one night. Leaders can take time between small group sessions to thoughtfully plan out how we are going to address issues that come up
– Students know more than they realize. If we can get the conversation started then let them run with it, they’ll be able to think through their theology in the process. If we dominate the conversation or jump in to correct every comment, they won’t be as likely to think for themselves which means they won’t own their beliefs
– There was one comment a student made attributing something to the Bible that isn’t in the Bible. There was a true part to his comment and a false part. I affirmed the true part and made sure he knew the false part was not in the Bible. When we can affirm truth before correcting, it is received more readily. Correction without affirmation can cause a student to feel unsafe about sharing
– Because the students were so excited to participate in this discussion, the hardest part for me was keeping order in the group. There were several side conversations popping up and a couple of students causing distractions. For maximum learning, it’s important to control the environment. There were a few times I had to stop the everybody from talking and refocus the group on having one person share at a time. I also had to threaten a couple of boys that they would have to leave the room if they continued being distractions. As a small group leader, to maximize the learning potential, we have be firm about maintaining a healthy learning environment. This also helps us maintain the boundary between being a fun person to be around and a respectable leader
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Being around Kurt Johnston, I’m sure you’re familiar with the idea of “request, reseat, remove.” How often have you had to actually take a kid out of the group altogether? We were discussing this over lunch today regarding the middle school boys we shepherd. I would be interested to hear how that plays out in a high school setting.
Andrew,
Thanks for the comment. I am always impressed when I catch a glimpse of what Kurt Johnston is doing. Since I don’t work with his ministry, I’m not familiar with his methods. I do, however, like what you wrote.
I’ve done the request then reseat, but haven’t had to do the remove yet. The night I taught this lesson was the first time I can remember even making the threat. Hopefully I don’t have to remove a student. However, I would if it came to that point of choosing between a healthy ministry environment and uncontrollable chaos.
Dennis
I’m sure there are many differences between my 6th grade boys and your high schoolers! But there are also lots of similarities… I bet if I had gotten to know your current students when they were in middle school, I could have told you then what they’d be like now.
And, no, I haven’t had to remove anybody before. Our middle school pastor, through whom I met Kurt, said he has removed maybe 5 in 20+ years of using some version of this method. With 11-12 year old boys, I even state the progression explicitly so they know that getting to the “reseat” stage is basically their last chance to shape up. When and if a student is removed, there has to be significant followup with him as well as youth pastor and probably parents.
I’m impressed that you seem to have a lot of control over what and how you teach in your small group environment. While we always have a lot of flexibility and sometimes “punt” in favor of dealing with a more pressing issue, the normal expectation is that we stick to the thematic element more often than not. Part of that equation is that our small groups on Wednesdays generally follows up on what the Sunday lesson was about.