Audio | Video | Sunday Summary
SPEAKER
Steve Hill
SCRIPTURE
Romans 8:18-27
OUTLINE
- Everyone will experience suffering in this life.
- Sources of Suffering
- Situation of a Fallen World
- Self-Inflicted
- Satan
- Salvation
- Five Ways to Hang On
- This is Temporary
- Look to the future
- Hope is looking at Christ not the crises
- Wait for God to intervene.
- The Spirit helps me.
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
- Discuss the difference between suffering and life-stinks situations.
- In what area are you experiencing suffering right now: Career? Physical? School? Mental? Spouse? Children? Living situation? Other? On a scale of 1-10 (10 = high), how intense is the suffering? How long has it been going on?
- In Romans 8:23, Paul describes the hope Christians have to eventually be released from sin and suffering. The problem is, we don’t know how long the suffering will exist. Discuss the inherent tension between having to wait with current suffering and the future hope of painlessness promised by God.
- Who has demonstrated amazing support for you in the midst of suffering?
- Verse 27 says that God “searches all hearts,” or “knows all hearts,” and the Holy Spirit intercedes for us when we do not know how to pray. To what degree do you believe that God, the Holy Spirit, is right there with you during suffering, offering support?
NEXT STEP
- I will choose to believe that God knows my heart and is present with me in my suffering.