REALLIFE STUDY GROUP

“Becoming the Gift”

 

ICEBREAKER:  What is your favorite Christmas memory or tradition?    

 

CONFESSION: May the gifts God placed in me be activated, emerge and multiply today.  Just like Mary, though not His Son, God has chosen me to conceive His wonders in me.  Not only has God placed gifts in me but He is inviting me to become a gift.  I choose to give myself away.  As Mary said, “Be it unto me according to thy word.”

 

DEFINITION: GIVE

1.    Capacity to bend or alter in shape under pressure; elasticity.  Plastic pots have enough give to accommodate the vigorous roots.

2.    Ability to adapt or comply; flexibility, resilience.  There is no give at all in your position. 

3.    To grant, to bestow, to impart, to transfer possession voluntarily and without expectation of reciprocity or remuneration. 

 

OUTLINE: 20 Facts About the Perfect Gift....The Gift in You

1.    Can come in small packages or small gift-wrapped boxes.  Christ came as a baby, not a man.

2.    Requires TLC; you have to love the gift to receive its benefit.

3.    Can come with messes in the midst of messes, the gift may create some messes as it grows and may be developed by messy parents or coaches as it becomes a message.  (cf. Proverbs 14:4)

4.    Must be protected; Herod is jealous and wants to destroy the gift.  The gift must be guarded.

5.    Can come in ripped packaging so don’t judge me.  You don’t know what I may grow up to be or do (swaddling clothes).

6.    It may not arrive or emerge in my best timing (traveling for census while pregnant).

7.    With no strings attached, Mary made mistakes....Even lost Jesus, but God didn’t take Jesus back and He doesn’t take your gifts back either.

8.    If you make room for the gift, the gift will make room for you.  There was no room in the Inn.  If you confess me before men I will confess you before my father in heaven.

9.    Wise men will seek the gift that you allow to be conceived in you.

10. The gift will attract gifts (gold, frankincense, myrrh)

11. God will put the gift in the spotlight (star in the east) even if no one else recognizes it.

12. The gift will become a bread maker, breadwinner, bread in Bethlehem (the house of bread).

13. The last to usually get the news will be the first to know (shepherds).  It may surprise you who is first to recognize your gifts.

14. The gift is your claim to royalty (King Jesus lives in me).

15. The gift may emerge or become evident after a long period of drought and hopelessness.  It had been 400 years since the last Word concerning the Gift.

16. The gift may one day be your salvation, deliverance.

17. God will choose and place stewards around the gift to cultivate it and who he chooses may also surprise you....Joseph the builder, Mary the teenager.

18. There are people waiting and praying for the gift (Simeon, Anna).

19. As the gift develops people will be amazed (elders, priests, doctors of the law).

20. Your gift (baby) makes my gift (baby) jump (John the Baptist in his mother’s womb began to leap when the pregnant Mary walked in the room).

 

TEXT: Luke 1 & 2

 

STUDY GROUP QUESTIONS:

1.    Just like a prenatal baby, the gift in you must grow and develop.  The baby begins to show long before it is born and fully grown.  Describe a gift in you that has just begun to show, become evident or emerge?  (In your case maybe the gift has always been there, it has just lain dormant.)

2.    Who in your family or in your life are your gifts most like?

3.    Like pregnancy, the process of becoming a gift can be a very tumultuous, emotional and stretching experience.  How have your gifts stretched you?

4.    The Magi, otherwise known as the wise men, came looking for the gift of the Christ child.  Who in your world is looking for or needs your gifts?

5.    If a prenatal baby, named John the Baptist, could be sensitive enough to recognize that greatness had just walked in the room when Mary, who was carrying baby Jesus in her womb, arrived, how much more should we be able to perceive the greatness God has placed in people?  Name somebody in your life that has validated your gifts and challenged you to develop your gifts. 

6.    What one thing will you do this week to keep your gifts sharp?

 

PRAISE & PRAYER REQUESTS:

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               

 

ACTION POINT:  This week I will become a gift to my family, my friends, my co-workers and maybe even my enemies by giving the gift of __________.  (Patience, time, listening, forgiveness, humor, honesty, service, encouragement, constructive feedback, kindness, understanding, compassion, mercy, honor....)