REALLIFE STUDY GROUP
"Train Up!"
ICEBREAKER:
If you could take a train ride anywhere where would you go and why?
INTRODUCTION:
Life is a process where we are being trained up and training up others
as well.
Training
up involves serving, fathering, mothering, nurturing, mentoring, disciplining,
coaching, teaching, modeling, correcting, encouraging, supporting, preparing,
cultivating, dedicating and discipling.
Training
up requires patience, repetition, persistence, courage, boldness and sacrifice.
And when
Abram heard that his brother was taken captive, he armed his trained
servants, born in his own house, three hundred and eighteen, and pursued them
unto Dan. (Genesis 14:14 KJV)
You cannot
win battles you have not been armed to fight.
You cannot
arm for battle those who have not been trained yet.
You cannot
train those who do not have a servant’s heart
yet.
In other
words,
Serving
precedes training.
Training
precedes arming.
Arming
precedes winning.
If you
train those who do not have a servant's heart, they will break your heart a
million times.
If you arm
those who have not been trained, while attempting to wound their enemy they may
wound you, their fellow soldiers and themselves.
If we
refuse to be trained we may never reach our full growth potential. And if we
refuse to train others it will take them longer to reach their full growth
potential, if ever.
CONFESSION: I am being trained to train up
others in this world and the world to come. I have been trained up and
dedicated for eternal purposes. My training is essential preparation for the
trials and triumphs of life. What I have survived and overcome gives me the
credibility and credentials to train others. My God is a master trainer of
master equippers called apostles, prophets, pastors, teachers, evangelists,
spiritual fathers and mothers of the faith.
DEFINITION: Train Up: Chanak Hebrew for train, dedicate,
inaugurate, or put a taste of something in the roof of the mouth of a child
Child:
In Hebrew is translated babe as well as servant
Go: In
Hebrew is also translated mouth or to speak
OUTLINE: BENEFITS OF TRAINING UP OTHERS
·
When
you train up someone you are reproducing and multiplying your knowledge, your
abilities and your productivity.
·
When
you train up someone you are insuring that your legacy will outlive you
·
When
you train up someone you are sowing a seed in the next generation
·
When
you train up someone you are paying it forward and saying thank you to the
previous generation or in some cases you are refusing to be like the previous
generation
·
When
you train up someone you always get more out of it than what you put into it
and learn more through the process
·
When
you train up someone you are becoming a river and not a swamp
·
When
you train up someone your reward is multiplied exponentially
·
When
you train up someone you are held to a higher level of accountability and if
you know you have been called and don't respond, you are still accountable. And
by the way everyone is called! To be called means you have heard the call and
seen the need!
·
When
you train up someone your gift goes to the next level. Use it or lose it!
·
When
you train up someone sometimes the only thanks you will receive is the
satisfaction of knowing you tried to help someone and you did the right thing. (The joy of serving rarely comes from the appreciation of
the people you serve, but rather from knowing you did what was hard, not easy,
and that you obeyed God by seeing a need and meeting it! But know this, you
will reap what you sow, and with what measure you sow it you will reap it. If
you sow nothing you will surely reap nothing.)
·
The
sooner you train up someone to do what you do, the sooner you can do something
else.
Things
to think about when the only church you are a part of is on TV or the Internet
or hiding in the audience on Sunday.
·
You
can be taught through the media but you cannot be trained up
·
Church
is not simply about which local church has the best menu of programs or the
most entertaining services
·
You
can't really love from a distance
·
You
can't break bread with a TV monitor
·
You
can't baptize yourself, be accountable to yourself, sing in a choir by yourself
·
You
can't truly give to yourself because everything you have already belongs to you
·
Your
gifts are only developed when you are actively using them for others
·
True
fulfillment only comes when you serve others
·
You
can't lay hands on the sick and pray for them or give them a hug from a
distance
·
You
can't experience a corporate anointing by yourself
·
You
can't see the need, feel the pain or make the difference while sitting on your
couch flipping channels
·
You
can't feel the touch of a friend or work side by side with a brother or sister
in the Lord while just watching on a screen.
·
You
can't wash someone's feet, serve someone communion, shake someone's hand, deliver
a thanksgiving basket, visit an elderly shut-in, teach someone's child and see
the joy on that child's face without getting involved.
·
If
you are in a live service you can't turn the channel when the speaker confronts
you with truth you do not like
·
You
can't make a commitment to be accountable to a TV screen
·
You
can't see things as they really are on TV. They only show you what they want
you to see. You only see the full part of the audience. You only see the happy
sermons....never a flat day.
TEXT:
Proverbs 22:5,6 (KJV) Thorns
and snares are in the way of the froward: he that doth keep his soul shall be
far from them. Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is
old, he will not depart from it.
Deu 20:5 And the officers
shall speak unto the people, saying, What man [is there] that hath built a new
house, and hath not dedicated it? let him go and return to his house, lest
he die in the battle, and another man dedicate it.
(The word dedicated here is the same Hebrew word
translated train up)
Ephesians 6:4; Psalm 144:12 KJV; Psalm 128:3 KJV
STUDY GROUP QUESTIONS:
1.
Name
someone in your life that made a major contribution to you who trained, taught
or coached you.
2.
Identify
someone in the Bible that was amazing at training up people. What methods did
this person use?
3.
Proverbs
22;5,6 says train up (put a taste in the roof of the mouth of) a child (a
servant or a baby that cannot speak for himself yet) in the way that he should
go (also translated mouth or to speak) and ... Literally put a word in the
mouth of a babe and that word will impact the direction of that child's
life. Identify something we should be
decreeing over ourselves, our family and friends.
4.
Why
is it dangerous to think that you don't need anyone in life to train you?
5.
What
does it mean to have a servants' heart?
6.
Why
do you think in America people are less committed to a local church in terms of
their regular attendance, their giving and their service to the community?
7.
Training
up is also translated to dedicate in Hebrew. When we dedicate something we
consecrate it. We give it our spirit or our DNA. Identify one attribute that
would cause you to believe someone was trained up to be like Jesus.
PRAISE REPORTS & PRAYER REQUESTS:
ACTION POINT:
This week I will ask God who I am called to train up. Sometimes training
is as simple as the power of influence exercised by the lifestyle I model to
those around me.