Tracking Transition: Get a Good Grip!

Discussion Guide for Sunday, February 9, 2020

GET A GOOD GRIP!

Series: Tracking Transition – Following God into Your New Beginning

Big Idea

This week, Pastor Mickles preached a message centered on Joshua 1:6-9. In this message, we learned that transition can be scary. Even for a military general like Joshua, the road ahead was enough to throw him into all out panic attacks and depression. Yet God gave Joshua a countermeasure – “Be strong and courageous!” These four words show three times in the space of 4 verses. To be strong is to grasp on something and to squeeze. To be courageous means to have the boldness to face your enemy without flinching. How does one develop this kind of resolve? Through the Word of God.

Verse 7 says, “be careful to do according to all the law. Verse 8 amplifies how we can accomplish this. We get a good grip when we “profess the promises”. No matter what, we have to keep saying what God has said. Ephesians 6:17 teaches that we use the Word of God as a weapon. Another way we get a good grip is when we “ponder the precepts”. The purpose of meditation is discerning the application of the Scripture to our personal lives. God wants to speak directly to us through His Word. We get a good grip when we “practice the principles”. As we walk out the God’s Word for our lives, we discover that God gives us the necessary wisdom to accomplish our goals.

Discussion Questions

• Can you remember a time in your transition journey when thing became a little scary? How did you deal with the sense of overwhelm? How well did you recover?
• Do you practice the spiritual discipline of meditation? Why? Why not?
• Have you ever experienced the biblical idea of success (God giving you the wisdom to navigate difficult situations to come out with the victory)? What made the experience different?

Prayer Focus

Father, I thank You for loving me enough to share Your Word with me. I do not know what lies ahead, but I trust you to keep me strong and courageous. Holy Spirit, help me to treasure the Word of God in my heart, so that when I need something to hold onto, You can bring the appropriate verse to my remembrance.

Next Steps

Getting a good grip on the Word of God takes our personal study to another level. Now we add disciplines like Scripture memorization and meditation to our routines. You can start by memorizing 1 verse each week for a month and meditating on each verse for a few minutes each day.

Want to Get Ahead?

Read and meditate on Joshua 3 in your devotional time this week.