Community Group Conversation Starters
Conversation Starters help us dig deeper, connecting Sunday’s sermons with our Monday lives. Please know that these questions are meant to be a resource. You do not have to follow them verbatim or get through them all. We trust you to know your group and to ask the questions based on your group needs.

1. Read Romans 7:14-25.

2. What stood out to you from the passage?

3. What stood out to you from the sermon?

4. In this passage, Paul paints a picture of the battle we face when we want to be good, but repeatedly fail to do so. The Message paraphrase of verses 21-23 reads: It happens so regularly that it’s predictable. The moment I decide to do good, sin is there to trip me up. I truly delight in God’s commands, but it’s pretty obvious that not all of me joins in that delight. Parts of me covertly rebel, and just when I least expect it, they take charge.

5. In what ways is this lament relatable to your life? How does the good news of Jesus Christ offer us rescue from that body of death (vv. 24-25)?

6. How will you apply this to your life? What are you going to do, be or think differently because of this truth?

Take time to share prayer requests and pray together.

Title: Fighting for Life
Reference: Romans 7:14-25
Speaker: Bill Gorman, BillG@cckc.church

> You won’t win every battle…but never, never, never stop fighting.

> You won’t win every battle…

"Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle." -

“that state of being human at a disappointing level of behavior or character… what is opposite to “spiritual” (i.e., godly) character and conduct.”
-John D. Harvey, Romans, Exegetical Guide to the Greek New Testament, 181

"Take the case of a sour old maid who is a Christian but cantankerous, on the other hand, take some pleasant and popular fellow but who has never been to church. Who knows how much more cantankerous the old maid might be if she were not a Christian, and how much more likeable the nice fellow might be if he were a Christian?
You can’t judge Christianity simply by comparing the product in those two people; you would need to know what kind of raw material Christ was working on in both cases."
(“Answers to Questions on Christianity” from Lewis’ God in the Dock.)

"…never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never -- in nothing, great or small, large or petty -- never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy." - Winston Churchill

> …but never, never, never stop fighting.

> Never stop hating your sin

“The choicest believers, who are assuredly freed from the condemning power of sin, ought yet to make it their business all their days to mortify the indwelling power of sin.”
“...be killing sin or it will be killing you.” (John Owen, The Mortification of Sin)

"For the more mature and spiritually discerning we get, the more we see of the sin in our hearts. The more holy we become, the less holy we will feel. This is not false modesty. Even when we know and see ourselves making progress against many bad habits and attitudes, we will grow more aware of the rebellious, selfish roots still within us. The holier we are, the more we cry about our unholiness." - Tim Keller, Romans for You

> Never stop delighting in God’s Law

"In our members there is a slumbering inclination toward desire, which is both sudden and fierce. With irresistible power, desire seizes mastery of the flesh. All at once a secret, smoldering fire is kindled. The flesh burns and is in flames. It makes no difference whether it is a sexual desire, or ambition, or vanity, or desire for revenge, our love of fame and power, or greed for money… At this moment God is quite unreal to us… Satan does not here fill us with hatred of God, but with forgetfulness of God…" - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

> Never stop running to Jesus

"Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle." - Plato