A friend was once in what she called ‘bible study by mind-reading’. The leader had some questions – and the right answers – on a piece of paper, and the group was only allowed to look at Question 2 when it had correctly answered Question 1. ‘Correctly’ meant using exactly the same words as on the paper. After half an hour of the group circling round, trying to get the answer exactly right, my friend exploded. ‘Oh, just tell us what the right answer is and we can move on to the next one.’ And so they did. And so the exercise of guessing what was in the leader’s mind happened again.
I think I put that down to the inexperience of the leader, who had come from a well-taught church, where group bible seminars were important, and followed a clear curriculum. There had been a prep. session, covering the questions and the answers. But this inexperienced leader, perhaps nervous at making theological errors, hadn’t realised that when a group happens it has a life of its own, and some flexibility needs to come into the planning.
Over the cycle of the study itself, there are three kinds of questions we can ask.... Read more
No comments:
Post a Comment