Pastor Ginduk from Flickr by caB.jm’s photostream

I know that a position as Sabbath School group discussion leader is one of the unwanted position in some Adventist church. You got to come early and face a bunch of people who never study their Sabbath School lessons. Help!

Do it wrongly and you got a dull and boring SS discussion… And that was the case with my church youth SS group discussion few years ago.

I tried several ways on how to improve the live of our youth SS discussion. Some works, some don’t, but in the process I learned several things that I believe are essential to improve a SS group discussion.

In this post I want to share to you some of the things that work in my church.

1. Small is Beautiful (and Circle Formation is Advantageous)

When it comes to the size of SS discussion, I prefer a small size of 4-6 person. Why? Because it encourage everyone to speak.

Smaller size means that less number of eye contact and since what refrain most of the people to speak is fear of rejection, the small size becomes your advantage to make everyone speak.

For any new SS group leader I encourage you to try this as this also will build your confidence as you try to lead more and more number of people.

There are some cases where you cannot force this idea of small group discussion size, but you can have a list of question and divide the group to discuss the questions seperately.

If possible, also create the group discussion in a circle form. It will make everyone sees everyone and also encourage a live group discussion. I believe this is one of the critical factor for encouraging everyone to speak too.

Most of Sabbath School group discussion I know is setup similar to a class room where the SS group leader stands in front of several rows of pew. It’s not so hard to guess who do all the talking in this kind of setup.

2. Get Prepared

Preparation is what a SS group leader should do every week. As SS group leader you should read your Sabbath School lessons everyday, period. You cannot skim read the lessons on Friday night and hope everything will be allright the next morning. It doesn’t work that way.

Your group will easily notice whenever you lack of preparation. Those of you who have experience it, you know what I’m talking about.

3. Choose The Proper Weapons

If preparation guarantees you ready for the discussion, choosing the right materials guarantees you to have a great discussion. Although we believe in “Bible and Bible alone”, preparing with the right materials broaden your mind of what the lesson could lead to.

You can refer to my earlier post “Djitz Sabbath School Stack” to see my list of weapons before leading the SS discussion on Sabbath.

4. Pray

Pray in your heart before you read your Bible and SS lessons, and before you go to Church on Sabbath, and pray together before you start your SS group discussion. There is no such thing as too much prayer.

I learned my lesson when one of my youngest student in AY reminded me that we didn’t pray before we start the Pathfinder lesson.

(Wait a second, are we talking about AY or SS?)

The point is, you can forget anything in this tips but never forget to pray to God that He will lead you as you lead the discussion.

5. Ask Questions

SS group leader should not do all the talk, for it won’t be a discussion.
Besides your goal here is to make everyone thinks and talks (if possible) so go ahead, prepare some questions before you start the SS discussion and asks for everyone’s opinion appropriately.

SS lesson has some good questions you can easily ask. Most of the resources in my Sabbath School Stack will also give you some more good questions. You even may also ask some of your personal questions sometimes.

Here’s how I do the discussion:

First, I present the lesson title, have people read the texts and I explain briefly what the lesson of that particular day is all about.

Then I ask the group about the question that I have prepared in relation with the lesson.

Let the discussion flow from there, but keep it under the lesson context.

6. You Don’t Know Everything, Don’t Act As If You Do

Face it, nobody knows everything about Bible, not even your Pastor, so why should you act like you do?

Humbleness is one important characteristic for a SS discussion leader. However much resources you have read prior to the SS discussion you will never know all the questions that your group will ask.

Rather than trying to be the know it all, why not ask everyone’s opinion of the matter? You will be surprised on how much actually we can learn from everyone.

7. Smile

Don’t smile only to the cute girl (or guy) in the group, but smile generously to everyone in the group. People don’t go to church to see people frown, they go to church to feel how everyone is happy in the Sabbath day.

I believe Jesus must have smiled a lot during Sabbath when He was in this Earth.

I usually smile whenever I don’t know an answer. I smile whenever anyone try to tell me I’m dead wrong.

Control yourself and your words, don’t let emotion takes control when you lead a SS discussion. Keep smiling.

Conclusion

Believe me, becoming a Sabbath School group discussion leader is one of the most interesting responsibility in a church. When else you have the chance to talk and discuss about Bible with a group of people? You will also meet so many different types of people with their different understanding and perceptions.

Simply put, if you are one of the person who likes to meet different types of people, you’ll love it.

Moreover, a Sabbath School group discussion leader bears a heavy responsibility of leading the group to Jesus, the main reason of the Sabbath worship itself. Never take it for granted.

If you have some other tips that you can share here, please write them in the comment section.

God bless your Sabbath School discussion brothers and sisters!

So as with one’s Sabbath School (SS) stack, I believe different people have different favorite Sabbath school lesson studies and preparation books that they read. Although if I’m not wrong, this only applies to less than 10% of church members who regularly read lesson studies to prepare for the Sabbath school discussion. (Don’t you think so?)

Anyway, I’m not writing this post to judge anyone, but I just want to share my Sabbath school stack, a list of my favorite tools that I use to prepare myself for Sabbath school discussion every Sabbath. The list is sorted in order of importance.

1. e-Sword
2. Adult Sabbath School Easy Reading Lesson Studies
3. Sabbath School U Video Cast
4. Adult Sabbath School Lesson Study Outlines by Bruce N. Cameron, J.D.
5. Sacramento Church Sabbath School Discussion Video Cast

I will discuss briefly about each of the tools above.

1. e-Sword

e-Sword is actually a Bible study software created by Rick Meyers. For those of you who have not tried this software, I strongly recommend you to try it. In default it only has the KJV version Bible plus Strong Bible Commentary. However, you can check the website for other Bible translations plugins, be them English or other language as well. There are commercial plugins and free plugins available in the website, and they are not limited to Bible translation only as you can find Bible commentaries, Illustrations, and Devotional plugins there.

The Bible Version plugins that is currently installed in my e-Sword are:
- Indonesian Terjemahan Baru (ITB)
- Indonesian Bahasa Indonesia Sehari-hari (IBIS)
- Good News Bible (GNB)
- Bible in Basic English (BBE)

I love comparing Bible verses in different Bible translation because doing such give me a better understanding and insights of what actually the verses could mean seen from different perspectives.

2. Adult Sabbath School Easy Reading Lesson Studies

This is my most favorite Sabbath School lesson study version, as compared with the regular Adult Sabbath School lesson study and CQ (Collegiate Quarterly) lesson study. Why? Because it’s short, easy to read… but yet it contains the same exact lessons from the other two lesson studies. It’s actually like a juice extract of Adult Sabbath School lesson study.

I totally recommend this lesson study for Sabbath School discussion leader. If you are a Sabbath school discussion leader, try to use it and you will understand why I said so.

3. Sabbath School U Video Cast

This is my another favorite Sabbath School “lesson study”. Sabbath School U is a 28 minutes video cast freely available to download. It shows a group of college and university students discussing Sabbath School lesson and lead by a youth pastor.

Why I love it? You certainly can find different insights from the young people as they tell their stories and how they see the practical use of the Sabbath School lesson. I also recommend this to Sabbath School discussion leader and those who fail to study Sabbath School for the whole week but don’t wanna look blank during Sabbath school discussion.

4. Adult Sabbath School Lesson Study Outlines by Bruce N. Cameron, J.D.

This is actually also one of my older brother Sabbath School stack. It’s a Sabbath School lesson outlines seen completely from different perspective as the author promise not to use any Ellen G. White book in it and only use Bible verses to explain the lessons.

It is actually targetted to other non-SDA Christians and thus may have different approach to the Sabbath School lesson as compared with the regular Sabbath School Lesson Study.

I “do not” recommend this to Sabbath School discussion leader. What I mean with “do not” here is this lesson study outlines may confuse the Sabbath School members who only study the lesson guide. Although this outlines talk about the same thing, it approach the lesson differently and so may be more that 50% different from the regular lesson guide.

For personal study, however, I recommend this study outlines because it uses Bible verses extensively and contain fresh insights delivered in interesting way.

5. Sacramento Church Sabbath School Discussion Video Cast

It is a 60 minutes video freely available to download from Amazing Facts website. The video start with a beautiful song services and continued with “traditional” Sabbath School discussion where the whole congregation discussion is lead by a Pastor, so there is less participation from the congregation beside the Bible verse reading help.

Summary

So those are Djitz Sabbath School stack, my Sabbath School tools of trade. Just like an application stack to a programmer, that enables the programmer to create a good software, Sabbath School stack is a box of necessary tools for everyone who wants to have a great Sabbath School discussion.

I invite you to list your own Sabbath School here at the comment section. It may inspire other people who are not interested to study their lesson studies to study the lessons regularly.