Bible Study Tips - Hospitality

Hospitality - The Right Environment
As the day of your first meeting draws near, set up the right meeting spot for your Bible study. Have a place that is inviting and comfortable for your group to come each week. Here are some tips to help make this happen:

Find an accessible and informal location that can be used or reserved each week. Dorm rooms and possibly hall lounges can work well as long as they are free from distractions and noise (and as long as your roommates approve.) Be sure there is enough room for all the members to be comfortable and to see one another.

Schedule a time when all of your group members can attend. As a rule of thumb, Monday-Thursday nights usually work the best.

Provide food and refreshments, especially the first few weeks. What college student doesn’t like free food! It also gives a natural activity for people to participate in as they arrive and begin to converse.

Bring extra Bibles in case a member doesn’t bring one.

For more on how-to be hospitable or how-to lead a Bible study, click here.

Three Purposes of a Bible Study

Small-group Bible studies are an important part of FOCUS' work on campus. When training students and missionaries on how-to lead a Bible study, I like to ask: "Why do we lead Bible studies?" and then play devil's advocate. It is easy to lose track of why we do the things we do.

Below are the three purposes or goals of leading a Bible study. They can serve as three indicators for how your study is going.


Deep Transformation: Through interaction with God’s word and one another, it is our hope that the lives of your Bible study members will be profoundly changed. The purpose of a Bible study is not to simply learn information or to be a part of a Bible study club, but allow the Lord to transform our lives. Specifically, we hope that students, through Scripture, are drawn more intimately to our Lord in the sacraments and liturgy of the Church where they can most fully receive the gift of God’s grace in their lives.

Intimate Fellowship: If people are going to be deeply transformed, they will need others along the way, not only to help this transformation, but also to make sure they continue this transformation in the future. Your goal as a leader is to take a group of people with various backgrounds and personalities and help them form authentic relationships with one another.

Spiritual Multiplication: Another important dynamic of small groups is their ability to be reproduced. As you lead, pray that the Lord will raise up members of your small group to go on to disciple others and to lead Bible studies of their own.



What other indicators can help someone determine whether or not their study is thriving?

For more: Check out our How-to Lead a Bible Study series

The Crux - To Preach Christ Crucified

The Christian missionary Jim Elliot once said, “Lord, make me a crisis man. Let me not be a mile-post on a single road, but make me a fork that men must turn one way or another in facing Christ in me.”

How do we become crisis men and women? How do we live in such a way that people see Christ in us? How do we articulate who Christ is in a way they can understand? These are the ultimate questions of evangelization and questions that FOCUS continues to ask as we encounter thousands of college students each year.

One concrete effort in this area is FOCUS' new Bible study, The Crux. The Crux is a five-week study designed to give the participant the opportunity to understand the person of Jesus Christ. The climax of the study is an invitation for participants to make Jesus Christ the center of their lives.

The title of this study comes from the Latin word crux which means “cross.” It follows the example of St. Paul, “to preach Christ crucified” so that others may come to know the love that God has for us (1 Corinthians 1:23). The word crux today also refers to a place of decision or turning point.

In many ways, it is designed to live out Jim Elliot's quote about making us forks rather than mile posts. We want this study to be an experience where the participants can gaze upon the cross of Jesus Christ and come to a decision about Him in their own lives. Presenting the person of Jesus Christ within the context of a Bible study allows the person to not only hear about Jesus Christ in Scripture, but to hopefully see the person of Christ in their leader and others in the study.

After testing out this study last year, this is our first year "officially" using it out on campus. Anyone can download the study for free on FOCUSequip.org: http://bit.ly/FOCUSequipTheCrux


Have you seen The Crux yet?

What do you think?