Q16 | What is our future?
Q. What is our future?
A. Like Jesus, we will be raised from the dead, either to worship God forever or to be forever separated from Him. (1 Corinthians 6:14)
● Discussion Question: Open your Bibles to Revelation 21 and 22:1–5. Ask this question and then let students answer as they read through it. How does the Bible describe heaven? Where is it? What is it like?
● Discussion Question: How is heaven different in the Bible from the way it is pictured in pop culture?
● Discussion Question: Why do you think the question of what happens to us after we die has gripped humanity in the way that it has?
● Discussion Question: What characteristics of Jesus’ own resurrection reflect the resurrection that we will experience?
● Discussion Question: N.T. Wright calls resurrection the “defining event of the new creation.” If we are to enter this new world, he says, we need a different kind of knowing and living. Christianity often gets mistakenly boiled down to going to heaven when we die, but we find Jesus in the Gospels is often not as concerned with what happens after we die as we are. Why do you think that is? How is our present world and life connected with God’s new creation that we will one day experience?
● Discussion Question: What will New Creation include; what is its scope? Where in the Bible do we see hints of an answer?
● Discussion Question: Read Matthew 25:31–46 together. What does this tell us about damnation? What are the people (“goats”) who are punished like? Do they show any love for God?
● Discussion Question: What does it mean to be sent to hell? Who goes to hell?
● Discussion Question: What was the most important idea you learned from this lesson? Is there anything you still don’t understand?
Application Question: Are you already living in the new creation now? Or are you rejecting God’s grace? What does this mean for your salvation? If you are worried about this, what can you do to know with confidence that you are saved? (This is an important question.)