(Much of this discussion was taken from the Leaders Guide for the study. Discussion commentary was added throughout.)

Last night we took on the question about sharing our faith. Why is it sometimes so awkward? Why does it feel like it works sometimes and other times whatever I say is rejected?

Have you ever met someone who would twist any conversation into a conversation about spirituality or Christianity? No matter what it was, sports, politics, finals, etc.? Or maybe you've heard it said, "Jesus wants you to tell your friends about God." Sometimes we need a nudge to speak to someone about our faith, or to have a conversation with someone we care about, but often times it can be awkward and feel forced.

Maybe you ask yourself the question, "Why would anyone feel the need to share their faith with someone else? Why not just keep it private?" Sharing our faith can be difficult, even as adults we don't necessarily like it. Think about how you can feel in the midst of high school, to share something like faith could be detrimental to their lives.

Jesus himself gave us the call to share our faith in God with others. "The Great Commission" was Jesus' last words in Matthews Gospel.

Matthew 28:18-20 New Living Translation (NLT)
​18 Jesus came and told his disciples, “I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth. 19 Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. 20 Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

(Much of this discussion was taken from the Leaders Guide for the study. Discussion commentary was added throughout.)

Jonah made plans with his girlfriend over the weekend and sent out cryptic text messages to his friends, if his parents contacted them to let him know. His friends were confused and didn't know what was going on until Monday morning at school. Trevor asked what Jonah did over the weekend...

"We did it," Jonah said with a grin. "Ruthie and I had sex last night."

Trevor tried not to look surprised. Both he and Jonah had heard a talk at church a couple of years ago that motivated them to make a decision not to have sex until they got married. Trevor wondered "What happened?"

"We love each other," Jonah said. "We finally woke up and figured out that there was no reason to hold back any longer. What could be wrong about something so natural?"

This was the opening story from our study last night. This was a topic I thought we wouldn't get much conversation about, but the youth in attendance talked about it with more candid conversation than the past topics. Sex is everywhere around us, whether we acknowledge the role it plays in our life or not, we cannot hide from it.

The first question on the topic was related to the "What could be so wrong about something so natural?" There was wide ranging thoughts on this aspect of the topic and led us into our next question, "What are the pros and cons of having sex outside of marriage?" This brought up a lot of comments both on the pros and cons side of the spectrum. From the emotional damage of having sex too young, to the sexually compatible idea of knowing what to expect before marriage.

(Much of this discussion was taken from the Leaders Guide for the study. Discussion commentary was added throughout.)
Untimely deaths of teenagers. Grandparents with terminal illnesses. Friends going through their parents’ divorce. All of these struggles impact all of our youth in some way throughout their early years.

This often begs the question “How could God love us and let this happen?”

How do you explain why God allows tragedies to happen? What are some of the things you hear people say following tragedies that kind of become cliché phrases? How do you feel when you hear these responses?
How could God love us and let bad things happen?

What would the world be like if God didn’t allow human beings to choose to do evil? Or to make mistakes? One of the possible implications is that we would no longer have the ability to choose to love God because there would be no alternative. If God controlled our decisions, would that really be loving?
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Theodicy- The question of why God permits evil to harm good people is not a new question. People have asked this question for centuries. It even has its own term: theodicy. A theodicy is an attempt to explain the relationship between our suffering and the nature of God. There are many theodicies out there, like the following…

• The existence of pain means God is real but isn’t good and loving
• God isn’t powerful enough to stop bad things from happening
• God doesn’t care and isn’t powerful—a combination of the first two
• God allows suffering because we are given free will to choose to do good or bad
• God must not exist at all

If you would like to read more on different theodicies, check out this article from the publishers of our study Fuller Youth Institue: http://fulleryouthinstitute.org/articles/your-pain