Leader Guide 5-4-08 / Luke 15:11-24

Small Group Leaders Guide
May 4, 2008

How To Save A Life
Luke 15:11-24

Getting Started:
1. Have you ever saved a life? In what way? Do you think you may have, but are not sure? Describe that time.

• About 8 years ago, I was at Promenade Park for a New Life event. I was sitting in my car while my son, Andrew, was playing flag football with some of the youth. I saw a little girl that was probably about two years old, walk across the street and begin walking down the sidewalk. I thought it was weird that she was alone. I went to her and carried her back to the park where I ran into her dad. He had been searching for her but couldn’t find her. I don’t know if I saved her life, but I might have…

2. When was the last time you ran to your son (or daughter, dad, mom, small group leader) and threw your arms around him and kissed him?


Going Deeper:
3. In Luke 15:11-13, we can see that this person took what the father had given him but didn’t use it well. How is this descriptive of the way a person may be living before coming to Christ?

4. In verse 17, what does it mean that the man “came to his senses?” Why would anyone think he had ever “lost his senses?”

• Wanting to eat pig food may be the first sign that you have lost your senses.
• I find it interesting that during a famine, instead of eating pigs, they were feeding pigs. No one would give him anything, but there he was giving pods to pigs!
• It seems he realized the position he is in. If the famine (v. 14) continues and no one will give him anything (v. 16), he’s going to die.

5. In verse 17, we read that the father’s men “have food to spare,” but the son is “starving to death.” Why is this an important realization for the son?

• At a minimum, he recognizes that he is not one of the “father’s hired men.”
• He has now noticed that he is in need and that his father can satisfy that need.

6. Coming back to God after feeling like you have really let Him down can be difficult. What do you see happening to the son in the first nine verses of this parable that illustrate what it can be like for you or someone you know to come back to God?

7. Read Luke 15:20. Is it an important point that the father saw the son and ran to him, even while he was a long way off? Why do you think so?

• Check out the following passages.
• Romans 5:6-8
• Romans 4:9-10
• 1Peter 3:18

8. Read Luke 15:18-20. In verse 20, we see the word, “but.” Why is that word important?

• Scroll down to see the blog post on this question.

9. In this parable, the son sums up his own actions by saying that he has sinned against heaven and against his father. Doesn’t it seem more appropriate to punish the son for the bad things that he’s done rather than celebrate? Is that what happens? In what way is punishment involved when a person comes to Christ now?

• Scroll down to see the blog post on this question.

Putting it into practice:
10. How can you use this parable to help someone you know, meet Christ?
11. Pray in your groups for your friends and family that need the forgiveness that is only available through Jesus Christ.