ST NICOLAS, NEWBURY
HOME GROUP QUESTIONS
WE WILL HARVEST THE DESERT
Our study material this week is drawn from the resources for harvest produced by Christian Aid, some of which we used on Sunday morning.
Worship: Through God's eyes
1. To open the session, sing or read the words of ‘Be Thou my vision’ and ‘The eyes of my heart’ by Tim Hughes.
Word: Seeing with our hearts
2. Read aloud Ecclesiastes 3:1-14 and Romans 12:9-16.
World: The big picture
3. Read Ally’s story:
Ally Ouedraogo is celebrating harvesting enough millet to feed his family. It seems like a simple, ordinary story. But nothing could be more extraordinary than Ally’s harvest.
Fifty years ago Ally’s land was full of greenery. But climate change in Burkina Faso means less frequent, more unpredictable rains and an advancing desert. By the mid-1980s fertile soil had turned dry; grass and trees had died; and the soil had eroded.
But Ally refused to give up. He was determined to provide for his family. In an act of astonishing faith he chose to see something different when he looked at the land – possibility. ‘Everything is a state of mind. If you decide to do something, it can be,’ says Ally.
For 20 years Ally worked with his bare hands to build rock ‘belts’ that retained rainwater. By irrigating his land this way, and practising simple zai farming techniques to make areas of the soil fertile, he has brought his land back to life.
Now the land is green again, there are many strong trees and the crops can grow. And Ally has united his community by teaching them these simple methods. ‘If drought comes, we have the recipe to fight it,’ he says.
But Ally is not content to stop here. He is working with Christian Aid partner Reseau Marp to test droughtresistant seeds and to help other communities. Now they too are building rock belts and using the new techniques, working together to turn their own deserts to harvests. ‘I am glad to help people,’ Ally says. ‘I do not want a vast discrepancy between us.’
4. As a group reflect upon what God sees when He looks at His world. How does God view the ‘vast discrepancy’ between those whose harvests come easily and those who must struggle daily to survive?
5. Individually spend a few minutes reflecting on how God views each one of us.
Discussion: Devoted to one another
Ecclesiastes 3:1-14: One heart
6. Reread vs 2-8. Spend time considering the meaning of these verses for our own lives. What does it mean for us to plant or uproot; to kill or heal; to scatter stones or gather them; to search or give up?
7. Consider vs 9-14. What does this tell us about the issue of work in our lives? And what might it mean for those individuals living in poor, rural communities like Ally’s?
8. Times of suffering and difficulty are an inevitable part of life, but what does it mean to have eternity in each of our hearts (v 11)? What impact does this have on our view of the world?
Romans 12:9-16: In community
9. Read v 10 and vs 15-16. The passage in Ecclesiastes deals with the individual human experience. But here God asks us to look at our place in the world in terms of our relationships with each other. What does it really mean to rejoice with those who rejoice and mourn with those who mourn, in the local and global community?
10. Read vs 12-13. What does this say about love in action? And how is this active love connected to the ‘eternity in our hearts’?
Response: Living the vision
Just £62 could help a poor community in the Sahel region turn their desert into a harvest. This money could provide a trainer to give a day’s instruction on drought-resistant farming techniques.
11. As a group reflect upon what God’s vision for a perfect world might look like.
Just £7.50 could provide enough drought-resistant millet seed for a farmer in Burkina Faso to harvest a year’s food for four people – from the desert.
12. Individually reflect on how God’s purpose for our own lives might fit into God’s vision. Prayerfully consider how you can give to make God’s vision a reality today.
David Stone
28 September 2008