Skip to content Your Life Support System — pt 1 (small group, Bible study, healthy, growth, growing, community)
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31:06 Listen to Your Life Support System — pt 1 (small group, Bible study, healthy, growth, growing, community) Your Life Support System — pt 1 (small group, Bible study, healthy, growth, growing, community) May 30 · 31 min ...more
Your Life Support System — pt 1 (small group, Bible study, healthy, growth, growing, community)
May 30, 2025 · 31 min
Join Pastor Rick as he looks at the main reasons to be part of a small group and why you need it to keep you healthy and growing.
Series Transformed May 30, 2025 · 31 min · Transformed
Join Pastor Rick as he looks at the main reasons to be part of a small group and why you need it to keep you healthy and growing. ...more Show the full description Show less Join Pastor Rick as he looks at the main reasons to be part of a small group and why you need it to keep you healthy and growing.
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Pastor Rick Warren shares the hope and encouragement you need to hear everyday. Listen in as he shares biblical truths to help you live the purpose driven life
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In this video 0:00 The Importance of a Life Support System17:24 The Role and Benefits of Small Groups
The Importance of a Life Support System 0:02 Hey, friends. Thanks so much for joining us today on Pastor Rick's Daily Hope, the Bible teaching ministry of Pastor Rick Warren. We're so glad to have you with us. And today, Rick continues0:14 in his series called transform. Together, we'll dive into God's word and discover powerful principles that can truly change our lives from the inside out. Spiritually,0:26 physically, mentally, emotionally, relationally, financially, and vocationally. You'll experience how God's truth brings real transformation to every part of your0:38 life. Okay. Well, here's part 1 of a message called your life support system.0:44 No astronaut would ever go into space without a life support system. No deep sea diver would ever go to the ocean depths without a life support system.0:56 No brain surgeon would ever operate on you without first hooking you up to a life support system. No soldier is ever sent into1:08 battle without some kind of support system. In the military, it's a basic unit called a platoon. A platoon is another word for a small group.1:20 And in that soldier's small group, that band of brothers, they support each other, they care for each other, they watch out for each other, they fight for each other, and if necessary, they die for each other.1:32 That's the support system a soldier has when he goes into conflict. God never intended for you to go through life on your own, facing your problems, your your difficulties, your1:44 tragedies, your pressures by yourself. In fact, the very first thing that God said when he made man is it's not good for man to be alone. Now whether you ever
1:56 get married or marry again is irrelevant. The issue is you need people in your life. You need relationships. We're better together. God wired us for community. And the basic
2:07 unit of community is the small group. In your body, the life support system that keeps you alive is the millions of little cells
2:20 connecting together to keep you alive. You're not 1 big giant cell. You're millions of little cells. And in your body, the actual life of your body isn't in
2:32 the body, it's actually in those small cells. The life is in the cells. The same is true spiritually in the family of God, in the church,
2:44 which is called the body of Christ. The life of every church is in the cells, in the small group. This is a crowd that we see right now. This is not a church. This is a crowd.
2:56 The church is actually in the cells, in the small groups. Now, this is not a new concept. Jesus talked about the importance of small community. In
3:08 Matthew 18, look on your outline. Matthew 18 verse 20, Jesus said this. Wherever 2 or 3 gather together in my name, I will be, read it with me aloud,
3:20 right there with them. God is not with us in the crowd. He is with us in the core. He's with us in the cells. He's with us in the small group. Jesus said, anytime
3:32 I get 2 or 3 of my followers, that's called a group, friends, that's a small group. When I get 2 or 3 together in a group, he said, I will be there in the midst of them.
3:44 Now, I spent nearly 2 years thinking and planning, and preparing the small group studies that all of our small groups are gonna study beginning next week. We're gonna look at the 7 key areas of your
3:55 life. Your spiritual health, your physical health, your relational health, your mental health, your emotional health, your financial health. We're gonna
4:07 look at your vocational health, that's your job, your work. We're gonna look at your family, all the different areas of your life, and how do you have transformation? How do you change the things you'd like to see
4:19 change, and how do you maintain that change? Sometimes you change your life and it's changed for a while, but you weren't able to keep it up. How do you have long term transformation? Now, since
4:32 about 75000 of you are going to be in small groups for the next 7 weeks because everybody in our church will be in a small group, I thought this week I would explain to you the answers to 2 questions.
4:44 Number 1, what does a small group actually do according to the Bible? And number 2, how do I benefit the most? How do I get the most out of it? Now, if you have never been
4:55 in a small group, you really need to take notes today. If you've been in a small group, a lot of this is gonna be review for you because you already know the benefits of it. But if you are not in a group,
5:07 you're gonna need to understand these 2 questions. Now, you say, well, where do we get our model? Fortunately, the Bible tells us. Paul says this in first Timothy 3 15.
5:19 I'm writing these instructions so that you'll know so you'll know how to live in the family of God. You don't automatically know how to live in the
5:31 family of God. You don't automatically know what a small group does, what a cell in the body of Christ does. Paul says, I'm writing these instructions so you'll know how to live in the family of God. That
5:43 family is the church. Now our model for Saddleback Church has always been not some contemporary church or some other church. Our model has been the church in the Bible. The very
5:55 first church was started in Jerusalem 2000 years ago. And in Acts chapter 5 verse 42, it says this. The first church, it says,
6:06 met day after day in the temple courts and from house to house. That looks like a pretty plain, plain verse. They met day after day in the temple courts and from house to house.
6:18 That verse contains the structure on which this church, Saddleback, is built. We do the exact same thing. We meet in the temple courts and from house to house. What does that mean? Large group
6:30 worship, small group fellowship. 2 meetings a week. Large group worship, small group fellowship. We're doing the temple courts right now. And by the way, notice it was plural
6:42 courts. Even in the first church, they didn't all meet in 1 building because 1 building wouldn't hold everybody in the church of Jerusalem, so they met in multiple campuses in temple courts. We don't meet in all 1
6:53 building for worship because there are too many people in our church. We meet in multiple buildings in temple courts. But then during the week, we meet just like the Bible did, they did in the Bible, from house to house.
7:05 That's home groups, fellowship groups, life groups, support groups, transformation groups. They meet in Starbucks, they meet in in, office buildings. They meet in school campuses.
7:17 They meet literally all around. Now, what does a small group actually do? It does 5 things. And we find these 5 things in Acts chapter 2 verses
7:29 42 to 47. These are the 5 elements of your life support system. You're not gonna make it in your spiritual life
7:41 if you don't have these 5 support systems. These are the things that keep you healthy. These are the things that keep you growing. These are the things that keep you transforming and becoming more the man
7:53 or the woman God wants you to be. And how do you get those? You get them in a small group. Let's look at it real quickly. 5 things. Number 1, what do we do in a small group? Number 1, we study God's word
8:05 together. Well, duh, it's a Bible study. If you don't study the word together, you don't have a small group. You got a party. You got a click. You got a social club, but you don't have you don't have a
8:17 small group. The Bible tells us in Acts chapter 2 verse 42 that they committed themselves to learning the teaching of the apostles. By the way, what is
8:29 the teaching of the apostles? It's this right here. It's this. It's the Bible. Because the New Testament was written by the apostles, Peter and John and Paul. And and so
8:41 when they're studying the teaching of the apostles, they're talking about studying the Bible. Now listen very closely. Small group Bible study is more important to your spiritual
8:52 health than personal Bible study. Are you kidding me? No, I'm not. Why? Here's why. If you go home from a church service today and you see an accident, a car accident,
9:05 who's going to see more details? 1 witness or 6 witnesses? Who? Who? Yeah. 6. Why? 6 pair of eyes are gonna see more details
9:17 than 1 pair of eyes, and the same is true of Bible study. When you study the Bible with other people in a small group, you get far more out of it than when you just read it by yourself. Why?
9:29 Because other eyes are seeing things you don't see. All of us have blinders. We all have cultural lenses that when we look at the Bible, I see it from my perspective, I see it from my
9:41 background, I see it with my prejudices, I see it with my biases, and so do you. And when you go to a small group that is people who have different occupations, and
9:53 different ages, and are of a different gender than you, they're gonna see things you simply don't see. I can't tell you how much I've learned
10:05 about the Bible from my small groups. The 1 I'm in right now, I've been in in I think 11 years in my small group, and it's 4 couples, 4 guys, and 4 4 women.
10:17 And I have learned so much from my small group because they see things in the Bible that I don't see. Now, you guys, I have studied
10:29 the Bible my entire life. I have a master's degree and a doctorate in theology. And yet when I I've studied the Bible my entire life. I can't tell you how many times I've read through the
10:41 entire Bible over and over and over and over and over. And yet when I go to my small group, I learn from all of those people in those that group. I don't go as doctor Rick Warren, pastor
10:53 of Saddleback Church. I go as Rick, ordinary Christian member of Saddleback Church. 1 of the benefits is that I see things
11:05 from a woman's perspective, and you may have noticed I'm not a woman. And there are 4 women in my small group, and they get a feminine perspective, and they see things all the time that I would have never seen
11:17 as a guy. Now, I learned from the guys too, but the women often have an insight that I would have never in a million years seen simply because they're coming at it from a different perspective. So
11:29 what I do is I go to small group, I learn from the guys, I learn from the women, and then I write it all down, and then I come and it's here, it's called a sermon. So if you like my sermons, you can
11:41 thank the women in my small group. Alright? Because they have an awful lot of insight and you need people who see things differently. Does this make sense?
11:53 Yeah. So, yes, you should read the Bible study on your own, but you're actually gonna get more out of it in a Bible study in a small group, and you're missing out on that if you're not in a group. Now 1 of the cool
12:03 things about Bible study Saddleback in our small groups is you don't have to be a teacher to be a host of a small group. You just have to open up your home. See, because all of our Bible
12:15 studies are taught by our pastors. This new 1 we're doing, 50 days of transformation, I taught those studies. And so, anybody can start a small group Bible study because the teaching
12:27 is already given there, then you just have the questions. You can even pass those around and say, why don't you ask the questions this week, and we'll just discuss it. We've had grade school children start small groups
12:39 as host in our church. We've had teenagers. You could do this. You could start a small group for 50 days of transpiration. I'm not talking about for the rest of your life. I'm talking about for the next 7 weeks.
12:51 We've had grandmas and grandpas and elderly start, small groups as host. You know, the oldest host I've ever met, I was in England. A
13:03 little old lady, just about that tall, came up to me, had a cane, I mean really, and she walked up and she said, You know Pastor Rick, I've gone to church my entire life. I can't tell
13:15 you how many sermons I've heard, I've taken notes since I've never actually ever participated in anything in my church. I go, I'm faithful, I'm regular in attendance, but I've never actually done anything because I
13:27 thought, I'm not a teacher, I'm not a leader, I can't do this. But when you said, we're starting 40 Days of Purpose, she thought, I can be nice to people, I could be a host, I like people, I can open up my home, I
13:39 can put on some tea, and I and I can, you know, turn on the DVD player. So I said, well, that's just great. She said, so I did. I said, I'm having so much fun. I said, That's great. So how many you got in your group?
13:51 She said, 9. I said, That's more than I've got. I said, How old are you? She says, I'm 93. You can do this. Anybody can start, you could be a brand new believer and
14:03 start a small group. Now, that's first thing. We study the word together. Number 2. Second thing is we practice learning how to love. That is the second purpose of a small group, and
14:15 that's what they did in the Bible. We practice learning how to love in a small group. You can't love a crowd. Like the crowd we've got right now in this in this worship center right now, you
14:27 can't love everybody. You don't even know them all. But you can love 4 people or 5 people or 6 people. You can love a small group, you can't love a crowd. Small groups are the
14:38 laboratory for learning how to love. They're learning relational skills. You did not learn relational skills growing up. Some of them did, you learned the wrong ones. You didn't learn how to resolve conflict,
14:50 you didn't learn how to make your point with, get across without being cross, a lot of those things. You learn relational skills in a small group. It's a laboratory for
15:02 love. Now, now listen. The number 1 purpose of your life, the number 1 purpose of your life is to learn how to love. It's why God puts
15:14 you on this planet Earth instead of creating you and taking you instantly to heaven. You ever thought about this? Why does God put us here for 80 years, or 90 years, or a hundred years at the most? Why didn't God just
15:26 make us and take us instantly to heaven if that's where we're going anyway? He puts you here to learn how to love because God is love. 1 day Jesus was asked, what's the most important commandment? He said, love God with
15:37 all your heart, love your neighbors yourself. So God wants you to learn to love God, learn to love others, learn to love yourself. And he says, you learn these things in community. Now, you can't learn love, the most
15:49 important thing in life, unless you're around other people that you actually practice it with, you practice unselfishness with. Now, and you have to do it with people who are different than you.
16:01 You see, a lot of religions teach that the way you become holy, the way you become spiritual is you get away from people. And in a lot of religions, the holiest person, the holy
16:13 man is the person who goes and lives up on the mountain in the cave, so he's not touched by evil, wicked, mean, bad, nasty humanity. And so, he stays pure. Jesus
16:25 came in and blew up that myth. He said, no, no, no. He was in the marketplace, he was in the home, he was in the small group. Why? Because you can't learn love by yourself. Right? That make sense? You can't
16:37 learn love if you're not around other people. The only way you can learn around love is to be around other people. And specifically, you gotta be around some unlovely people.
16:49 Hate to tell you this. I mean, it's easy to love people like you. You're cool. You don't have any faults. You don't have any hang ups. You don't have any weird habits. You don't have any
17:01 fears. So it's really easy to love you, but I hate to tell you this, the person next to you, they're really messed up. And so you gotta learn to love the unlovely.
17:12 Now, in every small group, there are people who really get on your nerves, and we call them Egrs that means extra grace required
The Role and Benefits of Small Groups
17:25 and You got to have extra grace to be nice these people they're kind of like heavenly sandpaper. You know they rub you the wrong way Okay? And, they irritate just like fingernails on a blackboard.
17:37 And, they may not have all of the social skills that you do. Maybe maybe they don't know the issue about personal space and they kind of get up really too close to you and then when they talk they kind of spit on you,
17:47 you know? That's not cool. Okay. Or or maybe they talk too much and they dominate the conversation or or they're whining all the time and you're just going why
17:59 did I get in this group with this person? So you could learn to love. That's why because if everybody nobody got on your nerves, it's easy to love people just like
18:11 you. So God puts you And you know what? You're in a group so other people can learn to love. Okay. And put up with all your stuff
18:23 you got to put up with. I nearly said the wrong word there. Okay. Okay. So, are we getting this? That small
18:34 group is a laboratory where you learn all the relational skills you never learned that should have learned. They didn't teach them in school. And so you grow up, and you have all kinds of conflicts and
18:46 problems like that. Now, there is a word for practicing love. We practice love in small groups. And the word, the Bible word for practicing love is called
18:59 fellowship. That's what fellowship means. Fellowship simply means practicing love. And you're practicing love before you go to get to heaven.
19:11 God wants to see you. You're gonna learn to be a great lover before you get to heaven. Now the second thing they did in the New Testament says, they joined with other believers
19:23 in fellowship. Circle that they were practicing love. The Bible says they were like family to each other. In many ways, your spiritual family can be closer than your physical family. And then it
19:35 says they committed themselves to life together. Circle the word committed. Love isn't a feeling. Love is a commitment. Love is a choice. Love is not a feel. If you think love is a feeling, then as
19:47 soon as the feeling is gone, you think, well, I don't love you anymore. No. Love is a choice. Love is a commitment. Now love creates feelings, but love is not a feeling. How do you know love isn't a
19:59 feeling? Because you are commanded by God to love everybody, and you can't feel good about everybody. But, you're commanded to love everybody regardless of your feelings. You can't command a
20:11 feeling. It's like a parent telling a crying child, I command you to be happy. I am mommy. I'm trying. I'm trying. You know, you can't command a feeling, but you can
20:23 command a choice, a commitment. Love is a choice. They committed themselves to life together. I'm asking you to make a 7 week commitment to say, I'm gonna practice learning how to love
20:35 by being in a small group for 7 weeks. Not the rest of your life, just 7 weeks. Get in this thing for 7 weeks. Alright? Number 3, we study God's word together, we
20:46 practice learning how to love. And third thing, I really like this 1, in small groups we eat together. Alright. Now we're talking. We eat together in small groups. They did that in the Bible, and
20:58 we're gonna do it too. This is the fellowship of food. A small group without food is a small group I don't want to be a part of.
21:11 Okay. Okay. I want to know what are you serving. Alright. Now, the Bible says this, they shared in fellowship meals. They did this in the house to house, home to home in
21:23 their small group. The Bible says, they broke bread together. Now, may have been gluten free or not, I don't know but it was, but we eat together. Now, it's interesting when you study the life of Jesus,
21:34 how many times Jesus taught when he was either eating or walking. In fact, if you look at the life of Jesus, most of the time he's teaching the most important stuff, He's at
21:46 a meal or he's walking. Why? In fact, Jesus spent so much time going to parties and going to dinners and going to meals that his critics, the Pharisees,
21:59 said the guy is a glutton and a drunk. That's what they said. It's in the Bible. They called him a glutton and a drunk because he went to so many meals. Why did Jesus do most of his
22:10 teaching when people were eating and walking? Because when you're eating and walking, you're relaxed. And when you're relaxed, your tension goes down,
22:22 your barriers and resistance goes down, and your your mind gets more open, and your receptivity to truth is much wider. That's why we don't have like
22:34 adult Sunday school classes like a lot of churches do where people come on Sunday morning, and sit in a classroom, and study the Bible. You put a guy on a Sunday morning in a classroom in a suit and tie, he's gonna
22:46 sit there like a bump on a log and say nothing. It just seems unnatural. But you put that same guy in a home on Friday night in flip flops, t shirts, cut offs, coke, or cup of coffee, and something in
22:58 his other hand, he'll talk his head off. Why? Because he's now relaxed. So food is important part of fellowship. Notice the Bible says here, they ate their meals in
23:10 their homes, eating with great joy and generosity. Circle joy and generosity. So in sharing food in our small groups, we share it joyfully, and we share it
23:22 generously. That means you don't save the good stuff till after everybody leaves. Put out cheese and crackers for everybody else and let's save back those really bonbons or the cinnamon rolls
23:35 or no, no, whatever. But the bottom line is you're I'm saying you are joyfully and generously sharing your food. That's part of small group experience. Tom's gonna come and talk about the
23:47 other 2.
23:55 Here's a fourth thing we do with each other. We pray for each other. We pray for each other. It's the greatest thing in the world to know there's other people praying for you. They did that in the first group. They spent
24:04 time praying together and that's what we do. We pray together. We pray for each other. Now, there's amazing thing about this when it comes to prayer and groups. There is additional power. I don't know how this
24:16 works, but there is additional power when we pray together. That's what Jesus taught us. Look at this next verse in the outline. Jesus said, I tell you that if 2 of you on earth agree for something in prayer, it will be
24:28 done for you by my father in heaven. So there's this this great power in praying together. In fact, you might even just write this down. Here's what we're talking about. You pray with your group and you pray for your
24:39 group. That's what we're talking about. You pray with your group and you pray for your group. Now, with your group, I know some of you, you think, that's why I don't want to be a part of a group. I'm gonna get in there
24:49 and they're gonna ask me to pray. First week, hey, why don't you close in prayer? I've never prayed in front of people. How how do you handle that 1? Well, let me let me tell you what to do. Here's the way to do that.
24:59 Just go around your group. The simple way to start is you just pray 1 sentence thank you prayers. You just pray God, I thank you for and you fill in the blank. Don't make it difficult. That's a great way to start. You
25:08 think, I don't even know what to thank God for. Thank God for the group. They're gonna think you're brilliant. You just thank God for them. They're gonna think you're the smartest person in the world. So you just go
25:17 around, you thank God for the people in your group, and that's the way that you get started. It's 1 of the things that happens in a group that changes us. We we pray with each other. And then there's a final thing that
25:26 happens. We encourage each other. We help each other out. Basically, what I'm saying here is we practice unselfishness in the group. We're
25:37 unselfish with each other by, in practical ways, supporting each other in times of need. The Bible says about these first groups, they shared everything with each other. They helped each other when
25:49 anyone in the group had a need. So, I'm I'm talking here about practical needs, when they had a need. I I look at our group, small group I'm in, we've done all kinds of things for each other. Brought a meal to someone
26:00 when they were having a busy time, or someone was sick, gone shopping for someone to get groceries into their home when things were going on in their life, helped people move, taking people to the hospital when someone
26:10 in their family wasn't in town, and someone else needed to take them there. Just all kinds of different practical things, helping each other out. And it's really what we're doing is exercising the unselfishness muscle.
26:22 Not just doing something for yourself, not even just doing something for your family, but doing something for somebody else because they have a need. In order to be all that God wants us to be, you gotta get outside of
26:33 yourself. You can't do it getting closer and closer, more and more selfish. You gotta get outside of yourself to be bigger than yourself, to be all that God wants you to be. And God has made every 1 of us with abilities,
26:44 with strengths that can help other people. That's the value of being in a small group. We can help each other with the strengths that we have. Look at this next verse in the outline. First Peter 4 10 says, God has given
26:54 each of you some special abilities. Be sure to use them to make a lot of money. Now is that what it says? No. No. No. No. That's not why God gave me those abilities. God gave you those abilities to help each
27:06 other. God gave me some abilities that you don't have, and those are for your benefit. I can help you. He gave you some abilities I don't have. Those are for my benefit. And in a group, you're able to share with each
27:18 other and help each other. Now, those abilities that you have, where are you going to use them to help other people? It's got to be in a small group. In a group this large, I don't even know what abilities you have. You
27:28 have I don't know what they are. You have lots of them. You got to get in a small enough group that you can help each other. And by the way, when we say small, when we talk about small group, we really mean small. If a
27:39 group gets too big, it really can't help each other. Even at 8 or 10, if you get a group of 8 or 10, someone will stop talking. It always happens, and someone will dominate the talking because they
27:51 feel like I got to lead this group it's so big, and you're not able to help each other. So a small group 3, 4, 5, that's a great size group. Because then you can help each other, then you can strengthen each other.
28:02 If you'll do these things, I'm gonna give you 6 very simple things to do. In the next 7 weeks, you will grow like crazy, your life will be transformed, you will enjoy your small group, and you'll have a
28:14 whole lot of fun while you're doing it. Okay? Real quick, 6 things. Number 1, make my group a priority. Make my group a priority. In other words, show up every
28:26 week. You know, don't fake out, don't flake out, don't say, oh, I don't have time to go this week. If you only show up every other week Then you're going to miss half of the 50 days of
28:37 transformation and at the end you'll only be half transformed and That is not a pretty sight The Bible says, let us not give up the habit, circle
28:49 the word habit, of meeting together. Instead, let us encourage 1 another. A habit means you have consistency, and you have frequency.
29:05 Hey. Have you noticed how the world's answers to life's biggest challenges, your relationships, finances, and even your purpose always seem to change or leave you searching for more.
29:16 Well, here's the good news. God's word offers timeless truths that can truly transform every area of your life from the inside out, And that's why pastor Rick created the
29:28 transformed bible study, a life changing resource designed to help you renew your mind and discover God's principles for lasting transformation. Now in this 7 session video
29:40 and workbook study, Rick's gonna guide you through all the key areas of life, spiritual, physical, mental, emotional, relational, financial, and vocational,
29:53 equipping you with practical steps to experience real lasting change with weekly lessons, daily devotions, and exercises that will help you dive deeper into God's
30:05 word. This study is perfect for personal growth or sharing with your small group. Request the transform study kit today when you give a gift to Daily Hope and join us in
30:16 bringing the hope of Jesus to people around the world. Your transformation starts here. Just go to pastor rick dot com to get your copy of this great resource. That's pastor
30:28 rick dot com, or you can just text the word hope to 7 0 3 0 9. Again, that's the word hope to 7 0 3 0 9. And thank you so much for your support. Your gift
30:40 to Daily Hope helps us share the hope of Christ with people everywhere. We hope you'll join us next time as we continue to look into God's word for our daily hope. This program is
30:52 sponsored by pastor Rick's Daily Hope and your generous financial support.
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