Feb. 10 - "Flame" (002)

It's a cold, bleak day, somewhere in a rural flatland. Rob pulls his truck over on the side of a country road and starts walking across a field. As he walks, he begins talking about the Song of Songs and the image of love it evokes.

Daughters of Jerusalem, I charge you by the gazelles and by the does of the field: do not arouse or awaken love until it so desires. - Song of Songs, 2:7 (NIV)

• Why is love so complex?
• Do we generally, in today's world, treat the concept of love the same way as the people in Song of Songs? As a sacred, beautiful, and mysterious thing?

Rob continues about how the word "love" in English might have lost its meaning. "We'll tell somebody that we love them and in the same breath, we'll talk about how much we love a new car, or a certain pair of pants. I mean, I love my wife, and I also love tacos?"

• Do you think the word "love" loses its meaning when we use it for so many things?
• Does it affect our understanding of what real love is?

The Song of Songs, Rob explains, is written in the Hebrew language, which has at least three different words for love. These are Raya (friendship, companionship), Ahava (commitment), and Dod (the physical, sexual element).

You are beautiful from head to toe, my dear love, beautiful beyond compare, absolutely flawless. - Song of Songs 4:7 (MSG)

"We have our raya flame, our ahava flame and our dod flame," says Rob. "One flame burning all by itself will never be as hot as all the flames burning together."

• How many relationships have you seen where all the flames are burning as one?
• Do you think it's possible to be completely satisfied without having all three flames burning?

Rob proposes that "True sexuality is vast and mysterious. It involves all of you." This means not just giving your body but your soul and spirit.

• What does it mean to give all of yourself to another person?
• Are you giving everything you've got?

Love is patient, love is kind, love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly,; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. - 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 (NASB)

Feb. 3 - 'Rhythm" (segment 011)

Rob seats himself in a concert hall, as a musician on stage begins to play. Rob starts talking about how he hears people say sometimes that God helps them by finding sales or good parking spaces for them. It's as if God has created the world and is now sitting back, watching.

• What do you believe about God's involvement in our daily lives?
• What images do you have of God? What or who has helped shape the images that you have?
• Where is God?

And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you. - Exodus 3:14 (KJV)

"When I think of God, I hear a song," shares Rob.

• Why do you think people, including some writes of the bible use human physical references like "hands," "feet," "eyes," and "he" to describe God, when other Scriptures state that God is a spirit and has no form?

You saw now form of any kind the day the LORD spoke to you at Horeb out of the fire. Therefore watch yourselves very carefully, so that you do not become corrupt and make for yourselves an idol, an image of any shape, whether formed like a man or woman, or like any animal on earth or any bird that flies in the air, or like any creature that moves along the ground or any fish in the waters below. - Deuteronomy 4:15-18 (NIV)

• Is God compassionate, truthful, loving and forgiving or is God compassion, truth, love and forgiveness?
• What about Jesus?

Rob continues his analogy about God as a song. "The song is playing all around us all the time, the song is playing everywhere, it's written in our hearts, and everybody is playing the song. See the question isn't whether or not you're playing a song, the question is, 'Are you in tune?' "

God is sheer being itself - Spirit. Those who worship him must do it out of their very being, their spirits, their true selves, in adoration. - John 4:24 (MSG)

The stage is now filled with an entire orchestra playing along with the rock band, everyone adding his or her own sound to the music. Rob says, "There are people who talk as if they know everything about being a Christian and yet they can seem way out of tune. And then there are others who would say they don't know much at all about the Christian faith, and yet they can seem very in tune with the song."

• Can you believe in God and be out of tune with the song? does it works the other way around?
• What is more important to Jesus: what we believe or what we do?
• Do you believe that if you live the way Jesus taught us to live, being in tune with the song, that you "will have life in its fullest"?

I came so that everyone would have life, and have it in its fullest. - John 10:10 (CEV)