Introducing the New Midweek Session Option

Systematic verse-by-verse expository teaching through books is the best approach for some student ministries. Explore the Bible: Students now includes an innovative new product that will equip your ministry to offer exactly that. When a given quarter of Explore the Bible focuses on a New Testament book, these midweek sessions will focus on a book from the Old Testament and vice versa. Not only do these single-sheet sessions challenge students, but they also equip leaders to deliver accordingly. They can serve as your sermon outline for your Wednesday night student event, your discussion questions that you distribute to your leaders for their breakout groups after the sermon, or a combination of both. The following explains how each session is structured. See for yourself and download a free sample session below.

Opening Illustration:
These illustration ideas are drawn directly from the Scripture and are then brought back in the session’s closing application to provide a sense of cohesion for your session. They are varied in their approaches, specific in their instructions, and require little to no supplies. Grab and keep the attention of students of every learning style. Then, direct their focus to God’s Word. Set a tone that is fun, but use this illustration to ultimately direct students to Scripture.

Context:
Immerse your students in the original historical, cultural, and/or literary context. Heavy emphasis is given to the original earthly author’s intent; a crucial distinctive of true expository teaching. Show your students how relevant God’s inerrant Word is.

Exposition:
This table is divided into rows that focus on each individual verse or group of verses according to the Scripture’s natural structure without skipping a single verse to cover the entire book by the quarter’s end. The left column provides sermon points upon which the speaker can elaborate and provide illustration; contextualizing the Scripture for each individual student ministry’s unique setting. The right column provides discussion questions that can be used for a small group setting. This unique session model facilitates a hybrid approach in which discussion questions posed in the right column can be answered by any leader of any education background by simply consulting the left column. Smaller ministries who include discussion in their sermon delivery time can ask their groups questions from the right column as they preach through the left column. This table is also ideal for the master-teacher approach in which a student pastor or leader preaches through the left column, then dismisses the crowd into breakout groups who work together through the right column.

Session Connection:
This portion of the outline provides a theological bridge that connects the previous weekend’s session material with this session’s Scripture content. Use this section to provide a sense of cohesiveness to your ministry’s overall teaching plan across the week’s programming. Reinforce the previous weekend’s message and prove to your students the perfect ways in which the New Testament fulfills the Old Testament. When your students are being taught Old Testament Scripture through Explore the Bible: Students on the weekends, they are being taught New Testament Scripture through these midweeks.

Object Lesson/Application:
Exegete from the Scripture a series of direct, clear, practical, and highly challenging action steps for your students to take along with their leaders. Reach the lost with the gospel and disciple Christian students to the next levels in their individual walks. Set the bar high and watch your students rise to it after having been immersed deeply into Scripture. At this point in each session, the opening illustration content returns to help the students wrap the overall message of the Scripture up in their minds and then put that message into action.

Download a free sample Midweek Session here: ETBV05SU1S1_MIDWEEK.

Beginning Fall 2015, all thirteen midweek outlines are included with your purchase of Explore the Bible: Students for a given quarter. Customers who purchase the print materials will be able to find a link at the end of each session in the Leader Guide and digital customers will be emailed the link. The strength of a Bible message comes directly from the Scripture itself, so let Scripture be the focus of your messages. God’s potent and perfect Word will not return void. So, unleash it upon your ministry and watch the Word bear fruit in students’ lives!