Script:

(Hold up a ball) How many parts does a ball have? (Let coaches make guesses. Someone will guess 3 parts. Draw the three circles.) We are made of three parts. Just like the ball skin, we have a body (write as shown in the diagram above on the outer circle), and in the body, what are the senses? (Hear, Sight, Touch, Smell, Taste) (Let the coaches provide the answers and write them). Like the bladder, we have a soul. What is the soul made up of? (Let the coaches provide the answers and write them). And our mind and our emotions can often dictate our will. And then like the air, we have at the center a spirit.

 

Our will does not dictate to our mind or our emotions. The will is like an off/on switch. You decide and you do it and that is because of what the mind and emotions are dictating. So, the will is a servant to your emotions and mind. When you are angry you outwardly react and can become physical and say things you regret.

 

But unlike a ball, we have something else inside of us which is sin (draw this on the diagram). And sin is defined as missing the mark. It is something that is inside of you. You cannot surgically remove it. Sin corrupts our mind, and our emotions and sin’s goal is to ultimately destroy us. You did not ask for this, but scripture says you were born with this.

 

Sin is “missing the mark.” We all have failed to live perfectly under God’s law. Sin is anything you do or perform outside the will of God. The essence of sin is what we have done against God. Have you rejected God’s love for you? Sin is also the good things you do not do. For example, in Romans Chapter 13, it says we must obey the laws of the governing authorities. For Old Testament Jews, sin was their inability to keep the law. But the Law was created by God to show us that it is impossible to keep it to be holy enough and acceptable enough for God, and this is why there was a need for a savior, Jesus.

 

For example, we do not perfectly love those around us. Our love is incomplete. This is also why we have mountains and valleys in our relationships. People like to compare sins, big sins versus little sins. We like to justify our little sins by comparing them to bigger sins, thinking we are not so bad after all. But here is what God sees about your sin. All sin is the same. Think of a glass window. You pick up a small rock and throw it through the glass. A small hole appears, and the glass is cracked. The window is broken and has to be replaced. Now take a bigger rock and throw it at the same window. Now you have a bigger hole. This represents bigger, worse sin. Regardless of the size of the rock, the glass is broken and needs to be replaced. God sees our sins as all the same. It is the fact it is broken that is the key point, regardless of the size.

 

And then we have another component called the flesh (draw this on the diagram). God has placed into each of us divine needs. These needs are there so that we desire to have God meet them. However, your flesh is trying to meet the God’s Divine needs of love, affirmation, value/worth, acceptance and security through the things of the world. (Write the Divine Needs as a list on the chart – see sample chart above). These divine needs come from God because God is the only one who can completely give them to you. However, we often or always choose things of this world to feed our divine needs.

 

The flesh is hungry and must eat to be satisfied. An example is an alcoholic who needs to get that drink because he is trying to numb his pain from lack of love and security. This is what we call inflation (draw this on the diagram). And like the valve of a ball, it is the introduction of the things of the world into you.

 

I am providing you with knowledge and the opportunity to understand. Understanding is critical because, as a leader and influencer, you need to know your strengths and weaknesses. You need to know where you are and how you operate. Like a good coach who knows his competitors’ strengths and weaknesses, you too must understand.

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Testimony Opportunity:

(Share a testimony from your life that connects with what you have just taught about inflation, but do not include how it was resolved. You’re just sharing an example of the problem.)

 

The problem is that the things of the world are limited, corrupted, and false. Inflation results in deflation. This deflation may not be perceptible, but it is evident with this new understanding. Look at your life. How are you trying to meet your divine needs? Is it working for you? Are you ever satisfied? Do you continue to return to the same habits and bad relationships? Inflation becomes deflation, something is being taken out of you, life, love, ambition, generosity, curiosity, health – you name it.

 

For example, someone reviews social media and gets fed images of people happy and successful with material wealth. We are getting fed worth and security.  We go to bed and wake up the next morning wanting to go back to social media and get fed again. This process continues to repeat itself, but it never satisfies. The same thing for alcoholics. They keep returning to the drink, never satisfied. This is also how people become addicts. The deflation continues to reduce us to something that is without life. We become dry like a desert and are desperate to find things to meet our needs.

 

Testimony Opportunity:

(Share a testimony from your life that connects with what you have just taught about deflation, but do not include how it was resolved. You’re just sharing an example of the problem.)

 

God gave us these divine needs so that we would turn to him not to the world. The Old testament is littered with Israel’s kings turning to idols instead of God. You can see the deflation of Israel over time. Finally, they meet destruction at the hands of the same people God directed them to overcome. This is the same for you and me. (Point to the Triangle) We must place ourselves under, and God above. We must learn to get our needs met by him and not the world. Only God can satisfy our divine needs.

 

Why is this important for you to know? Because this is how you operate. Each and every one of us operates this way. When you were born as an unbeliever, your spirit was dead to God. You had no ability to have a relationship, no way of meeting the divine needs so you had a problem. And as we will discuss later on, even if you are a believer, born again, you may still operate by going to the world to meet your needs. The majority of Christians do this because they do not know what happened in their spirit when they were born again. But we will move on to that later.

 

Small Group Breakout – Questions to consider

• Have you ever considered your soul before and how it works?

• What are the obvious things you are doing in your flesh?

• Did you know what sin really is, does this change your understanding

• Did you know that everyone has sin and can be condemned before God?

• What does “being lost” now mean to you?

• Share your personal story of religion – what have you experienced?

• Have you ever been depressed? – share the experience of deflation

• Did you know you have divine needs that your heart’s desire is to meet?

 

Supporting Scripture (You can add the book and verse to the chart for coaches to reference)

 

• 1 Thessalonians 5:23–24 - Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

• James 4:17 - If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn’t do it, it is sin for them.

• Hebrews 4:12 - For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit, of joints and marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

• Romans 3:23-24 - For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus

• Romans 5:12-14 - Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned— (For until the law sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law. Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who had not sinned according to the likeness of the transgression of Adam

• Psalm 51:5 - Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, And in sin my mother conceived me.

• Romans 13:2 - Consequently, whoever rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves.

• ​Romans 8:4-5 - By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin,[c] he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit

• ​Romans 7: 15-20 - For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who does it, but sin that dwells within me.