Welcome to Life-Minded: Belonging to God and Each Other

As human beings, we were created to live lives of devotion. We were crafted to be worshipers at heart. To what or whom will we devote ourselves? To understand God’s Word is to see that our devotion is to be reserved for God—and God alone.

When you complete this lesson, you should be able to:

1. Explain what it means to be devoted to God and how Scripture supports this practice.
2. Reflect on your own priorities and what you devote yourself to.
3. Identify priorities for practicing devotion.

In our fast-paced world, the virtue of curiosity is often overshadowed by the need for quick answers and immediate gratification. Embracing curiosity in conversation not only enriches our understanding of others and the world, but also deepens our spiritual growth by fostering a genuine quest for knowledge and truth.

When you complete this lesson, you should be able to:

1. Explain what it means to have a posture of curiosity and how Scripture supports this practice.
2. Reflect on your own capacity for curiosity in conversation.
3. Identify areas in your own life and community to practice compassion and empathy.

“To answer before listening—that is folly and shame” (Proverbs 18:13). After listening well to others, we can contribute to the dialogue with great discernment and contribute to the healing and reconciliation of a divided world.

When you complete this lesson, you should be able to:

1. Explain what it means to practice discernment in speech and how Scripture supports this practice.
2. Reflect on your own listening and speaking habits.
3. Identify opportunities to practice speaking words of comfort, confirmation, and cooperation in your own life and community.

Just as He calmed the storm that threatened His disciples’ lives, Jesus remains our source of peace today. In a world marked by division, following Jesus’ example of de-escalation is a powerful way to be a beacon of peace.

When you complete this lesson, you should be able to:

1. Explain what it means to practice peace and how Scripture supports this practice.
2. Reflect on your own ability to make or keep peace within yourself and others.
3. Identify ways to practice peacemaking in your own life and community.

“Faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead” (James 2:17). To align our lives with the example Jesus set during His earthly ministry is to couple works of service with our wonderful faith.

When you complete this lesson, you should be able to:

1. Explain what it means to be a servant and how Scripture supports this practice.
2. Reflect on your own posture towards service.
3. Identify opportunities to practice serving with a spirit of humility in your own life and community.

Forgiveness isn’t always easy, but the Bible teaches us that the practice of forgiveness is meant to be a fundamental aspect of our faith journey. We may know no greater satisfaction than when we are released from the burden of bitterness to reflect the grace and love we have received from God.

When you complete this lesson, you should be able to:

1. Explain what it means to practice forgiveness and how Scripture supports this practice.
2. Reflect on your own experiences with forgiveness.
3. Identify opportunities to practice forgiveness in your own life and community.

Awe is a universal human experience, but for the follower of Jesus, it is a deeply spiritual one as well. Moving experiences aren’t mere accidents, they’re glimpses of the Divine that ask us to acknowledge the Source of all that is beautiful and good.

When you complete this lesson, you should be able to:

1. Explain what it means to practice awe and how Scripture supports this practice.
2. Reflect on your own sense of awe of God.
3. Identify ways to prioritize experiencing awe in your own life and community.

Grace is God’s unmerited favor offered freely to humanity. As such, it is the single most powerful gift we can give to another person. It is only by grace—our receiving God’s grace and our passing along that grace to others—that the unity we seek can unfold.

When you complete this lesson, you should be able to:

1. Explain what it means to give grace and how Scripture supports this practice.
2. Reflect on your own experiences of receiving and giving grace.
3. Identify opportunities to prioritize giving grace in your own life and community.

This activity offers a brief description of the lesson and informs you of the lesson’s learning objectives.

Viewing this activity is required for course completion.

This activity identifies and explains the specific discipline that the lesson focuses on. It also includes warm-up questions to help you start thinking about your experience with the practice that will be discussed. These questions can be answered in your journal or in the downloadable course workbook. You will find the link to download the digital workbook in the Opener activity for Lesson One.

Viewing this activity is required for course completion.

This activity provides the main teaching content for the lesson. You may choose to watch the video, listen to the audio, or read the transcript. Closed captioning is also provided for any video segments. In each case the content is the same.

This activity is required for course completion.

This quiz activity checks your understanding of the concepts learned so far. It is not a timed activity, and the quiz can be attempted as many times as needed.

Earning a quiz score of 70% or better is required for course completion.

This activity allows you to spend time in Scripture and connect it to the topic of each lesson. Spend some time carefully reading the Scripture passage provided in the activity, utilizing the simple three-step method of Receive, Reflect, and Respond.

Complete these activities digitally in the downloadable course workbook or write them in your own journal. Find the link to download the digital workbook in Lesson One.

1. Receive simply involves reading the text and asking, “What does the text say?”
2. Reflect challenges you to ask, “What does the text mean?”
3. Respond invites you to apply the meaning of the text to your life.

Instructions for reflection

1. Get and use a hard copy journal or an e-note-taking tool such as Notion, OneNote, or Apple Notes. You can also complete these activities in the course workbook, which can be downloaded in Lesson One.
2. Spend time reflecting on the questions provided in the activity. Make it a time of prayer by sharing your thoughts and reflections with God.
3. Write down your answers, thoughts, and other revelatory ideas in your journal that God reveals during your time of prayerful reflection.

For reflective journaling activities such as this one, find a quiet place in which you will not be disturbed by other people, noises, or other distractions. Silence e-devices and quiet your mind by reading Bible passages or praying before attempting the activity.

This discussion activity is designed to help you articulate what you have learned in each lesson. It may also help you collect ideas from other course participants about practicing the disciplines discussed in the course. Since this course is asynchronous (i.e., other learners complete the course at different times), you may not see many discussion submissions or receive replies to your posts. Therefore, consider your submissions to this discussion forum as a way to share your insights about what you have learned to inspire or challenge others in their learning journey, and to enable others to do the same for you.

While other learners may not see or respond to your comments in the short term, encouraging others and engaging with others enhances your learning experience.

This activity is required for course completion.

These application activities are designed to help you consider how to put your learning to use in your own context. When you finish this course, you will have an action plan that will help you deepen your relationship with God and promote unity within the Body of Christ.

Complete these activities digitally in the downloadable course workbook or write them in your own journal. You will find the link to download the digital workbook in the Opener activity for Lesson One.

This section features passages from Pastor Boyd’s book Life-Minded that relate to each lesson.

This activity is not required for course completion.

This section includes suggested readings from Pastor Boyd’s book and Bible study. These are not required for course completion but will enrich and deepen your understanding of each lesson. You can purchase these books here.

This activity sums up the concepts learned in each lesson and looks ahead to what comes next.

This activity appears in the course wrap-up section at the end of the course. It allows you to review what you have learned in the course and identify actions you will commit to in order to implement the course concepts.