week four
hide-and-seek

game over

Read: Chapter 10 and the part 2 introduction

Opening Question: This week, you only read one chapter and the part 2 introduction because there needed to be space to absorb some of these deep truths from Scripture. Take a few minutes to debrief with your group. Was there something in particular you read that has been rolling around in your mind and heart over the past few days?

Discuss Life behind the Mask

Your masks, or your flesh, will never completely go away. But we can learn what it looks and feels like to choose dependence on Jesus rather than dependence on self. There are many deep, spiritual truths to explore as we consider what it means to live life free of the masks we hide behind. Chapter 10 highlights five of them.

1. The two trees (Gen. 2:16–17). God put two trees in the Garden—the Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. You answered this question individually in your reading, so let’s talk about it now as a group.

• Have you ever considered the fact that the forbidden tree was not just offering the knowledge of evil, but the knowledge of good as well?
• Why would God want to protect us from the knowledge of good?

2. The mask (or flesh) and the Spirit (Gal. 5:17). Take a few minutes to discuss which of the masks from chapters 2 through 9 each woman most personally identifies with. Perhaps there is one she can think of that isn’t in the book.

• In what ways is living life from behind our masks similar to eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil? (Example: They are both a result of depending on ourselves to meet our own needs.)

3. Born into Adam vs. born into Christ (1 Cor. 15:21–22). Birth determines identity. This new birth is what provides the authority by which we can choose not to live behind the mask (our flesh). Because of the fall, every person is born into Adam—leading to death. But when we choose Jesus, we are reborn into Christ—leading to life.

• What does this say to you about the try-hard life?
• In what ways are you living your life as if you are still in Adam, that is, still eating from the Tree of Knowledge rather than the Tree of Life?

4. Guilt and shame. Guilt deals with our behavior while shame deals with our identity.

• Can you identify ways in which healthy conviction of sin could morph into unhealthy feelings of shame?
• How might this feed our attempts to be good girls living a try-hard life?

5. The mercy side of the cross and the grace side of the cross (Col. 1:13–14). God’s mercy holds back the wrath we deserve—Jesus died in our place, offering forgiveness. God’s grace lavishes upon us what we don’t deserve—Jesus rose from the dead, offering life.

• If you live on the mercy side and avoid the grace side, of what will you constantly be aware? (Examples: the wrath you deserve, your need for forgiveness)
• When we embrace both sides of the cross, what is the result?
• Can you relate to being sure of your salvation but in desperate need of a rescue?
• What do you feel you most need to be rescued from? (Examples: impossible expectations, the weight of worry, the need to be liked, etc.)

Journal: We were created to hide, but not in a hiding place crafted by our own hands to get our needs met. We were made to find our safe place in God. Go back in your journal to week one where you briefly recorded some of the main points from your story. Which of these five truths did you least understand when you first accepted Jesus? Record in your own words how some of these truths are beginning to shape your story.

Truth to Remember: These masks, this girl-made hiding, are all a part of our flesh patterns. This may be how you cope, but this is not who you are. “For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son” (Col. 1:13).

Song: Matt Redman, “You Alone Can Rescue”