What would be non-negotiable in your version of a "lazy day"?

"Unguarded" isn't one thing. It's a spectrum that maybe runs from "very controlled" to "undignified." For example, a different version of unguarded in a work meeting than with a close teammate, a neighbor, a family member, or alone at home. As we close out this series, we want to think about where your relationship with God is meant to fit on that spectrum and why that might matter more than you'd expect.

Now that you've answered the Icebreaker, here's another question - this one, about a loving God.

Let's acknowledge that a lot of people don't believe in a higher, god-ish being at all. There are many reasons people have for this, and we're not going to try to address them here. The question we are asking is more of a thought experiment that comes from the idea of there being belief in a god at all: Why? Why is this something that people seem to want? How might it be helpful?

Even if the idea of a personal God is made up, what benefits might exist in making such a being up?

Here's one possible answer: We - that is, each person who exists - we need an "other." We need there to be someone who is not ourself. Now, while the people around us are all "other" than us, they all have the same flaw that we do: they tend to judge, putting rules or parameters on their love. We do this to each other, creating a whole world of insecurity and fear and hiding.

Imagine, then, how nice it would be if there another "other," one whose love is total and perfect and never gives up! If such a pure and total lover could exist, and if that one were interested in loving you...sounds kind of nice. And safe. Like a place you could really let down your guard and still be OK.

Let's examine the significance of having an "other" who is there for you under any circumstance, even your least dignified and most unguarded moments.

Hopefully that makes enough sense to get you started. As you continue into the Worship portion of the Spotlight, pray this prayer together:

Lord,
Teach us to lean into the idea
that we can be seen fully and still be accepted,
loved, and finding belonging in you. 
Even when those around us and their reactions 
make us doubt that this is possible,
bring us back to your love. 
Amen.

The Song of Songs is a love poem.

It has always been read, whether by it's earliest teachers in Judaism, by Christian theologians, or by ordinary people across centuries, as more than a poem about two humans. It is a picture of the way God pursues, delights in, and desires to be close to his people. It's about the way God loves each one of us. It's about how God feels about you. 

You are about to read all of God's ("the lover's") words from the whole (eight chapter) book, which are words that make some folks blush because they are intimate, earnest, and from a smitten heart. As they are read, notice that these are words that are meant to illustrate the way God feels about you. They express the thought God has put into loving and admiring you. They create space for an intimate connection.

How do you feel about that version of God's love? Let that question exist as you read these words.

Have a different volunteer read each slide. 

After you've read, let everyone share their response to this:
What's one thing the lover said that landed for you, and why did you appreciate it?
You don't have to explain why.

These are intimate words, and Solomon wrote them to reflect the intimate relationship he perceived God to have with his people. Using the metaphor of a lover is an intentional way of inviting the reader into a relationship in which nothing is held back or hidden, because it doesn't need to be. God delights in you.

The desire of this God is reflected nicely in the song "Ever Chasing God." Listen to it now as you reflect on the lover's words. 

Imagine a princess in a tower. Here's what you know about her:

• She has been there so long she stopped counting the days.
• Her window faces a direction she doesn't recognize.
• She isn't sure anyone knows she's there.
• But someone does know - and that someone is the key to her rescue.

The title of this series, On Letting Down Your Guard, carries two meanings. 

1. The first is the obvious one: you are guarding yourself, and you're being invited to lower your defenses. 
2. The second flips it: Someone or something else is guarding you. They are keeping you in, keeping you contained - and you want out. You want your captor to be disappointed that the guard didn't hold. If this series succeeds, all the forces that are guarding you will be let down.

Your group's task is to build the rest of the princess story together using the questions below. You are not going to finish it, but you will flesh out its world. As you do, keep in mind the way we've been talking about God in this Spotlight: someone who sees you, knows where you are, and is already moving toward you. It makes a difference when there is someone who knows about you. 

She gave this name to the Lord who spoke to her: "You are the God who sees me," for she said, "I have now seen the One who sees me." | Genesis 16:13

Now, read the story of Hagar, who was a different kind of "damsel in distress" from Genesis 16:

Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian slave named Hagar; 2 so she said to Abram, “The Lord has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my slave; perhaps I can build a family through her.”
Abram agreed to what Sarai said. 3 So after Abram had been living in Canaan ten years, Sarai his wife took her Egyptian slave Hagar and gave her to her husband to be his wife. 4 He slept with Hagar, and she conceived.
When she knew she was pregnant, she began to despise her mistress. 5 Then Sarai said to Abram, “You are responsible for the wrong I am suffering. I put my slave in your arms, and now that she knows she is pregnant, she despises me. May the Lord judge between you and me.”
6 “Your slave is in your hands,” Abram said. “Do with her whatever you think best.” Then Sarai mistreated Hagar; so she fled from her.
7 The angel of the Lord found Hagar near a spring in the desert; it was the spring that is beside the road to Shur. 8 And he said, “Hagar, slave of Sarai, where have you come from, and where are you going?”
“I’m running away from my mistress Sarai,” she answered.
9 Then the angel of the Lord told her, “Go back to your mistress and submit to her.” 10 The angel added, “I will increase your descendants so much that they will be too numerous to count.”
11 The angel of the Lord also said to her:
“You are now pregnant
    and you will give birth to a son.
You shall name him Ishmael,
    for the Lord has heard of your misery.
12 He will be a wild donkey of a man;
    his hand will be against everyone
    and everyone’s hand against him,
and he will live in hostility
    toward all his brothers.”
13 She gave this name to the Lord who spoke to her: “You are the God who sees me,” for she said, “I have now seen the One who sees me.” 14 That is why the well was called Beer Lahai Roi; it is still there, between Kadesh and Bered.
15 So Hagar bore Abram a son, and Abram gave the name Ishmael to the son she had borne. 16 Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore him Ishmael.
--
Hagar had been enslaved, used, and cruelly dismissed. She and her baby were alone in the wilderness. She had no plan and no thought of rescue. God showed up, saw her, spoke to her, and she gave him the name: "the God who sees me."

She and her son did return to Abraham's household - interestingly, her son Ishmael was the second person ever to be circumcised into the covenant God made with Abraham.

Earlier, you fleshed out a story about a princess who was rescued. Hagar's story finds a God who doesn't ride in on a white horse at all. In fact, he has her go back into the situation she was trying to escape. Nevertheless, having this angel of the Lord pay attention to her at her lowest moment mattered to her. A lot.

Continue into the Serve section to "land the plane" on this idea.

Read this story: 

2 Samuel 6:12-22
12 Now King David was told, “The Lord has blessed the household of Obed-Edom and everything he has, because of the ark of God.” So David went to bring up the ark of God from the house of Obed-Edom to the City of David with rejoicing. 13 When those who were carrying the ark of the Lord had taken six steps, he sacrificed a bull and a fattened calf. 14 Wearing a linen ephod, David was dancing before the Lord with all his might, 15 while he and all Israel were bringing up the ark of the Lord with shouts and the sound of trumpets.
16 As the ark of the Lord was entering the City of David, Michal daughter of Saul watched from a window. And when she saw King David leaping and dancing before the Lord, she despised him in her heart.
17 They brought the ark of the Lord and set it in its place inside the tent that David had pitched for it, and David sacrificed burnt offerings and fellowship offerings before the Lord. 18 After he had finished sacrificing the burnt offerings and fellowship offerings, he blessed the people in the name of the Lord Almighty. 19 Then he gave a loaf of bread, a cake of dates and a cake of raisins to each person in the whole crowd of Israelites, both men and women. And all the people went to their homes.
20 When David returned home to bless his household, Michal daughter of Saul came out to meet him and said, “How the king of Israel has distinguished himself today, going around half-naked in full view of the slave girls of his servants as any vulgar fellow would!”
21 David said to Michal, “It was before the Lord, who chose me rather than your father or anyone from his house when he appointed me ruler over the Lord’s people Israel—I will celebrate before the Lord. 22 I will become even more undignified than this, and I will be humiliated in my own eyes. But by these slave girls you spoke of, I will be held in honor.”

Which of these words reflect what you think David meant when he said he would become "even more undignified than this"?

Exposed · Foolish · Unfiltered · Honest · Reckless · Raw · Transparent · Uninhibited · Unashamed · Open · Vulnerable · Undone · Forthright · Excessive · Embarrassing · Carried away · Ridiculous · Unguarded · Abandoned · Free

We started this series with David's words from Psalm 32:
3 When I kept silent,
    my bones wasted away
    through my groaning all day long.
4 For day and night
    your hand was heavy on me;
my strength was sapped
    as in the heat of summer.

He said this because he was hiding, and then once he was open about his shame, he felt better in God's forgiveness.

If hiding shame is this costly, why do people keep doing it...and why does it so often take an "other" person to get us out of it? 

Close with this reflective song.