Congregation Book Study, Week of June 12-18, 2023, Lesson 48, Points 1-4, Choose your friends well, Answers.

Study of the Book of the congregation, June 12-18, 2023, Lesson 48 points from 1-4, Choose your friends well, Answers.

Congregation Bible study (30 min.): lff lesson 48 points 1-4.

Choose your friends well

Good friends make our joys bigger. And, with your support, our sorrows are smaller. But be careful, the Bible says that not everyone is a good friend. So how can you select your friends? Analyze the following questions.

1. How do your friends influence you?

We know that friends influence for better or for worse. For example: If our friends serve Jehovah, they will help us to be loyal, but if not, they will lead us down the wrong path, hence the importance of choosing our friends well.

And something interesting that the paragraph mentions is that we must choose our friends well, but not only with whom we meet physically, but also on social networks.

Friendships, if they are good, will bring us good things, and if they are bad, bad things. The Bible advises us to choose well with whom we share the time, since we will be sharing it in things that those friendships like, as 1 Thessalonians 5:11 says, if faith in God is shared in friendship, we will build each other up .

2. Does Jehovah care what kind of friends you choose?

Of course, that is why Jehovah makes it very clear to us in James 4:4, that if we have friends from the world or who do not serve him, we will be becoming his enemies, but if we choose friends who serve him, we will be getting closer. to our God.

Jehovah loves us and therefore he wants us not to suffer and to be happy in his faithful service, that is why he sees us and cares about how we use our time and what are our diversions that we share with other people, because, perhaps, one of them can pose a danger that distances us from God.

LET'S DEEPER INTO THE SUBJECT

Let's see why it's important that we choose our friends well and how you can make friends that really enrich your life.

3. Beware of bad companies

The bad companies are the people who do not love God or respect his rules. Watch the VIDEO and talk about the following:

VIDEO: How to reject bad company (6:17)

How could we get to have bad companies without realizing it?

For example: At work we could start to get together more than normal with people who do not serve Jehovah, even sharing their humor, their jokes, also on social networks we could have contact with people who are not well in a spiritual sense or who are not They are Christians.

In addition, while playing online video games, young people may come into contact with people who do not serve Jehovah and with many bad habits, and those habits could endanger their spirituality.

At work, we may be involved in sharing time with clients beyond the professional sphere or taking time for spiritual activities. Another example is in social networks although we think it is harmless or in online games that are inappropriate in nature according to what the Bible teaches us. They are all situations that a priori we think will not affect us but could end up being so.

Read 1 Corinthians 15:33 and discuss the following:

In your case, which people could be a bad company? Because?

Personally they could be a bad company to the people I meet at work, because they are people who do not serve Jehovah, that is why I must learn to set limits.

Although it is true, as we see in the illustration, that we can have very good friends, but a bad friendship is enough to spoil the roots that we have put down in faith. That is why we have to analyze each friendship, the time we spend with them and what we do.

Read Psalm 119:63 and discuss the following:

What should you look for in a friend?

What we should look for in a friend is that he fears Jehovah and that he also complies with all his commands.

As we have just read in Psalm 119:63, every good friendship, every good friend would be one who loves Jehovah as much or more as we do, who fears him and lives according to his fair divided standards. So that the time we spend with him/her is as we saw previously in Thessalonians, edifying for the faith of both.

One bad apple can spoil all the others. And you, how could bad companies affect you?

One bad apple could spoil all the others. And just as a rotten apple is combined with a healthy apple, it will also cause it to rot. In the same way, if I associate with people who do not do God's will, I could come to love what is bad and thus lose Jehovah's approval.

4. We can become good friends with people who are very different from us.

The Bible tells of David and Jonathan, two men from ancient Israel. Although they had very different ages and lives, they enjoyed a precious friendship. Read 1 Samuel 18:1 and discuss the following:

Why is it not necessary that all our friends are of our age or social position?

Because we can have friends of all ages, just like David and Jonathan, we will even benefit more if we have friends older than us, due to their experience in serving Jehovah, because without a doubt their advice will help us to continue on the right path. .

The Bible teaches us examples of friendship at different ages and how it can be productive because they have other wisdom, knowledge, a different perspective of seeing things and we can learn from all of them. In addition, we will enrich ourselves with their experiences, personal circumstances or way of thinking.

Read Romans 1:11, 12 and discuss the following:

How do friends who love Jehovah encourage each other?

We strengthen each other by spending time together, whether it be in Meetings, Preaching or getting together in our spare time with our brothers in faith.

Every person who loves Jehovah faces similar situations throughout his life and we know very well what it is to serve Jehovah, which is why no one better than faithful servants of God knows how and what we need at all times. so that our words, gestures and actions are truly encouraging.

Watch the VIDEO and talk about the following:

VIDEO: There are friends where you least expect it (5:06)

Why were Akil's parents worried about the friends their son had at school?

He took advantage of the friendship that an elderly brother gave him, because they even had similar hobbies. So they became great friends, teaching us in this way that it is not necessary for someone to be our age to be our friend.

It worried him, because, on the one hand, his son is experiencing a difficult situation, leaving his friends behind and now having to fit in, and this feeling of fitting in is very strong and could lead him to choose toxic friendships that in order to adapt or enter into your circle of friends would have to do things that were contrary to God or share or accept behaviors that are unbiblical.

Why did Akil like these friendships in the beginning?

Because he felt very lonely, since he had just moved and had no friends, so it was a bit easy for him to have those friends at school.

Obviously, Akil liked them because they accepted him into their circle of friends for who he was, but it could come at a high cost. She even thought that she could get the truth to these new friends. But little by little, with living together, he really saw what was in his heart and that it would be detrimental to his future with Jehovah.

What did you do to stop feeling alone?

 He took advantage of the friendship that an elderly brother gave him, because they even had similar hobbies. So they became great friends, teaching us in this way that it is not necessary for someone to be our age to be our friend.

Akil realized that his friends did not have to be young his age, but he found in experienced brothers in the congregation the support, refuge and uplifting friendship he needed to not feel lonely, a very strong feeling, and he even found brothers who He shared his hobby of photography.