A Bible Study For The Boys

When one Freedom Fellowships family saw an opportunity to start a discovery group for their son and his friends, they prayed and hopped on it with joy.

For a while, Sarah Ramsey, a member of the BroYo fellowship group, felt convicted to form some kind of small group Bible study for her 10-year-old son Ernst.

“There are a lot of kids in our fellowship but no other fourth-grade boys,” she said. “I had a burden for him to have a Bible study group.”

In July, Freedom Fellowships’ Body Meeting focused on the importance of church planting and discovery groups. As people split off to pray during that meeting, Sarah knew she wanted to pray about starting a small group Bible study for Ernst.

Sarah and her husband, Jeremiah, then decided to approach Ernst about the idea of starting a Bible study for him and his friends.

“We talked to Ernst about it on a hike,” Sarah explained. “He would have to want to do it and be on board with it. We said it’s only going to work if you want to do it since you’re going to be the one inviting people. He really liked the idea and was into it.”

In Colossians 4:2-3, Paul calls on believers to be devoted to prayer, watchful and thankful as well as to pray for God to open a door for the gospel message. The Ramsey family did just that, praying for an open door to start a Boy’s Bible Study for Ernst and his friends. Jeremiah said they knew it would be important to keep the Bible study small and simple for it to work.

“What would it look like if we invited just one kid to our house to hear and talk about a Bible story? That’s what we wanted to do,” he said. “It’s not about starting a huge Bible study for 50 kids and launch it into space. It began with just praying. Then it was about trying to invite one kid. We’re going to invite one kid to one Bible study. That becomes a lot more doable!”

In September, Ernst did just that: He invited a few friends to attend a Bible study at his house, and two boys came. The boys read through a Bible passage and Jeremiah asked them questions about the passage. Afterward, the kids naturally had a blast with a Nerf gun target-shooting contest.

With one Bible study done, Ernst invited his friends to come back the next month for another Bible study. This time, three boys came. Again, in December, he invited friends over for Bible study and this time six came! Jeremiah said he and Sarah have encouraged Ernst to take ownership in the group by leading and explaining the activity after Bible study. He added that he’s hopeful other boys who come regularly might take ownership in the group, too.

“The goal is not me as a leader of these boys but it’s that these boys take ownership of this,” said Jeremiah.

Sarah added that it’s been encouraging to see all the boys genuinely engaged in the Bible discussion.

“The kids also ask some pretty good questions,” she said.

“They’ve asked, ‘Did Jesus want to die on the cross?’ and ‘Do you think Jesus knew what would happen to Him?’”

Ernst plans to have another Bible study with his friends Jan. 5. The Ramsey family is praying for another good Bible discussion in January and for some of these boys to enter into a personal relationship with Christ.

Sarah admitted that the idea of starting a discovery Bible study for her son seemed daunting at first. But after praying about it and trying it out, the Lord provided everything to fall into place for the discovery group. It’s been an answered prayer to a concern she had earlier in the year.

“It wasn’t that hard to do – it is something anyone can do!” she said.