EA Essential - engaging young people with biblical truth

Review

Glad You Asked is a very well produced DVD that is designed to facilitate discussion on some meaty topics. Each session includes several short DVD clips surrounded by discussion questions. The leaders guide is very helpful and provides plenty of useful information and ideas. It also includes suggestions to help deal with some of the difficult questions that group members are likely to ask.

The DVD clips include input from a range of people including scientists, theologians, philosophers and students. The strength of this resource is the blend of academic input and personal testimony. Sessions such as ‘How can God allow pain?’ (Session 2) ensure that the mind (thinking) is not separated from the heart (feeling) and everything is grounded in the reality of everyday life. The variety of people presenting the DVD material throughout the series will help keep people engaged and goes along way to ensure that there is ‘something for everyone’.

The series has been designed to be used with ‘seekers’. Therefore it begins to introduce God from ‘outside’ the Bible and sensibly doesn’t reference the Bible until after session 4 (Can the Bible be trusted?). As well as being a great resource to use with ‘seekers’ it is also an ideal resource to help Christians explore their faith further and become more secure in it.

Glad You Asked is aimed at 16-30 year olds. Therefore it is most suitable for students and young adults. However, if your 14-18s group are asking big questions and you would like to stretch their thinking it is well worth checking out this resource. It ought to be noted that the first session (which explores the scientific and philosophical arguments for God), is probably the most academically challenging. This is an ideal resource to use if you have young people in your group who are studying A-Level Philosophy and Ethics.

For more information and sample clips go to www.gladyouasked.org

Contents

Session 1 – Part 1: Does God matter?

Session 1 – Part 2: Does God exist?

Session 2 – How can God allow pain?

Session 3 – Do the differences in religions matter?

Session 4 – Can the Bible be trusted?

Session 5 – Why is religion full of hypocrites?

Session 6 – What was Jesus really like?

Session 7 – Questions Jesus Asked: ‘Why do you call me good?’

Session 8 – Questions Jesus Asked: ‘Why have you abandoned me?’

Session 9 – Questions Jesus Asked: ‘Why are you crying?’

Session 10 – Questions Jesus Asked: ‘Who do you say I am?’