Warm Up

Present your students with this riddle: Four men were in a boat on the lake. The boat turns over, and all four men sink to the bottom of the lake, yet not a single man got wet! Why? Allow them to work in groups if they’d like, but they can’t use anything to look up the answer. They can ask every person in the room for help (chances are, none of them will ask you) and once they have their answer, ask them to present it to you written on a piece of paper.

 

Once you’ve given them a few minutes to work on the riddle, you can reveal to them that you know the answer and they had every opportunity to ask you for the answer. However, they may not have realized that you were included on the “every person in the room for help” detail.

 

The answer to the riddle is that all four men were married, so not a single man got wet.

 

How many times do we focus so much on the problem that we forget that there is always someone who has the answer? Sometimes we can fail to recognize God’s place in our lives because we tend to focus on the problems that are right in front of us. However, God wants us to surrender everything to Him – that includes our problems. He wants us to know that we need Him and He wants to be our source of help.

 

“Praise Over Problems” by planetboom encourages us to look beyond how big our problems may seem and get a better perspective of exactly how big our God is. The video starts with, I tell my problems how big my God is. When we realize that God is the creator of the universe and that when He spoke things came to life, we begin to see the scope of His magnitude.

 

Give the students a piece of paper. As the video plays, have them draw a problem or issue they’re struggling with in the bottom left corner. Then begin to fill the rest of the paper with a representation of how big God truly is.

 

Ask, “Why does it seem so easy to focus on our problems instead of praising God in the middle of our problems?”

 

Hand out the Student Guides. Use this outline to teach the Bible Study, and encourage the students to take notes. Encourage group discussion when answering the questions.

 

Give Thanks in the Good, Bad, and Ugly. (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18) It’s not always easy to give thanks and worship God. When everything is going right it tends to be a little easier. However, when things are bad it does get more difficult. But when things are downright ugly, it’s nearly impossible.

 

Have the students list times when it is more difficult than others to give God praise. After they’ve given a few answers, ask for a Bible story of when someone was in a bad or ugly situation and they pushed through to give God praise. Be ready to tell the story of Daniel and the lion’s den, Paul and Silas in jail, etc.

 

You Are Not Alone. (1 Peter 5:9) It’s much easier to navigate problems no matter how big they may be when we know we have access to the person with the answer to those problems. The enemy wants you to feel alone and isolated, but knowing that God is right there with you should change your perspective.

 

You Don’t Have to Be Fearful. (Deuteronomy 20:4) What are you afraid of the most? What does God want to give you, according to this verse? Why? (Hopefully an answer to this question will be, “He loves us.” If that doesn’t freely come, lead the conversation that way.)

 

God’s Love Is Deeper Than Any Valley and Higher Than Any Mountain. 1 John 4:18a says, “perfect love casts out all fear.” Sometimes we don’t need more courage when we’re afraid. We just need a greater revelation of God’s love.

 

Our praise and worship to God is what helps have the proper perspective that God is greater than our problems. He is our source of help when difficult times come.

 

What do you think is the best way to navigate through your problems no matter how big or how little they may be? We can try our hardest to figure things out ourselves, but most of the time we stay focused on the problems instead of the problem solver. Let’s commit to praising God through our problems.

 

This song is featured on “The Linc: God’s Power” Spotify playlist – which is the perfect way to remind your students what you’ve taught them in this session. To share it with them, click the live link on the web version of this study.