Free for your church, class, or home
Thirty weeks on the gospel.
A leader guide for The Visual Gospel. Each gathering gives you the word, the book’s definition, the memory verse, an icebreaker, a passage your group has not already journaled, and questions that start a real conversation.
The thirty weeks
0 of 30 taught
Part I · God’s Heart
What God is like, before we make the story about our crisis.
Part II · Our Problem
What went wrong, and why good news is necessary.
Part III · Christ’s Work
What Jesus did. The long center of the study.
- IncarnationJohn 1:14Christ’s Work
- GospelLuke 2:10–11Christ’s Work
- SalvationRomans 1:16Christ’s Work
- Atonement1 Peter 2:24Christ’s Work
- Propitiation1 John 2:2Christ’s Work
- JustificationRomans 3:24Christ’s Work
- Mediation1 Timothy 2:5–6Christ’s Work
- RedemptionEphesians 1:7Christ’s Work
- ReconciliationColossians 1:19–20Christ’s Work
- ForgivenessColossians 1:14Christ’s Work
- CovenantHebrews 9:15Christ’s Work
Part IV · The Spirit’s Role
How the gospel gets inside a person and starts to show.
Part V · Our Future
Where the story is going, and why it was never fragile.
How to lead the hour
Plan on 60 to 75 minutes. The book is a 30-day devotion. This guide is 30 gatherings — one word a week. Everyone should already have read that day and sat with its reflection questions. If they have not, still use this guide. Do not switch back to the journal prompts. Those were for the quiet hour. These are for the room.
The shape of a strong hour
The rhythm is borrowed from three guides that already work in real rooms. The Gospel-Centered Life moves from the text to the heart and will not let application outrun Christ. Knowing the Bible makes a group say what a passage actually says before anyone applies it. Gospel in Life opens with a human question, stays in Scripture, and ends in prayer instead of homework that repeats the reading. This guide assumes the reading is done. The hour is a new passage, and a conversation.
1 · 7 min
Icebreaker
A light question tied to the picture. People may pass.
2 · 8 min
The word
Look at the drawing, read the definition, say the memory verse, open the card.
3 · 15 min
Open the Bible
A passage they did not already journal. Read it aloud. Ask what it says.
4 · 20 min
Around the room
Three new questions. Stay curious. Do not reteach the devotion.
5 · 5 min
Say it
Two volunteers put the word into one sentence a friend could understand.
6 · 8 min
Pray
Three prompts. Leave silence. Do not reread the book’s prayer.
Before you walk in
- Read the day in The Visual Gospel yourself. Do not summarize the essay back to people who read it.
- Read the gathering’s passage in your own Bible. The excerpt in the guide is a backup, not a replacement.
- Skim “Before you stumble.” The hard weeks — wrath, depravity, propitiation, election — have a line you can say without starting a debate.
- Have the drawing ready: the book, a printed page, or a screen. Have Bibles in the room. Phones are for the card, then they go down.
How to ask
Ask the question, then wait. Eight seconds feels long and is not long enough. When an answer is fuzzy, ask “Where do you see that in the passage?” instead of giving a speech. If someone answers the journal question from the book, thank them and return to the question in front of you. You are a facilitator. The text teaches.
Questions marked Core are the ones to keep if you only have 45 minutes: one voice on the icebreaker, the verse said together, the passage read aloud, the Core questions, and a short prayer.
The picture and the cards
Show the drawing and give the room ten quiet seconds. Then use the short script under the picture if you need words. After that, open cards.visualgospelbook.com, find the week’s word, and say the word, the definition, and the verse together once. Review two older cards if you are past week four and the room is willing. Then close it.
Students, families, and a shorter night
With students, use the icebreaker, the picture, the verse, and the line marked for youth in the leader notes. Drop the second “from the passage” question if energy falls. At a family table, read the passage, ask one Core question, and pray the first prompt. Nobody needs all six movements to have met with God.
A note on the hard words
Wrath is not God losing His temper. Depravity means we cannot save ourselves, not that every person is as bad as possible or that their sadness is spiritual death. Propitiation means wrath landed on Christ, and it is received by faith — do not tell a room that everyone is already safe, and do not shrink the cross to your circle. Justification is a declaration, not the slow work of sanctification. Election, in week 30, is taught after the welcome of Christ is clear: whoever comes to Him, He will never cast out. The leader notes say this again where it matters. Read them. Do not read them aloud.