Palm Sunday 2026
Community Group Questions
1. Tim used Muzafer Sherif’s 1950s social psychology experiments at Robbers Cave and Middle Grove as a framework for discussing what he called The Big Lie & The Big Truth. He defined these two ideas like this:
The Big Lie: the good life comes through winning, controlling, dominating, defeating through power, and violence.
The Big Truth: the good life comes through cooperation, community, common good, neighboring, friendship, mutuality, interdependence, forgiveness, reconciliation, and fidelity over time. In other words, each other.
What types of situations, settings, and scenarios are most likely to move you into a place that (unconsciously or otherwise) has you saying things or acting in accordance with “The Big Lie?”
When you become aware of those inclinations and impulses, how do you respond to yourself? What helps you to recenter your thoughts, emotions, and actions on the way of Jesus?
2. Tim gave some examples of groups of people who are sometimes used as tools for stoking fear in the populace, driving us toward conflict: Palestinians, trans kids, and undocumented immigrants.
Many of us, however, might be more inclined to protect than blame those specific groups. If that’s true for you, then spend a moment to ask yourself: who are the groups that you, whether publicly or privately, are likely to point the finger at? Who, for you, are the “problem people” that are causing and worsening the problems in our world today?
What would it look like for you to take a Jesus-like posture of authentic inclusion and lovingkindness toward those people?
How do you feel about that idea? If there are places of resistance (which there probably are), share about them and ponder how you engage with your own resistance. If you feel drawn to the idea, why do you think that might be? What does that mean for you?
3. After he enters into the public eye, Jesus enters Jerusalem only once. As he enters, to shouts of praise and the embrace of the crowd, Jesus weeps. He weeps because, as he embarks on the final leg of a journey during which he has embodied “The Big Truth” at every turn, the crowd misunderstands him and rallies around him as a symbol of “The Big Lie.” He speaks to this, lamenting that if only his people had known the things that make for peace (Luke 19).
How well do you think that you understand the “things that make for peace?” What are they?
In what ways do you find it easiest to embody them in your own life? Why do you think that is?
In what ways do you find it most difficult? Why do you think that is?
When you see others missing the point and misunderstanding Jesus today, what’s your likely response? To what extent does it mirror Jesus’ weeping? In what ways is it different?
