Sermon-Based Small Group Questions: How to Write a Weekly Guide from Sunday's Text

Sermon-based small group questions should send the group back into the passage preached on Sunday, not back into the sermon. A simple weekly guide has five parts: read the text aloud, ask a few observation questions (what does it say?), a few interpretation questions (what does it mean?), two or three application questions (what does it change?), and close in prayer shaped by the passage. Eight to ten written questions are plenty for an hour, and the leader will use fewer. Below are the structure, a bank of reusable question stems and a worked example you can copy.

Why build the group on Sunday's text?

The Westminster Larger Catechism describes what hearers owe the Word after the service is over. Among other things, they are to "examine what they hear by the Scriptures" and to "meditate, and confer of it" (WLC Q. 160). The Shorter Catechism says it in fewer words: we must "lay it up in our hearts, and practice it in our lives" (WSC Q. 90). The Baptist Catechism used in many 1689 churches gives the same answer (Q. 95 in the common numbering).

A sermon-based group is one way to give that conferring a regular place. Members return to one text with people who heard it beside them, and the whole church spends the week in the same passage. Leaders do not have to choose material, and the pastor knows what every group is discussing.

The trade-off

Not every church builds its groups this way, and the alternative has real strengths. Groups that study their own book or topic can go deeper over several weeks, cover ground the pulpit is not covering (marriage, new believers, a book the elders want the church to know), and give leaders more ownership. A member who misses Sunday is not behind.

The cost is that the group and the pulpit run on separate tracks. Sermon-based groups gain unity and follow-through, and they risk becoming an echo of Sunday if the guide is careless. Some churches alternate: the sermon text during a series, a closed study between series.

What goes into a weekly guide?

Five parts, in this order.

1. Read the text. Have someone read the whole passage aloud, even if everyone heard it on Sunday. If the passage is long, read the core verses the sermon centered on.
2. Observation: what does the text say? Questions that make the group look at the words: repeated phrases, who is speaking, what God does, what people do, where the argument turns.
3. Interpretation: what does it mean? Questions about context, the flow of the argument, the rest of Scripture and how the passage points to Christ.
4. Application: what does it change? Questions that move from the text to faith, repentance and obedience this week, with grace before effort.
5. Prayer. Topics drawn from the passage: something to praise God for, something to confess, something to ask.

At the top of the guide, put the reference and a two- or three-sentence summary of the sermon's main point. Nothing more. That summary helps the members who were away and keeps the leader from re-preaching.

How many questions should you write?

Write eight to ten: three or four for observation, three or four for interpretation, two or three for application. Then tell the leader plainly that the list is a menu. A good discussion on four questions is better than a hurried pass through ten.

A rough rhythm for a 60 to 75 minute meeting, after any meal or fellowship time:

• Reading: 5 minutes
• Observation: 10 minutes
• Interpretation: 15 to 20 minutes
• Application: 15 minutes
• Prayer: 10 to 15 minutes

Watch for two common imbalances. Too many observation questions and the group gets bored with the obvious. Too few interpretation questions and the group jumps from the words to "what this means to me" without asking what the author meant.

How do you keep the group in the text?

The two dangers of a sermon-based group pull in opposite directions. Either the leader preaches a second sermon, or the group reviews the first one.

Not a second sermon. The leader's opening should be two or three sentences, not a lecture. If the leader is doing most of the talking, the questions are probably closed or too hard. Write open questions (what, why, how, where) rather than yes-or-no questions or blanks with one right word.

Not a review of the preacher. Avoid questions like "What did you like about the sermon?" or "What did Pastor say about verse 4?" They turn the passage into an evaluation of the pastor. Ask about the text instead. If the guide mentions the sermon at all, use it to send people back to the passage: "The sermon summed up these verses as ___. Where do you see that in the text?"

When someone disagrees with the sermon. The catechism's call to "examine what they hear by the Scriptures" is meant seriously. Members may test what they heard, as the Bereans did, "examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so" (Acts 17:11, ESV). In the group, the place to do that is the passage itself. If a disagreement is more than a question of emphasis, the leader should take it to the pastor or the elders rather than settle it in the living room.

What if someone missed Sunday?

Every week someone will have been sick, traveling, serving in the nursery or new to the church. Build the guide so they can join without feeling behind.

• Start from the reading, not from the sermon. Everyone in the room can answer an observation question.
• Keep the summary at the top short enough for the leader to read aloud.
• Offer the sermon recording, if your church posts one, as an option, not as homework.
• Never ask the group who heard the sermon. A visitor should not have to admit it.

Reusable question stems

These stems work with almost any passage. Fill in the blanks with words from the text.

Observation

• What words or phrases are repeated in these verses?
• Who is speaking, and to whom?
• What does God do in this passage? What do people do?
• What commands, promises or warnings do you see?
• Where does the passage turn? Look for "but," "therefore" or "so that."

Interpretation

• How do the verses just before this help us read it?
• Why do you think the author says ___ here?
• What does this passage teach about God? About us?
• How does this text point to Christ, or rest on what he has done?
• Where else does Scripture say something similar?
• Which question of the Shorter Catechism (or the Baptist Catechism) speaks to this passage?

Application

• What does this passage call us to believe, and not only to do?
• What sin does it expose, and what grace does it offer?
• Where does this text press on your week: at home, at work, in the church?
• What would obedience look like between now and next Sunday?

Prayer

• Praise God for ___ (something the text shows about him).
• Confess where we fall short of ___.
• Ask for grace to ___.
• Pray for ___ (someone the passage brings to mind).

A worked template: Ephesians 2:1-10

What follows is an example written for this article, not a published curriculum. Imagine the sermon was on Ephesians 2:1-10 and summed up the passage this way: we were dead in sin, and God made us alive in Christ by grace alone, through faith, for the good works he prepared.

Read: Ephesians 2:1-10 aloud.

Observation

1. How does Paul describe us in verses 1 to 3? Make a list of his words.
2. Verse 4 begins "But God." What does God do in verses 4 to 7?
3. Mark every phrase in verses 5 to 10 that says "with Christ," "with him" or "in Christ Jesus." What does that tell you?

Interpretation

4. Why does Paul describe us as dead, and not just weak or confused? What difference does that make?
5. Verse 8 says salvation is "not your own doing; it is the gift of God." What is Paul ruling out? (Compare WSC Q. 33 on justification.)
6. If we are not saved by works (verse 9), why does verse 10 say we were created for them?
7. What do verses 4 to 7 teach about why God saves?

Application

8. Which part of verses 1 to 3 is easiest for you to forget about yourself?
9. Where are you tempted to treat your standing with God as something you keep up by effort?
10. What is one good work God has put in front of you this week?

Prayer

• Thank God for being "rich in mercy" (verse 4).
• Confess the ways we boast, even quietly.
• Pray for someone you know who is not yet a believer.
• Ask for grace to walk in the good works he prepared.

Notice what the template leaves out. It does not repeat the sermon's points, it does not ask what the preacher said, and it leaves the leader room to choose.

What to do this week

• Take the passage you will preach this Sunday and write the two- or three-sentence summary first.
• Draft eight to ten questions with the stems above, then cut any that ask about the sermon instead of the text.
• Send the guide to your leaders with one instruction: choose four or five, and start with the reading.
• After a few weeks, ask the leaders which questions opened discussion and which fell flat, and adjust.

If you preach in series, Hokmah Expositor can draft a small group guide and a Sunday School Bible study aligned with each sermon of a planned sermon series, for you to examine and edit before it reaches your leaders. For a group that follows its own theme, a closed small group cycle of six, eight or ten sessions is written so the meeting is not a mini sermon. The structure above works either way.

Sources

• The Larger Catechism, Q. 160, Orthodox Presbyterian Church edition, accessed October 2026, https://opc.org/lc.html
• The Shorter Catechism, Q. 33 and Q. 90, Orthodox Presbyterian Church edition, accessed October 2026, https://opc.org/sc.html
• The Baptist Catechism, Question 95, baptistcatechism.org, accessed October 2026, https://baptistcatechism.org/95/