Book Club Questions for Believing God

1.Moore opens by describing the moment she came face to face with Isaiah 43:10 — 'You are my witnesses,' declares the Lord, 'and my servant whom I have chosen, so that you may know and believe me.' How does she distinguish between believing *in* God and believing *God*? In your own words, what is the difference?

2.Be honest with yourself: up to this point in your life, which side of that distinction have you lived on more consistently? What evidence from your daily life points you to that answer?

3.Moore references Abraham as the paradigm case — a man of whom Scripture says he 'believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness' (Genesis 15:6; Romans 4:3). What do you know about Abraham's story that makes that statement remarkable? What did he actually have to believe God *about*?

1.What does Moore establish about God's own character as the foundation for believing Him? Why does it matter *who* God is before we can trust *what* He says?

2.Moore emphasizes that God is not just the object of our faith but its author and sustainer. How does Hebrews 11:1 — 'faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen' — shape the way she frames what it even means to believe?

3.Think about a time when you found it genuinely difficult to trust someone — a parent, a friend, an employer. What made trusting them hard? How does that experience illuminate the challenge of trusting God, who cannot be seen?

1.Moore argues that faith is not just a personal possession but something meant to be passed on. What does Deuteronomy 6 — the great Shema passage — suggest about how this transmission is supposed to happen?

2.Think about the people in your own life through whom faith was modeled for you. What did you observe in them that made their faith believable and worth inheriting? Was it their words, their lives, or a crisis they navigated with trust?

3.Moore is candid about the faith failures of previous generations — the ways in which fear, unbelief, and small living can be passed down just as surely as bold faith. What 'inherited unbelief' or fear might you have received from your family of origin that still limits you?

1.What happened at Kadesh Barnea, and why does Moore use it as such a central image for the life of an unbelieving believer? What were the twelve spies sent to do, and what did ten of them do instead?

2.Caleb and Joshua saw the same giants, the same walled cities, and the same formidable people as the other ten spies — but they came back with a different report. What made the difference? What were they looking at that the others weren't?

3.Hebrews 3 says the Israelites 'were not able to enter because of unbelief.' Moore points out that these were people who had been saved out of Egypt, baptized in the Red Sea, and fed by God's own hand — and they still couldn't believe Him for the next step. How does that challenge your assumption that more spiritual experience automatically produces more faith?

1.What is the first of Moore's five statements of faith, and why does she begin here? Why does our belief about *who God is* have to come before our belief about *what God can do*?

2.When God tells Moses 'I AM WHO I AM' at the burning bush, He is making a claim unlike anything a human being can make. Moore unpacks the radical self-existence and self-sufficiency implied in that name. How does God's 'I AM-ness' relate to His trustworthiness?

3.Think about the names and attributes of God you know well — Jehovah Jireh (Provider), El Roi (the God who sees), Shepherd, Father. Pick one that you say you believe but find hardest to live out of. What makes it hard?

1.What is the second faith statement, and how does it build on the first? Why isn't it enough to believe that God *is* great if we don't also believe He *acts* with power in our specific situations?

2.Moore draws on the story of Abraham and Sarah — a hundred-year-old man and a ninety-year-old woman receiving the promise of a child. Romans 4 says Abraham 'did not waver in unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what He had promised.' What does 'fully persuaded' look like in practice? Is it a feeling or a choice?

3.The angel's question to Abraham — 'Is anything too hard for the LORD?' (Genesis 18:14) — is one of the most important questions in the Bible. What are the things in your life that feel 'too hard for the LORD'? Be specific.

1.What is the third faith statement, and why does Moore say that many Christians find it harder to believe than the first two? What is it about believing things *about ourselves* that is so difficult?

2.Moore walks through a series of 'I am' statements that Scripture speaks over the believer — chosen, holy, dearly loved, a new creation, co-heir with Christ. Which of these do you find easiest to accept intellectually but hardest to live out emotionally and practically?

3.Moore is honest about the war between the identity that God declares over us and the identity that our past, our wounds, or our failures have tried to assign to us. What competing identity has the loudest voice in your life right now?

1.What is the fourth faith statement, and what is the context in which Paul originally wrote it (Philippians 4:13)? Moore insists the verse is not a sports slogan. What is it actually about when read in context?

2.Moore anchors this statement in Paul's description of 'the secret of being content in any and every situation' — having learned to be content whether well-fed or hungry, in abundance or in want. What does it tell us that this supernatural ability is described as something *learned*, not automatically received?

3.Paul wrote Philippians from prison. Moore asks us to feel the weight of that. What is a 'prison' circumstance in your life — something you cannot change and did not choose — where you need to discover what it means to do all things through Christ?

1.What is the fifth faith statement, and why does Moore save it for last? How does it function as the practical engine that makes the other four statements actually work in everyday life?

2.Hebrews 4:12 describes the Word of God as 'living and active, sharper than any double-edged sword.' Moore dwells on the word *living* — not just ancient and authoritative, but alive. What is the difference between treating the Bible as a reference book and treating it as a living voice?

3.Isaiah 55 promises that God's Word 'will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.' Moore applies this to the specific Scripture passages we memorize, meditate on, and speak aloud. What Scripture passage has God used most powerfully in your life — one that seemed to accomplish exactly what He sent it to do?

1.When you compare where you were at the beginning of this study with where you are now, what is the most significant shift — in your thinking, your praying, your daily life, or your understanding of God? Be as specific as you can.

2.Of Moore's five faith statements, which one has done the most work in you over the course of this study? Which one still feels the most like unfinished business?

3.Moore uses the image of Kadesh Barnea throughout the book — the place where a whole generation chose fear over faith and stayed outside the land God had for them. Looking back, is there a 'Kadesh Barnea moment' you can identify in your own past — a time you chose not to believe God and paid a real cost for it? What did you learn from it?