Break the ice. Would you rather be able to run at 100 miles per hour or fly at 10 miles per hour?

Read Ecclesiastes 11:7-12:14.

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Discuss the text.

1. In what ways do we try to ignore old age and escape aging?
2. How would you respond to a person who thinks there is plenty of time to live their life before “settling down” to follow the Lord?
3. Have you ever been tempted to think of following Christ as work or a task you have to do, but don’t expect to enjoy? Share with the group a time you may have thought this way.
4. Are you in a season of enjoying God?
5. How can you enjoy God by fearing him and keeping his commandments this week?

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Home Group Focus: Fixed-hour prayer. Over the next few weeks, we hope that you will create intentional moments throughout the day to stop and pray in order to be with your Father and capture his holy perspective in the various aspects of your day.

Fixed-hour prayer is a way to anchor our daily lives in rhythms of prayer. It is to stop our work or our play in order to be with God. Fixed hour prayers are intentional moments throughout the day to acknowledge God’s presence and be with him. The hope of fixed-hour prayer is quite simple: being with God who is always with you.

Where do we see fixed-hour prayer practiced in Scripture? Growing up in a Jewish home, Jesus prayed the Shema every morning which is found in Deuteronomy 6: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.” According to Ps 119:164, David prayed seven times a day. Daniel prayed three times a day according to Daniel 6:10. And as we read the gospels, we learn that Jesus and his disciples were devoted to the Jewish times of prayer, like noon and three o’clock.

Specific, intentional times of prayer throughout the day have always been a part of the people of God.

Even if you have to set an alarm to remind you to pray at a specific time this week, trust God to cultivate an awareness of the unseen reality of his presence with you, in all things, at all times of your day.