� of � 1 3Kings and Kingdoms, May 17, 2020

LEADER GUIDE

5Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not rely on your own understanding; 6think about Him in all your ways, and He will guide you on the right paths. 7Don’t consider yourself to be wise; fear the Lord and turn away from evil. 8This will be healing for your body and strengthening for your bones. 9Honor the Lord with your possessions and with the first produce of your entire harvest; 10then your barns will be completely filled, and your vats will overflow with new wine. 11Do not despise the Lord’s instruction, my son, and do not loathe His discipline; 12for the Lord disciplines the one He loves, just as a father, the son he delights in.

EXPLAIN

Leaders: Feel free to use any of the “Explain” materials to guide discussion as it is needed or to expound on a certain area of the text as it comes up during your Life Group time, but the purpose of this section is to deepen your own personal understanding of the Word. Your members have access to all of this material as well.

Just as Solomon grew up receiving instruction from his father, he is turning around and instructing his son in the ways of the Lord. In this passage, Solomon shows the importance of obeying the Lord rather than the desires of the heart, and what kind of a fulfilled, abundant life walking with the Lord produces.

v. 5 “Trust” is the Hebrew word batah, which relays the sense of being completely confident and safe in something. Trusting in God means a twofold recognition: who God is and who we are. When we see that we are not the ones in control and that everything we do should be for the purpose of bringing God glory, we find that trusting God becomes easier—though it remains a daily process that begins again each time we wake up.

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HIGHLIGHT: Proverbs 3:5-12

� of � 2 3Kings and Kingdoms, May 17, 2020

LEADER GUIDE

AAPPLY Your Leader Guide will have material that the member guides do not have. The bolded material is what the people in your group will have, the other material is only for you to help guide discussion.

This guide can be as strict a script or as general a resource as the leader needs it to be.

1. What stuck out to you or challenged you in what you heard in the sermon orread in the text?

2. Share about a time you trusted someone or something only to have that trustbroken. What does it look like to put your trust in something?

There is a story about a missionary who was struggling to find a way to communicate the idea of trust to the people he was ministering to. He kept searching the native language for something that captured what trust is, but was consistently unsuccessful. One day, he was walking down the street and saw a man on his porch sitting in a chair. His legs were propped up, the back was laid down, and he was perfectly nestled in its cushions. The missionary asked him, “What is that you’re doing?” And the man replied with their native word for “reclining.” When you trust in something, it doesn’t count as trust unless all of you depends on it.

3. What does it look like to honor God with all of your possessions? How wouldthat affect what you buy? How would it affect the things that you want? Whatdoes Scripture say will be the outcome of you honoring God with yourpossessions and your wealth?

Honoring God is more than just putting money in an offering plate, it is a lifestyle. This is how a Christian lives his or her life—on mission. When living a life on mission, a wise question to ask ourselves may be, “How does the Lord want me to use this before I go out and do what I want with it?”

v. 6 This has been traditionally translated “acknowledge Him,” rather than “think about Him” (HCSB). The latter is, perhaps, more faithful to the Hebrew, which is closer to the meaning of “know Him.” It points to the intimate experience of a personal relationship with Him. Notice that the sequence of verse 5 and 6 points to a remarkable truth: by trusting in Him, you will fully know Him, and He will make your paths straight.

vv.11-12 Contrary to what Job’s friends said to him, suffering is not just punishment.Joseph suffered at the hands of countless forces he could not control, but they were all molding him into the man he would eventually be—the one who saved both his family and his nation. Hebrews 12:5-6 says that suffering is a sign of being a child of God, which this verse says as well. God is the perfect father, and will discipline those whom He loves, precisely because He loves them.

� of � 3 3Kings and Kingdoms, May 17, 2020

LEADER GUIDE

RRESPOND Based on the dynamic of your group and how discussion has progressed, challenge your group to respond. Responses could include:

Are any of your “ways” not devoted to the Lord? How can you take steps toward changing that this week?

Do you honor the Lord with the things you have? What is one thing you can do with something that you have this week in order to honor Him with it?

Encourage one another through email, text messages, or coffee dates throughout the week to build up and encourage each other.

4. Reference verses 11 and 12. What does it mean to you when you hear, “theLord’s discipline”? Share a story about a time you were corrected and how youresponded to it, good or bad. What should our reaction be to being told, inScriptural terms, that we are out of line?

Discipline hurts sometimes, but it is an unmistakable sign that lets you know you were out of line. We are imperfect and will frequently get off track, and it is discipline that will keep us on the right path. We should love it and be thankful that He cares enough about us to make those corrections.

5. Would you consider your life abundant and prosperous? Why or why not? Howdo you define an abundant or prosperous life? What can you do to get to thatpoint?

It’s not wrong to be wealthy and prosperous; the question is, Are you using it in a way that would please Him? We shouldn’t be seeking after God SO THAT we can be wealthy. In fact, He promised we’d be persecuted if we follow Him (Matthew 10:16-20, for example). We can get to the point where, even when we are being persecuted for our faith, we still consider our life abundant and prosperous.