Date: August 14, 2016
The Point: When it comes to your money, plan and invest wiseley.
- Get Into the Study
- Study the Bible
- Additional Questions
- Member Extra
- Tips for Leading Bible Study Groups
Get Into the Study
Use the following information to introduce Question #1.
Begin by sharing this news item:
Baby boomers – those people born between 1946 and 1964 – are now beginning to retire. For these boomers, retirement will likely be different than it was for the generations before them.
* For one thing, people are living longer now. The life expectancy for men who turn 65 in 2030 is six years longer than it was for men who turned 65 in 1970. For women, the life expectancy has increased by four years during this same time period.
* People are generally healthier now. The proportion of people over age 80 who reported that they had poor or fair health decreased from 43 percent to 34 percent during the years from 1998 to 2012. This improved health means that people might work longer and spend less money on medical care.
* Most boomers will enter retirement depending on money saved in their workplace retirement account versus a traditional pension plan. Generally, these 401(k)s are not as generous and large as traditional pension plans, meaning boomers will need to invest wisely so that they don’t overspend their money in retirement.
* Most boomers will work longer than the generations of people before them. The proportion of men ages 62 to 64 who are working (or looking for work) increased from 45 percent to 56 percent between 1994 and 2014. For women, these numbers rose from 33 percent to 45 percent for the same time period.
* Boomers are entering retirement with more debt than the generations before them. The number of adults over age 65 with debt rose from 30 percent to 44 percent between 1998 and 2012. This means that part of these boomers’ retirement income will be used to repay debt rather than providing for their current living expenses.
Say: We all want to be prepared as possible for our retirement years. Smart planning and investing is the key, all through our lives – to be ready when we reach retirement.
Direct attention to Question #1 (“What comes to mind when you hear the word “invest”?”) and call for the group to share their responses.
Say: Today we’ll look to Ecclesiastes to see what God’s Word says about how to plan and invest wisely.
Information for this post was gleaned from here:
— Donna McKinney wrote this Leader Extra. Donna is retired from a career with the federal government of the United States. She is a veteran Bible study group leader living in North Carolina.TEXT
Study the Bible
Use the following list of money-saving ideas and discussion questions to address some practical ways we can wisely invest money.
It’s impossible to begin investing money if there’s no money set aside to invest. For those in debt or young adults fresh out of college, the idea can be intimidating. Knowing one cannot begin investing huge sums of money overnight and getting an incredible return (except in rare circumstances), it’s important to start small, see progress and realize practically that investing is a reachable goal. These 10 money-saving tips were taken from a post from 100 (Share web address listed below with the class…the entire list is very helpful). Utilizing a few tips once or twice probably won’t yield measurable savings; making several of these life habits will likely produce savings over time:
- Make gifts instead of buying things from the store
- Repair clothing instead of tossing it
- Don’t spend big money entertaining your kids
- Invest in a deep freezer/buy staples in bulk
- Check out free events in town
- Learn about all benefits and perks from your company
- Always ask for fees to be waived
- Switch to term life insurance
- When buying a car, look only at used models/stick to fuel efficient, dependable cars
- Remove your credit card numbers from your online accounts
Discussion Questions:
- Which of the tips above have you never considered but will now examine in your own life?
- How can intentional stewardship of the practical, everyday decisions help us to glorify God in saving and investing money?
- Even if you believe the items on the list above would not be personally helpful or possible to you, in which area of spending could you cut costs?
- Once you have successfully eliminated unnecessary spending and saved an amount, where might God want you to invest that money?
— Emily Jennings wrote this Leader Extra. Emily is wife to Brian and Mommy to her three sweet boys. She loves serving at FBC, Woodstock, Georgia, where her husband is Middle School Pastor. Find her on Twitter: @emilyejennings.
Additional Questions
Icebreaker
- When is a quick fix usually a bad plan?
- When has a snap decision gotten you into trouble?
- When has practicing patience paid off for you?
- What sorts of heart attitudes should we fight if we want to cultivate a long-term investment mindset?
- How would you rate the current state of your investment planning?
Ecclesiastes 11:1-2
- What lessons can we learn from Solomon about managing our money?
- What areas of your future are uncertain?
- What are some financial “investments” that seem too good to be true?
- What’s the danger in putting all your eggs in one basket?
- How has Scripture offered you financial guidance in the past?
- Of the six biblical investment principles described here, which one most challenges you? Why?
- Describe a time when your investment strategy failed. What did you learn from it?
Ecclesiastes 11:3-4
- When we experience misfortune, what are our choices?
- Where has God placed you to labor right now?
- What are some things that distract us from work?
- What do you do when worry has you paralyzed?
- What truths about God can fuel a right attitude in our work and investments, no matter the outcome?
Ecclesiastes 11:5-6
- How does having God in your life help you when you face uncertainty?
- In what areas of life do you feel completely confident in God?
- What does this passage teach us about God?
- How do you typically react to uncertainty?
- What is the relationship between diligence in our work and trust in God? How do we do both simultaneously?
- How does Paul’s secret to contentment (in Philippians 4) relate to a current struggle in your life?
- Of the three aspects of the Promise, which most encourages you today?
Member Extra
Share the following with your group members as either a devotional before the group study or as a follow-up devotional:
This is a horrible abuse of this passage. Money investments is not what Soliman was referring to. This passage is about our responsibility to those who don’t have and how we can assist those with little or nothing. Shame on those who wrote this lesson. I suggest you read Matthew Poole’s commentary. He gives a breakdown of this passage for that day & time.
At LifeWay, we always seek to be faithful to God’s Word and good stewards with the materials we produce. Regarding your concern about Session 5 of the Bible Studies for Life “Re-Finance” unit, the commentary by Matthew Poole you referenced is one possible interpretation regarding the meaning of what Solomon wrote in Ecclesiastes 11:1-6. There is honest disagreement among commentators as to the meaning of the verses in this passage. Among the various views, some believe these verses deal with being generous to the needy; others believe they deal with how people should handle their investments.
For the interpretation that this passage is referring to advice on how a person should handle his or her investments, one source to look at is Duane A. Garrett, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, volume 14 of The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman Press, 1993). On page 337 he writes about Ecclesiastes 11:1-6, “The Teacher concludes his admonitions on wealth with the advice that one should diversify investments.” On page 338 he writes concerning verses 1-2, “This is not an exhortation to charity but advice on investments. To cast bread upon the waters is to engage in commercial enterprises involving overseas trade (cf. 1 Kgs 9:26-28; 10:22). Eventually the investment will pay off. ‘Seven’ and ‘eight’ represent a wide diversity of investments. Such diversification is necessary because it affords protection against unforeseen calamity in one or two of the enterprises.”
Some other commentaries that support this view (while acknowledging the “charity” view as well) are Michael A. Eaton, Ecclesiastes in The Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: Inter-Varsity Press, 1983) and David George Moore, “Ecclesiastes” in Ecclesiastes-Song of Songs, vol. 14 in Holman Old Testament Commentary (Nashville: Holman Reference, 2003).
Tremper Longman III notes the difficulty involved in discerning the exact meaning of these verses in their context in his commentary on Ecclesiastes 11:1-6 in The Book of Ecclesiastes in The New International Commentary on the Old Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998).
While certainly not the only interpretation, the view that Solomon was discussing how a person should handle investments is a valid one. From that interpretation flowed the various applications on handling one’s finances in the session.
Christians hold differing opinions as to the meaning of what Solomon wrote in Ecclesiastes 11:1-6. The interpretation of this passage in this session of the “Re-Finance” unit was different from the interpretation to which you hold, but there was no intent to abuse the text. Rather, it is honest difference of opinion as to the interpretation of the text.
Where is the extra devotion ? It just links to info about group studies instead of a devotion to end session 5. Thanks
It is there now. I’m not sure what happened. It was there several days ago, and then it disappeared.
As a Sunday School teacher who has little time to develop lessons for my senior adult class (70+) I really like Bible Studies for Life because it is faithful to God’s Word and the lessons are usually very interesting and easy to teach. My only problem with Bible Studies for Life is that sometimes, like this particular lesson and the majority of this lesson group for instance, is not applicable to the senior adult. Most all of the senior adults I teach are retired, have grandchildren and some great-grandchildren. They are faithful students and love to open the Word to read and study. They want to understand the world around them today and how they fit into it. Some of these folks children & grandchildren live lives that is so worldly that they can barely communicate with them. Some of these same grandchildren look so frightening that these grandparents don’t even know what to say or how to talk with them.
I would like to suggest to your groups of contributing writers and your Lifeway editors that y’all seriously take a hard look at this and work to really make the lessons more applicable to this senior age group
We do have a senior adult edition of Bible Studies for Life. Visit http://www.lifeway.com/n/Product-Family/Bible-Studies-for-Life/Adults/Senior-Adults?intcmp=BSFLAdults-Image-SrAdults-20160310 to learn more. That page includes samples to download.
If I can answer any specific questions about the senior adult edition, please contact me. Lynn Pryor, Team Leader for Bible Studies for Life, lynn.pryor@lifeway.com
It’s impressive that you are getting thoughts from this paragraph as well as from our discussion made at
this time.