How This Guide Is Different — Read This First (Q only)

The leader brief, in one line: every man names actual faces, not a goal weight, a PR, or a mile time. Then he names what those people will need him to be able to do twenty years from now, and one Brick he’ll lay this week to start building it. “I want to get back under 200” isn’t an answer. “My boys are 6 and 9. In twenty years I want to help them move into their first houses and be carrying the couch, not supervising from the truck” is.

Before the cold open: last Friday every man named his moment, one Brick to lay before it, and one man who would know. Take the reports first. Keep it quick: “Did the doorbell ring? What did you do? Did you call him?” An honest “I lost that round” is fine. Then say: “The King chapter says F3 added the Jester because ‘the wrong temptation will topple even the strongest man’s fitness kingdom.’ Last week we guarded the kingdom. This week we go back to its first stone: the King.”

A note on the chapters. Q1.2/King has never been the main chapter in this series, and it reads like it was written for this QOW. One of its headings is “A man maintains Fitness for reasons outside of himself.” It says the HIM “is building a kingdom of Preparedness within which he intends other people to safely dwell.” It gives the leader’s prompt in a picture: “How can a man be much of Leader if he gets smoked pulling his family’s luggage off the baggage carousel and carrying it to the minivan? What will a son learn from a father who can’t play catch with him in the backyard for more than five minutes without having to sit down?” It sets the goal as 3S2T (Speed, Strength, Stamina, Toughness physical, Toughness mental), says “Staying in shape is what Amateurs try to do,” and ends with “find a faster man. And chase him until you catch him.” It even borrows Lombardi from last week: “He knows that fatigue makes cowards of us all.”

Q1/Get Right (woven in July 24 and August 21) gives the why. A man whose boat capsizes doesn’t go into the water alone. His Concentrica “will be right there in the water with him, helpless because their husband, father and boss can do little more than focus on his own survival.” It also has the oxygen-mask picture and the hard line: “An unfit man is a slave to his lack of self-control.” Q1.1/DRP gives the how. It has the Pro and the Amateur, and the Mascot who “(if he can fit into his shorts) goes to the gym for a week or so every January.” It covers Bricks and Routines, and it has a line that is basically Jocko in QSource words: “Discretion is a cage with velvet bars… True freedom is the pre-determined what that allows full focus on the how.” And it carries the hope every out-of-shape man needs to hear: “no man is too far wrong to Get Right.”

A note on the verses. Three things to know before you read them to the circle.

• 1 Corinthians 9:24–27. Corinth hosted the Isthmian Games every two years, and every man in Paul’s audience had seen them. The winner got a wreath of pine or wild celery that was brown within a week. That’s the “perishable wreath.” Read verses 19–23 before you read 24–27, though. Paul says he made himself “a servant to all, that I might win more of them,” and “I do it all for the sake of the gospel” (vv. 19, 23). Paul disciplined his body for other people. That’s the QOW in Paul’s own words. And “disqualified” in verse 27 isn’t about losing his salvation. He’s worried about becoming a man whose life no longer backs up what he told others. (We used verse 27 on August 21. That’s fine. It’s worth hearing twice.)
• 1 Corinthians 6:19–20. Context matters here. Paul is writing about sexual immorality (6:12–18). Some in Corinth said the body didn’t matter: “Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food” (6:13). Paul’s answer is that the body matters a great deal. It is “for the Lord, and the Lord for the body,” and God will raise it (6:13–14). So don’t turn this verse into “God wants you to have abs.” The point is bigger. Your body isn’t yours to waste or worship. It belongs to the One who bought it.
• Romans 12:1. It starts with “therefore,” and that word points back to eleven chapters of grace. Paul appeals “by the mercies of God,” not by guilt. The Old Testament sacrifices were dead. This one is living. It gets up every morning and climbs back on the altar. “Spiritual worship” can also be translated “reasonable service” (that’s the KJV). A man getting out of bed at 0500 for the people God gave him can be doing exactly this.

A note on the quotes.

• Georges Hébert was a French naval officer stationed at Saint-Pierre, Martinique, when Mount Pelée erupted in 1902 and destroyed the town. He coordinated the rescue of roughly 700 people. That day convinced him that strength without courage and selflessness was worthless, and he built a whole training method around it. His motto was “Être fort pour être utile”: be strong to be useful. His “natural method” shaped military obstacle courses and, much later, parkour. His whole philosophy came out of a day when people needed strong men and there weren’t enough.
• Jim Rohn was a business philosopher and speaker, and the line is widely credited to him. On its own it can sound self-focused. Add one thing: the people who live with you live with that body too.
• Jocko Willink is a retired Navy SEAL officer. Discipline Equals Freedom is the title of his 2017 field manual. His point is that the disciplined man ends up with more freedom: more time, more health, more energy, more options. Q1.1 says the same.

The traps in this QOW. There are five, and each one lets a man talk without answering.

• Trap one — the number. “I want to lose 20 pounds.” “I want to run a sub-25 5K.” Numbers are fine, but they aren’t faces. Ask: “Who’s that for? What will it let you do for them?”
• Trap two — the mirror joke. “I’m staying strong for the beach.” Let them laugh. The King chapter even says there’s “nothing wrong” with looking good on the beach. Then ask: “Okay. And who gets you out of bed when nobody’s going to see you with your shirt off?”
• Trap three — shame. A man who’s out of shape, carrying extra weight, injured, or just back after a long layoff may go quiet or run himself down. The QOW is about faces, not condition. Quote Q1.1: “no man is too far wrong to Get Right.” Never comment on any man’s body or weight.
• Trap four — “I do it for me.” That’s partly true, and Rohn would agree. But push: “And who benefits when you’re there?” There’s almost always a face behind it.
• Trap five — the idol. For some men the King has become the whole kingdom: identity, schedule, conversation, comparison. Q1.4 said last week that pride is “king of all Jesters” and that a man’s “very satisfaction with his physical fitness might be his Jester.” Paul’s balance is in 1 Timothy 4:8: bodily training is of “some value.” Some.

Five rules for the Q running this:

1. Go first, and use names. Name your faces by name, then the age they’ll be in twenty years and the age you’ll be. If you say “my family,” every man after you will too.
2. Get three things from every man: the faces (names), the need (what they’ll need him to do in twenty years), and the Brick (one thing this week).
3. Use the prompt every time. “Picture them twenty years from now. What will they need you to be able to do?” Make them do the math: how old will they be, and how old will you be?
4. Faces, not numbers. If a man gives a weight, a PR, or a race, ask who it’s for.
5. Write it down and follow up. Next Friday, open by asking: “Did you lay the Brick? Did you look at the faces when the alarm went off?”

The prompt, if you need to reset the room: Picture them twenty years from now. What will they need you to be able to do? Then wait. The first answers will be about grandkids and shoulders. The honest ones usually come later: “lift my wife out of a chair,” “take care of my mom,” “be a pallbearer for my friends.”

The close: Fitness held for someone else outlasts fitness held for the mirror. Train for them, not the mirror.

One caution on tone. This QOW is about bodies, and bodies carry stories. Some men in the circle are dealing with injuries, chronic pain, illness, or a recent diagnosis. Some are carrying weight they’re ashamed of. Some have lost the person they were staying strong for, through death or divorce, or are estranged from their kids. And a single man may feel this question isn’t for him. Every man has faces. If he can’t name family, the men in this circle count, and so do the people God hasn’t put in his path yet. If a man shares a health scare, thank him and follow up after. Don’t play doctor in the circle. The QOW can also go wrong in two other ways: a workout-program debate, where men argue CrossFit vs. rucking vs. running (this QOW isn’t about how you train, it’s about who you train for), or a guilt trip, where the Q lectures about being out of shape and nobody says anything true. What we want from each man is faces, a need, and a Brick.

Facilitator Notes under each question tell you what to listen for, how to restart a stalled room, and where to push. You won’t use all fifteen questions. Pick 6–8 and give each one time. Q2 and Q3 are the QOW and the prompt, so don’t skip them. Q4, Q6, Q9, and Q12 are the leader’s follow-up questions. Q15 is the close, so don’t skip that either.

Q1: Georges Hébert said, “Be strong to be useful.” When have you seen a man’s strength turn out to be exactly what somebody else needed?

Facilitator Notes:

• This is the warm-up. It’s easier to talk about another man’s strength than your own. Start there.
• Tell Hébert’s story briefly (it’s in the Answer). A volcano, a destroyed town, and a naval officer who saw what strong men could do and how few of them there were.
• Listening for: Houston men remember Harvey and Beryl. Guys with jon boats pulling neighbors off roofs, crews mucking out houses for weeks, men with chainsaws clearing streets. Also the dad who carried an injured kid off the field, the coworker who caught someone falling, the neighbor who’s always the first one there on moving day.
• If the room stalls, ask a simpler one: “Who do you call when you have to move a couch?” Then ask why it’s him.
• Tie it to the QOW: strength is for something. Usually it’s for someone.

Answer: Hébert was a French naval officer at Saint-Pierre, Martinique, in 1902 when Mount Pelée erupted and wiped out the town. He coordinated the rescue of roughly 700 people. He walked away convinced of one thing: strength that isn’t put to use for other people isn’t worth much. He spent the rest of his life training men to be strong to be useful. Scripture has a picture of this too. A paralyzed man couldn’t get to Jesus, so “they came, bringing to him a paralytic carried by four men,” and when the crowd blocked the door they dug through the roof and lowered him down. Mark says, “when Jesus saw their faith” (Mark 2:3–5, ESV). Their faith showed up in their backs and their arms. The King chapter puts it simply: “The body is made to be used.” Paul gives the command behind it: “Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ” (Galatians 6:2, ESV). Sometimes that burden is emotional. Sometimes it’s a man on a stretcher. Concrete step: think about the last time someone needed your strength. Were you ready? Would you be ready this week?

Why This Matters: Strength nobody ever leans on is just a hobby. Being useful is the point.

Q2 (THE QOW): The King is a man’s physical fitness. Who are you staying strong for? Name the faces, not the goal weight.

Facilitator Notes:

• This is the main question. Everything else supports it. Get names from every man.
• Turn away labels kindly but firmly: “My family” → Which ones? What are their names? How old are they? “Myself” → Okay. And who benefits when you’re strong? “To lose 30 pounds” → For who?
• A specific answer sounds like: “My wife, Karen. Her dad had a stroke at 60 and her mom took care of him for nine years. I want to be the one who can take care of her, not the one who needs it.” “My girls, 4 and 7.” “My mom. She’s 78, she lives alone, and I’m the one she calls when something needs lifting.” “The younger guys at work. They watch everything I do.”
• Watch for trap one: numbers. A number is a scoreboard. Ask who’s in the stands.

Answer: The King chapter says it straight: “A man maintains Fitness for reasons outside of himself.” He isn’t working out to get good at working out. He is “building a kingdom of Preparedness within which he intends other people to safely dwell.” Q1/Get Right shows what happens when he doesn’t. When a man’s boat capsizes, his Concentrica “will be right there in the water with him, helpless because their husband, father and boss can do little more than focus on his own survival.” Your fitness was never just yours. Everyone in your boat is riding on it. Paul says, “You are not your own, for you were bought with a price” (1 Corinthians 6:19–20, ESV). And he tells us to “look not only to [our] own interests, but also to the interests of others” (Philippians 2:4, ESV). Even Paul’s own discipline was for other people: “I do it all for the sake of the gospel, that I may share with them in its blessings” (1 Corinthians 9:23, ESV). The question isn’t whether you’re strong. It’s who your strength is for. Concrete step: say the names out loud. Not “my family.” Names.

Why This Matters: A number won’t get you out of bed in January. A face will.

Q3 (THE PROMPT): Picture them twenty years from now. What will they need you to be able to do?

Facilitator Notes:

• This is the leader’s prompt as its own question. Run it right after Q2, while the names are fresh.
• Give 30 seconds of quiet first. Then make them do the math out loud: “How old will they be? How old will you be?”
• Listening for: carry a grandkid on his shoulders. Help a son move. Lift his wife after a surgery. Get his mother out of a chair or off the floor. Walk the trail on a family trip. Be a pallbearer for a friend. Get up off the floor after playing with grandkids without help. Still Q a workout at 70.
• Push deeper: “Can you do that today?” Some men will realize they can’t do it now, let alone in twenty years.

Answer: The King chapter gives the picture: the dad who “gets smoked pulling his family’s luggage off the baggage carousel,” and the son whose father “can’t play catch with him in the backyard for more than five minutes without having to sit down.” Twenty years changes the question. It’s no longer how you look. It’s what you’ll be able to do. Solomon described old age plainly. He wrote of the day “when the keepers of the house tremble, and the strong men are bent” (Ecclesiastes 12:3, ESV), shaky arms and bent legs. That day is coming for every man here. The only question is how ready you’ll be. Many men will spend their 60s and 70s caring for someone: a wife after surgery, a parent in decline, a grandchild on the weekends. The strength they’ll need from you at 70 is being built or lost right now. Proverbs says, “If you faint in the day of adversity, your strength is small” (Proverbs 24:10, ESV). The King chapter says Preparedness means being “ready for the unexpected (not just to get ready for the expected).” Concrete step: write one sentence down. “In twenty years, ___ will need me to be able to ___.” That’s your new training goal.

Why This Matters: You can’t train for a future you won’t picture. Picture it, then train for it.

Q4 (LEADER FOLLOW-UP): Tell about a moment when your fitness, or your lack of it, decided whether you could be there for someone who needed you.

Facilitator Notes:

• This is one of the leader’s follow-up questions. Both kinds of stories count, and most men have one of each.
• Listening for: “I carried my son two miles out after he broke his ankle on a hike.” “After Beryl I cut trees and hauled limbs for four days, and I could only do it because I’d been posting.” “I sat on the bench at Disney while my kids rode without me.” “I had to quit helping my buddy move after an hour.”
• Push deeper: “Who noticed?” Kids always notice.
• Handle with care. If a man couldn’t be there because of an injury or illness, that isn’t a failure of discipline. Thank him and move on.

Answer: The moment almost never announces itself. Benaiah, one of David’s mighty men, “went down and struck down a lion in a pit on a day when snow had fallen” (2 Samuel 23:20, ESV). He didn’t pick the day. The lion did. You don’t get to choose when you’ll be needed. You only get to choose whether you’ll be ready. That’s why the King chapter ties fitness to Preparedness, which means being ready for the unexpected, “not just to get ready for the expected.” Q1/Get Right uses the oxygen mask on the airplane: put yours on first, not because you matter more, but because “you can’t help them at all unless you help yourself first.” Hebrews says, “Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint but rather be healed” (Hebrews 12:12–13, ESV). The writer is talking about spiritual endurance, but notice why: so the weaker ones behind you don’t get hurt. Your path affects theirs. Concrete step: name the next moment you can see coming, like a move, a trip, or a parent’s surgery, and start training for it this week.

Why This Matters: The moment comes once. You either trained for it already, or you watch it from the bench.

Q5: Jim Rohn said, “Take care of your body. It’s the only place you have to live.” What has your body been telling you that you’ve been ignoring?

Facilitator Notes:

• This is the personal question. It moves from stories to the present tense.
• Listening for: the knee, the back, the shoulder, getting winded on the stairs, poor sleep, snoring, numbers the doctor mentioned, “I haven’t had a physical in five years.”
• Don’t let it become a medical consult. Don’t ask for diagnoses or details. The point is the ignoring, not the condition.
• Push deeper: “Who else lives with the consequences?” (The M hears the snoring. The kids feel the short temper after bad sleep.)

Answer: You’d never ignore the check-engine light on the truck your family rides in. But plenty of men ignore it on themselves for years. The King chapter says, “These fragile bodies of ours are what we are given to house our souls… How can the soul prosper if the body withers? And wither it will, if we don’t put it into motion.” The warning light isn’t the problem. Ignoring it is. Proverbs says, “The prudent sees danger and hides himself, but the simple go on and suffer for it” (Proverbs 22:3, ESV). Paul assumes a man will take care of his body. He writes, “no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church” (Ephesians 5:29, ESV). He’s talking about marriage there, but it only works because caring for your own body is normal. Rohn is right that it’s the only place you have to live. But the people who share your house live with that body too. Concrete step: if it’s been more than a year since your last physical, schedule one this week. Then tell one man in this circle you did.

Why This Matters: You change the oil in the truck because your family rides in it. Your family rides in you too.

Q6 (LEADER FOLLOW-UP): Walk us through a season when you let the King slide. Who paid for it besides you?

Facilitator Notes:

• This is one of the leader’s follow-up questions. Common seasons: a new baby, a new job, an injury, a divorce, grief, a move, the year everything shut down.
• Listening for the order: the King usually slid first, then sleep, food, patience, and presence followed.
• Push deeper: “Who paid?” The M. The 2.0s. The crew. The men who stopped seeing him at the gloom.
• Watch for trap three. Some seasons were survival, not laziness. Don’t let this turn into shame. End on hope (it’s in the Answer).

Answer: Q1.1 describes the Mascot’s year: “He (if he can fit into his shorts) goes to the gym for a week or so every January,” and by December he’s right back where he started, “only now, one year closer to death.” Q1/Get Right explains why it spreads. “An unfit man is a slave to his lack of self-control,” and gluttony and sloth “are jealous and all-consuming idols.” When the King slides, energy goes, then patience, then presence. The first person to pay is usually the one who loves you most. Proverbs shows how slow it is: “I passed by the field of a sluggard… and behold, it was all overgrown with thorns… A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest, and poverty will come upon you like a robber” (Proverbs 24:30–34, ESV). The field didn’t go bad in a day. The King chapter uses the same picture: “Let it lie fallow, and it will not produce a good crop.” But Q1.1 also gives the hope: “No matter how long his boat has been capsized he can begin returning it to the normal upright position with one very small Movement.” Scripture goes further: God’s mercies “are new every morning” (Lamentations 3:22–23, ESV). No man is too far wrong to Get Right. Concrete step: if you’re in a slide right now, name one small Movement and do it before Monday.

Why This Matters: No season of sliding is only yours. But no season is too long to come back from either.

Q7: The King chapter says there’s “nothing wrong” with feeling strong and looking good on the beach, but that isn’t the goal. Be honest: how much of your training is for the mirror?

Facilitator Notes:

• This is the vanity question. Laughs are welcome. Ask men to give an honest percentage.
• Listening for: honesty. “Probably 40%.” “More than I’d like.” “Zero, because I gave up on the mirror years ago” (that one may be trap three in disguise).
• Watch for trap five. The man whose fitness has become his identity. Tie it to last week: pride is “king of all Jesters.”
• Push deeper: “What would you keep doing if nobody ever saw you with your shirt off again?”

Answer: The mirror isn’t evil. But it’s a terrible coach. It can’t get you out of bed for twenty years, and it turns strength into comparison. Samson had more raw strength than any man in Scripture, and it was given for a purpose: “he shall begin to save Israel from the hand of the Philistines” (Judges 13:5, ESV). He spent most of it on himself: his appetites, his pride, his revenge. Even his last prayer was half about his own eyes (Judges 16:28). Only at the very end, blind and chained, did his strength finally serve his people (Judges 16:30). Strength spent on yourself is strength wasted, no matter how big it is. Paul isn’t against the gym. He says “bodily training is of some value” (1 Timothy 4:8, ESV). But “some” is the key word. The King chapter draws the same line: “A man who has turned Pro doesn’t exercise to get good at exercising. His goal is Preparedness.” Concrete step: answer the facilitator’s question honestly. What would you still do if nobody ever saw? Make that the core of your week.

Why This Matters: The mirror only wants you to look ready. Train for the people who need you to be ready.

Q8: Jocko Willink says, “Discipline equals freedom.” Q1.1 says, “Discretion is a cage with velvet bars.” Where has deciding every morning cost you, and what Brick would take that decision off the table?

Facilitator Notes:

• This is the Bricks and Routines question. It turns motivation into a system.
• Listening for: the alarm across the room, clothes laid out the night before, an EH buddy who picks you up, the workout on the calendar like a meeting, standing days at the gloom, “I don’t negotiate with myself before 5 a.m.”
• If the room stalls, ask a simpler one: “What’s your favorite excuse at 4:45?”
• Push deeper: “What’s the one decision you lose most often?”

Answer: Jocko’s point is that the disciplined man ends up with more freedom: more health, more time, more energy, more options. Q1.1 says the same in its own words: “Through military training, the soldier learns that there is nothing liberating in having to decide what to do in every situation. True freedom is the pre-determined what that allows full focus on the how.” The Amateur decides every morning, and the Blue Pill wins a lot of those mornings. The man who decides at 4:45 whether he’ll work out has already lost half the time. The Pro lays Bricks instead. “Once a Brick is set… the HIM has effectively deprived himself of the discretion to remove it,” and the Routine “would require his active choice not to perform.” Daniel shows how this works. When the king made prayer illegal, Daniel “got down on his knees three times a day and prayed and gave thanks before his God, as he had done previously” (Daniel 6:10, ESV). He didn’t have to decide that day. He’d decided years before. And Paul says “God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control” (2 Timothy 1:7, ESV). Concrete step: name the decision you lose most often, and lay one Brick tonight that removes it. The stronger the Guardrails, the faster you can drive.

Why This Matters: Willpower runs out, usually right when you need it. Bricks don’t need willpower.

Q9 (LEADER FOLLOW-UP): Tell about a time the early alarm went off and it was someone else, not your own goals, that got you out of bed.

Facilitator Notes:

• This is one of the leader’s follow-up questions. It’s the QOW in a single morning.
• Listening for: “I knew my EH buddy was going to be standing in the parking lot.” “I was the Q.” “My son asked me the night before if I was going.” “I thought about my dad, who died at 58.” (Handle that kind with care.) “I’d invited an FNG and couldn’t not show.”
• Push deeper: “Does that person know they get you out of bed?” Most don’t. Maybe they should.

Answer: Goals fade around the second mile. People don’t. F5/Preparedness says it plainly: “Preparedness is built upon Bricks, but its impetus and accelerant is love.” The King chapter says the HIM trains to build a kingdom “within which he intends other people to safely dwell.” Love is a better alarm clock than ambition. Scripture shows what love does to hard work. “Jacob served seven years for Rachel, and they seemed to him but a few days because of the love he had for her” (Genesis 29:20, ESV). Seven years of labor felt like a long weekend because of who it was for. And the greatest endurance in history had a face behind it: Jesus, “for the joy that was set before him endured the cross” (Hebrews 12:2, ESV). That joy included the people He was saving. Concrete step: put that person’s picture where you’ll see it when the alarm goes off. Make it your lock screen, or tape it next to the clock.

Why This Matters: You’ll quit on yourself. It’s a lot harder to quit on a face.

Q10: The King chapter sets the goal as 3S2T: Speed, Strength, Stamina, Toughness (physical), and Toughness (mental). Which of the five will your people need most from you in twenty years, and which is weakest right now?

Facilitator Notes:

• Read the five out loud. Then read the chapter’s line: “These are the aspects of a HIM’s physical kingdom that enable him to do the things he must do to be a Leader.”
• Listening for: Strength to lift and carry. Stamina for long caregiving days or a full day of moving. Mental toughness for hospital nights and grief. Speed to catch a toddler running at the street. Older men may say balance and mobility, which fit under strength and toughness.
• Push deeper: “What one workout or Brick would build your weak one?”

Answer: 3S2T isn’t about sports. It’s about usefulness. Speed is grabbing a toddler before he reaches the street. Strength is lifting a parent who has fallen. Stamina is a twelve-hour moving day or a week of hospital nights. Physical toughness is working through discomfort without quitting. Mental toughness is the long caregiving season nobody sees. 3S2T isn’t a scorecard. It’s a list of what the people behind you will need. The King chapter also says the Pro is “gradually but consistently Accelerating his fitness level rather than merely staying in shape. Staying in shape is what Amateurs try to do.” That doesn’t mean a 60-year-old should train like a 25-year-old. It means he keeps building where he can, for as long as he can. And our strength has a source beyond the weight room. “Even youths shall faint and be weary… but they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint” (Isaiah 40:30–31, ESV). Concrete step: pick your weakest S or T and add one thing this week aimed right at it, like a ruck for stamina or carries for strength.

Why This Matters: You can’t train everything at once. Train the one they’ll need that you don’t have yet.

Q11: The King chapter says, “If you want to learn how to run faster, just find a faster man. And chase him until you catch him.” Who’s your faster man? And who’s chasing you?

Facilitator Notes:

• This is the Shield Lock question. Men usually answer the first half easily. The second half is the one that matters.
• Listening for: a name in the circle. “The 62-year-old who beats me on every ruck.” “My son passed me last year.”
• Push the second half: someone is already chasing you, whether you know it or not (remember August 28, “Someone Is Already Following You”). Your 2.0s. The FNG. The younger man at work.
• For men who train alone: this is the invitation. Ask, “Whose workout could you join this week?”

Answer: The chapter says fitness “works much better as a Group than as a Singleton. Together, we pool our collective knowledge for the benefit of each individual and spur one another on to places we would never reach alone.” That’s the Shield Lock applied to the King. “Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another” (Proverbs 27:17, ESV). Hebrews says, “let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works” (Hebrews 10:24, ESV). And Paul pictures the whole thing as a race: “in a race all the runners run… So run that you may obtain it” (1 Corinthians 9:24, ESV). But your King isn’t only being built. It’s being watched. Somebody is chasing you, and your discipline is teaching him whether this is worth it. Paul could say, “Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ” (1 Corinthians 11:1, ESV). That’s a high bar, and it’s the right one. Concrete step: name your faster man and ask to join his next workout. Then name one man who’s chasing you and invite him to post with you.

Why This Matters: Alone, you’ll settle for your own pace. Find a faster man, and be one for somebody else.

Q12 (LEADER FOLLOW-UP): Describe a man you know who is still strong and useful late in life. What did you see him do year after year to stay that way?

Facilitator Notes:

• This is one of the leader’s follow-up questions. It gives men a picture of the finish line.
• Listening for: the grandfather who farmed into his 80s. The Respect who still beats the young guys on the ruck. The neighbor who walks every morning, rain or shine. The retired man who still shows up to every work day at church.
• Push deeper: “What did he do every year, not just once?” The answers are almost always boring: he walked, he worked, he kept moving, he stayed around people, he had faith.
• Optional: “Have you ever asked him how he did it? Would you?”

Answer: Caleb is Scripture’s best example. At 85 he said, “I am still as strong today as I was in the day that Moses sent me; my strength now is as my strength was then, for war and for going and coming.” Then he asked for the hardest assignment left: “So now give me this hill country” (Joshua 14:10–12, ESV). He wasn’t asking to retire. He was asking for a mountain. And the reason Scripture gives is that “he wholly followed the LORD” (Joshua 14:14, ESV). Moses at 120 had an eye that “was undimmed, and his vigor unabated” (Deuteronomy 34:7, ESV). The psalmist says the righteous “still bear fruit in old age; they are ever full of sap and green” (Psalm 92:14, ESV). Men like that weren’t lucky. They were consistent, for decades. Q1.1 says, “there are no plateaus in the pursuit of proper personal alignment. Every day he is either getting more Right or less.” Paul’s description of older men fits the ones we admire: “sober-minded, dignified, self-controlled, sound in faith, in love, and in steadfastness” (Titus 2:2, ESV). Concrete step: name one thing that man did year after year, and start doing it this week. Better yet, call him and ask him.

Why This Matters: Nobody gets to 80 strong and useful by accident. Decide now what kind of old man you’re building.

Q13: Paul says athletes train “to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable” (1 Corinthians 9:25). Read verses 19–23 first. Paul disciplined himself “for the sake of the gospel.” What would it look like to train for something that lasts?

Facilitator Notes:

• Read 1 Corinthians 9:19–27 out loud, the whole thing. The context changes how the athlete verses land.
• Explain the wreath: the Isthmian Games winner got pine or wild celery that wilted within days.
• Listening for: men connecting physical discipline to spiritual discipline, and men who’ve never thought of a workout as having any eternal purpose.
• For men who aren’t Christians: “When your strength is gone someday, what do you want it to have been for?”

Answer: Every man in Corinth knew the Isthmian Games, and every man knew the winner’s wreath turned brown in a week. Paul’s point is that the athletes gave everything for something that wilted. The King chapter borrows it directly: the HIM “stays in strict physical training to get a crown that will last forever. Thus, there is an eternal purpose in what he does.” Look at why Paul disciplined himself: “I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them… I do it all for the sake of the gospel” (1 Corinthians 9:19, 23, ESV). Paul didn’t discipline his body to win a race. He disciplined it so he could keep serving people. Then verse 27: “I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.” Paul isn’t afraid of losing his salvation. He’s afraid of becoming a man whose life doesn’t back up his words, like a dad who preaches discipline but can’t climb the stairs. And Paul keeps the balance: “while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come” (1 Timothy 4:8, ESV). Train the body and the soul together. Concrete step: this week, pray for the faces you named during your workout, by name, on every ruck, run, or set.

Why This Matters: Every PR you set will be broken, mostly by time. What you build in the people you served will outlast all of it.

Q14: “You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body” (1 Corinthians 6:19–20). Romans 12:1 tells us to present our bodies “as a living sacrifice.” If your body isn’t your own, what changes? And what about when it starts breaking down no matter what you do?

Facilitator Notes:

• This is the deepest question. It moves from discipline to grace.
• Some men in the room are living in a body that’s failing: injuries, chronic pain, illness, age. This question is especially for them. Don’t rush it.
• Use Luke 22:19. The price that bought us was a body.
• For men who aren’t Christians: “If your body were something you’d been trusted with instead of something you own, what would you do differently?”

Answer: Men make one of two mistakes with their bodies. Some think the body doesn’t matter, which is what the Corinthians believed (1 Corinthians 6:12–14). Others think it’s everything, which is the mirror. Paul says the body matters because it belongs to someone: “you were bought with a price.” And the price was a body. At the Last Supper, Jesus took bread and said, “This is my body, which is given for you” (Luke 22:19, ESV). Jesus didn’t stay strong for Himself. He gave His body for us. That’s the pattern for every man here. Romans 12:1 tells us how to respond: “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice.” The motive is mercy, not guilt. You’re not earning anything. You’re answering what’s already been done for you. And when the body breaks down, grace doesn’t run out. “Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day” (2 Corinthians 4:16, ESV). “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9, ESV). And Christ “will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body” (Philippians 3:21, ESV). A man in a wheelchair, or a man in the middle of chemo, can still offer his body as a living sacrifice. The King is a stewardship, not a scorecard. God’s measure is “faithful over a little” (Matthew 25:21, ESV), with whatever you’ve been given. Concrete step: tonight, thank God for the body you have, not the one you wish you had, and offer Him tomorrow’s workout for the faces you named.

Why This Matters: If your body is yours, you’ll either spoil it or neglect it. If it was given to you, you take care of it for someone else.

Q15 (THE CLOSE): Name your faces, what they’ll need you to be able to do in twenty years, and the one Brick you’ll lay this week to start building it.

Facilitator Notes:

• This is the close. Every man answers, and nobody passes.
• Give 60 seconds of quiet first. Let each man picture the faces, twenty years from now.
• Three parts, every man: the faces (names), the need (what they’ll need him to be able to do), and the Brick (one specific thing this week that someone could see him do).
• Write it all down. Next Friday, open by asking each man, “Did you lay the Brick? Did you look at the faces when the alarm went off?”
• Read the commitments back before you pray.

Example answers — what a real answer sounds like:

• The young dad: “Jake and Luke. They’re 6 and 9. In twenty years I want to help them move into their first houses and be carrying the couch, not supervising from the truck. My Brick: the gloom Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and a ruck with Luke on Saturday.”
• The man with an aging parent: “My mom. She’s 78 and I’m the one she calls. In twenty years it’ll probably be my wife who needs me. I need to be able to lift someone out of a chair and up off the floor. My Brick: carries and squats twice this week, and I’m telling Mike so he asks me next Friday.”
• The Respect: “My granddaughter, Ellie. She’s two. In twenty years she’ll be 22 and I’ll be 81. I want to be the grandpa who still walks the trail with her. My Brick: a 30-minute walk every day this week, no weather excuses.”
• The single man: “No wife or kids yet. My faces are my sister’s two boys and the men in this circle. In twenty years I want to be the uncle who still shows up on moving day, and the guy who can still Q a beatdown. My Brick: post four days, and I’m inviting my oldest nephew to a workout.”
• The man coming back from injury: “My wife, Sarah. After my back surgery she did everything for a year. I want to be the one who can take care of her. My Brick: my PT every single day this week, even the boring parts, and I’m telling her I’m doing it for her.”

The test: a real answer includes faces, a need, and a Brick. Push back on these:

• “I want to lose 20 pounds” → For who? What will it let you do for them?
• “My family” → Names?
• “I’ll work out more” → Which days? What time? Who knows?
• “I’m too far gone” → Q1.1 says no man is too far wrong to Get Right. What’s one small Movement?
• “I do it for me” → Good. And who benefits when you’re there?

Answer: Paul says, “So run that you may obtain it” (1 Corinthians 9:24, ESV). Hébert says be strong to be useful. Jocko says discipline equals freedom. Put them together and the close is simple. The faces are your why. The twenty-year need is your what. The Brick is your how. Q1/Get Right says “an un-Fit man is unprepared to help anyone else,” and the King chapter says the HIM trains for “reasons outside of himself.” Discipline equals freedom, and the freedom is being able to show up for them. You don’t have to fix twenty years this week. You only have to lay one Brick. And you do it as a man who isn’t his own, offering his body “by the mercies of God” (Romans 12:1, ESV). Train for them, not the mirror. Concrete step: say your faces, your need, and your Brick out loud, right now.

Why This Matters: The mirror will never thank you. They will. Name the faces. Lay the Brick. Report back next Friday.

“F3 is not a religious organization but we do ask that you believe in something higher than yourself. I am a Christian, so I will lead us out in a Christian reflection and prayer.”

Closing Prayer

Father, thank you for these bodies and for the people you’ve put in our boats. Forgive us for the times we’ve let the King slide or trained for the mirror instead of for them. Thank you that Jesus gave His body for us, and that we are not our own. Give each man here the discipline to get up when the alarm goes off and the love to remember whose faces he’s getting up for. Make us strong to be useful, for your glory. In Jesus’ name, Amen.