7-Week Study & Discussion Guide
The Practice of the Presence of God
by Brother Lawrence·56 discussion questions
Discussion question your group will work through:
1.The editor tells us that Brother Lawrence's birth records were destroyed in a war he himself fought in, and that the war left him crippled and in chronic pain for the rest of his life. What does it tell you about God's ways that the man who would teach the world about joyful, continuous communion with God spent his entire adult life in physical suffering?
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About This Study Guide
The Practice of the Presence of God is one of the most beloved spiritual classics in Christian history. Written by a seventeenth-century French Carmelite lay brother named Nicholas Herman — known in the monastery as Brother Lawrence — it is a slim but inexhaustible book about a single, revolutionary idea: that any person, in any circumstance, can walk in continuous, conscious communion with God. Brother Lawrence did not develop this practice in a quiet study or a peaceful garden. He discovered it in the noise and clutter of a busy monastic kitchen, while rolling over wine casks on lame legs and repairing the worn sandals of over a hundred brothers. His testimony is that God is not reserved for the chapel or the prayer closet, but is available — and eager — in every moment of every ordinary day.
This study guide moves through the book's four Conversations and fifteen Letters, plus a final week of review and reflection, for a total of seven weeks of study. Each week invites you to read the assigned section slowly — perhaps more than once — before sitting with the discussion questions. The questions are designed to be used in a small group or in personal journaling, and they move from what Brother Lawrence actually said, to what it might mean for your own inner life, to how it connects to the gospel of grace. If you are studying alone, consider writing your answers before you pray; if you are studying with others, allow silence between questions so that reflection, not performance, drives the conversation.
What you will gain from this guide is not a technique but an orientation — a fresh way of seeing the ordinary moments of your day as places where God is already present and waiting to be noticed. Brother Lawrence warned that "outside distraction spoils all," and he also insisted that the practice is available to anyone who desires it. You need no theological training, no special temperament, and no uncluttered life. You need only, as he put it, "a heart resolutely determined to apply itself to nothing but Him and to love Him only." Come with that desire, and let these weeks be a beginning.
7-Week Schedule
- Week 1Editor's Preface — The Man Behind the Method7 questions
- Week 2The Four Conversations — Learning to Walk with God9 questions
- Week 3Letters One through Four — Beginnings, Struggles, and the Torrent of Grace8 questions
- Week 4Letters Five through Eight — The Practice in Daily Life8 questions
- Week 5Letters Nine through Twelve — Love, Fidelity, and the Gift of Suffering8 questions
- Week 6Letters Thirteen through Fifteen — The Final Words8 questions
- Week 7Review & Reflection — Looking Back, Moving Forward8 questions
Week 1: Editor's Preface — The Man Behind the Method
Free sampleRead the Editor's Preface of The Practice of the Presence of God.
1.The editor tells us that Brother Lawrence's birth records were destroyed in a war he himself fought in, and that the war left him crippled and in chronic pain for the rest of his life. What does it tell you about God's ways that the man who would teach the world about joyful, continuous communion with God spent his entire adult life in physical suffering?
2.Brother Lawrence entered the monastery expecting to be punished for his clumsiness and faults — to 'sacrifice his life with its pleasures to God.' Instead, the editor notes, 'God surprised him because he met with nothing but satisfaction.' Have you ever approached God bracing for judgment and been surprised by grace instead? What happened?
3.The editor describes Brother Lawrence as a man who 'shunned attention and the limelight, knowing that outside distraction spoils all.' It was only after his death that his letters were collected and published.
a.Why do you think obscurity and hiddenness seemed natural — even necessary — to Brother Lawrence's way of life?
b.In your own life, do you find that public attention to your spiritual life helps or hinders your actual experience of God's presence? Be honest.
4.For roughly forty years, Brother Lawrence worked in the kitchen and then the sandal shop — unglamorous, repetitive, physically painful work. The editor says he discovered 'a pure and uncomplicated way to walk continually in God's presence' precisely there. What does this say about where we might expect to grow spiritually, versus where we actually do?
5.The editor notes that Brother Lawrence's first ten years in the monastery 'were full of severe trials and challenges.' We sometimes assume that those who seem most spiritually mature have always found faith easy. How does knowing that Brother Lawrence struggled for a decade before finding his footing change the way you read this book — or the way you think about your own spiritual journey?
6.Brother Lawrence died in 1691, and the editor says his 'quiet death was much like his monastic life where each day and each hour was a new beginning and a fresh commitment to love God with all his heart.' What would it look like for your own daily life to have that quality — each hour as a fresh beginning? What would have to change?
7.The editor frames the entire book around this promise: that 'anyone, regardless of age or circumstance, can practice [the presence of God] — anywhere, anytime.' Do you believe that? What in your circumstances feels like the biggest obstacle to practicing it yourself?
Week 2: The Four Conversations — Learning to Walk with God
Read all four Conversations in The Practice of the Presence of God.
1.In the First Conversation, Brother Lawrence describes his conversion at eighteen: seeing a bare winter tree and receiving 'a high view of the Providence and Power of God which has never since been effaced from his soul.' He could not tell whether his love for God had increased in the forty years since.
a.Have you had a moment — a scene, a sentence, a crisis — that gave you a new or deeper sense of God's reality? Describe it briefly.
b.Brother Lawrence says that vision 'set him loose from the world.' What does it mean, practically speaking, to be 'set loose from the world'? What would that look like in your daily life?
Week 3: Letters One through Four — Beginnings, Struggles, and the Torrent of Grace
Read Letters One through Four of The Practice of the Presence of God.
1.In the First Letter, Brother Lawrence writes that reading many books about the spiritual life made him feel 'puzzled' rather than helped. He resolved instead to 'give the all for the All' — to give himself wholly to God and renounce everything that was not God. What do you make of that phrase, 'give the all for the All'? What would it cost you, concretely, to make that resolution?
Week 4: Letters Five through Eight — The Practice in Daily Life
Read Letters Five through Eight of The Practice of the Presence of God.
1.In the Fifth Letter, Brother Lawrence makes a bold claim: 'It seems to me that whoever duly practices [the presence of God] will soon become devout.' He also says the heart must be 'empty of all other things' because 'God will possess the heart alone.' Do you find this condition — emptying the heart of everything that is not God — appealing, frightening, or both? What are you most reluctant to let go of?
Week 5: Letters Nine through Twelve — Love, Fidelity, and the Gift of Suffering
Read Letters Nine through Twelve of The Practice of the Presence of God.
1.In the Ninth Letter, Brother Lawrence asks himself and his friend a searching question: 'You and I have lived over forty years in the monastic life. Have we employed them in loving and serving God?' He adds that he is 'sometimes filled with shame and confusion' when he considers God's great favors to him alongside 'my small advancement in the way of perfection.' How do you sit with that kind of honest self-assessment — not despair, but clear-eyed humility? Is there a difference between shame that crushes and shame that purifies?
Week 6: Letters Thirteen through Fifteen — The Final Words
Read Letters Thirteen through Fifteen of The Practice of the Presence of God. Note that Brother Lawrence died peacefully within days of the last letter.
1.In the Thirteenth Letter, Brother Lawrence tells his suffering friend to stop pursuing human remedies and 'resign yourself entirely to the providence of God,' believing that 'perhaps He waits only for that resignation and perfect faith in Him to cure you.' He also says not to ask God for deliverance from pain, but rather 'for the strength to resolutely bear all that He pleases.' This is demanding counsel. What does it assume about the character of God, and about the purpose of suffering, that makes this counsel not cruel but compassionate?
Week 7: Review & Reflection — Looking Back, Moving Forward
No new reading this week. Review your notes, journal entries, and any passages you marked throughout the study.
1.Looking back across the entire book — the Conversations and all fifteen Letters — which single passage, image, or idea has stayed with you most powerfully? What is it about that particular moment in the text that lodged itself in you?
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This study guide covers The Practice of the Presence of God in 7 weeks, with chapter-by-chapter discussion questions, reading references, and closing prayers for each session.
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The complete guide includes 56 discussion questions across 7 weeks — an average of 8 questions per week, designed for group conversation.
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