Hey Friends,
If you have read this blog for any amount of time, you KNOW that I am the chief fan of the spiritual disciplines. I love them and God has used them in my life so many times to draw me closer to Him. With that said, if you are not careful you can allow your devotion and disciplines to be a drudgery or duty instead of a delight.
Most of us enjoy eating food and if someone prepares our favorite dish we get excited! There are several dishes that will cause my mouth to water. I want my spirit to be hungry for the things of God – to be ravishingly hungry for the Word and for fellowship with the King of heaven. There is no way that rote, religion, and ritual impress God. Passion, zeal, and desire impress Him. People seeking Him with their whole heart move Him. Placing Him as the priority and loving Him more than anything else moves Him.
Do your disciplines draw God? Are you coming at Christ with a driving passion and a prayer life that gains the ear of heaven? I think that is the kind of heart the Lord listens to, don’t you? Now, like food, you have to eat and we must be in the disciplines – but let’s love it!
As leaders, let’s love the Lord to the level others can follow. Don’t allow the delight of your devotion to become a duty. How sad that would be. Don’t let your devotion miss the mark, which is the heart of God.
If you were to rate the heat of your heart in your devotion and disciplines, what would it be? On a scale from 1 to 10, with 1 being cold and 10 being red hot, how would you rate?
1——–2——–3——–4——–5——–6——–7——–8——–9———10
Time to crank up the heat!
Love you and I mean it.
Pastor Chris
I think that there are core disciplines and additional disciplines. Prayer, Bible “reading” (text, audio, video, whatever), time with church community, serving others, tithing, and meditation are vital. When I slack on one of those for too long, I really start feeling spiritually depleted. This list may not be perfect, but I think it’s probably close.
Other spiritual disciplines can be great or even essential depending who you are. I believe there’s a tendency to always try to add “one more thing” to your schedule (whether secular or spiritual)… and then start going through the motions on one of your core disciplines. If an “additional” spiritual discipline isn’t spiritually productive, why keep doing it? Weeding through your activities makes sense. If an activity (secular or spiritual) is getting in your way of connecting with God, weed it out.
I agree that zeal is vital. Overpacking your schedule is a great way to kill zeal. If my zeal is dying, stepping back and refocusing on simple time with God is what I’ve had to do.
This is my experience. Any thoughts?