Dabblers or Disciples? : Part 3

Intimate Faith: A Woman's Guide to the Spiritual Disciplines
by Jan Winebrenner

(Page 3 of 5)

In much the same way, I've discovered that learning and practicing the spiritual disciplines has enhanced my spiritual life and shown me how to enjoy God and trust him more fully. They have become training tools that heighten my awareness of God in my daily, moment-to-moment existence; they train me to participate more fully, more consciously, in the kingdom purposes of God; they teach me how to relate to an invisible God.

I have seen my faith grow stronger, my soul enlarged (slowly and often in only small increments) to receive more of his grace and sweetness.

I have come to understand this reality: if all we are doing as Christians, as disciples of Jesus Christ, is practicing a few habits in order to look like a Christian (whatever that looks like), or to satisfy a denominational standard for behavior, we are doing little more than dabbling with the idea of discipleship. And instead of reveling in the abundant life Jesus promised us, instead of experiencing increasing intimacy with him and an ever-growing confidence in his goodness, we can expect discouragement, disillusionment, and frequent failure.

The Ancient Paths

For most of us, our Christian traditions encouraged the practice of some of the spiritual disciplines, although which disciplines varied from denomination to denomination. Growing up in a very conservative Christian community, I never heard a sermon on the disciplines of silence or simplicity; however, many a pastor preached study and service. I heard sermons on prayer and worship, but never on humility or celebration or solitude.

My friend Marie grew up in Australia in a religious tradition that emphasized church attendance - just show up. Confession was mandatory, but she never learned about private worship or meaningful Bible study. She never heard a sermon on submission or sacrifice.

As we shared our spiritual heritages with each other, we discovered that both of our traditions had ignored, or forgotten, most of the habits that Jesus taught and lived in front of his followers. Neither of us had ever been taught silence as a discipline, or submission, or sacrifice. No one had ever included the disciplines of fasting or meditation in a discipleship class. Yet down through the centuries, faithful, godly individuals have practiced these disciplines and urged others to follow them as well.

Jeremiah the prophet called: "Ask for the ancient paths, / ask where the good way is, and walk in it, / and you will find rest for your souls."

These disciplines, these ancient paths, when embraced in faith with reliance on the Holy Spirit, are the very means that offer us hope for change and the expectation of spiritual growth. They are our promise of rest and peace.

Lurking Dangers

Two dangers lurk in any discussion of the spiritual disciplines. The first, and the most perilous: thinking that exercising the spiritual disciplines will earn us favor with God and make us worthy of a home in heaven. We must never forget that the disciplines are training tools only, aids that enable us to grab hold of God's promises, to live in the reality of his love and presence, to understand what it means, experientially, to be "in Christ." They do not impart life.

Life comes only through the Son, the Begotten of the Father, who came to show us what grace and truth look like. When we forget this, "the gospel becomes just a pattering of pious platitudes spoken by a Jewish carpenter in the distant past."

John Wesley testified that until he understood grace, the methodical approach through the effort of discipline didn't make sense. But "his heart was strangely warmed" once he found salvation through faith in Christ. He learned that salvation preceded growth toward discipleship.

The second danger is that, having understood salvation, we would misunderstand the purpose of spiritual disciplines. We would try to make them an end in themselves, rather than a means of encountering God and experiencing his presence. We would treat them like rules we force on ourselves and on others, with no relationship to the pursuit of intimacy with God.

Thomas Merton wrote: "An activity that is based on the frenzies and impulsions of human ambition is a delusion and an obstacle to grace. It gets in the way of God's will, and it creates more problems than it solves." The problems we create for ourselves are pride and legalism, defeat and despair.

Those problems multiply when we attempt to force others to get busy about the business of being good, without understanding that the only business that matters is that we be God's. We become guilty of coercion and manipulation; we become unkind usurpers of the Holy Spirit's work, which is always gentle, courteous, and respectful.

This, then, is our strong reminder: that the bedrock of our faith is Jesus Christ, crucified for our sins, raised on the third day, ever living to intercede for us and bring us into glory. On that foundation we build a life of loving obedience and trust, trained by the spiritual disciplines that Jesus taught and exhibited for us.

Copyright © 2003 by Jan Winebrenner

About the Author

Jan Winebrenner is the founder of the Dallas Christian Writers Guild and co-founder of the Writers Roundtable Conferences. She is a frequent speaker and workshop leader for writer's groups and college and university writing classes. Mentoring and encouraging other writers is one of her passions, as is studying classic Christian literature.