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Week Six - The Discipline
In religious circles, we talk a lot about letting God work through us, and He does. (Remember John 15:5-8) We talk about waiting on the Lord, and we should. We talk about spiritual growth as a process, and it is. However, we must be very careful not to use these ideas as excuses to become passive, lazy, or complacent about our own spiritual condition or our usefulness within the body. While it is certainly true that Christ works through us to accomplish the will of God, obedience to Him does require effort on our part. It is not always easy to follow Him, stay motivated to grow, or to continually press for the level of excellence in service that He deserves. Yet, we must do these things or the body of Christ will atrophy. You may have heard this verse one hundred times, but take a closer look. It calls us to do more than "a good job for Jesus." It calls us to do everything as Christ's ambassadors, performing our daily tasks just as He would if they had been assigned to Him. It also calls us to view our daily activities and the details of our assignments as opportunities to demonstrate our gratitude to God for what He has done for us. Does that raise the stakes and expectation of excellence in our work? Absolutely. In every task in any location, we should be compelled by the love of God to serve and love. We should never lack motivation to live for God. As you begin your assignment, guard against the tendency to simply do a better job than the next person or last person. Give it your all! Not for yourself, but for God. You may be speaking, cleaning carpet, stacking chairs, running a sound board, leading worship, painting, updating a web site or thousands of other things. But with each task, serve in such a way that others would know, without question, that you belong to Jesus. Serve in such a way that Jesus would be well-represented and God sufficiently thanked for the salvation you have because of Him. Let the love of God compel you. Just as His love is excellent, strive for excellence in every area of your life. Take a few moments and write your thoughts, concerns, and questions in your journal. Allow the following thought suggestions to guide you. What excuses have you used in the past for doing or being less than God called you to do or be? Are those legitimate excuses? Explain. Are there some tasks that God would require you to do well and other tasks that are "lesser" in the Kingdom of God? Are you serving God in any and every way that you can right now or are you waiting for a "big" task before you start serving? If you wait on a job that everyone will see as important, before you will serve, what does that tell you about your motivation to serve God and people?
What did God say to you today? Review:
As you carry out the assignments that God gives you, it is very important that you continue to mature in every way. The passing of time will ensure physical maturity, but it does not ensure any other kind of maturity. There is a discipline to following Jesus and being His servant. There is study involved, self discipline, servanthood and much more. Jesus calls us to salvation and to ministry as His ambassadors, but He also calls us to become His disciples, to learn from Him. According to Webster, "to learn" means "to acquire by study." This definition suggests that the act of learning requires effort on the part of the student. Learning is actively taking in knowledge and making it a part of your life in such a way that it becomes yours, not watching and hoping to catch a glimpse of obvious truth here and there. This verse isn't talking about "nailing down" your salvation and making sure that you are a Christian. Instead it questions what it is that you will do with your salvation, a gift so great and coupled with so much responsibility that you should constantly consider what it is you must be doing with that gift in order to be a good steward with what you've been given. To become a disciple is to take responsibility for your own growth and maturity. Take a few moments and write your thoughts, concerns, and questions in your journal. Allow the following thought suggestions to guide you. Have you ever made excuses for lack of progress in your spiritual growth? Do you feel the responsibility that is yours as a believer to learn from Jesus? To the point of "fear and trembling"? On a scale from 1 to 10, rate the amount of personal effort you put forth to grow and mature personally. Explain.
What is God teaching you? Review:
To grow and mature personally, you must actively seek God and His direction for your life. Why did Paul disappear to Arabia? He wanted to get alone with God. He knew that surrounding himself with Christians was important, but that an intimate relationship with God was even more important. Only God can reveal Himself to us. A Christian who only learns about God through others is like a doctor who reads only textbooks, but never examines a human body. Medicine, to him is theory, not reality. Likewise, a faith filtered through the mouths of preachers and teachers is just theory until a Christian learns to put into practice the words spoken to him personally through prayer or scripture. It is tempting sometimes to blame others for our own lack of growth or maturity. When our hearts lack the zeal that we once had for serving God, we tend to point our fingers outward instead of taking responsibility ourselves for the stagnation we are experiencing. Preachers, teachers, parents, and friends often take the brunt of our frustration, labeled in our own minds as ineffective, when the real source of our frustration lies within the choices we ourselves make concerning our obedience to Christ. We cannot expect a sermon, Bible study, retreat, camp, or program to grow us spiritually. They are man-made. They are texts to aid us in our pursuit of the Holy and Living God who deserves our personal examination. We must get alone with God and His word. Jesus saw time alone with His Father as important, we should see this as important.
Luke 5:16 Take a few moments and write your thoughts, concerns, and questions in your journal. Allow the following thought suggestions to guide you. Are you in the habit of leaning on people or on God to help you grow and mature? Give examples. Have you ever blamed someone else for your own stagnation? Have you ever considered taking a time of spiritual retreat to be alone with God and His word for a full hour, day, weekend or week? Blocking off times, in addition to your daily quiet time can help you re-focus and refresh with God.
What is God teaching you?
If you ever intend to lead others toward a deeper relationship with Christ, you must first make the journey yourself. After all, you cannot take others where you have never been. If you truly intend to become intentional about your own spiritual growth and to take responsibility for it, there are tools you can use to help you along your way, tools that will help you to deepen your relationship with Christ and lead others in the same direction. We call those tools spiritual disciplines. Discipline means training. As believers, we make spiritual disciplines a permanent part of our lives to allow God to train us to become more effective ambassadors for Christ, something that doesn't always come naturally, but requires constant effort and practice. Perhaps the most important of all spiritual disciplines is prayer. To pray is to communicate with God, submitting to His response, and it is our lifeline as believers. Prayer is a privilege and an honor. Prayer is effective, when your heart is right. Prayer allows us to experience Christ at work through us and to know God more intimately. Prayer is not only a good idea. It is a vital discipline in the life of a believer. Without it, you disconnect yourself from the source of power behind your ministry. But, prayer is not a formula or a spell. Prayer is not a means to power. If you pray so you will get more, you have missed the meaning of prayer. Prayer is another way that God can speak to you, guide you and empower you, so you will be useful in ministry. If you goal is to get more for your own fame and fortune, you do not understand prayer. If you goal is to know God and be blessed, so that you can bless others, you are beginning to understand prayer. God does care for His children and He loves to bless them, but your calling is to make God famous, not for Him to make you famous. Take a few moments and write your thoughts, concerns, and questions in your journal. Allow the following thought suggestions to guide you. Are you consciously aware of the fact that you are constantly in training to become an effective ambassador of Christ? Why or why not? How do you approach prayer? What kind of attitude have you had towards it? Did you learn anything new about prayer today or were you reminded of anything important about prayer? Explain.
Has your life up to this point demonstrated a true understanding of the importance of prayer? Does anything need to change?
Intercessory prayer is the prayer of a believer for God's will to be done in the life of another person. It is vital to the survival and successful functioning of the body of Christ. Jesus understood this. He prayed for us. Take your time reading John 17. Paul understood the power of intercessory prayer. He constantly requested prayer from the many churches with whom he worked. In Ephesians, he writes: As you develop the Spiritual Discipline of prayer, make sure to make intercessory prayer a priority. In this way, you are enabling the body even when you have no physical role in a particular function. Also, make sure that you have someone praying intercessory prayer for you. God may perform a miracle for or through you because of the prayer of another believer. For example, read Acts 12:5-17. Take a few moments and write your thoughts, concerns, and questions in your journal. Allow the following thought suggestions to guide you. How do you feel knowing that Jesus prays for you? Have you been taking intercessory prayer seriously? Why or why not? Have you ever witnessed the power of intercessory prayer first hand? Record the instance(s). How would your church be affected if its members took intercessory prayer seriously? How would your friends and family be affected if you took it seriously? Are you sure someone is interceding for you in prayer? If not, what steps do you plan to take to make sure that you are being prayed for? |
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