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“Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle, and you will find rest for your souls. For
my yoke fits perfectly, and the burden I give you is light." – Jesus, Matthew 11:29,30, NLT
Jesus ‘yoke’ fits perfectly? His burden is light? We will find rest in our souls through Jesus? Lots of us scoff;
yeah, right, we say. Ever since I found Jesus life has been so much harder! I don’t find rest! I find exhaustion! Light
burden? Life was a lot easier before my relationship with God!
G. K. Chesterton said, “Christianity has not so much been tried and found wanting, as it has been difficult and left
untried.”
I was at a concert when the lead singer said, “Being a Christian isn’t easy!” No, it’s not. But it
was meant to be. Jesus meant for it to be easy. And as we see in Acts and in the Gospels, it was easy for the first followers,
yet over time such ease, such faith, such joy and rapture and rest in Jesus has all but vanished. So what happened?
The answer is that most of us have stopped following Jesus completely. A lot of people are growling at me. But just wait.
What does it mean to follow? Most of us would say to “walk in his footsteps.” Or to become a missionary. All these
are only half-right. When Jesus first told you and me, “Follow me,” he meant, “Live like me. Mind. Body.
Spirit. Live like I have. Then you will find rest for your souls.” What does it mean to totally live not for Jesus,
but like Jesus, 24/7? Most of us – including me – don’t really know.
But what it does mean, and this I know for sure, is that we are to model everything he did – not only when we are around
people, but when we are by ourselves, when we are eating and watching movies, when we are going about life. So that people,
if told about a man named Jesus, will point to us and say, “Hey, I know him! He’s right there!” And this
change doesn’t just revolve around changing our thoughts and our ideas and our activities – it means changing
our habits, too. A Christian who refuses to change his habits will probably receive very little of Christ after conversion.
When one is saved, at that moment he is closer to God than he has ever been before. But after a few days, the excitement,
the inertia, it wears off. Doubt sets in. One wonders, “What happened? Am I not saved?” Meeting someone can be
great. But if you just exchange names, how exciting will it be in three days? My point is this: salvation isn’t a one-time
thing, it’s a day-by-day experience. It doesn’t culminate in baptism or a prayer: it culminates when we step into
Paradise. Building a relationship takes work – we can’t expect our relationship with God to blossom with no effort
on our part. God is a Person, not a machine – we need to treat him for who He is. That means we need, first of all,
to take time to get to know Him better. A lot of us do this in devotionals or prayers or morning quiet times. But what most
of us look over is that if you want to get to know somebody, you don’t always invite them over to your house; you go
over to their house: we need to take up the habits of God – we need to step into Jesus’ house – so that
our relationship can become so loving, so intimate, so real and foundational that it surprises us how so many people live
in dullness and think it normal and are content to remain that way. We will become like Jesus, if we do it from our hearts,
minds and souls, and experience the transformation so many of us have found lacking.
How are we to build our relationship with God? Bible study helps. So does worship. And prayer. But if we are content just
to study the Bible over a cup of coffee, our focus entirely on the aroma, how much intimacy is there? Or if we only worship
on Sunday mornings, or prayer is a before-bed and before-meals thing, how closer are we going to draw to God? How much closer
are you getting reading spiritual self-help books and talking to ministers about theological truth? Growth between you and
a friend grows in communion; you don’t read books about each other and grow closer. It just doesn’t work. So the
same it is with God. One way to draw closer to God, if heartfelt and passionate, is spiritual disciplines.
We can’t ignore the fact that most protestant Christians cringe at the mention of spiritual disciplines. It is no secret
that Protestantism opened the door to a lot of truths that had long been forgotten in the age of Catholic power. Faith that
saves you. Read God’s Word for yourself. You don’t need a priest to forgive sins. It’s all about you and
your intimate relationship with God. Yet there was one thing protestants didn’t just ignore, but frowned upon –
and continue to frown upon: and that is discipline. Protestantism has done something fatal – it has overreacted –
negatively – against ascetic or disciplinary practices in the Christian realm. In most protestant circles, a “head
trip” of mental assent to doctrine and the enjoyment of pleasant imagery and imagination is quietly substituted for
a rigorous practice of discipleship that would bring a true transformation of character.
“Thank God! Once you were slaves of sin, but now you have obeyed with all your heart the new teaching God has given
you. Now you are free from sin, your old master, and you have become slaves to your new master, righteousness.” - Romans
6:17,18, NLT
The moment we are saved, we are freed from sin. Don’t get this confused with free from sin. We will still mess up. We
will still make sinful mistakes. It is unfortunate that many sincere Christians are thrown off and the burden is deepened
when they hear that we’re free from sin, but yet can’t forget that morning’s sin. We are freed from the
power of sin to control us – we have a choice. Those without God do not, on the other hand, have a choice. We can say
‘no’ to evil; a new attitude will develop. But what happens then is also a choice – will we say ‘yes’
or ‘no’ to developing the new creations we are? Saying ‘yes’ opens the doorway to the disciplines
we’re going to be talking about.
Who are the great ones in The Way, what are the significant movements in the history of the church that do not bear the deep
and pervasive imprint of the disciplines of the spiritual life? If there are none, what leads us to believe that we might
be the exception to the rule and might know the power of the Kingdom life without the appropriate disciplines? How could we
be practicing and teaching the disciplines of Jesus Christ himself and the best of his followers found necessary?
If you want to learn baseball, you don’t go to the kid at the dusty baseball diamond at the corner of Fifth and Broadway.
You go to Babe Ruth and Sammy Sosa and Mark McGuire and Barry Bonds – the legendary greats. If we want to know how to
draw deeper into God, to grow roots that drink only on the fountains of God, if we want to develop and experience that loving
intimacy we were created to have with God, let us not look at the ragtag Christians in the back pews at our churches; let’s
look at the disciples who changed the world: Paul and John and Peter. And let’s never forget to look at the One who
came to give us Life. When we dive into their lives, we see that they grew deeper with God through several different spiritual
disciplines, most of which we’ve forgotten or slighted, to our own downfalls.
Are you hungry, even starving, to experience the ‘easy yoke’ of Jesus? Are you eager to live a life that is completely
focused on God, that is filled with joy no matter what, and spiritual power beyond our dreams? Is there a desire within you
to step beyond just knowing about God, to knowing God intimately, lovingly, as a Lover and Beloved? Such an easy life, such
a life filled with rest for the soul, is within your reach…
“But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control,
to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love.
For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
- 1 Peter 1:5-8, NKJV
What is a spiritual discipline? An activity undertaken to bring us into more effective cooperation with Christ and his Kingdom;
a means to the grace and gifts of God; and a portal into an intimate love affair with God. Spiritual disciplines, coined “exercises
unto godliness,” are only activities undertaken to make us capable of receiving more of his life and power without harm
to ourselves or others. We need not try to come up with a complete list of disciplines, nor should we assume that our particular
list will be right for others – just as we are uniquely hand-crafted and hand-knit in our mother’s womb by the
Creator, so different disciplines will suit each one of us differently in our growing intimacy with God. We also need to keep
in mind that very few disciplines can be regarded as absolutely indispensable for a healthy spiritual life and work, though
some are obviously more important than others. We also need to realize that these disciplines are not for salvation, but because
of salvation; they aren’t needed to be saved: they are for those who are serious about developing a genuine intimacy
with their Lover.
Beware: those who think that they are spiritually superior because they make a practice of disciplines such as fasting or
silence or frugality are entirely missing the point. The need for extensive practice of a given discipline is an indication
of weakness, not strength. A good rule of thumb may be that if it is easy for us to practice a certain discipline, we probably
don’t need to practice it. The disciplines we need to practice are precisely the ones we are not “good at”
and do not enjoy. Baseball player Pete Rose, when asked to explain his phenomenal success as an athlete, said:
“I practice what I’m not good at. Most folks practice what they’re good at.”
The same is true for our success in spiritual living. Practice what is hard. Practice what doesn’t come naturally. For
me, that is fasting. I love to eat. Eating is a key part of my day, a high point. Fasting is one discipline among many that
draws me into the graces and love of God deeper than I was before the fast. Such is the way of the disciplines.
On the right is a list of a few disciplines; check them out and see what they're all about, and develop this intimate, passionate,
zealous relationship with God, and truly become a discipline not just of mouth, but of your life!
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