EVANGELICAL SPIRITUALITY – # 04
(Oct. 14, 2012)
REVIEW:
1. Defining Evangelical Spirituality
Evangelical Spirituality is based on “Christian Mysticism.” What is a “Christian Mystic?” One who experiences God in trans-rational and non-empirical ways. A Christian Mystic is one who has received the Spirit who is from God, who is taught by the Spirit and who accepts things that come from the Spirit of God. (See 1 Cor. 2:12-14).
2. “Christian Mystics” Experience the New Birth
Everyone who is “Born-Again” is a “Christian Mystic.” One who is “Born-Again” is born of the Spirit and sees and enters the Kingdom of God. None of these experiences can be proved empirically and all are trans-rational. (See John 3:1-8)
3. The “Christian Mystic” and God’s Guidance
“Christian Mystics” experience God’s guidance again and again. God’s guidance is primarily given in non-empirical and trans-rational ways. (See Acts 15:1-28, especially 15:26. Also 26:17-18, 13:2, 16:6, 16:9-10, 18:9-11, 21:10-14, 23:6, 24:21, 21:28, 23:11.)
SOME THOUGHTS ABOUT “WORK”
QUESTION: Who has ever had a job that you didn’t like but still went to work? Tell us about your job.
QUESTION: Who has had a job that was okay but there were days that you didn’t want to go to work? Tell us about your job.
QUESTION: Who has had a job that you liked but still experienced days that going to work was hard, unpleasant?
QUESTION: In all these situations why did you continue to go to work?
A mature person, healthy emotionally, does what needs to be done even if it, at times, is difficult. That is what we call maturity!
REFLECTING ON THE TEN COMMANDMENTS
READ: Exodus 20:1-17
QUESTION: Out of the Ten Commandments, which one seems to most incongruous, the most out of place?
QUESTION: If you could leave just one commandment out of the list, what one would you leave out? What do you think is the least important commandment in this list?
QUESTION: Why do you think God included the Fourth Commandment?
To help the Jewish people and mankind have time to focus on cultivating a relationship with God.
SORTING THROUGH THE FIVE LOVE LANGUAGES
QUESTION: What are the five love languages?
(1) Words of Affirmation; (2) Quality Time; (3) Receiving Gifts; (4) Acts of Service; (5) Physical Touch
QUESTION: If you were to re-arrange these in order of importance as they might relate to God, what would be first?
Quality Time – The person whose love language is quality time likes being with those that they love and enjoy spending time just being together. This person enjoys being with other people. When you offer to spend time with a person whose love language is quality time they are overjoyed at the thought that you value them enough to take time with them. They think of time as valuable and a gift when given. If you don’t plan time to spend with this person, they will feel that you don’t care about them or love them.
REFLECTING ON THE GREAT COMMANDMENT
Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments (Mt. 22:37-40).
QUESTION: What is the focus of the Great Commandment? Theological? Ethical? Anthropological? Sociological?
The focus is sociological. Note the power verb “Love.” Everything in the sentence flows from the base clause, “Love the Lord your God.”
The organizing principle of Christianity. (These commandments are of great antiquity and dignity. The focus of this Great Commandment is not theological, nor ethical, nor anthropological but sociological — the focus is on relationship. “All” emphasizes totality. “First” emphasizes priority. “Greatest” emphasizes preeminence.
QUESTION: So how do we tie loving God and the idea of taking time to love God into our 24 hour days?
STRUCTURED TIMES FOR COMMUNAL WORSHIP
Jewish Prayer
1. Shaharit (morning light, Abraham)
2. Minha (afternoon, Isaac)
3. Arvit (nightfall, Jacob)
Islamic Prayer
1. Fajr (near dawn)
2. Dhuhr (noon)
3. Asr (in the afternoon)
4. Maghrib (sunset)
5. ‘Isha (nightfall)
Benedictine Prayer
1. Horarium (12:00 midnight)
2. Lauds (3:00am)
3. Prime (6:00am)
4. Terce (9:00)
5. Sext (12:00 noon)
6. None (3:00pm)
7. Vespers (6:00pm)
8. Compline (9:00pm)
QUESTION: Why do you think these three religions focus/focused on a structured communal devotional life?
STRUCTURED TIME FOR PERSONAL WORSHIP
“Train yourself to be godly” (I Tim. 4:7).
QUESTION: How would some evangelical Christians argue against setting aside a focused, scheduled time for quality fellowship with God on a daily basis? How would they support their reasoning?
QUESTION: Do we have Scriptural support for scheduled times of fellowship with our Lord and Savior?
In the morning, O LORD, you hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait in expectation (Psalm 5:3).
Evening, morning and noon I cry out in distress and he hears my voice (Psalm 55:17).
Now when Daniel learned that the decree had been published, he went home to his upstairs room where the windows opened toward Jerusalem. Three times a day he got down on his knees and prayed, giving thanks to his God, just as he had done before (Daniel 6:10).
About noon the following day as they were on their journey and approaching the city, Peter went up on the roof to pray (Acts 10:9).
Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed (Mark 1:35).
QUESTION: How much time should we set aside for quality, focused fellowship with God every day?
“Tomorrow I plan to work, work, from early until late. In fact I have so much to do that I shall spend the first three hours in prayer” (Martin Luther).
Total hours in week – 168 hours (24×7)
Time spent working (on a job or studying) – 40 hours
Time spent sleeping – 56 hours (assuming we sleep for 8 hours each day)
Time spent cooking/eating – 14 hours (2×7)
Time Left (to do as you please) – 58 hours (168-40-56-14 = 58)
I do not know how much scheduled time you should spend in fellowship with the Lord every day. Sixty minutes has worked well for me. But I am saying that you need to schedule time and you need to be fanatical about sticking to your schedule. I would say too, that if you choose 30 minutes within a year or two you will find that 30 minutes is inadequate.
BACK TO WORK
There are some days, for various reasons, we did not want to go to work. Sometimes we were not emotionally up to it. Sometimes we were sick. Sometimes we had other pressing things to do. Sometimes we just did not feel like working. But a mature person gets up and goes to work in spite of all the above.
Sometimes for various reasons, we don’t want to follow a scheduled time of personal Bible Study, Prayer, Worship, Fellowship with the Lord. But a mature Christian does so no matter how he/she feels. This is what Christian maturity looks like.
ILL: I had almost no Christian background when I accepted Christ in the fall of 1959. One month after my conversion I found myself at Prairie Bible Institute in Alberta, Canada, on windswept prairies about 6o miles from Calgary. The very first evening at 9:00 a loud bell rang in the dormitory signaling time to get ready for bed. Another rang at 9:30 signaling time for personal devotions. At 6:00pm another bell rang to get us up and at 6:30 another bell rang signaling time for morning devotions. And thus I lived for four years.
During my missionary career I was pretty serious about devotions, especially morning devotions. All of our family would have personal devotions, the children at least for 15 minutes. Then we would have family devotions for 30 minutes before our boys went to school. We were quite consistent in this matter.
In the winter 1993 Connie and I were continuing to have problems in our marriage. It came to me that if I was going to make any progress in my personal life and marriage I had to refocus on my relationship with the Lord. I was still spending 20-30 minutes every day in personal devotions but felt I was only going through the motions. I decided at that time that I would spend 60 minutes every day developing a more focused devotional life and a closer relationship with the Lord. Since that time, almost 20 years ago I don’t believe I have missed one day in which I have not spent an hour in personal devotions. And it has been life changing. That decision I made in 1993 to spend an hour a day in devotions is certainly one of the four or five most important decisions that I made in my life.
SO WHAT???
1. We are “Evangelical Mystics” that experience God in trans- rational and non-empirical ways.
2. God has put indications in His Word about our need to set aside focused time in order to cultivate an intimate relationship with Him.
3. We can only really cultivate a loving relationship with God by making sure we are giving adequate time to the relationship.
4. The Bible supports and Christians throughout history have concluded that focused time for cultivating a relationship with God is of absolute necessity.
5. Mature Christians train themselves in godliness by disciplining themselves to be consistent in their daily devotional lives.
Oh, send Thy Spirit, Lord, now unto me,
That He may touch my eyes, and make me see:
Show me the truth concealed within Thy Word,
‘Til in Thy Book revealed I see Thee Lord.
Open my eyes, that I may see
Glimpses of truth Thou hast for me;
Place in my hands the wonderful key
That shall unclasp and set me free.
Silently now I wait for Thee,
Ready, my God, Thy will to see;
Open my eyes, illumine me,
Spirit Divine!
Holy Spirit, dwell with me;
I myself would holy be;
Separate from sin, I would
Choose and cherish all things good,
And whatever I can be
Give to Him Who gave me Thee!
More about Jesus let me learn,
More of His holy will discern;
Spirit of God, my teacher be,
Showing the things of Christ to me.
In Thy truth Thou dost direct me
By Thy Spirit through Thy Word;
And Thy grace my need is meeting,
As I trust in Thee, my Lord.
Of Thy fullness Thou art pouring
Thy great love and power on me,
Without measure, full and boundless,
Drawing out my heart to Thee.
Shall I, for fear of feeble man,
The Spirit’s course in me restrain?
Or, undismayed, in deed and word
Be a true witness for my Lord?
QUESTION: Can you think of mystical experiences that are common
to evangelical Christians?
Conversion
New Insights
Heightened Awareness
Breakthrough Experiences.\
“There is no event so common place but that God is present within it, always hidden, always leaving room to recognize Him or not to recognize Him.” (Frederick Buechner).
“Discernment is crucial to mystical spirituality. Without it, anything goes. On the other hand, we must learn to doubt our doubts if we are going to be open to the work of the Spirit in our lives (The God of Intimacy and Action, Tony Campolo and Mary Albert
Darling).
“. . . encounters with God, without an intentional plan for consistent growth in intimacy with Christ, will not, as a rule, produce people who are transformed into Christ’s likeness (The God of Intimacy and Action, Tony Campolo and Mary Albert
Darling).
“Intimacy is at the heart of what it means to be a Christian mystic” (The God of Intimacy and Action, Tony Campolo and Mary Albert
Darling).
“I think the rock on which I had the nearest made shipwreck of the faith was the writing of the mystics” “Intimacy is at the heart of what it means to be a Christian mystic” (Quote from John Wesley in The God of Intimacy and Action, Tony Campolo and Mary Albert
Darling).
“Even though we all recognize the importance of concentrated discipline in many other areas of life – whether brushing our teeth, getting an education, training for a job, being involved in a sport, or developing a musical skill — still, we often do not understand how necessary training is to our spiritual lives “ . . . . “Intimacy is at the heart of what it means to be a Christian mystic” . . . But for some of us, even hearing the word discipline conjures up negative images. That is why I prefer the term ‘holy habits’ or ‘spiritual practices’” (The God of Intimacy and Action, Tony Campolo and Mary Albert
Darling).
Talk about the conflict between spontaneity and planning in our spiritual lives.
Dallas Willard, who writes extensively on …. spiritual practices, contends that we will not get far in our spiritual life if we do it haphazardly. We need to intentionally train, just like Jesus did” “Intimacy is at the heart of what it means to be a Christian mystic” (The God of Intimacy and Action, Tony Campolo and Mary Albert
Darling).
We may have a great desire for spiritual growth but without daily training, not much will happen.
Rules for self-discipline are not the “end,” they are the “means!”