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Thursday, May 19, 2005
My early days in the spiritual life were a checklist of sorts.
I woke up and prayed. Check.
I read the Bible. Check.
Me and some friends did a devotional at school. Check.
I went to my Wednesday night small group...even did the homework sometimes. Check.
Went to Sunday School and church. Check.
Did the youth group fellowship after night service. Check.
Went to the occasional youth conference. Check.
Mission trip. Check.
My friends and I thought we were pretty spiritual guys, too...
Until Big Dave asked us during small group if we thought King David was a spiritual guy.
"Of course," we answered. "He was after God's own heart. Killed Goliath. Wrote, like, half of Psalms or whatever. King of Israel." It was a slam dunk, right?
Until Big Dave brought up all the other stuff: Adultery. Murder. Rage. He threw out some other stuff, too, that Scripture allowed us to take a gander at...none of it really pretty.
Then he asked us again if David was spiritual.
We desperately wanted to say yes. Really. We just knew that was the right answer, but the evidence was against "yes." But we knew the answer was "yes," we just didn't know how to back it up.
And then we read 1 Corinthians 2: 14--16, "But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised. But he who is spiritual appraises all things, yet he himself is appraised by no man. For 'who has known the mind of the Lord, that he should instruct Him?' But we have the mind of Christ."
Notice in verse 15 that the man (or woman) who is spiritual appraises all things. The spiritual man looks at the world through God's eyes.
And, in essence, that is worship.
No longer is school about education.
Sports aren't about winning.
Jobs aren't about making money.
Relationships have deeper meaning.
All the decisions matter now.
It's taking the normal day-in, day-out occurrences in our lives and filtering them through God's glasses. Actions aren't the measure of the spiritual life at all...which is foreign to our way of thinking, right? We're results oriented folks. The checklist becomes our personal walk with God.
Which cheapens the walk with God when you think about it.
And, how do you begin to think about the world the way God thinks about the world? The question is really, "How do I become spiritual?"
You know the Word and apply it to everyday situations...which we'll deal with in detail tomorrow.
But for today, how does the reality that the spiritual person having the mind of Christ change the way we view spirituality? How does that affect our spiritual life as we live it in the here and now?
Brent 4:22 AM
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