Archive for the ‘Disciplines’ Category

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Just What Are Spiritual Disciplines?

July 12, 2016

Spiritual Disciplines are merely activities that we do to enable us to receive more of Jesus’ life and power. –Howard Baker writing an introduction to Galatians in the “Life With God Bible”

Ever listen to little kids (under 10 or so) organize to play? There’s always at least one who assumes the burden of making up the rules of the game. Sometimes they spend more time discussing the rules than actually playing–or so it seems.

Then again, I know an adult who makes up rules all the time–well, actually, I know many–that include other people. Yet they may not always tell them. Then they are upset or worse if the other person doesn’t keep the rule.

Organizations and even societies make up those rules designed to differentiate outsiders from themselves.

The other day I was sitting in a nice little storefront Middle Eastern restaurant. A gentle and humble woman and her husband owned and ran it. She was so nice to us, if I lived in the town, I’d go back to eat. Oh, she was Muslim–from Palestine. Came over here for a better life. Works hard. Has a good business. Great Turkish coffee.

While sitting in that restaurant, I opened Facebook to check on something for business. But the “news” stream pops up first. The first post was a “photo” of a saying from a politician about how bad all Muslims are and how we need to ship them all back to where they originated. Someone made up one of those “rules.”

The irony was too much. When we stop labeling and start meeting, then we see that people are people. Name your group–Christian, Muslim, police, black man, liberal, conservative. Some are good. Some are filled with hate, anger, evil. Every group includes some of both.

Paul wrote Galatians to teach us how to live beyond rules. “Live for God,” he said. “The law (rules) was our disciplinarian until Christ came,” he added.

Spiritual disciplines pursued with an open, loving heart, bring us closer to Jesus and to the ability to live a life focused on God. We don’t need to focus on others and how we’re better than them. We only focus on God. Open our hearts to God. Then when we leave our prayer room or chair and live with others in a way pleasing to God.

Disciplines? Study–not to reinforce prejudices but to learn something new about God daily; prayer–to focus our minds on God; worship–for the joy of singing and praise; service–to be like Jesus was during his  ministry physically on earth.

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It’s All About Trust

July 11, 2016

Once upon a time I was entrusted with thousands of dollars from two soccer referee associations. There were few checks and balances. That always bothered me. This is not a confession. I was careful with the money. But one of my colleagues many years ago made off with tens of thousands of dollars before it came to light.

There’s a lot of cash floating around in our economy. Much of it flows to organizations that operate with volunteer leadership. The New York Times recently ran an article about people who stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from their youth sports clubs. It can happen in churches, service clubs, school support organizations.

These are trusted people. But they got into personal financial trouble. Often due to gambling. Sometime personal circumstances–divorce, lost job, medical bills.

Leadership begins with trust. But trust must be earned again every day.

Every story of leadership and leadership theory I read has trust as the foundation–whether explicitly stated or not.

It goes deeper. I’ve talked with many people in the aftermath of affairs. Many of those don’t realize the damage done to their trustworthiness. See, it’s not just money, but when you are trusted in a relationship, too.

How would you like to have a job like a policeman where you have trouble trusting anyone? With all the guns carried openly, how are they to know if they can trust that the gun won’t be turned on them? Or us, when we see the guns around?

You’d like to trust everyone. Many of us grew up in small towns where trust was the cement that held the society together.

I’d hate to live life as a cynic, distrusting everyone. On the other hand, if I’m in an organization, I would want to see trust with oversight. Just to be responsible.

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Collaboration-It’s a Good Thing

July 8, 2016

They were sitting on the couch intent on their iPads. Chatting away about the project. My grandkids, that is, ages 9 and 7. They were building something in Minecraft, together, connected through iCloud. But also connected by voice.

Collaboration, it’s a good thing. Sometimes technology enables us to collaborate to build better things.

In my other profession, the one that pays the bills, I research companies and industries involved in a building and using a variety of technologies. But it always gets down to people. And how people interact.

Many companies foster silos. People exist only within their department or division or within their product group. They seldom share information or ideas. Many may not even know people in another division.

I’ve seen other companies where there is an attempt to bring people from a variety of functions together, but collaboration is hampered by what we call politics. The trust level in the company is not high. A person may be reluctant to say something out of fear that the comment may be taken out of context, spread to higher management ranks, and they may suffer career repercussions.

Once upon a time I led a department that designed machines to solve specific customer problems. We needed lots of ideas. White boards were a new thing. I bought a bunch. Put them in every cubical, office, and conference room. I told the engineers, sketch the problem on your white board. As you wander through the room to get coffee or whatever, look at the whiteboards. Talk to the other engineer. Maybe new ideas spring up.

We designed some pretty cool machines.

What are you building? Technology? Relationships? An organization?

Sensitize yourself to the atmosphere of the office or organization if you’re geographically spread. Are people sharing ideas? Are people receptive to ideas from others? What can be done to encourage collaboration?

One of my favorite quotes from the cartoon character Bugs Bunny was when somebody wanted to tell him something. “I’m all ears.”

Ah, the beginning of collaboration.

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Spiritual Discipline of Humility

July 7, 2016

Jesus makes it impossible to think you’re righteous because of what you do.

After Matthew introduces who Jesus is in his book, he dives right in to report Jesus’ teaching. I say report because much of chapters 5-7 are quotes.

I have been returning to Matthew this year and also Mark to search out just Jesus’ words. Not the stories or drama. Or to pick on poor Peter. I thought that this year I’d throw out the theologies and commentaries and just focus on his words.

You can read these chapters as a set of instructions. Remembering that the Pharisees also had a set of instructions. Or they called them “Laws.” It was like a checklist of things to do today. Except that for the Pharisees it was a checklist of about 630 items. Imagine trying to check those off every day!

So, looking at Jesus’ words. His checklist in Matthew is smaller. But then stop and contemplate what he’s saying:

  • If you’re angry at someone, it’s the same thing as murder
  • If you obtain an easy divorce, not only you commit adultery, you force your spouse to do so as well
  • If you hate your enemy, so what, that’s easy; love your enemy
  • If someone forces you to carry their packs (think Roman soldiers) for a mile, carry it two
  • If someone asks for a small thing, give them a big thing
  • And there is more…

When you look at Jesus’ checklist, it’s impossible to do on your own. Even more impossible than that of the Pharisees.

This is all leading up to a conclusion–it’s all about the status of your heart. Is your heart cold and methodical? Just intent in checking off the list so that God will think you’re great? Or is your heart focused on God?

You cannot checklist your way to righteousness (being right with God). That means you cannot compare yourself to others, saying ‘I’m better than those sinners.’ No, you cannot do that.

Changing your heart’s focus from self (ego) toward God with the outlook of helping others–that is called humility and that is the path to righteousness.

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Spiritual Discipline: Overcoming Emotions

July 6, 2016

…if you say, ‘You fool,’ you will be liable to the hell of fire. — Jesus (Matthew 5: 22)

Emotions are neither good nor bad. They just are. How we handle them, well, that’s the subject of many books, advanced degrees, time spent in therapy, time that should have been spent in therapy.

I wrote a series of posts a few years ago based on the book, Emotional Intelligence. I’ve spent a lifetime overcoming some of the emotions I was exposed to as a child–anger, anxiety. I bet you all have your own set of emotions that, when they capture too much of our energy.

When it’s time to grieve, grieve. And when your friend grieves, grieve with her or him. When it’s time to move on, move on. And so it is with other emotions. Sometimes it is right to be angry.

But out of emotions riding unchecked, come things that hurt others and ourselves. We say things we shouldn’t have said. We expose our lack of maturity.

Don’t we all see things, read things, hear things that can ruin our day–or at least set us back a little? The other person was just giving vent to unbridled emotions.

I was on the Internet before there was a Web (yes, there was such a time). And there were groups (called UseGroups) where people gathered to share information on a topic. And, lo, there came “trolls” who would say hurtful things. And then came the Web and blogging. And people shared information and thoughts. And, lo, the trolls followed to the new medium. And hurt people deeply. It’s so easy when it’s late at night and your emotions are riding high, and it’s just words on a screen.

And then came new ways of sharing such as Facebook and others. And lo, we could all become trolls in general, venting forth our anger, fear, hate.

And people have not changed despite teaching, research, books.

2,000 years ago, Jesus dealt with this:

You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, ‘You shall not murder’ and ‘whoever murders shall be liable to judgement.’ But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgement; and if you insult a brother or sister, you will be liable to the council; and if you say, ‘You fool,’ you will be liable to the hell of fire.’

Keeping your peace when you feel like venting is a Spiritual Discipline. It’s that moment between the urge and the keyboard or mouth when you have the opportunity for a deep breath. In the pause, you can reflect, “Of what use is this that I am about to say? Does it uplift? Or tear down?”

In that pause, we have the opportunity to show the true status of our hearts.

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You’ve Got Some ‘splainin’ To Do

July 5, 2016

“Lucy, you’ve got some ‘splainin’ to do!” Desi Arnaz to Lucille Ball

One of the earliest of TV comedies was the Lucille Ball show. It featured a crazy “housewife” and her Cuban band director husband–Lucy and Ricky. She was forever getting herself into impossible situations and then Ricky would discover the scheme of the week.

Steve Carter, teaching pastor at Willow Creek Community Church, was speaking Sunday on Paul’s second letter to his mentee Timothy (2:14-17). Paul instructed Timothy as a pastor and leader to warn people about the destructiveness of empty chatter.

Carter proceeded to pull up Facebook on his laptop (projected to us all, of course), and showed some of the more sanitized of his “news” feed. The loudest response came when he mentioned that many posts are made late at night. “There’s nothing you have to say at 11:45 pm that the world needs to know,” he stated.

It is hard to count the number of times I want to respond to the lies, exaggerations, innuendos, and hate I see spewed by people I know who call themselves Christians. If “by your fruits you will be known” means anything, perhaps more of us should be looking at the fruits of our hearts as broadcast to the world through our Facebook posts.

Well, then I stop, let it sit for a while, and then realize that nothing I say will have any impact on the person. It’s best to just not read it in the first place (you can unfollow people who continually violate that “mindless chatter” stuff and save yourself a few points of blood pressure increase). If by happenstance you do read the stuff, just let it slide by.

But the thought came to me picturing these Christians (especially) on this topic facing God someday and hearing, “About that Facebook thing, you’ve got some ‘splainin’ to do.”

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Remembering Our US Heritage

July 4, 2016

This is The National holiday in the US. It is in commemoration of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. It was a document that had no legal standing, didn’t form a new government, didn’t lay out a plan for anything. But it did give voice to a movement with a vision.

In this era, not uncommon in our national history, of people manipulating the words of this document and the US Constitution (that’s OK, you don’t know who you are), it is always good every year to go back and read all the founding documents–The Declaration, The Constitution, The Federalist Papers–with new eyes.

It’s just like going back often to read the Bible with new eyes. You always learn something.

I’m thinking that as the people of the society, we all need to learn more about what they really said rather than these little quips that substitute for learning and wisdom I see on Facebook and other media.

So, once again, I suggest pulling out that old document that still lives and reading it.

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What Behavior Does Your Leadership Encourage

July 1, 2016

James and John went to Jesus privately at the urging of their mother. They wanted to ask for the two top positions in the kingdom Jesus was going to start. Jesus wasn’t impressed. He stopped that sort of political backstabbing at the beginning.

My wife taught third grade for many years. Believe it or not, she did not like it when kids would come running up to her, “Mrs. Mintchell, did you know what [fill in kid’s name] did?”

Why did the kids do that? Same reason as the big guys. They were trying to make themselves look good often at the expense of others of their colleagues.

Two or three times in my career people have spread “stuff” around on me. One boss came to me once and asked, “Did you know that [x] has been going to the president complaining that you don’t have enough work to do?”

It bothered me, but taking the longer view, I knew both companies were tanking. It just gave me incentive to hit the job market before everyone else.

But what if there had been a new president who came in to turn things around? Part of her plan would be to form teams where people collaborated on projects. Just how much collaboration will we do when we’ve been in a culture of “tattling” and other such back-stabbing activities?

We know today that companies and organizations that thrive are those that build an environment where people are comfortable with each other and are free to collaborate and share.

  • Do we stop people who wish to manipulate us with out-of-bounds requests?
  • Do we weed out those who strive to make others look bad
  • Do we react to such gossip?
  • Do we let things go, afraid to act on it?

If we start to sense a lack of trust and collaboration in the organization, maybe it’s a signal to start evaluating our own leadership.

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Discipline of Knowing Our Spiritual Gifts

June 30, 2016

Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same spirit; and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. –Paul, 1 Corinthians 12:4-7

Do you know your spiritual gifts?

We know through research and maybe just by paying attention to ourselves that people are happiest when doing something that they enjoy and that they know contributes something good.

That is where knowing our spiritual gifts is important. Maybe we got talked into teaching little kids. But we have no gift or desire for that. Maybe our gift is leadership, or giving, or serving.

Bill Hybels at Willow Creek Community Church recently spoke on this topic. By the way, Willow Creek has a Web-based personal survey that will evaluate your answers, suggest what may be your spiritual gifts, and (and here’s the step most churches don’t take) it suggests ministries in the church that could use volunteers that match your gifts.

Hybels said that you need to try these things on. You tried teaching. It just wasn’t you. That’s OK. Try missions. It is only through trying that you really discover your gift, your joy.

Pursue love and strive for the Spiritual Gifts.–Paul, 1 Corinthians 14:1

While Paul is discussing gifts, he puts them in context. That context is love. Remember chapter 13? Without love, I’m (fill in the blank). If what you do is done without love, then it is of no value. This echoes Jesus who said that people will know his followers by their love.

Who knows? Perhaps you have come to royal dignity for just such a time as this. — Mordecai to Esther, Esther 4:14

Who knows? You might just discover your spiritual gift at just the time when such a gift is needed.

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The Discipline of Self Awareness

June 29, 2016

3 “Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? 4 How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye. — Matthew 7:3-5 New International Version (NIV)

Our conversation must have wandered not having a lot of news to share. I had made my daily call home as is my practice when I’m on the road. Since I’m in Las Vegas, she’s probably insisting on a call just to check up.

Anyway, we got to talking about how hard it is to see your own sins and difficulties. It’s so easy to see what’s wrong with others. Although many people (most? all?) have sins hidden from public  view, many seem to live out their sins in public. Makes for good conversation, I guess. Or interesting Facebook posts. (I have cut way back on the amount of time I scan Facebook posts, by the way.)

It is easy for everyone to fall into this habit. But Jesus reserved his anger (it sure sounds like anger, doesn’t it?) for a specific group of people. These were the Pharisees.

These people made a detailed study of the Law. They memorized it. They interpreted it. To their credit, they tried to live it.

Unfortunately, living the letter of the Law usually means a bad attitude. It breeds contempt. It breeds the attitude that “I’m better than you–here, I can prove it.” Yet, their sins are hidden  somewhere in the depths (we’ll let Freud have a field day on uncovering those). And they act (put on a mask to assume a different persona–therefore a “hypocrite”) as if they are perfect. And they love to point fingers at others who are not so conscientious about following the Law.

Paul picked up this theme in the beginning of Romans. “For all have sinned and fallen short.”

Even if we have trouble identifying where we each fall short, we must remember this instruction before pointing at others.

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