Day 105: Spiritual Discipline

"But reject profane and old wives' fables, and exercise yourself toward godliness.  For bodily exercise profits a little, but godliness is profitable for all things, having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come."  1 Timothy 4:7-8

Here's an excellent metaphor for spirituality.

The two verses seem to make up two important components for spiritual discipline: self-control and practice.  If we take a step backwards to follow the physical metaphor, these two components are diet and exercise.

Dieting is a very interesting field.  I must say that in our modern times, a healthy diet is quite hard to come by.  On the one hand, everything that is being advertised is quite unhealthy, from soda and fast food ads on TV to having all of the processed snacks in eyesight at the supermarkets.  On the other hand, many diets that claim to have health benefits have absolutely no scientific backing or approval.  In fact, even studies in support of fad diets tend to be debunked and/or retracted.  Therefore, dieting consists of resisting the temptations of advertisements and the temptations of fast results.  The only solution is to go to your personal doctor and/or nutritionist to find out what is best for you.  In the same way, spiritual self-control involves quite a bit of resisting of temptations - both of things that will only harm our minds, bodies, and souls and of doctrines that claim to be able to be a quick fix to our problems.  Yet, we have our authority more easily and readily available to us than a doctor (with the long waits and exorbitant costs).  God is just a prayer away, and the word is only a book a way (or even an app!).  We have all that we need, but we need to put these things into practice.

Exercise is quite straightforward.  Do this, and that will happen.  Do cardio, and you will lose weight.  Practice strength training, and you will get stronger.  The best thing about exercise is that you can see the results.  Looking at your physical appearance, you can see when you lose some weight or gain some muscle.  When you are performing everyday tasks (such as walking up stairs or even walking around for certain periods of time) or even when meeting with a personal trainer, it becomes very clear whether you have been doing your exercise or not.  There is no lying.  The same goes for our spirituality.  If we don't put it to practice, it will be quite obvious.  If all we are doing is asking questions and not researching or praying or reading, then we will be left with the blubber of ignorance.  If we don't put the teachings of Christ into practice, we will forget them.  Words are nice, but if they take no root, they are merely noise or scribbles.

Just as a nutritionist or a doctor wants us to get healthier, the same goes for Jesus.  Jesus wants to see us become the best that we can be.  Through his teachings, Jesus shows us how to get into shape.  Until we put them to practice, they will mean nothing to us.

Day 065: Lawn of Life

He who works his own land will be satisfied with bread, but those who pursue vain things are in need of discernment.  Proverbs 12:11

Here is a commentary on how we should be living our lives.

On the surface, this admonishes us to live productively.  The second half of the proverb is pretty vague when it is taken by itself, but in context with the first half, it suggests that living one's life just to judge somebody else's is pointless.  As a musician, I have learned that I can't be directing my craft towards every set of ears out there.  In fact, I shouldn't even be directing my practice just to somebody else's ears.  I need to play for myself.  I have learned over the years about what I like and what I don't like in music.  I've been quite fortunate to have teachers direct me towards understanding my preferences and keeping consistent with them.

In the same way, we should be living our lives concerned with our own tasks at hand.  We have so many different challenges facing us each day that we can't handle all of them at once.  Just think about the things that you are already leaving off for tomorrow, next week, or even next year.  Yet, we think it's alright to make sure we are judging all the people around us as well.  That is what our issue is.  When we start bringing other people's faults (according to our own perceptions) into our lives, we end up wasting so much of our precious energy on the things that don't benefit us.  Rather than finishing up our projects for our school/job, we stand in a corner, burning with anger about someone else who - at least - is doing something.

Think about the image of land.  This past winter (which barely existed) has been quite an ugly one with our front yard.  I didn't bother to rake the leaves this winter, and the grass stopped growing, so I figured that everything was going to be alright until the next rains would come and wash away the superfluous leaves.  However, a bunch of crane flies decided to lay their eggs among the leaves instead.  Now, for the past two months, we have had quite a few crane flies just hanging out all over our front lawn, cars, trees, doorway, and, with little effort, in our own house.  Now that plants are starting to grow once again, there are very tall weeds growing around our rose bushes.  My own land is quite horrid at the moment.

Now, place that entire concept of land into the proverb.  Our lives are just as horrid as that land.  We face many different challenges with the land: weeds, flies, gardening, pruning, cutting grass, raking.  When we do the work that is necessary in our lives, we will receive our daily bread, and we will be satisfied.  When we tend to our spiritual lives, we will receive the bread of eternal life.

During this Lent, ask God to turn your discipline into daily bread.  Ask God how you can work on all the challenges you are facing.  Then, go and do them.

Day 006: Courage

"And do not be afraid of intimidation when it comes upon you, nor of the attack of the ungodly when it comes at you; for the Lord will be over all your ways, and He will plant your feet firmly, that you may not be shaken."  Proverbs 3:28-29

With today being the celebration of the Epiphany, I can only think that this relates so strongly to the occasion of the magi coming to see Jesus.  They had to go their way through land at night, it seems. Now, I feel scared enough when I have to drive at night and only my headlights are guiding me.  I can't even imagine how terrifying it must have been for these people to be going at night with nothing more than a bright star among many other stars.  It was sheer faith that kept them going in order to bring their gifts to Jesus and then to return to their home land.

But where does this courage come from, for I don't feel it all the time.  Even in this section of Proverbs, the writer tells his reader to remember wisdom at all times.  The magi are considered to be wise men in some translations.  According to the Middle Liddell Ancient Greek Dictionary, magi in ancient times were priests or wise men from Persia who were experts at interpreting dreams.  So it seems that they had such great wisdom that they couldn't care less about intimidation.

Then again, I find myself thinking that there is a consolation, and that's taking the time to listen to God's voice.  God speaks to us constantly by different means, but we need to be receptive to it.  Think about how the radio works: there are many broadcasting towers releasing information in the form of sound all around us, but it is only when we use a device that is tuned to a certain frequency that we can hear what is going on.  With older radios, one has to adjust a dial carefully enough so as not to receive just feedback.

We should approach prayer and meditation and reading in this same way.  I don't know if the magi were Jews, but if they were, they were probably well versed in the Hebrew Scriptures enough to have such encouragement swirling around in their heads when they traveled.  They were, though, probably skilled enough to know when God was speaking to them in dreams, and they probably had the skills to be silent and listen to God.  So, I find that reading the Bible and listening to what God is trying to tell me through my reading is one way of making sure to have wisdom always in my heart.  If I can just tune myself into more and more spiritual frequencies, I'm certain I will be able to experience God in that many ways.