Spiritual Disciplines

Here's what we've been doing throughout Lent...

As March begins, so does the season of Lent. Lent is a time for reflection and meditation and getting ready for Easter. If you were an athlete, Easter would be the Olympics. The Olympics are full of pomp and circumstance and celebration. At the Olympics, you get to see the very essence of what it means to be an athlete. The Olympics make all of the hard work of training worthwhile. And, similarly, Easter is full of celebration and festivities, and it is that moment when it is most clear why you are a Christian. As we celebrate Jesus’ Resurrection, we are reminded why we became a Christian in the first place.

During this Lenten season, you have been invited to participate in the “Olympics.” We are “spiritual athletes” that need to get in shape for Easter. And, so, to help us on that journey toward Easter, we are going to be focusing on the Spiritual Disciplines. The word “discipline” often carries with it ideas of harsh fear and punishment. However, fear and punishment is not the purpose or intention of the Spiritual Disciplines. Instead, the Spiritual Disciplines are long-held Christian practices that help us in our Christian journey. Just as an athlete trains for hours and hours to finally get to a place of freedom of movement, the Spiritual Disciplines help us to train our spirit to get to a place of freedom in our relationship with God. John Wesley called these practices the “means of grace,” because through these Disciplines, we come to know and see God’s grace more clearly.

To help us in our journey, I will be using the book Celebration of Discipline by Richard Foster. In his introduction, he compares growing one’s spiritual life to growing a seed. He reminds us that only God can grow the seed. The farmer is very important in the growing process, helping to create the best conditions for growing the seed. But, after the soil is tended, irrigated, weeded, etc., the farmer still cannot guarantee that the seed will grow. It is God who grows the seed. And the same is true in our spiritual lives. I believe that the Spiritual Disciplines can be very helpful to us to create the right conditions for our spiritual lives to grow. But in the end, we must remember that only God can grow the seed.

I pray that you may be blessed as we journey together exploring these Spiritual Disciplines during this Lenten Season.



This Year’s Lenten Journey looks like this:
1st Sunday March 1
Simplicity & Submission
Nehemiah 1:5-11 Matthew 6:19-24

2nd Sunday March 8
Study & Guidance
Deuteronomy 11:18-21 Acts 15:22-29

3rd Sunday March 15
Meditation, Prayer, & Solitude
Psalm 119:97-105 Matthew 6:5-15

4th Sunday March 22
Fasting & Confession
2 Samuel 12:1-14 Psalm 51 Matthew 6:16-18

5th Sunday March 29
Service
Leviticus 19:1-2;9-18 Matthew 25:31-46

6th Sunday April 5
Worship
Psalm 118:1-2 Psalm 118:19-29 Mark 11:1-11