Sunday was both my birthday and Father’s Day. I had an overwhelming number of people wish me a Happy Birthday and I truly had one. At the end of the day I was very overwhelmed with a sense of gratitude. Somewhere around 80 people sent me Happy Birthday greetings via facebook. These were people from every aspect of my life. I was so moved by it that I made a point of writing back every single person. It was the least I could do for the blessing they have each been to me.
 
Also, this weekend I was reading a little book about gratitude titled, Learning to Dance in the Rain by Mac Anderson. The title was inspired by a quote, “Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass, it’s learning to dance in the rain.” Feeling blessed in the high times of life, such as my weekend when expressions of joy and love abounded, is easy. It’s not so easy at other times; yet, scripture calls us to be thankful in all things. Really? Wow. That’s a tall order. I was pondering this when today, a great blog post from a site that is rapidly become one of my favorites, focused very eloquently on just this subject. Rather than reinvent the wheel I invite you to read the post, Thanking God for All Things by Emily Riley at Devotional Christian. Also, I am making Mac’s book my current recommended resources. It’s a beautiful book full of amazing photos and inspiring quotes. It is a great book just to have on hand to give to someone who needs a lift. I got mine as a gift and treasure it.
 
What are you grateful for today?
 
 

My Daily Intention on My Mirror

MY MIRROR

I also have written on my bathroom mirror with a dry erase marker the following…

Hold the picture
Make the space
Receive the gift
Honor it
PIC of the Day…

 
…and then a single word to encapsulate what I intend to be the key focus of my day. For example, right now it says, “Execute” Don’t worry, I won’t be executing anyone. I realized the other day that I had way too many unresolved plans, so my focus for a couple of days was executing what was already planned. Many words have appeared in that slot: create, praise, care, act, etc.
 

WHY YOU NEED AN INTENTION AND NOT JUST A TO-DO LIST

Let’s use going into a grocery store as an analogy. If you are a good shopper, you will go into the store with a list. Without a list you tend to waste time roaming, forget to get things you need, and pick up a number of things you probably don’t need. Similarly, if you want to have good day, you will go into it with a to do list. Without one you spend excessive time needlessly on things that don’t matter to you and get failing to accomplish some really critical tasks. A to do list can reduce a lot of wasted time, stress and frustration. It can also replace those things with efficiency, reduced stress and a sense of accomplishment. Not bad, but what if you want a great day. What if you want to be a super shopper in the grocery store of life, not just an average shopper?
 

MOVING FROM GOOD TO GREAT

Great shoppers don’t just have a list. They have a meal plan for the week. They have a plan behind the list. Their trip to the grocery store isn’t driven by the phone call, “Hey, honey we need a few things from the grocery store, could you pick them up on the way home?” That scenario can be a life style to someone without a meal plan. People shopping from lists without a meal plan tend to be driven by what they want in the moment not what they need. That’s a formula for poor health and eating habits and numerous needless trips to the store.
 
Having an intention for the day is like having a meal plan. Your intention drives what is on your list and insures your list is meaningful. It’s meaningful because with intention your list because something that has a focused purpose. An intention also helps insure that you are not just reacting to immediate needs. Do you really want your day to be a constant scurry of reaction? Then don’t live without intention.
 

WHAT IS GREATER THAN GREAT?

Have a godly intention for your day is greater than great. Some people have a meal plan, but the meal plan is garbage for their bodies driven by their desires, not necessarily what is nutritious for them. They are highly efficient at sustaining a poor life. That’s what happens when you have clear intentions that are not godly. If you want to have great days that are blessed days, then set godly intentions. For example, let your pic for the day be: compassion, grace, mercy, joy, praise, kindness, etc. Let that intention both define what goes on your list and how you do whatever is on your list.
 
So what is your intention for today. I hope it is a godly one and I hope you have a greater than great day. Peace from The Practical Disciple.
 
P.S. By the way, I don’t have a “to do” list, I use a “joyful offering” list. Want to know why, then read the post, Eliminate your to do list and never have to do anything again.
 

Call Before You Fall

Verse:

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit. Galatians 5:22-25

Meditation:

In yesterday’s verse we were urged to set our minds on the Spirit that we might live by the Spirit. In today’s verses, Paul paints a picture of what living in the Spirit looks like. Given what we learned yesterday; specifically, that the focus of our minds produces are actions and eventually our character, what thoughts are necessary for us to find the fruit of the Spirit in our lives? What thoughts lead toward joy? What thoughts produce patience? What thoughts kindle kindness? etc.
 
Similarly, we must understand what thoughts lead us away from the fruits. We must recognize what thought patterns push us toward being impatient, cruel, bitter, envious, etc. Whenever we recognize that we are trapped in those thoughts, we need to call upon the Spirit to help us walk faithfully.
 
Yesterday, I was lying in a hospital emergency room being checked out after a car accident. I saw a sign on the wall of someone holding a nurse call button and above it where the words, “Call before you fall.” I commented to my wife that it was a sermon in a sentence. When we find ourselves thinking thoughts contrary to the Spirit we need to call out to the Spirit before we take any steps. If we do not, then we are sure to fall.
 

Prayer:

Holy Spirit, I quiet my heart before You so that I might become aware of  any thoughts contrary to You. I would like to be able to observe my thoughts without reflexively reacting to them. Bring me that awareness. I want enough objectivity in my relationship to my thoughts so that when I stray from  you I can see it happening and choose differently. Then I pray that through your power, I am able to disassociate from my mind of the flesh and embrace a mind of the Spirit. When I consider the vast stream of never ending thoughts that rush through my head, bringing them under the control of your Spirit seems nearly impossible. But, I know that all things are possible through You. Thank you for your gift of power, love and self-discipline. I give you my mind. Use it for your purposes. Amen.
 
P.S. In regards to my car accident–The car was totaled, but I am not. Just got some nasty bruising and swelling from my safety belt doing its job. I want to thank the many friends and family who have offered prayers and words of encouragement.
 

If you are new to this Ghost Dose series, you may want to read the post, A Protestant Novena, A Dose of the Ghost..

For God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and discipline. (2 Timothy 1:7)

 
Last night I was watching a video with my son Matthew that was part of an online course we are taking together. It is a course in developing online products. The instructor actually gives away a number of products to participants in the course. They are completely free to reproduce them and put them online. In the video the instructor was addressing the concern that if he gives the products away won’t the market then be flooded to the point that his students can’t realistically compete. The short answer was no. Mainly because he explained that the sad reality is that 99% of the people who take a course fail to do the work necessary.
 
I was reminded of a real estate agent I met who was extremely profitable at what he did. A young competitor called him up one day and said, “I know that you probably won’t want to do this, but I was wondering if there is anyway you would meet with me for lunch and share with me what you do that makes you so successful.” The agent agreed without hesitation. He went and he shared the many personal disciplines that he regularly exercised to succeed so well. Afterwards, the young competitor said, “I still can’t believe you where willing to do this. Why did you do this? Aren’t you afraid I’ll take your business?” The agent explained to him, “I am really not worried about that. Very few people are willing to do what I do to be successful.”
 
Unfortunately, I can relate all to well to these stories in my spiritual life, both as a mentor and a student. I can’t tell you how many books, retreats, sermons, cd’s, videos, and classes I have sat through that gave me clear direction that would benefit my spiritual life. Yet, finding myself applying far to little. I also have seen this in the church regularly. I repeatedly hand people spiritual disciplines in kit form, but sadly only a very limited number apply tools long enough to see the fruit.
 
My concern around this very human reality is heavily on my mind as I try to re-craft an online bible mentoring program that people will actually hopefully apply themselves to. I am not trying to sound dismal and skeptical here. The harsh reality though is that we are conditioned daily to crave newness and immediate gratification which are both antithetical to the self-discipline necessary to develop depth in any discipline.
 
I have noticed that whether you are talking about sports, academics, finances, business, or spiritual growth, the people who excel have tremendous personal discipline. They share some common characteristics and practices. Highly successful and disciplined people:
 
PLAN THEIR WORK
Disciplined people have clear plans for what they will do. Clear to-do lists for the day. Journals for their prayers. Stated or written intentions and goals. Do you consciously have any plan for how you are growing in your relationship with God. Do you have a plan for improving your study of the Word or prayer life? Do you have a plan for what you will give in money, time or talent? Do you have a hope or vision for how you will be different as a disciple in six months? If so, do you know what specifically you are going to do to get there? You cannot expect to arrive somewhere, if you have no destination in mind or no plan to get there.
Application step: Write a description of how you would like to be different as a disciple in the next six months or write down an accomplishment that you would like to achieve to honor God. Make a list of the steps you need to take to transform these hopes into realities.
 
WORK THEIR PLAN.
The greatest intention in the world without action is worthless. Once you craft a plan, work it. Work it without fail, not just when it is convenient. I have noticed disciplined people stick to their plan to completion. They do not keep willy-nilly jumping to a new idea or plan. I actually recently heard discipline defined as “not changing course unless a different choice brings you closer to your destination.” Stay focused on taking action daily and consistently. No matter how small a step you take, take a step.
Application step: Track your progress. Create charts, checklists or other visible reminders that reflect your progress. For example, on the corner of my bathroom mirror I have written the following with a dry erase marker: “Blog Posts–41/210.” I have a goal of writing 210 posts in 2010. The first number is my current count of posts year to date. I update it each time I produce a new posts. It stares me in the face every time I stand at my sink. I have several other goals similarly tracked on my mirror. Notebooks can be another great way to track progress. My son and I have a notebook for tracking our progress in a joint venture. We print out lists of actions steps. We then check off and date when we accomplish them.
 
DO NOTHING MORE, NOTHING LESS
This principle goes hand-in-hand with working a plan. I have often voiced it this way, “Don’t work ahead and don’t make an exception.” This principle is really a principle of boundaries. Disciplined people resist distraction. How often do you put together a to-do list and then later you find that you spent hours doing other things with limited progress on your actual list. This may be symptomatic of a lack of self-discipline around staying focused. Or you may be grabbing at other solutions before applying something long enough to see its fruit. Keep on your plan. Discipline also draws boundaries on working excessively to the point of burn-out. A lack of rest is a lack of discipline. I am discovering more and more that fatigue debilitates discipline faster than any other factor in my life.
Application step: Define the upper and lower boundaries for the activity you will put into a discipline and stick with those boundaries. At first this will very likely induce stress, but over time it will extremely reduce stress.
 
ATTENTION TO THE DETAILS
Disciplined people think and plan fully through things. They don’t half do a task. As Christians we are supposed to do all that we do as if we are doing it for Christ. Doesn’t it follow that we should do all things excellently? Doesn’t it follow that we shouldn’t be sloppy or disorganized about how we approach our spiritual disciplines?
Application step: Go back and evaluate your plan. Is it specific and thoughtful or have you just thrown a loose idea out there? What if someone else had to follow it? Could they follow it clearly?
 
KNOW THEIR PURPOSE
It’s one thing to have a destination in mind and even a plan for getting there, and it is an entirely different thing to understanding why you are going there. Disciplined people don’t only know what they are doing but they understand why they are doing it. This clarity of purpose is partly what allows disciplined people an edge in accomplishing their plans. When the going gets tough, they can remind themselves of the importance of the activity they are doing.
Application step: Look at your plan and write down why you want to succeed. What is your motivation? What will be accomplished ultimately?
 
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EXERCISES THAT WILL STRENGTHEN PERSONAL DISCIPLINE
 
Fasting
Fasting from anything that matters to you will increase your baseline ability to practice discipline in all things. You don’t have to just fast from food. Give up something for a period of time that is significant to you or reflexive, i.e. spending time on facebook, watching television, texting, etc. A life coach that I know says, “The way we do one thing is the way we do all things.” There is a lot truth to that statement. The good news is that if we shift significantly how we do one thing it can effect how we do all things. So, discipline around how you eat will translate into greater discipline in how you study.
 
Pick a single activity each day and perform it with extreme excellence.
For example, next time you iron a shirt, do it very meticulously. Or next time you have to clean something, clean it until it is absolutely spotless. Actively working at attention to detail on a task will shift your awareness around detail in other tasks.
 
Practice waking and rising at the same time each day.
This is something that I have a particularly difficult time with, so I may be preaching mostly to myself. Nevertheless, there are two important reasons why you should do this. You will develop your ability to exercise placing boundaries which are critical to discipline. You will also dismantle fatigue in your life. Fatigue causes you to cut corners and compromises your judgement.
 
Use a timer on activities you easily get lost in and quit when it goes off.
I can get lost in activities all to easily. Some people set time boundaries more naturally than others. Using and obeying a timer will help expand your ability to set healthy limits. I used a timer twice this morning in the office. I spent 15 minutes “T.R.A.F.ing” (toss, refer, act, or file) in my offices and 20 minutes reading a magazine on children’s ministry. I knew that both of them were things that I could easily let consume much time so I set a timer. When my office gets out of control, I traf daily for just a few minutes at a time until it is restored to order. I set my timer and do nothing more and nothing less.
 
Maintain a Sabbath
A sabbath is a discipline in and of itself but I find the practice of it effects my ability to be disciplined. You need time for quiet reflection or you will become very muddied in your purpose and find yourself pulled about by every demand that comes your way. I am in the process of reestablishing a Sabbath time. I used to take half of every Monday and use it to wander in the woods for a couple of hours and then I would sit in prayer at the edge of a pond for an entire hour of uninterrupted prayer. When I maintain a day of rest like this my ability to be disciplined sores.  To learn the basics of sabbath read my sabbath post.
 
Practice stillness
Few things will awaken self-awareness like stillness and self-awareness is key to self-discipline. When we lack awareness we are reactionary. If you practice stillness, you will become much more conscious of thoughts and feelings going on inside of you. You increase your ability through stillness to observe thoughts and feelings and either respond to or disregard them. Sitting quietly observing nature and paying attention to my senses for lengthy periods of time has been particularly beneficial in this regard. Centering prayer though has been incomparable to any other activity in honing my ability to stay focused and not get jerked about by thoughts, feelings, and physical distractions. If you are unfamiliar with this practice then check out my centering prayer post.
 
Pray for self-discipline
Did you notice in the opening quote from the bible that Paul is telling us that a spirit of discipline or self-control is something God gave you. You can work on all the things above and it will help, but don’t forget to ask God to fill you with his Holy Spirit to keep the flesh in check and your spirit faithful.
 
Blessing to you as you seek greater faithfulness to God in all things.
  

“Do all things without grumbling or questioning.”  Phillippians 2:14

So much of whether we experience life as joyful or drudgery depends upon the mindset we choose.  Grumbling whether out loud or with the committee in you head is a sure way to make yourself unnecessarily miserable.  In a recent post on taking mundane chores and making them Christ-centered, I shared two biblical mindsets that are spiritually healthy to adopt:  Do all thing with Gratitude (Col. 3:17), Do all things as if you do them for Christ (Col. 3:23-24).

You nurture those mindsets through tiny interventions when you find yourself complaining.  How we frame our work is important as getting it done.  In fact, its more important.  If you go at your work whether it be preaching or cleaning toilets with a reluctant heart that feels imposed upon  you might as well not do it.  You are only being a witness to others that a life in Christ is drudgery and that is a lie.  So you stop living a lie but modeling both in speech and behavior a joyful willingness to do whatever task lies before you.  Paul describes the spirit that we should have as working heartily for the Lord.

BE CAREFUL WITH YOUR LANGUAGE IT SHAPES YOUR MINDSET

—————————————————-

Eliminate “To Do”

This morning I was reminded of this as I was mopping my kitchen floor and paused to look at what you might call my “to do” list.  Only that’s not what mine is called.  I don’t have  a “to do” list.   I create a mind map of my activities for the week and one for each day.  A mind map is simply a visual way of laying out information that works more efficiently with how your mind works.  Using a mind map is not why I said I don’t have a to do list.  If you look at my mind map  it doesn’t say “to do” it says “my joyful offering.”  That’s right when I create a list of things I am going to accomplish, I label at as my joyful offering.  It’s a declaration that what I will be doing that day is not some burden I must bear, but rather instead activities I choose to do and give to God.

Eradicate “Have To”

Notice something about my language above.  I spoke about “the things I am going to accomplish” and “activities I choose to do.” Note that I didn’t say “things I have to do.”  ”Have to” is both an unhealthy mindset and a lie.  The other day one of my kid’s asked me if they “had” to go to worship.  I said, “No, you don’t have to go to worship. You get to go to worship.”  I explained that it is a freedom that we can avail ourselves of.  In fact, many people live in places where they would be killed for trying to worship.  We don’t have to worship.  We get to worship.

Realize that virtually everything you do is a choice.  Some things may feel like a “have to” because the consequences of not doing them are so great that it feels as if you do not have an option. That simply is not true. Therefore, I would encourage you to honestly consider the alternatives you have and recognize how free you truly are.  You are not a victim to whom life happens.  You are more than a conqueror in Christ Jesus.

Apply it

I would challenge you to try to eliminate for one week to get rid of your to do list and rather instead adopt a “joyful offering list.”  Also, for one week do everything you can to eliminate “have to” language from your life.  When you find yourself thinking or saying you “have to” do something shift your language to “get to” or “chose to.”  Note how often you do this.  Observe how uncomfortable this makes you.  See if you find yourself trying to justify your feelings of “have to”.

I guarantee from my own experience that these to shifts in mindset can make a radical difference in how you experience life.  You will be moving away from lies that give you a sense of being burden and into a joyful celebration of the truth that God gives you amazing opportunities everyday.  May God’s Blessing be with you.

Last night I received the following email from PD reader Angie in Missouri and wanted to share my reply with all my readers because she has a great question.

Yay – Lent starts tomorrow!

I am full of anticipation for Lent!  It is an incredible feeling.  :)  There’s this guy I know who’s been talking it up for practically all of 2010!  It’s got me all excited.  :)
Anyway, I need a little help with what I want to do for Lent.  I want to do something along the lines of your 40 days of 40 bags of clutter.  I want to spend 40 days working on getting the basement organized.  That space just upsets me b/c it is so chaotic and things are in boxes and just no organization what-so-ever.  I can’t seem to find the motivation to work on it b/c it seems so daunting.  We’ve just left this space – it’s like we had no energy for it once we got settled into the house.  So I decided this might be the opportunity I’m looking for.  I was thinking about spending 15 minutes each day working on the organization/decluttering of the basement.

My question to you is how do I make sure I keep the focus of Christ in this daily endeavor?  I don’t want to approach this like a New Year’s Resolution but something with more focus and purpose spiritually.  I know it will be bring me peace to have this space less chaotic.  I was thinking about starting each time of cleaning with prayer?  I don’t know.  I feel a little stuck in figuring out how to really make this a spiritual practice without piling a ton of “work” on my plate.  I don’t want to dread this but approach each day with anticipation for it – even if it is challenging.  I’m not trying to make it into something “easy” necessarily but something doable.

Does any of this make sense?

Thanks John.

Your question, “How do I make sure I keep the focus of Christ in this daily endeavor?”, is really a question of,  ”How do I take take something mundane and make it holy?”  When I say holy, I literally mean “holy.”  The words in the Old and New Testament that we translate as “holy” both mean “set apart” or “separated from”.  So when you read about God’s holy mountain or God’s’ holy people you are reading about a mountain and a people set apart for God’s purposes.  They are set apart from all that is around them and they are set apart with a specific godly purpose.  So if you want to make the mundane in your life holy set it apart from other activity for a holy purpose and here is how you do that.

MAKE IT HOLY–SET IT APART

Trust your instinct to start with a prayer.  That is probably a God nudge.  I would also recommend closing with a prayer.  Those prayers will be a boundary marker that says, “Hey, this time is for you God?”  It will trigger your mind out of other distractions and flag your attention to be refocused on Christ.  You may even want to start with the exact same words each time you start and close.  For example begin with, “God I give this time of tending to the things you have put in my care as an offering of thanks for the many blessings in my life.” and then close with something like, “God thank you for providing for me beyond my needs. I pray that I honor you by being a joyful steward.”

REWIRE YOUR BRAIN FOR GOD

Praying the same words is valuable when starting.  After a week or so, shift the words, but maintain the same intentions.  Here is why.   You are actually renewing your mind for God by doing so.  There is fascinating research emergingon how our brains work called neuroplasticity, that Allyson Lewis, author of The Seven Minute Difference,  shared with me during my recent interview with her.  What scientist are discovering is that we actually generate new neurons and neural paths when we practice focused repeated attention.  We literally renew our minds when we choose to think the same thought repeatedly.  As those new neurons and neural paths get laid it becomes easier and easier for us to move into the same thought process.

So, I would recommend that for the first several days you pray the same words as you enter into and out of your time.  Then begin to vary the words but keep the intention identical.  It’s a bit like you are whacking a path through a bunch of weeds in your head.  The same words are an intense effort to just get an open trail where one hasn’t existed before.  The shifting of words broadens the path and makes it progressively easier to move down.  In the case of the opening prayer I suggested, you are conditioning your mind to recognize several truths:

1. All that you have is from God.
2. You have a responsibility to care for it.
3. Your actions can be an offering of gratitude.
4. You are richly blessed.

These are great mindsets to sustain as you address mundane tasks.  When I think about neuroplasticity I think of Paul’s instruction to the Phillippians,

“Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.” (Phillippians 4:8 NASB)

The word translated as “dwell” actually means to ruminate, like a cow chewing its cud over and over again.  Dwell upon means to repeatedly focus upon.  Dwell upon means take advantage of the God-given neuroplasticity of your brain.

Once you have entered your time of cleaning ruminate on these things:

GRATITUDE

“Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to God the Father” (Colossians 3:17)

One time I was bemoaning mowing my lawn on an extremely hot Arkansas Summer day.  I was wretchedly hot and exercising a mindset that was very biblical, “weeping and gnashing of teeth”, when I realized how absurd it was for me to complain.  I suddenly thought, “How can I complain about mowing my lawn?  Mowing my lawn means I own a lawn.  I have a home.  I am blessed beyond my needs and have far more than other people even dream of having.”  It changed my heart and mind around what I was doing and the chore then became a prayer of gratitude.  I shifted to a different biblical attitude, an attitude of gratitude.  Mowing became an opportunity to be thankful  for all that God gave me.  This experience often comes to mind for me as I do my chore cards.  More frequently now I am finding that those mundane tasks are becoming times of thanks and praise.  At times these are almost sacramental moments.  You may think I am nuts, but recently as I dusted our china cabinet I found myself singing a simple improvised refrain, “I am blessed for I am dusting.”

DO IT AS IF YOU ARE SERVING CHRIST (because you are)

“Whatever you do, do your work heartily, as for the Lord rather than for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance. It is the Lord Christ whom you serve.” Colossians 3:23-24.

The spirit in which you work is a testimony to people around you and it is a statement to God.  Do what you do heartily and for the Lord.  One way to trigger this mindset is to imagine as you organize that you are in Jesus’ house.  That these are his things and that he has asked you to organize it.  If that were the case, how would your attitude shift?  Adopt that attitude.

One thing that will happen is that the mindsets you are developing will naturally seep out of the confines of your fifteen minutes.  I suspect you that by the end of Lent you will reflexively begin bringing gratitude to tasks  like doing laundry, loading the dishwasher or cooking a meal.

SOME PRACTICAL CONSIDERATIONS

First, don’t work ahead.

I would highly recommend setting a timer for 15 minutes and stop when it goes off no matter what you are doing.  At first, this will be very difficult.  You will think, “Oh, I’ll just finish this area over here.” or “I’ll just do one more box.”  DON’T DO IT.  What almost inevitably happens is you get sucked into more and before you know it you have grossly cut into time you need for something else.  You will almost surely sow resentment and set yourself up to start skipping later because you did so much on an earlier day.  DON’T DO IT.

I have found that whether it is Bible reading or bagging, there is a tendency for some people to jump on board enthusiastically at the front end and rapidly burn out.  This happens almost 100% of the time to those who work ahead. So, DON’T DO IT.  I am not sure exactly why, but it is an extremely reliable phenomenon.  As I mentioned above, I think when people work ahead they begin to give themselves permission to skip on other days. Once they start skipping the discipline unravels. Sometimes people also skip and then get in a mindset of “I’ll catch up later.”  Catching up becomes hard and soon impossible.  So, people quit.  So, if you are thinking about working ahead, DON’T DO IT. If you haven’t caught on I can’t over emphasize this enough.  Well, may be I can.  Four bold print all caps repetitions is a bit extreme, but I can’t tell you how many people I have shared this with who have ignored it and then failed.

The other commitment that you want to be inflexible on is-Never Make an Exception.  Do your fifteen minutes no matter what it takes?  If it’s 3 in the morning and you have to be up at 6, so what, do your fifteen minutes.  It won’t kill you, but not doing it will kill your discipline.

WHAT IF YOU IGNORE ALL THIS GREAT ADVICE AND BLOW IT?

Don’t play catch up.  This is another death blow to your discipline.  Just pick-up where you left off and keep moving forward.  Once again, this is true for any discipline whether it be for Bible reading or bagging.

To Angie:  I hope this is helpful to you and my other readers.  To everyone else:  If you are not adopting a discipline like Angie’s for Lent, I would encourage you to adopt the mindsets above for the mundane tasks in your life. I would also encourage you to apply the principles of “Don’t work ahead” and “Never make an exception” to whatever discipline you are practicing.

Blessings to you all during Lent.  I love questions like Angie’s.  Anyone, please feel free to email me questions or post them in a comment.

John

For most people the word meditation summons up images of sitting motionlessly for hours on end humming at the universe while staring at a candle. That’s one form of meditation, but at a more rudimentary level, meditation is simply sustained attention. Today I want you to rethink meditation in terms of dwelling on something for a season in order to internalize it.

In recent posts, I have encouraged you to thinking on, ponder or dwell on specific things as Paul did in the letter to the Phillippians.  I even suggested specific practical practices.  I want you to realize though that to “dwell on something” doesn’t mean that you have to sit for hours motionless thinking about it. In fact, it may profit you more to repetitively come back to focused attention in bits and pieces, that’s how we internalize life lessons for the long haul.

I was thinking about this in terms of my daughter Ruth recently. She had to memorize a list of squares, fractions, and decimals for a quiz.  She did pretty well, but now the class is retaking the quiz and she realizes that she hasn’t really internalize the information.  She just shoved them in her short term memory hopper and that hopper has a big leak in it.  Now we are going back and having to re-learn.  

This practice of cram and release is common faith development issues.   We “learn” but don’t commit to applying ourselves for a season. We are excited and inspired for a short bit and then move on to something else. That’s a great way to accumulate information, but not a good way to experience transformation. As people we tend to be a bit thick.  We need repetition and practice for something to become a part of our character.  This is where meditating or dwelling with something in repeated moments of attention over a lengthy period of time comes in handy. Living with and living out lessons over time is how we grow from knowledge to understanding. This is how you gain maturity.  You can’t cram it.  If you try to cram it, when a test of maturity arises you will fail.

So let me illustrate from my own life. Recently, I was practicing what I posted regarding dwelling on good people by reflecting on the life of one of my favorite figures of faith, George Washington Carver. (see also, Evicting Annoying Person From My Head) I would love to grow into the richness of faith that he had. The morning I reflected on him listed his characteristics I admire and activities he regularly did. That reflection got my mind out of a funk. I refocused my mind in a faith enhancing way. That’s great, but if I really want more, if I really want to have a faith as deep and rich as Carver, then I am going to have to sustain attention and application around what I learned. In a way, you could say that I need to meditate with my life for a month.

This kind of activity is what Paul was getting at when he told the Phillippians, “Brethren join in following my example, and observe those who walk according to the pattern you have in us.” (Phillippians 3:17) and “The things you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.” (Phillippians 4:9)

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