a drop of water

– What experiences of prayer and meditation have you had this week?
– What temptations did you face this week?
– What movements of the Holy Spirit did you experience this week?
– What opportunities to serve others have you had this week?
– In what ways have you encountered Christ in your study of the Bible this week?

These were noted in Chapter 21 (Radical Prayer) of Richard Foster‘s book, Prayer: Finding the Heart’s True Home. They were questions that he and a group of friends committed to asking and answering each week in hopes of growing to be better disciples of Christ. I really appreciate the directness of these questions. Each one seems to imply that doing “A” has great benefit and at the same time admits there are barriers, “B”, that we must face in community by being intentional of “C”.

• Question 1: “A” is prayer and meditation. “B” is a fast paced life. “C” is taking time out of the busy schedule and assigning worth and dependence to hearing from God and letting God meet you in prayer and meditation.
• Question 2: “A” is overcoming temptations. “B” is being jaded or having a hardened heart towards sin. “C” is actively understanding our own weaknesses so that we can, in community, build up those areas where we are tempted.
• Question 3: “A” is experiencing the Holy Spirit’s movements. “B” is relying so much on our own understanding, knowledge and perspective that there is little room for anything else. “C” is actively seeking to see the Holy Spirit’s movements and testing them in community.
• Question 4: “A” is serving others. “B” is thinking that what doesn’t affect me directly, is not worth my time. “C” is actively listening and being aware of the needs of people around us, as if they were (are) our own.
• Question 5: “A” is encountering Christ in the Bible. “B” is assuming you understand the familiar stories completely and that there is no more value in reading what you know already. “C” is seeing the Bible as living and active, where we do not just learn about Christ, but where we actually meet Christ.

With the turning of the year I’ve been trying to formulate questions to evaluate the health of different areas that I consider crucial to inviting (and discovering) God into my life.  All of these areas are interrelated and sometimes difficult to separate, but trying to understand them individually helps me better understand their influence on each other.  This list is by no means exhaustive (and there is no implication by order), but intended to be a concise list of questions to poignantly touch key issues in our lives today.

Spiritual Health

1. What are the prayers that I have prayed?
2. Where have I grown more dependent on God in my life?

Physical Health

1. How much time do I spend creating and cultivating with my mind and body versus consuming and condemning?
2. How can I grow and mature in my physical intimacy with my wife?

Resource Health

1. Where are am I giving, saving, and spending finances, time, energy and creativity?
2. Where am I undercommitted and where am I overcommitted?

Educational Health

1. Where and from who am I learning from and being inspired by?
2. Who am I teaching and investing in, hoping to inspire?

Work Health

1. Am I satisfied with my level of dedication to work?
2. Am I bringing good to my coworkers, customers and managers?

Relational Health

1. How am I intentionally loving the people most important in my life?
2. How am I intentionally loving the people in my life who I would prefer not to love?

Jamie mentioned in his sermon a few weeks ago at Coast, that we are hungry for God’s direction, for the power of the Spirit and for his answers to our questions and problems, but we are not hungry for our character to be made more like God’s character and not for the fruit of the Spirit, love, joy, peace, patient, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.

It was a sharp reminder to me.  I want the answers, and the power to work in people’s lives and pass over the working through the hard stuff of love, joy, peace, patient, kindess, goodenss, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control in my personal relationships with God and people.

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Jamie also posed the question, “What are we known for?”  It’s an interesting question to answer yourself and ask a close friend.  I think that the point of the question is not to ‘just’ find out what people think of you, but to realize that what your are known for is a direct result of how much you are letting God into your life.  His work in you and through will (or lack of) will overflow out in your actions and people will know you for that.  Examining what you are known for is one window into how God is working your life.

Maybe a different way to pose this question is, “What are you sowing in your life?”  In light of Andy Crouch’s call to be cultivators and creators, I think we need to be sowing.  Then we have to ask the equally important question of where we are getting seeds to sow?

I was reading Chapter 2 of Dallas Willard’s, Renovation of the Heart, and came across this break down of the human life on page 30.

1. Thought (images, concepts, judgments, inferences)
2. Feeling (sensation, emotion)
3. Choice (will, decision, character)
4. Body (action, interaction with the physical world)
5. Social context (personal and structural relations to others)
6. Soul (the factor that integrates all of the above to form one life)

I’m finding it helpful to evaluate my spiritual health in regards to each of these areas.  I’d like to make it a regular habit, because often life’s experiences magnify one area out of proportion.  It’s easy for us to dissociate one aspect of our lives in order to focus on just that.  Alone, each of these areas are thought to be manageable, but when considered together, the result is overwhelming.  But I believe that our spiritual health depends on the integration of all the parts.

They are all equally important and interdependent; some may be more important than others for a time, but their relation to each other has the potential to enhance and empower.  The true health of our soul in light of a redemptive plan, seems to depend on our lives integration of each complimenting God designed area.  Some brief questions that I’ve considered:

1. (Thought) – Where do my thoughts go in my free time?
2. (Feeling) – Where do I feel content in my life?
3. (Choice) – What choices in my life reflect my thoughts and feelings?
4. (Body) – Where am I being available with energy for people?
5. (Social Context) – Who am I lovingly investing in?
6. (Soul) – How compartmentalized is my life?

These questions are an attempt to create spaces where we can invite and allow God to speak into and guide our lives.  They are meant to lead to challenges to are methods of thinking, our habits, and our perspectives and let God redeem us from the inside out.  This is not intended to be a list to check off, in a “did-this, did-that” pragmatic approach, but instead to allow God’s guidance and leading to shape our decisions and the foundations they come out of.  You may discover that the issues and obstalces you are trying to face are in a completely different direction than the direction God wants you to head.

Questions…

1. Where and when do I feel most close to and most distant from God and where is God leading me through those times?

2.  What am I consciously dependent on God for in my life?  (aka, what in my life would change if God was not around?)  What can I be more intentionally dependent on God for in my life? (What areas in my life must I release my control of and my anxiety of into God’s hands?)

3. Where and how much am I giving and where and how much am I getting in my life. (Suggested categories: time / rest, hopes / dreams, relationships, sexuality, finances, social issues, knowledge, wisdom, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control).  How does does my heart match up with God’s on these areas?

The start of answers…

1. For me, understanding where I feel least close to God speaks louder to me than understanding where I feel most close to God.  This is because I’m realizing that when I feel distant from God it is my own fault.  I’ve either left him behind and run in the other direction, or have turned my back to him and have forgotten to acknowlege his presence in what I am doing at the moment.

2. Honestly and soberingly, I feel like a failure in answering this question, which is why I must ask it of myself more frequently.  Very little of my life is consciously or intentionally dependent on God.  I know that I like having control over as much as I can manage, and often try to control too many things, resulting in anxieties that make me forget God even more.

3. The suggested categories in is only the tip of the iceberg for this question.  A lot of times I wonder why someting I’ve worked on just doesn’t come out right and it’s usually because the pieces that made up the whole weren’t right.  I need to understand the simple relationship that what I put in my heart, mind and soul determines what comes out.