Making Sense of Church is an easy read, so I won’t try to summarize the whole thing for you (get it yourself!), but one thing that struck me from the first chatper was a closing remark Spencer made about quiet times.
All my life, I’ve struggle with quiet times. It’s not that I haven’t worked at it, but that I’ve worked too hard. By trying to follow someone else’s model, I turned quiet times into busy times. I would arm myself with highlighters and notebooks, reference books and workbooks. Like a kid with too much homework, I resented the time I spent and yet at the same time drew a sense of worth from completing a lesson. The day I found the courage to unplug the quiet time machine and instead truly rest in God’s presence, my world changed.
Last Sunday at our church gathering, I asked everyone about quiet times. “The quiet time” as such has undergone a good bashing recently, at least in some circles, and I’m wondering what there is to replace it. Darren has some good thoughts on this, but I’m still left wondering what kind of results we can really expect if an entire movement of people embraces a “I don’t need discipline” approach to spiritual formation. Dallas Willard, in Spirit of the Disciplines, would contend that it is precisely this lack of, well, discipline that has resulted in the failings of evangelicalism. The solution cannot be less discipline and a more free-floating approach. But neither can we simply say “Buckle down and do it.” Spencer expresses a longing for a more holistic, less logic-only approach to spiritual growth - which, for many, may be a much-needed invitation.
I like what Todd Hunter once said - ‘Grace does not equal no effort - it does equal no earning’
I fear for a generation that flies by the seat of the pants and hopes that they remain ’spiritually fit’ by the ocasional conversation or flick thru the scripures.
It aint gonna happen!
I shared Spencer’s sentiments for a long time. One of the nice things about being Orthodox is having a spiritual father who does, in fact, give me a model for “quiet time”, but its customized for me and where I am in my walk. Which means it will also change as I grow! And be more challenging as needed.
I think the issue is less of “discipline” and more of “guidance”, something I did not often find in my evangelical life.
I was part of this conversation, and probably the primary “quite time” basher. I bashed it because “quite time” seems to have become the de facto only way to grow in prayer and the knowledge of God’s Word.
I remember “quite time” being a combination of both, some sort of reading and praying formula. And, of course, you have to do it every day. Miss a day and there’s another thing to feel bad about.
Anyway, to me the “quite time” is a means to an end. The end I suppose is to be knowledgable in the Word of God (as Paul admonishes us to let the Word of God dwell in us richly) and to pray without ceasing (as Paul also says).
Paul was very good at writing down the direction we need to be going, without giving us a lot of rules as to exactly how to get going in that direction.
The “daily quite time” is great for those that thrive on it, but it’s not the only way to pray or study the bible. Also, simply because a person is not having “daily quite times” does not mean they don’t have spiritual disciplines in their lives.
For example, the essence of prayer is talking to God. We are also to love God. Why does it take such “discipline” to talk to God if we love Him and we have seen how He loves us? I love my wife, and I don’t have a “husbandly discipline” of talking to my wife. It’s natural. I hope I get to the point where prayer is not a “dicipline” to me.
I personally don’t consider Bible study a “discipline” for me because I enjoy it. I tend to focus on a single issue and to a very broad study of it lasting many hours. Then I rest a few days or a few weeks. I’ve learned a lot this way, but I don’t have a “bible study quiet time” routine.
Traditional churches are great at institutionalizing means to ends, and then implying that if you are not practicing the means, you cannot possibly be attaining the ends. I hope at least some in the “emergent church” will get past this mentality.
Point taken, and I’m sure many people who were influenced by campus movements and discipling movements feel exactly the same way. Guilt-tripping people into keeping up with arbitrary standards (a certain kind of quiet time, EVERY day) isn’t helpful.
I can’t help but think, though, that you can’t just encourage people to grow closer to God without also giving them practical advice on how to do that. The difference between your wife and God is that you can’t ignore your wife - she’s there and will talk to you whether you think about her or not. God is there too, but he lets us ignore him.
I think that’s where discipline comes in, and for the vast majority of us, we need to get spending time with God into our daily rhythms, or else we will develop patterns of life that have no room for him.
I suppose the key word here is “practical”. What’s practical for some is not for others. We need to make an effort to know people before we can offer them advice that is genuinely practical for them (not just for us and our efforts to create a smoothly running church machine). And, that advice would probably vary from person to person.
As far as ignoring your wife…well, there are men that do. But that’s for another subject.
And, as far as ignoring God is concerned, I personaly can’t. I suppose some can, but I can only speak for myself. I think about God all the time. Even when I try to ignore God, things just get worse and I end up praying.