God’s Kind of Spirituality
By Bill Jacobs
An article is taken from a transcript date July 3, 2008.
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The title of this presentation is God's Kind of Spiriuality . It comes from the Natural Church Development topic of Passionate Spirituality , as one of the eight qualities of a healthy congregation. We're going to delve deeply into this topic to see how our congregations can become more excited about doing the congregation's work and, thereby, becoming more healthy.
Now we've done a series of presentations on True Spirituality already. There were fourteen parts to it. In that series, we defined, as best we knew, what Godly spirituality looks like. So I'd like to refer you to that series because it details a number of misconceptions that humans tend to hold when they think about being spiritually minded. But when the NCD people talk about passionate spirituality they are really talking about three things. I believe there is a lot more to spirituality than these three things, but their perspective is that part of it is going to help the congregation to be healthy. It's more about how it affects the group. Their three things are prayer , enthusiasm and boldness . So the emphasis there in those three terms is in the passion , isn't it? Perhaps even more than on the spirituality. Because they work with Christians from all around the world with all different kinds of orientations, they leave it up to us to decide what spirituality looks like. But they want us to pray about it, be enthusiastic and be bold. That's their primary concern. We're going to take three more presentations after today to cover each one of those three aspects – prayer, enthusiasm and boldness. Today I want to talk about how God gives us those things.
There's sort of a standard of spiritual maturity that some people hold to. I'm going to read off seven things:
• How long someone has been a Christian.
You know, if you read the book of Hebrews...you know, they're all about tenure. “I've gone to the Feast for forty years!” – as though that makes one something. I think about the book of Hebrews, where Paul told them – people who had been in the church for a long time – that they were like children that should have been able to eat solid food, but they still needed to be nursed, because they were so immature spiritually.
• Perceived Bible knowledge.
Another one that people get hung up on all the time is perceived Bible knowledge – how educated a person is about the scriptures. Of course, I seem to remember the devil is real good at quoting the Bible, too. He just doesn't do any of it. So, just knowing it isn't sufficient. Of course, it is good to know it. There are a lot of people that think they are spiritual and they don't know their Bible. And that doesn't work either.
• Attendance at church – just showing one's face – presence.
Judas went everywhere the twelve went – and Jesus – for three and a half years, but it didn't seem to do him any good, did it?
• Participation in programs.
Somehow, people seem to think that people that are really busy with church stuff are spiritually minded. I remember Jesus taking Martha to task because she was so busy with the busy work.
• Always in agreement with the pastor.
Then there areithose people that are always in agreement with the pastor – you know, the head-nodders, the ones that want to comply – or at least look like they're complying. I think of Ananias and Sapphira, who would fit into that mold, but they weren't really very spiritual, were they?
• Gifted people
Then there are the people who look at others who have the ability to perform well – you know, the gifted people – the good preachers, the good singers, the good counselors. The Corinthians were a pretty well-gifted people, but look at the problems they had. They weren't very spiritually minded in the beginning.
• Give a lot of money to the church.
And then there are those that give a lot of money to the church and others who look at them and think, “Oh, that's really great. They must be very dedicated.” Jesus said that the Pharisees tithed of every last little leaf and coriander seed, but it didn't seem to do much for them.
If we're going to talk about spiritual maturity and this sort of thing – and I don't want to go back over all fourteen points we covered before, but by way of something to set our eyes on – to focus on – here about what spirituality is, we can look at these things.
• A hatred of evil and not of evil doers.
Proverbs 8:13 says, To fear the LORD is to hate evil. I hate pride and arrogance, evil behavior and perverse speech. To be able to hate the bad things that are done and not hate the people that do them – to make that distinction. That would be a very spiritually-minded approach.
• Love for unlovable people.
Zacchaeus was pretty well hated in his community, because he was such a scoundrel, but Jesus stopped and took time with him. God's way is to have love for everybody. It's easy to love the lovable, so we're going to say “to love the un lovable” is a spiritual thing. Everybody loves the lovable people. That's easy.
• The ability to draw others to Christ.
The apostles – disciples – were fishers of men. They trained up a whole group of other people that also did the same thing. When they were persecuted, they went everywhere. So the ability to express oneself in a way that makes Christ seem beneficial and interesting is a spiritual thing.
• Teachable – to be teachable.
I think of David asking God to create in him a clean heart – to be open to what God had for him to learn.
• Flexibility.
I think about flexibility. I think of Jonah, who wasn't – wasn't willing to do what God said. He wasn't flexible.
• Peaceability.
You know, I think, in the churches of God, of all the strife over doctrine and control. I was talking to a mother recently, who was telling me that, in their church, they'd had so many splits and divisions over little picky doctrinal things that her kids were really confused about what to believe and there was no stability in their group. It kept getting smaller as it kept dividing.
• Contentment
Then, finally, contentment. Paul said that he had learned to be content with a little or a lot. You can read that in Philippians 4:12. He said, I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I've learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. Now, here's a clue. It's not so hard to be content when you have plenty. So, the issue is how to be content when we don't, right?
So which list of those things is easier? The first one? Is it easier to do those things? Or is it easier to do the latter. Well, I don't know about you, but the second list, to me, seems to be a lot harder than the first one. The second one is all about what's in your heart , and the first one is all about what other people can see .
I think that when Paul said that he'd kept the law perfectly in the ritualistic intent, that was one thing. But to say that he learned how to be content in all situations, now that's saying something! Because that really isn't humanly possible, is it? That is true spirituality.
NCD people talk about two approaches to reach the goal of passionate spirituality. I think that you can find both of them in the Bible. One is what they call the corporate approach , or what people do in groups to build passion. And the other is the personal aspect or approach .
Let's talk about that corporate approach first. One of things that they talk a lot about doing is to have a celebrative atmosphere. I was talking to a young woman who grew up in our Church of God background. She's in college now. Where she goes to school, she doesn't know anybody. She just got started there. And she's not aware of any groups that believe exactly like she does, so goes to a Sunday church just to get to know people and to have some fellowship. She commented she wasn't used to this because she went to church with our kind of folks. She said every week they managed to send her out the door charged up to face the week – determined to follow God better and more commitedly. And she said, “They do it in thirty minutes!”
These people – the Natural Church Development people – are not talking about just whooping it up and putting on a phony enthusiasm. They're talking about group dynamics. If you walk into a room full of happy people, it makes you feel better. It does! It's contagious! I think a lot of us don't really understand much about that. I talk to these folks who don't go to church anywhere – who've dropped out of a group. Maybe they're discouraged or distracted or whatever. But they seem to have no idea how their absence affects the group. The more people there are together, the easier it is to be enthusiastic. So I think that's partly why Paul said in Hebrews 10:25, Let us not give up meeting together as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another – and all the more as you see the day approaching. Christians are supposed to go to church. They're supposed get together with other folks.
Another thing that they focus on a lot is small groups. Most of the mega-churches in this country have what they call affinity-based small groups . You can go be with people who are interested in the same thing that you're interested in. If you're interested in evangelism, they have groups for people that want to do that. If you're interested in community service, you can do that. If you're a music person, you can do that. If you want to teach Sunday school, they have groups for people that do that. So there's a natural bridge of connection and fellowship because you already come to the group having something very much in common with some of the other people that are in it. So these groups provide a place for people to use their spiritual gifts, to get close to each other and share more than they would just sitting in a seat with three thousand other people sitting around them – or maybe even more than that – and become close to somebody – become spiritually intimate, where they talk about what's really important and they communicate at a spiritual level. And they learn how to pray with and for others. And they learn how to think about God as they talk among each other in that way. They also learn how to do outreach. They support and motivate each other to do those things. All of that generates excitement. And it's not phony. It's real.
Another thing that they talk about is prayer teams and vigils. Praying for common goals draws people together. Seeing prayers answered inspires and encourages us, doesn't it? You have a group of people and they're trying to accomplish something together. And they spend time praying together about it. Then they see something good happen. That's inspiring and it draws people closer together. It makes it more unified. It's the unity of the Spirit.
Let's go to Acts 1, and verse 23. From our tradition, we always quoted the scripture where Jesus said we should go in our closet and pray, and don't be like the Pharisee – you know, that made the big deal in public. But we know in Acts 1, and verse 23 – well, I'll just read it.
Acts 1:23 – So they proposed two men – this is where they were selecting somebody else to replace Judas – Joseph called Barsabas, also known as Justus, and Matthias. Then they prayed, “Lord, you know everyone's heart. Show us which of these two you have chosen to take over this apostolic ministry which Judas left to go where he belongs.” And then they cast lots and the lot fell on Matthias. So he was added to the eleven. So they prayed together about this important decision.
Then in the New Testament, it says, Then they called them in again – this in...I'm thinking it's 4 – I negleced to write down the chapter and verse – maybe it's 6. But then then called them in again – this is the Jews –they'd just finished beating some of the apostles – Peter and all – and commanded them not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus. But Peter and John replied, “Judge for yourselves whether it is right in God's sight to obey you rather than God. For we cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard.” See, they were witnesses , weren't they, to what had happened. And after further threats, they let them go. Of course. They could not decide how to punish them because all the people were praising God for what had happened – for the man who was miraculously healed who was over forty years old. So they had healed somebody. Everybody knew about it. And there wasn't really anything they could do. So on their release, Peter and John went back to their own people – they went back to the congregation – and reported all that the chief priests and elders had said to them. And when the heard this – when the brethren heard this – they raised their voices together in prayer to God. “Sovereign Lord,” they said, “You've made the heaven, and the earth and the sea, and everything in them. You spoke through the Holy Spirit through the mouth of your servant, our father David, ‘Why do the nations rage and the people plot in vain? The kings of the earth take their stand, and the rulers gather together against the Lord and against the anointed One.' Indeed, Herod and Pontius Pilate met people together with the Gentiles and the people of Israel in this city to conspire against Your holy servant, Jesus, whom You anointed. They did what Your power and will decided beforehand should happen.” They were just reiterating to God how that everything happens the way He wants it to. “ And now, Lord, consider their threats” – verse 29 – “and enable Your servants to speak Your word with great boldness” – one of the things that a church needs to have to be healthy. “Stretch out your hand to heal and perform miraculous signs and wonders through the name of Your holy servant, Jesus.” After they prayed the place where they were meeting was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and spoke the word of God boldly.
So they did pray together. So much for the excuse that we should go in our closet. Right? When there were big things that needed to be decided, when there were objectives that needed to be achieved, the church prayed together . So, we'll talk some more about that next week – or next time. Sorry.
What else do they talk about in the Natural Church Development material? Well, they talk about employing everybody's gifts. That means getting everybody engaged and doing something that they're good at doing. We're talking about passionate spirituality in a group setting, so one of the most important things a group can do, if they want their group to become more passionate, is to help people find, cultivate and use their gifts. We've already talked about this, too.
But I remember – about twelve years ago...maybe ten – when the United Church of God was just getting started, we had our first Feast. And there was a minister who told me that a man in their congregation put on a seminar at the Feast on How to Build a Webpage for Your Congregation . His son – who, by the way, made $100,000 his first year out of high school, because he knew how to build Webpages and not many people did back then – not as many as now anyway – knew what to do and he taught the class. He knew the most about it. And the man that put on the class was smart enough to realize, “Well, if you've got a big cannon, you shoot it!” So he let this high school boy teach these people how to do this. And when he came back, the minister told me that his son said, “That really was the best Feast ever, because I learned that I have something to contribute.” Isn't that interesting how that works? So, would you say that he was excited about that? Yeah, he absolutely was. And this father was just beaming with enthusiasm for the fact that his son had been so engaged in the work of the church.
Why is this whole issue with spiritual gifts so tied into spirituality? Well, because Jesus Christ gives us what? He gives us gifts, but what are they? Well, they're His own things – His own assets, if you want to call it that. How do we know that? Because it says that's what He did in the parable of the rich nobleman, doesn't it? It says he left on a journey, but before he went, he divided his assets among his servants, and told them, “Occupy till I come. Do something with this.” That's what we've been given. That is the gift that we have been given. We have been given the skills, the abilities, the wisdom, the power of Jesus Christ to do His work. He's left His assets with us. To ignore such a gift, to ignore such tools would be extremely foolish, wouldn't it – and spiritually blind . Any discussion about passionate spirituality has to include the discovery and use of those gifts.
I heard – I think this came from Rick Warren – you know, the guy that wrote Purpose Driven Life and Purpose Driven Church .... I'm not sure, though. I can't remember. But the analogy was about how a congregation has a number of smaller and smaller circles in it – going into the center. In the middle is God and Christ. That's perfectcion. Then the next outer circle from that is those people who are completely committed and do all of those seven things we talked about at the beginning – who are spiritually minded. Then outside of that there's another circle of people a little further from the center. They attend a lot, and they get involved in a lot of the things , but they miss out on the finer points. They're not as spiritually mature as those in the inner circle. Then out from that, there's another ring of people who are spiritually unaware. They're kind of like small children. You how little kids – because their brains aren't fully developed yet – they miss a lot of what goes on around them in the adult world – because they think concretely instead of abstractly and all? So there are those that are spiritually im mature there, even though they're walking around in adult bodies. They're like little children when it comes to spiritual things. Then there are the new people, who just haven't got it figured out completely yet and don't even know what to do. They don't know what the group believes. They don't know what the rules are. They don't know what the norms are. They're there and they need to be helped along. I think, sometimes, in that group we might also say there are other people that are kind of blocked in their growth and kind of act like new people – like they don't know what the rules are and don't know what to do.
The point of his discussion, as I recall it, is that the people who are toward the center spend a lot of time with, and try to help the other people – that are out further from them – along. A congregation never has all spiritually mature people or all people that are totally tuned out. There's always a mixture of that in a group. So, if you're going to be spiritually healthy, there has to be a place for everybody in your group. It's kind of like Guy Swenson said, “Is the church supposed to be a spa for saints or a hospital for sinners?” There are those people – and they're ususally the ones that tithe a lot, and are always there, and doing all the work – and they tend to look down on the ones who have all the problems, and don't come as much, or whatever. Yet, in a healthy church, the people that are toward the center don't have that attitude, because they are spiritually mature, and they love the unlovable, and they help people along. That's how it works. They accept others without condemnation. And they remember what Jesus told the crowd when they were condemning Zacchaeus – He came to seek and to save those who were lost.
I was thinking about what we just talked about – about this circle of involvement, about using everybody's gifts in the group, about praying together – prayer teams – about small groups, about having a celebratory atmosphere – you know, good music and lots of fun activities – activities that engage everybody – that kind of thing. I've seen over the years that there are some people that are really genuinely helped by those things. In fact, I know a woman now – she's not in our church – but she's been trying to build a relationship with God. She knew something was missing in her life. Her church that she goes to – which is one of those churches that really gets involved in all that kind of stuff – has really helped her a lot. She feels like she has a place and she's busy and involved. And I can tell that she's learning more about the Bible and growing.
In thinking about my own development, I see most of it coming from another direction for me. And I'm just me. I know it doesn't always happen to me the same way it happens to everybody else, but I suspect that a lot of people will probably feel like I feel, too. I think that most of what I have, such as it is, didn't so much come from the kind of group I was in. And maybe that has to do with the kinds of groups I was in, but I'm not sure. But it seems to me, that besides learning doctrine from the church, mostly God taught me what I needed to know about Him to become excited. And I think if I have any passion – and I'm not the kind of person that's always just really bubbly and enthusiastic – I have more of the burning, never quit kind of thing going on or I always keep what I want to do in my mind – but if I have any, it hasn't come a group experience, but more from personal experience with God. And I think that without those experiences, I don't think that I could really bring any passion to the church, because I believe mostly everything I have along those lines came straight from God. I don't have any way to measure, but I suspect there are some folks that feel that way. I know there are a number of people I can point to in the Bible that were definitely that way. I mean, think about the apostle Paul. You say, “Well, he was always passionate. First he was passionate for persecuting the church, and then he was passionate for the church.” Well, when he was passionate for persecuting the church, he wasn't passionate for it, was he? So he had to become passionate. How did that happen? Well, it happened over a three-day period while he was blind, and he couldn't get away from Christ, while Christ explained to him how it was going to be. And that three-day period totally changed his life. And it made him passionate for something else that he had never been passionate for before. He not only lacked passion for Christ, he – as Christ explained to him – was resisting Him. So there it is – struck blind on the Damascus Road .
We know that Paul attended a lot of prayer meetings, and he probably prayed passionately in them, but we know that his passion did not come from them – at least not the initial.... I'm sure he was enthused when the brethren were there to meet him enthusiastically and all that, but that really isn't the root of it all, is it, for him.
Then I think about the apostles – the other apostles. One minute they were running for fear of being associated with Jesus – on the night He was taken – and forty or fifty days later, they weren't afraid of anybody anymore. And that didn't come from being in a small group. It came from knowing that Jesus Christ died and was resurrected. They saw it! They were the witnesses. They had an experience and they were to tell everybody about what happened. That was a life-changing personal experience that each one of them had. You say, “Well, they were a group.” When Thomas said, “I'm not going to believe until I can put my hand in Your side and touch the place the nails went into Your hands,” that was personal . And that was a better motivator than any...you know what they wanted Him to do – which was to conquer the Romans – that was a lot more motivating and passion producing than any war that He could have conducted.
And then I think about Job. In Job 42, it says:
Job 42:1 – Then Job answered the LORD and said, “I know that you can do everything...” – notice that this is in Job 42, right at the end of the book, after all those chapters – “I know that You can do everything, and no thought can be withholden from You. Who is that hides counsel without knowledge? Therefore I have uttered that I understood not – things too wonderful for me, which I knew not. Hear, I beseech You, and I will speak. I will demand of you and declare you unto Me. I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees You! I finally get it! I ran my mouth for forty chapters and now I get it.” You know, seeing God – understanding God is always a life-changing, passion-producing experience.
And then there was the guy that demon possessed – you know, the man of the Gadarenes – who would hang out in graveyards by the tombs, and he was naked, and they tried to contain him with chains, and he would rip the chains with his bare hands. He probably shredded his hands doing that. And Jesus came and healed him. And we're told in the story that he wanted to go with Jesus. He was so inspired! But Jesus told him he couldn't go with Him. He was to go home and tell everyone what He had done. Do you think he did? Do you think he was pretty enthusiastic about it? I think he was.
Then there was David. You know, we have a wonderful book in the Bible that teaches us what a relationship with God is like. It's called the Psalms . David wrote most of it. How did he have such a great relationship with God? He got way off track. And he had a brave soldier killed in battle so he could have the man's wife. That was the last straw for God. And He sent Nathan the prophet to him, and he told him a story of man who took another man's pet lamb, and killed it to feed his company. And David, a former shepherd, was so incensed that he wanted to have that guy killed. And then Nathan told him that he was the man. And in that instant, David underwent a profound change, didn't he? A profound change. The book of Psalms is the story of what happened, really, in a way. And that was very personal , wasn't it? Very personal. He was an amazing person after that.
Okay, I can relate to those stories because of what happened to me. I was called when I was very young. My parents were not in the church, so my calling wasn't my family. It was something else. It was a powerful attraction to a way of life at first. That's what I could see as a middle-schooler. It wasn't long after that, though, when I got into high school that I learned who I was supposed to follow. So I understood that from my calling. I knew about God and I knew about Jesus Christ. I was baptized when I was eighteen years old. I'm not saying that I've never had my weak moments of discouragement or whatever, but I've never deterred from the commitment so far. I'm going to knock on wood, because I know that I think I've probably been protected in that quite a bit. I don't take any credit for it, but it is true that I haven't. I think God's been with me in that.
But I actually received a second calling – at least that's what I've called it – where I learned what I was supposed to do . And lots of Christians don't know what they're supposed to do specifically – what they are supposed to do. But don't feel bad. I had been called for probably twenty-five years to know who I was supposed to follow before God showed me what I was supposed to do . So I went a long time in the church not knowing that there was something else I was supposed to do . And I know exactly where and when that happened. I was in icy water up to my neck in an Alpine lake, right near the Silver Pass in the Sierra Nevadas. I was with two teens. We were on a church group backpacking trip. It all snapped into focus for me right there at Silver Pass. And I've been on task ever since on that.
One time I got discouraged and I went back there. And I sat up on a boulder on top of the pass and looked down at the lake that we had been in up to our necks in icy water. I prayed for further instructions and inspiration. Do you know what happened? I'm not joking. A thunder cloud quickly blew in from the south and lightning chased me down off of the pass. Then, just for good measure, it snowed on me in July. So I never went back. I don't have to. I know what the answer was. And I remember what Paul said when he prayed God would heal his eyes. He prayed three times and finally God said, “Well, Paul, stop. You don't have to pray anymore. The answer is no. My grace is sufficient for you.” So I took it that what I learned the first time was still good and that I didn't need to be instructed more about what needed to happen. So I never went back. I don't have to. I just keep on doing what I was shown to do. God keeps opening the doors that He wants Elaine and me to walk through in this regard. You know, my calling of what to do is not some great thing like Paul's or Peter's, but it's what, I think, God gave me to do. And it was a galvanizing experience that propels me forward everyday.
You know, I'm not passionate about studying Greek or Hebrew. Leave that to the others guys that like to do that. And I'm really bored with the idea of studying which day Passover falls on. And I'm also more willing to wait to learn about the answers about what God is like – one, two or three. The nature of God issue? I just don't have the energy to study all that out when I know I'm going to find out the answer straight from His own mouth. But I'm really excited about teaching people how to save our children. I'm really exicted about that. I'm on that one. And I think I need to be on it. And I think that I'm not alone. I think there are lots of people in the church that have learned something directly from God about what they are to do.
I'm probably a bit biased about this personal side of things, rather than the group thing, but I really think that a lot of what we really need to be passionate comes from our own personal relationship with God and the things that He teaches us to do. You can say, “Well, that never happened to me.” Well, you know, I think it would be really good for all of us to sit down sometime with a pencil and paper and write down all the things that we have learned about God that nobody else taught us – that we learned from God Himself. Maybe that would be a clue as to where to start looking. I would encourage anyone listening to be on the lookout for God's hand in their life, because that is something we can't help but get excited about. Just can't help it. It's an exciting thing when God intervenes in your life. I'm just glad that I didn't have to go blind or be chased around by a bunch of Herod's men. But it is an exciting thing.
So, the next time, we're going to take a look at the first of the three fundamental elements of a passionate, healthy congregation. And that has to do with praying – as a group – about group goals.
