The second balance beam in the Christian walk is the balance
of witness and submission. It involves the connection of body and spirit. (for more about the balance beams, go here.)
God reveals Himself to us through physical acts. He gave us
physical signs—the sacrifices of animals in the Old Testament, baptism and
communion in the New, promising to reveal himself through physical acts to His
creatures. He entered our world by taking on flesh. When He demonstrated His love bodily in the
crucifixion. He healed physical ailments and performed miracles. Through these means He demonstrated that what
we do with our bodies matters to our souls.
Physical actions cause us to come closer to God or push us away from
Him.
The church calls physical actions that strengthen our relationship to God the means of grace. These include
baptism, the Lord’s Supper, anointing with oil and the
laying on of hands. Acts of love--such as visiting the sick, praying for the
lost, and helping the needy--are also means of grace. Fixing a flat tire for a stranded motorist, a
kind touch on a grieving shoulder, or a well-timed word of comfort also convey
God’s grace to others. Deciding to go to church instead of to the store or the
golf course are acts of grace as well.
A disciple duplicates the actions of a master. A coach runs his team through hours of
physical practice. A dancing master does the same for her dancers. Musicians follow their master, repeating
continually the scales, methods, and pieces that made her great. Martial arts students follow the discipline
of their sensei. In every area of life
being a disciple means physical training. Faith is the same; following Jesus
means bodily action.
Willard gives this example.
“Think of certain young people who idolize an outstanding baseball
player. They want nothing better than
to pitch or run or hit as well as their idol.
So what do they do? When they are
playing in a baseball game, they all try to behave exactly as their favorite
baseball player does. . .
The buy the same shoes he wears, the same glove he uses, the same bat.
“Will they succeed in performing like the star, though? . .
. The star performer himself
didn’t achieve his excellence by trying to behave a certain way only during the
game. Instead, he chose an overall life
of preparation of mind and body, pouring all his energies into that total
preparation, to provide a foundation in the body’s automatic responses and
strength for his conscious efforts during a game.”[1]
“Being the Son of God clearly
did not relieve him of the necessity of a life of preparation that was mainly
spent out of the public eye. . . The
secret of the easy yoke involves living as he lived in the entirety of his
life—adopting His overall lifestyle.”[2]
In Celebration of
Discipline, Richard Foster writes:
“The inner
righteousness we seek is not something which can be poured on our hearts. God has ordained the disciplines of the
spiritual life as a means by which we place ourselves where He can bless us.”[3]
All physical acts start in the mind as an inner choice. When
the alarm goes off, we choose whether to get up or to turn it off and roll over
in bed. When the clock says noon, we must
choose whether or not to eat. It takes mental energy and will to make choices
about behavior. So God has provided us with
an inner mechanism that governs our actions and saves us from the burden of
making constant decisions. This
mechanism is called habit. Habits enable us to choose certain behaviors
automatically. Once they are formed, we do things without thinking, freeing up
our minds for more important functions and for multitasking. Habits govern most of what we think and do
every day.
A large part of our spiritual lives are governed by habits
as well. Our morning ritual of
devotions, our weekly habit of corporate worship, prayer before meals or at
bedtime are not something we think about doing—we just do them. Fasting, giving, forgiving, witnessing, helping,
and even silence are habits that lead us closer to God. Responding in anger to sleights, overeating,
drug or alcohol use, timidity, worry, timidity, and fear are also
habitual responses.
In order to experience the means of grace, we must learn to
master our habits, both positive and
negative. For most of us, this the
hardest part of our walk with God. Can
we learn to master the habits that master us?
Can we make our habits work for us instead of against us?
Christ has a kingdom--it is wherever He rules. We have
a kingdom, too—it is wherever we are the masters of our own souls. Before we
can surrender what we have to Christ, we must possess what He has given
us. Before we can make our souls His, we
first must make them ours.
Habits are means of maintaining our faith on a daily basis
are the way we keep a continual commitment to God. The early church understood
that, and established a regular system of rituals which continually kept them
in contact with and in submission to God.
The inner disciplines of prayer, study, and worship, keep us close to
God throughout the day. St. James wrote
“faith without works is dead.”[4] Inward faith without outward behavior quickly
disappears.
In the next several articles, we will be discussing how to
balance two kinds of habits—those that help us maintain stillness and attention
before God, and those that lead to act in the world on God’s behalf. These two groups of habits we are calling Submission and Witness.
[1] Dallas Willard The
Spirit of the Disciplines, (HarperSanFrancisco) 1988, pp. 3-4.
[2] Ibid, p. 6.
[3] Richard Foster The
Celebration of Discipline (Harper One, New York) 1978, p. 7.
[4] James 2:20
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