UrbanFaith.com: Christian commentary, culture, and conversation.
via UrbanFaith.com: Christian commentary, culture, and conversation..
A great e-magazine for those interested in a Christian perspective on life and culture.
Accepting God’s leadership and lordship in my life has produced a well-spring of peace, restoration, and comfort. He is willing to take the helm if we commit to obedience and if we trust in His faithfulness. Meditate on Psalm 32:8, and experience the peace of God.
“The Lord says, ‘I will guide you along the best pathway for your life. I will advise you and watch over you’” (NLT).
I really enjoyed reading Stornie Omartian’s The Power of a Praying Life: Finding the Freedom, Wholeness, and True Success God Has for You (2010). It is a book that is simple, but I found it to be a wonderful reminder about how absolutely essential prayer is for cultivating the kind of peace we all seek in our lives. Not only does it offer wonderful bits of wisdom about life’s most perplexing problems, but it also gives a prayer at the end of chapter, which pertains to the theme discussed. For those who are sometimes at a loss for the words to communicate their deepest longings, this book is a wonderful resource.
A sermon by Pastor Morris of the Gateway Church. Pastor Morris clearly elucidates the path for prosperity as hearing, believing, obeying and inhabiting the presence of the Lord.
I can’t believe that we are now in 2011! I feel that this will be a year of wonderful blessings. I am all the more committed to pursuing this path towards a more disciplined life, brimming with purpose. I know that incorporating the spiritual disciplines into each aspect of my life is the way to achieve wholeness, wellness, and wealth. The wealth I speak of is not limited to material riches but to those that are eternal and spiritual: joy, peace, and love. My prayer for me and for you is that we remain focused on what God has defined as His will for our lives. My prayer is that we dedicate our lives to holiness–a word not often used any more, but I am all the more convinced that there is no other way to the wholeness and wellness we seek. God desires us to be holy and to live life in the light of his grace and salvation. I want to do just that, but I know that I am dependent upon Him for the strength, the courage, and the faith to live the life He has called me to: a disciplined, faithful, purposeful, and happy life. Let’s resolve to settle for no less than what He desires for us.
What I intended for this blog to accomplish, as I originally conceptualized it at the beginning of 2010, has dramatically changed. I expected that the blog would serve as an outlet for my creative expression and help me to solidify my thoughts concerning what it truly means to leave a disciplined life. As it turns out, what I discovered is that I have a lot to learn about this area. The idea of living a disciplined life is one that resonates with me because I have felt so burdened by the increasing demands placed upon us in our homes, workplaces, worship centers, and communities. It seems as if there is never enough time in the day or enough of you to share with those who mean the most to you. So, I sought to discover what disciplined living looks like to try to remove some of the pressures that often consume us. What I found is that discipline in itself is not illusive. The challenge for me was (and is) finding a way to maintain consistency and commitment to the core disciplines that structure our existence and that free us to have an abundant life. The core (or spiritual) disciplines of meditation, prayer, fasting, study, submission, and service, to name only a few, are the keys to the kind of life we seek. Once I understood that without these core disciplines I would never experience fulfillment or wholeness, it dawned on me that everything in my life needed to align with these essential principles and practices. In other words, if the activity or the commitment does not reflect my spiritual purpose or disposition then it needed to be reexamined or eliminated. In this way, I came to understand that a disciplined life is possible and is our reasonable service. The only difficulty lies in being honest with ourselves and others about what is ultimately important to us–being clear about what our values are and how we use those values to determine the value of our current commitments and relationships. This is the issue I believe this blog should address. How do we incorporate the disciplines into our daily lives, and how do we shape our daily lives so that they are truly reflective of the disciplines we practice? Heavy stuff!! Are you ready for your journey toward discipline, toward wholeness, toward fulfillment? I am.
“I Need Thy Sense of Time
Always I have an underlying anxiety about things.
Sometimes I am in a hurry to achieve my ends
And am completely without patience. It is hard for me
To realize that some growth is slow,
That all processes are not swift. I cannot always discriminate
Between what takes time to develop and what can be rushed,
Because my sense of time is dulled.
I measure things in terms of happenings.
O to understand the meaning of perspective
That I may do all things with a profound sense of leisure–of time.”–Howard Thurman
I found this beautiful passage in Confirmation: The Spiritual Wisdom That Has Shaped Our Lives by Khephra Burns and Susan L. Taylor, published in 1997. The poem forcefully rings out to me the wisdom behind seeking and acquiring the wisdom of perspective and the practice (discipline) of patience. As I struggle with my own goals and as I try to excavate the treasures of God’s will for my life, I realize how much I need God’s wisdom, to understand the fact that in God’s time and through his provision alone will I reach my destiny. Thurman’s reflection settles me and assures me that with the right perspective and clarity of purpose that I may go about my life’s work, no matter how liberating or daunting, by the grace of God and with the “profound sense of leisure” that only He can offer.
David Allen’s Ready for Anything: 52 Principles for Getting Things Done (2003) is a national bestseller and a wonderful book for those who want to make the best out of each day without undue stress. So much of this book deals with the art of disciplined living by creating simple strategies for handling the onslaught of information, activities, and projects that often tend to direct our lives and cause us to lose focus. By teaching his audience how to be more productive, Allen really charts a path toward greater creativity. I found the text to be very illuminating and in alignment with my own desire for the mental and emotional freedom and energy to do those things God has purposed for me to complete.
In this powerful sermon, Zac Poonen offers three spiritual principles for living a disciplined life.
Consider focusing on your strengths rather than your weaknesses.
