Mark 2:1-12,
Philippians 2:1-5,
1 Timothy 4:8
Rev. Linda Fernandes-Bailey
February 19, 2006
“Spiritually Fit”
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about Betty, a woman who was a member of my home church. Betty was a woman of amazing faith. She would come to church every Sunday as she was able always carrying her bible. I loved her bible because it had quotes written in it, it had passages underlined, papers and bookmarks in it and it was worn and torn….in other words it was a well read bible! It was a bible that had gone many places with Betty and had gotten her through many of life’s passages. You could tell Betty read her bible because whenever you had a conversation with her she had no problem quoting a verse. She didn’t quote it to prove a point or win an argument she quoted it to extend God’s love and fill you with encouragement or possibly to explain what had helped her through a difficult time. Not only could she quote scripture but out of nowhere she would just start belting out a hymn. Once she even left a message on my answering machine singing a hymn….how wonderful it was to come home to hear Betty’s sweet voice praising God! Betty was seeped in faith…it was in every fiber of her being. She was spiritually fit! Physically she had many ailments…liver disease…depression and who knows what else but her physical disabilities were not the first thing you would notice about Betty because you were struck by her spiritual fitness. At least I know I was! Betty was a woman in her seventies and grew up in a time when church and bible study were central to people’s life. You could tell she spent many a day reading the bible…not just studying it but meditating on it…praying with scripture and allowing scripture to seep deep into her heart. It was not that her life wasn’t busy she raised five children and worked and as I recall was widowed early on so her life was not easy by any means. But nurturing her faith and praising God were her priorities…it was what shaped and formed who she was and God’s love flowed easily through her. In fact periodically Betty would come up to me at coffee hour and give me a big hug and say have I told you lately how much we appreciate your work with the children here…thank you for your ministry. I could never leave a conversation with Betty without feeling like I had been touched by God. She was a spiritual friend the kind that would carry you through a crowd…break through the roof and do whatever she had to… to get you to Jesus. She had faith enough for all of us.
You may or may not know it but my area of ministry here is spiritual formation. Spiritual Formation is a very popular term right now in the profession of ministry and programs for training are popping up everywhere. If you go online you will find quite an array of articles, books and retreat centers all offering training in spiritual formation. Spiritual formation is not a new concept and actually many of the teaching programs on spiritual formation seek to bring back ancient spiritual disciplines of prayer, fasting, meditation and reading scripture. So what is spiritual formation? The image of God as the potter and we as the clay from Isaiah is a good image to hold when thinking about spiritual formation. Spiritual formation is God’s work in and through us. Paul would say as he did in today’s scripture that the purpose of Christian spiritual formation is having the same love and mind as Jesus. “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus” were his words. He is speaking not just to individuals but to a community telling them they need to have unity of mind and heart and that unity is always in Christ Jesus for the church and for individual Christians. Granted that’s a lofty goal for both individuals and the church but remember this is a life long process. In Galatians Paul says “My little children, for whom I am again in the pain of child birth until Christ is formed in you.” (Gal 4:19) The idea of spiritual formation is that as Christ is formed in us and we take on the same heart and mind as Christ we naturally begin to respond in all situations as Christ would with love and compassion and speaking out bolding against injustice. The temptation is always letting the world form us and resisting God’s formation. Luckily, the work of spiritual formation is not ours alone. It is initiated by God but we participate in it. In other words when we feel the Spirit’s nudge we listen…we respond rather than brushing it off. The challenge is to be able to recognize the Spirit in the first place. The reason that spiritual disciplines like prayer, meditation and reading scripture become important is that they help us first of all to know the heart and mind of Jesus. How can we have it if we don’t even know what that is? We find that in scripture because scripture is the place that we can know who Jesus is. We can see in scripture that: “Jesus is the human being fully alive and fully open to God’s work in the world. He is the fulfillment of God’s work of spiritual formation.”(The Spiritual Formation Bible) Through prayer and meditation we open our hearts and clear the clutter in our minds that so we can become more aware of God’s presence…more aware of God’s voice…more aware of God’s call for us so that we might live into our divine purpose and live into our true self.
In Paul’s letter to Timothy he gives pastoral advice for the health of congregations. One thing he says in the letter is “”while physical training is of some value, godliness is valuable in every way, holding promise for both this life and the life to come” So the question is: How spiritually fit are you? Do you train yourself in godliness? Is your faith strong enough to carry your friends? There is a lot of information out there about what we need to do to be physically fit…exercise 30 minutes most days…eat foods that are low in fat…high in fiber…eat lots of fruits and vegetables and the list goes on and on. You can not pick up a magazine that will not have an article in it about what to do to be physically fit. But what about spiritually fit? How do we train ourselves in godliness? Well, you have taken a great first step because you are here today! More and more research shows that those who have a spiritual practice of prayer and worship are healthier. Perhaps Paul did not know it but there is a close connection between body and spirit. Prayer can actually induce the relaxation response in the body according to Dr Andrew Weil! But like exercise a once a week spiritual practice will not benefit one as much as a daily practice (or at least multiple times a week). So in my work here I have tried to provide programs that would teach and encourage spiritual practices so that we can participate in God’s spiritual formation of each of us. I have tried to provide classes that would help each of us to “put on Christ” and have the same love and mind as Christ. I have tried to provide programs in which small Christian community forms and people can together explore their faith journey, have a safe place to ask questions and express doubt and support one another. We have had great successes. I have seen again and again that once people make the commitment transformation can and does happen. Yet I sometimes feel discouraged because I am always up against the pull of the culture that values busy-ness and achievement…progress and production. Sitting and meditating feels like doing nothing…who has time for that!!! Listening for God’s voice…listening deeply to one another…looking for God’s presence in our lives hardly feel like productive activities. They take time, practice and patience. We may have to commit to spiritual formation again and again.
I hear your cry for shorter classes but I hesitate. I hesitate because personal experience tells me that the longer you journey with people the more you grow together. Trust builds and people are more willing to be vulnerable…our hearts open wider…we take in love…we learn compassion…we begin to see others as Jesus would…we begin to be shaped and formed by God. We are upheld by friends whose faith is so strong they can carry us and break through any barrier that keeps us from God. I will never forget my first experience in a small group bible study. My husband and I were newlyweds (now that was a long time ago) we participated in a program called renew. It met in peoples homes and the classes ran in 6week sessions then you’d have a break and start up again. We did this for six years. I grew up having religious education but somewhere along the way got spiritual amnesia and really knew little about being a Christian. This was the first time I even read a bible…the first time I was talking with others about faith…the first time I was around others who were living an intentionally Christian life. It became a safe place to bring my questions and doubts. Jim says what he liked best was that you could have read a passage thinking that you had figured out the meaning but when you gathered as a group others had insights you hadn’t even considered and so you learned all the more! I learned as much about life as I did about the bible. Being a young couple it was great to have more seasoned couples in our group who modeled healthy marriage for us. There were elderly folk who had wisdom way beyond our years. It was a profound experience…a great way to start our marriage and the people we journeyed with remain forever in my heart. They were my wisdom teachers…my mentors…my friends. This was the beginning of committing to a life long process of participating in God’s spiritual formation. I learned what it meant to be a faithful person and the knowledge that didn’t sink in as a child was beginning to take form. Remember spiritual formation is a life long process so we need to be continually exploring and learning about our faith and how to practice it. We need to participate in God’s formation.
Last March I went to a workshop on Centering Prayer a form of Christian meditation. At the end of the class the teacher turned to us and said “So, Can you commit to this practice?” And that statement hit me like a ton of bricks. I had been trying to meditate for years suddenly it hit me… it’s all about commitment! Commitment does not mean it will be easy. It does not mean we will feel like we have the time. It does not mean we will reap immediate rewards. It means that we have decided that something is important enough that we will keep at it. That we will come back to it again and again no matter how busy we are and no matter how cluttered our minds become. It is because we are so busy and cluttered that we need spiritual fitness! I came here with a vision of infusing excitement about spiritual formation and wanted to get people excited about journeying together. I had visions of filled classes. This has not always happened. But, I hold fast to my vision confident that God works through me and through each of you. Still I fear that people like my friend Betty might be the last of a dying breed. Don’t let that happen! SO… Can you commit to participating in your spiritual formation? Train yourself in holiness! Commit yourself to spiritual fitness! Strengthen your faith so it can be strong enough to carry your friends! Amen.