A Disciplined Life!

July 21, 2010

 

“A Disciplined Life!”

 

I remember when I played ball how tedious and sometimes weary I would become practicing during the season.  In the beginning of the season I had a bounce in my step and an enthusiasm in my attitude related to practice.  As the season wore on and I became more familiar with the schemes it became much more difficult to be as invested in preparing myself for the games on Friday.  My life of faith can sometimes get that way.  After all I have been at this for 54 years.  Practicing day in and day out, reading scripture, meditating, worshipping on Sunday, Wednesday night Bible studies, praying, sharing the various disciplines of our faith.  It can become predictable and old hat sometimes.  I tend to forget oftentimes the reason behind the discipline.  I am not practicing the disciplines out of obligation or as some test or proof that I am a good Christian.  It is through the practice of the disciplines that I come to be aware of who God is and what God is doing in life!!!  The disciplines are tools that God and the church give to me to sense and become present with the reality of God’s presence and work in every moment I live!  When I come to remember that and I come to realize the purpose behind the practice it makes the disciplines come alive because they are about sensing and discerning the will of God now!!

 

When I become sloppy and lazy in my practice of the disciplines I become numb to the presence of God in my life and in the life of the world around me.  The given of the Christian life of faith is that God is working and revealing God’s will in this moment, right now!  My apathy and my lack of discipline with sensing and responding to that presence and work leaves me out of the loop of what God is doing.  Many Christians keep wanting God to do all the work.  Many Christians just keep expecting God to show up in miraculous ways that are obvious and powerful.  Many times the work of God is discovered in the silence, in the stillness, in the background of living.  Our role is to utilize all the tools God has given us to heighten our awareness and sensitize us to where God is, what God is doing, and how God is revealing God’s love in the midst of a hurting creation.  Practicing the disciplines bends and shapes our wills to God’s.  Without such discipline we become unaware and unavailable to all that God is doing in our lives and in the life of the creation all around us.  God continues to be so faithful to us.  When you stop to consider all that we have been given by God it seems a little foolish to keep expecting God to do all the work for us.  We must learn to live out the disciplines of our faith.  Such a life is really the only one worth living!!!

 

I will see you on the road,

 

Travis

"LIfe is...."

July 1, 2010

 

“Life Is ….”

 

It is hard to accept that July is already here and the summer is slipping away from me.  Life seems to be like that.  It just seems to squirm and turn and wiggle and jiggle and we struggle at best to keep it where we think we want it.  About the time we think we have it secure something happens and we lose our grip on it again and then we find ourselves wrestling with it and clutching at it, trying to hold it down.  I remember being at a rodeo once and they had an event where several kids were put in the arena and a greased pig was let loose.  The object was to catch the pig for a cash prize.  It was so funny to watch those kids and their efforts at catching and controlling that pig.  One kid finally did it but it took a while and he didn’t hold it for long!

 

It is difficult at best to allow life to be what it is in any given moment.  We work hard, we expend great amounts of time and energy to box it up, contain it, control it and make it fit our ideas of what it should be and how it should express itself.  It doesn’t take long before it just gets away from us again and we find ourselves frustrated, angry, and hurt because once again it has surprised us and delivered to us an experience we just didn’t see coming.  I am not sure God ever intended that we control life.  The Genesis story has God and the first human beings just enjoying the life of creation, carefree, and in harmony with it.  Maybe we should spend less time trying to manipulate life and more time just sensing what it is and the expression it is seeking to share in any given moment.  It is not easy to grant life such freedom.  Any yet, I am not sure we grant life anything.  It seems to me life is free no matter how hard we try to convince ourselves it is not.  I like the wildness of life.  I am beginning to appreciate the reality that it cannot be contained and that it defies our pitiful attempts at controlling it.  Life is here, right now and we have the freedom and opportunity to go with where it seeking expression next.  What an adventure!  There is nothing quite like living, is there?

 

I will see you on the road,

 

Travis