This morning I would like to talk about how to live spirituality in the real world.
We live in a world of terrorist attacks
– of sexual predators that prey on small children
– of gang violence and drug busts
– of economic hardships, poverty, homelessness, and starvation
– of battered spouses and neglected children
– of wars and rumors of wars
– of homelessness and poverty.
We live in a world of shattered dreams, broken promises, and heart-wrenching grief.
That’s the real world!
But that’s not all there is to the real world.
We also live in a world were many nations have learned to live at peace with one another
– where babies are birthed and children are nurtured
– where neighbors learn to see beyond their differences to find commonality
– where many families are marked by fidelity, honor, love and integrity
– where joy and laughter punctuate the stuff of every day life.
– where it is possible to find joy and know fulfillment.
We live in a world of tremendous beauty, of mountain streams, rolling hills, and vast oceans. We live in a world where even amidst the desert sands you can find an oasis.
This, too, is the real world.
The real world is an enormous place, filled with both good and bad, wonder and dread, potential and despair. If you have lived more than a handful of years, you have experienced all of the above, both the good and the bad. You have known beauty and ugliness, elation and sorrow, possibility and despondency, goodness and grief.
The question is, “How are we to live in such a world?”
It would be a easier if it were not for the apparent cosmic moods swings. If we knew what to expect from the day when we woke up in the morning it would be a lot easier to face that day. If we knew that everyday would be a good day then we’d be ready to receive each day as a gift. If we knew that each new day would be a bad day then we’d be ready to confront those days as well. The problem is that this is not how the world works.
Ask British Prime Minister Tony Blair. On one day he is punching the air with joy as he and all Londoners celebrate their city’s selection to host the 2112 Olympics. The next day his face is more solemn in the wake of London’s terrorist bombings.
So how do we live a life of consistency in a world that seems so inconsistent?
We need to answer that question because the world is and will always be an inconsistent place. That is what I’d like to talk about this morning. I want to talk about a quality of life that separates light from darkness and hope from despair. I want to talk about real world spirituality
Now right off the back I realize that I have to define the word spirituality. In some respects when we hear this word in the church it sounds just a little bit dirty – thanks to the crystal gazers, the Hollywood Scientologist, and the new age gurus. I propose that we redeem this word and understand it from a biblical perspective. Spirituality is not gushing sentimentality. Spirituality is not pink-cheeked piety. Spirituality is not a warm fuzzy or some sort of escape hatch designed to remove us from reality.
What is spirituality? Let’s take our cues from the Apostle Paul!
Spirituality is LIFE IN THE SPIRIT. And by the “Spirit” we don’t mean some nebulous expressions of positive thought patterns or some impersonal force that we call “the universe.” By Spirit we mean Holy Spirit. We mean one expression of the Triune God – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Spirituality means living by faith in the Holy Spirit of God to be our source and supply for living. We do not live by “the flesh” – independent, self-assured, fulfilling our wants, whims, and desires. We live dependent on God, trusting God – no matter what the REAL WORLD throws at us!
If the real world throws some blessing (a good home, a nice job, a loving family, good health, financial well-being, etc., etc., etc.), we don’t live from those blessing – we live dependent on God as our source and supply.
If the real world throws us a curve ball (no job, poor health, financial stress, sickness, sorrow, suffering and death), we STILL live our lives dependent on God as our source and supply.
The reality is that the real world is filled with things we might consider to be both GOOD and BAD, blessings and catastrophe, - and if you live long enough, you’re going to experience a bit of all of it. The path to the victorious living is NOT to allow the circumstances to determine how we live – but to allow our relationship with God to determine how we live. That’s living by the Spirit – the Holy Spirit. That’s real world spirituality.
How do we move from our current way of living toward a lifestyle that is more spiritual?
How do we move from a lifestyle that is control by the flesh (which is the self-life – self-centered, self-righteousness, and self-dependent) toward a way of living that is spiritual (life in and from the Spirit)?
It begins, as most things Christian, with surrender. We don’t grunt our way into the realm of the Spirit with fists clenched and nostrils flaring. We don’t batter down the doors of the spirit-world. We simply open ourselves --whoever and whatever we may be -- and welcome Spirit in. We pray the same words we often sing:
Spirit of the living God,
Fall afresh on me.
Melt me, mold me,
Fill me, use me.
Spirit of the living God,
Fall afresh on me.
We cannot live “life by the spirit” without surrender. Listen to what Paul says: “Those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit."
Those who live by the flesh are those who refuse to surrender.
Understand that Paul is not talking about the unbeliever. Paul is talking about those in the church who live with the myth that they have all they need to “make it” in this world. They live with the notion that they know better than God how life is to be lived. They often are what I would call “practical atheist.” They believe in the existence of God. They might even affirm certain orthodox Christian doctrines. They might even express a belief that salvation comes only through Christ. They might even desire to live FOR GOD. Yet on a “practical level,” they live most of their days without an awareness of or dependence on God. They live by the flesh rather than by faith. They live from the resources they find in SELF rather than in the SPIRIT. While they might desire to live FOR GOD, they do not live FROM GOD by faith.
They need to surrender. They need to stop setting our minds on the flesh and start setting their minds on the Spirit. To be "spiritual" means to know and live by the knowledge that God is present to us in the Holy Spirit as the source and supply by which we live.
The first step toward real world spirituality is to surrender to the Holy Spirit and to live our lives dependent on Him by faith.
The second step is discipline. I know that might strike you as odd, coming from me. Discipline has a ring of legalism about it (it strikes a note of rules, rituals, and regulations). You know that there is nothing I despise more than legalism. But here’s the thing: spiritual discipline and religious legalism are not the same thing.
What is a spiritual discipline?
Those of you who attended our recent Bible study: “Spiritual Living for Ordinary People” might remember how we defined the idea of a spiritual discipline. Looking in Webster’s, we defined a DISCIPLINE as “any activity engaged in by intentional effort that will help a person do what they could not otherwise do through intentional effort.”
The example I shared involved me making a decision to run in twenty-five mile marathon (a purely mythical example, I assure you). The reality is that I do not have the strength, stamina, or will power to run in a twenty-five mile marathon. I might wish I had the strength. I might even buy a new pair of running shoes and sign my name on the roster of those willing to run the race. Nevertheless, I need to face the truth: I would be one of those who are scraped up off the pavement by the rescue squad at the end of the day. It is simply not within me to run that kind of race at this time. HOWEVER, if I began a training regiment through daily exercise and diet I could condition myself to run and finish that kind of race about this time next year. It’s all a matter of TRAINING.
That’s what a spiritual discipline is. It is training for living our lives dependent on God. A spiritual discipline is “any activity that will help me depend more on the Holy Spirit than on my own strength for the purpose of living life the way Jesus taught and modeled it.”
That’s the whole purpose of spiritual disciplines like meditation, reflection, Bible study, confession, simplicity, fasting and prayer. Each of these disciplines aim to make me less dependent on self (the flesh) and more dependent on God (the Holy Spirit).
Prayer says, “God, I can’t make it on my own, I need you.”
Fasting says, “I am trusting you to be my nourishment and strength.”
Study says, “I don’t have the wisdom to deal with all the real world – I need God’s word.”
Giving says, “I don’t find my security in my possessions. I find my security in God.”
Do you get it? Spiritual living is dependent on some engagement in spiritual disciplines with the aim of helping us surrender our flesh, instead opting to depend on God as our source and supply.
Real world spirituality calls for a life of surrender and discipline.
You should also know that real world spirituality is not aimed at altering our circumstances. Our circumstances will still be a mixture of the good and the bad. That’s simple the stuff of real world living. Real world spirituality aims at altering who we are as we live in the real world. There are at least two ways that we will be changed.
First, life in the Spirit will alter our vision in such a way that we will be able to see the reality of God’s presence no matter what our circumstances.
I find it kind of interesting how easy it is for many of us to write God out of the picture of our lives – no matter what our circumstances.
When things are bad, it is easy to ask the question, “Where is God amidst the turmoil of my life?” When our finances are poor, or our relationships are stress, our body is touched by pain, or we find ourselves faces a terrible illness, or any other of the thousands of things that can go wrong in our lives actually do go wrong, it is easy for many to imagine that God might be missing. We reason that God has turned God’s back on us because of some great sin. Or we imagine that God might not really exist. Or we think that God might not care for us. Or we reason that God might actually be powerless to fix all that is wrong with our lives.
Have you been there?
In that wonderful comic strip features that pathetic little character we know as Ziggy, we see Ziggy returning home after a long and hectic day. His car had a flat tired while on his way to work. Since he was late for work, his boss greeted him with shouts of disapproval. Late in the day he received a call from the fire department telling him that he had left the toaster oven on, resulting in a fire that destroyed his house. When he got home, he stood next to the smoldering ashes of what once had been his house and he grabbed a letter out of the mailbox from the IRS telling him about an audit of his tax return. Frustrated, he raised his hands toward heaven said, “Why is this happening to me?” After a moment of silence, there was a reply from heaven, which said, “It’s because I don’t like you!”
That’s how many of us view the difficult circumstances of our lives. Either God is punishing us, powerless, or simply not present.
What about when things are going well? What about those times when finances are plentiful, when our health is good, and our relationships seem like manna from heaven? We stop to recognize and praise God at moments like these, don’t we? Usually not! Usually we pause to enjoy our circumstances. Perhaps we pause to pat ourselves on the back for bringing these blessing into being. But the reality is that we don’t recognize the presence of God in moments when things go well!
We tend to write God out of the equation of our lives as often as possible. Oh, we might often the cursory and habitual prayer of thanks before consuming the evening meal – but when we look at the circumstances of our life, we tend not to see God.
When we live “but the Spirit,” however, this will begin to change. We will learn to see God’s presence at all the places of our lives! The Psalmist understood this aspect of spiritual living when he wrote in a prayer: “When I climbing to the highest mountains, YOU are there, O Lord. When I descend into the pits of hell, YOU are there also!”
When we live by the Spirit, we will begin to see God’s presence in ALL the circumstances of our lives.
We will see God through the good times as the giver of every good gift – yet we remember that our lives are not to be sustained by the good circumstances, but by God. God is the only adequate source and supply for our lives.
Then we will see God’s presence through the bad times as the one who is holding us, loving us, sustaining us, teaching us, and equipping us. Some of you have recognized this truth. You’ve been through some very hard times – a time of loss, pain, loneliness, sorrow, suffering, or grief – and you’ve come out the other side of those difficult times saying, “I don’t think I could have made it if not for the presence of the Lord.”
Paul writes about this very thing a moment later in Romans 8:31-39. (Read the passage!)
When we live “by the Spirit,” – when we live by faith in the Holy Spirit as our source for life and supply for living – we will discover that “nothing can separate us from the Lord of God that is in Jesus Christ our Lord.”
The second thing that will be impacted by spiritual living our relationships with others.
Through the Holy Spirit, we will see our connection to others.
Each of us (red, yellow, black or white, rich or poor, Bayside or Seaside) has all come from the hand of the same creator-God. By our common humanity as creates of God, we have a connection that will prompt us to love, share, sacrifice and care for the good of others and the common good of the human family.
And for those of us who are in Christ, the bond is even closer. The bond of our common life in the Spirit overshadows our cultural, denominational, and theological differences and human-made boundaries. What an impact it would have on our world when we stop labeling each other in the Christian family and instead start loving each another!
Here’s what will happen when we starting living by the Spirit and not in the flesh. We will start seeing one another through the eyes of Christ and our perspective, feelings, and emotions will be changed. Then we will start loving them by the Spirit, rather than by the flesh, and it will revolutionize our families, our church fellowship, our ministry, and our passion for evangelism.
My friend Mark Maulding, whose preached here on several occasions, once told me about the personal renewal that took place in his when he finally realized that he could not live for God, but needed to live FROM GOD.
Mark shares that nearly every relationship in his life was in ruins. His marriage was in trouble and he didn’t feel he knew how to love his wife. His ministry was in trouble as he had been preaching and teaching religious rules and regulations more than preaching a gospel about a relationship with Jesus Christ.
His awakening came as he read this eighth chapter of Romans and began learning about the difference between life in the Spirit and life in the flesh.
He realized that he couldn’t love his wife as a husband should love a wife, but that the Holy Spirit of God through Him could. He also realized that he could not pastor a church by his own wisdom and strength, but the Holy Spirit through him could make all the difference. Mark started to learn how to surrender his flesh and start depending on the Holy Spirit – and he started to change. And as he changed – so did the way he saw his circumstances. So did the way he viewed his wife and family. So did his preaching and teaching.
Maybe there is a message in Romans 8 for you! Maybe you’ve been wondering how you would make it in the real would. Maybe you’ve been tempted to give up and give in. Maybe you’ve been stressing and straining to make it by your own strength and your own resources. You can’t! But even if you somehow COULD, that’s not God’s way. God wants you to rely on Him. God wants you to LIVE BY THE Holy Spirit. God wants you to live you life with Him as your source and supply.
Stop trying to live for God! Stop it! Just stop it!
There is a better way. Surrender yourself completely to the work of the Holy Spirit. Start living from God instead of for God. Stop living by the flesh and start living by the Spirit.
Hymn 275 – “I Surrender All!”
