Hello ICC Family!
Last week we kicked off a new discipleship class and a new sermon series and I wrote here about how we all as Christians are on a journey. That journey is called many different things depending on what church background you come from and level of training you have had. Theologians call the bulk of this journey “sanctification.” Really hip and more sensitive Christians call this journey “spiritual formation.” When Laurel and I were on the mission field, our leaders referred to everything as “training,” and so the journey we were trying to help people on was “training for trainers.” (I didn’t care for that name at all!) I guess I am old-school on this one and I greatly just prefer the word discipleship - the process of becoming a better disciple. Disciple is a nice, biblical word, and simply means follower. And that is what Jesus called people to do - follow him. Be like him. Imitate him. Discipleship then is the process by which we grow to follow him better. And it’s a process we have to go through because nobody is very good at it in the beginning.
“… train yourself to be godly. For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come.”
1 Timothy 4:7 – 8
I have had several friends over the past 5 years or so do an exercise program called Couch to 5K. This workout takes people that basically do no exercise at all and slowly builds them up to being able to run a 5K race. It obviously starts very slowly and ramps things up gradually. When you are out of shape and just starting to exercise, there are going to be times when you have to just walk instead of run. There are even going to be times when you have to stop and rest. That’s ok.
I read an article this week that basically says the same thing about our discipleship. It made the point that having the right perspective about our discipleship involves understanding that our direction is the most important thing to remember. Not our speed. So there will be times in our walk with the Lord that we are leaping like a gazelle and seeing incredible victory over sin and victories of faith and people responding to our testimony and witness. Other times you will be making steady progress as you read the Bible, pray, worship, and serve others on a daily basis. At times you will find that your progress is much slower. You are having to trudge along as you struggle with fears or temptation, and you are just trying to make it to church and remember to pray every now and then until you can get your second wind. And then unfortunately, there are times when we aren’t moving at all. We are defeated and paralyzed by fear or sin and struggling with all of our might to get our feet moving again. It is all we can do to remember the words of Hebrews 12:2 - to fix our eyes on Jesus. But if we can do that… even then, when we are struggling so badly… we at least know that we are pointed in the right direction.
Brothers and sisters, we are going back to basics this month, and it’s a time to speak encouragingly yet bluntly with each other and ask each other how we are doing. Let’s do that knowing that everyone is at a different place in their journey. Some people are flying, and some people are barely crawling. The most important thing is whether we are heading in the right direction - towards Jesus!
Blessings to you all. And know that I’m praying for you!
Pastor Aaron