Prayer (Spiritual Disciplines Part 2)

Photo: Smabs Sputzer

Oh, the Olympics...a beloved tradition in my family.  It’s such a thrill to see competitors from ninety-plus nations in one place, to root for the good ole U. S. of A., and to watch athletes live the moments they’ve trained for their whole lives.  My favorite events involve balance (gymnastics, snowboarding, figure skating)...athletes pushing themselves to the very edge of control.  It’s intense to watch someone flipping and flying, almost losing it but somehow finding their center of gravity and making the seemingly impossible happen. 

Spiritual disciplines bring this kind of reorientation for the Christian.  They are signposts we build into our lives to remind us which way is up as life continually upends us.  Without them, we can lose control and find the landing to be painful.  

In part one, we discussed practicing solitude (creating space to be alone with God), and today we examine what we do with our solitude.  For the Christian, the goal is not to achieve some blissful state of nothingness.  Instead, our solitude should sensitize us to God’s presence and the unchanging truth of the Gospel.  We experience this primarily through prayer and the study of Scripture.

It’s easy for our prayers to become dominated by superstitious, please-oh-please-God petitions to a cosmic vending machine.  It’s our nature to be consumed with our desires, and our prayers often reflect this.  To combat this tendency, we must let God’s Word spur and shape the way we pray.   

The Bible contains several common prayer themes emulated by the church for millennia.  We see prayers of praise (for God’s character and works), confession (of sin and need for God), intercession (personally and for others), lament (over sin and trials), and yet more praise.  Jesus echoes these themes in his model prayer.  Meditating on and applying each line of this prayer to our lives is a great start to cultivating a biblically shaped prayer life.   

Our Father in heaven,  (How has he shown himself as Father?)

hallowed be your name.  (What sets God apart?)

Your kingdom come, your will be done,

on earth as it is in heaven.  (What circumstances are we surrendering to God’s will?)

Give us this day our daily bread,  (What do we need?)

and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.  (How have we sinned?  Whom should we forgive?)

And lead us not into temptation,

but deliver us from evil. (What guidance and help do we need?  What evil do we face?).

Following a biblical pattern lifts our prayers from the fog of our immediate desires to a clear-eyed vision of Christ’s character (and our identity in him).  This is true of much of Scripture but is particularly applicable to the psalms.  The psalms provide language to pray about every part of life, no matter how dark, in contrast to the strictly “positive and encouraging” culture of our day.  This article, this plan, and this book/app are great resources for praying the psalms.

Another simple “reorienting” method is praying breath prayers.  Breath prayers are brief prayers (a Scripture verse or hymn lyric) than can be recited while taking a deep breath.  These prayers can happen any time (a pause during work, a restroom break, an elevator ride) to practically reawaken ourselves to God’s presence and work.  A prayer I often use comes from Psalm 33: “Let your steadfast love be upon us even as we hope in you.”  Other good ones are Romans 8:1, Psalm 46:1, or Revelation 5:12.  The purpose is to take a deep breath, pray, and be reminded of the Gospel in the midst of whatever you’re doing.  

Biblical prayer is inseparable from studying Scripture, so we’ll examine that in part three.  

This series draws from Mike Cosper’s Recapturing the Wonder.

Solitude (Spiritual Disciplines Part 1)

Photo: klndonnelly

This series draws from Mike Cosper’s Recapturing the Wonder, which examines spiritual disciplines as pathways to reawakening our sense of awe in God’s work around us and His presence in us.

The trees along the Pearl River are still mostly bare in early March, but what beauty they lack in color is made up for by the stillness they guard.  I walked for a while one day, mandolin slung over my shoulder, along a trail that winds its way through puddles and fallen leaves to a tiny clearing at a bend in the river.  This little patch would be submerged later in the spring, but on this grey afternoon, it was the perfect spot for me to be alone and search for a song.  I strummed for a while at the water’s edge but found I didn’t have much to say, so I thumbed through my notebook to an old hymn text I’d scribbled down that morning.  As I sang that prayer over the water, the noise in my head quieted, and for a few minutes, my soul drank in the elusive joy of solitude.

Solitude is difficult to come by for me these days.  Between work and laundry and twin babies on the verge of toddlerhood (and...Netflix and Twitter), making time to be alone with God is a hard habit to cultivate.  Yet it’s something Jesus modeled for us time and again.  He’d teach and heal and give of himself and then quietly slip away from the bustle to be alone with his Father.  It was his way of reorienting himself, of calling to mind the reality that he was in the world but not of it.

In a world that is increasingly restless and constantly busy, Christians must create space daily for stillness with God.  Notice that I didn’t say “find time.”  Everyone is busy, and if we allow ourselves this excuse, we’ll never actually find time.  In Recapturing the Wonder, Mike Cosper recounts his experience on a retreat at a small monastery in Kentucky.  The monks there have built their daily life around times of prayer and worship, signaled by the ringing of bells throughout the day.  Similarly, our days (and weeks and years) should be intentionally framed by times of worship, not as a means of pleasing God but of resting in Christ’s work on our behalf.

Time alone with God should anchor our daily routine, and we don't have to take a monastic vow or a long walk in the woods to make it happen.  Some people wake early for half an hour of prayer and Scripture study.  Some use their lunch breaks, and some end the day with a time of quiet stillness.  It’s looked different for me in each season of life, but right now, my times of solitude revolve around my twins.  Every morning, I sit between them for 15-20 minutes to feed them their bottles, so I use this time to pray (with this great app as a purposeful, Scripture-soaked guide).  My evening prayer is similar.  This practice has been life-giving.  

Creating this kind of space isn’t just limited to 30 minutes of quiet.  Throughout the day, we can take moments to pause, say a brief prayer, or recite a verse of Scripture (more on this in part two!).  Mealtimes are perfect for this, as well as trips to the restroom and daily commutes.  A little intentionality goes a long way in reminding yourself of the reality of the Gospel.  The result of these “reorientations” is a heightened awareness of God’s presence in and purpose for our lives.

As our series continues, we’ll examine what we do with our solitude (prayer and Scripture study) as well as fasting, feasting, and generosity.  Stay tuned for part two!

He Has Come, The Christ of God

Photo: Joe O'Meara

For more Advent resources, check out our posts about celebrating Advent as a family and dealing with the problem of Santa.  

This summer, some good friends who live out of town came to visit us.  They’re the type of friends that you may only see every couple of years, but when you get together, it’s as if no time has passed.  The conversations are rich and lengthy, full of laughter, and in our case, usually enjoyed over styrofoam containers of the finest Chinese food a delivery man could offer.  

We started planning for our short time together weeks in advance, so when the day came, our anticipation level had reached its peak.  Our kids waited by the window, eyeing each passing car to see if it carried the faces of our friends.  And then finally, they were here.  Our visit was everything we expected and hoped for, and of course it was too short and we spoke of when we could get together again.  Then, they were gone.  

The Advent season is a lot like this for me, and I think it is a reflection of the anticipation God’s people (and even creation) felt in the time leading up to Christ’s birth.  Humanity longed for its Creator, for restoration, for rescue, for true life.  And then, he was here.  The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.  His time here was more glorious than anyone could have dreamed, and He changed the course of human history forever.  And now, we once again wait for him to return...this time to stay.  

I recently heard a retuned version of a hymn by 19th-century minister and hymn-writer, Horatius Bonar, called “He Has Come, The Christ of God.”  As we celebrate Advent, may these words be a reminder to us of all that Christ accomplished in his coming and all that he will complete when he comes again.  

He has come, the Christ of God:
Left for us His glad abode;
Stooping from His throne of bliss
To this darksome wilderness.

He has come, the Prince of Peace:
Come to bid our sorrows cease;
Come to scatter with His light
All the shadows of our night.

He, the mighty King, has come,
Making this poor earth His home:
Come to bear our sin's sad load,
Son of David, Son of God.

He has come, whose Name of grace
Speaks deliverance to our race:
Left for us His glad abode,
Son of Mary, Son of God.

Unto us a Child is born:
Ne'er has earth beheld a morn
Among all the morns of time,
Half so glorious in its prime.

Unto us a Son is given:
He has come from God's own heaven,
Bringing with Him from above
Holy peace and holy love.

Reflecting on the Reformation

Photo: Daniel Ferreira Balta

Much has been written about the Protestant Reformation, especially as we approach the 500th anniversary of the catalyst of that movement: Martin Luther’s posting of his Ninety-five Theses on the door of the church in Wittenburg, Germany on October 31, 1517.  It began the eventual split between the Reformers and the Roman Catholic Church.  It was the beginning of a Gospel resurgence, but it was also the continuation of Jesus’ promise that not even the gates of hell would prevail against his church.

It’s a worthy pursuit to pause and thank God for this movement because, more than anything, it was a movement of God.  The notable names like Luther and Calvin were significant proponents for Christ-centered change whose bold acts and articulate writings continue to echo after half of a millennium.  But these men were human like anyone else.  They were sinners with skeletons in their closets that the Lord sovereignly used in spite of themselves, as he is prone to do (Abraham, Moses, David, Solomon, Paul, Peter, et al).

Circumstances in the church had reached a crisis point (not for the first time or the last), and the Lord used that crisis to bring a renewed focus on the explicit teachings of Scripture: that man is saved by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone to the glory of God alone.  Through the great trials that the Reformation sparked, these truths took root in a fresh way in the hearts of God’s people, and we feel the effects every day.  Every time we read Scripture in our own language, sing together as a congregation, or pray directly to God himself with only Christ as our mediator, we are experiencing the ripples of the Reformation.  

Praise God that he sees fit to correct us in our misdirection that we might continually be brought back to a clear vision of his sovereign grace and perfect love.  Praise God that moments of crisis and suffering are not without hope.  May he always be reforming the hearts of his people.  May he continue to use broken vessels for his purpose.  May we ever seek to live for his glory alone.  

For more information about the people involved in the Reformation, check out this helpful series of short podcasts from Desiring God.  For information about the foundational truths of the Reformation, check out our sermon series on the 5 Solas of the Reformation.

Also, this is a great hymn by Bob Kauflin based on the 5 Solas:
 

The Broken Heart

"The Broken Heart"
Words and music by Stephen McNeill

I have walked under midnight shadows, 
My face numb from the wind
Straining under the weight of sorrow
With dark clouds rolling in

You are a faithful and true companion
You are a close and constant friend
When I am grieving alone, abandoned
The broken heart, you mend
The broken heart, you mend

I am free, I'm a new creation
A dead man made alive
But in the midst of a strong temptation,
I still believe the lie

You are a faithful and true companion
You are a close and constant friend
When I am guilty and empty-handed
The broken heart, you mend

Sorrow may last for the night, 
But oh, the morning! 
When darkness gives way to the light,
When dancing replaces mourning!

In the hearts of your sons and daughters
Abides a bounty unseen
An endless river of living water, 
An ever-swelling stream

You are a faithful and true companion
You are a close and constant friend
When I am ruined, I find compassion
The broken heart, you mend

Family Worship (Vintage Family Part 1)

Photo by: Dave Traynor

This is the first in a series of posts on the Biblical family.  Stay tuned in the coming weeks for more.

The Bible strongly calls parents to teach and disciple their children but never really gives a specific guide as to what worship in the home should look like.  So, unfortunately, generic prayers at mealtime often make up the entirety of a family’s worship time together.  But if the Gospel is informing and shaping all aspects of our lives, transforming every moment into a continuous act of worship, shouldn’t we carefully consider how our families worship together?  

Since the birth of our oldest daughter, my wife and I have been blessed to know several families who set examples we could follow as we sought to cultivate worship in our home.  Over the years, we’ve implemented some of their ideas as well as some of our own.  What follows are a few things that work for our family.  Some of these might not apply to your family, and I’m quite sure that our own routine will change as our kids get older.  But the idea is that each of us must do something to pursue a family life consumed with Scripture, prayer, and reminders of our need for God’s grace in Christ.  

Bedtime Bible reading

Every night before bed, we sit down with our kids (ages 7 and 4) to read a Bible story.  We briefly discuss it and then pray together.  This usually takes ten minutes, at the most.  It requires no preparation time, eloquent speech, or special talent.  It just takes a little bit of time.  It’s a baby step that leaves a huge footprint.  Over time, these stories become ingrained, and the kids remember and relate them to situations in their lives.  

For our readings, we rotate through several age-appropriate, story Bibles: The Rhyme Bible (great for toddlers), The Beginner’s Bible (simple language, summarizes many key stories), The Jesus Storybook Bible (contains fewer stories but deeper and more beautiful language/art, points all of Scripture to Jesus), and the Seek and Find ESV Bible (includes the entire English Standard Version translation, illustrated summaries of a very wide selection of Bible stories, and discussion questions).

Prayer

After we read the Bible at bedtime, we spend a minute or two praying together about whatever may be going on that day.  The kids are welcome to pray aloud or silently if they want, but they don’t have to pray.  We just make them be still and quiet during prayer out of respect for those who are praying.  

To remind us to pray about a variety of things, we also follow a weekly prayer calendar.  Each day of the week, we pray for different people in our lives: family members, friends who don’t know Christ, missionaries we know or support, and others.  It reminds all of us that there is more to prayer than thanking God for our food, though we certainly do that too!  A brief prayer of thanksgiving before meal time is a great way to pause and remember the One from whom, to whom, and through whom all things exist.  We also try to be sensitive to stop and pray during special instances of need or praise as they arise.

Catechism and Scripture memory

A couple of years ago, we began learning A Catechism for Boys and Girls during our missional community gatherings, and it has become an integral part of our family life.  The catechism asks key questions like “Who made you?” (Answer: “God made me.”) and “Why did God make you and all things?” (Answer: “For His own glory.”).  As we memorize each question and answer, we examine Scriptures that illustrate each point and slowly learn the overarching themes of the Bible.  Learning the catechism continually brings about wonderful spiritual conversations with our kids and provokes them to ask important questions.  We often discuss the catechism over dinner together.  It has been just as beneficial for us as it has for them!

Our first exposure to this catechism was in the Truth and Grace Memory Books, which contain the catechism questions, as well as hymns and age-based lists of Bible verses that we memorize as a family.  The main way we memorize these verses is by making up silly but memorable tunes to go along with the words.  You don’t have to be very musically literate to do this.  Just take a portion of Scripture and try singing it to a tune.  It doesn’t have to be good, just memorable!  

Songs

Speaking of music, our kids enjoy a song at bedtime, so we often sing a verse of a hymn or part of a worship song that we know from our church.  For non-musical people, singing together can be intimidating, but it doesn’t have to be.  Kids don’t care if you sing well, and it doesn’t have to be very formal.  Often, just including some quality worship music in the rotation during car rides or around the house will often bring it about organically.  Download some worship songs you enjoy from iTunes or make a Spotify playlist that you can use to sing along with your family.

Church worship gatherings

Gathering to worship with our church is an extension of the worship that takes place in our home.  For our kids, some parts of congregational worship are required: they must come with us,  and after a certain age, they must sit with us in the worship service.  They must be quiet and still (within reason, of course...they’re kids!) during prayer, preaching, communion, etc.  But some things aren’t required: we encourage them to pray, sing, and read along, but we don’t make them.  We also try to explain what is going on in worship to the kids on their level.  We seek to find the balance between modeling worship and requiring obedience without legalism.

Other thoughts

It has taken time for these things to become normal for us, and it’s still a work in progress.  Sometimes, we stay out late and don’t have time for our bedtime routine, or we go a long time between learning Scriptures.  But little by little, by experimenting to find what works, worship has become part of everything we do as a family.  As a result, we get to use the Scriptures we’ve memorized, catechism questions we’ve learned, and songs we’ve sung in “real life” situations.  When the girls are scared of the dark, we recite “When I am afraid, I will trust in You.”  When something wonderful happens, we sing “Praise God from whom all blessings flow…”  When there is whining or complaining, we sing “Give thanks in all circumstances for the is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”  When the kids are violent toward each other, we say, “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you.”  It makes the discipline more meaningful, the blessings sweeter, and the fears and pains more bearable.  

Find what works for your family, and do it!

Worshiping Passionately (Vintage Values: Part 2)

Photo: Vicki Wolkins

This is the second post in a series on the core values of Vintage Church.  You can read part one here.

It is impossible to talk about the Gospel too much, so let’s start by talking about the Gospel. I was dead in my sin, separated from God, under His wrath, and utterly without hope. This is the place all humanity exists apart from God’s intervention. But God is rich in merciful love, and because of His great love for us, He made a way for me to be saved: He sent His only Son as my substitute to take the full punishment for my sins that I might have an avenue of escape from sin and death. He gave me faith to believe and repent, and now I am His child and will be forever. He has raised me to live a new life with Him as my king. Hallelujah!

So, how do I respond to this glorious thing that has happened to me? How do I worship God for who He is and what He has done? What is Christian worship supposed to look like?

We generally describe worship as some sort of religious exercise: attending a church gathering, reading some sort of religious text, listening to someone preach, singing songs of worship, praying, or doing some faith-motivated act of service. The Bible clearly commands that these things should be a part of our worship, but is that all there is to it? Is worship relegated only to the most overtly religious compartments of life? Well, Romans 11:36-12:2  says this:

For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.

I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.  Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

If this text is true (and it is), then it seems that Christian culture has somehow come to define Christian worship as something less than it is. Worship is not to be merely constrained to our religious acts. Because all things are from Christ and through Christ and to Christ, for His glory, our logical response should be to present ourselves to Him as living sacrifices. This is an act of worship that never ceases, that consumes every minuscule moment of our lives. All of life is an opportunity to worship Jesus because all of life belongs to Him. Drinking your morning coffee can be an act of worship. Responding to the jerk who cut you off in traffic can be an act of worship. Doing your work, arguing with your spouse, spending your money, grieving the death of a loved one, watching your favorite band perform, seeing your football team lose, paying your taxes, tweeting...every aspect of your life can and should be an act of worship to God.  

In order to pursue this kind of lifestyle, we must continually ask ourselves this question:

"In light of the Gospel, how should I live this moment?"

In light of the Gospel, we can face trials and suffering with joy, work our jobs for God’s glory, cope with disappointment, celebrate good things (regardless of their “Christianness” or lack thereof), and live with gratitude and contentment. True worship is not about making each moment a religious exercise. It springs forth from recognizing and leaning into the fact that Jesus is king of every aspect of your life, from the mundane to the extraordinary, the “most” spiritual moments to the “least.” If He is king of all, then every moment can be lived for His glory.

For Vintage Church, fostering this lifestyle of worship, both corporately and individually, is vital to our existence. The Lord is continuing to sanctify us and teach us in this area, but we press forward to make every part of life an act of worship. We do this in three ways we see outlined in Scripture:

1. Personal worship- This includes private prayer and study of Scripture as well as honoring the Lord in the way we think, treat each other, and use our time and resources.

2. Small group worship- This includes being a part of one of our missional community groups, in which we study Scripture, share meals, work together to reach our neighbors with the Gospel, hold each other accountable, and live life together (not just on Sundays).  

3. Corporate worship- This includes our Sunday morning gathering and other gatherings that involve the church as a whole.  The Bible is preached, songs are sung, communion is taken, and prayers are said as a local body gathered in one place.

Every Sunday, we recite a prayer after we take communion, and I always think of it as a wonderful summary of what a lifestyle of worship looks like. So, I often pray:

Almighty God,

We thank you for the body and blood of Your Son, Jesus Christ.

Through Him, we offer you our souls and bodies to be a living sacrifice.

Send us out, in the power of Your Spirit, to live and work to Your praise and glory.

Amen.

In light of the Gospel, may we present ourselves as living sacrifices--not being conformed to the world but being transformed by the renewing of our minds that we may discern the will of God in every moment of our lives.