Holy Rewired - "Disciplines and Community"

In this chapter, David Phillips says that the spiritual disciplines and a faith community are "the entryway to self-awareness, emotional healing, and thought change" (which leads to behavioral change).

He warns that there is a danger, however, in practicing the disciplines (prayer, fasting, Bible reading and study, etc.). "The practice of the disciplines can itself be a symptom of brokenness. The disciplines can become a rigid structure of life that allows no room for the divine interruptions of life...The disciplines for some can become the 'total content of their relationship with God, and works righteousness (can become) the shape of their spirituality.'"

When practiced in a healthy way, the disciplines can be a primary avenue on which our journey into wholeness can travel. "It is here that the potter God shapes us into the image of Christ."

Phillips goes on to write about prayer and about "spiritual reading" of the Word. He is careful to point out that the practice of spiritual disciplines needs to be both personal and corporate.

Because I have dealt with this topic a lot on this blog over the years, I will simply share a few quotes from these two sections to conclude this post.

"Prayer is the act by which we divest ourselves of all false belongings and become free to belong to God and God alone." (Henry Nouwen)

The suggestion is made that we use the Psalms and the prayers of those who have come before us: "This (the prayers of the psalmists and others) is the essence of the classical spiritual discipline of prayer; not our private, individualized prayers, but immersing ourselves in the deep, sacrificial prayers of the saints through which the church through the ages has offered itself to be the body of Christ in the world. Unless our individual prayer life exists within the greater support structure of the prayers of the saints, it will tend to become very narrow, individualized and privatized, and we will shy away from yielding control of our existence for God's purposes." - Robert Mulholland

In speaking of "spiritual reading", the author is referring to encountering God through the Scriptures and also through the writings of His people throughout church history.

While the study of the Word is very important, "spiritual" (or devotional) reading means to approach the Word with a submissive and humble heart with the desire to encounter Jesus personally in it and to allow it to speak to us personally, whether that be to encourage and affirm or to correct or direct us.

The chapter ends with this statement: "...the scriptures, along with our relationships, reveal our emotional brokenness, the patterns of destructive thinking and habits as well as areas where we are hurting others...This practice of letting the text challenge us to explore the motivation behind behavior is key to opening up the emotional brokenness and the destructive thinking and helps free us towards a life of wholeness as well as conformity to the image of Christ."