Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life PDF

NavPress is the publishing ministry of The Navigators, an international Christian organization and leader in personal spiritual development. NavPress is committed to helping people grow spiritually and enjoy lives of meaning and hope through personal and group resources that are biblically rooted,...

NavPress is the publishing ministry of The Navigators, an international Christian organization and leader in personal spiritual development. NavPress is committed to helping people grow spiritually and enjoy lives of meaning and hope through personal and group resources that are biblically rooted, culturally relevant, and highly practical. For a free catalog go to www.NavPress.com. © 1991, 2014 by Donald S. Whitney A NavPress published resource in alliance with Tyndale House Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form without written permission from NavPress, P.O. Box 6000, Colorado Springs, CO 80934-6000. NAVPRESS and the NAVPRESS logo are registered trademarks of NavPress, The Navigators. Absence of ® in connection with marks of NavPress or other parties does not indicate an absence of registration of those marks. TYNDALE is a registered trademark of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc. ISBN 978-1-61521-617-8 Cover image by Shutterstock Some of the anecdotal illustrations in this book are true to life and are included with the permission of the persons involved. All other illustrations are composites of real situations, and any resemblance to people living or dead is coincidental. Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked NASB are taken from the New American Standard Bible,® copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. Scripture quotations marked NIV are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version,® NIV.® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com. Scripture quotations marked KJV are taken from the Holy Bible, King James Version. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Whitney, Donald S. Spiritual disciplines for the Christian life / Donald S. Whitney. — Revised and Updated. pages cm Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 978-1-61521-617-8 1. Spiritual life—Christianity. 2. Discipline—Religious aspects—Christianity. I. Title. BV4501.3.W4695 2014 248.4'861—dc23 2013050852 ISBN 978-1-61291-753-5 (ePub); ISBN 978-1-61291-754-2 (Kindle); ISBN 978-1-61291-755-9 (Apple) Build: 2018-09-28 16:08:57 EPUB 3.0  CONTENTS Title Page Copyright Acknowledgments Foreword Chapter 1: The Spiritual Disciplines... for the Purpose of Godliness Chapter 2: Bible Intake (Part 1)... for the Purpose of Godliness Chapter 3: Bible Intake (Part 2)... for the Purpose of Godliness Chapter 4: Prayer... for the Purpose of Godliness Chapter 5: Worship... for the Purpose of Godliness Chapter 6: Evangelism... for the Purpose of Godliness Chapter 7: Serving... for the Purpose of Godliness Chapter 8: Stewardship... for the Purpose of Godliness Chapter 9: Fasting... for the Purpose of Godliness Chapter 10: Silence and Solitude... for the Purpose of Godliness Chapter 11: Journaling... for the Purpose of Godliness Chapter 12: Learning... for the Purpose of Godliness Chapter 13: Perseverance in the Disciplines... for the Purpose of Godliness About the Author Scripture Index Subject Index  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Thanks to all the pastors, teachers, Bible study leaders, the ministers to singles, college students, and youth, and all the other disciple-makers in all the local churches who used the first edition of this book. Thanks to all the students who have taken a Personal Spiritual Disciplines class with me in seminary and read Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life as a part of the course study. Thanks to all the students in colleges, universities, seminaries, and other educational institutions who have studied it as a textbook. Thanks to those around the world who have read the book in one of the non-English versions. Thanks to all those who have read a digital copy of the original edition. Thanks to those who have listened to the audio version of the book. And thanks to everyone who is reading or listening to this revised and updated edition. Thanks to the many friends inside and outside of NavPress who helped with the original publication and revision of this book. You know who you are. Most important, so does the Lord (Hebrews 6:10). Thanks to Caffy, who patiently endured so much that this book might be written, and to both Caffy and Laurelen (who wasn’t born when the book was first written), who patiently endured so much that it might be revised. I am humbled and honored by you all. In all cases, may the Lord bring much lasting fruit in your life from this book.  FOREWORD I was asked to write a foreword for this book before I saw it. Having now gone through it, I would in any case have volunteered for the job, so that I can go on record as urging all Christians to read what Don Whitney has written; indeed, to read it three times over, with a month’s interval (certainly not less, and ideally, I think, not more) between each reading. This will not only make the book sink in, but will also give you a realistic picture of your seriousness, or lack of it, as Jesus’ disciple. Your first reading will show you several particular things that you should start doing. In your second and third readings (for each of which you should choose a date on the day you complete the previous reading) you shall find yourself reviewing what you have done and how you have fared in doing it. That will be very good for you, even if the discovery comes as a bit of a shock at first. Ever since Richard Foster rang the bell with his Celebration of Discipline (1978), discussing the various spiritual disciplines has become a staple element of conservative Christian in-talk in North America. This is a happy thing. The doctrine of the disciplines (Latin disciplinae, meaning “courses of learning and training”) is really a restatement and extension of classical Protestant teaching on the means of grace (the Word of God, prayer, fellowship, the Lord’s Supper). Don Whitney’s spiritual feet are blessedly cemented in the wisdom of the Bible, as spelled out by the Puritan and older evangelical masters, and he plots the path of discipline with a sure touch. The foundations he lays are evangelical, not legalistic. In other words, he calls us to pursue godliness through practicing the disciplines out of gratitude for the grace that has saved us, not as self-justifying or self- advancing effort. What he builds on these foundations is as beneficial as it is solid. He is in truth showing us the path of life. If, then, as a Christian you want to be really real with your God, moving beyond the stage of playing games with yourself and Him, this book provides practical help. A century and a half ago the Scottish professor “Rabbi” Duncan sent his students off to read John Owen, the Puritan, on indwelling sin with the admonition, “But, gentlemen, prepare for the knife.” As I pass you over to Don Whitney, I would say to you, “Now, friend, prepare for the workout.” And you will find health for your soul. —J. I. Packer  CHAPTER 1 THE SPIRITUAL DISCIPLINES... FOR THE PURPOSE OF GODLINESS Ours is an undisciplined age. The old disciplines are breaking down.... Above all, the discipline of divine grace is derided as legalism or is entirely unknown to a generation that is largely illiterate in the Scriptures. We need the rugged strength of Christian character that can come only from discipline. V. R AY M O N D E D M A N Discipline without direction is drudgery. Imagine six-year-old Kevin, whose parents have enrolled him in music lessons. After school every afternoon, prompted by his mother, he slouches into the living room and strums songs he must practice but doesn’t like while watching his buddies play baseball in the park across the street. That’s discipline without direction. It’s drudgery. Now suppose Kevin is visited by an angel one afternoon during guitar practice. In a vision, he’s transported to Carnegie Hall. He’s shown a guitar virtuoso giving a concert. Usually bored by classical music, Kevin is astonished by what he sees and hears. The musician’s fingers dance on the strings with fluidity and grace. Kevin thinks of how stupid and clunky his own hands feel when they halt and falter over the chords. The virtuoso blends clean, soaring notes into a musical aroma that wafts from his guitar. Kevin remembers the toneless, irritating discord that comes stumbling out of his. But Kevin is enchanted. His head tilts to one side as he listens. He drinks in everything. He never imagined that anyone could play the guitar like this. “What do you think, Kevin?” asks the angel. The answer is a soft, slow, six-year-old’s “W-o-w!”  The vision vanishes, and the angel is again standing in front of Kevin in his living room. “Kevin,” says the angel, “the wonderful musician you saw is you in a few years.” Then pointing at the guitar, the angel declares, “But you must practice!” Suddenly the angel disappears and Kevin finds himself alone with his guitar. Do you think his attitude toward practice will be different now? As long as he remembers what he’s going to become, Kevin’s discipline will have a direction, a goal that will pull him into the future. Yes, effort will be involved, but you could hardly call it drudgery. When it comes to discipline in the Christian life, many believers feel as Kevin did toward guitar practice—it’s discipline without direction. Prayer threatens to be drudgery. The practical value of meditation on Scripture seems uncertain. The real purpose of a discipline such as fasting is often a mystery. First, we must understand what we shall become. The Bible says of God’s elect, “For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son” (Romans 8:29). God’s eternal plan ensures that every Christian will ultimately conform to Christlikeness. We will be changed “when he appears” so that “we shall be like him” (1 John 3:2). If you are born again (see John 3:3-8), this is no vision; this is you, Christian, as soon as “he appears.” So why talk about discipline? If God has predestined our conformity to Christlikeness, where does discipline fit in? Why not just coast into the promised Christlikeness and forget about discipline? Although God will grant Christlikeness to us when Jesus returns, until then He intends for us to grow toward it. We aren’t merely to wait for holiness; we’re to pursue it. “Strive for peace with everyone,” we’re commanded in Hebrews 12:14, “and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.” Notice carefully what that says: Without holiness—that is, Christlikeness or godliness—no one will see the Lord, regardless of how many times they have been to church or how often they have engaged in religious activities or how spiritual they believe themselves to be. It’s crucial—crucial—to understand that it’s not our pursuit of holiness that qualifies us to see the Lord. Rather, we are qualified to see the Lord by the Lord, not by good things we do. We cannot produce enough righteousness to impress God and gain admittance into heaven. Instead we can stand before God only in the righteousness that’s been earned by another, Jesus Christ. Only Jesus lived a life good enough to be accepted by God and worthy of entrance into heaven. And He was able to do so because He was God in the flesh. Living a perfect life qualified Him to be a sacrifice that the Father accepts on behalf of others who by sin disqualify themselves from heaven and a relationship with God. As proof of God’s acceptance of Jesus’ life and sacrifice, God raised Him from the dead. In other words, Jesus lived a perfectly righteous life in complete obedience to the commands of God, and He did so in order to give the credit for all that obedience and righteousness to those who had not kept all of God’s Law, and He died for them on a Roman cross in order to receive the punishment they deserved for all their sins against God’s Law. As a result, all who come to God trusting in the person and work of Jesus to make them right with God are given the Holy Spirit (see Ephesians 1:13-14). The presence of the Holy Spirit causes all those in whom He resides to have new holy hungers they didn’t have before. They hunger, for example, for the Holy Word of God—the Bible—that they used to find boring or irrelevant. They have new holy longings, such as the longing to live in a body without sin and to have a mind no longer tempted by sin. They yearn to live in a holy and perfect world with holy and perfect people, and to see at last the One the angels perpetually praise as “holy, holy, holy” (Revelation 4:8). These are some of the holy heartbeats in all those in whom the Holy Spirit resides. Consequently, when the Holy Spirit indwells someone, that person begins to prize and pursue holiness. Thus, as we have seen in Hebrews 12:14, anyone who is not striving for holiness will not see the Lord. And the reason he or she will not see the Lord in eternity is because he or she does not know the Lord now, for those who know Him are given His Holy Spirit, and all those indwelled by the Holy Spirit are compelled to pursue holiness. And so, the urgent question every Christian should ask is, “How then shall I pursue holiness, the holiness without which I will not see the Lord? How can I become more like Jesus Christ?” We find a clear answer in 1 Timothy 4:7: “Discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness” (NASB). In other words, if your purpose is godliness— and godliness is your purpose if you are indwelled by the Holy Spirit, for He makes godliness your purpose—then how do you pursue that purpose? According to this verse, you “discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness.”  This verse is the theme for the entire book. In this chapter, I will attempt to unpack its meaning; the rest of the book is an effort to apply it in practical ways. I will refer to the scriptural ways Christians discipline themselves in obedience to this verse as the Spiritual Disciplines. I will maintain that the only road to Christian maturity and godliness (a biblical term synonymous with Christlikeness and holiness) passes through the practice of the Spiritual Disciplines. I will emphasize that godliness is the goal of the Disciplines, and when we remember this, the Spiritual Disciplines become a delight instead of drudgery. THE SPIRITUAL DISCIPLINES—WHAT ARE THEY? The Spiritual Disciplines are those practices found in Scripture that promote spiritual growth among believers in the gospel of Jesus Christ. They are the habits of devotion and experiential Christianity that have been practiced by the people of God since biblical times. The Disciplines could be described in several ways. First, the Bible prescribes both personal and interpersonal Spiritual Disciplines. This book is about personal Spiritual Disciplines, but they are not more important than the interpersonal Spiritual Disciplines, even if they are emphasized more frequently in most of the literature about spiritual growth. So while some Disciplines are practiced alone, some are to be practiced with others. The former are personal Spiritual Disciplines and the latter are interpersonal Spiritual Disciplines. For example, Christians should read and study the Word of God on their own (personal Spiritual Disciplines), but they should also hear the Bible read and study it with the church (interpersonal Spiritual Disciplines). Christians should worship God privately, but they should also worship Him publicly with His people. Some Spiritual Disciplines are by nature practiced alone, such as journaling, solitude, and fasting (though individuals sometimes fast in conjunction with a congregational fast). Other Disciplines are by nature congregational, such as fellowship, hearing God’s Word preached, and participation in the Lord’s Supper—all of which require the presence of people. Both the personal and interpersonal Disciplines are means of blessings for followers of Jesus and a part of growth in godliness, for the Bible teaches both. Moreover, Jesus practiced both, and becoming like Jesus is the purpose of practicing the Disciplines. So, for instance, the Bible tells us that on at least four occasions Jesus got alone to pray (Matthew 4:1; 14:13; Mark 1:35; Luke 4:42), thereby practicing personal Spiritual Disciplines. Conversely, we’re told in Luke 4:16, “as was his custom, [Jesus] went to the synagogue on the Sabbath Day,” thus engaging in interpersonal Spiritual Disciplines. Each of us is perhaps inclined a little more toward Disciplines that are practiced individually or toward those that are practiced corporately. Some, for instance, might think they could be all that God wants them to be, even without the local church, just by practicing the personal Spiritual Disciplines faithfully. Others may be equally deceived into thinking that they’ll make sufficient spiritual progress if they are deeply involved in the life of their church, believing that somehow their participation in meaningful church activities will compensate for the lack of a personal devotional life. To lean too far toward our own personal inclination, however, will get us out of balance and deform our pursuit of holiness. Christians are individuals, but we are also part of the body of Christ. We experience God and we grow in His grace through both personal and interpersonal Spiritual Disciplines. So even though this book is about personal Spiritual Disciplines, understand that Christlikeness also requires the pursuit of God through the interpersonal Spiritual Disciplines. Second, Spiritual Disciplines are activities, not attitudes. Disciplines are practices, not character qualities, graces, or “fruit of the Spirit” (Galatians 5:22-23). Disciplines are things you do—such as read, meditate, pray, fast, worship, serve, learn, and so on. The goal of practicing a given Discipline, of course, is not about doing as much as it is about being, that is, being like Jesus. But the biblical way to grow in being more like Jesus is through the rightly motivated doing of the biblical Spiritual Disciplines. Note it again —“Discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness.” Godliness—being like Jesus—is the purpose, but the God-given path to that purpose is through certain activities found in Scripture known as the Spiritual Disciplines. To put it another way, there are specific practices we are to do sometimes that cultivate generally being like Jesus all the time. So fasting is a Spiritual Discipline, because that’s something you do. Joy, strictly speaking, is not a Spiritual Discipline, because joy is something you experience, not something you do. Fasting itself is not the goal; rather joy is part of the goal of fasting, because joy is a Christlike quality. Joy does not come to you if you are spiritually passive; rather, joy is cultivated, but joy is cultivated by things you do. And the “things you do” that cultivate Christlike joy are the Spiritual Disciplines. Third, I want to limit the subject matter of this book to those Spiritual Disciplines that are biblical, that is, to practices taught or modeled in the Bible. Without this limitation, we leave ourselves open to calling anything we fancy a Spiritual Discipline. Thus some might declare, “Gardening is a Spiritual Discipline for me,” or “Exercise is one of my Spiritual Disciplines,” or claim that some other hobby or pleasurable habit is a valid Spiritual Discipline. One of the problems with this approach is that it can tempt people to assert something like, “Maybe meditation on Scripture works for you, but gardening does just as much for my soul as the Bible does for yours.” And the result is that virtually anything can be designated a Spiritual Discipline, and worse, it means that we determine for ourselves what practices are best for our spiritual health and maturity rather than accepting those God has revealed in Scripture. I believe a case can be made —to a greater or lesser extent for each—that the following personal Spiritual Disciplines are commended in Scripture: Bible intake, prayer, worship, evangelism, service, stewardship, fasting, silence and solitude, journaling, and learning. Is this an exhaustive list? No, I wouldn’t presume to maintain that. A survey of other literature on the subject would reveal additional candidates for consideration as biblical Spiritual Disciplines to be practiced by individual Christians. But I do believe it can be argued that the ones discussed in these pages are the more prominent ones in Scripture. Fourth, this book takes the position that the Spiritual Disciplines found in Scripture are sufficient for knowing and experiencing God, and for growing in Christlikeness. This is based upon the fact that “all Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16-17). These verses tell us that Scripture, because it is divinely inspired, provides the guidance Christians need to “be complete, equipped for every good work,” including the good work of pursuing “the purpose of godliness.” So whatever else a person might claim regarding the spiritual benefits he or she receives from a practice not found in the Bible, at the very least we can say this about that activity—it is not necessary. If it were necessary for spiritual maturity and progress in holiness it would have been recorded and promoted in Scripture. Fifth, the Spiritual Disciplines are practices derived from the gospel, not divorced from the gospel. When the Disciplines are rightly practiced, they take us deeper into the gospel of Jesus and its glories, not away from it as though we’ve moved on to more advanced levels of Christianity. New Testament scholar D. A. Carson makes this point eloquently: The gospel is not a minor theme that deals with the point of entry into the Christian way, to be followed by a lot of material that actually brings about the life transformation. Very large swaths of evangelicalism simply presuppose that this is the case. Preaching the gospel, it is argued, is announcing how to be saved from God’s condemnation; believing the gospel guarantees you won’t go to hell.  But for actual transformation to take place, you need to take a lot of discipleship courses, spiritual enrichment courses, “Go deep” spiritual disciplines courses, and the like. You need to learn journaling, or asceticism, or the simple lifestyle, or Scripture memorization; you need to join a small group, an accountability group, or... Bible study. Not for a moment would I speak against the potential for good of all of these steps; rather, I am speaking against the tendency to treat these as postgospel disciplines, disciplines divorced from what God has done in Christ Jesus in the gospel of the crucified and resurrected Lord.... Failure to see this point has huge and deleterious consequences.... First, if the gospel becomes that by which we slip into the kingdom, but all the business of transformation turns on postgospel disciplines and strategies, then we shall constantly be directing the attention of people away from the gospel, away from the cross and resurrection. Soon the gospel will be something that we quietly assume is necessary for salvation, but not what we are excited about, not what we are preaching, not the power of God. What is really important are the spiritual disciplines. Of course, when we point this out to someone for whom techniques and disciplines are of paramount importance, there is likely to be instant indignation. Of course I believe in the cross and resurrection of Jesus, they say. And doubtless they do. Yet the question remains: What are they excited about? Where do they rest their confidence? On what does their hope of transformation depend? When I read, say, Julian of Norwich, I find an example of just how far an alleged spirituality may be pursued, in medieval form, directly attempting to connect with God apart from self-conscious dependence on the substitutionary death and resurrection of Jesus—the very matters the apostle labels “of first importance.” Wherever contemporary pursuit of spirituality becomes similarly distanced from the gospel, it is taking a dangerous turn. Sixth, the Spiritual Disciplines are means, not ends. The end—that is, the purpose of practicing the Disciplines—is godliness. I define godliness as both closeness to Christ and conformity to Christ, a conformity that’s both inward and outward, a growing conformity to both the heart of Christ and the life of Christ. This Christlikeness is the goal, the reason we should practice the Disciplines. Without this purpose in our practice, the performance of Spiritual Disciplines—no matter how consistent or vigorous —is vain and nothing more than an empty husk of godliness. So while we cannot be godly without the practice of the Disciplines, we can practice the Disciplines without being godly if we see them as ends and not means. The next section of the chapter is devoted to developing this crucial aspect of the theology behind the practice of the Spiritual Disciplines. So the Spiritual Disciplines are those personal and interpersonal activities given by God in the Bible as the sufficient means believers in Jesus Christ are to use in the Spirit-filled, gospel-driven pursuit of godliness, that is, closeness to Christ and conformity to Christ. THE SPIRITUAL DISCIPLINES—THE MEANS TO GODLINESS The most important feature of any Spiritual Discipline is its purpose. Just as there is little value in practicing the scales on a guitar or piano apart from the purpose of playing music, so there is little value in practicing Spiritual Disciplines apart from the single purpose that unites them (see Colossians 2:20-23; 1 Timothy 4:8). That purpose is godliness. Thus we are told in 1 Timothy 4:7 to discipline ourselves “for the purpose of godliness” (NASB). That’s what the godly heroes of Christian history have done. From biblical times to our time, godly people have always been spiritually disciplined people. Call to mind some heroes of church history, people such as Augustine, Martin Luther, John Calvin, John Bunyan, George Whitefield, Lady Huntingdon, Jonathan and Sarah Edwards, Charles Spurgeon, Lottie Moon, George Müller, Dawson Trotman, Jim and Elisabeth Elliot, and Martyn Lloyd-Jones. How did they develop such a reputation for godliness? It wasn’t as though God somehow anointed them with holiness in ways He hasn’t bestowed on the rest of us. It may be true that He blessed these believers in terms of ministry fruitfulness in ways that He hasn’t conferred upon many others, but in terms of conformity to Christ, they made progress the same way that all Christians do—through the Spiritual Disciplines. And in my own pastoral and personal Christian experience, I can say that I’ve never known a man or woman who came to spiritual maturity except through discipline. Godliness comes through discipline. Actually, God uses three primary catalysts for changing us and conforming us to Christlikeness, but only one is largely under our control. One catalyst the Lord uses to change us is people. “Iron sharpens iron,” says Proverbs 27:17, “and one man sharpens another.” Sometimes God uses our friends to sharpen us into more Christlike living, and sometimes He uses our enemies to file away our rough, ungodly edges. Parents, children, spouses, coworkers, customers, teachers, neighbors, pastors—God changes us through these people. Another change agent God uses in our lives is circumstances. The classic text for this is Romans 8:28: “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” Financial pressures, physical conditions, even the weather are used in the hands of Divine Providence to stimulate His elect toward holiness. Then there is the catalyst of the Spiritual Disciplines. This catalyst differs from the first two in that when He uses the Disciplines, God works primarily from the inside out. When He changes us through people and circumstances, the process works mainly from the outside in. The Spiritual Disciplines also differ from the other two methods of change in that God grants us a greater measure of choice regarding involvement with the Disciplines. We often have little choice regarding the people and circumstances God brings into our lives, but we can decide, for example, whether we will read the Bible or fast today. So on the one hand, we recognize that even the most iron-willed self- discipline by itself will not make us more holy; instead, it may make us more like the Pharisees. Growth in holiness is a gift from God (see John 17:17; 1 Thessalonians 5:23; Hebrews 2:11). On the other hand, that doesn’t mean that we’re to do nothing to pursue godliness, just living the life we want until and unless God decides to make us holy. What we are to do is discipline ourselves for the purpose of godliness, practicing the God-given Spiritual Disciplines as a means of receiving His grace and growing in Christlikeness. In Colossians 1:29 the apostle Paul illustrated how these two—the efforts of a Christian and the work of God—can occur simultaneously in a person indwelled by the Holy Spirit. In this text Paul spoke of his labors to help believers become “mature in Christ,” declaring, “For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me” (Colossians 1:29). Notice that Paul said that he himself was toiling, but he then affirmed that the energy for this struggle came from Christ. That Paul had the desire and the power for ministry was entirely of the grace of God (see Philippians 2:13). And if any lasting fruit resulted from his labors, Paul gave all the glory to God. But sometimes it surely felt as though all the toil was of Paul, and at the end of each day, Paul was the one who was work- weary. That’s the way it is with the Spiritual Disciplines. The desire and the power for them are produced by the grace of God. But Christians themselves must practice the Disciplines. For example, a deep, insatiable hunger for the Bible is a gift from God, but we are the ones who must turn the pages and read the words. God doesn’t pull our passive bodies over to the desk and cause our hands to open the Bible and draw our eyes back and forth over the pages without any effort on our part. The New Testament was originally written in the Greek language. The word rendered “discipline” in the New American Standard translation is the Greek word gumnasia from which our English words gymnasium and gymnastics derive. This word means “to exercise or discipline,” which is why the King James Version renders 1 Timothy 4:7 as “exercise thyself rather unto godliness,” the English Standard Version as “train yourself for godliness,” and the New International Version as “train yourself to be godly.” It’s a sweaty word with the smell of the gym to it. So think of the Spiritual Disciplines as spiritual exercises. To go to your favorite spot for prayer or journaling, for example, is the spiritual equivalent of going to a gym and using a weight machine. As physical disciplines like this promote bodily strength, so the Spiritual Disciplines promote godliness. A Bible story that illustrates another way of thinking of the role of the Spiritual Disciplines is in Luke 19:1-10. It’s the famous account of the conversion of the tax collector, Zacchaeus. Because he was so short, Zacchaeus was unable to see Jesus in the crowd. So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree in order to see Jesus when He passed by. When Jesus came to the place, He looked up, called Zacchaeus by name, and told him to come down. The two went to the tax collector’s house, where he believed in Christ for salvation and resolved to give half his possessions to the poor and return with interest all tax money he had wrongfully taken. Think of the Spiritual Disciplines as ways by which we can spiritually place ourselves in the path of God’s grace and seek Him, much like Zacchaeus placed himself physically in Jesus’ path and sought Him. The Lord, by His Spirit, still travels down certain paths, paths that He Himself has ordained and revealed in Scripture. We call these paths the Spiritual Disciplines, and if we will place ourselves on these paths and look for Him there by faith, we can expect to encounter Him. For instance, when we come to the Bible, or when we engage in any of the biblical Disciplines— looking by faith to God through them—we can anticipate experiencing God. As with this tax collector, we will find Him willing to have mercy on us and to have communion with us. And in the course of time we, too, will be transformed by Him from one level of Christlikeness to another (see 2 Corinthians 3:18). So again, by means of these Bible-based practices we consciously place ourselves before God in anticipation of enjoying His presence and receiving His transforming grace. Tom Landry, coach of the Dallas Cowboys football team for most of three decades, said, “The job of a football coach is to make men do what they don’t want to do in order to achieve what they’ve always wanted to be.” In much the same way, Christians are called to make themselves, by the Spirit’s power, do what they would not naturally do—practice the Spiritual Disciplines—in order to experience what the Spirit gives them a desire to be, that is, to be with Christ and like Christ. “Discipline yourself,” says the Scripture, “for the purpose of godliness” (NASB). THE SPIRITUAL DISCIPLINES—GOD’S WILL FOR CHRISTIANS The original language of the words “discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness” (NASB) makes it plain that this is a command of God, not merely a suggestion. Holiness is not an option for those who claim to be children of the Holy One (see 1 Peter 1:15-16), so neither are the means of holiness— that is, the Spiritual Disciplines—an option. The expectation of disciplined spirituality is implied in Jesus’ offer of Matthew 11:29: “Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me.” The same is true in this offer of discipleship: “And he said to all, ‘If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me’” (Luke 9:23). These verses tell us that to be a disciple of Jesus means, at the very least, to learn from and follow Him. That’s what the twelve apostles of Jesus did—they followed Him around, and as they did, they learned from Him. But for them to follow Jesus required discipline; they had to go where He went and when. Following Jesus today and learning from Him still involves discipline, for you don’t follow someone accidentally—at least not for very long—nor do you learn as much accidentally as you do by discipline. Are you a disciplined follower of Jesus? That discipline is at the heart of discipleship is validated by 2 Timothy 1:7, which says, “God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.” A key component of this self-control in a follower of Jesus is spiritual self-discipline. Further, Galatians 5:22-23 declares that one evidence of the influence of this God-given spirit of self-control is greater self-control in our own lives, especially as followers of and learners from Jesus. The Lord Jesus not only expects these biblical Spiritual Disciplines of those who follow Him, He is the model of discipline for the purpose of godliness. And if we are going to be Christlike, we must live as Christ lived —insofar as sinful humans can. We cannot do what Jesus did as God, but Christian living means we should seek to follow His human example of how a person lives in fellowship with the Father. Although Jesus is much more than our example of spirituality—for He is also our Lord, our King, our Savior, our Substitute, our Righteousness, our Judge, and many other things to us—He is not less than our example of spirituality. And when we look to Jesus we see an example of disciplined personal piety, of how to live in consistent communion with God.  Despite the example of Jesus and the teaching of the New Testament about Christianity as a life of disciplined spirituality, many professing Christians are spiritually undisciplined and seem to have little Christlike fruit and power in their lives. However, many of them are remarkably disciplined in other areas of their lives. I’ve seen men and women who discipline themselves with zeal for the purpose of excelling in their career, but who discipline themselves very little “for the purpose of godliness.” I’m sure you’ve seen people who will devote time to learning to play an instrument, knowing that it takes countless hours to acquire the skills; who will practice hard to improve their sports performance, knowing it takes work to become proficient; who will commit to a long curriculum of intense study to complete a degree, knowing it takes sacrifice to succeed. Then many of these same people will give up quickly if they find that the Spiritual Disciplines don’t come easily, as though becoming like Jesus would not take much effort. I’ve seen Christians who are faithful to the church of God, who frequently demonstrate genuine enthusiasm for the things of God, and who are committed to the preaching of the Word of God, yet who trivialize their effectiveness for the kingdom of God through lack of discipline. A woman in her sixties once came to my wife and me for counsel, a woman who had spent a lifetime in conservative Bible-believing churches. Over the decades this faithful worker had served in just about every volunteer ministry position open to her. But through tears she admitted, “I know how to do everything in the church, but I don’t know how to read the Bible and pray.” Spiritually such people are a mile wide and an inch deep. There are no deep, time-worn channels of communing discipline between them and God. They have dabbled in everything but disciplined themselves in nothing. MORE APPLICATION There is danger in neglecting the Spiritual Disciplines. The greatest danger of neglecting the Spiritual Disciplines is the danger of missing God —forever; not because personal piety earns anyone a place in heaven, but because it characterizes those who are on their way there. In other words, some who fail to practice the Disciplines disregard them because they simply have no appetite for them, and they have no appetite for them because they have no hunger for God. They do not know God, so the God- given means of personally experiencing and enjoying God have little appeal. To them, the Spiritual Disciplines are tedious religious duties to be endured as little as conscience or reputation will allow, not a banquet of God on which their famished souls long to feed as much as possible. For those who do know God through the gospel of Christ, there’s another danger in neglecting the Disciplines. A selection from the pen of a writer many years ago timelessly illustrates the danger. Commenting on the difference between the disciplined and the undisciplined way, he wrote, Nothing was ever achieved without discipline; and many an athlete and many a man has been ruined because he abandoned discipline and let himself grow slack. Coleridge is the supreme tragedy of indiscipline. Never did so great a mind produce so little. He left Cambridge University to join the army; but he left the army because, in spite of all his erudition, he could not rub down a horse; he returned to Oxford and left without a degree. He began a paper called The Watchman which lived for ten numbers and then died. It has been said of him: “He lost himself in visions of work to be done, that always remained to be done. Coleridge had every poetic gift but one—the gift of sustained and concentrated effort.” In his head and in his mind he had all kinds of books, as he said himself, “completed save for transcription.” “I am on the eve,” he says, “of sending to the press two octavo volumes.” But the books were never composed outside Coleridge’s mind, because he would not face the discipline of sitting down to write them out. No one ever reached any eminence, and no one having reached it ever maintained it, without discipline.  Likely from your own observations you could name athletes, musicians, or students who displayed enormous potential, but who failed to live up to that God-given potential simply because they could not discipline themselves to practice. Something similar can happen in the spiritual realm to Christians. While few of us will have Coleridge’s intellectual or poetic gifts, all believers have been given spiritual gifts (see 1 Corinthians 12:4-7). The mere presence of spiritual gifts, however, guarantees no more spiritual fruitfulness than Coleridge’s mental gifts assured the production of books and poetry. Just as with athletic, musical, or intellectual gifts, so also spiritual gifts must be developed by discipline in order to bear spiritual fruit. Thus, the danger of neglecting the Spiritual Disciplines is the danger of bearing little spiritual fruit—your life counting little for the sake of the kingdom. There is freedom in embracing the Spiritual Disciplines. Many hear the term Spiritual Disciplines and think of bondage and burdens—things they have to do, not freedom. Nevertheless, there is a freedom in the Christian life that comes not through indolence, but discipline. We can illustrate this principle by observing the freedom that comes through mastery of any discipline. For instance, watching a consummate guitar player pluck and strum those six strings almost gives the impression that he was born with the instrument attached to his body. He has an intimacy and a freedom with the guitar that make playing the thing look easy. Anyone who’s ever tried to play realizes that such musical liberty and flair with a guitar comes only from decades of disciplined practice. Likewise, freedom through discipline is seen not only in proficient musicians, but also in all-star shortstops, expert carpenters, successful executives, skilled craftsmen, excellent students, and moms who daily manage home and family well. Freedom through discipline is the idea behind what has become known as “the ten-thousand-hour rule.” This is an observation based upon research indicating that to become an expert in anything, for anything to become second nature, you must perform that activity—such as playing the guitar—for at least ten thousand hours. And it’s not just a matter of repeating an identical task—such as playing the same song—for something like four hours per day, five days per week, fifty weeks per year for ten years; rather there must also be a deliberate, ongoing effort (usually under the guidance of another) to improve overall performance. Thus in the case of a musician, a wide variety of songs, styles, and drills would be rehearsed so consistently and with such increasing complexity that an ever-developing freedom with the instrument would result. In one sense we might call discipline “the price” we must pay for freedom. But Elisabeth Elliot is more precise when she explains that “freedom and discipline have come to be regarded as mutually exclusive, when in fact freedom is not at all the opposite, but the final reward, of discipline.” So while stressing that freedom requires discipline, let us not forget to emphasize that discipline rewards us with freedom. What is this freedom of godliness? Think again of our illustrations. For instance, a guitar virtuoso is “free” to play a difficult arrangement by Segovia while I am not. Why? Because of his years of disciplined practice. Similarly, those who are “free” to quote Scripture are those who have disciplined themselves to memorize God’s Word. We may experience a measure of freedom from spiritual lethargy through the Discipline of fasting. Or we may sense some liberation from self-centeredness while engaged in Disciplines such as worship, service, and evangelism. The freedom of godliness is the freedom to do what God calls us through Scripture to do and the freedom to express the character qualities of Christ through our own personality. This kind of freedom is the “reward” or result of the blessing of God upon our engagement in the Spiritual Disciplines. But we must remember that the mature freedoms of discipline-nurtured godliness do not develop in a single reading through the Bible or in a few forays through some of the other Disciplines. Scripture reminds us that self- control, such as that expressed through the Spiritual Disciplines, must persevere before it ripens into the mature fruit of godliness. Observe closely the sequence of development in 2 Peter 1:6—“to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness” (NIV). The bridge between Spirit- empowered self-control and godliness is perseverance. Occasional self- control results in occasional godliness. But self-control with perseverance results in more consistent Christlikeness. True godliness requires not merely a ten-thousand-hour pursuit, but a lifetime of perseverance. There is an invitation to all Christians to enjoy God and the things of God through the Spiritual Disciplines. All in whom the Spirit of God dwells are invited to taste the joy of a Christ-centered, gospel-based, Spiritual Disciplines lifestyle.  Remember Kevin and his guitar? The drudgery of his daily practice would take on an entirely new spirit once he realized that someday he would be playing for a packed house in Carnegie Hall. The discipline of practice would gradually become the means to one of the greatest enjoyments of his life. Any discipline—from guitar practice to Scripture memory—without direction is drudgery. But the Spiritual Disciplines are never drudgery as long as we practice them with the goal of godliness (that is, closeness to and conformity to Christ) in mind. If your picture of a disciplined Christian is one of a grim, tight-lipped, joyless half-robot, then you’ve missed the point. Jesus was the most disciplined Man who ever lived and yet the most joyful and truly alive. Though more than our example, nevertheless He is our example of discipline. Let us follow Him to joy through the Spiritual Disciplines. Focus on the person and work of Jesus in each of the Disciplines. Through them, learn from, gaze upon, and enjoy who Jesus is and what He has done. By means of the Disciplines, let the truths of the gospel restore your soul. Engage in the Spiritual Disciplines given by God in Scripture so that you are continually shown your need for Christ and the infinite supply of grace and mercy to be found by faith in Jesus Christ. I capitalize “Spiritual Disciplines” in these pages to call attention to the term as the subject of the book and to help the reader think of these biblical practices as a group. My book-length treatment of the interpersonal Spiritual Disciplines is Spiritual Disciplines Within the Church: Participating Fully in the Body of Christ (Chicago: Moody, 1996). D. A. Carson, “What Is the Gospel?—Revisited,” in For the Fame of God’s Name: Essays in Honor of John Piper (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2010), 164–165. Emphasis added. Tom Landry, as quoted by Ray Stedman in Preaching Today (Carol Stream, IL: Christianity Today, n.d.), recording number 25. Indeed, the New American Standard Bible translates the verse as “For God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and discipline” (emphasis added). The famous English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834) is best known for his poems “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” and “Kubla Khan.” William Barclay, The Gospel of Matthew (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster, 1958), vol. 1, 284. “The 10,000-Hour Rule” is a chapter in Malcolm Gladwell’s best-selling book Outliers: The Story of Success (New York: Little, Brown, 2008, 35–67), which popularized research by Dr. K. Anders Ericsson, professor of psychology at Florida State University. Elisabeth Elliot, as quoted in Christianity Today, November 4, 1988, 33, emphasis added. CHAPTER 2  BIBLE INTAKE (PART 1)... FOR THE PURPOSE OF GODLINESS The alternative to discipline is disaster. V A N C E H AV N E R Several years ago, I had the privilege of participating in a mission trip to the bush country of East Africa. Four of us from the church I pastored lived in tents in front of a tiny, unfinished, mud-and-sticks church building six miles from the nearest settlement. I’ve been overseas enough to know that many customs I have come to identify with Christianity will clash at some points with the culture of our hosts. My experiences have taught me to anticipate swallowing with difficulty some of my American expectations (not to mention a few other things!) about how Christians should live. But I was unprepared for some of my encounters with many of the professing Christians in this equatorial setting. Lying, stealing, and immorality were common and generally accepted, even among the leadership of the church. Theological understanding was as scarce as water, the disease of doctrinal error as common as malaria. Soon I discovered one of the main reasons this church looked as though it had been started by Corinthian missionaries. No one had a Bible—not the pastor, not a deacon, no one. The pastor had only half-a-dozen sermons, all half-baked over the coals of a few Bible-story recollections. Every sixth week came the same sermon. The only real contact with Scripture happened with the occasional visit of a missionary (the nearest one was one hundred miles away) or when an area denominational worker preached. For almost everyone in the church, these infrequent, vicarious brushes with the Bible were all they’d ever known. Only one man had any measure of spiritual maturity, and that was because he had lived most of his life elsewhere and had attended a Bible-teaching church.  The four of us pooled our resources and bought inexpensive Bibles for many of the church members. After evangelistic visitation each day we led Bible studies for the church in the afternoon and again at night by flashlight. We left with prayers that the Holy Spirit would cause the Word of God to take deep root in this dry, bush-country assembly. Most of us shake our heads in pity at such sad conditions. Fact is, however, that many of us have more Bibles in our homes than entire churches have in some impoverished or isolated parts of the world. But it’s one thing to be unfamiliar with Scripture when you don’t own a Bible; it’s another when you have a bookshelf full. No Spiritual Discipline is more important than the intake of God’s Word. Nothing can substitute for it. There simply is no healthy Christian life apart from a diet of the milk and meat of Scripture. The reasons for this are obvious. In the Bible God tells us about Himself, and especially about Jesus Christ, the incarnation of God. The Bible unfolds the Law of God to us and shows us how we’ve all broken it. There we learn how Christ died as a sinless, willing Substitute for breakers of God’s Law and how we must repent and believe in Him to be right with God. In the Bible we learn the ways and will of the Lord. We find in Scripture how God wants us to live, and what brings the most joy and satisfaction in life. None of this eternally essential information can be found anywhere else except the Bible. Therefore if we would know God and be godly, we must know the Word of God—intimately. However, many who yawn with familiarity and nod in agreement to these statements spend no more time with God’s Word in an average day than do those with no Bible at all. My pastoral experience bears witness to the validity of surveys that reveal that great numbers of professing Christians know little more about the Bible than poor Christians in remote parts of the world who possess not even a shred of Scripture. Some wag remarked that the worst dust storm in history would happen if all church members who were neglecting their Bibles dusted them off simultaneously. So even though we honor God’s Word with our lips, we must confess that our hearts—as well as our hands, ears, eyes, and minds—are often far from it. Regardless of how busy we become with all things Christian, we must remember that the most transforming practice available to us is the disciplined intake of Scripture.  Bible intake is not only the most important Spiritual Discipline, it is also the most broad. It actually consists of several subdisciplines. It’s much like a university comprised of many colleges, each specializing in a different discipline, yet all united under the general name of the university. Let’s examine the “colleges,” or subdisciplines, of Bible intake, proceeding from the least to the most difficult. HEARING GOD’S WORD The easiest of the Disciplines related to the intake of God’s Word is simply hearing it. Why consider this a Discipline? Because if we don’t discipline ourselves to hear God’s Word regularly, we may hear it only accidentally, just when we feel like it, or never hear it at all. For most of us, disciplining ourselves to hear God’s Word means primarily developing the practice of steadfastly attending a Bible-believing church where the Word of God is faithfully preached. Jesus once said, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it!” (Luke 11:28). Merely listening to God-inspired words is not the point. The purpose of all methods of Bible intake is to “keep it,” that is, to do what God says and thereby develop in Christlikeness. But the method of intake Jesus encourages in this verse is hearing God’s Word. Another passage emphasizing the importance of hearing is Romans 10:17: “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.” This doesn’t mean that a person can come to faith in Christ through no other means except by hearing Scripture, for multitudes have become believers as Jonathan Edwards did—and many hearing-impaired people have—through reading the Bible. Still, this verse concerns itself with the power of hearing. We may add, however, that most who, like Edwards, were converted while reading Scripture are also like him in that they often heard the proclamation of God’s Word prior to conversion. Furthermore, whereas this passage teaches that initial faith in Christ comes from hearing the inspired Word about Jesus Christ, it’s also true for Christians that much of the faith we need for day-to-day living after conversion comes from hearing the Bible’s message. From a scriptural word about God’s provision may come the faith that a family with financial struggles needs. Hearing a biblically based sermon on the love of Christ may be God’s means of granting assurance of faith to a downcast believer. I recently heard a recorded message that the Lord used to give me the faith to persevere in a difficult matter. Gifts of faith are often given to those who discipline themselves to hear the Word of God. There are other ways we may discipline ourselves to hear God’s Word in addition to the most important way, namely, hearing it preached as part of a local church ministry. The most obvious of these is by some form of recording of Bible-based content. These can be used in creative ways and times such as while dressing, cooking, commuting, and so on. If you do not have access to the Internet or portable devices with biblical content taken from the Internet, consider radio, including shortwave radio. One other text worthy of note on this subject is 1 Timothy 4:13. There the apostle Paul instructed his young friend in the ministry: “Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation, to teaching.” Though a lot more explanation could be given, it’s enough to say that it was important in the ministry of Paul and important to the Lord, who inspired these words, for God’s people to hear God’s Word. Since this is so, it should become a disciplined priority for us to hear it. If someone says, “I don’t need to go to church to worship God; I can worship Him on the golf course or at the lake just as well, if not better, than in church,” we may agree that our omnipresent God can be worshiped there. But the ongoing worship of God cannot be separated from the Word of God, which you don’t expect to be read aloud or preached on the golf course or at the lake. We are to discipline ourselves to go and hear the Word of God. Incidentally, if you have the privilege of reading God’s Word to God’s people—whether to an entire congregation or to a small group—learn to read it well. You may not be gifted with a remarkable voice, but you can learn to read the Scriptures expressively. This is an acquired skill, for no one naturally reads well aloud. Far too many read the Bible publicly in such a flat, unenthusiastic way that it sounds like a book no one would want to read on his or her own. Read it for what it is: the living Word of the living God. Practice reading the passage aloud. Listen to it in your favorite recording of the Bible. Use the Scripture reading time in family worship as ongoing training in reading well to others. I just did an Internet search on how to read aloud well. There are plenty of tips and resources available. Resolve to glorify God by being an excellent public reader of His Word. So few do, but what a difference it makes. A brief word is in order here about preparing ourselves to hear the Word of God. If you enter the typical evangelical church two minutes before the start of the worship service, it sounds almost like you’ve walked into a gymnasium two minutes before a basketball game. Part of my pastoral heart appreciates the good things represented by people who are glad to see and talk with each other. There is a spirit of family reunion in the air when the family of God gathers together. But I think a larger part of my heart longs for reverence and a spirit of seeking God among those who come to hear His Word. For a while a congregation of Korean Christians used our church building for their midweek service. I was impressed by the way they entered the worship center. Whether they were first to arrive or came in after the service had already started, as soon as each was seated he or she immediately bowed in prayer for several moments before arranging belongings, unbuttoning a coat, or acknowledging the presence of anyone else. This served as an effective reminder to his or her own heart and to everyone else of his or her main purpose for that time. Most churches I’m familiar with could stand more of this. One way to do so is to celebrate the “family reunion” until shortly before the beginning of worship, then call for a time of quiet reflection and focus a couple of minutes prior to the start of the service. Similarly, one of the English Puritans, Jeremiah Burroughs, wrote before his death in 1646 the following words of counsel regarding preparation for the Discipline of hearing God’s Word: First, when you come to hear the Word, if you would sanctify God’s name, you must possess your souls with what it is you are going to hear, that what you are going to hear is the Word of God.... Therefore you find that the Apostle, writing to the Thessalonians, gives them the reason why the Word did them so much good as it did. It was because they heard it as the Word of God, 1 Thess. 2:13, “For this cause also thank we God without ceasing, because when ye received the Word of God, which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of men, but (as it is in truth) the Word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe.” So hearing the Word of God is not merely passive listening; it is a Discipline to be cultivated. READING GOD’S WORD If you still doubt that Christians need to be exhorted to discipline themselves to read the Bible, consider this: USA Today reported a poll that showed only 11 percent of Americans read the Bible every day. More than half read it less than once a month or never at all. Of course, we attempt to comfort ourselves by noting that the poll included all Americans, not just professing Christians. Lamentably, little comfort may be found. A survey taken less than a year earlier by the Barna Research Group among those claiming to be “born-again Christians” disclosed these disheartening numbers: Only 18 percent—less than two of every ten—read the Bible every day. Worst of all, 23 percent—almost one in four professing Christians—say they never read the Word of God. Polls and surveys come and go, but there’s little reason to believe that these numbers fluctuate dramatically over time. Consider these statistics in light of 1 Timothy 4:7, “Discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness” (NASB). Jesus often asked questions about people’s understanding of the Scriptures, sometimes beginning with the words, “Have you not read... ?” (Matthew 19:4; Mark 12:10). He assumed that those claiming to be the people of God would have read the Word of God. And a case can be made that this question implies a familiarity with the entire Word of God. When Jesus said, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4), surely He intended at the very least for us to read “every word,” for how can we “live... by every word that comes from the mouth of God” if we’ve never even read “every word that comes from the mouth of God”? Since “all Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16), shouldn’t we read it? Revelation 1:3 tells us, “Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear, and who keep what is written in it, for the time is near.” God promises that those who read and heed His Word will be blessed. But only those who discipline themselves to do so will receive those blessings. The main reason, remember, for disciplining ourselves is godliness. We have learned that the Spiritual Disciplines are scriptural paths where we may expect to encounter the transforming grace of God. The most critical Discipline is the intake of God’s Word. No factor is more influential in making us more like the Son of God than the Spirit of God working through the Word of God. If you want to be changed, if you want to become more like Jesus Christ, discipline yourself to read the Bible. How often should we read it? British preacher John Blanchard, in his book How to Enjoy Your Bible, answers, Surely we only have to be realistic and honest with ourselves to know how regularly we need to turn to the Bible. How often do we face problems, temptation and pressure? Every day! Then how often do we need instruction, guidance and greater encouragement? Every day! To catch all these felt needs up into an even greater issue, how often do we need to see God’s face, hear his voice, feel his touch, know his power? The answer to all these questions is the same: every day! As the American evangelist D. L. Moody put it, “A man can no more take in a supply of grace for the future than he can eat enough for the next six months, or take sufficient air into his lungs at one time to sustain life for a week. We must draw upon God’s boundless store of grace from day to day as we need it.” Here are the three most practical suggestions for consistent success in Bible reading. First, find the time. Perhaps one of the main reasons Christians never read through the entire Bible is discouragement. Many people have never read a thousand-page book before and get discouraged at the sheer length of the Bible. Do you realize that recorded readings of the Bible have proven that you can read through the entire Book in seventy-one hours? That’s less time than the average American spends in front of the television every month. In other words, if most people would exchange their TV time for Scripture reading, they’d finish reading the entire Bible in four weeks or less. If that sounds unworkable, consider this: In no more than fifteen minutes a day you can read through the Bible in less than a year’s time. Only five minutes a day takes you through the Bible in less than three years. And yet the majority of Christians never read God’s Word all the way through in a lifetime of decades. So we’re back to the idea that it’s primarily a matter of discipline and motivation. Discipline yourself to find the time. Try to make it the same time every day. If possible, read the Bible at a time other than just before you go to sleep. There’s value in reading the Bible just before you drop off, but if this is the only part of your day when you read Scripture then you should try to find another time. There are at least two reasons for this. First, you will retain very little of what you read when you’re so tired and sleepy. And second, you probably do very little evil in your sleep. You need to encounter Christ in the Scriptures when it will still have an impact on your day. The second practical suggestion is to find a Bible-reading plan. It’s no wonder that those who simply open the Bible at random each day soon drop the discipline. Bible-reading plans abound on the Internet. Many study Bibles contain a reading schedule somewhere within the pages. Most local churches can provide you with a daily reading guide also. Apart from a specific plan, reading three chapters every day and five on Sundays will take you through the Bible in a year’s time. Read three in the Old Testament and three in the New Testament every day, and you will finish the Old Testament once and the New Testament four times in a twelve-month span. My favorite plan involves reading in five places in the Bible each day. I begin in Genesis, Joshua, Job, Isaiah, and Matthew and read an equal number of chapters in each section. A variation of this plan is to read in three places daily, starting in Genesis, Job, and Matthew, respectively. The three sections are roughly the same in length, so you will finish them all about the same time. The great advantage of such a design is its variety. Many who intend to read straight through the Bible become confused in Leviticus, discouraged in Numbers, and give up completely by Deuteronomy. But when you are reading in more than one place each day, the variety makes it easier to keep up the momentum. Even if you don’t read through the Bible in a year’s time, keep a record of which books you have read. Put a mark beside a chapter when you read it or by the title of a book in the table of contents when you’ve completed it. That way, regardless of how long it takes, or in what order they’re read, you’ll know when you’ve read every book in the Bible. The third suggestion is to find at least one word, phrase, or verse to meditate on each time you read. We’ll look at meditation more closely in the next chapter, but you should recognize now that without meditation you may close your Bible and not be able to remember a single thing you’ve read. And if that happens, your Bible reading is not likely to change you. Even with a good plan, it can become a mundane chore instead of a Discipline of joy. Take at least one thing you’ve read and think deeply about it for a few moments. Your insight into Scripture will deepen, and you’ll better understand how it applies to your life. And the more you apply the truth of Scripture, the more you’ll become like Jesus. We should all have the following man’s passion for reading God’s Word. Robert L. Sumner, in The Wonder of the Word of God, tells of a man in Kansas City who was severely injured in an explosion. His face was badly disfigured, and he lost his eyesight as well as both hands. He had only recently become a Christian when the accident happened, and one of his greatest disappointments was that he could no longer read the Bible. Then he heard about a lady in England who read Braille with her lips. Hoping to do the same, he sent for some books of the Bible in Braille. But he discovered that the nerve endings in his lips had been too badly damaged to distinguish the characters. One day, as he brought one of the Braille pages to his lips, his tongue happened to touch a few of the raised characters and he could feel them. Like a flash he realized, I can read the Bible using my tongue. At the time Sumner wrote his book, the man had read through the entire Bible four times. If he can do that, can you discipline yourself to read the Bible? STUDYING GOD’S WORD If reading the Bible can be compared to cruising the width of a clear, sparkling lake in a motorboat, studying the Bible is like slowly crossing that same lake in a glass-bottomed boat. The motorboat crossing provides an overview of the lake and a swift, passing view of its depths. The glass- bottomed boat of study, however, takes you beneath the surface of Scripture for an unhurried look of clarity and detail that’s normally missed by those who simply read the text. As author Jerry Bridges put it, “Reading gives us breadth, but study gives us depth.” Let’s look at three examples of a heart to study the Word of God. The first is the Old Testament figure Ezra: “For Ezra had set his heart to study the Law of the LORD, and to do it and to teach his statutes and rules in Israel” (Ezra 7:10). There’s an instructive significance to the sequence in this verse. Ezra (1) “set his heart,” (2) “to study the Law of the LORD,” (3) “and to do it,” (4) “and to teach his statutes and rules in Israel.” Before he taught the Word of God to the people of God, he practiced what he learned. But Ezra’s learning came from a study of the Scriptures. Before he studied, however, he first “set his heart” to study. In other words, Ezra disciplined himself to study God’s Word. A second example is from Acts 17:11. Missionaries Paul and Silas had barely escaped with their lives from Thessalonica after their successful evangelistic work had provoked the Jews there to jealousy. When they repeated the same course of action in Berea, the Jews there responded differently: “Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessalonica; they received the word with all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so.” According to the next verse, the result was that “many of them therefore believed” (verse 12). The willingness to examine the Scriptures is commended here as noble character. My favorite example of a heart to study the truth of God is in 2 Timothy 4:13. The apostle Paul was in prison and writing the last chapter of his final New Testament letter. Anticipating the arrival of his younger friend Timothy, he wrote, “When you come, bring the cloak that I left with Carpus at Troas, also the books, and above all the parchments.” The scrolls and parchments Paul requested almost certainly included copies of the Scriptures. In his cold and miserable confinement, the godly apostle asked for two things: a cloak to wear so his body could be warmed and God’s Word to study so his mind and heart could be warmed. Paul had seen heaven (see 2 Corinthians 12:1-6) and the resurrected Christ (see Acts 9:5), he had experienced the Holy Spirit’s power for miracles (see Acts 14:10) and even for writing Holy Scripture (see 2 Peter 3:16); nevertheless, he continued to study God’s Word until he died. So if Paul, with all his firsthand knowledge of heaven, Jesus, miracles, and more needed to study God’s Word, surely you and I need to study it and should discipline ourselves to do it. Then why don’t we? Why do so many Christians neglect the study of God’s Word? R. C. Sproul said it painfully well: “Here then, is the real problem of our negligence. We fail in our duty to study God’s Word not so much because it is difficult to understand, not so much because it is dull and boring, but because it is work. Our problem is not a lack of intelligence or a lack of passion. Our problem is that we are lazy.” Besides laziness, part of the problem for some may be an insecurity about how to study the Bible or even where to begin. Actually, starting is not so difficult. The basic difference between Bible reading and Bible study is simply a pen and paper (or some other means of preserving your thoughts). Write down observations about the text as you read, and record questions that come to your mind. If your Bible has cross-references, look up the ones that relate to the verses that prompt your questions, then record your insights. Find a key word in your reading and use the concordance found in the back of most Bibles to review the other references that use the word, and again note your findings. Another way to begin is to outline a chapter, one paragraph at a time. When you finish that chapter, move on to the next until you’ve outlined the entire book. Before long you’ll have a far stronger grasp on a section of Scripture than you had by just reading it. As you advance in the study of the Book of God, you will learn the value of in-depth word studies, character studies, topical studies, and book studies. You’ll discover a new richness in the Scripture as your understanding grows of how the grammar, history, culture, and geography surrounding a text factor into its interpretation. Don’t let a feeling of inadequacy keep you from the delight of learning the Bible on your own. Books, thick and thin, abound on how to study the Bible. They can provide more guidance regarding methods and tools than I can in this chapter. Don’t settle only for spiritual food that’s been “predigested” by others. Experience the joy of discovering biblical insights firsthand through your own Bible study. MORE APPLICATION If your growth in godliness were measured by the quality of your Bible intake, what would be the result? This is an important question, for the truth is, your growth in godliness is greatly affected by the quality of your Bible intake. In His magnificent High Priestly prayer of John 17, Jesus asked this of the Father for us: “Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth” (verse 17). God’s plan for sanctifying us, that is, for making us holy and godly, is accomplished by means of “the truth”—His Word. If we settle for a poor quality intake of hearing, reading, and studying God’s Word, we severely restrict the main flow of God’s sanctifying grace toward us. As I say this, I realize that it would be easy to cause guilt feelings in us all (myself included) over past failures regarding the intake of God’s Word. Above all, remember that heaven’s door is opened to us not by the works we do (such as our intake of God’s Word), but by the work of God in Jesus Christ. Beyond that, let’s apply the message of Philippians 3:13 to any previous inconsistency with our Bible intake and start “forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead” in this area. This leads us to a final application question. What is one thing you can do to improve your intake of God’s Word? Unless providentially hindered, joining a group of like-minded believers to hear God’s Word preached each week should be a minimum. Many Bible- believing churches provide more than one opportunity each week to hear God’s Word. You may want to consider recordings of the Bible, as well as Bible teaching on the Internet or radio, as options to increasingly hear God’s Word. Set goals of earnestly attempting to read the Bible every day and regularly completing the entire Book. Also, inexpensive workbooks and study guides on every book in the Bible and a multitude of topics are available about anywhere Christian books are sold. Besides launching out individually, join a Bible study group in your church or community, or even start a group study. Whatever way you choose, discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness by committing to at least one way of improving your intake of the Holy Word of God. For those who use their Bibles little are really not much better off than those who have no Bible at all.  Let’s finish this chapter with a substantial word of encouragement. It’s from a helpful booklet, Reading the Bible, by a Welsh pastor named Geoffrey Thomas. Whenever he writes of reading the Bible, we should also apply his words to hearing and studying it. Do not expect to master the Bible in a day, or a month, or a year. Rather expect often to be puzzled by its contents. It is not all equally clear. Great men of God often feel like absolute novices when they read the Word. The Apostle Peter said that there were some things hard to understand in the epistles of Paul (2 Peter 3:16). I am glad he wrote those words because I have felt that often. So do not expect always to get an emotional charge or a feeling of quiet peace when you read the Bible. By the grace of God you may expect that to be a frequent experience, but often you will get no emotional response at all. Let the Word break over your heart and mind again and again as the years go by, and imperceptibly there will come great changes in your attitude and outlook and conduct. You will probably be the last to recognize these. Often you will feel very, very small, because increasingly the God of the Bible will become to you wonderfully great. So go on reading it until you can read no longer, and then you will not need the Bible any more, because when your eyes close for the last time in death, and never again read the Word of God in Scripture you will open them to the Word of God in the flesh, that same Jesus of the Bible whom you have known for so long, standing before you to take you for ever to His eternal home. Although shortwave radio is common overseas, most Americans don’t have one and rarely think of the medium. But many of the best Bible teachers on the Internet or on traditional radio stations in the United States also can be heard practically anywhere in the world (including the United States) on the powerful, if lesser quality signal, shortwave stations. Jeremiah Burroughs, Gospel Worship (1648; reprint, Ligonier, PA: Soli Deo Gloria Publications, 1990), 200. George Gallup, 100 Questions and Answers: Religion in America (Princeton Religious Research Center, 1989), cited in USA Today, February 1, 1990. Bookstore Journal, as quoted in Discipleship Journal, issue 52, 10. John Blanchard, How to Enjoy Your Bible (Colchester, England: Evangelical Press, 1984), 104.  An Internet search for “how much time watching tv,” noting especially time use surveys provided by the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, will reveal a variety of research efforts confirming this claim. Robert L. Sumner, The Wonder of the Word of God (Murfreesboro, TN: Biblical Evangelism Press, 1963), 12. Jerry Bridges, The Practice of Godliness (Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 1983), 51. R. C. Sproul, Knowing Scripture (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 1977), 17. If you are unsure of what cross-references are or how to use them, ask your pastor or another mature Christian. Geoffrey Thomas, Reading the Bible (Edinburgh, Scotland: The Banner of Truth Trust, 1980), 22. CHAPTER 3  BIBLE INTAKE (PART 2)... FOR THE PURPOSE OF GODLINESS There is discipline involved in Christian growth. The rapidity with which a man grows spiritually and the extent to which he grows, depends upon this discipline. It is the discipline of the means. R I C H A R D H A LV E R S O N Because you are reading this book, it’s likely that you are a person who, at least to some degree, already engages in hearing, reading, and studying the Word of God as advocated in the previous chapter. Despite this, there is also a strong possibility that you do not perceive a great deal of fruit being produced in your life from these Disciplines. Your experience does not measure up to your expectation, so perhaps you conclude that you are the problem, that maybe you are a second-rate Christian. The reality is that you may not be the problem at all. The problem may simply be your method. I know, for example, many people who read the Bible every day. They may even read multiple chapters of God’s Word each morning. But as soon as they close the Bible, on most days they would have to admit that they can’t remember a thing they’ve read. “I just don’t have a good memory,” they conclude with a sigh. Or they may believe that they can’t remember what they’ve read because they don’t have a high IQ, or didn’t have a good education, or they are just too old. Well, I’ve had some twenty-two-year-old geniuses in my seminary classes who have the same problem. So I would contend that in most cases the reason people can’t remember what they read in the Bible is not their age, mental ability, or training, but their method. Moreover, does anyone want to argue that ordinary people—people with no more than an average intellect or education—are unable to profit satisfyingly from the Bible on a regular basis? Surely not, especially since observation confirms that what the apostle Paul said of the Christians in Corinth is true of Christians everywhere: “For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth” (1 Corinthians 1:26). In other words, since the majority of those God calls are not “wise according to worldly standards,” does that mean most Christians can’t benefit much from Scripture on an individual basis? No, for doubtless God wants all His children to grow in grace and in their knowledge of Him through His Word. So what’s the problem? Why is it that the words of Scripture can go through our ears or eyes and then out of our minds so quickly and commonly, despite the depth of our devotion to the Bible? The problem is that hearing and reading the Bible, by themselves, usually aren’t sufficient for remembering what we’ve received. They are invaluable and irreplaceable Disciplines, but they are incomplete without other Disciplines of the Word. While hearing and reading plant the seed of Scripture into the soil of our souls, other Disciplines are the water and sun God uses to bring the growth and fruit of Christlikeness in our lives. As the previous pages have indicated, studying the Bible is one way to water and warm the seed planted by hearing or reading. In this chapter are three more important Disciplines for the intake of God’s Word that, when rightly practiced, promote the increased knowledge of God and closer conformity to Christ. MEMORIZING GOD’S WORD—BENEFITS AND METHODS Many Christians consider the Spiritual Discipline of memorizing God’s Word as something tantamount to modern-day martyrdom. Ask them to memorize Bible verses and they react with about as much eagerness as a request for volunteers to face Nero’s lions. How come? Perhaps because many associate all memorization with the memory efforts required of them in school. It was work, and most of it was uninteresting and of limited value. Frequently heard, also, is the excuse of having a bad memory. But what if I offered you one thousand dollars for every verse you could memorize in the next seven days? Do you think your attitude toward Scripture memory and your ability to memorize would improve? Any financial reward would be minimal when compared to the accumulating value of the treasure of God’s Word deposited within your mind. Memorization Supplies Spiritual Power When Scripture is stored in your mind, it is available for the Holy Spirit to bring to your attention when you need it most. That’s why the author of Psalm 119 wrote, “I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you” (verse 11). It’s one thing, for instance, to be watching or thinking about something when you know you shouldn’t, but there’s added power against the temptation when a specific verse can be brought to your mind, like Colossians 3:2: “Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.” When the Holy Spirit brings a definite verse to mind like that, it’s an illustration of what Ephesians 6:17 can mean when it refers to “the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.” A pertinent scriptural truth, brought to your awareness by the Holy Spirit at just the right moment, can be the weapon that makes the difference in a spiritual battle. There is no better illustration of this than Jesus’ confrontation with Satan in the lonely Judean wilderness (see Matthew 4:1-11). Each time the Enemy thrust a temptation at Jesus, He parried it with the Sword of the Spirit. It was the Spirit-prompted recollection of specific texts of Scripture that helped Jesus experience victory. One of the ways we can experience more spiritual victories is to do as Jesus did—memorize Scripture so that it’s available within us for the Holy Spirit to bring to our remembrance when it’s needed. Memorization Strengthens Your Faith What Christian doesn’t want his or her faith strengthened? One thing you can do to strengthen it is to discipline yourself to memorize Scripture. Let’s walk through Proverbs 22:17-19, which says, “Incline your ear, and hear the words of the wise, and apply your heart to my knowledge, for it will be pleasant if you keep them within you, if all of them are ready on your lips. That your trust may be in the LORD, I have made them known to you today, even to you.” To “apply your heart” to the “words of the wise” spoken of here and to “keep them within you” certainly pertains to Scripture memory. Notice the reason given here for keeping the wise words of Scripture within you and “ready on your lips.” It’s so “that your trust may be in the LORD.” Memorizing Scripture strengthens your faith because it repeatedly reinforces the truth, often just when you need to hear it again. A church I pastored sought to build a new worship center. We believed that in our situation we would most honor God if we built the building without going into debt. There were times when my faith in the Lord’s provision began to sink. More often than not, what renewed my faith was the reminder of God’s promise in 1 Samuel 2:30: “Those who honor me I will honor.” Scripture memory is like reinforcing steel to a sagging faith. Memorization Prepares Us for Witnessing and Counseling On the Day of Pentecost (the Jewish holiday being celebrated when the Holy Spirit came in great power upon Jesus’ followers), the apostle Peter was suddenly inspired by God to stand and preach to the crowd about Jesus. Much of what he said consisted of quotations from the Old Testament (see Acts 2:14-40). Although there’s a qualitative difference between Peter’s uniquely inspired sermon and our Spirit-led conversations, his experience illustrates how Scripture memory can prepare us for unexpected witnessing or counseling opportunities that come our way. Recently, while I was talking to a man about Jesus, he said something that brought to mind a verse I had memorized. I quoted that verse, and it was the turning point in a conversation that resulted in him professing faith in Christ. I often experience something similar in counseling conversations. But until the verses are hidden in the heart, they aren’t available to use with the mouth. Memorization Provides a Means of God’s Guidance The psalmist wrote, “Your testimonies are my delight; they are my counselors” (Psalm 119:24). Just as the Holy Spirit retrieves scriptural truth from our memory banks for use in counseling others, so also will He bring it to our own minds in providing timely guidance for ourselves. Many times when I have been trying to decide whether to say what I think in a given situation, the Lord brings Ephesians 4:29 to my mind: “Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.” I’m sure that sometimes I misunderstand the leading of the Holy Spirit, but His guidance could hardly be more clear than when He brings to mind a verse like that! When it happens, it’s the fruit of disciplined Scripture memory. Memorization Stimulates Meditation One of the most underrated benefits of memorizing Scripture is that it provides fuel for meditation. When you have memorized a verse of Scripture, you can meditate on it anywhere at any time during the day or night. If you love God’s Word enough to memorize it, you can become like the writer of Psalm 119:97, who exclaimed, “Oh how I love your law! It is my meditation all the day.” Whether you’re standing in line, taking a walk, driving the car, riding the train, waiting at the airport, cleaning the house, mowing the yard, rocking a baby, or eating a meal, you can benefit from the Spiritual Discipline of meditation if you have made the deposits of memorization. The Word of God is the “sword of the Spirit,” but if there is no Bible physically accessible to you, then the weapon of the Word must be present in the armory of your mind in order for the Spirit to wield it. Imagine yourself in the midst of a decision and needing guidance, or struggling with a difficult temptation and needing victory. The Holy Spirit enters your mental arsenal and looks around for available weapons, but all He finds is a John 3:16, a Genesis 1:1, and a Great Commission. Those are great swords, but they’re not made for every battle. How do we go about filling our personal spiritual arsenal with a supply of swords for the Holy Spirit to use? You Can Memorize Scripture Most people think they have a bad memory, but it’s not true. As we’ve already discovered, most of the time memorizing is mainly a problem of motivation. If you know your birthday, phone number, and address, and can remember the names of your friends and family, then you have a functioning memory and can memorize Scripture. The question becomes whether you are willing to discipline yourself to do it. When Dawson Trotman, founder of the Christian organization called The Navigators, was converted to faith in Christ in 1926, he began memorizing one Bible verse every day. He was driving a truck for a lumberyard in Los Angeles at the time. While driving around town he would work on his verse for that day. During the first three years of his Christian life he memorized his first thousand verses. If he could memorize over three hundred verses a year while driving, surely we can find ways to memorize a few. Have a Plan There are many good prepackaged Scripture memory resources available in print and digital formats. But you might prefer selecting verses yourself on a particular topic where the Lord is working in your life right now. If your faith is weak, memorize verses on faith. If you’re struggling with a habit, find verses that will help you experience victory over it. One man told Dawson Trotman that he was afraid that following his example of Scripture memory would make him prideful. Trotman’s reply: “Then make your first ten verses on humility!” Another option is to memorize a section of Scripture, such as a psalm, rather than isolated verses. If you are using a digital resource to help you with Scripture memory, it probably provides you with plenty of guidance on how to utilize it. But if not, or to supplement your use of that digital guide, the following tips will be helpful. Write Out the Verses Make a list of the verses on-screen or on a sheet of paper, leaving an inch or so of space between each one, or write each verse on a separate index card. Draw Picture Reminders Nothing elaborate is needed here, just a few lines or stick figures beside each verse, or some sort of picture or clip art if done on-screen. This makes the verse “visual” and puts the picture-is-worth-a-thousand-words principle to work for you. One simple image can remind you of a couple dozen words. This is especially true if the drawing illustrates some action described in the verse. For instance, with Psalm 119:11, you might make a crude drawing of a heart with a Bible inside to remind you of treasuring God’s Word in the heart. For Ephesians 6:17, a sketch of a sword is an obvious reminder. You’ll find this method particularly helpful when memorizing a section of consecutive verses. I realize that you are probably no more of an artist than I am, but no one else has to see the pictures and they can certainly make Scripture memory easier. Memorize the Verses Word-Perfectly There’s a great temptation, especially when first learning a verse, to lower this standard. Don’t settle for just getting close, or getting the “main idea.” Memorize it word for word. Learn the reference, too. Without an objective standard of measurement, the goal is unclear and you may tend to continue lowering the standard until you quit altogether. Moreover, if you don’t have the verse memorized exactly, you lose confidence in using it in conversation and witnessing. So even though memorizing “every jot and tittle” is harder in the beginning, it’s easier and more productive in the long run. Incidentally, verses you know word-perfectly are easier to review than those you don’t know so accurately. Find a Method of Accountability Because of our tendency toward sloth, most of us need more accountability on Scripture memory than on other Disciplines. And the busier we are, the more we tend to excuse ourselves from this commitment. Some, as Dawson Trotman did, develop personalized means of accountability to this Discipline that keep them faithful. Most Christians, however, are more consistent when they meet or talk regularly with someone else—not always another Christian—with whom they review their verses. Review and Meditate Every Day No principle of Scripture memory is more important than the principle of review. Without adequate review you will eventually lose most of what you memorize. But once you really learn a verse, you can mentally review it in a fraction of the time it would take to speak it. And when you know a verse this well, you don’t have to review but once a week, once a month, or even once every six months to keep a sharp edge on it. It’s not unusual, however, to reach a point where you spend 80 percent of your Scripture memory time in review. Don’t begrudge devoting so much time to polishing your swords. Rejoice instead at having so many! Integrating Scripture memory review into one or more of your life routines leverages the regularity of your habits to strengthen your grip on Scripture. Thus you might want to incorporate a few minutes of review into your daily devotional time. Or you might find that you can review your verses while you are brushing your teeth, working out, or making your daily commute. A great time to review your better-known verses is while going to sleep. Since you don’t need a written copy of the verses before you, you can repeat them and meditate on them while dozing off or even when you have trouble sleeping. And if you can’t stay awake, that’s okay, since you’re supposed to be sleeping anyway. If you can’t go to sleep, you’re putting the most profitable and peaceful information possible into your mind, as well as making good use of the time. As we finish this section on the Discipline of Scripture memory, remember that memorizing verses is not an end in itself. The goal is not to see how many verses we can memorize; the goal is godliness. The goal is to memorize the Word of God so that it can transform our minds and our lives. Jerry Bridges said in this regard, I am very much aware that Scripture memorization has largely fallen by the wayside in our day.... But let me say as graciously but firmly as I can: We cannot effectively pursue holiness without the Word of God stored up in our minds where it can be used by the Holy Spirit to transform us.... I know it requires work and is sometimes discouraging when we can’t recall accurately a verse we have worked hard to memorize. The truth is, however, all forms of discipline require work and are often discouraging. But the person who perseveres in any discipline, despite the hard work and discouraging times, reaps the reward the discipline is intended to produce. MEDITATING ON GOD’S WORD—BENEFITS AND METHODS One sad feature of our contemporary culture is that meditation has become identified more with non-Christian systems of thought than with biblical Christianity. Even among believers, the practice of meditation is often more closely associated with yoga, transcendental meditation, relaxation therapy, or some New Age practice than with Christian spirituality. Because meditation is so prominent in many spiritually counterfeit groups and movements, some Christians are uncomfortable with the whole subject and suspicious of those who engage in it. But we must remember that meditation is both commanded by God and modeled by the godly in Scripture. Just because a cult adopts the cross as a symbol doesn’t mean the church should cease to use it. In the same way, we shouldn’t discard or be afraid of scriptural meditation simply because the world engages in something it calls meditation. The kind of meditation encouraged in the Bible differs from other kinds of meditation in several ways. While some advocate a kind of meditation in which you do your best to empty your mind, Christian meditation involves filling your mind with God and His truth. For some, meditation is an attempt to achieve complete mental passivity, but biblical meditation requires constructive mental activity. Wor