Six ways I listen and follow Jesus’ teaching

Posted on October 14, 2016 by Matthew Laker

“Anyone who listens to my teaching and follows it is wise, like a person who builds a house on solid rock.” Matthew 7:24 (NLT)

Just how do we listen to Jesus’ teachings and embrace them in our life?

It was a Saturday night and I was sitting on our back steps and reflecting on life. I started to think about the sermon I would preach the next day. I was talking about the need to learn the ways of Jesus and embrace him in the everyday moments. I wondered to myself, just how do I learn the ways of Jesus.

Here are six things I wrote down in my journal of ways I go about learning the ways of Jesus and embracing in him my life.

These are in no order.

Six ways to listen and follow Jesus’ teaching

a. Time for self reflection

Life goes so fast we fail to slow down long enough to actually reflect upon our experiences and their impact in our life. It is during these moments that I am looking at my life in light of who Jesus is. I am not sure if I do this well yet, but am learning as I walk this journey.

b. Regular reading of and meditating on God’s word

It is no secret that one of the biggest catalysts we can have in growing our faith is a regular reading and meditating on God’s word. I have learned to not get so hung up on completing a certain amount of text, but picking up where I left off. For example I do use some version of a bible reading plan. However, if I miss a time, I just pick up either where I should be in the plan or where I left off. I am not concerned about completing it, as I am about spending time in God’s word.

c. Investing in others (serving)

There is no better way to learn the ways of Jesus than to help others learn the ways of Jesus.

d. Regular gathering with God’s people for teaching, worship, prayer and fun.

Community is a big part of our faith journey. Many struggle with it for many different reasons. However if I am honest, it is part of how I listen to Jesus and follow him.

e. Learning from Saints now and before.

This one is connected to the community one above. The example as well comes out of Hebrews 11 and I have found it useful. You can do this through reading the stories of those who have gone before and those who are now. You can do this meeting with other followers of Jesus and being intentional with your questions and learn from them.

f. Walk the path

This is literally about putting his words into practice. It is that easy and that hard. It is about how I use my time, what I read, how I react and in what I trust. It is not easy.

What about you? How do you go about learning the ways of Jesus and putting them into practice?

Tools in my backpack to help me keep a quiet time

Posted on October 5, 2016October 14, 2016 by Matthew Laker

In all of our lives, there are foundational practices that need to be part of the regular rhythm of life. As I journey with people, often when I ask about people’s quiet time, their head drops or they look away. They know they need to develop this area but have not. A few along the journey honestly have never really developed a quiet time in their life.

What is a Quiet time?

A quiet time is the intentional regular rhythm of pausing to pray and sit with Jesus. Often it involves scripture reading but does not always have to.

My 3 purposes of a Quite time.

a. To provide reflection space in my life to gain a better perspective of myself, circumstances, and Jesus.

b. To hear from and listen to the Holy Spirit.

c. To align my life with Christ’s

There are more, but these are my top three.

Developing and practising our quiet time is like going on a hike. In that journey, there are some useful tools to have in our backpack.

Here are four tools I carry in my life that help me in the journey, or rhythm, of a quiet time.

1. Calendar – Set time aside to meet with Jesus. We do it with everyone else. You can still have that spur of the moment time. For example, unplanned times where you find yourself praying or worshiping in music, etc. You need those, but you also need scheduled times of hitting the pause button in your life. So find a time that works and do it.

2. A Framework – Many people, when starting out, need the assistance of a framework to help them know what to do in this time. The framework is just a tool to help you hear from Jesus. There are many good ones out there. For example Lectio Divina. Here is an outline you can read to help and you can read a little more about it here.

3. A Bible and a journal – Many people use this time to reflect upon scripture and read scripture. I suggest having a bible reading plan can be a great help. A journal as well can help you process your thoughts.

4. Understand yourself – It is important to know how you best connect with Jesus. It is important to know your personality and character and who God calls you to be. There are a number of great tools that can serve as jumping off points to help in this.

In my journey of practising a quiet time these are a few of my tools that have proved to be helpful. It is important as well to also be aware of the space you are in and what your distractions will be.

Finally, give yourself some grace. Just because you missed that one time does not mean the world is going to end or you lose God’s favour. You already have God’s favour, that is why we want to spend time with him.

What tools are in your backpack?

What is one step you can do today to develop the rhythm of quiet?

What is one tool you need to use to develop the rhythm of your quiet time?

My Personal navigational aids to stay focused in Life

Posted on April 13, 2016April 10, 2016 by Matthew Laker

Traditionally, a lighthouse would help warn of dangerous areas of travel for boats as well as serve as a navigational aid. In order to enter, engage and experience the life Jesus calls us to we need some navigational aids.

Just as we put faith in a chair when we sit down, we must put faith in Jesus to live our life. The challenge is I can see the four legs of the chair that will hold me up. That is not always the case with Jesus and yet, perhaps we are looking at the wrong things.

You can read about a few of my personal challenges of trusting Jesus in the daily rhythms of life here.

In this post, I want to share a few of my navigational life aids from my personal experiences that help me stay focused on the life Jesus calls me to.

Stay connected to the community of God.

This is in large, small and smaller settings. The community of Jesus is meant to be a witness of God to us. We were created to be in relationships and having a smaller community leads to a good life. We need to seek out a small group of trusted believers to journey with us during every season we find ourselves in.

Spiritual disciplines

This encompasses a number of activities all with the purpose of leading us to Jesus. They help to push out the noise of life and focus on Jesus. For example, a regular time of meditation in the bible often yields greater growth in our life than just running to it when the crisis comes.

Serve

Finding a place to serve others helps to get your focus off of yourself in life. Our life is often consumed with something we consider to be a big deal so having a place to serve helps us keep a bigger picture in mind. It lets me interact with people who are on similar journeys in life. Serving has also been one of the avenues that God shapes and teaches me.

My wife.

This one could come under the community section and the smaller community, but it’s also a unique relationship you may or may not have. However, in my life, my wife helps and reminds me at times of God’s truth. This is especially important when I have forgotten to look to Jesus.

Trusting Jesus is no simple matter and for many carries both a mystery and a practical element to it. It is easy to say “trust Jesus,” but letting go of fear can be easier said than done. It is during prayer, I approach the throne of grace. There I call out to Jesus asking for grace and mercy to get through.

Hebrews 4:16 “Lets us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need”

Emotionally healthy Spirituality by Peter Scazzero

Posted on April 8, 2016April 11, 2016 by Matthew Laker

“Emotionally healthy Spirituality” by Peter Scazzero was my lent reading for 2016.

The following are some personal takeaways through my experience of reading the book.

The core message of the book is “When emotional heath and contemplative spirituality are interwoven together in an individual’s life, a small group, a church, a university fellowship, or a community, people’s lives are dramatically transformed. They work as an antidote to heal the symptoms of emotionally unhealthy spirituality…”[1]

“Awareness of yourself and your relationship with God are intricately related. In fact, the challenge to shed our “old false” self in order to live authentically in our “new true” self strikes at the very core of true spirituality.”[2]

Here are my personal takeaways – in no order

1. His Honesty in asking why he was not experiencing or seeing emotional or spiritual maturity in the church or himself.

One person I was recently coaching shared that if the church really believed who Jesus says he was, we should be acting differently. At times, the church is guilty of telling people to love more or love better. However, that is not good enough. Over the last number of years, I have started to wrestle more with why we are not seeing the transformation in people’s lives that the gospel is calling us to. The author’s hope was to help us be transformed.

2. Wrestling with deeply rooted behavioral patterns that move us away from Christ.

Many of us have underestimated how deep sin goes in our life. Many of us have underestimated how deeply entrenched the old ways and patterns are in our life. In chapter five, he talks about going back in order to move forward. He challenges the reader to understand behaviors and patterns that have entrenched themselves in our life.

3. Top 10 symptoms indicating someone is suffering from a base case of emotionally unhealthy spirituality

4. We have a problem, but here are some paths that could help.

Scazzero does point out in chapter two five components of who we are. However, this book only focuses on two parts as foundationally. I appreciate him trying to provide some initial practical steps to help people grow in their faith. Not only is this useful for my own personal journey, but I can introduce them easily to other people.

5. Pay attention to emotion and pain.

One of the big takeaways for me was the call to not push the emotion away. Throughout the book is a call to ask questions about what you are feeling. What are your emotions telling you? What is God saying through those emotions or pain? Where is God in this moment? There is a call to not fully give ourselves over to the whim of emotions, but also understand they are God given, so do not fear them. I am not sure this is well understood in the church.

6. A Rule of Life.

The author gives a great illustration of a trellis that helps us abide in Christ and become fruitful. The trellis is a combination of the spiritual practices that provide structure for me to intentionally pay attention and remember God in everything I do. The fruit that comes from that is seen in how we live our life.

Throughout the book is a desire to provide practical skills for people to apply in their life. The idea of developing a rule of life reminds me a little of developing a life plan. It is the whole idea of being intentional in your life.

When I started the book the hope was it would serve as an avenue of personal reflection and deepening of my life. It has helped with that.

You can check out the book here.

Resource:

I found some mp3 of his teaching around this here. –http://ncdefca.org/resources/conference/2010-emotionally-healthy-spirituality-pete-scazzero/

[1]Scazzero, Peter “Emotionally Healthy Spirituality” (Tennesse, Thomas Nelson, 2006), p.44

[2] Ibid, p.65

Is Lent Biblical

Posted on March 16, 2016March 3, 2022 by Matthew Laker

Is Lent Biblical?

When we ask that question what we are wanting to know is, is Lent a practise that Jesus said we must do?

The bottom line is no. Nowhere in the bible do we find Jesus instructing us to follow Lent.

So, why then would we take part in the practise?

Lent generally is a time for followers of Jesus to reflect, repent, pray, fast and give. These are part of what we may call spiritual disciplines. Commonly Lent is held by those in the Catholic, Anglican, or Lutheran-influenced Christian traditions and many of the different Christian traditions observe it in different ways.

Someone who opposes Lent may say “Lent is just a tradition created by man.” That would be a correct statement. However, it is a tradition with the intent to make disciples. The core of it is to point people to Jesus. It is not a salvation issue or maturity meter.

Jesus said, “teach them to obey my commands.”

Yes, Jesus did not say you should practise Lent. However, I have come to see Lent as a system that could help us accomplish the mission of Jesus. Yes in many circles perhaps we have not used it to its full potential. For some, they have not had good experiences with Lent, but when I look at Lent, I see connections to growing our own faith and other’s.

One may ask, “but are not the spiritual disciples we find in Lent part of our regular routine of following Jesus?”

The quick answer is yes. However like Jesus taking a 40 day time of fasting, there is value in a focused set time of seeking Jesus.

My experience has shown me that Lent can be this great set time of discipleship to help people align their life with Jesus. Like when building muscle you need to stress the muscle then release it and let it rest. Lent can serve as a time to focus and to stress the muscle of faith in order to build it. So Lent can be used to build the foundations of good habits/spiritual disciplines that are to be part of one’s life.

Is Lent instructed by Jesus to do? No, it is not.

Is Lent useful in discipleship? I believe it can be.

Do you have to practise Lent? No, you do not.

Can Lent serve as an avenue to build spiritual muscle? Yes.