I stood in the line for my latte feeling guilty.
Lattes are expensive, I thought. I am pretty sure the money I just used for the latte could’ve gone to something better. My current church’s ministry to those in need in Haiti. The food pantry. When Jesus said “give up everything you have and follow me” He probably expected me to leave my Starbucks cup behind.
But, you know, the money was already spent. So I stayed in line.
And then it occurred to me: it’s not that you’re not allowed to experience joy. It’s just that you have been given more than enough to share that joy. The question isn’t always “should I buy myself the latte” but sometimes “what’s stopping me for buying a latte for someone who would enjoy it but can’t have it?”
And then: what if, for everything you purchased for yourself, you purchased an equivalent amount or more for someone else?
I don’t know how you feel about the price of coffee or lattes or how you handle your Christian giving or if we should all give in the same way, beyond tithing, but that’s fine. The point here is that I suspect many believers have moments like this: the visit of a thought, an experience, a pause that feels as though God has connected with you about something very specific.
It is a reminder that I am not in control of much.
Every church I have ever been to has—rightly—emphasized the spiritual disciplines to one extent or another: prayer, scripture study, fellowship. Your walk with God, I have often been told, will benefit from these regular practices, and that is absolutely and unequivocally true.
But the truth also remains that God is in control of our experience with, and of, God.
Bible study and Scripture reading and fellowship and gathering-together orient in us right minds and right hearts. They put us in a right positioning to God. They hold us accountable; they offer us guidance and a sort of spiritual muscle memory; they form and shape us.
But it is God, always God, who works in us through the Spirit. It is God, always God, who invites the response, who begins the exchange, who authors the engagement.
If we depend on these spiritual practices—on ourselves—to author the divine encounter, they will fail. At some point the Bible starts to read dully to our eyes; our prayers become difficult; the church frustrates us; the fellowship proves woefully insufficient. At times of difficulty or boredom or struggle or confusion they lapse. We lapse.
If our faith become a matter of intellectual assent and willpower, we will fail, too.
Again: these things matter. I can hardly have faith in God without intellectually assenting to my beliefs. And faith does require a sort of discipline to remain committed, to not be shaken by every wind and storm.
But willpower fails. Intellect fails. Without the Spirit, it all corrodes.
I don’t know when I started to believe that a relationship with God primarily depended on my engagement, but oftentimes I act as though I am in control of the whole affair. As though my mindset and my practices will determine where and how God shows up. In this, I sometimes leave little room for the Spirit to work. I sometimes steamroll ahead without making space for whatever interesting or curious thing God might want to do.
None of this is to say we should abandon spiritual disciplines; please don’t. Nor should we neglect the practice of cultivating our faith. But I wonder if we couldn’t all benefit from building a pause into our day to say, “Holy Spirit, what is it you’re wanting?” Or pausing to really get a sense of what God might be asking you. Or being silent enough to have those stray random thoughts that have the touch of God about them: the why don’t you… or the what if you…
We love because He first loved us. What we do, how we live, and how we think emerges from our rootedness in Him. It would be helpful, then, to spend some time being rooted instead of always trying to build a trellis to bear the fruit of the Spirit.
To be present to God’s work in us is a vital step that we can’t bypass. I hear a lot of Christians talk about their efforts to “grow closer to God,” and fewer discuss the ways they perceive God is trying “to grow closer to them.” Are you leaving room to engage with the Holy Spirit? To let God move? To observe and perceive?
(Simply putting your phone down for a day is a phenomenal way to start doing this).
Lent is period where God demands our focus, and the practice of fasting offers us a unique opportunity to think about Him and to remember Him. Maybe, as a part of that practice, it would be helpful to start listening too—to learn to wait and be still, to pay attention, to wait for what might happen.
The Spirit commences the work. Watch for it, wait for it, and don’t let yourself fall prey to the belief the work belongs solely to you.
Samaritan's Song 