Beginning with God 1

Q: "What helps folks change the most in spiritual formation?"

For me, being involved in Christian community and seeing godly behavior modeled by others.

It seems to me there is slight contradiction in the description on how spiritual formation truly happens. In one sense, it doesn't happen by "willpower" or effort, but 3 of the 4 elements that are listed seem to require some sort of "effort"...Am I missing something?

Samuel (#4) said: 'it doesn't happen by "willpower" or effort'.

Hi Samuel. I agree that lasting faith doesn't result from willpower, but it does require effort. If we don't really want something, it won't happen. The Spirit gives Christians the passion to follow Jesus, but that doesn't negate our human effort.

And, of course, "really wanting" something means you will it. While we lack the power for true spiritual formation and thus need grace (which is simply to say that we need God himself), any spiritual formation at all requires that we will to be a human who can commune with God and that we exert what effort we can toward that goal, trusting God to bring it to fruition.

You also can't stand still -- or at least I've never encountered anyone who did. You are either participating and shaping yourself along the way of life or along the way of death. But we are always in movement somewhere.

The question of what causes us to grow is a bit faceted. Here's my attempt :)

1: The first foundation of belief and spirituality comes only from the regeneration from God. Coming from a Calvinistic perspective here, so the movement of grace is the first thing.

2: After regeneration, there seems to be two main ways that begin to complement one another. The first is that we learn something about theology and then we experience the truth of it in life and thus grow to trust it. This is probably the most common, at least in terms of ways to grow correctly and steadily.

3: The second way, still occurring but less reliable at times, is to come to an inductive view of the world and try to gain theological truth from events that occur. While this can be right, it can be difficult to get anything nuanced in its full glory from inductive thought alone.

Someone may say that these views reflect too great an emphasis on knowledge alone. I will say that knowledge does not necessarily result in maturity (i.e., secular biblical scholars), but I would argue that all maturity must come from knowledge. What is faith, but knowing what God has spoken and believing it? The will to believe comes from God, that which we believe comes from theology.

You asked the question of what is the least effective way of bringing about change.

I would say the obsession with more. More prayer, more scripture reading, more church attendance, more devotional reading. Our prescription for creating change is so often to tell someone what they need to add to their life. Adding things to our already busy lives usually ends with frustration and resignation.

What if we found ways to cut things from our lives? Even important things such as church services, committees, and ministries. Maybe the problem isn't we don't have enough religious activities in our lives but we have too much or the wrong kind and it is stifling our transformation.

I have set a schedule for my week. I read scripture three times a week for fifteen minutes, I pray three times a week for fifteen minutes, and I try to memorize one scripture for the week. I won't be making it through the Bible in a year but I will be able to reflect, consider and thoughtfully meditate on what God is doing in my life. I am avoiding the addiction to accomplishment in favor of a method of creating space for the Holy Spirit to work. We will see.