The Spiritual Discipline: Door to Liberation

Bienhome Muivah *

Superficiality is the curse of our age. The doctrine of instant satisfaction is a primary spiritual problem. The desperate need today is not for a greater number of intelligent people, or gifted people, but for deep people. The classical disciplines of the spiritual life call us to move beyond surface living into the depths. They invite us to explore the inner caverns of the spiritual realm. They urge us to be the answer to a hollow world. A renowned counselor counsels, 'It is good for you to dwell deep that you may feel and understand the spirits of people.

We must not be led to believe that the disciplines are only for spiritual giants and hence beyond our reach, or only for contemplatives who devote all their time to prayer and meditation. Far from it, God intends the discipline of the spiritual life to be for ordinary human beings: people who have jobs, who care for children, who wash dishes … In fact, the disciplines are best exercised in the midst of our relationships with our brothers/sisters/ wives/husband, our friends and neighbours.

Neither should we think of the spiritual disciplines as some dull drudgery aimed at exterminating laughter from the face of the earth. Joy is the keynote of all disciplines. The purpose of the disciplines is liberation from the stifling slavery. When the inner spirit is liberated from all that weighs it down, it can hardly be described as dull drudgery. Singing, dancing, even shouting characterize the disciplines of the spiritual life.

In one important sense, the spiritual disciplines are not hard. We may not be well advanced in matters of theology to practice the disciplines. Recent converts-for that matter people who have yet to turn their lives over to Jesus Christ-can and should practice them. The primary requirement is longing after God. 'As a deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God? writes the psalmist (Psa. 42:1,2).

Beginners are welcome, we all are beginners. 'No one wants to be a beginner though.' But let us be convinced of the fact that we will never be anything else but beginners, all our life!

Psalm 42:7 reads 'Deep calls to deep.' Perhaps somewhere in the subterranean chambers of your life you have heard the call to deeper, fuller living. You have become weary of frothy experience and shallow teaching. Every now and then you have caught glimpses, hints of something more than you have known. Inwardly you long to launch out into the deep.

Those who have heard the distant call deep within and who desire to explore the world of the spiritual disciplines are immediately faced with two difficulties. The first is philosophic. The materialistic base of our age has become so pervasive that it has given people grave doubts about their ability to reach beyond the physical world. Many first-rate scientists have passed beyond such doubts, knowing that we cannot be confined to a space-time box. But the average person is influenced by popular science, which is a generation behind the times and is prejudiced against the non material world.

It is hard to overstate how saturated we are with the mentality of popular science. Meditation for example if allowed at all, is not thought of as an encounter between a person and God, but as psychological manipulation. Usually people will tolerate a brief dabbling in the 'inward journey,' but then it is time to get on with real business in the real world. We need the courage to move beyond the prejudice of our age and affirm with our best scientists that more than the material world exists. In intellectual honesty, we should be willing to study and explore the spiritual life with all the rigor and determination we would give to any field of research.

The second difficulty is a practical one. We simply do not know how to go about exploring the inward life. This has not always been true. In the first century and earlier, it was not necessary to give instruction on how to 'do' the disciples of the spiritual life. The Bible called people to such disciplines as fasting, prayer, worship, and celebration but gave almost no instruction about how to do them.

The reason for this is easy to see. Those disciplines were so frequently practiced and such a part of the general culture that the 'how to' was common knowledge. Fasting, for example, was so common that no one had to ask what to eat before a fast, or how to break a fast, or how to avoid dizziness while fasting-everyone already knew. This is not true of our generation. Today there is an abysmal ignorance of the most simple and practical aspects of nearly all the classic spiritual discipline.

The spiritual disciplines are an inward and spiritual reality, and the inner attitude of the heart is far more crucial than the mechanics for coming into the reality of the spiritual life. In our enthusiasm to practice disciples we may fail to practice disciplines. The life that is pleasing to God is not a series of religious duties. We have only one thing to do, namely to experience a life of relationship and intimacy with God, 'the father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows' (James 1:17).

The Spiritual Disciplines opens the Door

When we despair of gaining inner transformation through human powers of will and determination, we are open to a wonderful new realization: inner righteousness is a gift from God to be graciously received. The needed change within us is God's work, not ours. The demand is for an inside job, and only God can work from the inside. We cannot attain or earn this righteousness of the Kingdom of God, it is a grace that is given.

In the book of Romans the apostle Paul goes to great lengths to show that righteousness is a gift of God. He uses the term thirty five times in this epistle and each time insists that righteousness is unattained and unattainable through human effort. One of the clearest statements is Romans 5:17 … those who receive God's abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness [shall] reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ'. This teaching, of course is found not only in Romans but throughout scripture and stands as one of the cornerstones of the Christian faith.

The moment we grasp this breathtaking insight we are in danger of an error in the opposite direction. We are tempted to believe there is nothing we can do. If all human strivings end in moral bankruptcy, and if righteousness is a gracious gift from God (as the Bible clearly states), then is it not logical to conclude that we must wait for God to come and transform us? Strangely enough, the answer is no.

The analysis is correct-human striving is insufficient and righteousness is a gift from God but the conclusion is faulty. Happily there is something we can do. We do not need to be hung on the horns of the dilemma of either human works or idleness. God has given us the disciplines of the spiritual life as a means of receiving his grace. The disciplines allow us to place ourselves before God so that He can transform us.

The apostle Paul says, 'The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life' (Gal. 6:8). Paul's analogy is instructive. A farmer is helpless to grow grain; all he can do is provide the right conditions for the growing of grain. He cultivates the ground, he plants the seed, he waters the plants, and then the natural forces of the earth take over and up comes the grain. This, it is with the spiritual disciplines-they are a way of sowing to the spirit.

The disciplines are God's way of getting us into the ground; they put us where he can work within us and transform us. By themselves the spiritual disciplines can do nothing; they can only get us to the place where something can be done. They are God's means of grace. The inner righteousness we seek is not something that is poured on our heads. God has ordained the disciplines of the spiritual life as the means by which we place ourselves where He can bless us.

In this regard it would be proper to speak of 'the path of disciplined grace.' It is 'grace' because it is free; it is 'disciplined' because there is something for us to do. The grace is free, but it is not cheap. The grace of God is unearned and unearnable, but the price of a consciously chosen course of action which involves both individual and group life. Spiritual growth is the purpose of the disciplines.

Once we live and walk on the path of disciplined grace for a season, we will discover internal changes. We do no more than receive a gift, yet we know the changes are real. We know they are real because we discover that the spirit of compassion we once found so hard to exhibit is now easy. Infact, to be full of bitterness would be the hard thing. Divine love has slipped into our inner spirit and taken over our habit patterns. In the unguarded moments there is a spontaneous flow from the inner sanctuary of our lives of 'love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control' (Gal: 5:22,23).

There is no longer the tiring need to hide our inner selves from others. We do not have to work hard at being good and kind; we are good and kind. To refrain from being good and kind would be the hard work because goodness and kindness are part of our nature. Just as the natural notions of our lives once produced mire and dirt, 'now they produce righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit' (Rom. 14:17). Shakespeare observes that 'The quality of mercy is not strained'-nor are any of the virtues once they have taken over the personality.

The spiritual disciplines are intended for our good. They are meant to bring the abundance of God into our lives, and not to restrict/limit us.

Our world is hungry for genuinely changed people. Leo Tolstoy observes, 'Everybody thinks of changing humanity and nobody thinks of changing himself.' Let us be among those who believe that the inner transformation of our lives is a goal worthy of our best effort.

Be the genuine kind of person!