Discipline
Ok, I’m going to let you in on a little secret – seminary students struggle with their faith. You may think, how can that be, you’re learning about God? Well, there’s two major reasons. One, we neglect true intimate time, with our heart engaged, in worship and Bible study. Second, we get so puffed up with Biblical knowledge that we don’t actually apply it and allow it to humble us. This of course doesn’t characterize all of us, so I may be preaching to the choir, but it has happened to me.  For me, there is a third reason. I have too many distractions that give me much greater enjoyment than studying my Bible. Truth is, I hate to study, that’s why I’m a horrible student, however, I love to research something that interests me. So here’s the big question, how do I make Bible study interesting?
As alluded to in the title, discipline is the answer. You may think that its not because it sounds boring and monotonous, but let me try to convince you. If I wanted to compete in the greatest of all sporting events, the Olympics, I couldn’t just walk out there, out of shape as I am, and compete and expect to win the gold. Yet that’s exactly how I approach the Christian life. Its the mentality that if it doesn’t come easy, I don’t want it. So how do I discipline myself? The same way you would if you wanted to win the gold medal in track. First you start out small, actually do some running. Its going to be sheer torture at first, but you’ve got to be determined and convinced that the end result is worth it, and in the Christian life, it is most definitely worth it! I’ve been told that those who start to run for exercise hate it at first, but after they stick with it for awhile, they can’t get enough of it. So it will be with our Christian walk, its going to seem legalistic and boring and hard at first, but if we continually seek to engage our heart in meaningful study and seek to keep God’s word fresh in our minds, we will inevitably form a habit that will become addictive and will cause us to want to go deeper in our study.
So what does this look like for you? Only you can figure that out. There are some basic principles that determine if you’re on the right track, here are a few:
- Do whatever it takes to engage the heart. Anyone can read the Bible for years and never really get any closer to God because all you’re doing is checking off your to-do list.
- Set a predetermined, uninterrupted time where you can set your mind on God and only God. If something tries to vie for that time, switch times or squelch it out.
- Find someone or do something to help you stay accountable to both the above. Its impossible to motivate ourselves consistently, especially at first. Satan would love to either disrupt our set time or cause us to think about something other than God to keep us from engaging the heart. By finding someone to hold you accountable, you can let them into your life and vise versa, which is a great thing anyway.
I’m going to be honest, I’ve been trying to do this for years and have not been successful, but I’ve always failed at one of the three points above. This post is my motivation and promise to myself to start this journey afresh. Anyone jump in and hold me accountable and I’ll do my best to reciprocate.