The Practical Steps to the Deeper Spiritual Life

By Larry Mehaffey

In attempting to more effectively communicate the principles of spiritual life to those who sincerely desire a deeper reality in their walk with Christ, I have discovered that most people appreciate practical and straightforward instructions, and this is especially true when it involves the mystical nature of spiritual life. Although spiritual life is not meritoriously attained through natural means or human effort, there are several Practical Steps that can be taken to help facilitate the practice of spiritual disciplines. The combination of these Practical Steps with the spiritual disciplines themselves will work to promote a dynamic life of faith that will effectively bring the believer into a productive and rewarding relationship with God.

Man is an intentional creation of divine wisdom explicitly designed to fulfill a sacred purpose:

Agape love requires a soul to empty the wealth of its humanity upon the altar of God as a willing sacrifice

If determination is to live up to its potential in promoting the spiritual life , it must be united with some very fundamental practical steps

Heaven should not be a culture shock to the consciousness of the believer; it should be a gradual final step into the glorious reality of a spiritual life whose progress began at conversion

Divine pleasure must be the goal of human effort, not divine favor

The genuineness of what we actually believe is nowhere so obviously exposed as in our daily schedules

It does not take overtly carnal acts to corrupt the days of a mans life, for inattention and idleness produce the same result as evil actions or wicked intentions

Liberty must always precede service if either are to be authentic

It is our great love for the Father, not our initial desire for salvation, that motivates and liberates the sincere believer to live a life of chosen obedience to God

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Jan 23, 2012
• ISBN: 9781449735067

Larry Mehaffey

In his more than twenty-five years of experience as a pastor, bush pilot, and missionary in Alaskan villages, the Central Rockies of Idaho, and upon Native American reservations in New Mexico, author Larry Mehaffey has discovered the reality of an authentic and vibrant spiritual life. Through the wisdom of the Spirit’s guidance, the Word’s assurance, and the historic example of many of the great mystics and saints of God throughout the ages, he has allowed the disciplines of spiritual life to be daily practices that continue to bring a greater intimacy with Jesus Christ and a deeper understanding of the Father’s eternal purpose.     While living isolated from many of the normal conventions of modern society, he has learned to daily depend upon the Holy Spirit’s guidance and provision in both meeting his personal needs and the demands of the ministries in which the Lord has entrusted him. Today, that life of simple Christ-centered faith continues for Larry and his wife Betsy as they live off the grid in a log cabin they have built themselves high on a bench overlooking the Salmon River Valley of Central Idaho.     Still pastoring a small church in a nearby mountain community, Larry is able to further pursue a life of quiet devotion and spiritual reality in the solitude and sanctuary of his mountain cabin.  It is here, in extended times of prayer and study, that the Lord has developed his understanding of what John Wesley called “the religion of the heart,”  the way of dynamic spiritual life that is found in Jesus Christ alone. Larry’s first book, The Ancient Path to the Deeper Spiritual Life, reveals the disciplines and devotions necessary to begin to experience the Lord’s continual presence in the inner man.  The Practical Steps to the Deeper Spiritual Life introduces some of the “practical steps” a believer can take to create an environment where the disciplines and devotions can produce truly spiritual fruit. These “Practical Steps” along the “Ancient Path” await all who are sincere in their desire for authentic spiritual life  and determined  to know Jesus Christ in a more personal and dynamic faith.

Book preview

Introduction

I say this for your own benefit; not to put a restraint upon you, but to promote what is seemly, and to secure undistracted devotion to the Lord

1 Co 7:35

Since the publication of The Ancient Path to the Deeper Spiritual Life , I have been repeatedly confronted with the practical and essential question, What can I do to enter into this spiritual life? Considering the fact The Ancient Path was an introduction into the disciplines and devotions that serve to develop an authentic spiritual life, I realized the question being asked, and that what I had to ask myself, was not, what the disciplines necessary for experiencing a dynamic spiritual life are, but what practical steps can be taken to better facilitate those disciplines and to begin a truly spiritual experience.

In attempting to more effectively communicate the principles of spiritual life to those who sincerely desire a deeper reality in their walk with Christ, I have discovered that most people appreciate practical and straightforward instructions, and this is especially true when it involves the mystical nature of spiritual life. Although spiritual life is not meritoriously attained through natural means or human effort, there are several practical steps that can be taken to help facilitate the practice of spiritual disciplines. The combination of these practical steps with the spiritual disciplines themselves will work to promote a dynamic life of faith that will effectively bring the believer into a productive and rewarding relationship with God.

Although I am presenting the biblical and spiritual authorities that serve to justify each of the following practical steps, I am not endeavoring to present them as a comprehensive to do list of requirements for spiritual life. Rather, they are the testimony of my own spiritual journey and the practical steps that have most assisted my personal spiritual growth. Because of their absolute biblical integrity accompanied by both the testimony of my own experience and that of many other sincere believers throughout the centuries, I do believe them to be an effective and proven path to authentic spiritual life for all those desperate for eternal life and fellowship with Jesus Christ.

In studying many of the excellent ancient and contemporary authors who have presented the inward path and the reality of a deeper spiritual life, I have been continually challenged with the opportunity to experience even greater depths in my own relationship with Jesus Christ. Their writings have encouraged me to study the Scriptures with an emphasis upon their invitation to the inner man with a greater sensitivity to the light of divine revelation that awaits those who are willing to turn inward in their walk of faith.

Describing the profound influence fifteenth century author Thomas A Kempis had upon his life, John Wesley wrote, In the year 1726, I met with Kempis’’ Christian’s Pattern.’ The nature and extent of inward religion, the religion of the heart, now appeared to me in a stronger light than ever it had done before.¹ Through the writings of other spiritual pilgrims and from the influence of numerous mature men of faith he encountered throughout his life, John Wesley grew to embrace a faith that brought him into an authentic experience of God’s saving grace, a greater awareness of God’s daily presence, and an open opposition with the organized church. What he called the religion of the heart represented the believer’s assurance of faith and the inner life of spiritual reality that brought renewal to England and eventually throughout much of the modern world.

As it has done for other sincere believers throughout church history, this inward path has been a progressively intensive learning process in my life characterized by the constant revelation of eternal truths that daily continue to shape and mature my faith. In the course of this challenging spiritual journey, the wisdom of the Scriptures and the inner guidance of the Holy Spirit have remained the foundational authorities upon which all other discovery and experience have been verified.

In responding to the question, What can I do to enter into spiritual life? I have prayerfully considered the practical steps that have helped to create an environment where the spiritual disciplines have succeeded in drawing my own life closer to Jesus Christ. These steps have served to liberate me from many of the temporal activities and attitudes of the natural man that hinder spiritual life for all believers. Hosea warned the people of Israel that their natural lives were influenced by practices that prevented intimacy with God writing, "Their deeds will not allow them to return to their God" (Hos 5:4, NASB). Many are unaware of the natural circumstances of their lives that hinder and even prevent them from drawing near to God in a biblical and spiritual way. Although sincerely desiring greater depth in their Christian faith, many believers continue to stumble along in the rut of moderate or even casual spiritual experience. For those desperate for authentic spiritual life and the intimacy of fellowship with Jesus Christ that accompanies it, the only solution is a practical rearrangement of the natural environment in which we live.

In presenting these practical steps, I admit that some have been applied in my own life with a greater degree of success than others. Certainly none of them have reached perfection in their process as part of my spiritual maturity. Like the apostle Paul I humbly confess, "I don’t mean to say that I have already achieved these things or that I have already reached perfection. But I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me" (Php 3:12, NLT). Spiritual life is a work in progress for all who sincerely pursue its lofty course. Those who cavalierly approach their faith as an accomplishment rather than an ongoing adventure will never realize the rewards of a dynamic spiritual pilgrimage deep into the heart of Jesus Christ. A. W. Tozer writes, I fear there are many so called followers of Jesus Christ who have never understood that the Christian life is a process². By choosing to take a few practical steps in the process of our everyday lives, we can begin to create that spiritually conducive environment where the disciplines of spiritual life can flourish and produce rewarding eternal fruit.

After further prayer and study to better define their biblical integrity, I have presented these practical steps in a way that I pray will be beneficial to those who sincerely desire to walk in the Spirit and live what Wesley called the religion of the heart. Some of the steps in this book may appear legalistic and austere, and I can already hear the cries of antisocialism, authoritarianism, asceticism, and a poverty spirit, especially from those who are aware of the abuses of some of the monastic orders and ultra-religious movements throughout the centuries. This skeptical response is understandable and can even be beneficial if it produces in the believer sincere self-examination and not divisive judgmental condemnation. Like doubting Thomas, those who have the greatest desire for a dynamic relationship with the God of Glory often begin with the greatest skepticism regarding its path.

In any determined pursuit of spiritual life, it is up to each believer to discerningly apply the practical step in the manner and measure that the Lord directs in their own spiritual journey. Only the absolute authority of the Scriptures can require a believer to embrace practices that proclaim the way to eternal life. Although in presenting these steps I have endeavored to maintain biblical and spiritual veracity, I also realize that every believer is not called to respond in exactly the same fashion. My prayer is that the sincere believer will see these practical steps as opportunities to progress spiritually and not as another list of commands to burden their spiritual progress.

In responding to the concern regarding the severity of these steps, we must remember that the Scriptures teach us that drastic circumstances require drastic measures, and surely, entry into the kingdom of God can be described as a drastic circumstance. Jesus taught His followers, "The kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and violent men take it by force (Mt11:12, NASB). The seriousness of this venture into eternal life will often require drastic and even dramatic action. The Gospels record how Jesus called men to abandon their families, deny self, sell their belongings, and give up their professions in their determination to follow Him. Why do we think that in a modern society dominated by possessions, pleasures, and personal ambition that Jesus would not continue to require drastic measures to separate those He loves from the dangers and destructive influences of this natural world? But let me say this, dear brothers and sisters: The time that remains is very short. So from now on, those with wives should not focus only on their marriage. Their weeping or their joy or their possessions should not absorb those who weep or who rejoice or who buy things. Those who use the things of the world should not become attached to them. For this world as we know it will soon pass away. I want you to be free from the concerns of this life" (1 Co 7:29-32, NLT). All things may be lawful, but all things are not expedient for those who passionately desire the intimacy with Christ that only comes through experiencing a consecrated and effective spiritual life (1 Co 6:12).

With little spiritual encouragement coming from the present day religious culture, those dissatisfied with casual Christianity must aggressively pursue every biblical opportunity if they are to experience a rewarding spiritual life. Complacency, whether promoted by a temporally minded secular society or a self-justifying religious environment has never been the path to vibrant spiritual life.

The pursuit of an authentic spiritual experience will require the believer to embrace truths that may appear extreme in view of our present sensualistic culture. Those content with the temporal gratifications of a materialistic society generally possess little comprehension of why others are not. However, those who are not satisfied with the natural order or kosmos of this carnal world and are passionate for the eternal rewards of an authentic spiritual life will eagerly abandon any cultural custom or convention that proves to be a hindrance to its progress. "Look forward to the gracious salvation that will come to you when Jesus Christ is revealed to the world…So you must live in reverent fear of him during your time as foreigners in the land (1 Pe 1:13,17, NLT).

As Jesus called His first disciples to abandon their nets to embrace the mysteries that accompany a life of faith, He will also call the sincere believer today to both abandon and embrace his way along that same path to the heavenly rewards of a dynamic spiritual life. The enduring witness of the many great saints of God throughout the centuries accompany the Holy Spirit in testifying to the existence of this inner life of faith and the intimacy with Jesus Christ that it brings.

While discernment must be used in accepting the experiences of other believers as spiritual guidance, to much caution will also leave the believer lukewarm in the apathy of conventional religion and lost in the false securities of human discretion and excessive prudence. The pages of history are filled with the records of many of the great preachers and prophets of God whose teachings were often rejected until many years after their death. The same spirit of fear that caused the crowds of Jerusalem to cautiously side with the Pharisees and not with the radical doctrines of Jesus can today hinder the fearful and timid from experiencing the reality of a dynamic spiritual life. "God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and discipline" (2 Tim 1:7, NASB).

Christian musician and author Michael Card presents what I believe is the appropriate attitude towards an effective pursuit of God. He calls this spiritual approach reckless abandon, where the believer presses forward in a childlike passion for Jesus Christ. Like a toddler running carefree into the arms of his loving mother, reckless abandon challenges us to innocently focus our eyes upon Jesus in a singular passion that disregards all obstacles or excuses. Only in childlike devotion and the simplicity of innocence can the believer run with reckless abandon into the loving arms of His heavenly Father to experience the intimacy of fellowship that the Father desires with all of His children.

I believe that this is the greatest requirement in the desperate search for the deeper spiritual life, an unadulterated passion for God. Passion causes the soul to cast aside creature restraints, temporal considerations, and cultural conventions, to pursue with fervor the holy object of its affection through sometimes difficult and dangerous religious waters. It will keep his eyes firmly upon Jesus, even when the waves of persecution and opposition threaten to shipwreck his faith.

Those who choose to transform their natural environment to better pursue a life of radical and passionate Christ centered faith will, by the grace of God, willingly endure the contradiction of society and much of the complacent religious community to realize their prize. Those who courageously endure such opposition to persevere in their spiritual pilgrimage will come to know the reassuring grace of God’s presence and the promised reality of eternal life. His Word and Spirit will make that way possible and bring the sincere believer to the purpose of all true spiritual journeys, an eternal and glorious union with God.

¹. A Plain Account of Christian Perfection, Pgh. 3 by John Wesley

². The Missing Gifts, Pg. 121 by A. W. Tozer

Part 1

The Trinity of Authority

Chapter 1

The Practical then the Spiritual

The spiritual is not first, but the natural; then the spiritual.

1 Co 15:46-47

Answers to the questions of spirituality are often confusing and discouraging to many who sincerely seek the all too seldom traveled path to eternal life. The variety of religious and spiritual influences in the world today all proclaiming their own peculiar path to enlightenment merely serve to confuse the quest for many sincere yet naive seekers who desire an authentic spiritual experience. In recent years, the emergence of many diverse and eclectic spiritual paths have only served to further complicate this search. Books, magazines, teaching CD’s, and other forms of religious media crowd the airwaves and bookstore shelves with a diverse assortment of spiritual advisors proclaiming everything from health and wealth to astral projection. For the novice spiritual pilgrim, discerning the false prophet from the true messenger of God can be a difficult and confusing experience.

Nevertheless, there is an encouraging side to this surplus of spiritual misdirection. The existence of these many voices, although initially confusing and usually contradictory, still serves to expose a thread of virtue hidden beneath the general hedonism and self-gratifying interests of our modern culture. That virtuous thread is that there does exist a sincere desire for something beyond this present realm of sensuality and superficial materialism! There are people who are hungry for an authentic spiritual life!

John the beloved cautioned the early church that there would always be false teachers ready to lead the people astray, especially at the end of the age. "Children, it is the last hour; and just as you heard that antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have arisen; from this we know that it is the last hour. (1 Jn 2:18, NASB). The antichrist that he spoke of is the spirit of the false prophet that comes to deceive many in the way of spiritual life. John discloses one of the cardinal strategies of this demonic scheme when he tells us that there will be many antichrists" that will come to complicate the way to eternal life in Christ. By cluttering the airwaves with false testimony and confusing the souls of men with a myriad of spiritual misinformation, false teachers achieve the devil’s ultimate and resolute goal, to keep mankind from discerning the one true way to eternal life and the knowledge of God.

Above the misguided counsel of the many false prophets and spiritual pretenders, God’s abundant love for mankind assures us that there will always be a true prophet faithfully proclaiming the way to eternal life. In the days of the wicked king Ahab, many false prophets arose to contradict the true Word of God while the prophet Micaiah vowed to faithfully uphold it, even when it was dangerously unpopular (1 Kings 22). While false prophets spoke deceiving words to appease the vanity of Israel’s king, Micaiah boldly described a vision where a demon came to be a lying spirit in the mouth of the false prophets. This lying spirit inspired the false prophets to speak in opposition to the true counsel of God. However, this lying spirit came only in response to the Godly counsel of Micaiah. When there is no true prophet of God proclaiming the one way to truth, the enemy does not find it necessary to inspire the false teachers to deceive.

The myriad of false spiritual messages that daily compete for the attention of the spiritually hungry have only surfaced because the devil knows that his time is short. The enemy is aware that through the gospel of Jesus Christ, the true message of eternal life is powerfully present and active in the world today. "Woe to the inhabitants of the earth and of the sea, for the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knows that he hath but a short time" (Rev 12:12). Jesus prophesied that in the last days there would be many false prophets actively leading the unsuspecting astray. "Jesus told them, Don’t let anyone mislead you, for many will come in my name, claiming, I am the Messiah.’ …And many false prophets will appear and will deceive many people" (Mt 24: 4-5, 11 NLT). This volume of counterfeit spiritual voices available in both Christian and non-Christian environments are evidence of the enemy’s frantic desperation to undermine the gospel of Jesus Christ in these last days.

Above the contradictions of the false teachers and many self professed spiritual leaders, the Spirit of God continues to faithfully trumpet His loving message of eternal life in the person of Jesus Christ. This message is not so ultra spiritual that man cannot apprehend its wisdom. Rather, He speaks a practical message to those of childlike faith to help guide them into the not so practical life of fellowship with a Majestic and Holy God.

The Natural then the Spiritual

One of the many misconceptions associated with spiritual life is that its wisdom is restricted to the spiritual