Spiritual Formation: The Joy of the Journey

By Larry E. Houck

How do we form a strong spiritual life when even wholesome activities can drain spiritual energy? How and when should we extend Christ-honoring compassion to others?

Using the cross as a visual, Spiritual Formation guides us through four sections of developing an ever-increasing vertical passion for God and never-failing horizontal compassion for others.

The familiar disciplines and exercises of Spiritual Formation would seem to produce cloned Christians, but Dr. Houck explains how personalities, strengths, and weaknesses determine how we live out these disciplines.

No matter how much passion for God and passion for others we develop, we never cease movement through Spiritual Formation sections. Joy found in the journey will lead us back to section one to embrace those who have not yet started the journey or have faltered on the way.

Spiritual Formation: The Joy of the Journey calls each of us to follow Gods unique personal path to passion for God and compassion for others.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Feb 9, 2015
• ISBN: 9781490864204

Larry E. Houck

Larry E. Houck received the M. Div. and D. Min. from Asbury Theological Seminary. He and his wife, Sharon, served as missionaries in Asia. He has pastored churches; was General Director of Free Methodist World Missions, and Professor of Religion at Mount Vernon Nazarene University. The Houcks have one son.

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Copyright © 2015 Larry E. Houck.

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Psalm of the Fat Camel is a poem by Joe Bayly and is used by kind permission of the Bayly family. This poem is from Joe’s book of poetry, Psalms of My Life, and may be purchased on Amazon.com

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by Zondervan. All rights reserved.

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ISBN: 978-1-4908-6419-8 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4908-6421-1 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4908-6420-4 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2014922664

WestBow Press rev. date: 02/09/2015

Contents

Acknowledgements

Introduction

Section One Passion For Self

Chapter 1 Passion for Self

Section Two Passion For Spiritual Birth

Chapter 2 Spiritual Adoption

Chapter 3 Prayer

Chapter 4 God’s Word

Chapter 5 Sabbath, Worship, and Rest

Section Three Passion For Spiritual Growth

Chapter 6 Accountability

Chapter 7 Silence and Solitude

Chapter 8 Fasting and Spiritual Retreats

Chapter 9 Journaling

Section Four Passion For Spiritual Maturity

Chapter 10 Being and Doing

Chapter 11 Hospitality and Simplicity

Chapter 12 Stewardship and Servanthood

Chapter 13 Personal Strengths

Chapter 14 Thorns and Thistles

For

Spiritual, searchable for the Lord…

Praying follower of Christ…

Together for 45 years…

Sharon,

My wonderful wife.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Dr. David McKenna, former president of Asbury Theological Seminary, spoke at a missions executive meeting held in Cairo, Egypt, when I served as the World Missions Director of an evangelical denomination. During our time in Cairo we had long conversations about where the Church was headed in taking Christ to the world. Dr. McKenna suggested that I consider shaping my ideas with the framework of the cross — Passion for God and Compassion for Others. The advice stayed with me. When I accepted teaching and administrative responsibilities at a university, I began developing the Sections of this book drawing observations taken from my ministry and teaching, and from the writings of Bernard Clairvaux. I want to thank Dr. McKenna for the valuable contribution he made to the formation of this book. I also give thanks to Martha VanCise for the hard work of helping me pull my ideas together. She stuck with us until things came together.

INTRODUCTION

St. Augustine (354-430 A.D.) once said, God is always trying to give us good things, but our hands are too full of other things to receive them. Our affluent culture has convinced us that the only things of value are possessions and the tangible things that we touch, taste, see and hoard. Our relationship with others has suffered as we trample people to get our share of materialism. Materialism, though, never satisfies. When what we have no longer satisfies, we reach for more.

A great part of our lives cannot be filled by anything other than God himself. The desire for happiness and significance has seduced us to pursue and fill our empty souls with almost anything but God. The changes witnessed by the last three generations are almost too large to comprehend. There was a time when the home with a family unit was the place of prayer and spiritual training. As time has passed significant changes have happened to each generation and many have drifted from God’s spiritual values. The demands of our jobs, changes in our culture, pressure to pursue materialism, lure of TV and internet, and the incessant use of cell phones have disrupted the purpose of the home as a place where we pray, study the Bible, and teach our families the basics of godly faith.

In the following pages you will be called to think and pray about allowing God to be at the center of your life. We will see that even good things, can lead us away from God and keep us from grasping his hand.

The present spiritual culture has grown lukewarm as we have gradually become more like our culture than God. This spiritual dullness has left us devoid of the power of God. If we are to know God, we must look somewhere other than our culture. We need only to look into God’s Word and Christianity’s past to see the strength and power that held the Church together.

Throughout the Bible when God’s people were asked to do something they responded. They obeyed and followed God’s direction. Abraham obeyed and nearly sacrificed his only son Isaac, but God provided a ram to be sacrificed instead. When Moses, in obedience to God’s direction, raised his staff over the Red Sea the waters parted. God could have done this miracle alone, but depended on Moses’ participation. Later, Moses had to strike a rock in the desert before God provided water for the Israelites. As you skim through the Old and New Testaments you will see this pattern again and again—the believer takes a step of obedience, then God provides a miracle.

For us to deepen our spiritual life and allow God to be the center of our lives we must take steps toward him in our spiritual walk. Without God as the center we will never develop spiritually. These pages are about developing a deeper walk with God by prayer and reading the Bible. We must also allow the Bible to read us, or reveal what the Bible says about us.

We don’t pray our wishes, but pray God’s will. We don’t fast to convince or manipulate God; we fast to know and obey God. Keeping the Sabbath and worship are not options but God’s expectation. Servanthood is not something we do when it’s convenient, but our response when we look through spiritual eyes filled with God’s love. God’s intention is not to give us a religion, but a relationship.

I invite you to take the journey of Spiritual Formation as in Sections One and Two you discover how to find forgiveness of sin, life in Christ and the joy of worship with a body of believers.

With a strong foundation of a new birth and fellowship with the Church you will be able to move on to Section Three. In Section Three you will journey into the personal and private disciplines of accountability, solitude, silence, journaling, fasting and retreats, and experience more fully being in Christ.

Strength, developed through the inner disciplines of previous sections, will enable you to move boldly into Section Four where you combine being with doing. In Section Four you will find the joy and satisfaction of touching others with God’s love through hospitality, simplicity, strength, stewardship and servanthood.

The journey to Spiritual Formation, however, does not end in Section Four. The joy we find in this journey drives us back to Section One. Equipped with all that we have learned in the four sections of the journey, we embrace those who have not yet started or who have turned back from the journey.

It is my desire that as you read and study these pages that you develop a spiritual hunger and thirst for the things of God and strive to be the loving, compassionate arms of Jesus to those you meet. In these pages, I pray that you will find hope and spiritual strength in knowing God. May God make you joyful on your spiritual journey.

Larry Houck

SECTION ONE

Passion For Self

Chapter 1

CHOICES

Low Passion for God

Low Compassion for Others

Emphasis is on self-centered passion

Danger: Lives in the darkness of sin and selfishness. Secular in nature and will do good, but in the name of self, not in the name of Christ.

Self-focused: Gets involved where there is personal gain. Life is defined as What makes me happy.

Reaching Out to God is the beginning of Section One as we seek for spiritual forgiveness, Christian birth and Christian adoption.

Luke 18:10-14 (New International Version) Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: God, I thank you that I am not like other men—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.

But the tax collector stood in a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, God, have mercy on me, a sinner. I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted".

Chapter 1 — Passion for Self—Loving Myself More Than Loving God

CHAPTER 1

Passion for Self

Loving Myself More than Loving God and Others

The anatomy of sin is fairly predictable. The first Bible-recorded sin (Genesis 3) shows us that Eve looked at the forbidden fruit, listened to the serpent and then was tempted to eat. When Eve accepted and responded to temptation, it became sin. When tempted, we must pray for God’s protection and strength so we won’t give in to temptation. As Joseph did (Genesis 39), we must run from temptation. Eve did not resist or run from temptation. She reached out, touched, and tasted the forbidden fruit. Then she invited Adam to join her in sin. When their eyes were opened to the sin they had committed, they covered up their nakedness and hid from God.

Disobedience lies in Section One. Disobedience without immediate consequence leads us to believe that there are no limits to sin. We can do what we want to do. Later we will see that these sins are ours. We own them. Our conscience lets us know we have done wrong. When God called to Adam and Eve they rationalized their hiding and shifted the blame to each other. From that time, starting even in childhood, we have followed the same response to temptation and sin. Galatians 5:16-26 makes it clear that the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit of God and that the Spirit is in opposition to the sinful nature. Verses 19-21 describe the life of sin:

The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition; dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.

In Section One we find self-love or lives filled with selfish desire that leaves no room for God. Motivated by personal gain and pursuits, these people ask, What’s in it for me? They love a god that brings pleasure, money, career, fame, and possessions. The Section One person is not awakened to pursuing a relationship with God. The dangerous result of lacking a relationship with God is that this person is dead in the trespasses of sin (Ephesians 2:1). Section One is characterized by a low or non-existent passion for God, and a low or non-existent compassion for others. This person will not do anything for others unless it serves personal needs and goals. There is no attempt to be in a loving relationship with Holy God. They already have a god, the god of self, and they will get involved only when there is personal gain.

Daryl was an intelligent, outgoing person. Experiences of life had shaped him to believe that people couldn’t be trusted to do right. He believed his success rested in him alone and his philosophy was Trust no one. Make it happen. Work hard. Claw your way to the top by whatever means you need. Although Daryl grew up in a Christian family, attended every church service and even considered entering ministry he decided he couldn’t make enough money in Christian work. So he eventually became involved in sexual addictions and experimented with drugs. For a time, it looked like nothing good would come of his life.

Eventually, though, Daryl became a businessman and established several successful businesses. Life was good. He had anything he wanted and spent money as if it would last forever. He focused on self and cheated to get what he wanted. He would lie with a straight face and saw nothing wrong with it. With glee he told of selling a necessary service to a grieving widow whose elderly husband had recently died. Since she lacked money he traded the services for her land and other valuables. He then sold everything at a huge profit. He saw nothing wrong in his actions since he hadn’t illegally taken advantage of the woman.

If you talked with Daryl he would say that he has done well. He has the best that life has to offer. But you will also notice that he has no passion for God and little compassion for others. Daryl only has room for self-interests. He is a generous person, but only when it benefits him, his family or his business. There are those with whom he is in contact and who have intense needs, but he does not see their needs. Compassion for others is ignored when it does not benefit him or help him reach his personal goals. He is blind to the needs of others.

I talked to him about life with Jesus and he quickly changed the subject. He has made tremendous plans for this life, but no preparation for eternity.

Our love for God does not begin with self-love. First John 4:8 shows us that without God’s love we cannot know God. We were created to love God and be loved. Yet, if we reject God’s love for selfish love it turns us away from God. Life on earth will end and there will be no future.

What is not understood is that there is more than the physical world. Let me put it this way: Yes, our physical life will end, but there is more because, when God created us, he also created us with a soul and spirit. The temporal body will come to an end but the spirit will live forever. God made us spiritual