Spiritual Formation

We want to be a healthy church, amen?

Amen.

We want to be a healthy, faithful, and fruitful church, good stewards of all that God has entrusted to us.

And to that end, we have this vision for 2023.

It's quite simple, SEE23.

It's a way of asking, as I said before, the question, what are you doing in my life, Lord God?

And what are you doing in our church?

And more particularly, what habits, what daily rhythms would be required to become the sort of people that would see that achieved in and through us?

We started 75 Weeks of Sevens back in July last year.

If you're part of the church, maybe you're at the Thousand Brave Days finishing celebration dinner.

And then we launched this.

We said 75 Weeks of Sevens, 75 Rhythms.

Let's do our best to become the people God has called us to be.

And so we talked about individual rhythms, and they were sup, salt, scripture, and Sunday.

Do you guys remember that?

Hopefully, you've been thinking about that and maybe doing it.

We talked about supping with the Lord, which is an old fashioned way of saying hanging out.

And we need to, we need to be people who spend time with the Lord.

And we're called to be the salt of the earth, and it's a great prayer to be praying on a weekly basis, as a rhythm, as a daily rhythm.

Lord, can I be salt today?

I know you've got good works prepared in advance for me to do.

You've gone ahead of me.

Your grace is right there.

Wherever I'm living my life, can I be salty?

Can I make a difference?

We talk about the individual commitment to scripture, some sort of disciplined way of getting the word of God into you.

Might be in big slabs.

It might be short.

It might be little devotions.

But somehow, we need that, or we won't become the people God is calling us to be.

And Sundays, we talked about how they're very important.

And you know what?

Put your hand up if life gets in the way of coming every week.

For some of us, the Lord bless you.

And live your life and do what needs to be done.

Because it does.

Life, we live in a world that's busy, but also there's just, there are things that come up.

You're helping out your elderly parents or whatever it is.

But I would just encourage us as a church, what are we shooting for?

Notwithstanding the problems, we're shooting for regular attendance on a Sunday, because it's the Lord's Day.

And we just talked about the fact that churches that make Sunday a priority to come together and worship are often healthy churches.

And that's what we're trying to become.

We also identified seven corporate strategies, which we haven't spoken a lot about.

But every single week, the staff get together, and we trawl through these seven phrases.

We think about how we're going in incremental advance.

We think about spiritual formation, Next 100, and we'll explain these in the coming weeks.

Big Sundays, mission or Push, Next generation, Forward Press, and Ministry mobilization.

So this, Lord willing, the first seven weeks of the year are not so much an exposition of a book, but we're looking at these strategic keys and seeing why they're biblical and why they're important for us, I guess in a topical way, though sometimes we will look at it through an exposition of a text.

Today, we're not doing that.

Today, we're doing an overview of the Waveform series.

That's what we're going to cover a bit of ground in this next 25 minutes.

No one's touch your clock.

It's always dangerous as a preacher to say, in 25, right you are, there we go.

But we've summarized the Waveform series.

That was a series we did last year.

It was called Spiritual formation in the Way of the Master.

And we covered a lot of ground.

It was very important, I think.

So please, if you're new to the church, check out online at our website the Waveform series.

It began with Spiritual formation, a description of it, and it began with these, it's gonna be on a clock face, with these symbols, these shapes.

Spiritual formation is a fancy way to talk about discipleship.

The idea that we have been changed radically through faith in Christ, those of us who are Christians, but there is a time period, there is effort required for us to appropriate all that Christ has won for us in what we might call Humanity version 2.0.

So the clock face begins with these shapes, a triangle and concentric circles.

Before we get there, go into all the world and make disciples.

That is the Great commission.

And it's what drives us as Christians.

Go into all the world, tell people just how amazing Jesus is and how they can go to heaven when they die.

But it's also, we have a command to teach people how to get heaven into them before they die, amen?

So Christianity is about getting into heaven when you die.

But it's also about getting heaven into you now.

And that's really referred to in the Great omission.

Going to all the world and make disciples, evangelizes the Great commission.

The Great omission sometimes is referred to where Jesus said, teach them to obey everything I commanded.

What?

I didn't know I had to become the different.

Yeah, you know, that's what Jesus said.

Teach them how to live out the Sermon on the Mount.

Teach them how to live the Christian way, and life will be different.

We are different people as Christians.

It's the new version.

It's what Ezekiel promised.

Let me read from Ezekiel 36.

God said, I'm gonna give you a new heart.

Put a new spirit in you.

I'll remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh, and I'll put my spirit in you and move you and teach you to walk according to my statutes.

I'm gonna change you from the inside out.

Christianity involves a formation process.

We become representatives of Christ.

We become, over time, ambassadors for Christ, amen?

And we get better at living Christianly.

That's sometimes a jarring statement.

Can you get any better?

Aren't we just miserable sinners?

I would argue biblically, now, we're always gonna struggle with sin, but you absolutely can become more mature and learn how to live more and more the way Jesus wants us to live, by the power of His Spirit.

And so, we have these shapes, the triangle first, and that's a really helpful shape to remember.

It represents what God is doing in this process in our lives.

The whole gospel is not just a sin management gospel.

The whole gospel is Christ has changed my heart and He's given me His Spirit and His teachings so that I can become an ambassador.

I can become more and more progressively conformed to the likeness of Christ.

That's a whole gospel.

Empowered by the Spirit and the Word, we have the way God works in this formation process is there are habits to learn.

Rhythms, things like study, prayer, worship, service, giving, submission.

They're learned practices.

And then there's another part that God uses.

Trials, temptations, sufferings.

That's all part of the formation process, would you agree?

Sometimes we forget that.

But that triangle, if you realize, okay, God is doing a work in my life, and it's going to be based out of the gospel, there's going to be some effort that I will put in to learn some habits, and it's all going to be in the context of not everything will go my way.

There's trials and there's temptations.

And how is that work through my life?

We looked at these concentric circles.

Again, they're really helpful.

The gospel, faith in Christ, changes my heart, will and spirit.

I'm a new creation, but that has to be worked through, a renewing of my mind, which affects my emotions, my dominant emotions, how my body reacts, what I allow my body to do, and how my body fits into the social context I'm in.

That's how God is working this transformation process through my personhood.

Is there effort?

This is a big question we ask.

Aren't we meant to just rest?

Well, 2 Peter 1.3 is one of the great spiritual formation verses.

Peter writes, his divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life.

Doesn't say to just stay a miserable sinner that never gets any better at living the Jesus way.

No, no, we've been given everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.

Through these promises, he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature.

Having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.

It's a powerful statement, isn't it?

Is anyone feeling it?

We can become more and more like Jesus.

We don't stop sinning, but for this very reason, what are we meant to do?

Make every effort to add to your faith, goodness, and other various good things, and ultimately love.

So after the power of the cross, the greatest symbol in Christianity, we have some other shapes, the triangle and the circles.

Do you remember them from the teaching?

I think that they're very helpful when we think about spiritual formation.

Why would we spend so much time summarizing all of this?

Because spiritual formation, or the lack thereof, is the primary reason why churches often are not healthy.

They're not fruitful.

They're in chronic decline decade after decade, because the people aren't taking seriously the challenge of being Christian, the call to holiness, the call to living out the Jesus way, the way He said that we could.

So we're off around the clock.

Inside out is 2 o'clock, and that's just so important to realize, being a Christian is not something you bolt on to the outside of us, amen?

It's not just a bunch of things you do.

It's not a church service you go to every a couple of times a month.

It is a radical transformation that comes from the inside out.

Jesus said in His Sermon on the Mount, unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees, you can't be my disciple.

They did lots of things externally, but Jesus is interested in who we are on the inside, on the backstage.

It's what He says in Luke 6, verse 43.

Jesus said, No good tree bears bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit.

Each tree is recognized by its fruit.

People don't pick figs from thorn bushes or grapes from briars.

A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart.

For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.

It comes from within.

We have to become integrous people if we're going to live christianly.

It can't be.

I try and fake it some of my life.

I need to go through a process where I'm like, no, Lord, come to my innermost being and change me from the inside out.

Is this just all hard work?

No, it's an easy yoke.

Three o'clock is an easy yoke.

Matthew 11, where Jesus says, Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.

So this spiritual formation journey is not just hard work.

Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

Interestingly, it's the picture, the metaphor, of two oxen with a big, wooden, heavy yoke around their neck doing work.

So this idea of come to me and find rest is in the context of work.

But so important to realise that Jesus says, come to who?

Come to him, come to me.

He doesn't say, come to the laws of God.

Come to the works, come to some external thing.

He doesn't.

He says, no, come to me, and I will give you the yoke of discipleship.

I'm gonna be like an older ox, and I'm gonna walk alongside you, and I'll teach you the way of the mast.

Not too fast, the right pace so you can work all day.

You can run straight with that plow, and that's the with God life, the easy yoke.

That's what we've been called to live out.

And super important, this spiritual formation process we're on, is that we know our identity, known and loved identity.

We talked a lot in the Wayform series about daughter ship and son ship.

Paul writes in Romans 8, and by him we cry, Abba father.

The spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children.

1 John 3, 1, see what great love the father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God.

And that is what we are.

We looked in that series at the fact that not every human being by birthright is a child of God.

Those scriptures tell us that it is through faith that we are called a child of God.

Amen?

It is something we enter into.

But when we have, we need to take on that identity.

I belong.

And so we looked at these four letters, four words beginning with B.

We believe, and that allows us to become a child, and the spirit testifies to us, and we know we belong.

And then we learn to behave.

So these are important words, believing, becoming, belonging, and behaving.

Do you know what it's like to have a Christmas celebration in your family and to go to it and feel like you belong?

Anybody?

It's a lovely thing.

I mean, sometimes Christmas celebrations, I've got a little bit of angst going on.

Sometimes.

But when it's good, it's just so lovely to be sort of like, you know, we get it.

Do you get that your family is a big family?

You know what it's like, Trudy?

It's like, yeah, we get it.

That's what we should feel in the church.

I'm a child of God by grace through faith because of the cross, and we belong.

We ate the same bread.

We're one body.

And that's an important thing that we're known and loved.

Out of that identity, we then do the work on the mind.

And we spent four weeks looking at the mind, starting with replacing lies.

Christianity is about the truth.

Jesus said, I am the way, the truth and the life.

John 8, he said, you will know the truth, my disciples, and the truth will set you free.

The problem with the truth is that a lie believed as truth will affect your life as if it is true.

Do you remember that line?

Who's found that to be true in your life?

A lie believed as true will affect your life as if it were true.

So in this new identity, born from above, pursuing love, a child of God, called to be an ambassador of Christ, changed into his likeness, it's really important, as Romans 12 says, to renew our minds, to find out, are there lies I've been believing for a long time that have actually created patterns of behaviour that I need to actually remove?

Last year, I mentioned about Ivan Petrovich Pavlov, the Russian physiologist who did Pavlov's dogs, and quite bizarrely, about a hundred years ago, he put little test tubes in dog's cheeks, and he tested the saliva glands when he put food in front of these dogs.

And he found that if you put food out, as you could imagine, the saliva glands release saliva, but then he started ringing a bell, and when they were fed, the bell rang as well.

And then Pavlov's dogs, the whole story, is that he could get the dogs to salivate without any food, just with a bell.

What were the dogs believing?

A lie.

There was no food.

There was just ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.

All the dog lovers are going, oh.

Well, it's the truth.

But the same is true for us.

We can believe lies that have found a home in our heart and mind, even as Christians.

And the spiritual formation process involves understanding, what am I believing about me, about my past and my future?

It's not true.

It's very important to identify these, and see if they have actually established fortified strongholds.

That's the language the Apostle Paul says.

He says there are lies in communities and in individuals that have actually been set up in your mind, in our minds, as a fortified stronghold.

But he says the Gospel has the power to demolish strongholds.

The truth of the Gospel, the truth of our identity, what Christ has accomplished.

So we talked about needing to remove the lie and then rewire the truth.

Does anyone remember Ben's famous sermon?

repetition rewires the Brian.

Best one ever.

repetition rewires the Brian.

That came from Ben, who's one of our other preachers and leads worship and leads our youth team.

He was writing a sermon and 10 times in a row, he was trying to write, repetition rewires the Brain.

And as soon as he got it in his brain, that it was Brian, he wrote, repetition rewires the Brian every time.

And that was the point.

repetition rewires the Brain.

It's the truth.

Psalm 119 tells us, 3,000 years ago, the psalmist says, I have hidden your word in my heart.

I've rewired my brain with the truth of your word, that I might not sin against you because we need to rewired truth into our minds and hearts.

Joshua 1, 8, just before they headed out into the promised land, keep this book of the law always on your lips.

Meditate on it day and night so that you may be careful to do everything written in it, through meditating, through repetition, then you'll be prosperous and successful.

Psalm 1, 2, Fifi Redpart, The Rest of the Sermon, the Psalm out.

But whose delight is in the law of the Lord and who meditates on his law day and night.

Have you found that?

We need to dig trenches of truth in our minds.

Now I can see Davin out there.

He's a very good quality skier.

I'm not that great a skier, but I have had the experience of getting good enough that I thought, and my mates and I when we were late teens, is let's go down those Black Diamond runs.

You guys know the Black Diamond runs.

They're the ones that are nasty.

They're straight down.

And we were over at Blue Cow near Perisher, and the run was called Kamikaze.

It was never good.

The names are never good on these Black Diamond runs.

But I was getting a bit better, and so you come to the edge and your skis are hanging off, and it's so steep that it looks like that.

And I'm not going to just traverse across.

I'm going to go down, go with the fall line.

And I started straight down, turning a little bit, and then all of a sudden, I got in about a foot and a half of snow, which just created trenches, and I just couldn't change.

So the end wasn't good.

The only way out of that was to dive back in the day when you didn't have helmets.

But I remember having about five feet of snow over my head.

But I say that because you can get stuck in a trench that's not truth, amen?

And we have to dig it out and go, wait a second, that's not who I am.

Who am I?

We find that in the Word of God, and we rewire truth by digging trenches of truth.

Number seven, seven o'clock is one of my favourite weeks, it's reframe and pre-frame.

And we looked at Romans 8.28.

We know that in all things, God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.

He doesn't write, we're pretty sure that in most things, God sometimes works for his people in all things.

And we talked about collateral goodness.

When you look back on your life, have you ever realised in hindsight, that God was working when I thought he wasn't?

Yes?

Sometimes we have to thank God for what he didn't do.

We think, where were you, God?

But he was doing exactly what he needed to do in that event, and suddenly in hindsight, we look back and say, well, I could see your fingerprints all over that event.

And so we talked about reframing and pre-framing.

You do the same for the future, and I'm running out of time, so I'm gonna just really whiz through this.

Reframing and pre-framing, so important.

If that peaks your interest, please look it up on our website.

Rejoice always is eight o'clock, and it's part of the spiritual formation process.

Paul writes, rejoice in the Lord always.

I'll say it again, rejoice.

Replace the lies, rewire with truth.

Reframe and pre-frame, and rejoice.

How?

Because the Lord is near.

Philippians four.

Don't be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your request to God.

And the peace of God which transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

We rejoice first for the who and not the what.

It's what we sang in that song, isn't it?

We're gonna rejoice in what you have done.

Because I'm gonna believe to pre-frame, you are doing something that is equally as good.

And that's how you learn to rejoice.

And we have to find a way in the trials and temptations and sufferings and stress of this race called life.

We need to find a way to smile in the storm through the grace of God and the goodness of God.

Rest rhythms is a super important part of spiritual formation that, unfortunately, we've got no time to look at.

But managing fatigue in the unfinished race is essential.

We all get fatigued in the race of life.

And we looked at that message on four words, unhurry, love, rest, and work.

Hurry is a great word to just dwell on.

Is your life a life of hurry?

Normally, not helpful.

Unhurry your life if you can.

Jesus loved slowly.

Didn't he?

Jesus loved in an unhurried way.

30 years was his mission, plus another three going to the cross.

In those three, he took 12 men, plus a few others on a camping trip.

It wasn't an expedited, quick, you know, smash it out.

It was come with me, I'm gonna teach you, and it's gonna take some time.

And this interplay between rest and work is so important.

John 15, Jesus says, I am the true vine, and my father is the gardener.

He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit, he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.

We're trying to be a faithful and fruitful church, and it's gonna involve pruning.

And these two diagrams are really helpful.

Again, if you're interested, check out the sermon last year.

But life tends to work like this.

God prunes us, John 15 says.

He prunes a field, a vine certainly, and then things are left to rest.

God isn't as active as we would love him to be sometimes.

Maybe in our lives, it's a time to rest.

But then the pendulum comes back the other way, and there is growth happening often under the surface.

And then we go into a season of fruitfulness.

I think, and so do many of the other leaders, that we are in a season, we've been in a season of pruning and rest in our church, and it feels like we've been in a season now of growth and fruitfulness.

No one knows how long that will take or be for, but it just tends to be how it works.

And evening comes in Genesis before morning, so rest is so important, we work out of rest.

But if we can embrace in this journey of spiritual formation, God, I don't have to be fruitful all the time, but I want to be fruitful in your season.

So, you know, rest, my father in heaven knows I need rest, and then when I need to be growing, sometimes I'm growing in the midst of pain, it's a really powerful symbol and graph to meditate on.

The last couple, yes, no limits, yes, no limits.

James 5, the spiritual formation process in community involves boundaries, boundaries.

I think this is one of the most important truths that is neglected, the dynamic of request.

James 5 is bouncing out of Jesus' teaching, above all, my brothers and sisters, don't swear not by heaven or by earth or by anything else.

All you need to say is a simple yes or no.

You know, the world runs on request.

It runs on requests.

How we speak to God in prayer, we can ask him anything, and he's the right to say yes or no, amen?

He can say yes or no, but he says, tell me about it.

Bring your request.

And by the way, ask other people's stuff too.

Ask them nicely, could you please do this?

And most people will.

How hard is it for a dog to say no to a dog when they come up and, can you give me your sandwich?

He's like, oh, here's a little bit.

It's the dynamic of request.

We are actually invited into this powerful system that God has created.

It's about request.

But there are yeses and nos.

And in community, churches get unhealthy when there's always yeses.

You need to have nos.

I need nos.

We have yes and we have no.

And that's a super important part of spiritual formation and communal health.

11 is about Adam 1.0, which is Adam, the first Adam in the garden, and Adam 2.0.

And it's all about temptation.

Because this journey of spiritual formation is going to involve temptation.

And churches get unhealthy when people give in to temptation too much, and don't find God's grace, and don't find an authentic community where you can be vulnerable and say, you know, I'm struggling in this area.

When we see the devil come in Luke 4, the devil said to Jesus, if you are the son of God, tell this stone to become bread.

Jesus answered, it is written, man shall not live on bread alone.

And if you study that passage, which we did last year, it's almost exactly the same as the attack that the devil did as the serpent in the garden on Adam and Eve.

He came to second Adam.

Romans 6 says Jesus is second Adam.

And he did the same tricks, and Jesus said, no, no, I'm not gonna listen to you over my father in heaven.

No, I'm not gonna hunger after the hungers of the flesh when I'm gonna follow my father in heaven.

I'm not gonna worship you.

No, I'm not gonna chase after pride.

I'm gonna follow my father in heaven.

And so, that's an important part of our journey, learning how to say yes and no to the right things.

Spiritual maturity says, God said it, and that settles it.

Who would have thought we made it?

12 o'clock, love.

Spiritual formation is to know Christ and share his love with the world, born from above, pursuing love.

John 13 says, A new command I give you, these are the words of Jesus, love one another.

As I have loved you, so you must love one another.

By this, everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.

If you could pick one verse to describe what a healthy, fruitful, faithful church is, it's probably that one, isn't it?

If we are known by our love for each other, for the world, for our enemies, that is proof of authenticity, because that's who God is, most powerfully demonstrated in Christ.

1 John 4, this is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.

Dear friends, since God so loved us, we ought also to love one another.

And 1 Corinthians 14 says this often forgotten line, let love be your highest goal.

So that's our calling, our spiritual formation calling, pursue love.

Born from above, he by his grace called us, we responded with faith and repentance.

Here we become a new creation, humanity 2.0, and our goal ultimately is to pursue the love of God, to love him back, and to love the world.

When a church of individuals takes seriously the journey of spiritual formation, and these vastly different and unique people allow Christ to live his life through them, which involves grace with effort as we've just discussed, they are a potent force.

Amen.

They are a potent force.

We're what it's meant to be.

We're the hope of the world.

We're the body of Christ.

We represent God.

How could this not be an amazing thing to be part of?

That's why I'm still a pastor after nearly 30 years, because there's nothing like the local church when it works.

Amen?

A church that's hungry for the glory and fame of Jesus, who are willing to make mistakes, and when you mess up, say, yeah, I'm sorry, I have messed up.

And who want to take the resources, the vast resources in every way, be it financial, education, relational skills, just street smarts, to take those resources and pull them together and say, let's do something amazing together that will affect the world, to take the gospel to the world and across the street.

That's why I was so keen for Virginia to share.

I hope you're inspired by what we are doing together.

We're doing great stuff, and it's all because of God's kindness to us, that he's sharing what he's doing with us, because he's looking for a church that are hungry for him, amen?

seriously, he's just like, give me a church who are willing to make mistakes, who will be humble, who will seek my face, and who will lift up the name of Jesus through his gospel proclamation.

And God is still the same.

God, he goes, I'll bless that church.

I'll bless that church.

You make much of my son, and I'll bless you.

And that's who we want to be.

Faithful and fruitful, multiracial, which is the blessing that we have, intergenerational, born from above, pursuing love.

Let's do spiritual formation well, amen?

I hope we can.

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