Spiritual Disciplines and The Quiet Time

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Spiritual Disciplines and The Quiet Time

• The Life Practical Insights for Christian
  Living
• MITACF Large Group
• February 22, 2002

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Discipline The Other Definition
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What is a spiritual discipline?

• A habit or regular pattern in your life that
  repeatedly brings you back to God and opens you
  up to what God is saying to you.
• - from www.spirithome.com (part of
  crosswalk.com)

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Examples of spiritual disciplines

• - community - prayer - journaling
• - a sabbath - bible study - confession-
  fasting - worship - solitude
• - keeping a budget - celebration
• - and more

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Those seem constricting. Isnt the Gospel about
freedom?

• What disciplines ARE NOT
• What it means to be a Christian
• The way to start a relationship with God
• Things to do to earn Gods favor and love
• Ways to make up for your sins
• There is nothing you can do to achieve these
  things they have already been DONE for you by
  Jesus.

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Those seems constricting. Isnt the Gospel about
freedom?

• What disciplines ARE
• The tools that help you to know God more deeply
  and that He uses to mold you more and more into
  His image.
• Learned habits that free us to focus on the
  object of the activity God rather than the
  mechanics of the activity itself.
• The ways our lives as Christians, our restored
  relationship with God, play out daily the ends,
  not the means.

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The Quiet Time The Swiss Army Knife of
Spiritual Disciplines

• Definition An unhurried time of the day where
  you intentionally seek solitude in order to talk
  to and hear from God through prayer, the Bible,
  listening, and meditating.

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Lets Get Practical The Quiet

• The quiet is an important part. Find a place
  where you can spend it alone with God, unhurried
  and without distraction.
• A priority for JesusVery early in the morning,
  while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the
  house and went off to a solitary place, where he
  prayed. Mark 135

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Lets Get PracticalThe Time

• Find a time and schedule it and stick to it, just
  as you would anything else in your life.
• Make it the priority If whats happening at
  10pm at night is more important than my time with
  Jesus in the morning, then Ill do it -
  Dawson Trotman
• Find a regular time start with a workable
  expectation.
• Start with 10 minutes faithfully applied
  everyday, and let God expand your
  capacities -Dave Schmelzer

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Lets Get PracticalThe Time

• First ½ of your time Seek God in the Bible.
• Second ½ of your time Hear from and talk to
  God in prayer

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Bible Study

• Observe Who? What? When? Where? Why? How?
• Interpret Whats the context? Is there
  something that strikes you? Is there something
  different from what you expected? What is the
  passage saying?
• Meditate and ApplyGod, what does this mean in
  my life?
• Be careful of using the Bible as your fortune
  teller.

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Prayer

• Have a normal conversation with God. Come to him
  and speak like you would with your parents, your
  friends.
• No special language needed.
• If it helps, follow a structure
• e.g. A.C.T.S. (Adoration, Confession,
  Thanksgiving, Supplication)

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Practical Tips

• Too tired?
• Try to find a time during the day.
• Lose focus when you pray?
• write down your prayers
• speak out loud
• use a pattern like A.C.T.S.

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Practical Tips

• Hard to find a quiet time because you have
  roommates?
• Find a place on campus
• Dont know where to start?
• Ask people here what they do

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Practical Tips

• There is no right way" to have a quiet time.
• If you find your times dry, come to God with your
  desire to know Him more. He wants that, too.

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Not natural? Well, a discipline is like learning
to play an instrument

• It takes 3 weeks for you to become familiar with
  a new task. Then it takes another 3 weeks before
  it becomes a comfortable habit. Many people
  never make it past the 6-week barrier of having a
  quiet time Vineyard 201

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Remember Jesus Emmanuel God With Us

• you do not leave God when you go from the
  quiet place any more than he leaves you. A
  quiet time is a tuning in time. You should
  not switch off the radio once you have tuned in
  to Gods wavelength.
• - John White

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Remember Always Think About Why Youre Doing
This

• A quiet time is not a time for you to set aside
  to do something.
• A quiet time is a time for you to set aside to
  meet with Someone.