Spiritual Practices – “The Long and Winding Road”
The Paul McCartney song above was always one of my favorites. If you listen to it for a moment you will hear the plaintive desire for relationship. It is a love song but can easily be seen as a yearning for something just beyond our grasp but still not impossible. “Lead me to your door” – These lyrics echo that there is something I desperately desire, so wish to know, and so long to experience. For us in the Urban Monastery it is a deep aspiration to know God in a way that nurtures, sustains, and provides daily substance to our lives. It is a journey fraught with challenge but a sweetness as it unfolds. And…it is a long and winding road.
Developing a rhythm of spiritual practices takes time. It takes time to fit them into your life in a seamless fashion that reflects your personality, your lifestyle and your capacity. Over time they weave themselves into our own individual season of life, our particularities (a more structured disposition vs. spontaneous), and the sin patterns that we gravitate towards that harm our outlook.
Our practices need to reflect our particular stage of life, whether or not we have kids, who is under our roof, the pressure of work demands, our sleep/wake patterns, and our extroversion or introversion tendencies. Disciplines of solitude and silence are a stretch for extroverts. For introverts the need for relationships in community may not be as strong. Both ends of the spectrum are needed for a full expression of our faith, and both must be recognized. Without community, the introvert would run the risk of becoming isolated and disconnected from reality. Without solitude, the extrovert would run the risk of becoming shallow and unable to discern the still, small voice of God.
Above all, we need to be flexible. We retain our intentionality, the secret sauce, but must be clear, over time, about the optimal approach to keeping our spiritual rhythms effective and life-giving. There will be momentary changes in schedule, crisis that demands attention, and circumstances that demand our attention. The point is that we know that we have set our intention. We know God will speak to us and find a way to make himself known in the midst of our real lives on any given day.
A good question to ask: Am I willing to rearrange my life for what my heart most wants?
Then…over a few weeks: What has been the most life-giving and results in real life change…for me?
The Urban Monastery intentionally asks you to settle into certain basic rhythms as a baseline. As we progress together, you will discover what speaks to you the best, and subsequently, modulate your own practices accordingly. But for now…let’s go with the fundamental suggested disciplines together.
Walking with you.
Doug