Find Your Own Way

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Wednesday, June 3, 2015
Jeff Lampl



“Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me” 
John 15:4 (NIV2011)

After 30+ years of following Christ, it feels like I have read every book there is on prayer and listened to every great Christian speaker/guru there is tell me the right way to pray and connect with God.   After having tried all of them at one time or another, I have concluded two things.   All the different pathways to God are great and it’s wonderful to learn all of them because each is so helpful.   However, the second thing I’ve learned is that the best advice on prayer came from my favorite seminary professor years ago. He said, “find your own way”.    

He’s right!!  

Just as every snowflake is different, so are we.  And God is a personal who made each of us in an individualized way and it is in that individualized way that we should seek to relate to Him.   I can’t do someone else’s spirituality.   I can only do my own.  

Years ago Gary Thomas wrote a well-researched, biblically sound book called Sacred Pathways.   Here’s a synopsis of seven different pathways that Christians have followed in their quest to connect with God and Jesus Christ.   The safest rule of thumb is to stretch yourself into spiritual disciplines that might be hard, but will enhance your relationship with God, but major on the pathway that most reflects who God made you to be.   Which is your major pathway?  

• Intellectual – Loving God with the Mind:
  These Christians live in the world of concepts. They may feel closest to God when they first understand something new about Him.
• Contemplative – Loving God through Adoration:
  These Christians seek to love God with the purest, deepest, and brightest love imaginable. They want nothing more than some privacy and quiet to gaze upon the face of their heavenly Lover and give all of themselves to God.
• Enthusiast – Loving God with Mystery & Celebration:
  Excitement and mystery in worship is the spiritual lifeblood of enthusiasts. They are inspired by joyful celebration; cheerleaders for God and the Christian life. They don’t want to just know concepts, but to experience them, to feel them, and to be moved by them. They like to let go and experience God on the precipice of excitement and awe.
• Caregiver – Loving God by Loving Others:
  Caregivers serve God by serving others. They often claim to see Christ in the poor and needy, and their faith is built up by interacting with other people. Caring for others recharges a caregiver’s batteries.
• Activist – Loving God Through Confrontation:
  These Christians define worship as standing against evil and calling sinners to repentance. They are energized more by interaction with others, even in conflict, than by being alone or in small groups. Activists are spiritually nourished through the battle.
• Ascetic – Loving God in Solitude and Simplicity:
  Ascetics want nothing more than to be left alone in prayer. Let there be nothing to distract them–no pictures, no loud music–and leave them alone to pray in silence and simplicity.
• Traditionalist – Loving God Through Ritual and Symbol:
  Traditionalists are fed by what are often termed the historic dimensions of faith: rituals, symbols, sacraments, and sacrifice. They tend to have a disciplined life of faith and have a need for ritual and structure.
• Sensate – Loving God with the Senses:
  Sensate Christians want to be lost in the awe, beauty, and splendor of God. They are drawn particularly to the liturgical, the majestic, the grand. They want to be filled with sights, sounds, and smells that overwhelm them. The five senses are God’s most effective inroad to their hearts.
• Naturalist – Loving God Out of Doors:
  The naturalist seeks to leave the formal architecture and the padded pews to enter an entirely new “cathedral”, a place that God himself has built: the out-of-doors.

Want to take the online Assessment?  http://common.northpoint.org/sacredpathway.html

 
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