Lazy Spirituality

A few years back I was working on a roof repair. And I was uncertain about how to flash the chimney so water did not leak into my house. And I remember asking someone who was knowledgeable, and they said this to me: “Just remember, water flows downhill.”

What sage advice... But he was right. It is water's nature to flow down hill. This is because water takes the path of least resistance. 

It is the same thing in our sin nature. As fallen human beings we desire the path of least resistance. In other words, we are prone to spiritual laziness. And because of sin we have grown fat around the heart (Ps 119:70).

This is important for us to recognize as a church plant. Because it is common for church plants to be full of hard work on the outside (moving tables and chairs and what-not). But that doesn’t necessarily mean people are working hard on the inside to burn that fat around the heart.

All the work going on in a church plant might just be a big struggle to find “what works.” Doing things simply because they “work” is called pragmatism. New churches are prone to pragmatism because in the early days they have to scrap just to survive. They work hard to discover what brings people in the door, what keeps them happy, what keeps their attention, what makes them give, what makes them serve. And as a result, many churches settle for programs, styles of music, buildings, or sermons simply because they “work.” 

But the real question is, by what standard do we judge what is working?I think the Apostle Paul would answer that question this way: Does what we are doing as a church train us for godliness? Does outside bodily work lead us to do any inward bodily work. Or are we settling for what seems to just be working on the outside.In Paul’s letter to Timothy he tells him to “train yourself for godliness” (1 Tim 4:7). The word “godliness” means an inner attitude toward God that is reverent and honoring to Him. So godliness is an interior disposition. It's what the old theologians called piety. It’s at the heart of the greatest command to love God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength. A godly person submits their whole being to God in a way that pleases him and glorifies him. 

Timothy is told that he is to train himself for godliness. This word that is translated into train is the Greek word gymnazo, which is the word we get our English word gymnasium from. Timothy is to work out to strengthen his godliness like an athlete works out to strengthen a muscle or a skill.Churches are supposed to be gymnasiums for training in godliness and leaders are supposed to function as kind of personal trainers in this work. Every single thing we do should be strengthening our godliness. 

But many churches have settled and taken the path of least resistance. As Paul says in his second letter to Timothy, many believers and churches only have the form of godliness. Or as Jesus pointed out in the Religious leaders in his day, they were like white washed tombs. The outside looked good but the inside was festering. So it is a form of spiritual laziness that we settle for an outward religious form, what Paul generically calls bodily training, instead of digging deeper to burn that fat around the heart. 

In our own culture here in the Gateway area I see this play out in two main ways. One way is what I would call high church laziness. This is a church full of people who go through all the right motions. They say all the prayers. They kneel at the right time. They wear the right robes. They lift the elements just right.  All outward disciplines seem to be very godly. But on the inside so many people are simply going through the motions with ungodliness in their hearts. 

The spiritually lazy high church is like a gym culture that people go in and settle for just being there. They rack the same amount of weight. They do the same amount of reps. They never push themselves any further than the fundamentals and so they plateau. 

There is also a lazy low church. It’s the same problem as the high church, it's just the other side of the coin. These are churches that pride themselves in authenticity and passion. But they too can settle for the appearance of godliness. These churches are full of people that say they value a passionate and authentic spiritual life but they really are just happy to be entertained by others who seem to be passionate and authentic. This too is settling for mere bodily training because they are settling for external religion rather than inward godliness. 

And leaders in lazy low churches often neglect urging their people to godliness because they are pragmatists who settle for “what works.” As long as there are butts in the seats and dollars in the bank account people are not challenged to train for godliness. Because that might scare people away. They act like a gym that installs ice cream vending machines and holds hourly pizza parties because it brings people in. But all the while the gym owner is the only one working out. And everyone else is unhealthy but they are content just happy as a peach to be around the owner. This is what is happening in churches all over America who bow to the idol of church growth and pragmatism. 

The only way to be rescued from lazy spirituality is to receive the true godliness of Christ. Jesus Christ perfectly revered the Father. He perfectly submitted his every thought to the Father. Every single motivation of his heart was always in the right place. He alone resisted temptation and he alone was godly. Because he himself is God. 

By faith in Christ you receive a substitute godliness. On the cross Jesus exchanged his godliness for your ungodliness. On the cross your ungodliness died in Christ. And by faith in his resurrection his godliness lives in you. 

So for the Christian your godliness is like your righteousness. It is not native to you. No person natively or naturally reveres and honors Christ. And yet, by grace through faith you receive the gift of God’s Spirit. And it is through the Spirit of God that godliness begins to bloom in your life from the inside out. All godliness, from front to back, beginning to end is a work of grace.

But grace works through active submission and not passive laziness. Paul captures this elsewhere when he says he worked harder than any of the other apostles but it wasn’t him it was the grace of God working through him. This is what Christian training in godliness looks like. 

Make sure you catch this or the whole thing will run off the rails. You work hard because God saved you to work hard. You don’t work hard to get saved. God calls you to fan the flame of godliness that he put there, not to try and start the fire in your own heart. To try to manufacture godliness apart from the initiating grace of God would be like trying to start a fire with soggy wood with no spark. 

This is why describing Timothy’s upbringing as nurture was the perfect way of describing it. As Christians we are called not to create godliness. We are called to nurture it. And we are called to grow it through intentional training and cultivation. 

We should desire this above all things because to possess godliness is to possess fullness of life. Jesus himself said that abide in me and I in you. And it was Jesus who said that if we abide in Christ his joy will be in us and our joy will be complete. 

This is why Paul so confidently says to Timothy that this is the best way for him to spend his time. This is the best way for all Christians to spend their time. It’s to train for godliness.