#projectC61920 Day 1: Intro
So this is day one of #projectC61920. As an introduction, I wanted to overview the four main aspects of the project: physical, spiritual, mental, and social.
First, there's the obvious physical factor of an individual person's health. In the focusing passage, Paul reminds us that our bodies or a temple of the Holy Spirit. This implies that great care and maintenance should be taken and exercised on the physical bodies that God has given us. As with developing and maintaining anything that should last our whole lives, discipline is going to be a major factor. Discipline comes from habits observed over time. Habits become disciplines, disciplines become elements of our character. And just like the military conducts regular, rigorous physical training as a habit, it eventually becomes a personal discipline of most, if not all, service members. Will get into personal physical disciplines very soon.
Second, there is the spiritual aspect of health. As stated before, there will be habits to develop, thus resulting in disciplines and eventually character traits. If you only exercise your muscles, you're only taking care of the physical part of yourself. But when you exercise religious practices, those habits become disciplines, and eventually become part of the person that we are in Christ. Again, more about spiritual disciplines to come.
Third, you may be tempted to think that the mental aspect would simply feed into the spiritual aspect since much of the spiritual aspect involves how we think about God, the Bible, and our own religion in general. Actually, the mental state of a person is not relegated only to spiritual thoughts, but our entire thought process and mental capacity. Consider questions like "I know the Bible is true, but how do I process the truth that it provides?" Consider further, what is the mind of Christ like? We know that the thoughts of the Father are not our thoughts, as his ways are not our ways. We need to be aware of the thought processes that we have, and evaluate them against the truth of Scripture.
Lastly, there is the social aspect of our being. How do we interact with each other? What is the importance of church, friends, family, and other relationships? How are we to conduct ourselves in these relationships? Do we know the difference between a friendship, a marriage, and family? Is there a difference at all? We will begin to answer these and more questions as the days go forward.
In closing, remember that this is a journey. A journey involves a starting place, a path, and destination. Even with a map, we can never really tell exactly what the destination is going to look like, nor the path to get there.there will be missed steps, wrong paths taken, and lessons learned. But there will also be victories, long stretches, and waypoints to be reached and celebrated. So get your Bible, get your water, get your thinking cap, and get your friends and family involved. Because the Christian journey is never meant for one person to figure out alone or with no guidance.
#walkwithme
“Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,”
Hebrews 12:1 NASB
“Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.”
Romans 12:1-2 NASB
Grace and Peace,
Joseph Kilbreth
So this is day one of #projectC61920. As an introduction, I wanted to overview the four main aspects of the project: physical, spiritual, mental, and social.
First, there's the obvious physical factor of an individual person's health. In the focusing passage, Paul reminds us that our bodies or a temple of the Holy Spirit. This implies that great care and maintenance should be taken and exercised on the physical bodies that God has given us. As with developing and maintaining anything that should last our whole lives, discipline is going to be a major factor. Discipline comes from habits observed over time. Habits become disciplines, disciplines become elements of our character. And just like the military conducts regular, rigorous physical training as a habit, it eventually becomes a personal discipline of most, if not all, service members. Will get into personal physical disciplines very soon.
Second, there is the spiritual aspect of health. As stated before, there will be habits to develop, thus resulting in disciplines and eventually character traits. If you only exercise your muscles, you're only taking care of the physical part of yourself. But when you exercise religious practices, those habits become disciplines, and eventually become part of the person that we are in Christ. Again, more about spiritual disciplines to come.
Third, you may be tempted to think that the mental aspect would simply feed into the spiritual aspect since much of the spiritual aspect involves how we think about God, the Bible, and our own religion in general. Actually, the mental state of a person is not relegated only to spiritual thoughts, but our entire thought process and mental capacity. Consider questions like "I know the Bible is true, but how do I process the truth that it provides?" Consider further, what is the mind of Christ like? We know that the thoughts of the Father are not our thoughts, as his ways are not our ways. We need to be aware of the thought processes that we have, and evaluate them against the truth of Scripture.
Lastly, there is the social aspect of our being. How do we interact with each other? What is the importance of church, friends, family, and other relationships? How are we to conduct ourselves in these relationships? Do we know the difference between a friendship, a marriage, and family? Is there a difference at all? We will begin to answer these and more questions as the days go forward.
In closing, remember that this is a journey. A journey involves a starting place, a path, and destination. Even with a map, we can never really tell exactly what the destination is going to look like, nor the path to get there.there will be missed steps, wrong paths taken, and lessons learned. But there will also be victories, long stretches, and waypoints to be reached and celebrated. So get your Bible, get your water, get your thinking cap, and get your friends and family involved. Because the Christian journey is never meant for one person to figure out alone or with no guidance.
#walkwithme
“Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,”
Hebrews 12:1 NASB
“Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.”
Romans 12:1-2 NASB
Grace and Peace,
Joseph Kilbreth
