Spiritual Disciplines & Growth

The Idea of Spiritual Disciplines has been rumbling around my heart and mind for about a year.  How does the Church help people to grow in Christ?  How can we inspire people to spend time praying, fasting, reading the Bible, memorizing scripture etc?

Churches used to have sunday school to teach both kids and adults.  I'm sure some churches still do this, but in my experience, it is slowly falling into disuse - primarily because people don't attend.  Growing up, we also had Sunday night church.  Now, I suspect, if we have a service then, we'd have about 2 people there including the three pastors at church!  I understand that people are busy and do not want to devote more time to another activity, even if it is a church activity (myself included!).

This leaves the small group model as the primary way to disciple people.  Most churches also expect small groups to be the caring community and social network for their members.  

While I have been in wonderful small groups, I wonder if the church isn't leaving too much to the small group model.  One complaint I have with the small group model is that while I get to know 6-10 people really well, I don't get to know anyone else in the church body.  In a church over 300 members, this can be a problem; in a church of over 1,000 members, this is a tremendous issue.  This says nothing of the fact that the groups can become cliques to the exclusion of others.

Sometimes one thing or another is left out or ignored due to the composition of the small group.  By this, I mean that either the social or the discipleship issue is stressed - the group gets together to socialize with no discipleship in sight, or is glued to a book/lesson with no time to socialize.  

I wonder if these small group models aren't the Church shirking some of its responsibilities.  Did we get rid of Sunday night and midweek activities because we have gone to the small group model? I suspect the answer is yes.

The reality is that church attendance is shrinking in every state in the US except Hawaii.  We have more and more nominal Christians in our churches and we give them less and less opportunity to dive deep into Christ's love.

So how do we inspire the diverse ages, backgrounds, and people in the Church to pick up the traditional spiritual disciplines in a non-traditional way?  Can the Church make Bible study, scripture memory, prayer, fasting, community and good works fashionable again?  

I suspect the answer is yes!  But it will take effort to convince people that these activities are worth while, are not legalistic (which they can become), and that doing these things will help them live the life Christ desires for them - one that involves walking with Him.

My hope is to look at some spiritual disciplines and figure out ways to get these back into the church in my upcoming blogs.