Six Habits of a Transformed Life
The Six Habits of a Transformed Life are at the heart of our Christian Journey. Nobody gets very far in life without some effort, commitment and follow through. They are ancient disciplines that Christ followers have practiced for centuries and all are proven effective in transforming the mundane and routine into the Adventure of a Lifetime. They are proven ways to grow deeper in our relationship with Christ and farther our walk with God through every season of life. Every member is asked to practice these habits and encourage those around us in staying true to who we are as the Body of Christ. While there are other spiritual disciplines, these six are at our core.
- Spend time daily with God March 28, 2011
- Invite friends to church
- Give generously
- Serve in a ministry
- Participate in a small group
- Worship Regularly
Each week I will share some thoughts and helpful hints on how to follow through on these important disciplines.
I used to teach school.
Tests were inevitable.
Quizzes — popped or announced — were given as preparation for the tests, with the expectation that students would study the mass of information incrementally and regularly so that studying for the test would be more review than cramming.
Some students did as hoped; most did not, which invariably caused me, on the day before the test, to remind them that they could not pass let alone “ace” the test by applying the theory of osmosis to themselves — that they could not place their text and/or notes under their pillow and expect to awaken in the morning with a wealth of knowledge absorbed by their brain. Osmosis works only for plants, not people.
Learning requires effort, work, discipline.
Amazing how, many people, today, believe that Sunday morning church offers the same kind of osmosis as does sleeping with a text and/or notes under their pillow.
Learning the Word and the character of God along with growing in relationship with Him in order to learn, among others, about the gift and sacrifice of His Son; His undeserved yet boundless grace; His incomprehensible love for each of us; and how to enter, as Matthew says, “through the narrow gate” requires our willingness and desire to accept and admit our “hunger and thirst” and then to choose to submit to and practice the spiritual disciplines necessary for developing a “closer walk with Him.”
Perhaps and hopefully, by accepting as their own and practicing the Six Habits of a Transformed Life, more Christians will not only be able but, most assuredly, more willing to defend their faith as the one true faith and their God as the one true God.
I look forward to reading your definitions of each of the six habits and your suggestions as to how we can practice them, because, as John Wesley, the founder of Methodism expoused, “We must live our lives striving for holiness, that is Chirst-likeness,” thus “practicing the spiritual disciplines will help make perfect.”