Reading an excellent new book with our church. Tonight was our third moderated discussion at the church covering chapters two and three. I thought pages 18 and 19 were particularly insightful. Here’s a quote of merit on the difference our routines make in our lives.
“Sometimes, our lives are shaped by these routines in ways we never even think about. Even then–perhaps especially then–these liturgies are still at work, creating the longings that direct our lives. For example, if you first act every morning is to check how many comments and like you received overnight on social media, you are training your soul to ache for the approval of others. This love will shape how you respond to people around you, even if you never recognize the reason why. If you obsessively check the news throughout the day, you could be feeding a delusion that you are more in control of what happens in your own life if you know everything about every global event as soon as it happens. If that’s your liturgy, you’re far more likely to become enraged whenever the events of your life don’t conform to your expectations. If you see someone whose ethnicity is different from yours and immediately lock your car doors or watch them with a touch of suspicion, these actions don’t merely reflect your inner disposition. Your habits are also shaping your loves in such a way that your hospitality becomes limited to people who look like you.”
In Church as it is in Heaven: Cultivating a Multiethnic Kingdom Culture,
Jamaal E. Williams & TImothy Paul Jones
(Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2023)
Two questions:
- What are the “liturgies”, the patterns, the instinctive behaviours, the practiced rhythms of your life that are keeping you from progressing in holiness?
- What are the new patterns and “liturgies”, the new rhythms you want to develop so that you can actively cultivate a multiethnic Kingdom culture in your life?
ChosenRebel's Blog 