Most memorable (shockingly accurate) transformative lesson

DAVE'S SUMMARY: Along the line of family tensions, my lifelong buddy and I, both followers of Jesus, have talked and fretted over wayward children, now grown. Now we’ve discovered a book, shedding light on God’s Word and God’s Word shedding light on this book. The book is called Renovation of the Heart, Putting On the Character of Christ by Dallas Willard.

The author talks about our messed up hearts or souls that need godly formation or transformation.

Consider jotting down, if you will, four words. What contributes to messing up our soul or heart or spirit:

Rejection – in my own life: favoritism shown to my siblings, translating into rebellion and reinforced by lack of self-esteem and rejection by dates and unfaithful wives.

Assault – we observe put-downs and mockery in marriages GROWING UP & AS ADULTS, as well as outright shouting & sometimes violence (one wife threw a flowerpot at me. If she had better aim, I’d be dead). As kids, we take these observations in marriages to the playground, where they are practiced in abundance.

Withdrawal – being attacked or guilty of such results in withdrawal or distancing in marriage, and then socially, we self-distance.

Defensiveness – with assaults & distancing in our experience, we think we must defend our every thought and action.

We bring these problems into our own marriage and raise kids who observe them and carry on the vicious cycle. That’s what’s wrong with America and the whole world today.

God, however, offers ways to refocus our thoughts, feelings and actions to transform our lives. Paul said, follow me as I follow Christ. Few of us dare to say that. 

DALLAS WILLARD:

THE FIRST MAIN ELEMENT in the transformed social dimension is for individuals to come to see themselves whole, as God himself sees them. Such a vision sets them beyond the wounds and limitations they have received in their past relationships to others. It is this vision of oneself from God’s point of view that makes it possible to regard oneself as blessed, no matter what has happened. 

“We are dead,” Paul tells us, and “our life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then we will appear with him, glorious” (Colossians 3:3-4, PAR). We have stepped into a new life where the primary relationship is with Christ and we are assured of a glorious existence forever. 

God has a plan for each of us in the work he is doing during our lifetime, and no one can prevent this from being fulfilled if we place our hope entirely in him. The part we play in his plans now will extend to the role he has set before us for eternity. Our life in him is whole and it is blessed, no matter what has or has not been done to us, no matter how shamefully our human circles of sufficiency have been violated. 

It is God’s sufficiency to us that secures everything else. Paul again said, “Our sufficiency is of God” (2 Corinthians 3:5; 9:8, PAR). It is the God-given vision of us as whole in him that draws all the poisons from our relationships to others and enables us to go forward with sincere forgiveness and blessing toward them. Only in this way can we stand free from the wounds of the past and from those who have assaulted or forsaken us. DEFENSIVENESS GONE 

THE SECOND ELEMENT IN the spiritually transformed social dimension is abandonment of all defensiveness. This of course could occur only in a social context where Christ dwells—that is, among his special people. But it is natural it would occur in the absence of attack and withdrawal, wherever that may be, or where we have an impregnable defense against it.

GENUINE LOVE PREDOMINATES IN OUR GATHERINGS AND THEN ALL PRETENSE would vanish from our lives. That would be the THIRD element in the spiritually transformed social dimension of the self. Love between Christians then would, as Paul says to the Romans, “be genuine.”

The FOURTH element is an opening up of our broader social dimension to redemption. Not having the burden of defending and securing ourselves, and acting now from the resources of our new “life from above,” we can devote our lives to the service of others. This is the positive moment in redemption of the social side of the self. It is not just a matter of not attacking or withdrawing. That redemption will naturally and rightly be chiefly focused in blessing upon those closest to us, beginning with our family members and moving out from there, proportional to our degree of life involvement with others.

And that is the central factor in the beautiful picture of what the local gatherings of disciples into “churches” should be like, given by Paul in Romans 12:1-21, WHICH OFFERS A PICTURE OF WHAT A TRANSFORMED HEART WOULD LOOK LIKE.  Christ’s apprentices would be carrying out their particular work in the group life with a grace and power that is not from themselves, but from God. CONSIDER THE FIRST 8 VERSES (verses 3-8), EACH ONE would be exhibiting the following qualities (verses 9-21):

WRAP-UP

1. Letting love be completely real
2. Abhorring what is evil
3. Clinging to what is good
4. Being devoted to one another in family-like love (philostorgoi)
5. Outdoing one another in giving honor
6. Serving the Lord with ardent spirit and all diligence
7. Rejoicing in hope 8. Being patient in troubles
9. Being devoted constantly to prayer
10. Contributing to the needs of the saints
11. Pursuing (running after) hospitality
12. Blessing persecutors and not cursing them
13. Being joyful with those who are rejoicing and being sorrowful with those in sorrow
14. Living in harmony with each other
15. Not being haughty, but fitting right in with the “lowly” in human terms
16. Not seeing yourself as wise
17. Never repaying evil for evil
18. Having due regard for what everyone takes to be right
19. Being at peace with everyone, so far as it depends on you
20. Never taking revenge, but leaving that to whatever God may decide
21. Providing for needy enemies
22. Not being overwhelmed by evil, but overwhelming evil with good.

This is the most adequate biblical description of what the details of a spiritually transformed social dimension look like. We should pause to contemplate it. Just think for a moment what it would be like to be part of a group of disciples in which this list was the conscious, shared intention, and where it was actually lived out, even if with some imperfection. 

You can see, I think, how it would totally transform the marriage relation and the home and family. Its effect on the community would be incalculable, as it in fact has been wherever realized throughout the history of Christ’s people on earth. The abandonment of all defensiveness and its many strategies would clearly be achieved in such a group. There would no longer be any need for them. In their place would be receptiveness and blessing for all, even enemies. 

Certainly, to achieve this in our social dimension we must have heard and accepted the gospel of grace, of Jesus’ defenseless death on the cross on our behalf, and of his acceptance of us into his life beyond death and beyond the worst that could be done to him or to us. We must stand safe and solid in his kingdom. 

The social world is set before us as an infinite task, which can only be carried out in the power of God. We accept that. Just as we cannot be the husband or wife or parent God intends except in the power of God, so for our life as a whole. We do not even know how to pray as we ought, Paul tells us (Romans 8:26). What then, shall we not pray? By no means, for “the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words” (verse 26). And the Spirit of God will enter into all of our social connections if we invite him, wait on him, and proceed as best we can. 

We have the promise of Jesus to those who live by his “living water.” That water “shall become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life” (John 4:14), and “‘from his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water’” (John 7:38; compare Isaiah 58:11). Spiritual formation in Christ obviously requires that we increasingly be happily reconciled to living in and by the direct upholding of the hand of God. 

This is clearly what the entire biblical view of life calls for, and especially what Jesus himself lived and presented as the truth. Only from within this gospel outlook on life can we begin to approach the godly reformation of the self in its social world. But from within that outlook we can cease from assault and withdrawal and can extend ourselves in blessing to all whose lives we touch.

Willard, Dallas. Renovation of the Heart: Putting On the Character of Christ (pp. 195-197). The Navigators. Kindle Edition.
To review the life-transforming action steps, click on the white links above the pictured book recommendations here:
roundtableministries.com  

 

Well-directed activities that are under the personal supervision of Christ

 

Spiritual formation in Christlikeness is the sure outcome of well-directed activities that are under the personal supervision of Christ and are sustained by all of the instrumentalities of his grace. This aching world is waiting for the people explicitly identified with Christ to be, through and through, the people he intends them to be. “Christ in you, the hope of glory” is possible (Colossians 1:27, NIV). Christ can live in all the dimensions of you. God’s grace will do it, but God wants your cooperation. 

TODAY’S EXPERIMENT - Consider how God may be leading you as you’ve worked through this book to focus your mind on the things of Christ—to examine the ideas and images you picture there; to ponder Scripture in a slow, full way; to read material that stretches you; to memorize a passage that describes who you need to be.  

Consider how God is leading you to examine where you routinely let your feelings dwell—to investigate what ideas and images guide your feelings; to cultivate feelings of faith, hope, and love, which build the underlying conditions of love, joy, and peace. 

Consider how God is leading you to examine your character based on what automatically slips out without your thinking about it—to explore where you are on the continuum of identifying your will with God’s (surrender, abandonment, contentment, participation in accomplishing God’s will in our world); to ask God what spiritual disciplines would help you align your will with his. 

Consider how God is leading you to review what you discovered about what your body is poised to do—to walk through the steps of releasing your body to God if you did not do so and to review it if you did; to admit ways you have idolized your body or misused it to dominate or manipulate others; to arrange your life for rest and Sabbath. 

Consider how God is leading you in your social dimension—to review your sense of ease or lack of ease at being reciprocally rooted in others; to admit the routine ways of attack and withdrawal you have continued to discover about yourself; to pray that God will work “genuine love” in you.  

Consider how God is leading you to review the kinds of things you routinely say to your soul and that your soul cries out—to abandon outcomes in humility to God; to embrace the teachings of Scripture (law) as sweetness and light.

Who or what's in charge? Planning & aligning with the Spirit & Word for transformation

MOVING FORWARD - The path of renovation of the heart is one in which the revitalized will takes grace-provided measures to change the content of the thought life, the dominant feeling tones, what the body is ready to do, the prevailing social atmosphere, and the deep currents of the soul. These all are to be progressively transformed toward the character they each have in Jesus Christ. 

Willpower is not the key to personal transformation. Rather, the will and character progress in effectual well-being and well-doing only as all other essential aspects of the person come into line with the intent of a will brought to newness of life from above by the Word and the Spirit. Now is the time for specific planning. 

Are there areas where our will is not abandoned to God’s will or where old segments of fallen character remain unchallenged? 

Do some of our thoughts, images, or patterns of thinking show more of our kingdom or the kingdom of evil than they do God’s kingdom—for example, as they relate to money or social practices or efforts to bring the world to Christ? 

Is our body still our master in some area? Are we its servant rather than it ours? 

And if we have some role in leadership among Christ’s people, are we doing all we reasonably can to aid and direct their progress in inward transformation into Christlikeness? 

Is that progress the true aim of our lives together, and are there ways in which our activities might be more supportive of that aim? 

Is the teaching that goes out from us appropriate to the condition of the people, and is our example one that gives clear assurance and direction? Is “our progress evident to all”? (1 Timothy 4:15, PAR).

 

A taste of who Jesus is and what it looks like to walk and talk like Jesus

Imagine the classes offered at such a church: being genuinely kind to hostile people, returning blessing for cursing, living without contempt, living without lust, speaking simply (see Matthew 5). 

In order to change the dimensions of the self so that these behaviors grow from within, such classes include time for questions and discussion so that students can offer ideas of what these behaviors look like (discipline of community). Students do exercises from Scripture to envision how Jesus did these things (study, meditation). They then role-play these situations and offer testimonies of successes and failures (confession, prayer, celebration). What happens in such a class is . . . nearly magical. Attendees get a taste of who Jesus is and what it looks like to walk and talk like Jesus. 

They begin to grieve their sarcastic comebacks and manipulative speech. Apologies occur among participants regarding that last heated discussion about the church budget. Jesus becomes the center of attention as all begin wondering, How would Jesus live his life if he were in my shoes? 

TODAY’S EXPERIMENT - Reflect on Jesus in this scene: On the Via Dolorosa, as Jesus carried his cross and suffered the effects of mental and physical torture, he noticed among the crowd following him some women who mourned and wailed for him. In this moment (where I would have been self-consumed), he turned to them in great concern about their future: “Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me; weep for yourselves and for your children” (Luke 23:28, NIV). He warned them of the impending horror of the destruction of Jerusalem. Imagine these women years later remembering his words and saving themselves and their children. 

Jesus never stopped looking out for other people. A few hours later he could naturally say, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34). When I’m suffering, I struggle not to think that everything is about me, yet Jesus in his great need turned to address the needs and hurts of others! O Jesus, help us have the kind of heart that naturally turns to comfort and help others. If you wish, turn to Luke 23:27-31 and review what comes before it. Consider what it would be like to have this heart of Christ. What does this experience make you want to pray to God?

 

Audience of One: From the only point of view that matters (God’s), no human knows how the service went.

ARRANGING FOR TRANSFORMATION - The second stage in God’s plan for the growth and prospering of local congregations has to do with immersing the apprentices into the Trinitarian presence. God’s intent is to be present among his people and heal them, teach them, and provide for them. 

A local congregation of disciples of Jesus should be a place where divine life and power is manifestly present to glorify God and meet the needs of repentant human beings. This implies an atmosphere of honesty, openness, indiscriminate acceptance of all, and supernatural caring with utter admiration for and confidence in Jesus. 

Performance, which is where we try to make an impression rather than just be what we are, would be absent in the Trinitarian gathering, as would constant solicitude concerning “How did the service go?” God is the primary agent in the gathering. From the only point of view that matters (God’s), no human knows how the service went. The minister does not need techniques but needs only speak Christ’s Word from Christ’s character, standing within the manifest presence of God. 

The third stage, intending and arranging for the inner transformation of disciples, is what Jesus described as teaching the disciples to do all he commanded. The doing of what he commanded is not the focus of our activities at this point; rather, it is the natural outcome or side effect. The focus is inner transformation of the five essential aspects of human personality that we have been studying. This should be the local congregation’s constant preoccupation. 

If this is your congregation, announce that you teach people to do the things that Jesus said to do. Publicize and run training programs designed to develop specific points of the character of Christ as given in the New Testament. Put the whole weight of the staff and the congregation toward this effort. All of the other details of church activities will matter little, one way or the other, so long as all are organized around God’s plan for spiritual formation in the local congregation.

 

Live like Jesus would live your life if He were you!

Perhaps the idea that apprentices “are constantly with him to learn to be like him” sounds too challenging to you. How could you accomplish this? 

Consider that the one who said, “I am with you always” (Matthew 28:20) is already by your side and may be doing things to get your attention. Our job, then, is to pay attention to this constant companion of our lives. 

This practice of the presence of God is not a chore but the best way to live. We can turn our thoughts to Jesus throughout the day, using small reminders at first but always living out of a foundation of regular moments of being with Jesus through the written Word (and this is the purpose of Bible reading—not just to get to the bottom of the page). 

To be with Jesus this way means that during such times we live in our heart as well as our head. Both are good, but insights aren’t enough. We need to put our whole self into it and pray back to God what we find there. With gospel passages in particular, we can enter into them and tell Jesus how we respond to what we experience there. 

Perhaps even more challenging is how apprentices are learning to lead their everyday lives as he would lead their lives if he were they. 

If you’re a hair stylist or an engineer, how would Jesus do his work and treat his clients/coworkers if he were you? If you’re an adult child of an aging parent or the parent of an uncooperative teenager, how would Jesus treat this person if he were in your shoes? If you’re a small-business owner, how would Jesus approach your promotional activities? How would he respond to a complaining customer or times a product failed to measure up? What would Jesus write in each e-mail if he were in your body, living your life, responding to the person who just e-mailed you? 

TODAY’S EXPERIMENT - What is your next step in understanding and doing the things Jesus gave us specific commandments and teachings about? Consider how Jesus would lead your life if he were you—working at your job, living in your family and neighborhood, going to your church.

 

Constantly with & learning form Jesus

 

STAGE ONE: MAKING APPRENTICES - Apprentices are those who have trusted Jesus with their whole life, so far as they understand it. They want to learn everything Jesus has to teach them about life in the kingdom of God and are constantly with him to learn to be like him. 

First, they are learning to understand and do the things Jesus gave us specific commandments and teachings about. They study his words and deeds in the four Gospels. They explore what it means to give a cup of cold water to a little child in the name of Jesus (see Matthew 10:42), to not swear (see James 5:12), to love their enemies and pray for those who persecute them (see Matthew 5:44), and so forth. They are learning how to actually do these things. 

The second aspect of discipleship concerns learning how Jesus would lead our lives if he were in our place. How would Jesus (living your life) get along with neighbors, participate in government, get an education, and engage in the cultural life of your society? How would he do those things if he were you? In these matters of ordinary human existence, Jesus is our constant teacher, and we are his constant apprentices. “He walks with me and he talks with me,” as the old hymn says. When setting out as his apprentices, we will sharply encounter all of the harmful things that are in us: false thoughts and feelings, self-will, bodily inclinations to evil, ungodly social relationships and patterns, and soul wounds and misconnections. Our Savior and Teacher will help us remove these a

s we strive forward through the many-sided ministries of himself, his kingdom, and his people. All will be bathed in the Holy Spirit. The process of spiritual formation in Christlikeness is a process through which all the dimensions of our lives are transformed as they increasingly take on the character of our Teacher.