Cultivating a Spiritual Life: Seeking the Lord

I imagine some of you expected something a little bit more “how-to” in the last blog. I have struggled over the years with so much guilt in cultivating a spiritual life because many of the tools I was given were legalistic – lists of things to do to be more spiritual, lists to which I could never measure up. Sometimes I would be so discouraged that I wouldn’t even read certain Christian magazines. I knew if I read one more thing that I was supposed to do – one more thing that other Christians were doing – I’d feel guilty for not being spiritual or godly enough! The letter certainly kills, but the Spirit gives LIFE! (II Cor. 3:6)

Over the years I have learned that spiritual life isn’t something I can make happen on my own because I am dead; it’s Christ’s life in me, His Holy Spirit, that produces spiritual life. Therefore, I can’t count on the perfect time of day for my quiet time or the perfect number of minutes spent in prayer to help me grow spiritually. Don’t get me wrong, these things are certainly good and needed, but let’s turn to the illustration of cultivating the land again to think more broadly about spiritual life.  

The seasons dictate for us when the soil is to be tilled, planted, and harvested. If I told you that I was going to plant corn in the fall and wait for it to come up in the spring, you’d think I was crazy. If I said I was going to till the soil after the new green shoots had just come up in June, you’d think I was crazier—that would destroy the crop! Yet we often submit our spiritual lives to our own timetables and formulas, thinking we will get the results for which we’re looking, only to find ourselves frustrated and fruitless.

As busy women, as pastors’ wives with full schedules where we are called on constantly to minister at all times of the day and night to our husbands, children, congregants, and community folk, we have to have a broader view of spiritual life than a set-in-stone, daily quiet time (as important as it is).

It should be our desire to seek the Lord moment-by-moment, walking by the Spirit, submitting to whatever season we are in and whatever job we have in that season.

Allow me to share an example. During a potluck at our first church, I ended up across the table from a woman who was recently widowed. Her husband had struggled from mental challenges, and she was not known as the most gracious of women in our church. In fact, we knew she’d criticized my husband’s ministry on a number of occasions in the past. But I knew I needed to reach out to her, to ask her how she was doing, to pour out the mercy and love of Christ to her.  

I don’t even remember what I said to her that day, but I know that God used me to bless her; I was totally energized in that moment, and she seemed softer towards me going forward. Not only that, my own attitude towards her had changed.

THAT is spiritual life, obeying God’s Spirit in all things. Even when you have to forgive those people in your church who make your husband’s life miserable. Even when that late night phone call requires your husband to head out to the hospital and you are left putting the kids to bed on your own again. Even when you feel totally alone in your church because you don’t think you can trust any of the women there with the struggles you are facing. Even when much of your time is spent caring for your child who has special needs and the women in your church don’t understand why you can’t attend all of their ladies’ events.

Seek the Lord and have life, women. If we embrace the season of life in which God has placed us and submit to and seek Him in it, then we will cultivate a spiritual life. Then we will reap the rewards of our labour in Him.

Part 2 of 2
– Part 1: Cultivating a Spiritual Life – Seasons