Exercise
A couple of months ago, I went to the doctor with leg pain. Turns out it was actually a back problem, but due to the way nerves work, the pain was manifesting itself down my leg. Weird. Anyway, I was sent to a physical therapist to strengthen my back and, basically, to learn new ways of sitting, walking and standing so that my back would be in better shape (and my leg would stop hurting). And it worked! After a few weeks of therapy, Joy (my therapist) said, "There's not much more I can teach you, and I think you can do these exercises on your own." With those words, I was set loose.
Now, when I was going in two or three times a week to see Joy, I was very good about doing my exercises...because I knew she would ask! And I would either have to tell her I had done what she had assigned to me, or I would have to come up with a good reason why I didn't. But now, there's no one asking me if I do the exercises or not. No accountability. No one's checking up on me. So I (more often than I want to admit) convince myself that I don't really need to do them. And then, after a few days, the leg pain returns...and I grudgingly admit to myself that I should have been doing the exercises all along.
This morning, as I was reading my devotions and "prayerfully" considering ways not to do my exercises, it hit me (voice of the Lord, perhaps?) how similar we are in doing our spiritual exercises. We know things like prayer, Scripture reading, journaling and worship are good for us. They strengthen our souls, they edify our spirits and they put us once again in contact with the Lord of the universe, which just generally makes life better. But it's easy (yes, even for pastors) to convince ourselves that we don't need to do that today. There are other things that need to be done. There are meetings to attend, appointments to get to, the newspaper to read, Facebook to scan...and on and on it goes. And before we know it, the day is over and our spiritual exercises didn't get done. Well, there's always tomorrow...
Except that, just like with physical exercises, the more we "skip" our spiritual practices, the easier it is to skip another day and then another and then...sooner or later, we're out of the habit. Experts say that skipping something three times is enough to cause us to get out of the habit, even if we know that what we're skipping is something that is good for us...because things that are good for us usually are hard, and take effort. Like exercise. And spiritual disciplines. One strengthens our body and the other strengthens our soul. We can't really live without either.
Now, when I was going in two or three times a week to see Joy, I was very good about doing my exercises...because I knew she would ask! And I would either have to tell her I had done what she had assigned to me, or I would have to come up with a good reason why I didn't. But now, there's no one asking me if I do the exercises or not. No accountability. No one's checking up on me. So I (more often than I want to admit) convince myself that I don't really need to do them. And then, after a few days, the leg pain returns...and I grudgingly admit to myself that I should have been doing the exercises all along.
This morning, as I was reading my devotions and "prayerfully" considering ways not to do my exercises, it hit me (voice of the Lord, perhaps?) how similar we are in doing our spiritual exercises. We know things like prayer, Scripture reading, journaling and worship are good for us. They strengthen our souls, they edify our spirits and they put us once again in contact with the Lord of the universe, which just generally makes life better. But it's easy (yes, even for pastors) to convince ourselves that we don't need to do that today. There are other things that need to be done. There are meetings to attend, appointments to get to, the newspaper to read, Facebook to scan...and on and on it goes. And before we know it, the day is over and our spiritual exercises didn't get done. Well, there's always tomorrow...
Except that, just like with physical exercises, the more we "skip" our spiritual practices, the easier it is to skip another day and then another and then...sooner or later, we're out of the habit. Experts say that skipping something three times is enough to cause us to get out of the habit, even if we know that what we're skipping is something that is good for us...because things that are good for us usually are hard, and take effort. Like exercise. And spiritual disciplines. One strengthens our body and the other strengthens our soul. We can't really live without either.
Comments
Post a Comment