Maybe your schedule loosens with the close of the school year, or you find yourself stressing out for what should be fun vacations. Whether summer brings deeper rest or unrest, the change in season invites us to consider engaging—or re-engaging—in spiritual practices.
Spiritual practices—also known as spiritual disciplines—mark the lives of followers of Jesus and sustain our relationship with God. Just as regular phone calls or eating dinner with loved ones build our relationship with them, spiritual disciplines strengthen our relationship with God.
Regardless of where you find yourself—stressed or relaxed—here are four spiritual practices to aid your relationship with God this summer:
Writing on prayer in Celebration of Discipline, Richard Foster said, “Of all the spiritual disciplines, prayer is the most central because it ushers us into perpetual communion with the Father.” Prayer is how we talk with God. We see Jesus model prayer for us in the gospels (Luke 11:1–4) and are directed to continually pray by the apostle Paul (1 Thess. 5:17). Without prayer—much like without consistent communication with a friend or loved one—our relationship with God is distant and apathetic.
Prayer encompasses many postures: praise—expressing joy to God; thanksgiving—showing gratitude for God’s gifts and provision; confession—acknowledging our sin before God; lament—bringing our grief to God; and petition/intercession—asking God for forgiveness or to act on someone else’s behalf.
Exercise: Fixed Hour Prayer
Early Christians prayed at specific times of day to establish a rhythm of talking to God. Set a time to pray each day through the rest of the summer.
For more on prayer, visit The Prayer Practice by Practicing the Way in the RightNow Media library.
Keeping the sabbath might be the most disruptive spiritual practice in our modern age. In the Old Testament, the sabbath was the day set aside for all people to stop working and worship God. To be part of the people of God back then meant you practiced sabbath. Now, followers of Jesus are not obligated to keep the sabbath (Col. 2:16), but the principle of following God’s model of rest in Genesis 2:1–3 is woven into the very fabric of creation. Regularly practicing worshipful rest can be good for you even if it’s not required of you.
Because we live in a fast-paced, achievement-oriented culture, purposefully withdrawing from all work—not just our employment—for a set time to stop, rest, delight, and worship may be exactly what your soul longs for this summer.
Exercise: Mini-Sabbath
Setting aside an entire day to rest and enjoy God may be intimidating. Start with a small amount of time—a weekday afternoon or a Saturday morning—where you remove distractions and engage in activities that deepen your joy in God and relationships with others.
For more on the sabbath, visit The Sabbath Practice by Practicing the Way in the RightNow Media library.
In Matthew 6, Jesus assumes his followers will fast when he warns us about practicing our “righteousness in front of others” (v. 1) when we give to the poor (vv. 2–4), when we pray (vv. 5–15), and when we fast (vv. 16–18).
At its core, fasting is choosing to go without something you want or need to make room for something you want or need even more. Perhaps you choose to go without food to make room in your heart to hear God or to give the money or food you would have used to sustain your own body to sustain someone else.
Exercise: Fast with a Friend
Fasting has the potential for good, but also misuse. Because of the dangers of treating fasting like dieting or taking your heart to an unhealthy place with food, ask someone you trust if fasting is a good spiritual discipline for you to try. If they agree, invite them to walk with you as you start this practice. Consider skipping lunch once a week and spending the time you would have been eating to pray with your friend.
For more on fasting, watch The Fasting Practice by Practicing the Way in the RightNow Media library.
Solitude can be refreshing for some and a struggle for others. But Jesus demonstrated the need to spend time alone throughout his life—withdrawing to the desert to start his ministry (Matt. 4:1), retreating after a busy day of ministering (Mark 1:35), and before making monumental decisions (Luke 6:12–16). Just as Jesus needed space to hear from the Father, we need solitude to turn down the noise of our busy lives and focus on God. It may sound counter-intuitive, but the goal of solitude is not to be alone—rather solitude frees us from noise to be with God.
Exercise: Find Your Place
While we can make space to be alone with God anywhere, it can be helpful to have a designated space to retreat and sit with God. It doesn’t have to be anywhere fancy—maybe it’s your back porch, your kitchen table, or at a local park. The goal is to go to this place consistently and avoid distractions to focus your attention on God. Determine where that place is and use it for holy solitude this summer.
For more on the practice of solitude, check out The Solitude Practice by Practicing the Way in the RightNow Media library.
Writer/Content Editor, RightNow Media
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Summertime can feel like an obstacle to overcome for parents of school-aged kids. How do we keep our kids busy without over-scheduling them? How do we manage our own responsibilities while also ensuring our children’s minds don’t wither away from hours of screen time? Can anything keep kids interested, occupied, productive, and even learning during summer vacation?
Remember playdough, finger paint, and crayons? Toddler days were messy! But while the medium may (or may not) change, our kids’ creativity doesn’t. Let’s occupy their busy minds by filling their busy hands with opportunities to create. Adapt the following ideas to the ages and abilities of your children.
Set up a dedicated spot in your home—a table, nook, or entire room if you have it—for artistic endeavors stocked with a supply of paper, pencils, paint, and other creative tools. Name a particular hour of your day as “art class” and explore a passion or talent your child may possess. And if you just can’t handle glitter, paint, or modeling clay, find a friend who can and trade playdates with them. When my kids were between five and twelve years old, I always loved taking them to my friend Susie, who, as an actual artist, was happy for them to join her kids in making a huge mess on her kitchen table. They came home with glittery hair, colorful smudges, and shining eyes as they showed me their newest handmade treasures.
Books are the doorway to the future, exercising children’s imaginations, thinking, comprehension skills, and creativity. Stories help them understand the world and imagine a new world in which they can play a part. The power of reading inspired Dolly Parton, for instance, to create her Imagination Library, which sends a book per month to children from birth to five years old.
While babies are napping, toddlers can enjoy “rest time” with books until they doze off. Older kids can settle down during the heat of the day with a reading hour. Or jazz up your routine with a weekly trip to the library where they can discover new stories and foster a lifelong habit of reading.
Begin with the best book in the world, the Bible. A short time reading God’s Word will start every day with pure goodness. Don’t make it complicated—even opening your physical Bible and then retelling the story in your own words teaches your children the value of hearing from God every day. Let them participate and help you as they are able. Maybe have them draw a picture depicting something from the story that day.
Once they start reading, many children begin dramatizing the stories they love. Do your kids enjoy imitating or quoting their favorite characters and scenes? Clean out your closets and offer your rejects or old favorites to a costume bin. Encourage the kids to act out their morning Bible stories, write screenplays, get into character, and become someone new on stage. Cheer on your cotton ball-bearded Moses and blue sash-draped Mary. Ooh and aah when “Jesus” multiplies the cheese and crackers. Always say yes when they ask if you want to watch.
Reading often leads to writing. Keep old school notebooks from the recycle bin, tear out the used pages, and reuse what’s left as “dreaming and drafting” notebooks. Let your kids’ creative instincts run wild! Don’t worry about penmanship or grammar. When they feel they’ve completed a poem or short story and are ready to share, help them re-write it neatly or even type it into the computer (we can’t ignore sneaking in easy learning). Print out a final version to share with friends and family. Celebrate your child’s imagination and hard work.
Storytelling takes many forms, and video is easily the most popular type of media right now. Disney, for example, rules the screens in many households. The kids will ask to watch their favorite episodes or movies all day long, and we are often tempted to let them vegetate in front of the screen. But why not put the camera—or your iPhone—into their hands instead? Using free apps such as iMovie or InShot, young aspiring producers can learn basic editing skills for photography and video. Movie night can take on a whole new angle.
Let’s encourage our kids to tell stories that reflect their faith and God’s character. The original kids’ series The Creators, a product of the RightNow Media video production team, tells the story of a group of friends who join forces to create films that are “meaningful, virtuous, and good.” The Creators weaves biblical truths into engaging stories with humor and the right dose of seriousness. Perhaps a short time in front of a show will inspire your kids to produce their own series!
When God created humans, he made us in his image (Genesis 1:27). That means we are made to be creators too—it’s part of our DNA and our purpose. Who says we have to wait until we are adults to make wonderful things?
The following is an excerpt from www.Exponential.org, originally written by Dave Ferguson on January 8, 2023. For more wisdom from Dave, check out Lost Cause, a five-session RightNow Media video series on evangelism.
We need to create and use language that reinforces our values. We must be intentional about creating and consistently using vocabulary that mobilizes Christians to reach lost people. The clarity, consistency, and intentionality of our narratives, language, behaviors, and practices are an overflow of the clarity and conviction of our values.
Consistency is one of the keys to effective storytelling. We need to use the same language, in the same ways, over a long period of time.
One of the things we learn as church leaders over time is that just when we get sick and tired of repeating phrases is when the congregation is just beginning to get it. We like to be onto the next new terminology, and often it works against us.
To create narratives that make it clear evangelism is important to us, we need to be willing to embrace repetition.
The reason we need to pay so much attention to our language is that we are responsible for telling the most important story in human history: the gospel. This is the story of a redeeming God who came to live among us in the human form of Jesus before dying for our sins, coming back from the dead, and leaving his Holy Spirit with us to empower us to share this story widely and well. We are all responsible for telling this story in a way that makes clear the fact that all human stories lead back to Jesus’ story.
We are all lost and in need of our risen savior.
We see Jesus articulate this in one simple statement in Luke 19:10: “For the son of man came to seek and save the lost.” That was Jesus’ mission. And that should be our mission, too. And, therefore it certainly should be the mission of his church. If that was his mission, we should ask ourselves: how did Jesus live out his mission in the story of his life?
From the beginning, Jesus’ story expands beyond the religious institutions of his day. These spaces were often closed to outsiders and the lost, but through his actions and words, he expressed his values (and that of his father) to welcome people into a new story.
When you follow Jesus’ example and intentionally connect with people far from God you’ll begin to get questions about why you believe stories from the Bible, and about how your life story has changed as a result of your relationship with Jesus. Be prepared for these moments because they offer golden opportunities to open doors. They allow you to build bridges between the stories that others tell you and the story of Jesus.
We also see from Jesus’ examples that we have an easier time sharing our stories with people during meaningful moments that don’t necessarily take place in our church buildings. For many of us, this will require a shift in our ecclesiology, the way we come together and experience church. If you have a mindset that evangelism happens only in a building once a week (the common model for most of our Western cultures) you’ll miss opportunities to build relationships that create space for storytelling and story-sharing. It’s hard to build relationships while sitting in the pews listening to sermons, attending Sunday school, or taking communion.
As we seek opportunities to tell our stories, it can be helpful to use a simple storytelling framework that helps us connect to others around us. I use a simple three-part format to share my story and it’s been so effective I wrote about it in my book BLESS: 5 Everyday Ways to Love Your Neighbor and Change the World. You wouldn’t believe how many stories have come out of this method.
What was your life like before you met Jesus? Or if you grew up in the church knowing all about Jesus, what was your life like before you got serious about following him? Your story begins with who you were.
How did you become a Christ-follower? Did you go through a particularly tough time in your life that led you back to God? Did a friend invite you to a church service? Did a family member introduce you to Jesus? Did a life experience inspire you to get serious about following Jesus?
What difference has following Jesus made in your life? How has knowing him impacted both the good and hard times? Yes, when telling your story, include both the good and the hard. People will be more impacted when you’re honest about the challenges you continue to face even when you’re following Jesus. And don’t give the Sunday school answer. Talk about how your life is different and how God is growing you in certain areas, but make sure you’re sincere about how it’s a process and how often you still make mistakes.
To learn more about developing narratives of evangelism in your church or community, watch Lost Cause, a RightNow Media original series made in partnership with Dave Ferguson and Exponential.
We all know that prayer is an important part of the Christian life, but if we’re honest, finding time to pray can seem impossible. It’s hard to pause to pray throughout the week when work, family, and an overloaded schedule seem to take up most of our free time. We all have a lot going on, but we don’t have to let busyness stop us from spending time with God. In fact, we can’t afford to let busyness stop us—prayer is one of the most important aspects of the Christian life because it is how we communicate with God. We cannot properly serve a God we don’t talk to.
If we’re going to see prayer as an important part of our daily lives, let’s keep a few things in mind.
The Bible makes it clear that prayer isn’t optional—prayer is a command and is essential to following Jesus. Philippians 4:6 says, “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God” (emphasis mine). Think about your current prayer life and ask yourself, “Do I really talk to God about everything?” Many of us would admit that we have a habit of inviting God into the large-scale issues of life, while leaving him out of what we might consider miniscule. But leaving him out of the little things can subtly lead to a lifestyle of independence and isolation. Every Christian is called to pray in every circumstance.
Prayer keeps us in check and helps us remain dependent on God. We all have the tendency to think we have life figured out—with Google, opinions on social media, and readily available advice from friends, it’s easy to think we have our lives under control. But as helpful as our friends and internet resources are, we need the Spirit of God to generate a spiritual life. When we pray, we’re showing God that we know we need him. We cannot make it through this life without his guidance, his wisdom, and his input.
No relationship we have can thrive if we don’t spend significant time with the other person—the connection we have with friends, family, or significant others will eventually fizzle if we don’t make quality time a priority. The same is true for our relationship with God. If we want to know God deeply, then communication is key.
As believers, much of how and why we pray is rooted in how well we know God. Because we know he expects holiness, our prayers must include repentance. Because we know he is a generous God, our prayers must include thanksgiving and gratitude. Because he is a good and kind God, our prayers should include our adoration and praise for him. The more we know him, the broader and more intimate our prayers become.
There are many ways we can enrich our life of prayer. Take a moment to read through these suggestions and reflect on the prayer life you currently have and what kind of prayer life you want.
God desires to be involved in our daily routine, thoughts, and decision making. Say a prayer of thankfulness when you find a great parking spot on a busy day. Ask him to help you stay focused when a work project is frustrating. Pray for wisdom when your toddler throws a tantrum in the grocery store.
When you can’t form the right words to say but are filled with emotion, you can allow the words of Scripture to become your heart’s prayer. Read your favorite psalm or passage and allow those verses to be your prayer. Meditate on them, memorize them, or read them aloud.
God is our creator and, as the psalmist says in Psalm 139:2, he knows our thoughts from far off. There’s no need to hide our true feelings, frustrations, or questions from God—he already knows and wants us to bring those feelings to him. When we pray, we have the freedom to be honest in his presence knowing that he will guide us into all truth, correct any erroneous thinking we might have, and comfort us.
Sometimes, the best way to enhance our prayer life is to form a routine. When we intentionally incorporate prayer into our daily lives, it will become a natural habit. An easy way to get started is to try out one of the devotionals on RightNow Media. Prayer and the Psalms is a ten-day devotional that takes you through several psalms to learn more about prayer.
When we start to invite God into the everyday—even mundane—parts of our lives, we move past solely making requests and walk into trusting him with all our thoughts and troubles. Prayer is how we learn to worship him fully, know him as our friend and savior, and lean on him as our only hope.
Romantic love steps into the spotlight in mid-February, but is that the type of love behind the holiday? A closer look at history reveals that romance has nothing to do with the man behind the hearts and chocolates. Rather, the love of St. Valentine points us all to the love of Christ.
The origin of Valentine’s Day traces back to the historical figure St. Valentine. However, the legend of this saint more closely resembles Paul Bunyan than George Washington. From what we know about church history, there were two significant men named Valentine in the third century—a priest in Rome and a bishop in Terni, Italy—with miraculous stories attached to their names. Because of the passage of time, historians aren’t sure which events should be attributed to whom and tend to combine the two figures into one man.
Some sources say Valentine secretly married couples against imperial military policy. Others comment that he healed a blind woman in front of the imperial court, evidencing the power of the gospel to skeptical eyes. Regardless of what is true about the life of the Valentines, there is one historically reliable event historians agree that they share: each was executed for his faith under intense Roman persecution. All we can really know about Valentine is that he served as a Christian leader who gave his life for his faith. That story doesn’t make for a cute Valentine’s Day card.
The celebration of Valentine’s Day that we know today didn’t begin until one thousand years after Valentine died. English poet Geoffrey Chaucer mentioned in his poem Parliament of Foules that birds choose their mate “halfway through the second month of the year.” Since that moment, Valentine’s Day has been associated with passionate courtship rather than remembering the life of a saint in service to Jesus.
But some of you may be thinking: “Why should we care about remembering saints from the past at all?” Looking to faithful men and women of the past who’ve followed Jesus can renew our love for God and inspire us to emulate their devotion.
Saints from church history are part of our “great cloud of witnesses” the author of Hebrews writes about in Hebrews 11 and 12. The example of Christians both present and historic should motivate us to action, saying, “Therefore . . . let us lay aside every hindrance and the sin that so easily ensnares us . . . keeping our eyes on Jesus.”
So, consider Valentine. If all we can know with certainty about his life is that he was a faithful pastor under intense persecution, yet so committed to Jesus that he didn’t renounce his faith when threatened with death, that alone should be celebrated and emulated.
This Valentine’s Day, as we focus on romantic love through food, chocolate, or cards (no matter how cheesy they may be), let’s also model Valentine’s self-sacrificial love for God and others as a leader and a martyr for the faith. While we probably won’t be called to die for our faith, we are called to heed Jesus’s martyr-like words in Matthew 16:24–25: “If anyone wants to follow after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life because of me will find it.”
Valentine’s Day should remind us that true love does exist—“No one has greater love than this: to lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).
Jesus’s resurrection, as “O Holy Night” says, is the breaking of a “new and glorious morn.” That hymn, in fact, bears great significance for us this Easter season. In its first few lines, we find incredible hope:
“O holy night, the stars are brightly shining
It is the night of our dear savior’s birth.
Long lay the world in sin and error pining,
Till he appeared and the soul felt its worth.
The thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices,
For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn.”
Jesus’s birth held the promise of a new hope for those who were there to see it. Joseph and Mary and the shepherds were certain of the significance of the child laying in that borrowed feeding trough (Luke 2:7). The “Savior . . . who is the Messiah, the Lord” was “born for [them]” (Luke 2:11, CSB).
Thirty-three years later, the “new and glorious morn” was replaced with hopeless mourning. Jesus’s lifeless, broken body was being placed in a borrowed tomb, and the holiness of that first night was being called into question. The stars that shined so “brightly” at his coming were now dimmed with his apparent departure. The joy of the weary world gave way to deep, guttural groans of lament.
In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve chose to pluck a fruit that they weren’t yet allowed to harvest, and the thorny consequences of that first sin affect us to this day. With one ill-advised bite, the garden became a graveyard that spread death around the globe.
In John’s gospel, we first meet the resurrected Jesus in a graveyard outside the tomb he had once occupied. Mary, soaking the ground outside the tomb with her tears, hears the voice of someone behind her, presuming him to be the gardener.
What’s a gardener doing in a graveyard before sunrise?
Mary’s assumption about the man in the garden, who we know is Jesus, points us to a deeper truth. Jesus, beginning with his death and resurrection, is turning a graveyard into a garden, undoing the curse of sin. He is inaugurating and cultivating the new creation. He is resurrecting this death-soaked world.
The world now has a reason to rejoice.
We celebrate Easter because at the resurrection of Jesus—the new and better gardener—the world is in bloom again. We wear bright colors, sing resurrection hymns, and feast with family and friends because we carry with us the thrill of hope, for “He is risen! He is risen, indeed!”
We couldn’t sing “O Holy Night” without the empty tomb of resurrection morning. The “night of our dear savior’s birth,” would be like any other night if not for the thrilling refrain: “He is risen! He is risen, indeed!”
If you’re interested in learning more about the life of Jesus of Nazareth and the impact of his ministry, check out Journey with Jesus with Dr. Tony Evans, Chrystal Evans Hurst, and Priscilla Shirer.
From Chicago to New York to New Orleans, and in dozens more cities across the country, Irish Americans and those happy to pretend they are flock to parade routes to enjoy the annual exception to the church’s Lenten fast—St. Paddy’s Day.
Patrick himself would likely be somewhat mystified at the legend that has sprung up around his memory. He wasn’t even Irish. Born in Britain around 387, he was sixteen when he was stolen and enslaved by Irish marauders. While working for his master herding sheep, Patrick was drawn back to the faith of his family—his father was a deacon and his grandfather a priest—and became a devoted follower of God. He wrote in his Confession, “More and more the love of God increased, and my sense of awe before God. Faith grew, and my spirit was moved . . .”
Patrick credited God with coming to him in a dream to point him to a ship that would enable his return home. Though the coast was two hundred miles away, he traveled to the port and found a ship ready to take him. When they arrived in Britain only three days later, they embarked on a twenty-eight-day journey by land. They grew hungry as their food ran out, and the sailors turned on Patrick: “What about this, Christian? You tell us that your God is great and all-powerful—why can’t you pray for us, since we’re in a bad state with hunger?” Patrick answered by proclaiming God’s ability to provide, and a herd of pigs walked across their path.
Back in Britain, Patrick was reunited with his family and began his studies anew. Sometime later (records are sketchy—we don’t know how much later), he dreamed that a man brought him letters from Ireland, in which the people he had left “called out as it were with one voice: ‘We beg you, holy boy, to come and walk again among us.’” From then on, he determined to return to Ireland to share the gospel of Christ with them.
His parents and friends, however, opposed his plan to return to Ireland. “Why does he put himself in danger among hostile people who do not know God?” they wondered. Patrick understood that they feared for him and wondered himself how qualified he could be. “I was just an unlearned country person,” he admitted.
But his call from God proved greater than family pressure, insecurity, and lack of training.
When the time was right, he returned to Ireland where he spent the rest of his life. He wrote, “I testify in truth and in great joy of heart before God and his holy angels that I never had any other reason for returning to that nation from which I had earlier escaped, except the gospel and God’s promises.”
The feeding of the sailors during Patrick’s return to England is the only miracle-turned-legend based on his own words. We learn this story straight from his pen. So where did the idea originate that Patrick used shamrocks, the common three-leaf clover, to illustrate the Christian doctrine of the Trinity to local pagans? We don’t know who started that rumor, but we do know that Patrick was profoundly shaped by his trinitarian faith. In his Confession, he wrote:
There is no other God, nor will there ever be, nor was there ever, except God the Father . . . And his son, Jesus Christ . . . Let every tongue confess that Jesus Christ, in whom we believe and whom we await to come back to us in the near future, is Lord and God . . . He has generously poured on us the Holy Spirit, the gift and promise of immortality . . . This is the one we acknowledge and adore—one God in a Trinity of the sacred name.
And those snakes? Ireland has never had snakes—yet another reason we love the Emerald Isle—but they were sacred to the local Druids. The closest explanation for the legend we can get is to see it as an allegory: When Patrick brought faith in Christ, he drove out the Druids and their pagan influence.
For decades, Patrick taught the pagan peoples of Ireland about the one true God. In the two documents still in existence written by his hand, we discover a humble man who remained grateful for God’s grace in his life. He was resilient, standing firm amid suffering, adversity, false accusations, betrayals, and more. Strengthened by his robust trust in God, Patrick the pastor loved his flock loyally. Writing his Confession late in life, he addressed a wide audience:
You all know, and God knows, how I have lived among you since my youth, in true faith and in sincerity of heart. Towards the pagan people too among whom I live, I have lived in good faith, and will continue to do so . . . I have cast myself into the hands of almighty God, who is the ruler of all places.
Patrick died March 17, 461. Saints of the church are historically celebrated on the anniversary of their death, rather than their birth, an acknowledgment that death was the “birthday” of their eternal life. Patrick graduated from life to life.
*All quotes are taken from Saint Patrick’s Confession.
So, you’re about to lead a small group, maybe for the first time, and you’re sure your pastor made a mistake in asking you to lead this group. You may be feeling overwhelmed, inadequate, and a little anxious at the thought of someone asking a question you don’t know the answer to. How can you, a normal person, lead a small group?
For some reason, we often think Bible study leaders have to be the smartest person in the room, armed with quick, charming, and compelling answers for every question. Good leaders host their small group in a pristine home or know the coolest place in town to chat over coffee. They’re stylish, funny, brilliant, put-together, and BFFs with Jesus. Now, we know small group leaders aren’t all of those things but—for whatever reason—we are sure we have to be that kind of leader.
The truth is you don’t have to be perfect in order to be effective. You don’t even need to be perfect in order to be a great small group leader. The best small group leaders are actually far from perfect, but they do share some traits in common that you can easily add to your own life.
Take a second to answer this question: What makes small group leaders different than the people they are leading?
Many of us think leaders are gurus—perfect, all-knowing, wise ones who know the Bible inside and out and can answer any question. But gurus make really bad small group leaders. They tend to make group meetings all about themselves, their knowledge, and their insights. It’s pretty hard to focus on Jesus when the leader is making the group about themselves.
The most effective small group leaders are guides. They have a map, know what trail they are on, and know where they are headed. Their leadership is not about getting everyone to focus on them but on avoiding dangers and making progress towards their destination.
Your small group time is not about you; it’s about Jesus. Your responsibility is to keep people focused on him, becoming more like him, and making him known.
But what if you don’t have the answer to a tough question? A guru would be threatened because it would challenge their status as the all-knowing leader. But a guide? Guides aren’t threatened because they have the “maps” of God’s Word, the support of church staff, and an abundance of great resources for answering tough questions at their fingertips. Guides actually become more helpful when tough questions come up.
If you don’t know an answer, be honest: “I don’t know, but I will try to find an answer for our meeting next week.” Which brings us to the second quality of effective leaders.
It’s like legendary basketball coach John Wooden said,
“Failing to prepare is preparing to fail.”
Being prepared doesn’t mean you have to outline your meeting minute by minute, but you should know what you are going to cover in your group that week. Take time to look over the Bible verses, study questions, and any resources you will be using. Preparation will look different for everyone, so find a method that works best for you.
The most effective small groups aren’t thrown together last second; they are the result of a prepared leader prayerfully thinking through the time they are about to spend in God’s Word. After all, if you are a guide, you need to know your map!
But being prepared does not mean you have to teach your group because…
You don’t have to be a seminary professor or pastor to be a great group leader. You simply need to facilitate conversation. Think of your group as a community rather than a classroom. Your goal in the group is to help the church grow in spirit and in truth, not ace a Bible quiz.
Ask an opening question and wait for people to start talking (it’s okay to endure a little awkwardness). If your group starts running down a rabbit trail, gently point them back to the topic at hand. Ask open-ended questions. Try to get everyone involved in the conversation. At the end of your time, talk about ways to apply what you are learning.
More often than not, you will learn from the people in your group. They will see things you missed. They will have ideas you wished you’d thought of. But for a great small group leader, being a part of a community headed towards Jesus isn’t about being in front—it’s about leading people to Jesus.
Starting out as a small group leader can be daunting. But most of our anxiety comes from thinking we have to be spiritual gurus. Once we realize that we are guides, the anxiety to be perfect starts to slip away. When we prepare well, we will build our confidence. Shifting our role from “teacher” to “member of the community” will take away our self-imposed performance pressure.
Great group leaders are normal people, just like you. No matter your background or leadership experience, if you guide people to Jesus you’ll be doing exactly what you’re supposed to do.
The Christmas season is full of light, joy, and beauty. At the center of our celebrations and family traditions is a vulnerable baby in a feeding trough—Emmanuel, God with us. As Christmas approaches, the season of Advent offers us a chance to reflect on our savior, his purpose, and the surprising ways he invited people near to him.
To help you and your church reflect on the coming, or advent, of Christ, pastor Derwin Gray spent time with our team filming Advent, a five-part series exploring the ways the birth of Jesus changes everything. We caught up with Derwin after he preached at the RightNow Conference to hear about his experience making this series and his hope for everyone who watches it.
Derwin: Filming with the RightNow Media team is not only fun—because they are all hilarious and we have good chemistry because they are great people—but also, they have professional expertise. The way they are able to take content and match it with locations and editing encourages me in my faith. I am excited about this Advent series because they make me better than I am!
Derwin: The biggest thing I learned about Advent was a greater awareness of God’s heart. Advent means “arriving” or “coming.” In the beginning, the Father had already determined that Jesus was going to come and reconcile all things to himself. The way he goes about that is beautiful, mysterious, life-giving, and powerful.
Derwin: I want them walking with Jesus more. Jesus is not just a Sunday friend; he is an all-week, all-the-time companion. He’s Lord. He’s Master.
The beauty of Advent is that we see the beauty and vulnerability of God entering into humanity in a fragile state and form. We see God use people to do incredible things! You don’t have to be the biggest or the best. Mary was just a teenager. Joseph was just some guy! God takes ordinary people and does extraordinary things.
So, I want people to be overwhelmed with God’s grace and the gift of his Son this Christmas.
It’s easy to say we agree with the previous statement, but it’s harder to believe it. Many Christians start their workday and wonder if typing on a computer for the entire day is worth the trouble. Teachers struggle to see the value of the work they put into lesson plans, especially when their students do not listen. CEOs of Fortune 500 companies wonder if all the long hours in the office will fulfill their hopes and dreams. In every job sector, people love God but often do not know if God cares about their work.
Work can be challenging and stressful, but it does not have to feel meaningless. Since God cares about our work, we must look to him to understand why our work matters.
The first few pages of Scripture contain God’s perspective on creating the universe. One of the main topics that the first three chapters of Genesis address is work. In fact, over 60% of the verses in Genesis 1–3 say something about work. God labored for six days and then rested on the seventh. When God created humans, the first thing he told them to do was work (Genesis 1:26; 2:15).
Work has always been essential to God’s plan for the world and his people.
God also said all he created was good, which includes humanity and their work. But since the tragic introduction of sin into the world, recorded in Genesis 3, humanity has doubted the goodness of work.
Our labor had dignity before being distorted. So today, we need to see our work as a reflection of God’s goodness—the way God saw it in the beginning. We should not dread our nine to five or see it as a part of the Genesis 3 curse. When we do our jobs, we fulfill a part of our God-given purpose to create, cultivate, and care for the earth. God sees both the garbage truck driver and the astrophysicist and says their work is good.
Many may not know what a J bolt is, but there is a J bolt helping to secure the foundation of buildings all over the world. J bolts are small J-shaped pieces of metal used to secure concrete foundations and provide an anchor for building structures. They look small and insignificant, but they serve people in a major way every day.
Work is one of the J bolts of society. The jobs we do play an essential role in supporting and contributing to the economic and social foundations of our lives. Our work, like a J bolt, impacts people, even when our jobs might look or feel insignificant.
We can also see examples of how work serves people in the Bible. In Exodus 31:1–11, God chose people with specific skills to work with wood, metals, and cloth to provide the necessary tools for Israel’s daily worship. Because of their craftsmanship, God was glorified and God’s people had a place to worship God for generations.
The work we do plays a role in serving our world. Without it, many people would have unmet needs and miss out on the ways our job benefits society. We need godly businesspeople to ensure business transactions involve fairness and equality. We need plumbers to handle our sanitation issues before they become public health concerns. We need metalworkers to make J bolts so our buildings can stand firm. No matter what we do, our work matters because it serves others.
Christians can be tempted to think a vocation is only spiritual if it’s a ministry job. But being a pastor is not the only job that can impact the kingdom. The Great Commission from Matthew 28 tells us that God calls his people to go all over the world to share the good news of Jesus Christ. But if the church has any chance of reaching the world, pastors cannot be the only people who use their vocation as a platform for the gospel.
What better opportunity is there than going to work every day to share the Christian life with many who do not know Jesus? Colossians 4:3 encourages Christians to pray for “open doors” to spread the name of Christ. God can use us in our jobs to build his kingdom, whether we are a professional football player or a high school janitor.
When we look to God for why our work matters, we can see that our jobs have a God-given purpose. God created work and it is good. Our vocation can serve people and grow the kingdom of God. We can therefore approach our nine to five knowing that God cares about what we do and sees our work as significant—to him, his people, and the world.
Are you a business leader looking to invest in a personal care resource for your employees that can help them flourish in every area of life? RightNow Media @ Work, a library of on-demand video resources has a library of over 20,000 videos on topics from leadership and personal development to parenting and finances. Schedule a free demo today!
Have you ever found yourself leaving a Sunday worship service saying to yourself, “The worship was great—I can’t wait for next week”? Or maybe you've had the opposite reaction: “I love this church, but the worship was not my favorite . . .” No matter which situation you have found yourself in, we can all admit that we sometimes equate worship with the music we sing on a Sunday morning.
Our perspective of worship is often limited to what we experience at church. But Scripture is clear about what worship is—it extends much deeper than the songs that we sing. Worship is an intimate expression of gratitude for the mercies of God that he’s given to his people. And singing is just one aspect of how we worship. True worship happens when we live a life of sacrifice—when we worship as a lifestyle.
Paul had a strong grasp of what it meant to worship when he wrote to the Roman church. In Romans 12 Paul writes,
“Therefore, brothers and sisters, in view of the mercies of God, I urge you to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God; this is your true worship.”
Paul appealed to the church in Rome with the truth that worship is meant to be a sacrificial offering to God. What do we sacrifice? We sacrifice our lives to God. Sacrificing time by setting aside moments to reach out to those we care about is an expression of worship. Worship is sacrificing our money by giving consistently to the local church or covering a friend’s bill. It’s also offering our gifts and talents to help others. We’re called to live a lifestyle of worship—not setting apart portions of our week for worship but instead living in a constant state of worship knowing that every moment can be an act of service to God.
So, what does it look like to worship with our lives?
First, we worship in Spirit and in truth. In John 4:23, Jesus spoke with a Samaritan woman who would become the first evangelist of Jesus’s ministry. In this passage, John records Jesus’s words as he taught the woman how we worship. Jesus said,
“But an hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in Spirit and in truth. Yes, the Father wants such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in Spirit and in truth.”
Worshiping in Spirit and truth means we are led by the Spirit and grounded in the truth of Scripture. We need the Spirit—he moves in us, teaching us to worship, maturing us, and rooting us in truth. Sacrificial worship begins with our relationship with the Spirit. But how, exactly, does he help us to worship? In Romans 12:2, Paul says,
“Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind . . .”
Worship begins with internal transformation. Renewal of the mind does not come from self-improvement or the next great self-help podcast. The Holy Spirit is the one who changes us. By his power, we experience transformation in our minds, our desires, and our actions. We worship in Spirit and truth by surrendering to the Holy Spirit and allowing him to work in our hearts. When we do so, we allow him to change us, enabling us to offer ourselves completely to God.
Second, our worship is to be holy, or set apart. Paul is not calling us to worship perfectly but rather to offer holistic worship. As Jesus’s followers, how we serve, how we give, how we love—they’re all expressions of our worship.
We can often get distracted by the ways of the world and lose sight of where we orient our worship. One example is how our minds are often slaves to any form of stimulation or entertainment. We can spend countless hours streaming Netflix or scrolling through our smartphones and, before we know it, we’ve devoted half our day to mindless consumption. But Paul reminds us that in our worship we should “not be conformed to this age.” Our devotion to God should be all-encompassing, which means we cannot let sin run rampant in our lives. Instead, we should live in a way that shows our lives belong to God.
Finally, our worship is to be pleasing to God. He wants us to offer our joys, struggles, successes, and hardships to him. We please him as we move away from self-centeredness toward God-centered lives. As we do so, we begin to see that his ways are much greater than ours. Our desires and aspirations begin to align with his. Paul comments on this transformation in Romans 12:2 by saying,
“. . . so that you may discern what is the good, pleasing, and perfect will of God.”
Paul says when we have a lifestyle of worship, we align with the Holy Spirit, and we know and delight in the will of God. Worship connects us to our creator; it changes us and makes us more like Christ.
So, how do we worship as a lifestyle? We live a life of sacrifice. We devote every day to God. We worship in Spirit and in truth in a manner that is holy and pleasing to God. The music we sing moves us and allows us to express praise in a unique and creative way. But music isn’t the main avenue of worship—our lives are the ultimate vehicle of worship to our savior. How do you worship? How are you devoting your life in surrender to God?
Living out our worship begins with a biblical understanding of worship. Gather your family and tune into Worship in the Word. Sing along with Christian artists Shane & Shane as they share ten beautiful, simple songs drawn directly from Scripture, providing a biblical and captivating worship experience.