What Is True Spirituality?
True Spirituality
I was pondering this week what it really means to be a spiritual person. Spirituality is something long attempted to achieve through out history. In ancient past, in order to be a spiritual person, an individual had to go through religious ritual or seek out the mysterious hidden revelation in order to be considered “up there” in spiritual terms. In our culture, being spiritual is a hard concept to wrap our head around. We humans are caught up in more earthly affairs. We want a good job, nice home, wonderful family life and success. We don’t think or consider too often the spiritual side of life, the supernatural reality of the breath in our bodies and the minutes in the day.
The Bible gives us a picture of what true spirituality is. I found, in the book of James, this week that true spirituality is not entangled within the power encounters we long for, the signs and wonders or the miraculous headings. No, the book of James straight up told me what “true religion” is:
“If anyone thinks himself to be religious, and yet does not bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, this man’s religion is worthless. Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father is this : to visit orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.” James 1:27
As I pondered on this portion of scripture my heart was pricked by the fact that the odds are stacked against me as a person who practices true and undefiled religion. I don’t visit orphans or widows, I have a hard time bridling my tongue and I’m far from being unstained by the world. So I took this scripture and spelled it out on my dry erase board to memorize it and plant this seed in my heart. God knows I desire to become like this person. A true spiritual person, who is not about the glamor and glitzy spirituality popularized by our church culture today. No I want to become like Jesus, the true example of spirituality, who touched the lives of sinners, spoke tender words full of grace and truth and lived a holy and blameless life. I take comfort in this, that Scripture tells us that he is able to keep me from stumbling, falling and being stained. (Jude 1:24) He has washed away my blemishes, and will, one day, present me before the Father in heaven, pure and spotless. (Ephesians 5:27)
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