Checking My Spiritual Signs

Recently, I have been asking myself the question, “So how are you, Dan, spiritually?”
“I’m saved, right?” I would answer to myself while running through all the sins I committed in the last two weeks in another part of my head “So everything must be fine.”
The question kept nagging me nonetheless and finally, another question came up: How do we determine how our spiritual well being? What do we look for?
Looking at this issue, I figure three methods of determining our spiritual state. Two of them lead to potential downfall and I have fallen into that kind of thinking at one point or another. Do we base it off how many times we didn’t sin, how many spiritual thrills this week, or something else?
If we are going to be good Christians, than we have to be good and not bad, i.e. sin. Although God doesn’t count it, we must keep a running tally in our head of the good and bad act we committed to determine where we are spiritually. Sinning more than usual? Hmmm, then you need work.
A legalist never really accepts the continual grace of God. For he must work not to break rules, and if he does break them, he thinks that God must surely be as hard on him as he on himself. “Sorry God, I screwed up again today. Forgive me, please. I don’t want to sin anymore. Thank you, amen”
We then have to try again, to do better. Then there is the focus on rules. The legalistic Christian will avoid the big sins by setting up a defense of rules, and then if they break those rules, a further wall of sub-rules to prevent them from breaking the first rules. When it is all done, a maze of rules binds the Christian in.
Rules, sin, legalism, and effort—the continual focus of looking at your sins is discouraging. Run from that. It creates emo Christians.
Another way a Christian may determine his spiritual health is to feel how he is doing. If the Christian determines his spiritual health by the “thrills” he gets, than that is equally corrosive.
When I was about eight or so, I remember hearing contemporary Christian music for the first time. I felt like really praising my Savior when that music of the spirit came on. I would raise my arms, and let the music be my praise to God. It had a beat and electric guitars and cool singers.
But when I listened to secular music for the first time (I had slow socialization growth), I caught myself raising my arms and singing whatever out. Jerking my hand down, I remember thinking, “Dan. What are you doing? This stuff isn’t of the spirit.”
The feel goodness can be often based on the externalities. Your spiritual health is based more on the quality of the worship band, or the charisma of the pastor or other feel good techniques than what is believed and taught. This is shallow.
The spiritual experience isn’t something I want to totally dismiss from the Christian experience; it is an important and wonderful part of Christianity. In addition, the rules and guidelines are important as well. The point I want to make is that they cannot be what we judge to determine who is a strong Christian.
So what determines spiritual health? Could it be the transformation? We were one way, and now that we have changed, the spiritual growth is determined by how much we are indifferent to the temptations of this world? What is the impact of that?
It also means we need to be improving, but that thought is a slippery slope into legalism if we focus on the rules.
No, Spiritual growth is determined on how much our eyes are on Jesus, how much we think about him, spend time with him, and desire him. It is a relationship of trust. If we look on him, through the failures of the flesh, and the dry spiritual times, we will grow.
No relationship is simply based only on ether rules or feelings. So to be very elementary about this, we have to ask the question, what does it mean to have a good relationship? Several things. To have a deepening relationship with someone means that you want to get to know them: how they react in certain situations, what they like and dislike, etc. I may be sticking my foot in my mouth, but the Bible says very little on the nuances of God’s character. We know the broad, generalizations, but we don’t know how God will orchestrate our life. We must spend time with him; talk with him to find that out for ourselves. We really cannot do this by hearing others talk about him.
You have probably experienced that awkward moment when you meet a close friend of your friend. Beaming, they inform you “Oh Dan has told me so much about you. It feels like I already know you!” But do they really? They might know a few of your quirks and they may make an educated guess about how you will react in certain situations, but they don’t really know you. They need to talk to you to hear your voice and spend time with you to discover your subtleties. The same goes with Christ.
Do you think that Jesus Christ can simply be reduced into a pile of cause and effect formulas? He is the most complex personality in the universe. Can we not try to discover that? Let’s stop examining our spirituality and instead focus on our Creator with worship—then and only then our spirituality is in the right place.