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- Herausgeber: IVP Formatio
- Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018
Diana Shiflett has been leading groups of all descriptions in spiritual practices for many years, and she understands the difficulties involved: the potential for awkwardness and self-doubt, the nagging question of whether anyone's getting anything out of this at all. But more than that, she understands the value of spiritual practices: their deep roots in the history and worship of God's people, and their ability to calm our distracted minds and hearts so we are ready to hear the voice of Jesus.In this personal, hands-on guide, Shiflett walks us through a wide array of spiritual practices, from communal silence and Scripture meditation to active prayer and corporate discernment. She proves a reliable guide, offering step-by-step instructions, pointing out hazards and pitfalls, and sharing her own experiences with honesty and humor.With this book as a guide, these spiritual practices can become life-giving resources in your ministry setting for years to come.
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TO THOMAS TEMPLE
(1919–1998)
AKA GRANDDADD
In gratitude for the monthly
handwritten letters of encouragement
you sent as I prepared for
and began ministry.
CONTENTS
MANY YEARS AGO, as I was reflecting on how I lead, I asked God to reveal his heart to me. An image came to mind: a fountain flowing from above, with me filling a cup and taking the living water to those I was leading. Either I got water too quickly, not allowing the cup to fill, or I spilled it along the way. By the time I got to those I was leading, I no longer had much to share. And I never had enough in my glass to give to all the people I was leading.
In that moment, I realized I needed to change the way I was leading, so I let God continue to reveal things from this image in my mind. Slow down at the fountain, I thought. So I walked slowly with my very full cup toward those I was leading.
After that time with God, I took more alone time with him than ever before. And then it hit me: I needed to invite people to stand under the fountain with me; I didn’t need to tell everyone what they needed to know about God. I started to trust God to speak directly to his people. I also realized I couldn’t possibly know everything God wanted to say to every person, but I could introduce them to God. I realized God longs to speak life and truth into everyone’s souls—not just mine.
The final image that came to mind was me standing under the flow of Jesus’ fountain and inviting others to stand under my cup. My cup was overflowing and so were their cups. In ministry, I found that I no longer had a cup that emptied every time I led a group.
All of our cups are overflowing with what God has for us. My hope for you is that you lead in a new way spiritually, inviting others into the heart of God.
Leading a group in a spiritual practice requires encountering God yourself. Throughout the Scriptures, God encourages his people to draw near to him. He invites us to come and drink living waters without cost (Isaiah 55:1). And Jesus interrupted a festival to say, “Come drink the living waters.”
On the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.” By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified. (John 7:37-39)
We live in a thirsty world that’s looking to leaders to lead well. This book is an opportunity to learn to lead differently. It will help you to not only tell people about the living water that Christ has to offer but also invite them to experience the thirst-quenching Spirit of Jesus Christ for themselves alongside you.
Over the years I’ve served as a pastor, I’ve heard these three statements often:
“I am not feeling fed at church.”
“Thank you for your sermon today!”
“Christ is transforming my life.”
If you’re like me, you hear the first two phrases far more than you hear the last. Yet we do ministry so that people will be transformed spiritually. I’d much rather people tell me their lives are being transformed spiritually than hear the first two phrases.
Simply put, spiritual practices are different ways of connecting with God. Over twenty-three years of ministry, I’ve gotten in a rhythm of using them. They have transformed me and the ministries I’m a part of. When I’m living into the practices and using them well as I lead, I feel fully alive in Christ—and often so do the people around me.
When I teach about spiritual practices, listeners often ask how they can lead the practices themselves in their own ministry contexts. We usually take a few moments right then and there to discuss different ideas, but a few minutes is not enough. People need more than a quick conversation; they need a book. My hope is that Spiritual Practices in Community gives you what you need to lead certain practices well in your context. Since everyone’s context is different, you’ll need to adjust each practice to fit yours.
Over the years, spiritual practices often have been referred to as spiritual disciplines. Some date back to the Old Testament, such as fasting and prayer. Others were created and refined during the hundreds of centuries of church history. Some of the ones in this book I’ve created along the way. Others I’ve learned from partners in ministry.
Each person is wired differently, and spiritual practices give us different ways to engage with God, according to how we best connect with him. In this book, you’ll find more than thirty different ways to engage with God. Encourage a group you’re in or leading to try different practices that may help them connect with God.
HELPING INDIVIDUALS AND GROUPS ENGAGE
Sometimes people assume they won’t like an activity because they didn’t like it in a different context. A woman in one of my spiritual practices groups said she didn’t like to journal. I said, “Just try it in class when we’re together, and you’ll never have to do it again.” Months later, she told the class she loved it.
There’s something about connecting with God in new ways; it can awaken our souls. When we focus on listening to and talking to God, mundane things can suddenly have life. Recently I taught a class of first through sixth graders. First I asked them to draw what I was reading from the Scriptures. One third grader chimed in right away and said, “I don’t like to draw.”
“Do you like to write?” I asked.
“No,” she said.
“Okay, well, how about you just try, and I will try too, and we’ll see what happens,” I answered.
She agreed, and as I read, I drew some terrible pictures. Seeing what I was doing, the whole class started to draw and to write. As we finished the practice, I asked her how she liked it, and she said, “It was kinda fun.” All the children were given time to show their picture to the group and share what they’d learned about God.
Almost every time I lead a practice, and no matter what age I lead, some don’t want to participate. I validate their feelings and request their engagement or silence. It seems the quicker I validate and encourage the group, the better it goes for everyone.
At the end, sometimes someone still feels it wasn’t a good practice. I acknowledge that and say that it’s good to learn what works and doesn’t work for us so we can connect with God in ways that are best for us.
There’s a time and a place for traditional messages and sermons, but there also need to be places where we listen for the voice of God together. As leaders, we need to start making more space for spiritual practices to help people learn how to meet and experience God. It’s important that we live into ways in which we are connecting with and hearing from God so we can lead and teach others to do the same.
You can’t lead where you aren’t willing to go. As a leader, I experience spiritual growth when I lead practices. I learn from others as we share what God is doing in each of us. Because of this, I hope that as you move through this book, you experience God for yourself and then lead others in these practices so they too can enter into the presence of God. I give you full permission to do what we have all done in ministry: jump into a particular spiritual practice that you need to lead right now—whether it’s for your edification or for those you will lead. My prayer and hope for you is that you will go and be with God yourself first. I hope you long for spiritual practice spaces—and find them. The best moments in leadership for me have come from experiencing God before I led a group.
USING SPIRITUAL PRACTICES IN COMMUNITY
The first chapter of this book shows how to lead spiritual practices in general. The rest of the chapters lay out how to lead more than thirty different practices (and in the back of the book, you’ll find an alphabetical list of every practice in the book, with corresponding page numbers). Each chapter includes spiritual practices, and each practice can be used in multiple settings with multiple age groups. I’ll explain how you can do each spiritual practice yourself and then how you can lead the practice.
Each practice works well with any size group. You’ll also find several examples of how you as a spiritual leader can use a specific spiritual practice in different arenas, such as in worship, meetings, or ministry to adults or children, and also in your own family and your own life. Some of these practices can even help you experience more intimacy in your marriage.
As you read, let these ideas be springboards for finding creative ways to help those you lead to enter deeply into a relationship with Jesus Christ. Don’t feel you have to do the practices exactly the way I present them. Because only you know your context, let the practices come alive as you lead in the way God is calling you to lead.
OVER THE PAST TEN YEARS, I’ve shared leadership with others at a winter retreat. One of my favorite moments was when I was watching another pastor learn on the fly. We had a group of two hundred people in the room, and I had written the script he was to read. It included him encouraging individuals to share spiritually and deeply with the person next to them about their lives. As you can imagine, after two minutes of two hundred people talking, the noise level had risen considerably.
The sound system wasn’t working, and without thinking, the young pastor yelled at the top of his lungs, “Hey!” Suddenly the room went silent—until he and I burst out laughing. Through his uncontrollable laughter, he said, “I guess that wasn’t my best soothing spiritual voice.” He held up his hand with his pointer and pinky up and the rest of the fingers folded down and confidently said, “From now on, when I’m pulling us back together, I’ll raise my hand like this, and you imitate it so others know it’s time to be quiet, because this is Quiet Giraffe.”
I loved how he handled that moment. He was able to laugh at himself and draw the group back after a yell. He quickly regrouped and moved forward to finish the spiritual practice well. When you’re leading and something unexpected happens, it’s okay to laugh, regroup, and move forward. That day I learned that a spiritual practice is more than the script.
When used corporately, spiritual practices help to grow people deeply in Christ as well as with one another. They create a way—and a space—to hear the voice of God together.
LEADING SPIRITUAL PRACTICES
Teaching spiritual practices is one of the best ways I’ve found to help propel a group forward. The group grows in its spiritual depth and in its relationships spiritually.
You can lead practices in various locations and groups:
board meetings
staff meetings
worship services
small groups
mission trips
prayer rooms
retreats
youth ministries
children’s ministries
intergenerational ministries
camps
conferences
around the dinner table
during devotions
If at all possible, do a spiritual practice on your own before you lead it, even if it’s a shortened form done quickly because you’re about to lead the practice. It’s worth taking the time to experience it yourself. This will make you more capable of talking about the process and will give you the ability to share how you met God in the practice. You’ll also be able to talk about what was hard about the experience.
Doing it on your own at least once helps you with three things. First, you can share your experiences, good or bad. As you’re doing a practice on your own, take a few notes about what God reveals to you as you listen for his voice. Don’t limit what you write in this moment; you won’t have to share everything you write down. Some moments between you and God are intimate and can help you understand why someone would choose not to share in a group.
Second, if you haven’t done it yourself, it’s hard to know how much silence is too long or too short to hear from God. Others have led me in spiritual practices, and when they’ve done it themselves beforehand, I can tell. The amount of silence seems right on target.
Third, meeting with God before you invite others into a time with God is extremely helpful for your personal spiritual well-being. All too often people in ministry forget to make sure they’re feeding their own souls so they can help others. When I was training in ministry, we were reminded throughout the process that we couldn’t take anyone where we weren’t willing and able to go ourselves. If you aren’t willing to go to the depths with God in preparation for leading a practice, you won’t know how to take others there. Remind yourself of this truth as you explore each chapter.
When I first started taking time to meet with God before teaching others, no matter how hard I tried, I was unable to quiet my mind for fear I’d forget to do something important later in the day. So I kept a small piece of paper next to me to write down what came to mind. I wouldn’t have realized how distracting the need to vacuum can be if I hadn’t slowed myself down to meet with God. Experiencing what those you lead may experience is invaluable.
SET UP THE ROOM
I do spiritual practices in all sorts of settings with different numbers of people. If I’m leading a group of more than ten, it’s very helpful to divide them into smaller groups that stay in one room. If I’m leading a group of more than ten, I like to set up the room with round tables with four to six people per table. Try to keep the same number of people at each table so you can all finish at about the same time.
However, I don’t always have the luxury of setting up a room of round tables, so when I arrive, I assess what my game plan will be for discussions. I decide if people will move their chairs and face one another. If they’re in pews or rows of chairs, I decide if I’ll encourage them to turn to talk to someone behind or in front of them or have them turn to a person next to them. Think about this before you are in the moment. Also guide people very specifically so little time is lost.
If you encourage participants to talk to someone in the same pew, they’ll likely be talking to someone they know. If you encourage them to turn around, they’ll likely know that person less or not at all. As you think about which way to have people turn, consider what your goals are. Do you want people to go deeper in relationship, or do you want them to connect with those they don’t know? Either is fine, but know what your goal is before you start.
If writing is part of the practice, you’ll need to have tables or other hard surfaces to write on. If participants won’t be writing, a circle without a table is another great way to set up the space. A circle allows everyone to face one another and be on the same level. When discussion is happening, everyone in the circle needs to be able to make eye contact and to hear each other. Take time at the beginning to make sure these can happen. Hearing and seeing are key, since everyone’s words are valuable to the group.
CREATE SPACE THAT’S NOT JUST PHYSICAL
You want people to be able to enter in, so you need to help them hold the space with God. This means both keeping track of the time and making sure you are guiding the time at the level they need and can handle. Let the group know the overall concept of the spiritual practice and that you will be the time keeper as you lead them through each step. For example, stating how long you will hold the silence and suggesting ways participants can be present to God helps them hold the space well.
Try to understand what a group can withstand and for how long. For example, you can hold times of silence longer with spiritual directors than with teenagers or children. Also, don’t find the level they’re comfortable with; find one they can handle. When we’re growing in our faith, we’re rarely comfortable. Seek a level of risk that’s right on the growing edge for that particular group. Also tell the group how long the silence will be each time. For teens, one to five minutes can feel like an eternity. For spiritual directors, it can feel too short. Try hard to stick close to the time you promised the group. When you stick to that time, you gain trust with them.
Remember that people are always thinking about something. When leading a spiritual practice, one important goal is to create space so people can stop thinking about distractions and give space for God’s voice to be heard. Keeping things on time helps people not worry about their schedule. When you promise they’ll have time to ask questions, make sure you hold to that time. Then when you promise you’ll let them out on time, they’ll know they don’t need to watch the clock.
However, also follow the Holy Spirit. If the Spirit wants more time with a group, look for ways to let some people slip out of the room, if needed. It isn’t life-giving when a leader tries to hold a group until they all hear the voice of God. Those sitting under your leadership who have tight schedules need the freedom to go.
At the end of each practice, get feedback from participants by asking how they’re doing and how you’re doing in your leadership role. That way, each time you lead a spiritual practice, you get to hone your leadership skills.
BREATHE DEEPLY
While a friend of mine was in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit with her little girl, she read this on a sign: “Breathing deeply resets your nervous system.” Breathing deeply is also one of the easiest ways to deal with anxiety. Consider doing it before you start or at any moment when you need to reset yourself during a spiritual practice. Also, one of the best gifts you can give those you lead is a genuine space of calm as you lead. When people sense that you’re calm, they feel calm. When you’re full of anxiety, most people can hear it in your voice and will internalize it, even if they don’t realize they’re taking on your anxiety.
Therapists teach people who struggle with anxiety to do four-count breathing. This practice can be good for you as you lead and for those you’re leading. Also consider having participants breathe deeply with you at the opening of each spiritual practice. This can help them focus on their breathing instead of all the other things distracting them. It’s a great way to start a meeting and a great way to remember that God is the one who breathes life into us; each breath is a gift from him. You can even remind the group of that truth. After you teach breath prayer to a group (see chapter four), you can add it to the beginning of each practice you teach.
LISTEN FOR THE HOLY SPIRIT
As you start any of the spiritual practices, pause and invite the Holy Spirit to speak. Also ask the Holy Spirit to speak to the people you’re leading as well as to be at work in you as you speak, lead, and teach. Pray this prayer out loud, or simply pray it as you’re breathing deeply before you start teaching. Set your heart and mind to desire to hear from God as you lead.
Another way to stay aware of the Holy Spirit is to light a candle. In fact, most spiritual directors light a candle in their sessions. The movement of the flame of the candle can remind you that the Spirit is moving and active in the room. Feel free to let people know why you’re lighting it, so they too can stay aware of the movement of the Spirit throughout the spiritual practice. Instruct them that looking at the candle can also help them refocus on the Spirit when distracted.
BE YOURSELF
A good goal for the first time you lead a spiritual practice is not to chase your group away from spiritual practices permanently. People know if you’re being anything but authentic. Feel free to be creative by morphing the spiritual practices in this book into your own style. Enjoy being created in the image of the great Creator by being creative yourself. If you don’t do the practice yourself first, the group will know you’re just reading off a script. If you don’t make it your own, it won’t go smoothly. If needed to take the pressure off being perfect, call it an experiment.
Let people know who you are without adding commentary as you lead. Share only what is real and true for you and what is directly connected to the practice. If what I’ve written regarding a practice doesn’t sound like you, restate it in your own words—unless they are from the Word of God, of course.
LEAD, DON’T PREACH
Once you’ve started a spiritual practice, make sure you’re not preaching and instead are facilitating a space where people can meet with Jesus. Make sure each of your words is used to take people deeper into the practice rather than into a space where they’re taking in factual information from you rather than what God has to say to them. It’s great to teach people about God, but it’s important to make sure you’re creating a space for others to meet with God. If you know you’re good at preaching or teaching, do that before or after the practice; don’t interrupt God as he’s speaking to his people. I remind myself that God is in the middle of a personal sermon for each person in the room, and that sermon will be more powerful than anything I could ever say. It’s a much higher honor to lead people into a space to meet with the living God than to tell them how they can meet him.
Sometimes people tell me about their experience in group spiritual practice, and in the middle of the story, one of us realizes I was the one leading the practice. I know I’ve led well when the participants don’t remember I was leading. The moment is about God, not the facilitator. This reality keeps me in check. If this whole idea makes you feel resistant, God may have some soul work for you to do before you start leading others into his presence.
Take a moment to lean back from these words and talk to God about how you want to be known as a great leader, or maybe how you’d rather not be a great leader—or a leader at all. Let him speak words of affirmation over you. Let him remind you that he wants to do a mighty work in and through you. He needs your ego to step back.
God does want to use you; he wants all of us to be a part of his great work. But we must remember that it’s his work, not ours. Trust me; even in the process of writing this book, I’ve had to let go of me being the creator. God is the great Creator, and I am created in his image so I can be creative. I can’t take his place.
DON’T RUSH
As you’re leading a spiritual practice, do your best not to rush the process. Sometimes this means being silent in front of a crowd longer than you’re comfortable. Speak slowly, concisely, and gently. Leave time and space for you to hear the Holy Spirit and for those you’re leading to hear too. Also be aware that some people in the room may be hard of hearing; you may have to be louder than you think.
There will be moments when you’re tempted to race ahead, maybe because you’re worried nothing is happening in people or maybe they’re getting antsy or too quiet. It can feel scary to keep a slow pace, and you may fear running out of time. This is why doing the practice before you lead it is important; you get a feel for how long each piece takes.
If there’s another leader in the room, I usually pick up that person’s anxiety. He or she may be the person that hired me to lead a retreat or the senior pastor in the sponsoring church or even the power player who has no problem voicing his or her opinion during or after the practice. Try to follow God’s prompting in the moment, not the feelings of a disruptive person in the room. Trust that God has a plan, and do your best to follow him in those moments.
Whether you’re reading out loud or talking, it’s important to speak slowly. Slowing down will help you hear the Holy Spirit, even as you’re leading. Sometimes this means speaking like you are the Amplified Version of the Bible, saying something two or three ways that mean the same thing, to help people understand what you’re saying. As you lead, God may add something to your sentence you don’t expect.
By slowing your speech, you give space to yourself and others to hear from the Holy Spirit. We all need that space. When we speak quickly, it’s hard for people to engage both with our words and with what God is prompting. You’re taking people to a place where they’re listening to three different voices simultaneously: theirs, yours, and God’s. If you speak quickly, they can avoid the deep place with God and hear only you.
The first thing your listeners are taking in is your voice, so they need to be able to understand what you’ve said. Once they’ve heard and comprehended, they’ll then be able to check in with their own internal voice. After they’ve heard those two levels, they can hear the still small voice of God.
This all happens almost simultaneously. If you move too fast, they’ll get stuck just trying to hear and understand your voice. They’ll miss checking in with themselves, making it impossible for them to hear from God. When we speak slowly, we can hear more too. We aren’t just giving people information that they’re writing in their notebooks.
The first time you do this, it will feel painfully slow. Let that happen. When you’re finished, ask your group about your pacing. Often people want more silence in the process than you’d expect.
USE A TIMER
As you move through each piece of a spiritual practice, put your phone on silent and ask your listeners to do the same. This will give you, them, and God some good space. Yet even a phone on silent during a spiritual practice can be distracting. I have been in a room where someone’s phone in their purse just seems to keep vibrating, and the owner does not attend to it, but several other people in the room keep looking toward the purse. For myself, I have gotten distracted by a text that comes in as I’m leading. Even though no one else knows about it, instead of being present to the Holy Spirit and the people in the room, I’m suddenly elsewhere mentally and spiritually. I will sometimes say that as we put our phones into airplane mode, it may cause anxiety at first because we are disconnecting from people outside the room, but that it will give us good space to connect with God and others inside the room.
Before you start, decide how many minutes you want to give to each part of the practice so you don’t run out of time before the end of each. The last part of a practice—debriefing with the whole group—is important. When we debrief well, the whole group gains spiritually and is unified spiritually.
Some leaders like to use a gentle alarm or vibration on their phone to let the group know time is up. I like to use my voice, since even a gentle alarm causes some people to think it’s time to burst out talking about how hard it was to be in silence, jarring those who enjoyed the silence. If you use your voice, it gives space to instruct people in that moment as well.
Depending on your group, you may need to instruct them how to come out of silence. Some spiritual directors will stay quiet with their eyes closed for as long as you let them, and some middle school students blurt something out as soon as the time is up. Leading with your voice encourages people to go where you’re headed next rather than to start a free-for-all.
Another important aspect to remember when leading spiritual practices is that at least one person is watching the clock. Sometimes they’re watching it because they know they have to leave at a certain time. Other clock watchers are just waiting for the class to be over. Be aware of this, because even one person can sway the whole group in the wrong direction if given the opportunity.
The key to letting the Spirit lead is to respect everyone’s time. By starting and ending on time, you have a better chance of God breaking through to even the controllers in the room. This leads us into the next step.
GET TO KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE
If you’re working with a group you don’t know, ask a person who knows the group well to tell you about it. If you’re leading a large gathering, do your research by looking it up online, and use language similar to what they use on their website. When I’m going to a location where I don’t know anyone, I arrive at least thirty minutes to an hour early. During that time, I do my best to learn a few names before we get started. If I can, I ask them a few questions to get a general idea of who’s in the room before we start. When we know people’s names, we have the ability to engage them specifically. I’m not suggesting calling on people, but when they raise their hand or start to talk, you can address them by name. Using names also helps the whole group feel more connected and warm.
STAY IN TUNE WITH YOUR AUDIENCE
While you’re leading, take time to notice people’s facial expressions. If you see looks of confusion, rephrase what you just said. Also use different examples to help people understand concepts.
If you’ve asked the group to write, when about half the people have stopped writing, move the practice along. Some people will write until you tell them to stop, but others will write only what you’ve guided them to document in that moment. When those people are done, they may start thinking about something else, so help the whole group stay with what God is doing by noticing who is done and moving on to the next task at hand.
