I hope your year has gotten off to a great start. For me, the beginning of each year is filled with expectancy, hope and lots of planning for a productive and fruitful year. Like most people, I make resolutions that are centered around things I want to see improved or changed in my life. I think it’s healthy to do that. However, a resolution without a plan is not a resolution at all — it’s a pipe dream! Having no plans or goals sets us up for failure. The truth is, working towards most of our resolutions takes hard work.
The key to keeping our resolutions and succeeding at the goals that we set for ourselves is DISCIPLINE! For some that’s a dirty word, but it shouldn’t be. It’s the key to achieving your goals, it’s the key to every successful athletes dream. Discipline is about denying yourself immediate gratification of things you want and substituting them with activities that will lead you to your desired result. It’s the hard work that yields the satisfying fruit of being one step closer to the goals you have set.
You may have come to view discipline in your life as something restrictive and not pleasurable. And while discipline in the moment challenges our most basic of instincts for self preservation and instant gratification — discipline is in actuality the pathway to freedom.
Dave Ramsey, the financial guru, famously says, “Live like no one else, so that later you can live like no one else.” What he means by that is do the hard things now. Discipline yourself financially by saving, paying off debt, planning your financial future and curbing all of that impulsive spending. And when your financial house is in order, you can do what you have always wanted to do, only now you can do and enjoy those things because you have financial freedom.
Well that principle holds true in other areas of life. Discipline is a pathway to freedom. Discipline is what separates the dreamers from the achievers. Those with the discipline, drive and determination get closer to their dreams. Those that don’t put in the hard work seldom get off the starting block.
Think about what it takes to succeed in a given profession. All of the hard work, sleepless nights of study that needs to be put into education. Then maybe you have to suffer through an unpaid internship. Then you have to struggle through several layers of jobs that you don’t want to do but will prove the foundational experience you need to get where you want to be.
Athletes have dreams as young boys and girls of competing in the Olympics or playing at the highest levels of their sport. The thing that separates the dreamers from the achievers is discipline. Those with discipline get closer to their dreams, those without discipline seldom do.
While other competitive swimmers were still sleeping, Michael Phelps, together with his coach, were training early mornings in the pool, six days a week, hours on end. Michael’s intense discipline made him one of the greatest Olympic swimmers of all time. He didn’t just do a few laps here and there and show up at the Olympics -- intense discipline was the pathway to achieving his dream.
So if discipline is the pathway to freedom in the natural, is that true in the spiritual as well? I believe it absolutely is. Discipline is necessary in all aspects of life and it’s necessary in our spiritual life as well.
Looking at discipline from a spiritual standpoint, we can say that spiritual discipline is a set of activities and behaviors that help us in our spiritual growth towards maturity. The goal of discipline in our spiritual life is spiritual maturity.
Discipline is what enables us to do the right things, at the right times, for the right reasons. Discipline enables us to walk in the freedom that Christ won for us. Discipline in our spiritual life leads us to becoming Christ-like in our speech, conduct, motivations, thoughts and actions and to living a life that is pleasing to God.
I hope some of your New Year’s resolutions include areas of spiritual growth, such as, Bible reading and prayer. Over the next few posts I am going to share 4 keys found in 1 Timothy 4:6-10 that will show you how discipline in your spiritual life will lead to godliness. Go ahead and familiarize yourself with that passage now.
What are some of your New Year’s spiritual resolutions?
What is your plan for meeting your spiritual goals?
What have you rearranged in your life to make sure you stay on track?