Pleasing God Podcast
Pleasing God Podcast
Breaking the Bonds of Legalism
The distinction between spiritual formation and legalism might seem subtle, but it fundamentally transforms how we approach our relationship with God. Join host Pastor Jonathan Sole and Pastor Mike Woodward as they unpack this life-changing difference that many Christians struggle to understand.
At the heart of this conversation lies a powerful truth: spiritual formation flows from who we are in Christ, while legalism demands performance to establish worth. Pastor Mike vulnerably shares how his early faith was marked by "achievement-oriented spirituality" that actually built walls around his deepest wounds—wounds God wanted to heal.
We explore how Genesis 3 reveals three toxic mindsets still plaguing believers today: distorted views of God, self, and Scripture. These misperceptions drive us toward rule-following rather than relationship-building. Through passages like Romans 12:2, 2 Corinthians 3:18, and Galatians 4:19, we discover how true transformation happens by "beholding" Christ rather than simply modifying behavior.
The conversation takes a practical turn as we discuss spiritual disciplines as "habits of the heart" rather than legalistic obligations. Prayer, Scripture reading, community, corporate worship—these practices create space for the Spirit's transforming work. But the motivation matters profoundly. Are you engaging with these disciplines from love or from fear?
This episode offers freedom to those trapped in performance-based spirituality. When you understand that your identity determines your actions—not the reverse—everything changes. God isn't waiting for your perfect performance; He's already perfectly pleased with His Son whose righteousness covers you completely. From this foundation of grace, true Christlikeness can flourish.
Ready to break free from the exhaustion of legalism? Listen now and discover the joy of spiritual formation that flows from being loved rather than striving to be worthy of love.
Stock Music provided by wolfgangwoehrle, from Pond5
Hi and welcome back to the Pleasing God podcast, a show focused on helping Christians to think biblically, engage practically and live faithfully for the glory of God. I'm your host, Jonathan Soul, and once again I'm joined with my special guest, Pastor Mike Woodward. It's good to have you on again, Good to be here, Awesome, Great. So on this episode I want to talk about spiritual formation as opposed to legalism and how do those two things because oftentimes we can kind of confuse them and just wanting to kind of create some understanding of separate categories and how spiritual formation actually breaks the bonds of legalism and so forth.
Speaker 1:So I know this is an important subject and I just hope it's encouraging for listeners as they kind of wrestle through, you know, this growth and fighting against tendencies of legalism. We are spiritual beings, we are created in the image of God and so there is a longing for the divine. It's no wonder why there's so many religions. Right, you just see, mankind is spiritual. But the question we want to think about is as spiritual beings, are we fostering biblical spirituality or are we just following rules? And, Mike, any experience just in your own life, maybe personally, about this kind of spiritual formation and legalism?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean it got into my mind when you were talking, I know, early in my faith because of my own trauma background. When I came into faith it was beautiful and I know that the Lord saved me by His grace. But I began to build up, without realizing, I think, religious walls through achievement-oriented spirituality, which was kind of marked for me by unperfectionism, to think I can achieve a spirituality, and it was a check the box type of thing.
Speaker 2:but it was actually a way for me to build up walls around my real wounds you know, and to kind of like make a almost confabulate the story of salvation by like God freed me from all and like it was a great you know story to tell. But for the early years of my faith I was, I was hiding wounds that God really wanted to get to. I just know, and it wasn't until I began to really understand spiritual formation to the degree of it. You said. You know we were talking off the podcast about. It's a delight. So we're dealing with spirituality that isn't fear-oriented or guilt-oriented but, it's love-oriented and grace-oriented and that's a beautiful thing.
Speaker 2:So, for me, I came into that place and I've continued to be in that place and learning it still to this day.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's great. And so just to define some of our terms in a clear sense, so that listeners have an understanding of what we're seeking to speak about spiritual formation. In the simplest terms, I want to say becoming more like Christ.
Speaker 2:Amen.
Speaker 1:Whereas legalism, we would say, is performance-based righteousness, doing your best and focus on your own performance. And so these are different categories. But the challenge is that when we observe it, they can look similar but they come from two different hearts. And when you talk about not fear-based or guilt-based, I'm just reminded of just the dominant cultures in our world. When you think about Genesis 3 and the effects of sin, we talk about the fall of mankind. You could go to Genesis 3, and three dominant worldviews emerge from Genesis 3. When Adam and Eve eat the fruit, you see fear, guilt and shame. And it's no wonder that those are the kind of dominant worldviews and cultures around our world.
Speaker 1:Here in the West, we're a guilt and innocence culture, and so this is why forensic justification by faith is like the doctrine that the church lives and dies on because we operate in this category of guilt and innocence, and so what speaks to us is declared righteous, not guilty.
Speaker 1:Well, you have other biblical passages lives and dies on because we operate in this category of guilt and innocence, and so what speaks to us is declared righteous, not guilty. Well, you have other biblical passages about Christ bearing our shame and taking our sin and our shame away and those speak to cultures of honor and shame. You'll get a lot of that in Middle Eastern cultures, muslim, jewish cultures as well. And then there's the fear and power cultures. I think about what Paul says to Timothy we don't have a spirit of fear, but of power and self-control and love and a sound mind, and so in some of tribal cultures, african culture, there's the fear and power. This is often why the spiritual man is considered like the powerful guy in the tribe and how all of those things can give way to a legalistic mindset of like well, I do these things because I feel guilty or because of shame.
Speaker 2:I have a friend who is a woodmaker crafter. He's a craftsman. I would break every. I would be doing demolition, sure, that's for sure. I went to see his shop in Providence a few weeks ago and he's showing me around. He's showing me all the tools and the machines and I'm like this stuff, if he left me in there, I don't even know where I would start. Give me a hammer, maybe I can do something, yeah. But I was walked over to the wall and he was showing me these. They were vices, is what he said. But when I saw them I thought the little part at the bottom, and I can't explain it well enough. But what I saw was the little part, the bottom was the vice. And then suddenly he goes no, the whole thing, and they were all lined up. And it was amazing because in that moment I was and it goes to what we're talking about. You said mindset that people have.
Speaker 2:I've had it with legalism, but really it's how we see things and it's a perception thing, which is why Jesus is trying to give us a new perception to see the world differently, which Paul uses the term in the old English was enlightened and the thing is that what my friends saw was different than what I saw, but we were looking at the same thing, but he had something in him that I didn't have that made us see it differently.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:So when we look at spiritual formation, when you talk Genesis 3, it's great what you said about the three things, because what happens there there's three I think there would be three toxic things that emerge A toxic view of me, yes, a toxic view of God and I really do think. A toxic view of the Bible, and I think this is where people misunderstand and it is there and right in the Scripture telling us this is what's gonna happen and you see God kind of mercifully walking, helping people. But it really is to get us to see God, the right way to see ourselves, the way God sees us. I should probably be writing this down.
Speaker 1:This is my three-step. We're doing the learning right now. John, that's right.
Speaker 2:And then to make sure we see the Bible the way God says it should be read and seen, and let it read us that way.
Speaker 1:the Bible the way God says it should be read and seen, and let it read us that way. That's so. I just hear John Calvin in that statement, because his premise of his institute is like no Know yourself, no God.
Speaker 1:And so we know God in light of ourselves, we know ourselves in light of God's revelation.
Speaker 1:But I would say that there is an order and the order you gave is it's perspective of God that puts right, perspective of self and his word, and, I think, your illustration of the clamps, the vices. We can see things differently and I guess the question would be then what is the lens that we're looking through, lens that we're looking through? Is it motivated from guilt, shame or fear, or is it through the power of the gospel that unlocks those things, that redeems us from all of those things? Because Jesus, the true and better Adam, who came and reversed the curse and set us free to grow in his likeness. While those things can still have their effects, they don't have dominion over us, and so when we think about spiritual formation and some biblical passages that come to mind in what this looks like in our minds, I think about Romans, chapter 12, verse 2. Paul says do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
Speaker 2:In parentheses see the clamps vices correctly.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah exactly, and it's not conformity to this world, but there's transform, this metamorphosis. It's the caterpillar going into the cocoon and coming out completely different.
Speaker 2:And there's a surrender in that, in Romans 12, one that he says is our reasonable act of worship, which, thinking about this more, this more Now, when people may hear that looking at the vice on the wall, they'll see that, as I've got to sacrifice myself, I've got to surrender myself. But it may be very abstract, but if you really look at it, it's really about vulnerability with God. It's about being able to be transparent with God, because to be able to surrender myself as a reasonable act of worship means I'm really, I'm doing what Jesus says. If you want to enter into the kingdom, you've got to be like a child. Yeah, which a child doesn't? You're not asking how is your youngest child? You have two twins that are?
Speaker 1:Yeah, they're six weeks, are they?
Speaker 2:going to be getting a paper route in a year so they can take care of their own feeding. No, Right. Because they are.
Speaker 2:Right, they are ultimately, they're gonna be dependent in a way that's free. And this really matters in spiritual formation that we are not childish but childlike to the degree that we're opened-armed, like when Jesus pulls a little child in the midst. Imagine being there when he pulls a child in the midst and said this is what you need. And there's a little boy looking at all of them looking around. There's a dependency that is so resting in parental love, but there's also a vulnerability there and I think this is a necessary thing. That's the shift that can happen. I think a lot of times, a lot of people are in the legalistic phase because of our pride, because of our wrong view of God, wrong view of ourselves, wrong view of scriptures.
Speaker 2:Perhaps and I'm not saying and there are brothers and sisters out there that are caught in this and we have to be so merciful to them. But I think that we have to understand that there's a vulnerability that's necessary in spirituality.
Speaker 1:It is the great paradox of the Christian faith. Here's another illustration In a past life I got to play golf, and one of the things about golf is aim left to go right, aim right to go left. It's backwards. Backward illustration, tighter to, and so everything's backwards and it's against your natural thinking. And when we think about spiritual formation, when you're talking about surrender and living sacrifice, to surrender is freedom and to try to hold on is bondage when Jesus says come and die that you might live.
Speaker 2:Paradox.
Speaker 1:There it is, there it is, and so legalism is trying to just hold on, because that's what might seem natural. I mean, legalism is I wanna be careful and be gracious. I don't think legalism is an error. I think, if we get it down to the core, it's almost another religion, just because it replaces the freedom that we have in Jesus.
Speaker 2:It's the go back to Genesis 3, it's the fig leaves in the narrative. It is it's me covering my own guilt 100%. So it's like that's the first religion, the religion of the fig.
Speaker 1:Yes, you know it's. I need to try better.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I need to do better, and God in the story, in the narrative, he clothes them. Yeah, that's right, that's right. So think about the grace which a lot of people wouldn't even see. They'll God's still gracious with them and clothing them.
Speaker 1:And even before he clothes them, he looks at the serpent and says the seed of the woman will bruise the head. It's prophecy. Yeah, here is Jesus. And so, before even the consequences fully fell and the curse falls, god preaches the gospel of victory. And so it's always been salvation by faith and the promised one to come. And then he closed them because God's the author of true religion and true spirituality. So we have this call to renewal, another passage of scripture, just understanding spiritual formation 2 Corinthians 3.18,. And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image, from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. So we have renewal, we have transformation. It's not moral reformation yeah, we don't need to, just it's not achievement yeah it's.
Speaker 2:you know, paul says in first timothy, a passage I continue to. Honestly I feel like it's become more of a ministry verse for me in the last few years. But he says to timothy says hey, I asked you to stay in ephesus. Confront those that are teaching the false, wrong doctrine, a contrary doctrine, yeah, and he says to him. He says and telling him to stop getting caught up with meaningless discussions about pedigrees and genealogies and mythos. He uses it later in 2 Timothy, but he tells him. He says these things don't lead to the right kind of stewardship of faith which I think he's talking. He's talking spiritual formation and he says there he goes, the aim or the goal of our teaching is love out of a pure heart, unfeigned faith, a conscience that's not defiled.
Speaker 2:Yeah, this is honestly, when I think about spiritual formation a lot lately, because I see a lot of people getting caught up in the wrong again. It's the wrong way of seeing something when Paul's saying, hey, that's all knowledge that they can't even be solid on. Here's the aim or the goal of the teaching, of the commandments, of the clear teachings of Christ, the New Testament, the things that we can know. Here it is, and what's the goal of it Love, not a spiritual trophy yeah, that's right or a self-achievement which is painful, and that's why I think a lot of people do it. I think a lot of people do it. I think a lot of legalism is there to hide or cover a pain or a wound. It's very easy to do. And here you have Paul saying hey, it's about. The goal is love, yeah that's right, that's right.
Speaker 2:But when 2 Corinthians 3, the word beholding there, I think, is the key, because you're talking about this continual action and I'm sure you're going to go here, john, because you're smart as a whip uh, the what is? What? Does that even mean to be smart as a whip? I gotta look that up, actually, I I never thought they were.
Speaker 1:I mean it strikes. I would think a whip could really hit it right, right, straight.
Speaker 2:so I'm thinking you, you, obviously you know you're saying things are right on point, sure, but beholding is like this continual action. So I know you're going to go to this because we're talking the knowledge, yeah, it's this, it's this, it's this and we're basically explaining what the vice is. We're talking still of that shop piece or this is how you play golf. You ever disc golfed? Same principles apply. I just played for the first time on Monday, shoulders sore.
Speaker 1:Oh man.
Speaker 2:Same principles, bro, but how does a person in spiritual formation now understand that it is love? That is the goal. We are going to be transformed, we are to renew our mind, we are going to behold. How do I sit and find that place? These are the spiritual practices. Yeah, these are your disciplines. You were going here. I know you were going here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so we have. We have we established our finish line, our goal. What are we, what are we seeking Then? Yeah, because we're not talking practically yet, you know, we're still talking the abstract, like renewal. I mean practically speaking, when we look at what spiritual formation is and we're talking growth and transformation, it's becoming less like me and more like Jesus, and it's progressive sanctification as a theological term, and to visualize that, my mind goes to Galatians 5. And in the most practical sense, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. I love that. It's singular, it's the one cluster, right, it's the fruits.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a good point.
Speaker 1:It's a cluster of grapes, right, and I want it all.
Speaker 2:And I do I desire it.
Speaker 1:And I think, even when we talk about spiritual formation, is, the more we grow like Christ, the more we desire Christ. And so when we talk about beholding. Even there it is looking to Jesus. And where do we look to Jesus and how do we commune with Jesus? What are the means for formation? Don Whitney writes a great book on spiritual disciplines for the Christian life, and I mean his premise is these are the habits that we can implement in our life for that formation, Not that we are in bondage to them, right.
Speaker 2:But they're liberating. They're like the breaking up of the ground, of the soil, but we can't make the seed grow or emerge. God does that. But it's like working in consonance with God by me opening my heart. These are the spiritual practices.
Speaker 2:This is a beautiful thing and that's why it does require people to step outside of certain. You know, in Fowler's stages of faith he talks about People recognize God, they get into discipleship and then they start serving and people stay there. You know, they stay in these things. Those are beautiful, but then they hit a trial or they hit a dry period, they hit a wall, and the church at times doesn't always know how to deal with that. It may even be a period of doubt, but it's in that moment where this is where growth can actually take place, because you've got to step out of these three realms and now it's time to really connect with God and move into that place. And it's interesting because when you say Galatians, I didn't know if you were going to say Galatians 4.19, which is probably one of the less verses used for spiritual formation, as I've heard it and here we are talking about legalism Galatians is a letter about legalism there it is yeah.
Speaker 2:And he tells them in Galatians, 4.19,. I'll read it from the ESV because when you hear it it's one of the defining verses of spiritual formation. He says here in 4.19, he says my little children. So he sees them, as you know, in this fatherly sense, for whom I am again in the anguish of childbirth, until Christ is formed in you. Wow, that's great, you know. So I wish I could be present with you now and change my tone if I'm perplexed about you. So he sees them as people who already began this process. Why are you putting yourself back into this bondage? Christ is being formed in us.
Speaker 2:You know, and that's a great verse to say, and actually some interpreters of the past they would call this. In the Greek it would be the Theotokos or the Christos Tokos. The Christ bearer, like Christ, is being birthed in us in that sense. Pretty wonderful theology.
Speaker 1:We don't you know, maybe spend a little time on it Similar to theosis, but that's a whole different category yeah, different different, different category yeah. But you think you know even image of God and likeness and reflecting Christ in our Christian lives. I mean that Christ being formed in you. I mean that is what coming to faith and growing as a disciple of Jesus Christ is a follower. And I think sometimes we even get the terms Christian and disciple a little. I'm a Christian, that's a noun, I'm a disciple, that's a verb right.
Speaker 1:And I am an active follower of Jesus. So in doing so I become more and more like the one I'm following, and so then again, we still need to kind of connect the dots here though, like how do I do that? And so, ultimately, I just want to kind of take some of the spiritual disciplines that we should and don't hear the word discipline and think duty and legalism.
Speaker 2:No, these are the means or habits of the heart I've heard it said that way disciplines that we should and don't hear the word discipline and think duty and legalism, no, that these are the means or habits of the heart.
Speaker 1:I've heard it said that way. That's a good way to put it, because it is heart. It is from a heart of love God has. I am renewed, redeemed, ransomed, and as a result of this I mean the Spirit dwells within us. Amen. The Spirit delights in the things of God. He is God right. So we think about practical steps for spiritual formation. I think, as we kind of come full circle on this, we need the shift in perspective. We need to shift from focusing on our performance to our relationship.
Speaker 2:Yes, and there it is.
Speaker 1:It's focusing on knowing Christ. Right now we're going through in our church, we're taking a group through knowing God and it's just wonderful we're sitting there. Great work. We're reflecting on this. Last week we were talking about God's unchangingness, his immutability, his majesty and even beholding God in his word and his attributes, beholding Christ in his actions and his works. That has power to transform the heart. So it's focusing on knowing Christ, not just doing for Christ. Let our actions flow downstream from the gospel. So in our service, I mean those things come as a result of so understanding we do based off of identity, and it's who I am in Christ. My identity determines my action, not my action determines my identity. There's the switch up on legalism. Legalism says my action determines who I am. The one who is growing in spiritual formation says because I am, I do.
Speaker 2:You know, one of the things that happened and it connects to what you're saying with the two see in the church, privileged Shepherd, I wanted to give some form of a solid creed about this, about what the Bible— when we were using Romans 8, 29 and 30, 31, and then we were using Galatians 4 and trying to teach and I was trying to get something that would—it wasn't the mission statement, but it was some form of a creedal representation. And you know, I years played around with this and that and tried to get it. So I, because I wanted people to understand this ultimate truth, that ultimately, we're becoming like Christ, that this is God's ultimate. You know, when you see Romans 8, 29, you know most people quote 28 without realizing it's connected to 29,. You know saying, you know we know all things work together for the good to them who love God, to them who love God, to them who call to the calling of His purpose whom God foreknew, he also predestined. They're going together because what he's saying is everything that you're going to go through in your life circumstances. God will use it and he can work with it and change us into what he wants us to be.
Speaker 2:One time I used this illustration. It became comical, but it helped me. My wife makes these great cookies. She's a, she loves the bake, she's a great baker and, uh, she makes this one cookie and I just love this sugar cookie. At christmas, I was like what is in this? When she told me the ingredients one of the ingredients I would never eat alone it's just not my thing which was sour cream.
Speaker 1:Oh, I was gonna say cottage cheese, yeah, yeah even that might be dangerous.
Speaker 2:So, but there's. When she said sour cream. But then I looked at the ingredients salt, white flour, you know, sugar you see them separate like whoa, but when you put them together the baker puts them together they make a really good cookie. So I always say that about Romans 8, 28, that this is what this text is really telling us that God can take the salt and the sour cream and the sugar in our life and if we're trusting him and surrender to him, he'll make us into one good cookie.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 2:And so I kept wrestling with these creedal things and I realized there's no way for me it's gonna be legalistic in a sense, or it's gonna be just a plain statement for me to tell people this Our church today uses a prayer and we don't use written prayers. We know the Psalms are written prayers, but we use a prayer that's very succinct in our church and we pray it. I preach on it once a year and we have it on a card in our Bibles. We have a card with it and it's a prayer we pray. Sometimes we pray it together publicly once in a while. It's not something we pray in a rote sense, but it's our church's sacred prayer and because I found that it couldn't be the spiritual formation I didn't want it to be a statement. It needed to be something that was active in prayer, and it's. The prayer is Lord, make me a more awake, compassionate, christ-like human being, where the inner life of Christ is being formed in my inner life. That's fantastic.
Speaker 2:That's the prayer of our church that we've had for the last three years. That's great and we pray. Like I said, I preach on it once a year, so people will use it and have it. But it was basically a way for them and we teach them how, what all the biblical pieces of it is to give them that first point to say God does wanna do this in your life. It starts with prayer and then it opens the door to what we're talking about now the habits of the heart. What are these?
Speaker 2:And I think that we come into the place of what our personalities are, because I don't think everybody's going to always practice the same things more. I have found a groove that works with me. I don't impose that on other people, though. I want them to make sure they explore that Most people never want to be in solitude or silence because then they're out of control. Whitney riffs on that one. Yeah, that's good. Yeah, because we do need that, especially in this culture, you know, in the dated culture today distraction, but yeah. So these are some of those, and these disciplines enable us to encounter God because they sanctify or make sacred the presence and the spaces we're in. Yes, by knowing that we can encounter.
Speaker 2:God as a Christian, god's dwelling within us, christ's dwelling within us. So for me it's. I sit quietly before the Lord, I call it. In the morning I sing a psalm. I read very slowly, without commentary or study. I read the passage of the Bible. I journal is one other area. I like to be contemplative, to the sense of walking and praying. So these are some of my practices that have helped me. Now some of them have helped in healing my spiritual wounds, or inner wounds, like sitting quietly with a text for a long time, trying to understand Christ's love, 1 Timothy 4. Those are things that have helped me in those regards.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's great, and yeah, we're not prescribing, so to speak of like, do these things follow this list, because now we're being spiritual formation.
Speaker 2:Legalists and we don't want to do that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, right, but we are saying here are practices from our own lives, things that we glean from the Scriptures that have been useful and there's nothing new under the sun. But we also we do recognize people are uniquely created in the image of God. Different personalities, different temperaments. You know what works? Uh, we know are tried and true methods but it might look.
Speaker 2:It might look different for people.
Speaker 1:You might be a, a night person. I mean, you can't, you don't wake up till 10 o'clock.
Speaker 2:Yeah, my wife's like that. She wants to read the Bible. She was telling me she read it at night yeah. You know I love the dawn. I got up this morning. I was at the church at five 30. I love going in there. There's nothing you know mystical happening, but I just need this silent, simple space, yeah.
Speaker 1:And I think what we can do is be descriptive of things that work. That means, I would say, means of grace for spiritual formation. And then, you know, the encouragement to listeners is to seek to implement some of these things in your life. It starts with the paradigm shift of thinking, because you're not doing to please God. God is perfectly pleased in his son, amen, and he has imputed that righteousness to you. And so I would say that the first, one of the first and primary things of spiritual formation is constantly preach the gospel to yourself, constantly remind yourself of who you are in Christ and let your identity rest in that, and that fuels that heart of love for prayer, prayer. I don't think spiritual formation at all makes any progress apart from prayer, and that we need to commune with God.
Speaker 2:It's our technology with God.
Speaker 1:That's right, and it's never gone out of style no, it's never become irrelevant in any way and so we need to have lives cultivating of prayer, personal prayer yeah, there's something beneficial about spiritual formation in the group, of praying with others, sure.
Speaker 2:Community.
Speaker 1:Community yeah, we need that. The covenant community, the people of God.
Speaker 2:It's a spiritual practice.
Speaker 1:It is, it is yeah absolutely Corporate worship being together Spiritual practice yeah, and so thinking I've done many episodes on these kind of individually, but bringing it all together, we have so many ways and avenues that God, in his gracious, kind providence, has given to us and so, scripture intake, read the Bible, read the Bible in community. That's something that's. It's a beautiful thing, man, I love my. I love personal devotions, spending quiet time with the Lord. I love reading the Bible with other men and just hearing from them and the insights and how God's the feeder needs to be fed.
Speaker 2:Amen, all the time.
Speaker 1:And I have found in my life some small group discipleship groups have been a tremendous means of spiritual formation. You find accountability. I need that. I need people in my life that are asking me certain questions and vice versa. It's helpful.
Speaker 2:It is. I have a staff of nine, including myself would be 10. So when we meet on Wednesday, the last part of our staff meeting is the spiritual formation piece. So yesterday we just reset and started some new stuff. But I talked to you guys about Jesus asking the question of the disciples what do you seek? And it came into that realm of spiritual formation because we are called and sometimes it's easy to lose sight of that calling in our spiritual formation. It's not just I think I said it to you off the podcast too it's not because it's easy in ministry to you know, like Jesus says, if you gain the whole world, you can lose your own soul. Sometimes you can gain the whole church and lose your own soul. You know you lose your worth, you lose the health of your psyche, you lose this whole thing.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, and that happens too with achievement. So to ask those questions. Going to Christ for spiritual formation is like you said earlier too. It's like the Christ mind that we're following Christ. We're a follower of Christ. I think that's a great place to start, where people are like hey, I like what I'm hearing, but where do I begin? Jesus, because he's inviting us to that, when he says come on to me, all that they're laboring and are heavy, you know, burdened. Yeah, this is he's dealing with religious legalism.
Speaker 1:That's exactly.
Speaker 2:And then he tells them to take his yoke, his way. I'm meek and humble of heart and you'll find rest. So what is Jesus doing in his spiritual formation? In the Sermon on the Mount he gives four big ones in Matthew 6. It's interesting because it's in the Sermon on the Mount. He says generosity right.
Speaker 2:I think prayer comes. Fasting, I think comes after that, yeah, prayer and then simplicity. So if you really looked at it from that perspective, when I've talked to him I was like, hmm, he highlights those. Those aren't the only four. But if you actually looked at the ones that he gives you in the Sermon on the Mount, these four are significant. Wow, of course, throughout the gospel you're finding the scripture being read, ministering to people. You find all of those things highlighted Generosity, fasting, prayer and simplicity. Wow. So that's a great place to start.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's a good, that's really good, that could change your world. Matthew 6, go there and just immerse yourself. Yeah, and, like you said, sermon on the Mount, because it's given a lot of things to do. But that again just highlights, once again we're just kind of hammering at home that spiritual formation is an outflow or it's. Once again we're just kind of hammering at home that spiritual formation is an outflow or it's based off our identity, and so we do these things not to please God or to please God but not to earn favor because we are in Christ, and I think that's again just a helpful reminder.
Speaker 2:I think that's beautiful, john. I appreciate you even going from that angle with the identity piece, because I think that is, and what we're saying is we're the sons and daughters of God. He is our father and he's our. I mean, they use Abba, papa. Yeah, we want them to grow up. We're nurturing them, caring for them, but they have their own identity. But they're also who we are and we're reflecting the Father as well and becoming like Jesus. He's our brother as the text says in Hebrews, declaring the name of Abba to us.
Speaker 1:So it's like and I like what it says in Hebrews. It says he's not ashamed to call us brothers. And if we turn the text on itself and just state it in the other way?
Speaker 2:which I love. That means he's proud to call you brother.
Speaker 1:Yeah amen, that's beautiful he's proud of you and I think again, as we started, our perspective on God will determine our view of spiritual formation and God is more glorious, more good, more loving and compassionate. Then we don't oversell that. I don't think you can, no, you can never think too high of thoughts of God, right, and so he's greater than all of our mind.
Speaker 2:And we see him in the most apex pinnacle. Chief revelation is Jesus In Christ. Yeah, so you see me, philip. When you see the Father, when you see me, it's like this is powerful.
Speaker 1:And Jesus is the most lovely, the most gracious.
Speaker 2:Thank you, God, for doing that so that we can have this reality of Christ who is our Savior, he is us. It's kind of like Hebrews keeps coming up in our spiritual formation now, and then it goes back to the verse you used at the beginning, 2 Corinthians 3.18,. We're beholding him.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And it's amazing, we're actually not. We don't even get one depiction of what Jesus looks like, but yet, if you're a believer, you know exactly what he looks like, in the sense of what you do see is beyond just this. You know a visible picture that you need. You don't you see it in the text itself?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and so you see him with your ears.
Speaker 2:Yes, we are ear witnesses of the resurrection right.
Speaker 1:The eyewitnesses, created, ear witnesses, and we are just going to be faithfully proclaiming that to the next generation and so forth. And Romans 12, looking to Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, right and he is now. And so, and connection with that is lay aside your sin. How do you defeat sin in your life? If, by the Spirit Romans 8, 13, you put to death the deeds of the flesh, you will live. Defeat sin in your life If, by the Spirit Romans 8, 13, you put to death the deeds of the flesh, you will live. Look to Jesus If you want to fight your sin battles on earth horizontally, man, you might think you gain victory, but all you might be doing is just kind of silencing it for a little bit.
Speaker 2:If you want to let go of that weight and that kind of all works together. I'm sorry.
Speaker 1:I interrupted you.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, that's right, go for it it kind of works together too, because you have to read the scripture to see Christ. So then, when you're reading it enough that it reads you in that spiritual formation practice, you're now beginning to say I desire this. God begins to work in it. You begin to know what those weights are, or sins are. I think the sins and the weights there may be even different. Weight could be like shame, whereas sin could be the actual behavior of something that pleases God.
Speaker 2:But now you're seeing it because the Bible is telling you. So you're moving forward with that and that's quite beautiful to see that. That is the biblical reading piece playing out Again. You've got to come to this in order to see it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, spiritual formation is the pathway of discipleship into becoming more and more like Jesus, and as we do that, the positive is likeness to Jesus and when that is happening, the negative is the sin falling away right and desiring to grow and become a more holy man, woman, teenager, wherever you are, and day by day progressing in that way, and it's a gift of the Spirit within us that's working. And so we only scratched the surface on this again, but I think it's just a helpful topic just to think about our own Christian walk and what motivates us. Why do we do the things we do? Because there is we want to be honest. We can fall into kind of like legalism ruts. We don't live there, but at times our spiritual formation turns into duties, not delights, and we just need sometimes to be recalibrated and that's where the body of Christ, that's where being in community, being in fellowship, there's no replacing that. It's very hard to be formed spiritually in complete isolation. Yeah, and so we need Community is important, we need each other.
Speaker 2:Yes, it is, it's God's design, it's the genius of the church, genesis 1, I've heard it said once. I think it was, I don't know where I heard it, but it made a good illustration out of the fact that when God's creating in Genesis 1, you see it in the singular, but when he creates us, which is life, it becomes a conversation within the nature of God. So I thought you know, when I heard that I was like, interestingly enough it was a conversation that actually brings life. So you have to be able to, there has to be community Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer is great to read. It really is true.
Speaker 1:Great. Well, let's bring this conversation to a close and just remember spiritual formation. It's a journey, it's not a checklist, okay, and one of the great beauties of it is as we are being formed in Christ. Oftentimes it's more obvious to those around us than it is even to ourselves, and I think that's a breeding of humility in us. Yeah, amen. So as you reflect on your own walk, just thinking, where might I be leaning towards legalism versus that delight in Christ and growing in His likeness? And so I want to thank you for listening to the Pleasing God Podcast. If you have any questions, I'd love to hear from you. You can reach out at questions at pleasinggodpodcastorg. And remember 1 Thessalonians 4.3,. This is the will of God, your sanctification.
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