Peter Scazzero - How Healthy is Your Spirituality?

ZONDERVAN

How Healthy Is Your Spirituality?

Copyright 2019 by Peter Scazzero

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Epub Edition November 2018 9780310356660

ISBN 978-0-310-35665-3 (softcover)

ISBN 978-0-310-35667-7 (audio)

ISBN 978-0-310-35666-0 (ebook)

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First printing November 2018 / Printed in the United States of America

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Contents

A lack of emotional health in the early years of my ministry almost cost me everythingmy marriage, my family, my work, and my own well-being. Just as my ministry leadership seemed to be reaching full swing, Geri, my wife, slowly began to protest that something was desperately wrongwrong with me and wrong with the church. I knew she might be right so I kept trying to implement different discipleship emphases that, to a certain degree, helped me. My conversation with myself went something like this:

More Bible study, Pete. That will change people. Their minds will be renewed. Changed lives will follow.

No. It is body life. Get everyone in deeper levels of community, in small groups. That will do it!

Pete, remember, deep change requires the power of the Spirit. That can only come through prayer. Spend more time in prayer yourself and schedule more prayer meetings at New Life. God doesnt move unless we pray.

No, these are spiritual warfare issues. The reason people arent really changing is you are not confronting the demonic powers in and around them. Apply Scripture and pray in Jesus authority for people to be set free from the evil one.

Worship. Thats it. If people will only soak in the presence of God in worship, that will work.

Remember Christs words from Matthew 25:40. We meet Christ when we give freely to the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, those sick, unknown, in prison. Get them involved in serving among the poor; they will change.

No, Pete, you need people who hear God in an exceptional way and have prophetic insight. They will finally break the unseen chains around people.

Enough, Pete. People dont really understand the grace of God in the gospel. Our standing before God is based on Jesus record and performance, not our own. It is his righteousness, not ours! Pound it into their heads every day, as Luther said, and theyll change!

There is biblical truth in each of these perspectives. I believe all of them have a place in our spiritual journey and development. You, no doubt, have experienced God and his presence through one or more of these in your walk with Christ.

The problem, however, is that you inevitably find, as I did, something is still missing. In fact, the spirituality of most current discipleship models often only adds an additional protective layer against people growing up emotionally. When people have authentic spiritual experiencessuch as worship, prayer, Bible studies, and fellowshipthey mistakenly believe they are doing fine, even if their relational life is fractured and their interior world is disordered. Their apparent progress then provides a spiritual reason for not doing the hard work of maturing.

They are deceived.

I know. I lived that way for almost seventeen years. Because of the spiritual growth in certain areas of my life and in those around me, I ignored the glaring signs of emotional immaturity that were everywhere in and around me.

In our more honest moments, most of us will admit that, much like an iceberg, we are made up of deep layers that exist well beneath our day-to-day awareness. As the following illustration shows, only about 10 percent of an iceberg is visible. This 10 percent represents the ways we conduct ourselves and the changes we make that others can see. We are nicer people, more respectful. We attend church and participate regularly. We clean up our lives somewhat by addressing any issues with alcohol and drugs to foul language to illicit behavior and beyond. We begin to pray and share Christ with others.

But the roots of who we are continue unchanged and unmoved.

Contemporary spiritual formation and discipleship models address some of that 90 percent below the surface. The problem is that a large portion (see below the dotted line) remains untouched by Jesus Christ until there is a serious engagement with what I call emotionally healthy spirituality.

Getting My Attention through Pain

Three things finally dragged me, kicking and screaming, to open up to the notion of emotionally healthy spirituality.

First, I was not experiencing the joy or contentment Scripture promises us in Christ. I was unhappy, frustrated, overworked, and harried. God had brought me into the Christian life with the offer, My yoke is easy and my burden is light (Matthew 11:30), an invitation to a free and abundant life. But I wasnt feeling it.

After many years as an active Christian, I felt exhausted and in need of a break. My life was lived more out of reaction to what other people did or might do or what they thought or might think about me. I knew in my head we were to live to please God. Living like that was another matter. Jesus yoke felt burdensome.

Second, I was angry, bitter, and depressed. For five years I had attempted to do the work of two or three people. We had two services in English in the morning and one in the afternoon in Spanish. I preached at all of them. When my associate in our afternoon Spanish congregation left the church with two hundred of the two hundred and fifty members to start his own church, I found myself hating him. I tried, without success, to forgive him.