This is, I hope, to be the first of several beneficial posts on spiritual disciplines over the course of the summer. This past semester I had to write my philosophy of youth ministry that included the four basic points that I wanted my youth ministry to be fostered around. One of these four points was the teaching of spiritual disciplines because I find that the understanding of spiritual disciplines helps one develop into a whole person.
Before I start on our discipline of the day, I will answer two questions promptly. The first of which asked to explain what “spiritual discipline” even meant. The best I have collected is that spiritual disciplines are practices that are used to help an individual grow their spiritual life. The second question one may ask is, what do I mean by “whole person”? By whole person I mean a person that is attempting to experience every facet of humanity that God has given us. It does not mean that a whole person will become perfectly rounded, just that he or she is trying to become round. Those who tend more towards solitude will work harder at fellowship and, although they will not equal the two out in life, will become more round by being able to do somewhat of both. So the goal of this series is to talk about some of these ways that we can come closer to being whole persons and to give a deeper look into what that actually means.