Healthy Spiritual Habit-Formation: Being “all in” as a Disciple

The beginning of the year—or any new season—is a great time to take an inventory of “how it is with our souls.” The quote above by Dallas Willard sounds like a wonderful way to live. But is it possible? It sounds like a daydream to experience total contentment, joy, and confidence in our everyday life with God. Honestly, most days, I’d settle for partial contentment, joy, and confidence. What does it mean for a follower of Christ—a disciple—to arrange our days? I think it all comes down to discipline.

The word “disciple” and the word “discipline” are different by only two letters: i and n. A “disciple” is a follower, a student, someone who learns to think and act as they see their teacher act.  “Discipline” is adherence to a set of rules for a particular thing; in this case, the relationship with the teacher. In other words, “discipline” is when a “disciple” is totally “in”!

It’s not surprising that the pathway of discipleship includes discipline. However, when it comes to New Year’s resolutions, most of us have unimpressive track records. So, what is the key to shifting away from a (failed) New Year’s resolution mindset toward embracing discipline as a way to order our days and connect with God?

Our habits make us who we are

Before I answer my question, let’s consider why New Year’s (or any-time-of-the-year) resolutions are hard. Quite simply, any interruption to our typical way of doing things requires work. Another word for “our typical way of doing things” is habit, which is the process by which our brains, emotions, and even our bodies learn to run a “program.” Once we learn it, our complex system wants to keep doing what we’ve been doing, even when a part of us wants to do something differently. 

That said, here’s my answer to the question of how we order our days to connect with God: I think we can be totally “in” as disciples when we recognize the power of habit and channel it for positive formation. Put another way, cultivating our habits is critical for ordering our lives to connect with God.^[1]

Habits can form without our thinking; they become our reflexive actions. This is important for us because it frees up our thinking capacity to focus, learn, or pay attention to a person or the changing dynamics around us. We don’t usually have to decide every time how (or if) we will drink our coffee or how to tie our shoes. Habits keep us from using the resource of our attention on every single decision. Obviously, “bad” habits can form in us as well; just ask anyone who bites their fingernails or swings their golf club too hard. So, the challenge for embracing discipline is deciding which habits to cultivate. 

You’ve probably heard some variation of this quote: “We first make our habits, and then our habits make us.”  In other words, what we repetitively do shapes us, as a potter shapes clay, into who we become. So how, then, do we “make” our habits? 

Habits to help us be “all in” as a disciple

Well, good news (and bad news): making our habits does not just “happen;” rather, we can harness the power of habit to become formed as disciples through the power of the Holy Spirit at work in us. There is much written about the “science” of habit (see the resources at the end of this article), but here are a few ways I believe the Holy Spirit can work through the power of habit to help us grow in spiritual practices. (To help us remember, the practices all start with the letter “P”):

1. We can order our days to connect with God when we have a PLAN.
   While creating a plan can sometimes feel like a homework assignment, naming our intentions to cultivate spiritual habits—including when and where, and how often—is the starting line. For example, your plan could include reading through the New Testament in ninety days. That’s a fantastic spiritual habit. As you create your plan, include a PLACE and a time. Place your Bible and notebook where they are easily accessible. Prepare your coffee pot to brew the night before, so that when your alarm goes off, you get where you’ve agreed with yourself to go to read your selected texts. In other words, plan to work, and work the plan.
    
2. Keep the PURPOSE at the heart of your PLAN. 
   The plan is never the “main thing.” The PURPOSE of ordering our days is to “experience total contentment, joy, and confidence in our everyday lives with God,” as Dallas Willard puts it (although I might say “connect with” or pay attention to God’s presence in my life). The PURPOSE is not to read through the New Testament; the PURPOSE is to grow into maturity in Christ.
    
3. Find a PERSON who can encourage you in this PLAN.
    Life with Christ is not a solitary existence; rather, growing in relationship with God inevitably means growing in relationship with others. Identify someone in your life with whom you can share your PLAN and create a rhythm of checking in with them (and ideally, you’re mutually committing to this accountability) to be honest about how your habits are growing.

We could add some more Ps (a POSTURE of being open to God or POSITIVITY—belief that you WILL encounter God) to our previous list. Still, the essential list for growing intentionally in the year ahead includes these three: (1) Have a PLAN; (2) Know your PURPOSE; and (3) Check in with a PERSON. These three Ps will create a nurturing place for healthy habits to grow. 

Learning to be a disciple who is “all-in” does involve discipline. But as Dallas Willard reminds us, arranging our days around things that bring contentment, joy, and confidence in our relationship with God is a soul-healthy habit to make.

• Reflection and Discussion Questions
  • How does the idea of focusing on your habits to connect with God sit with you?
  • What area of your life do you want to grow in the season ahead? If you were to focus on the 3 Ps (Plan, Purpose, and Person), what would that look like?
• Additional Resources
  • Explore other resources through the Adult Discipleship section on our website, www.umcdiscipleship.org.
  • Discover devotions or learn about spiritual formation at the Upper Room website, upperroom.org.
  • Nurture your Spirit through resources about Worship and Devotion at UMC.org.
  • For a focus on physical health in the year ahead, check out the following:
    • “A Call to Health and Wellness in Body and Spirit.” Discipleship Ministries.
    • “Promoting Health and Wholeness,” UMC.org.
  • For books about the science of habit formation, check out the following:
    • Atomic Habits: Tiny Changes, Remarkable Results by James Clear
    • Good Habits, Bad Habits: The Science of Making Positive Changes That Stick by Wendy Wood
    • Steps: A Guide to Transforming Your Life When Willpower Isn’t Enough by John Ortberg

Rev. Dr. Ashlee Alley Crawford, Director of Adult Discipleship, an elder in the Great Plains Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church, served in campus ministry for twelve years and in leadership with the Great Plains Conference for over a decade. She has a passion for connecting people with resources and encouraging them to nurture their faith and walk in step with Jesus Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit. She has a D.Min. in spiritual direction from Asbury Theological Seminary. Ashlee also has a Certificate in Discipleship Coaching through Discipleship Ministries.