dis-ci-pline |ˈdisəplin|

Discipline. When I first think or hear this word, thoughts of punishment, pain, and embarrassment come racing to my mind. In school, with a boss, or the law everyone would talk about discipline with a negative tone. The thought of discipline is annoying. No one wants to be disciplined, and when do receive discipline, it never seems to change the person. So I really began to despise the word, and it always seemed to be connoted with punishment, there was no happy or exciting discipline. So whenever anyone even began to start talking about discipline I would just shut them of, it was the same speech every time. Do good, follow the rules, don’t be insubordinate towards the system. But is this what discipline is really about? Is it really about punishment avoidance? Is it about a bunch of rules that has to be followed?

A problem of dissonance occurs when we approach discipline from the described perspective. Being disciplined in school becomes about following the rules and doing what the teacher tells you. In religion discipline begins to look like a long list of impossible rules to follow. The entire system of discipline is broken. We provide negative consequences to bad behavior and we call those consequences discipline. The true definition of discipline is far greater than negative consequences.

A discipline is a practice, a lifestyle, an act of faithfulness. It is a way to better ones life. In my previous post I wrote about discipline and a call to obedience to the call God has placed on our lives. Many people have been asking what does a disciplined life look like? If it is not about punishment or negative consequences, then what is it really about? The answer to these questions are not concrete, there is a multitude of different means to achieve the end of a disciplined life. But here are some steps that I try and uses to bring discipline to my daily life.

What are my priorities? These are concrete priorities that are the same everyday, each day we have different priorities but what are the ones that mean the most and need to be practiced daily.
What is the larger picture? What is the bigger calling in your life that you would like to achieve?
What are you doing today to achieve that goal?
Do your best at everything you do.
Do it. Tell yourself that you will do these things, begin to make a habit of it.

If you desire to pray and read the bible daily, and you find that you do not have the time to fit it into your day, yet you are waking up 5 min before class to go to class, consider waking up sooner. Allow yourself to take a shower, get cleaned up, read and pray for a few minuets. This will help you become more disciplined in three areas of your life just by waking up an hour earlier. You will be taking care of your physical self by showering, you will help your spiritual life by incorporating prayer and bible readings in your day, and you actually be awake for class, instead of feeling crappy as your brain cells click on in the morning. These are baby steps but they are necessary steps into becoming a disciplined person.

The next steps look are not as physically tangible as waking up early and doing some things, these disciplines are mental and require a conscious effort to transform your mind. Say you have a really hard time gossiping about people or being overly critical of every circumstance, and you would like to see this behavior change. First pray then act. Be conscious of the words the come from your mouth, if you feel the urge or you realize that you are gossiping about someone while in the middle of the act, stop yourself, change the topic or walk away from the conversation. Same thing with being critical, if you feel like you need to say something to ‘correct’ something, discipline yourself to wait a day before addressing the situation to see if what you are being critical is true, or just a reflection of your feelings at the moment.

We need to begin to look at disciplines, as a hope, as a tool, as a way to live a life that is more pleasing to God. It is going to take work, it is not going to be easy. There will be many times it does not seem worth it to keep practicing the same daily disciplines because it feels like too much of a sacrifice, or no one even notices the change in your life, but the thing is, is that we do not practice disciplines for others or even ourselves, we practice them for the King of the universe. We choose to remain obedient to the disciplines of God for his purposes, so that he may use us to his full potential. When we choose not to live a disciplined life we are not offering God our best our first fruits, these things he calls evil.

There is not much glory, much fame, or excitable gain from living disciplined, it may even look like saying no to something we truly desire to do but we know that God has called us a different direction, it may look like sacrificing everything, it may look like pain, but God is looking forward to tell us Welcome Home Good and Faithful Servant. The problem with today is that we have lost what it truly means to be faithful, to seek his commands, to practice righteous living. We are not going to be successful all the time. When people practice they do make mistakes, not every shot goes in, not every rebound is made, and sometimes we may even fall an break a bone. I am not making excuses. I HATE it when people say, oh were only human, as if it is a qualifier to sin boldly, but what I am saying is that disciplines are a practice, a practice you have to choose to attend. When world class athletes practice they breakdown and analyze each part of their game, they practice the fundaments over and over and over again until it is near perfect. May I suggest that we have forgotten the fundaments, we take Allen Iverson’s approach to practice, and we are just concerned with playing the game, and the way we have been playing the game is ‘good enough’ Let me challenge you to get back to practice, re-learn the fundamentals because our lives have taken on the muscle memory of a broken cycle. It will feel awkward at first, it will feel mundane for a while, but after each practice you will be able to push yourself a little further, and someday we will be winning the Gold for Christ and lucky for us we have the best coaching staff in the world.