Habits

Good morning. I am glad that we can be gathered here today. I wanted to start today with a simple question.

What are some of your habits?

Have you ever really thought about this.

What are some simple habits that you do each and everyday?

Now there are good and bad habits to have in our lives. For me it has become a good habit of regular exercise. I enjoy my day more when I am able to get that moment of activity and get the blood flowing. That is a good habit to have right...Well some might not feel that way but it has been a good one for me.

I have another habit that has mixed feelings in my household. I regularly have a toothpick in my mouth. Now this may be a good thing or bad thing but the problem doesn’t lie with the toothpick being in my mouth is I have a horrible habit of when I remove them I might set them on the counter or somewhere when I am not by a trashcan and Then they get knocked off and end up on the floor.

Or when I go to get one out of the container more than one comes out and it falls on the floor and I can’t find it, or didn’t realize it fell. Needless to say there are some toothpicks on the ground in the house. I try not to but it just happens. I don’t think my wife appreciates it.

Now, with most habits they form over time and they aren’t easy things to give ourselves to but they can be a very rewarding thing when we put positive ones into our lives.

Last week we talked about the importance of understanding that being a disciple is who we are not just what we do. It is a noun. A part of that is realizing that we need to be in relationship with Jesus and grow with him. It goes back to that whole idea of.

Be with Jesus

What does it mean to be with Jesus?

How do we make this a Habit?

How do we let our lives be filled with the Habit of Being with Jesus.

How do we live out what we talked about last week with the idea of John 15 and Remaining in him. Abiding in him.

Over the centuries there have been many people who have talked about this idea from the saints of old to modern day writers.

They have been trying to capture this idea of being with Jesus in everything.

Paul called it Praying without Ceasing.

The Spanish Carmelite Saint John of the Cross called it “silent love” and urged us to “remain in loving attention on God”

The Quakers called it “centering down”, as if abiding in Jesus was getting in touch with the bedrock of all reality.

Jesuit spiritual director Jean-Pierre De Caussade called it, “the scrament of the present moment”. Capturing the idea that each moment with God is its own Eucharist or communion experience.

A.W. Tozer called it “habitual, conscious communion” Go dis waiting for his redeemed children to push into the conscious awareness of his presence.

That realization that God is there the whole time. We just need to open ourselves to it.

The last one comes from a monk. Mot people wouldn’t have ever heard of him but It wasn’t till I was reading a book by John Mark Comer that I became aware of his story.

Comer shares the view of Brother Lawrence’s simplistic view, “the practice of the presence of God”

Not real complicated right. Pretty basic and isn’t filled with a bunch of flowery words or deep theological approach just simple words.

The Practice of the Presence of God

Comer shared in his book the fact that there is a reason behind this simple approach that Brother Lawrence had.

See Brother Lawrence wasn’t a priest or some deep thinker.

Brother Lawrence was a dishwasher in the monastery in 17th century Paris. He made it his life’s ambition to experience God in the chaos of the kitchen, with all its noise, distraction, and busyness.

I can relate to that a lot.

My first job when I turned 16 was a bus boy at a local restaurant named Eat n Park. I didn’t stay a bus boy for long I was moved into the kitchen and started work as a cook when they were short one night.

It was probably what started my love for cooking and it was a great experience.

When I started this job though I made it pretty clear I couldn’t work Sunday and that the only way I could was if they asked me in advance. I set those barriers early so that I wouldn’t miss church. One day though they were desperate and asked if I could work on a Sunday morning.

I agreed, and little did I know what I had signed up for.

The problem with our location is that it was located in the middle of multiple churches and when 11 o’clock hit you could say it got a little bit busy.

I was working the back room grill. I was in charge of fulfilling the orders for about 20 tables. This was a solo station that was only used during really busy times. When the busy part got going it was just absolute chaos. Breakfast order after breakfast order. That may not sound bad but you need to know that this is a dinner type food place.

My grill quickly filled up with eggs of all sorts.

Scrambled, over easy, sunny side up, omelets, pancakes, sausage and bacon, French toast, eggs benedict, and the list goes on and on.

Trying to keep it all straight was difficult. It was noisy hard work keeping up for about 3 hours of non stop action. By time it slowed down the whole kitchen is ready for a break because no one could stop.

Picture that for a moment and now try to find God in that. Can you hear him or do you think you would be a little more focused on not burning the eggs.

Could we do it?

Most of us probably could not start out with that kind of commitment. The beauty lies in the fact that with most habits it starts small and becomes something bigger.

For Brother Lawrence he had come to a place that his whole life was something holy. There was no longer any difference between the quiet of morning prayer and the noise and the busyiness of preparing for dinner. Life had become seamless, integrated and grounded in God’s Presence.

In many ways he embodied this.

Colossians 3:2 NIV

2 Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.

The purposeful approach of life of setting your mind on things above. Let’s read some more of this passage.

Colossians 3:1–9 NIV

1 Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. 3 For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. 5 Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. 6 Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. 7 You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. 8 But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. 9 Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices

This sounds like so much. To give up all of these thingss to change our lives in a moment. I will be honest if I look at the life of what it means to be a follower of Jesus and I was told by people that I had to do it in an instant I don’t know if it would be possible. Yet, we as the church can do that to some we can create the problem that to often happens when we try to start new habits. We get Overwhelmed.

Habits can Be Overwhelming

One of the biggest challenges with any habit change is it can feel overwhelming. It can be defeating and hard work and requries so much discipline but when we let it take over it gets easier.

Think about Brother Lawrence. If I asked you to do what he did we would probably fail miserably.

Yet, how do we get there.

That is a goal that we should strive for.

To put God at the center of who we are and let us be in his presence at all times.

I don’t know how Brother Lawerence did it but I imagine it started out small. The purposeful decision to think about God in the noise. To master one moment of thinking on him and to push from there. After mastering one moment like washing the dishes and thinking of Jesus moving on to the cooking of food and centering the mind on who he is.

What would this look like for you today.

Imagine driving down the road and pulling up to a stop light and instead of looking around at the world or singing a song that might come on the radio, or maybe getting mad at the bad driver in front of you your mind shifts to Jesus.

Imagine walking the grocery store and praying as you shop for you groceries.

Imagine spending time with your mind on Jesus as you fold the laundry, clean the toliet, mow the lawn.

How would your life shift if you found yourself in all the moments of the day dwelling in the presence of God.

This i the life that is something that we should pursue and want. To be in the constant presnces of our lord and savior.

Let’s pray.