Diligence: Intentional Consistent Effort
Diligence in our spiritual disciplines gives our souls the best chance to draw near to God.
If we want to see our spiritual lives flourish, we need to be as diligent as we can in working on it. Spiritual growth doesn't just happen by chance. In the book of Deuteronomy, Moses exhorted the Israelites to be diligent in keeping their souls (see Deut. 4:9). As disciples of Jesus, we are likewise called to be diligent in growing our personal spiritual lives and nurturing our relationship with God. Here’s a question to ask ourselves: are the things we are doing on a daily basis showing that we are actually being diligent in cultivating our souls? I see diligence as a combination of three important characteristics that go together.
First, diligence means being intentional. Our spiritual lives do not flourish by accident. Left on its own, our spiritual lives will more likely decay than grow. And so, we need to be intentional with how we go about developing our spirituality. We simply can't leave it to chance. Remember, your spiritual life and how it develops is ultimately your personal responsibility. Nobody can grow a relationship with God on your behalf. If we're not intentional about growing our spiritual lives, the best we can hope for is to stay the way we are. But what is more likely to happen is that we will see a significant decline in our spirituality. When it comes to the health of my personal spiritual life, I refuse to leave it to chance. I have a plan in place to help me be as intentional as I can with caring for my soul. If you don't have some sort of plan in place, you will likely succumb to all the demands of life and will end up with little to no time left in the day to cultivate your spirituality.
Second, diligence means being consistent. If we want our spiritual lives to really flourish, we can't just work on it once in a while. For our souls to truly flourish, we must pay attention to it regularly and give it what it needs on a consistent basis. Anybody who wants to flourish at anything important needs to learn to be consistent. The bodybuilding champion is consistent in their workout routine. The marathon winner is consistent in their training regimen. The successful novelist is consistent in their writing habits. Likewise, if we want to reach our best in our spiritual lives, we need to learn to be consistent in our spiritual routine. I personally make sure that I take care of my soul every single day and I try my very best not to skip days. My spirituality is that important to me.
Third, diligence means putting effort into it. Sure, we can be very consistent with our spiritual routine. But if what we actually do isn't challenging enough, will that produce growth? We can easily engage in our spiritual practices with a lazy attitude and with very little effort. But we might just be deceiving ourselves. Is the intensity of our spiritual exercises sufficient enough to actually produce spiritual growth? For example, is five minutes of prayer enough for us to grow in our relationships with Christ? Although I can't answer that question for you, I can answer it for myself: I know five minutes of prayer is certainly not enough for me to grow in my walk with God. I know I'll need to put deeper effort into it if I want to see strong spiritual results come out of my life. Ask yourself when you're engaging in a spiritual discipline: is what I'm currently doing sufficient enough to grow my spiritual life and take it to the next level? If it's not, you might want to consider doing more or increasing the intensity with the purpose of challenging yourself enough to reach higher levels of spiritual progress. Do we really want to get away with just the bare minimum effort in our spiritual disciplines? Or do we want to really explore the depths of cultivating our spiritual lives?
The point of flourishing our spiritual lives is to become very close to God and to put ourselves in a position to receive from Him. Diligence in our spiritual disciplines helps because it gives our souls the best chance to draw as near to God as we possibly can on a daily basis. We can't leave this to chance.
Barnabas the Monastic
Servant of Christ. Husband. Dad. Modern Monastic. I have a wild ambition in life: get as close to the Lord Jesus Christ as I can while on earth. I explore and integrate ancient Christian monk wisdom in modern everyday life. Lives in Canada.
