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The Good Shepherd
TheWay

Goal #2: Become Like Him

We are all being formed into something or someone. Who are you becoming?

Josh Servian6 min read

The Skull

  • Benedictine monks used skulls as reminders that life is fleeting and precious
  • They view the life of discipleship as a kind of preparation for death, for an eternity with God

We are distracting ourselves into spiritual oblivion.

  • Ronald Rolheiser
  • Live for your eulogy, not your resume

Spiritual Formation isn’t a Christian Thing

  • We all have been, are being, and will be formed
  • Who am I becoming?

Formation Defined

The process of being formed into people of love in Christ.
  • “The process”
    • Formation into the image of Jesus is a long, slow process
  • “Of being formed”
    • Formation into the image of Jesus is something that is done to us
    • We must make ourselves available (to be formed)
    • Lack of transformation is due to us not learning our part in spiritual formation

Without God, we cannot. Without us, God will not.

  • Saint Augustine
  • “Into people of love”
    • The most important question is:
      • Are we becoming more loving?
      • Not, are we becoming more biblically educated?
    • Love defined by Jesus is an attitude + action (agape)
    • Love isn’t something God does; it’s who he is

A process of being formed into the image of Christ for the sake of others.

  • Dr. Robert Mulholland (defining spiritual formation)
  • “In Christ”
    • This is the gospel: God has drawn near to us in Jesus to draw us into his inner life, to heal us by immersing us within the fold of his Trinitarian love, and then to send us out into the world as agents of his love
    • Jesus’ invitation is a chance to enter the inner life of God himself (union with God - the purpose of our human existence)

No Accidental Saints

  • Becoming like Christ is possible but is not natural - life will likely take you in the opposite direction
  • The Critical Journey
    1. Recognition of God
    2. Life of Discipleship
    3. Productive Life (most hit a wall after here)
    4. Journey Inward
    5. Journey Outward
    6. Life of Love
  • The problem isn’t that people don’t want or aren’t trying to change, but that they don’t know how to change

Three losing strategies

Losing Strategy #1: Willpower

  • Willpower is necessary, but is a finite resource
  • We must do what we can do (make space to surrender to God via the practices of Jesus) so God can do what we can’t do (heal, librerate, and transform us into people of love)

Losing Strategy #2: More Bible Study

  • We can’t think our way to Christlikeness
  • Love isn’t an intellectual theory; it’s an emobied way of being
  • Information (alone) does not produce transformation
    • Knowing without doing is not becoming

Losing Strategy #3: The zap from Heaven

  • It’s easy to go to church once a week; it’s much harder to do the “daily, unglamorous work of discipleship”
  • Jesus healed people, he didn’t remove their ugly habits or personality traits

Problem #1: Sin

  • Sin is not just an action, but a condition (being in sin)
  • To make progress in our formation, we must face our sin
  • Three dimesions to sin:
    • #1 Sin done by us
      • We mess things up all the time
    • #2 Sin done to us
      • We are perpetrator and victim
      • “Hurt people hurt people”
    • #3 Sin done around us
      • We live in a world where it’s “hard to do good”
  • Sin is more than breaking laws, it’s a kind of disease of the soul. Salvation is the healing of the whole person
  • This allows us to picture Jesus as the physician of our souls
Saved
Sōzō (in Greek): often translated as “healed”
  • Salvation is not just about getting back on the right side of God’s mercy through forgiveness; it’s about having your soul healed by God’s loving touch
  • The sin that keeps us from God can only be healed by God
  • The beginning of healing/salvation is what we call “confession”
  • Our job is to confess, God’s job is to heal
  • Human beings resist facing reality
  • The more we hide, the less we heal

Problem #2: You’ve already been formed

We are formed by 3 forces:

  1. The stories we believe
    • Pick your stories carefully
  2. Our habits
    • What we repeatedly do, we become
  3. Our relationships
    • We become like the people we spend time with
    • All Christian formation is counter-formation

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed.

  • Romans 12:2
  • You’re already being conformed or transformed
    • The default is conformation

A Working Theory of Change

Intentional Spiritual Formation

  • Teaching
  • Community
  • Practice

1. Teaching

  • We have the ability to believe unrealities
  • The best teaching shifts our trust; rewires our brain
  • Spiritual formation in the Way of Jesus begins with the healing of our false images of God
    • We become like who we believe God is
  • We must prioritize exposing ourselves to teaching and truth
    • Reading Scripture
    • Memorizing Scripture
    • Studying the Bible
    • Listening to sermons
    • Listening to podcasts
    • Reading books
    • Meditating
  • Paul refers to this as “the renewing of our mninds”

2. The practices

  • The Sermon on the Mount
    • Living his way is going to take practice
  • Most people think they will grow to be more like Jesus through trying hard rather than training hard (spiritual disciplines)

3. Community

  • At the core of what’s broken in the human condition is ruined relationships (with both God and people)
  • Does the community call people up to a higher level of apprenticeship? Or does it devolve to the lowest common denominator of maturity / immaturity?

4. The Holy Spirit

  • Christlikeness is not the result of the right application of spiritual disciples, but a gift of grace

5. Over Time

  • We do not become like Christ over night but through a long obedience in the same direction
  • Our formation will take a lot of time and take a long time

6. Through Suffering

  • Trials refine us; they produce perseverance, then character, then hope
  • What we run from (suffering) is the secret to our liberation
  • Suffering is sadness leaving the body

Terrible, Wonderful News: You Are Not In Control

  • You are not in control of your spiritual formation
  • Our world today has formed us to expect life to be easy, fast, and controllable
  • Formation into the image of Jesus is hard, slow, and out of our control

Reflection Questions

  1. Comer argues that “spiritual formation happens to everyone, whether or not you’re paying attention” — you’re becoming somebody, for better or worse. What did that idea stir up for you?
  2. What are some things you’re currently “practicing” (even unintentionally) that are shaping you into someone other than who you want to be?
  3. Is there a particular fruit of the Spirit (patience, gentleness, self-control, etc.) that consistently reveals you’re not as formed as you’d like to think? What tends to expose it?
  4. Comer suggests that real change comes through practices, not just information or inspiration. What’s one practice from this section you sense could actually shape your character, not just your knowledge?
  5. If becoming like Jesus is a long, slow apprenticeship rather than an event, what would it look like to measure progress over years instead of days?
  6. What’s one relationship or environment in your life you may need to change in order to support who you’re becoming (since we tend to become like those we spend time with)?
  7. Think of someone you know who genuinely seems like Jesus — patient, humble, loving, honest. What have you noticed about how they got that way?
  8. Can you share a time when a specific practice (fasting, silence, community, scripture, etc.) actually changed something in your character, not just your behavior in the moment?
  9. What’s one area where you can see clear growth in becoming more like Jesus over the past few years? What contributed to that?
  10. What’s one next step from this chapter you want to commit to, and who in this group can check in with you on it?