“I have a System for Brushing My Teeth and Going to Church”
Written by Rev. Dr. Scott Paczkowski
“While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.”
When you attend worship regularly, you begin to feel the structure of the Church year over time. We are coming up to Advent, Christmas, and then Epiphany. We then move to Lent and the season of Easter. Pentecost occurs, and then we move into the long period called Ordinary Time. Like nature itself, our faith life is neither random nor spontaneous. Our faith in God follows an intentional system that should feel as natural as the moving from fall into winter, to spring into summer.
Writer Thomas Oppong, in his article “Think of a Better Life as a System,” points out, nature is “a series of systems working in a specific order, according to specific laws. Everything in nature follows a pattern.” For example, the seasons of the year are an annual system. Oppong continues, “The human life cycle is a complex system made up of smaller systems working together to keep you alive: respiratory, digestive, immune, nervous, cardiovascular, skeletal system, etc. There are 11 major organ systems in your body-and they work together harmoniously to keep you alive.”
Likewise, Oppong continues, “On a higher level, systems streamline human political, social, religious, economic and technological progress.” Since all of life is built around systems, it is helpful to provide systems in the many different areas of our lives. For example, I have a system for how I take my medicine in the morning. I have a system for how I go about my daily grooming and cleanliness. I have a system for how and when I communicate with friends, family, and the church family. A system for when and how to exercise works much better than simply working out when I feel like it.
Our spiritual lives also respond better when we create a system of discipline. Sunday morning is a weekly commitment to sabbath keeping. Daily prayer and devotional time are more disciplined if we set up a system to carve out time in our schedule. The more organized and intentional we are with our faith system, the more productive we become at communing with God. Prayerfully consider the systems you have arranged in your life. Which ones have been successful and which ones have failed to produce fruit? Then use the successful systems as a model for how you will set up your spiritual system. Write down the spiritual activities you find meaningful. Schedule them and honor your commitment. As you do, the spiritual system you design will enliven your day and bring you closer to God.
