Moving on to Solid Food

First, for those of you who don't know me, my name is Chris Lohroff and I live in Grand Rapids Michigan with my wife and two daughters. I met Greg several years ago through our mutual board gaming hobby and over the past couple of years our relationship has grown to include (almost exclusively) spiritual matters.

In a previous post, Greg reminded us of Paul's exhortation to move from milk to solid food. This post started out as a comment to Greg's post, but as it grew I decided to give it a life of it's own.

I'd like to share a couple of things I've done in the past 18 months or so to progress to the point where I'm now getting solid food.

First, I got myself a mentor. I meet each week for about an hour with an older man and we are working through the Destined series from Lifebuilders. It's very foundational stuff (particularly the first book), but it's filled in a lot of gaps for me and becomes a springboard for deeper conversations with Chet. This has been a life changing experience and I will state without hesitation that EVERY Christian should be in a one on one transparent and meaningful relationship like this. I have now taken it to the next level and have begun mentoring a younger man by taking him through the same study. I have also begun working with the ministry staff at my church to expand the mentoring ministry. I simply couldn't overstate the impact this has had in my life.

Second, I fill my mind daily with God's word. This is something I've tried to do for years but could never make it past a the first week. I'm now in my 7th month. I happen to use John MacArthur's method (there are many other good ones too) where I read (or in my case, listen to) a section of scripture everyday for a month. For me, 3-4 chapters is about the right amount. This takes about 20 minutes covers my commute to and from work. Every day I pick up new things and by the time I'm done I find myself quoting large sections along with the speaker. You can download a free MP3 version of the the Bible in several translations from Faith Comes by Hearing. If you find you don't have the time or discipline to read everyday, download this, throw it on your iPod or burn it do CD's and listen to it in the car. I dare say it's likely more valuable that what you're currently listening to. I just started my third month in Romans (chapters 9-11 for this month) and it's been terrific. First John is a great place to start if you need an idea. It's short enough that you can get through the entire book in one sitting. Commit to trying this for a month.

Third, I have begun taking the passage I'm reading for the month and studying it in greater detail. I do this by reading commentaries (Warren Wiersbe is a favorite) and doing inductive study. Inductive study is a very simple approach by which you observe, THEN interpret, THEN apply a passage. I stress the order because too often we read a passage and immediately try to figure out how we apply it when in reality we probably haven't yet figured out what it says or means. Either google "Inductive Bible Study" or get a copy of Living by the Book by Howard and William Hendricks or How to Study Your Bible by Kay Arthur.

The final piece of the puzzle for me was tracking my progress. I spent a good deal of time looking for a tool that would help me keep track of my daily habits-- new habits I wanted to start and old habits I wanted to stop. I settled on Joe's Goals which is a very easy (and I dare say fun) way to track your daily habits. Each day I get a score-- positive points for doing good habits, negative points for doing bad ones. If there is a particular habit that is too personal track, give it an unrelated title (I use Aggressive Driving as a euphemism for something I struggle with on a daily basis). If you're a checklist person like me, it might be what you need to get your new behavior to stick.