Keys: Discernment

Philippians 1: 9, 10

I John 4: 1

Colossians 2: 8

October 26, 2025

We live today in a loud, busy, and fast paced world. In addition to friends, relationships – both formal and informal, both work and friend or family related – the average person in our country has over 70 apps on their phone, receives an array of notifications, and has thousands of news websites, social media platforms, and streaming services clamoring for their attention.

The sheer accumulation of data is now doubling every 11 hours. Artificial Intelligence makes it difficult to separate fact from fiction and many of us live under the tyranny of text messages and emails whose authors expect quick answers. No longer is a response in 24 hours deemed adequate. Many expect return replies within a few hours at most.

People want answers – now; and we are intolerant with slow decision making even from ourselves. The weight of indecision is a heavy burden, and we are pushed for resolution. Decision making, and the required discernment needed for good decisions is increasingly difficult to find.

We are told to be wise, filled with love so that our decisions would serve us – and our God – well. The author of 1st John speaks to a world filled with clamoring voices when he says that there are many false prophets and that we should test every spirit, every voice, to see if it is from God. Paul warns us in Colossians to not be held captive by misguided philosophy, empty deceit or faulty human tradition so that we might discern the mind of Christ.

Discerning the mind of Christ – that is the call for each of us; but rarely is the path or the journey of discernment made clear for us. The reality is that, like a plane landing at night, we need that runway well lit – we need the path of discernment made overwhelmingly clear for us. But rarely is that so.

The difficulty is that rarely, amongst all of the noise of our world, is the voice of God clear and obvious. We want a burning bush or at least some kind of divine Goodyear blimp flashing messages at us. The reality is that our own emotions and ego can deceive us; they can masquerade as the voice of conviction and certainty. The time, way, and price of discernment often feels like more than we can afford. And yet, discern we must.

The difficulty of spiritual discernment in life is both ancient and newly complicated. People have always struggled to hear God’s voice amid competing voices—but today, those competing voices are more numerous, constant, and persuasive than ever. Here are some key dimensions of the challenge:

1. As already mentioned, we have the noise and distraction of contemporary life. Silence and thoughtful reflection – once viewed as the spiritual soil out of which right discernment arose – is increasingly difficult to embrace.

2. In our North American, Western European world we prize individualism, self-determination, we have embraced a you do you mindset that struggles with the idea that there is something greater than ourselves and we are accountable to that greater thing. That sometimes makes it hard to push beyond our wants to God’s leading. Genuine discernment does not ask, “What do I want?”, but instead “What is God asking of me?”

3. In our pluralistic, post-modern culture moral boundaries and spiritual frameworks blur. The great heresy of post-modernity, the only absolute is that there are no absolutes, there are no absolutely good, just, or holy things to which we are accountable. The fear of being called “judgmental” mutes the human courage to name something as right in God’s eyes and thus worth pursuing.

4. We live in increasingly fragmented communities. Discernment is best exercised within the company of trusted and respected others who can serve as valued guides with whom we can test our wildest ideas.

5. We live in a world of spiritual consumerism where we can sample or test faith communities and teachings against our own personal preferences. Those preferences may be rooted in nothing more than what makes us happy, satisfied, comfortable, or content.

6. We live in a fast world, but discernment is often a slow process. Personal and public timeframes clash and while our culture rewards quick answers, yet God rarely shouts. Divine guidance often arrives in hints, gentle nudges, quiet discomforts, or strange circumstances that invite thoughtfulness and reflection.

All of these things work against the development of a consistent, eternal process of spiritual discernment that really works for us. And yet, the ability to spiritually discern is a critical ability for us. We need to resist the temptation to settle for what is expedient, what is convenient, or comfortable.

We need to recognize that over the last 2,000 years, the church has developed tools, developed ways of strengthening our discernment capabilities. We ignore this wisdom as an act of contemporary arrogance and at our own peril. These disciplines have been sharpened over time and can be expressed in contemporary language and form that make them more accessible.

I am told that when banks train tellers to recognize counterfeit bills, they don’t hand them stacks of fakes. Instead, they spend hours handling genuine currency — feeling its texture, studying its details, and noticing its features. The tellers become so familiar with the real thing that when a fake bill passes through their hands, something feels “off” immediately.

Spiritual discernment works the same way. The more we handle what is true — God’s Word, prayer, and the character of Christ, these disciplines of spiritual discernment— the more easily we recognize what isn’t. The better we are at dedicating time to spiritual discernment, the more likely we are to recognize the true voice or leading of God versus those things masquerading as divine wisdom in our lives.

The definitive work on spiritual disciplines, at least in the last 100 years is Richard Foster’s book, “Celebration of Discipline.” In that book, divided into 3 categories – Inward, Outward, and Corporate Disciplines – Foster identifies 13 disciplines, thirteen activities that serve as the identifiers of God’s direction in our path to spiritual growth and discernment.

Before I briefly introduce them, let me say a little bit about time and how we try to incorporate particular spiritual disciplines into our lives. One of the most precious commodities of contemporary life is time. Time. There never seems to be enough time that we can dedicate to the important things of our lives.

We look at those who practice the disciplines of spiritual discernment, and we marvel at the time they dedicate to this commitment. We look at their commitment of time – often starting and/or ending their day with hours of study, reflection, and prayer and we think we need to START with a similar time commitment.

Friends, the commitment is not to time, the commitment is to spiritual behaviors that empower discernment. If we overcommit on time - before we even begin to see the benefits of spiritual disciplines in our lives - we are doomed to failure. Be realistic. Start small. 5 minutes in the morning. 10 minutes in the evening. Start with a time commitment that you know you can maintain. At the beginning, faithful obedience to your time commitment is every bit as important as the selected discipline. God will use and bless whatever time you allot.

Foster, in his book, starts with Inward Disciplines, proceeds through Outward Disciplines, and finishes with what he calls Corporate Disciplines. For our purposes, and to facilitate long-term growth, I want to begin with the Corporate Disciplines. The Corporate, or Public, or Family Disciplines are Confession, Worship, Guidance, and Celebration.

Confession, Worship, Guidance and Celebration take seriously the notion that as believers we are a people, a family, a united entity. These Family Disciplines are the antidote to the radical individualism that is at the center of our contemporary world. These disciplines address the overwhelming loneliness that so many of us voice.

When God led Israel through the wilderness, on a national journey of discovery and spiritual discernment, God led a faith family. Participation in that family is the starting place of spiritual discernment.

Once ongoing, committed participation in Family Disciplines is established we then move to Inward Disciplines. So much of our life is reactionary. So much of our life is in response to the storms that swirl around us. The Inward Spiritual Disciplines of Meditation or Thoughtfulness, Prayer, Fasting, and Study are the historic disciplines that ask us to stop, be still, know that there is a God in heaven and we are not that God.

Inward Disciplines call us to intentionality. Inward Disciplines call us to spiritual purpose. Inward Disciplines exist in many different forms – there is more than one way to pray. We don’t have to be on a mountaintop or desert to reflect deeply. The study of God’s word can be done alone, in person, through books, music, or poetry. Prayer can be spoken, written, on your knees or in your car.

Inward Disciplines fine tune our individual receivers so that we can hear the voice of God – clearly, directly, in ways that can transform our souls. But start slowly. A few minutes with a verse or two, a few minutes with a podcast, or prayer can be the beginning of reclaiming time for spiritual discernment and intentionality.

Finally, Foster writes about Outward Disciplines – the disciplines of simplicity, solitude, submission, and service. These disciplines move us to reclaim ownership and purpose for our waking moments. These Outward Disciplines call us to claim our own path, our own levels of complexity instead of being forced down the public road of mindlessness like a bunch of soulless lemmings. Far too many of us live needlessly complicated, materially defined, self-centered and self-serving lives. We are alone in the crowds; we are adrift in a sea of humanity. The Outward Disciplines of simplicity, solitude, submission, and service help us find ourselves in God’s service.

How do we know that we are on the right track? How do we know that our spiritual time is well spent? Where do we gain encouragement from this radical reclaiming of our lives? Let me offer a simple set of possibilities.

First, where do we see the Holy Spirit at work? Where do we see spiritual resolutions to earthly problems? I would suggest that once we start seeing life through a lens that identifies the actions of God through the work of the Holy Spirit, we will see divine affirmation of our commitment to lead lives of spiritual discernment.

Second, what are the results of our new spiritual discernment commitments? Galatians 5 tells us that the fruits of the Spirit are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Spiritual discernment leads - not to chaos - but to a spiritual order, spiritual direction, spiritual peace.

The challenge is to discern those spiritual disciplines that are lifegiving – for you. It will not be the same for every person. We must be free to let these disciplines have their way with us, but we must also avoid the temptation of turning them into rites or rules or rituals that lose their transformative power.

Foster finishes the introduction to his book like this:

“Our world is hungry for genuinely changed people. Leo Tolstoy observes, ‘Everybody thinks of changing humanity, and nobody thinks of changing himself.’” Foster finishes: “let us be among those who believe that the inner transformation of our lives is a goal worthy of our best effort.”

Spiritual Disciplines that lead to faithful discernment. Let it begin here. Let it begin now. Amen.