I would say I feel most connected to God when I'm in community, whether that be at church or in a small group, and we're together, focused on him, discussing him. So I would say I feel most connected to God when I am outside just observing nature. I feel most connected to God when I'm listening or even singing praise and worship songs. Well, how do you best connect with God? Maybe your faith is inspired by beautiful art or maybe a song like we heard there. Or you love God by serving others. Or perhaps you find great meaning and strength through church and spiritual traditions.
We're going to explore all of these and more today on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. I'm John Fuller, and Jim, I wonder what happens when you take diverse people who experience God in all sorts of different ways and put them together in a room. The quiet devotional ones and then the loud rejoicing ones.
Yes, I think you end up with 60,000 denominations. That's kind of what happens with that. But it is interesting that we do kind of have different temperaments that bend us in a different direction, maybe where we're comfortable in our worship and our connection with God. And we do. We do get kind of dogmatic about the way it should be done. And you just think of the way marriage works. We tend to marry opposites. Jean is an introvert scientist.
I'm more a marketing guy on the extrovert scale. And it's true of our worship too. I could see that so clearly. She likes really structured worship. She wants to go 10 minutes this way with song and five minutes of prayer and now let's get to the kids' devotional. I'm like, let's just do it in the car on the way to church. So it's just so fun to see that. And hopefully we could look at it that way and understanding how we're wired, how the Lord has provided our temperament in a way to worship him is key.
And then being able to do it. So I'm looking forward to this discussion today with one of our favorite guests. Yes, Gary Thomas is a great friend. He's a neighbor now living in the Denver area.
He's back with us. Gary is part of the teaching team at Cherry Hills Community Church in Highlands Ranch. He's a prolific author and speaker and he's written more than 25 books. We're covering the content of one of those today called Sacred Pathways, Nine Ways to Connect with God. It's a wonderful resource and we'll encourage you to get a copy. We have details here at the ministry.
Look in the show notes for the details. Gary, welcome back to Focus. Hi, this is like home away from home, guys. It's always great to be back.
That's so fun. Let me ask you this. I'm thinking it's quite a statement to say Sacred Pathways, Nine Ways to Connect with God. Were you ever worried in the middle of the night the Lord would say, Gary, there's 10.
Gary, you missed one. You know, one of the reasons I love talking about this is it's a gift to a person in that we're always looking to our spouse for affirmation or our kids or the world at large. And God is the only place where we can get it.
So this is something that delights people. But what hits me is it also delights God when we take an effort to get to know him. James 4-8 says, draw near to God and he will draw near to you. That's talking to Christians. You look at it in context.
He's just saying, take a step in my way and I'm just going to pull you in. What strikes me, the relational nature of our God, the first question God ever asked. You guys probably know where I'm going, but Adam had sinned and it wasn't just a little thing. Everything was changed. God created a perfect world. Everything was set up so perfectly. And the minute Adam sinned, God knows what's going to happen.
The wars, the murders, the theft, the abuse. And then I think God knew what it meant. The father looks at the son, the son looks at the father and they know the terrible cost that's going to happen because of what Adam did. And I'm just thinking, you know, we're all parents, fathers.
You could run in. And the first question that come out of our minds is, what have you done or do you have any idea what this is going to cost me? And instead, God's first question to Adam was, where are you? Why are you hiding from me?
And it's not information. God knew where Adam was. He didn't say, hey, angels want to go out and do a posse.
We got to figure out where Adam. It was a relational statement to us. Even when we really blow it, God is most concerned about the relationship. Come back to me.
Draw near to me. And that that's God's first question tells me one of the biggest studies of our lives should be, how do we connect to this God who so passionately wants to connect with us? Yeah, that's a good statement. But here's the question.
What's really hard is how we get into this one size shouldn't fit all. And it's what divides us so often about how we do worship, how we connect with God, how we commune with them. And we end up breaking down into these groups. And if you don't do it our way, you're not doing it the right way. That's really the opening comment. That's what you've written about here.
Yeah. Well, we preach our preference and we act like there is just one way. And what I found and I hope God has mercy on young men that I was discipling in college is that we then turn it into an obligation. Or here's how you connect with God.
And in college, I had it down. You wake up at this time. You do this. This is how you pray. This is how you study scripture. Start in the morning.
Yeah, exactly what you have to do. And when you take this incredible opportunity that the God of the universe who loves us like nobody else loves us, who we were made to love, and then we make it an obligation, like have you taken your vitamins today? Have you done your exercise today? Have you met with God today? We're completely missing the opportunity. And so it's not the who, it's the how. The reason it feels like an obligation is we're trying to have people connect with God in a way that doesn't fit how God made them. But if we can teach them how to relate to God in the way he made them, it's going to be like, I get to meet with God today. And if life happens and they're not able to do it, at the end of the day, rather than feeling guilty, they'll feel like, I missed it.
But I got tomorrow. Yeah. And I, you know, reading the material, reading the book, this idea that we're living on a starvation diet. Yes. Man, that caught my attention. Like, back to your point about, you know, just having it regimented.
Yes. But speak to that. That really convicted me, this starvation diet when it comes to communing with God.
It's all about keeping the presence and affirmation of God flowing through our lives. Jack Sanford grew up in New England. He had an old, old family farm that had a well that had served his family for generations. And when they modernized the farm, they brought in electricity and plumbing and whatnot. They stopped up the well and kept it for emergencies. But now they had plumbing. But whenever the kids would gather in the whole family, he would just brag, oh, man, you've never tasted water like this well water. And so finally one of them called him out.
Well, let's go taste it. He goes, oh, this is going to be great. So he unstops the well. He drops down a bucket and pulls up nothing. Now, that well had served his family for generations through the worst droughts, the worst things you can imagine.
So he goes into the locals and says, what's up with this? It never ran dry. And they explained that in New England, that part of New England, the wells are fed by hundreds of tiny underground rivulets. As long as water is being drawn from them, the holes stay open and that well will never run out. But if you stop drawing water from the well, the rivulets fill up and the well goes dry.
Wow. And I found that with our hearts, the more we draw from God, the more his presence is dynamic and filling and affirming. And we want more of it. You get a taste of God and you want more of God. You get too busy and distracted, you start to get by with just a little bit of God. And that's not too far from stopping up the well together.
And then it becomes an obligation and you're not really getting hardly anything from God. That's really, really good. I understand this idea of different ways to connect with God became an issue for you and your wife, Lisa. I always like asking these questions.
You wrote about it, so it's true game, right? You know, this is when you're dating in college, so we could start there with this contrast. Yeah, that was funny. Lisa, what happened?
Well, look, I fell in love with, like you said with Jean, who I love more than life and was exactly opposite for me in so many ways. What we thought constituted food. I grew up the junk food junkie.
She grew up in a family that ate 100 percent whole wheat bread and things that grow, stuff like that. And then our schedules were so different. I was convinced back then you had to get up and have your quiet time first thing. And it had to be early. God's a busy God. If you're sleeping in past seven, he might be running China or Russia or something.
And so that's what I did. And Lisa is not a morning person. So even in college, she had an eight o'clock class. She'd roll out of bed at seven thirty, brush her hair and teeth, go to classes and come back.
And she loves to be in the sun. And you could go up onto the roof of the dorm back then, lay in the sun with her Bible. And she called it a quiet time. And in the flirty way college students do, I said, Lisa, come on.
Who goes up onto the roof at noontime, lays in the sun and calls that a quiet time? She couldn't say anything, but two weeks went by and I hear this knock on my dorm room door. I open it up and Lisa's got this smile on her face. She goes to my Bible, opens it up to Acts chapter 10, verse nine. And I read these words about noon the following day, Peter went up on the roof to pray. And she actually initialed it.
If you go to my old Bible, there's LRE because her last name was Eli, not Thomas yet. And it was just like, it really kind of opened up my eyes to not being quite so judgmental. Because here's the thing, I knew Lisa loved the Lord and I knew God spoke to her.
I wouldn't have fallen in love with her if he hadn't. But it helped me realize, but that doesn't mean we're going to have the same kind of devotional styles or the same kind of quiet times, even at the same time of the day or in the same place or doing the same thing. It was, it really was an eye-opening moment for me. Yeah, it's so good. It's so specific at noon on the rooftop. I don't know if I can answer something like this. What are the odds of that?
I love her spunk. That's so funny. One of the concerns, obviously, is how do we know that our spiritual temperament or our favorite form of worship toward the Lord is within orthodoxy? Maybe some people don't think about that, but I think some of the strife within the church is around that.
How do we measure it? What scripture do we use to say, okay, this is within the norms of Christian worship? Well, it's a very valid concern. And I think as a Christian, it all has to go through Jesus. It's about having a relationship with Jesus, not spirituality per se, but with a real living person. And then scripture does give us widely certain things that we're not to do. We're not to consult the dead. We're not to worship after other gods. There are certain things that are prohibited from us because they lead us astray and they lead our hearts astray. But the fascinating thing is while the Old Testament worship is so specific, sprinkle a little of this here, say this here, on this day of the month you do that, on that day of the month you do that, at nighttime you do this and that. I mean, it's very specific in the Old Testament. The New Testament is the exact opposite. It really doesn't give us those directions.
There are a few things, make sure it's in order. People should do this at that time. But as far as individually relating to God, the freedom of the New Testament is astonishing if it's offered through Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit. And so I think, for me, every form of worship needs to be found in scripture, honored by scripture, based on scripture. But scripture gives us a lot of freedom as long as Jesus is our focus. You mentioned four elements in Mark 12-20.
That's a good indicator for us. What did you find in Mark 12-20? Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. Now, this isn't straight exegesis, but I think it's a fair picture of the four elements that are essential for us to relate to God.
Heart, I'm referring to adoration. There should be times when we're not just trying to use God. Would you please do this?
Would you please fix that? There's got to be adoration of God. There's got to be that seeing God in his glory, seeing the beauty of God. We have to shape our hearts so that we love what is lovely, and God is the definition of that. Soul is communication.
I need to talk to God. I need to hear back from God through scripture the solid way, but there's got to be an essence where I lay my request before God. Mind, I need to shape my mind around the word of God. We know scripture is the revealed word of God.
It's his will. We find different ways to get scripture in our life. Some people, they're going to go to the Bible study fellowship with a big room full of people and other teachers.
Some, they're going to have their commentaries and concordances out there. Others will listen to scripture on their way to work. Others will focus on memorizing scripture, but getting the word into our minds is an essential part of following God.
And then strength, and that's important because it's not just about loving God. It's about being sent by God. It's not just relating to God. It's being used by God. So we need to find a different way that God loves us so that we can love others.
It doesn't end with us. We're getting filled up by God so that we can be poured out for others. And, Gary, I love how what you're talking about right there is individual worship and individual connection with God. Talk about the importance of connecting with God in community, especially these days it seems a lot of Christians are saying, I do God by myself. I don't do any connecting with God at church. We're going to talk about nine different ways of connecting with God.
I think we will impoverish ourselves if we have the outdoor chapel of the naturalists, the rock and rolling church of the enthusiasts, the bruised and beaten church of the activists, because we need to learn from each other. God has given us the church where we can expand our understanding of him. And it would be sort of like trying to understand the game of baseball if you only hung around catchers or you stayed in the bullpen and you only talked to pitchers or you only talked to the designated hitter.
You don't have a full understanding of all that baseball involves until you see different ways that people play the game. And I think as a Christian when I can draw from others and not just draw but learn from others and appreciate others, I get a fuller understanding of who God is. And I broaden my own delight in connecting with God and grow in my ability to connect with God. I do think the longer we walk with God, it's like our hearts are awakened, and we can connect to him in ways outside of our pathways. You see all nine pathways in Jesus.
I can see five in David and three or four in Moses. So it's not about putting ourselves into one box. It's really opening up our minds and hearts to connect to God on any number of ways. Gary, we've talked about it.
Let's get it out there. The nine sacred pathways or temperaments that you identify in the book. If you will allow us, we'll post those on the website so people can go look at them because we're going to go this time and next time through the nine. We want to cover them.
But what are the nine pathways that you've identified? The first is the naturalists. Their hearts are awakened to God when they get out of doors, and they're surrounded by all that God has made.
That's John. I do like the outdoors. How can you not be a naturalist in Colorado?
A little more difficult in Houston, cement city, but Colorado leads you that way. The sensates who approach God mainly through the five senses. If you tell a sensate to close your eyes and bow your head, they're likely to fall asleep. They like the majestic architecture. When their senses are awakened, their soul is awakened to God. The traditionalists love God through ritual and symbol. They like to worship God like people have for thousands of years. They may have a rule of prayer. They like symbols that remind them of the faith.
People downplay religion as this awful thing, but religious trappings and symbols and ceremonies can be very meaningful to a traditionalist. I mean, it makes their heart and mind come alive. They're the ascetics who seek God in solitude and simplicity. They want to be alone. They want to be quiet. Think of a monk or a nun.
You have the activists. They're drawn to God in the midst of confrontation. They feel closest to God when they're fighting God's battles. So churches where you get petitions signed, where you recruit volunteers, where you get your batteries to be charged up so that you can really connect with God. That sounds like a prophet.
Well, it does. And they need to receive God's affirmation because God may be the only one who loves activists. They're sort of those ones that really get under the saddle. But they serve a purpose is your point.
Yes, absolutely. And then you have the caregivers who love God by loving others. When they show care to others, they feel this special connection with God. I think of Mother Teresa when she said that she was caring for the leprosy patients.
She felt like she was caring for Jesus himself. Franklin Graham told me this when he saw Mother Teresa for the first time, and he was visiting with Bob Pierce. Bob Pierce at the time headed up World Vision. So you have Franklin Graham, who's representing the Billy Graham Association, Evangelistic Association. You have Bob Pierce, World Vision. I mean, these are two...
I mean this in a positive way. Big fat cats from the US, right? I mean, there are a lot of resources, a lot of influence. And they're there to meet with Mother Teresa. And the sister comes out and says, Mother Superior is caring for a man who's dying. She'll be out as soon as he's dead.
And you'd think mostly, I mean, the resource, I mean, they did depend on charity. She'd be out. But if you talk to Mother Teresa, it wasn't like she would be leaving this nameless, faceless man, because that's what he was.
He was taken off the streets of Calcutta to go see Franklin Graham and Bob Pierce. To her, it'd be like leaving Jesus in his moment of need to go see Franklin Graham and Bob Pierce. And for her, there's no competition. She's not going to leave Jesus, regardless of who's there. Because for a caregiver, it's that clear. For them, they sense the presence of Jesus when they're giving care to others. They're the enthusiasts. They tend to be charismatic. They like to worship in groups. They could go to the two- or three-hour worship services.
They never get tired. And they also like to focus on the supernatural. The traditionalist likes things like, okay, offering's being passed at 1034.
All is right with the world. The enthusiasts are thinking, I hope God comes in such a fresh and new way that we don't even get to offering, that everything is blown apart. They like to take spiritual risks.
Lord, let me see somebody today that I don't know. Maybe I give them a gift. Maybe I give them an encouraging word. But that energizes their faith, seeing the supernatural God.
You have the contemplatives, which I'm not using it as the word is used historically, as far as contemplation is an act of meditation. They have an emotional connection to God. For them, prayer is sitting in God's presence. They might even describe it as holding God's hand. The Eastern Orthodox approach to God is experience is above knowledge.
They just want to be with God, which really frustrates the last one. When we talk about the intellectuals, they always want to have something to apply because for an intellectual, you open up their mind to open up their heart. What's something new I can learn and something new I can apply? And so the intellectuals say to the contemplative, well, what did you learn?
I don't know, but I held hands with God. And then what good is that? Now, here's why I love that there is such a difference.
God is so brilliant in this. People often think of caregivers and activists as opposite sides of the spectrum. And in a sense, that's true. But here's what's going on. The activist is confronting evil on a macro scale. Let's stop the evil systems.
Let's stop the evil from happening. The caregiver is caring for the victims of evil on a micro scale, individuals who are hurt by evil. How brilliant of God that he creates people who feel closest to him when they're trying to stop evil at its source, and then he creates people who feel closest to him when they're caring for the victims of evil that hasn't yet been stopped. That's why I don't want the church to be one person. God knows what he's doing that we feel drawn to him as he's building his kingdom on this earth through many different people in many different ways. That's the beauty of this, and this is why the content is so rich and good, and it really helps to understand your temperament in this direction and to, I think, give a bit of leeway for those that feel it differently.
That's the key point you're making. We're going to go a little deeper next time into those nines, so we'll pick that up. But as we end today, you have a concept. You talk about finding your Gethsemane.
Let's cover that and the importance of that and what you mean by that, and then we'll come back next time and dig into the nines so we understand them better. We always talk about Gethsemane at Easter time because it was a place of such drama where Jesus met with his Father before he was betrayed and agreed, okay, I'm going to do this. But the reason Gethsemane has such a big role on Easter week is because it had such a big role in Jesus' life prior to Easter week, and it's the whole point of the pathways. When things are getting real, if your family is breaking up, you're being attacked, a loved one is lost, you're facing doubts, where is the garden you can go to where you know you can connect with God? When you really need to hear from God, you have this pathway that's saying, more often than not, this is where I meet with God. John 18 2 says that Judas knew where he could find Jesus because, Jesus had often met there with his disciples. Jesus didn't have to think, where's Jesus going to be?
He knows things are going down. He says, well, this is where Jesus usually met with us. And so if you look at the history, and there are other verses we don't have time to get into, Jesus knew he would face this challenge alone, and he thought, where can I meet with my Father? This is the moment of his life and his ministry, his whole purpose in coming was about to unfold, but he knew this excruciating isn't a strong enough word.
There isn't a strong enough word in English to describe the torturous hell that Jesus was about to face. And so he needed to connect with his Father, and here is the Garden of Gethsemane. And so I want to say to believers, where is your garden?
When life is getting real, when you've got to step forward in obedience, for some of you, it might be having a guitar in your hand. For others of you, there might be a familiar walk by the creek. For others, it's stealing into a chapel and praying in the quiet. For others, it's taking your Bible by a waterfall. For others of you, there's a special place in your room where maybe you've got candles and pictures and everything set up that reminds you of the presence of God. It's finding that place where you can connect with God, have your spiritual batteries recharged, receive the affirmation of God so that you can go out and do the work of God. That's so good, and Gary, we've just gotten started. There's so much more to cover, and I do want to come back next time and dig into those nine types. I hope for you, what you're hearing is how we want to help you develop your relationship with the Lord.
That's the bottom line. Whether you're watching on YouTube or listening on the radio or podcast, however you're getting focused on the family. But this is part of our goal, is to help develop your Christian faith. And partnering with Gary here with this great book, Sacred Pathways, Nine Ways to Connect with God, is a wonderful tool. Make a monthly pledge of any amount, and we'll get it out to you right away as our way of saying thanks for helping us strengthen and equip others to grow in their faith. That's a big part of what we do here at Focus on the Family, evangelism and discipleship. And I want to invite you to be part of our faith-building team.
Make a monthly pledge or send a one-time gift today. Gary, thanks again for being with us. My pleasure. Let's come back and we'll keep digging. Looking forward to it.
And we did a really quick dive there into the nine. We've got that list posted, and then for a deeper look, go ahead and get a copy of this book from Gary called Sacred Pathways, Nine Ways to Connect with God. Give us a call. Our number is 800, the letter A and the word family, or you can donate generously online.
We've got the details in the show notes. On behalf of the entire team, thanks for joining us today for Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. I'm John Fuller inviting you back as we continue the conversation with Gary Thomas and once again help you and your family thrive in Christ. Are you a pastor? Then you know ministry is full of challenges.
But those challenges sometimes come from lies that you believe about your role and expectations of you. As a pastor, you and your spouse need to be refreshed and encouraged. And that's why Focus on the Family presents the Focused Pastor Couples Conference. Join us as we hear from Paul David Tripp, Dr. Greg Smalley, Ted Cunningham, and more. Mark your calendar to join us on October 28th through 30th right here at Focus on the Family in Colorado Springs. Visit thefocusedpastor.com slash refresh for more details.
