A Simple, Helpful Lesson Learned in Don Whitney's Class
by Doug Smith
In the recent course on Biblical Spirituality I took, Dr. Don Whitney showed us how and why we should pray through Scripture. This practice has benefited me greatly, and I have been able to share it with some others. I requested Dr. Whitney's permission to post handouts I have prepared for use in sharing this material, which he has granted.
After Dr. Whitney instructed us on praying through Scripture, he said that if we ever taught this to others we must be sure to do two things:
1) Give people time to pray Scripture themselves.
2) Give time for people to give testimonies about their experience.
This fastens the truth to their minds and hearts better than simply lecturing and moving on to other things. If a person is told how to use a tool, he should then get some practice in utilizing it. People need the experience of praying through Scripture in order to have its advantages driven home to them. As Dr. Whitney put it, many people will be likely to get "hooked" on praying Scripture if you explain how to do it and then let them do it and give testimonies.
Let me explain the handouts. There are three pages I have posted.
I cannot overemphasize the value of praying Scripture. Please contact me at glorygazer@gmail.com if you have any questions about the handouts. For additional information about this practice, I commend to you Dr. Whitney's book Simplify Your Spiritual Life: Spiritual Disciplines for the Overwhelmed (
Handouts for Praying Through Scripture:
Lessons Learned from Biblical Spirituality with Don Whitney
by Doug Smith
Our bodies are not the only component of us that needs exercise. Our spiritual lives can sometimes become too flabby and weak as the result of a lack of discipline in our lives. Recently, I was privileged to get the benefits of several weeks of a spiritual workout, the most intense part being the time I had at a modular course at the Midwest Center for Theological Studies in
The course was book-ended by lectures on 1 Timothy 4:7 and 1 Timothy
The Bible gives us many exercises for godliness and this course covered several of them: the importance of Bible intake, meditation (which focuses on better understanding Scripture so that one may live in obedience to God), prayer, family worship, fasting, silence and solitude, how to approach the Lord's Day, and keeping a journal. These exercises help us to have time with, and grow to be more like, Jesus Christ. We were given the Biblical basis for all the Spiritual Disciplines covered and much practical advice for practicing them.
Our reading assignments also drove home the importance of the Spiritual Disciplines. We were assigned four books: John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, Roger Steer's George Müller Delighted in God, and Dr. Whitney's Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life.
The entire course was quite helpful. All of these disciplines are important. But three things have left a stronger impression than the others.
1) The importance of keeping a spiritual journal
Journaling is not explicitly commanded by Scripture, but it is demonstrated. The book of Lamentations and many of David's Psalms are forms of journals. Church history, while not our authority, confirms for us the value of journals for preserving a record and growing in godliness. Many of the Christians known for their godliness, such as George Whitefield and Jonathan Edwards, kept spiritual journals where they recorded their struggles and progress. David Brainerd's journals have been an encouragement to the missionary cause.
I was impressed with the fact that if I do not record my thoughts and many of my experiences, my children will have no way of knowing about them. I know very little about most of my ancestors because I have no access to any record of their lives or thoughts.
Keeping a journal also helps me chart my spiritual growth. I can look back over what I have written and see how I am progressing in my spiritual life. This motivates me in the other Spiritual Disciplines. It gives me a place to record insights from Scripture and to reflect on what God is doing in my life and what I am learning from Him.
My journal gives me a place to pour out my heart. Writing helps me by providing an outlet for expressing things that I might not be able to express to just anyone.
Dr. Whitney made sure that we understood that keeping a journal did not require daily entries, although we should write with regularity if we want to keep it as a practice. He also emphasized that the right way to do a personal journal is whatever is best for that person. For some it may be typing, but others may do better handwriting it. Even a weblog could have potential for serving as a journal (just to clarify: I make far more entries to my personal journal than to my blog, so they are not the same thing for me). There is no set amount of words one needs to write each time; short entries and long entries may both be appropriate.
2) The delight of silence and solitude
One of our assignments was to spend at least four hours in silence and solitude before the Lord. In other words, we needed to get away from other people and distractions so we could focus on the Lord. We were to spend time praising Him in song, reading His Word, praying through Scripture, meditating on Scripture, journaling, and reading a devotional book of our choice (I chose Joseph Carroll's How to Worship Jesus Christ). We were to do no sermon preparation or studies for class.
This was a time of great refreshment. I wish I could have spent more time this way, and hope to be able to take extended time for silence and solitude at least every several weeks. Much of my time dealt with how worthy our God is of praise. I prayed through Psalm 29 and meditated on Revelation 4:11: "Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created." I spent some time in Revelation 4 and 5 (especially verses 9-14), mainly because of the devotional book dealing with those chapters. I ended my time listening to "Worthy Is the Lamb" and "Amen" from Handel's Messiah and thought about how the glory of that music is nothing to compare with the praises we will give and hear in Heaven for our Lord Jesus Christ. This was a little taste of heaven on earth for me.
3) The blessing of praying through Scripture
Prayer has been an area in which I have struggled much. I have often been frustrated with wandering thoughts. My mind has drifted onto things other than what I was supposed to be focused upon. Sometimes I have felt like I was in "autopilot" mode, praying but not engaged in thinking about what I was saying to God. Praying through Scripture has helped combat these tendencies.
I had heard about praying through Scripture, but had not made it a practice. I came away from the lecture on this topic with a different approach to prayer and a renewed desire to pray. Dr. Whitney shared – very simply – how to pray through passages of Scripture (particularly Psalms) line by line, turning the words of the Bible into praise for God and requests for ourselves and others. This helped me deal with much of the drudgery, coldness, formality, and frustrating repetition and wandering of mind I have suffered from in prayer. It should be no big surprise, but my immediate reflection was that this is like having a real conversation with a real Person (and God is real). I was struck by the realization that we don't have to think of everything to say when we pray. Praying Scripture lets God initiate and carry the conversation – He sets the agenda. He speaks in the Word, we respond in prayer, then He speaks and we respond, and so on. I still have much growth to do, but praying through Scripture has been of more help to me spiritually than anything else I am conscious of.
A spiritual workout was very helpful to me, but I realize that getting in shape does not keep one in shape. There must be continual exercise. Even so, I must continue to practice Spiritual Disciplines. I have to contend with the world, the flesh, and the devil. Each is a formidable enemy to my soul. It is a battle. A soldier must be trained and conditioned to face the conflict, and this course was a great help in reminding me of those things I need to be doing regularly to stay in shape spiritually, so that I may be strong in the Lord and grow to be more like Christ.
If you are interested in more information about these things, I strongly recommend to you Don Whitney's books Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life (chapters covering 10 spiritual disciplines in detail) and Simplify Your Spiritual Life: Spiritual Disciplines for the Overwhelmed (bite size chapters covering various aspects of the Spiritual Disciplines). Also, be sure to visit the Center for Biblical Spirituality at www.BiblicalSpirituality.org.
UPDATE (12/20/07): Here are links to some audio very close to what I was privileged to hear -
From Omaha Bible Church:
Developing Your Spiritual Life by Gazing at Glory:
a Meditation on 2 Corinthians
"But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord,
are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord."
2 Corinthians
In the last two articles, we looked at the need to have our face unveiled like a camera's lenscap needs to be removed (speaking of God's work of converting us), and we saw that we must have sufficient exposure to God's Word to develop properly. In this last article of the series on 2 Corinthians
3. Time must be given for the image to develop.
Proper spiritual development occurs as a progressive change. To be changed and conformed to the image of Christ is a process that takes time. The amount of time it takes for pictures to develop with older cameras compared to modern digital ones is a major difference in those types of technology. There is no instant digital process to immediately make Christians as Christlike as they need to be, apart from that glorious day that is our blessed hope, when believers are changed "in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump" (1 Corinthians 15:51-52). There are no shortcuts to spiritual maturity; no one suddenly attains to sinless perfection in this life. Remember that the apostle Paul wrote of his struggles with indwelling sin in Romans 6 and 7 referring to his experience as a believer.
However, praise be to God, believers do become more Christlike as they behold the glory of God in His Word. The Spirit of the Lord is changing believers "from glory to glory," that is, from one degree of glory to the next, like the stages of a metamorphosis He has activated in us. We are no longer dead in our trespasses and sins (Ephesians 2:1), but we are like men with a deadly disease being reversed by the antidote. The cure has begun its work but full recovery takes time.
Because spiritual development is a progressive change, we must remember that we will never "arrive" in this life. No one reaches a point where he or she can no longer grow as a Christian. This reminds us that we should be teachable as long as we live, and open to change and challenge if clearly instructed from God's Word.
The fact that we can always grow spiritually means we always have something to look forward to. As we continually expose ourselves to the glory of God in His Word with our unveiled face, the indelible stamp of His image on our lives will become more and more obvious as the days and years pass.
So, how does your spiritual life compare to a camera?
Is the lenscap off? In other words, are you converted? Are the words of God a mystery and nonsense to you? Or has God's Spirit unveiled your face? This is everyone's natural condition, because of man's rebellion against God. Although the image of God has been marred and shattered in man, Christ came to redeem us. This sinless One lived a perfect life and died as a substitute for sinners, bearing the punishment we deserved. He rose again from the dead, ascended to heaven and is returning to the earth one day. If the lenscap is still on and all is dark, look to Him for this change that you can never make. You can never turn over enough "new leaves" to make yourself a new creation and raise yourself from spiritual deadness, but the omnipotent God who spoke the world into existence and raises the dead can do this by His Spirit. Turn to the Lord; trust in Jesus Christ the Lord, so that you will know what it is like to have an unveiled face.
Are you receiving sufficient exposure? In other words, are you getting quality and quantity time in God's Word, or just catches glimpses here and there? Be sure you are setting aside a regular, daily time to read God's Word, meditate on it and apply it to your life. There is no spiritual development if you ignore the Word of God, where you see the image that God changes you into. Gaze at His glory in His Word; steadfastly behold it, looking intently to learn what He would teach you.
What does your development show? Are there signs of growth? Are you on an upward path? True Christians, as all living things, will grow. But remember that this growth is a process. Do not compare yourselves to others, but to God's Word, which is the standard. Comparison to those who are not as mature may lead to pride. Comparing yourself with those who are more mature may lead to despair. Comparing yourself to the rule of God's Word will give you an accurate picture whereby you may assess your spiritual development, which should lead, over time, to a growing hatred of sin and a deepening love for God, His Word and His people.
Be sure your lenscap is off, that you are getting proper exposure, and that you are seeing signs of progressive development. May the Lord increase in us our desire to be like Christ, and may He hasten that blessed day "when He shall appear" and "we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is" (1 John 3:2). Until then, may God continually make us more like Christ, as with unveiled faces, we gaze at His glory in His Word.
Last time we noted that the “lenscap must be removed” from our “camera” in order to develop our spiritual life, as we need an open, or unveiled, face in order to see the glory of the Lord. The second thing that we need to remember is that:
2. There must be sufficient exposure to the desired image.
Just as a camera requires adequate exposure to an image in order to properly develop, proper spiritual development requires a steadfast gaze. In other words, we must behold the glory of the Lord. We must fix our eyes and give full attention for a significant period of time.
Where do we look? The thing we focus on is of utmost importance, as we see God in the place that He has clearly and infallibly revealed Himself – in the Bible, which has all that we need for life and godliness (2 Peter 1:3) and is so complete that God’s man can be “perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works” (2 Timothy 3:16-17).
We behold the glory of the Lord “as in a glass.” This means we look into it like we look in a mirror. When one looks into a mirror, if any good is to be done, one pays attention to details. As we look into the Bible to see the glory of God, we want to make sure we are really beholding Him and receiving adequate exposure, otherwise, we will not properly develop. Stealing a glance here and there is not sufficient. In our busy, information-saturated age, we will receive God’s Word like all the other “water” that flows through a pipe and retain little or none of it without an intentional commitment to pay attention. We need to be like plants absorbing nutrients.
George Müller, a man known for his godliness and faith, who was used of the Lord to provide for many orphans in 19th century England and who distributed much helpful literature and preached the Gospel to multitudes, knew what it was to fix a steadfast gaze on the glory of the Lord in His Word.
The first thing I did (early in the morning), after having asked in a few words the Lord’s blessing upon His precious word, was, to begin to meditate on the Word of God, searching, as it were, into every verse to get blessing out of it; not for the sake of preaching on what I had meditated upon; but for the sake of obtaining food for my soul. The result I have found to be almost invariably this, that after a very few minutes my soul has been led to confession, or to thanksgiving, or to intercession, or to supplication; so that, though I did not, as it were, give myself to prayer, but to meditation, yet it turned almost immediately more or less into prayer. . . . With this mode I have likewise combined the being out in the open air for an hour, an hour and a half, or two hours before breakfast, walking about in the fields, and in the summer sitting for a little on the stiles, if I find it too much to walk all the time. I find it very beneficial to my health to walk thus for meditation before breakfast, and am now so in the habit of using up the time for that purpose, that when I get in the open air, I generally take out a New testament of good-sized type, which I carry with me for that purpose, besides my Bible: and I find that I can profitably spend my time in the open air, which formerly was not the case for want of habit. . . . The difference, then, between my former practice and my present one is this. Formerly, when I rose, I began to pray as soon as possible, and generally spent all my time till breakfast in prayer, or almost all the time. . . . But what was the result? I often spent a quarter of an hour, or half an hour, or even an hour on my knees, before being conscious to myself of having derived comfort, encouragement, humbling of soul, etc; and often, after having suffered much from wandering of mind for the first ten minutes, or a quarter of an hour, or even half an hour, I only then really began to pray. I scarcely ever suffer now in this way. For my heart being nourished by the truth, being brought into experimental fellowship with God, I speak to my Father, and to my Friend (vile though I am, and unworthy of it!) about the things that He has brought before me in His precious Word. It often now astonishes me that I did not sooner see this point.
(quoted in Roger Steer, George Müller Delighted in God, published by Christian Focus, 1997, pages 91-92.)
Let us learn from Müller’s example. Only by making time and intentionally spending it in God’s Word can we grow in our spiritual lives. Use a Bible reading plan. Pray through Scripture, line by line. Meditate on it, chewing it as a cow chews the cud, “regurgitating it” throughout the day and freshly going over it again. Memorize it in verses and even in paragraphs, chapters, and whole books. Apply it to your life so that it sticks – obey it. Share it with others. Doing these things will help us to have a steadfast gaze, and, therefore, sufficient exposure to God’s Word.
Let us be sure our lenscap is off and that we are getting adequate exposure to God’s Word.
Steadfastly beholding God in His Word is a sure means to spiritual growth, but things may not move as fast as we always hope, a matter that we will look at in our third and final installment on 2 Corinthians 3:18.
Developing Your Spiritual Life by Gazing at Glory:
a Meditation on 2 Corinthians
"But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord,
are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord."
2 Corinthians
Although electronic digital cameras with their instant results have exploded with popularity, perhaps you still remember or use a camera which requires actual film. These cameras cause an image to be captured as a negative on the film. The film is taken to a photo development lab, where equipment in a darkroom transfers the image from a negative to a positive print. Whereas a digital camera allows you to see an image of the finished picture instantly, you actually have to wait (usually at least an hour) before seeing how film turned out.
Sometimes pictures do not turn out as we expect. Whenever taking a picture with such the film cameras, one would need to ask a few questions if the picture did not turn out as expected. The questions might include: Did I take the lenscap off? Did I give the camera sufficient exposure to the scene I tried to capture? What does the development actually show?
There is an analogy here for our spiritual lives. We are not like digital cameras that produce the image for instant viewing. Rather, we are in a process of development much more akin to the film that had to be developed. God made man in His image, to reflect His glory (Genesis
1. The lenscap must be removed.
Proper spiritual development requires an unveiled face. Paul speaks of an "open" or "unveiled" face. In 2 Corinthians 3, Paul makes use of contrast to bring home his point.
The first contrast is that of the Old to the New Covenant. In the Old Covenant, only a privileged few, such as Moses, beheld God's glory. However, because of the coming of Jesus Christ, the New Covenant offers such beholding to all believers.
The second contrast is that of the veil that exists for those who do not trust Christ with the unveiled faces of believers. The Bible says that the veil that Moses had to place over his face to shield the Israelites from the reflected glory of God continues as a veil over the "reading of the old testament" to this day, unless they turn to the Lord, who takes the veil away in Christ. The Spirit of God accomplishes this through His omnipotent power – the same power that created the world. "For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ" (2 Corinthians 4:6).
So, the first thing to remember in seeking spiritual development is that the lenscap must be taken off. God does this for those who turn to the Lord. He is the one who removes their blindness, gives them life, and shines His glorious light in their hearts. There is absolutely no growth in Christlikeness unless one is converted to trust in the Lord.
What do you think a blind man in a dark room would do if he knew that his sight had been restored? He would desire to get out into the light to see all the things he had been missing. In the same way, when God removes the veil so we can see His glory, we will desire to do so, and that leads to the second thing we must remember for proper spiritual development, which I will take up in my next post.
