Over the years Christians have developed some common traditions that make significant contributions to spiritual formation. Specifically I am talking about the liturgy and the Christian calendar. Even if you are a part of a church that does not yet do a lot with these tools collectively you can still make use of these patterns personally.
There is not enough time to go deeply into these practices. We can, however, take a quick glance at them. And my hope is that you will become interested enough that you will do more investigation on your own.
To get started I would like you to read from the introduction of Robert Webber's book Ancient-Future Time. In this book he is arguing for the importance of using the Christian calendar but his argument could easily be applied to the liturgical pattern which we will discuss in the next section. Through the practice of the liturgy and the calendar our lives are eventually shaped by the events that they represent.
Here is Dr Webber's personal testimony from the beginning of his book:
Before I develop the theme of ordering the spiritual life through the Christian year, I want to reflect on my previous experience of seeking a way to turn my life into a life with Christ. My impression is that my own floundering experience is common to most of us. Consequently, I suspect you are able to identify with some of the examples from my own experience.Specially, what are we talking about when we refer to the Christian year?
As far back as I can remember I was told that Christ should be at the center of my life. As a child I had a plaque on my bedroom wall that proclaimed, "Only one life, 'twill soon be past; only what's done for Christ will last." A day never went by without seeing these words, without them registering on my life their demanding message and making a lasting impression. This message was reinforced by the church, especially the Sunday-night sings that included songs such as, "Be like Jesus, all day long! I would be like Jesus." I was called into a continuous relationship with Christ, but I was also told that the way to attain spirituality was through the behavior code: "Don't do anything that you would be ashamed to do in front of Jesus, and don't go where you can't take Jesus -- an older version of "What would Jesus do?" Of course these are fine admonitions, and I don't deny their value. But how do you work them out in your life? How can you "be like Jesus"? How is your life a life with Christ?
In the fundamentalist tradition in which I grew up, this meant that you didn't go to the movies, smoke, drink, play cards, tell dirty jokes or hang out with non-Christians. On the positive side it meant that you were to be chaste, honest, obedient, thrifty, and courteous, and you were to work hard at everything. While I now look at this list of do's and don'ts as rather superficial, I do sense and honor what was at work in these instructions. The truth these admonitions sought to teach was the Christian calling to moral uprightness and to the simple and basic virtue of being a good person. Certainly there can be nothing wrong with that message. And when we live by Christian virtue, there is a sense in which we are living with Christ.
As I grew older and attended college and graduate school, my concern to be like Jesus continued to focus on the moral relationship with Jesus, but it grew to include an intellectual pattern of spirituality. For me, being with Jesus became learning to think out of a Christian worldview.
Truths about the origin, meaning, and destiny of life were to inform my worldview and make me a Christian in my mind, in a pattern of my thoughts, and then in my lifestyle. I embraced Jesus as the ultimate source of meaning in life, the one through whom existence was defined. He became the integrating core of my studies, the center for faith and learning, the beginning and end of knowledge. Today I continue to appreciate this emphasis. I confess that Jesus Christ is the cosmic center of the universe, the one in whom all things consist (Col. 1:17-20), the one through whom meaning is derived.
But I still looked for more, much more. What I longed for was something that went deeper than pious ideas on morality or intellectually stimulating thoughts about the meaning of human existence, as good as these were. I wanted something that actualized the pattern of being in Christ. I wanted something that worked in my life, something that brought a realistic spirituality into being. I wanted something that ordered my life into the pattern of Christ's life, death, and resurrection, and coming again.
In the early '70's I came upon an ancient discipline for ordering the Christian life. It is the spiritual disciple of living in the pattern of Jesus' saving life throughout the year: This discipline is so filled with depth and so challenging to the spirit that I feel I have, after a number of years, only begun to scratch the surface of its potential. It has the power to call ethical behavior into conformity with the pattern left us by Jesus. It has the power to construct a view of reality that is thoroughly Christian. But more, it compels us to live, die, and be raised with Christ. Through the discipline of the Christian year we can experience the power of Christ within the community of the church, through its worship and in our lives twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.
Now the question is: How can the discipline of the Christian year do this? How can the Christian year order our entire lives -- our values, worldview, and personal relationships; our struggles with lying, cheating, lust, jealousy, anger, and such; our ambitions and drive for success, material wealth, power, and recognition; our complicity with the hunger, injustice, and pain of the world? How can the discipline of the Christian year lift us up into Christ so that the cry of Paul, "For me to live is Christ" (Phil. 1:21), is fulfilled in greater measure within us? I want to answer that question by looking first at the nature of the Christian year and then showing how the church and its worship is the context for ordering the discipline of a Christian-year spirituality.
At this point you may be saying, "You're attaching too much significance to the Christian year. It is impossible for the discipline of the Christian year to accomplish so much for my spirituality." This objection has validity if the Christian year is seen as an end in itself. However, if we see the Christian year as an instrument through which we may be shaped by God's saving events in Christ, then it is not the Christian year that accomplishes our spiritual pilgrimage but Christ himself who is the very content and meaning of the Christian year.(1)
Every country and culture has special days that have come about over the years to help people keep in touch with the nation's story and to mark the passing of time. For example, I live in the US, and we have lots of special days -- some very serious, some just for fun.
- January 1 -- New Year’s Day
- January 18 -- Martin Luther King, Jr's Birthday (Civil rights leader)
- February 12 -- Abraham Lincoln's Birthday (16th president of the United States)
- February 14 -- Valentine's Day (Remember your love!)
- February 22 -- George Washington’s Birthday (First President of the United States)
- Second Sunday in May -- Mother's Day (Remember your mother!)
- May 31 -- Memorial Day (Remembering those who gave up their lives in wars to secure or maintain freedom in our country)
- Third Sunday of June -- Father's Day (Remember your father!)
- July 4 -- Independence Day (the day when we declared independence from England in 1776)
- First Monday in September -- Labor Day (End of summer season, remembering those who belong to the labor unions)
- October 11 -- Columbus Day (Remembering Christopher Columbus the explorer)
- October 31 -- Halloween (Fun day to pretend that you're scared)
- November 11 -- Veterans' Day (Remembering those who have served in the military)
- Last Thursday of November -- Thanksgiving Day (Remembering to be thankful)
- December 25 -- Christmas Day (Christian celebration of the birth of Christ)
Likewise, we do the same to emphasize what is important in the Christian culture.
In the Old Testament God commanded the ancient Hebrew people to keep certain special days as a means of enhancing their relationship with him. However, there are no commanded holidays in the New Testament. Yet, over the years Christians have found that the calendar is a good way of telling the story of Jesus. Every year we hear the same stories over and over -- and every year we are challenged to live out what is happening on these special days and in these special seasons. Paying attention to the calendar helps people grow closer to Christ. That is what the late Robert Webber was saying in his testimony.
Here are some, but certainly not all, of the days and seasons in the Christian year as kept by churches in the West.(2) (The Eastern Orthodox churches have some similar days but their system is a little different.)
| Season | Emphasis | Spiritual Challenge |
| Advent
| Readiness for the coming of Christ at the end of history and at Bethlehem (the four Sundays before Christmas day). | Repent and be ready for the second coming of Christ. Allow an eager longing for the coming of the Messiah to be birthed in your heart. |
| Christmas | The fulfillment of Israel’s longing. The messiah has come. The prophecies have been fulfilled. The Savior of the world has arrived (from December 25 through January 5). | Embrace an incarnational spirituality. Let Christ be born within in a new way. |
| Epiphany (manifestation) | The manifestation of Jesus to all as Savior not only for the Jews but for the whole world (January 6). | Make a new commitment to allow Jesus to be manifest in and through your life. |
| After Epiphany | A journey with Christ in his ministry as he manifests himself as son of God through signs and wonders (the period after January 6 to the beginning of Lent). | Learn to manifest the life of Christ through the witness of life and deeds. |
| Lent (spring) | A time to travel with Jesus toward his death. Although Jesus is under constant attack, he ministers effectively to the crowds. Lent follows the gathering storms (begins Ash Wednesday, six-and-a-half weeks before Easter; includes Palm Sunday and ends at sunset on Thursday of Holy Week). | Lent is a time for repentance through self-examination and renewal through identification with the journey of Jesus. A time for prayer, fasting, and almsgiving. |
| The Great Triduum
| The most crucial time in the history of salvation. The church recalls in its worship the events of Maundy Thursday and Good Friday. The Great Paschal Vigil of Saturday night concludes with the resurrection Eucharist (the Thursday, Friday, and Saturday of Holy Week). | The three great days are a time for fasting and prayer. We commit to live in the pattern of Jesus’ death and resurrection, the pattern of the life into which we have been baptized. |
| Easter
| A celebration of the great saving event of the death and resurrection of Jesus for the salvation of the world. The most crucial event of the Christian-year spirituality (extends for fifty days after Easter, includes Ascension Day, and ends on Pentecost). | Here is the source of the spiritual life. We are called to die to sin in the death of Jesus and rise to the life of the spirit in resurrection spirituality. |
| After Pentecost | The church is born on Pentecost Sunday with the coming of the Holy Spirit. After Pentecost witnesses the spread of the gospel and the growth and trials of the early church (from Pentecost Sunday to the beginning of Advent – about a six-month period). | A time to embrace the teaching of the church and to go deeper into the truths of Gods saving events in history. |
Dr Webber goes on to further explain the relationship between spiritual growth the Christian calendar:
As we think of our spirituality shaped through the practice of Christian time, it is of utmost importance that we begin with Christ, who is the source of our spirituality and the one who gives meaning to time. Without Christ there could be no Christian time. It is Christ who determines the Christian year; and it's through the practice of Christian-year spirituality that Christ is formed within us.If you would like more information about using the Christian year as a tool in your own spiritual development, or if you would like to encourage its use in your church, here are some online resources:
By Christ I mean the mystery of Christ born, living, dying, and being raised again for the salvation and healing of both creature and creation. Therefore, what gives rise to the Christian year is the paschal mystery (the oldest term used for Easter). The church is called to proclaim continually and act out this central mystery of God's reconciling work in Jesus Christ as it journeys through time from year to year, month to month, day to day, and hour to hour. For this reason the Christian year has been defined by Adolf Adam as "the commemorative celebration, throughout a calendar year, of the saving deeds God accomplished in Jesus Christ."
The saving deeds that God accomplished in Christ are historical events. They are not mythical ideas or powerful stories but true, real, concrete events through which the God of creation acted within history to rescue the fallen world. The very heart, center, and focal point of all God's saving activity is the passion and the resurrection of Christ. Consequently, the very heartbeat of time, the source of meaning and power for the cycle of all time, derives from and returns to the death and resurrection of Christ in which God was uniquely active reconciling us to himself (2 Cor. 5:18). It is Christ in his saving event who is the source, the summit, and the very substance of both objective and subjective spirituality...
Christian-year spirituality is nothing less than the calling to enter by faith into the incarnation, the life and ministry, the death and resurrection of Jesus. God's saving action is not only presented to us through the practice of the Christian year, it also takes up residence within us and transforms us by the saving and healing presence of Christ in our lives. As we enter the saving events of Jesus and especially the paschal mystery in faith, Christ shapes us by the patterns of his own living and dying so that our living and dying in this world is a living and dying in him.
I have found this spirituality to be an endless source of challenge, a rhythm for spiritual awakening and a pattern for a daily dying to the power of evil and rising to the power of Christ. But we are not asked to do this spiritual calling alone. It is a calling for me, for you, and for all God's people that is accomplished in the context of a community -- the church.(3)
SECTION #20 NOTES
(1) Robbert Webber, Ancient-Future Time (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2004) pp. 22-24.
(2) Webber, pp. 16-17
(3) Webber, pp. 24-26
SECTION #20 ASSIGNMENT
1. Describe how the Christian year is currently practiced in your life and in your church. (10 points possible)
2. What steps could you take to practice a Christian year spirituality in your own life, even if your church does not currently observe very much of the Christian calendar? (10 points possible)
3. What difference would it make to your personal spiritual life to practice Christian year spirituality? What difference would it make in the life of your church? (10 points possible)
4. BONUS: Investigate one of the Christian days mentioned -- a special day of which you were previously unaware. Explain its significance in more detail than what was in the chart. Explain the biblical background. (15 points possible)
Again, email your answers to me at bboydston@piu.edu. Write your answers in the email itself -- or if you use a word processor, copy and paste the answers into the email. Make sure that your name, the name which you used to register for this class, appears at the top of the work.
I will respond to you as soon as possible. Do not wait for a response from me before you start working on your next assignment.
