Dead People Walking?

A friend was in our home fidgeting with his new mobile phone. Head down, deeply concentrating on details he saw in his screen,  he walked slowly, albeit purposefully, across the living room still carrying a marginally intelligent conversation"? I quipped, "Dead man walking?," and his broken concentration erupted in laughter. If you have a smart phone....you know the territory.

Then the spiritual truth in the situation broke in on me. How easy it is to get lost in the spiritually distracting demands of a moment, of the week or the month...of my life. All the contemporary important tyrannical stuff subtly inserts itself into my intimate routines; it easily becomes the stuff of life. Ugh.

No cell phone criticism intended here, but in that moment I was curiously reminded how important it is for me to practice the reality of my Spiritual life (Colossians 3:1ff); 

• to consciously and purposefully dedicate myself to disciplined parallel commitments that contextualize today's demanding temporal circumstances (Romans 12: 1-2).
• to appropriately subject myself to the always present and ever jealous availability of our marvelous loving God (I John 5: 21).
• to live in the unfathomable truth that He literally died for me in time and space (John 3:16)!
• to invest myself in the implicit demands that spiritual truth makes on my time and how I use it (Philippians 2: 5-11) .
• to develop the variety of life and spiritual disciplines (virtues) and skills I am commanded to master and humbly practice (Galatians 5:22; I Peter 1: 3-9). 

 Dick