Part 1: Spiritual Discipline Evaluation
In Part 1, evaluate how well you did in implementing your first Spiritual Growth Plan. Honesty is an
important part of this evaluation. Focus on the successes and failures of following through with your first
growth plan and what changes you would make if you were to plan to focus on these again.
Part 2: Battle Strategy
In Part 2, assess how your battle against temptation went over the past few weeks. Were you successful
in overcoming your temptations, or were you overcome with temptation? If you were successful, reflect on
what made you successful here as compared to failures of the past. If you were unsuccessful, focus on
what triggered your capitulation into sin.
Part 3: Spiritual Discipline Plan
Soon, this course will come to an end. Create a spiritual discipline plan for the next month (or, better yet,
the next 12 months). In this plan, identify the spiritual practices you want to implement into your life so
that they become a part of your spiritual habits. This must focus on at least the next month of your life. Be
specific regarding what disciplines you are going to implement, how/when you are going to implement
them, and then when/how you are going to assess whether you have been successful in this
implementation plan.
Spiritual Growth Plan 2
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Spiritual discipline is imperative for any Christian with a strong quest to live a fulfilling
godly lifestyle and achieve the optimum outcome from his faith. It has been part of my weekly
practice to adhere to a spiritual discipline plan for the aim of inculcating a consistent godly
lifestyle and avoiding all manner of temptations. This study provides a brief evaluation of the
achievements I attained while implementing the plan, how I overcame temptations and the plan I
shall use for the next twelve months.
Spiritual Discipline Evaluation
In the entire week while implementing the spiritual discipline plan, I came to realize the
importance of having a consistent personal relationship with God. Spiritual discipline highlighted
to me the beauty of staying attached to the creator of all and learning many things that the Holy
Spirit has to offer to all that are thirsty for Him. My spiritual discipline plan entailed two
activities, which were journaling and a scripture taking. Each day I allocated an hour of prayer
and reading the Word every morning and evening with a quest of making it my personal habit. It
was difficult to adhere to the schedule as I was used to the normal routine of waking up and
preparing for other activities.
Putting God first ahead of my daily activities has made me realize that I achieve more
because He goes ahead of me. In scripture taking, I came across a verse granting the ownership
of day and night to Him; 1 therefore, His importance in leading us every day is unquestionable. I
allowed the Holy Spirit to lead me through scripture taking, which enabled me to have a
satisfying devotion every day. Although I managed to accomplish the devotions almost daily,
some days I slept late and woke up very late making it difficult to have a conducive session. I
1 Holy Bible. Psalms 74:16
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was able to achieve covering up to nine chapters of the scriptures per day, only skipping
devotion on average twice a week. I spent a considerable amount of time, sharing the scripture
with my neighbors and friends during the weekend and in our cell group, which exposed me to
more revelations from other brethren. I would make it clear that it was not smooth sailing as
exhaustion sometimes made it difficult to attain these goals but God enabled me to achieve them.
I also managed to do journaling every day. Journaling is an activity I personally saw as
important since it allowed me to quickly capture insights developed whenever I read the scripture
or reflected on the doings of the Lord in my life. Personal reflections and meditations especially
after my devotions helped me to grow a deep understanding of the purposes of God in my life.
Every day I sought to record at least five things that I consider a blessing in my life. This helped
me to identify what I had taken for granted in my life that God was doing. It is surely surprising
to know what the Lord has done by counting one’s blessings one by one. Implementing the first
plan was difficult because of lack of personal training into being consistent in implementing the
plan. However, it became easier to implement the plan on a daily basis by developing some
discipline in avoiding distractions that would rob me time in the evenings and morning. Some of
these activities included staying out late, sleeping late, oversleeping, and watching television
until late.
Battle Strategy
The ability to overcome temptations is an important step in achieving long-term goals in
life, whether spiritually, academically, economically, or socially. 2 Lack of self-control is a major
setback in establishing a thriving spiritual life that is both fulfilling and successful in the pursuit
2 Fishbach, Ayelet, and Luxi Shen. “The explicit and implicit ways of overcoming temptation.” Pp. 02.
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of godliness. The Bible is clear that temptations that come upon people are due to the evil that
are accustomed to them. 3 It is however important to undergo trials as it helps to build
perseverance in the life of a Christian. The main temptations I identified before the beginning of
my plan was the use of electronics and the social media. I realized I was spending a considerable
amount of time watching television and chatting on social media sites. This was detrimental to
my spiritual walk and especially being consistent in my devotions and prayer.
During the implementation of my plan, I learnt how to allocate time for my evening and
morning devotions by, reducing the time I was using to watch television and accessing social
media sites. I placed a lot of priority on my devotions especially in the evening by deciding to do
my devotions early before doing other things. Social media can also provide a lot of temptation
to a Christian, so I limited the time taken to use the sites. Additionally, I decided to use the sites
to promote spiritual matters by sharing Bible verses and evangelism.
I developed the need to draw satisfaction from the social media by interacting with
friends and catching up with people I have not met for a long time. Using sites like facebook,
whatsapp, and twitter provides a window into getting information concerning what is happening
in the society and people’s views concerning them. However, the devotion plan helped in making
me understand the importance of allocating time to build a relationship with God. Although there
was some great tendency to veer off the quest to remain spiritual, adhering to the spiritual
discipline plan made it easier to overcome temptations. However, I can also say that the Holy
Spirit helped me a lot in realizing this goal as it is not by my strength that I was able to
accomplish this. I also drew a lesson from the Bible, which states that we should draw closer to
God in order to overcome the temptations that the devil throws at us. 4
3 Holy Bible. James 1:14.
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Spiritual Discipline Plan
Reading the scriptures and prayers constitute a very important part of personal devotion.
In my devotions, I have learnt to create notes on what I have learnt, and this has helped me in
developing personal insight on what the Spirit communicates to me on a daily basis. In my new
plan for the next six-month or so, I would like to share with people more about these insights in
order to spread the word of God. I have desired to be active in evangelism so that I may lead
other people to Christ and help them change their lives.
In order to undertake this new plan, I would like to get involved with some brethren in
the church who are consistent in evangelism and become part of them. I believe by surrounding
myself with people who have the heart for the lost will enable me reach out to more people with
the message of truth and helping them in their daily struggle through sharing of a message of
hope. I also need to study the Bible more and my plan shall not rely on my daily devotions but
by taking part in Bible studies with my church’s cell group members.
In the next month going forward, I shall aim to lead at least one person to Christ every
month, while taking part in church activities that optimally capitalizes on my faith and ability.
Having a great intimacy with God can overflow into a personal action and lead to someone
reaching out to others as an expression of this intimacy. 5 I believe by putting action into my faith,
I shall not only be alive to the working of God in my life but also to hearing from Him even
more.
Bibliography
4 Holy Bible. James 4:7
5 Campolo, Tony. The God of Intimacy and Action: Reconnecting ancient spiritual practices, evangelism and justice.pp. 17.
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Bible, Holy. “King James Version.” Texas: National Publishing Company(2000).
Campolo, Tony. The God of Intimacy and Action: Reconnecting ancient spiritual practices,
evangelism and justice. SPCK, 2013.
Fishbach, Ayelet, and Luxi Shen. “The explicit and implicit ways of overcoming
temptation.” Dual process theories in the social mind (2014): 454-467.
