purchasing or practicing?

16th June 2010 by David Brice

Are you a purchaser or a practicer?

I came across this great article recently by Andy Crouch called From Purchases to Practices. Let me give you a snapshot of what he talks about:

Our society, he says, has become very consumer driven. One of our main ways of trying to find happiness is by purchasing and consuming stuff. Think of the last time you bought some music. There is this buzz that we love which comes from getting something like a new album. Over time, though, the enjoyment of it wears off and to get that same buzz again you have to go and buy something new. In fact, Andy notices that over time approaching life this way and looking for happiness in consuming gradually leads to less and less satisfaction in life.

Compare this to what he calls a life of developing “practices”. This is all about the hard work doing stuff. Think of learning an instrument. It takes heaps of hard work at first with not much joy, but in the long term as you master the instrument there is increasing joy every time pick it up and produce music.

What about being a Christian?

This made me question how I think about being a Christian and what it means to be part of the church. Do I approach this as a “consumer”, just asking the question “what can I get out of it?” Or, do I approach it like the “practicer,” getting active, doing the hard work of developing into the person God wants me to be and being part of God’s mission to the world around me?

When we choose to follow Jesus he certainly promises to bless us, but he also calls us to actively live out the hard life of a Jesus-follower who is on about what God is passionate about. Funnily enough, it is in this hard process of being a disciple that God promises we will find life and joy to the full! (Check out these for example: Mark 8:34–35; John 10:10; Heb 12:2)

How about it…are we purchasers or practicers?

Comments

Julia

June 22, 2010 at 11:44am

Thanks David. Just finished reading Andy's article; a good read. To add to David's reflection: to be a disciple of Jesus, we must be disciplined. We're not a "Christian" buy swiping our credit card, we freely receive God's grace and then work hard at following Jesus' example.

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