My Praxy Ran Over Your Doxy

I think balance is one of the key ingredients to a vibrant life in Christ. It seems there's a natural dichotomy in the teachings of Christ: flesh and Spirit, dark and light, wheat and tares, sheep and goats. Those are easy. I think James' faith and action is what's hard. You see, one hand we need to have orthodoxy - right beliefs. But, we also need orthopraxy - right actions.

The modern church relies heavily on orthodoxy, but I have found has little use for orthopraxy. In an attempt to make disciples, we standardized a process, leaving no room for individual expression or experience. You are taught by someone more learned than you, you soak it in, quote it back, and a titled "mature". The action side of things was relegated to being an usher or passing out bulletins.

Don't get me wrong, I think having some sort of process allows people to understand what growth and development looks like. Unfortunately, it doesn't look the same for everyone. So, how do we develop a process without the process?

Well, Jesus often had times of teaching, followed by an opportunity to live it out. Afterwards, he would ask the disciples questions, help them break it down and gain some true understanding. I looked a lot like my college chemistry class. We learned about titration, knew the formulas, then had to do it. Then we learned it was a lot harder than what we first thought. (By the way, I got an A in the theory side of things, and a D on the labs).

This idea of coaching, of taking personal experiences as a teaching opportunity, of self-discovery and understanding, of intentional discipleship, is the realm I've grown the most in. And I'm hoping to develop something that will help others in this too. A little bit of doxy, a little bit of praxy, and a whole lot of growth. On paper it looks great. Now I'm working to take it off the page and become something meaningful.