Tag: Discipleship

What I Enjoyed Writing This Year (And What It Did to My Faith)

Camaron G. W. SmithLeave a comment
A minimalist photograph of a vintage black typewriter with a blank sheet of paper inserted, centred against a clean white background, evoking reflection, writing, and the quiet act of putting words to page.

The soft rustle of pages turning, the faint smell of ink on paper, and the gentle glow of a lamp late at night frame this reflection. In these quiet moments, I discovered that this year’s writing is not a “best of” list, but a meditation on how it revealed the quiet, patient ways faith grows when I linger with attention and presence. It is a confession of where my attention lingered, and what that lingering did to my faith.

Looking back over my writing, I see a pattern I never planned. Certain themes kept circling back, like the sun lingering at the edge of morning. This single metaphor captures the persistence and gentle growth of my reflections, allowing the essence of faith’s slow, patient unfolding to shine through.

These are the pieces I enjoyed most. Not for their performance, but their honesty. In writing them, something in me grows.

Following the Winter Sun

Writing “Following the Winter Sun” slowed my pace in a way that theology rarely does. It made me honour the Southern Hemisphere, letting winter, darkness, and diminished light shape my imagination instead of borrowing someone else’s spirituality.

What I valued was resisting the pull of urgency, letting theology breathe with the seasons, and sensing God nearer to decline than to growth.

The winter sun does not conquer the darkness. It traces it faithfully.

That piece taught me faith does not always surge ahead. Sometimes it simply turns, just enough to catch whatever light is offered, without demanding more.

Faith and Mental Health: Part I (and 2)

This was among the most vulnerable things I wrote all year, and I could feel that vulnerability in every keystroke.

Here, I was unflinchingly honest, naming spiritual struggle as exhaustion, trauma, or simply a nervous system doing its best to survive.

Writing this clarified something essential for me:
God is not disappointed by wounded faith.

This piece loosened my hold on language that moralises suffering. It let me speak of faith not as pressure, but as permission—permission to heal, to name pain, to stop pretending obedience can skip over the inner world. It offered a holy act of self-compassion, bridging the gap between theology and psychological care. This is where the language of self-kindness finds its sacred place, encouraging readers to apply it to themselves and embrace their healing journey.

Why Christians Should Celebrate Halloween

I was surprised by how much joy I found in writing this one.

I reclaimed imagination from fear, pushing back against the idea that darkness is only dangerous. I reminded myself, and others, that Christianity knows resurrection and twilight both.

Writing about Halloween became a way to name something larger: the Church’s forgotten gift for sitting with death, mystery, and the in-between. We hurry toward light, rarely learning how to walk through dusk.

This piece reminded me that faith, stripped of imagination, grows anxious. Christ’s victory does not ask us to deny death, but to walk through it unafraid.

Healing Before Obedience

If any piece captured the heart of my year, it was this one.

I loved writing Healing Before Obedience because it finally named what I have seen quietly wound people for years: the belief that God wants compliance more than wholeness.

This was the piece where theology and pastoral concern fully met.

Writing it clarified my conviction: obedience without healing breeds distortion, not holiness. Jesus did not demand alignment first, but restored dignity. Transformation flows from love received, not pressure applied.

This post reframed discipleship for me, not as behaviour to be managed, but as the slow mending of a fragmented inner world in God’s presence.

Advent: Maybe Christ Is Waiting for Us

I loved writing this because it turned the usual script upside down.

Instead of us waiting anxiously for God, Advent became a season where God waits patiently for us—to notice, to arrive, to finally stop outrunning grace.

This piece wove the year together: slowness, attention, presence. God is not a void to be filled, but a presence waiting to be recognized. What if Christ has been waiting all along?

Writing it reminded me that Advent is not suspense, but hospitality.

And that Christ is not late.

What These Pieces Taught Me

Looking back, I see what I was really circling all year:

  • God is not in a hurry.
  • Healing is holy work.
  • Fear is not wisdom.
  • Imagination matters.
  • Faith matures through honesty, not performance.

I enjoyed writing these because they let me breathe, felt like careful truth-telling, and helped me resist the urge to hurry toward answers.

Writing did not tidy up my faith this year.
It made my faith gentler.

For the first time, that gentleness feels like real progress.

Charlie Kirk Wasn’t a Christian Martyr

Camaron G. W. SmithLeave a comment

Probably a political one…

When news spread that Charlie Kirk had died, the internet lit up. Some people grieved, others rejoiced, and many quickly called him a martyr for the faith. Within hours his name was being spoken with reverence, as though he had fallen in defence of Christianity itself.

But as I watched the commentaries roll across my feed, something in me felt unsettled. It was not about politics or even about Charlie Kirk as a person. It was about the word people kept using. Martyr.

That word means something sacred. And when it is used to crown someone who lived and died for political ideals, something in the heart of our faith begins to thin out.

—

What a Christian Martyr Really Is

In the earliest days of the Church, a martyr, from the Greek word martys, was not someone who died for an idea. A martyr was a witness. Someone who refused to stop proclaiming that Jesus Christ is Lord, even when it cost them their life.

Stephen, the first Christian martyr, was stoned to death because he would not renounce the gospel. His last words were not words of rage. They were words of forgiveness. “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.”

The early Christians understood that martyrdom was not about defending a system or a worldview. It was about bearing witness to a love that even death could not silence.

Tertullian once wrote, “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.” He did not mean that violence or victory would build the kingdom. He meant that forgiveness and mercy would.

True martyrdom looks like Jesus. It is not about conquering. It is about giving. It is not about being right. It is about being faithful. When we call someone a Christian martyr, we are saying that their death revealed Christ’s love, that somehow in their dying, heaven’s light broke through the world’s darkness.

When Politics Demands What Religion Once Did

Modern politics is a jealous god. It borrows the language of faith such as devotion, sacrifice and loyalty, and twists them into tools for power.

And like all gods, it demands offerings. It demands martyrs.

When we drape the cross in the flag, we start to confuse the kingdom of God with the ambitions of nations. We start to name enemies where Christ has called us to name neighbours. We turn a symbol of love into a banner for war.

Charlie Kirk’s voice was bold. He stood for what he believed, and many saw that as courage. But faithfulness is not measured by volume or defiance. It is measured by love.

Jesus never told us to take up our rights and follow him. He said, “Take up your cross.”

The gospel does not spread through outrage or dominance. It moves quietly through mercy. The Church does not grow through victory. It grows through love that refuses to die.

A Political Martyr

If Charlie Kirk was a martyr, then he was a political one, a man who gave himself fully to a cause he believed in. There is something deeply human in that. We all long to stand for something bigger than ourselves.

But dying for a cause is not the same as dying for Christ.

To die for a cause is to defend an idea of what is good. To die for Christ is to surrender to the One who is good.

The difference might sound small, but it changes everything.

A political martyr dies fighting enemies. A Christian martyr dies loving them.

A political martyr defends power. A Christian martyr lays it down.

A political martyr hopes their death proves they were right. A Christian martyr hopes it proves that love is real.

When the language of politics takes over the Church, these differences fade. The gospel starts to sound like another campaign, another tribe trying to win. But the story of Jesus is not about winning. It is about dying and rising again. It is about the power of love that does not need to win to transform the world.

And that is what troubles me most. Not that Charlie Kirk died, but that so many Christians can no longer tell the difference between his death and Stephen’s.

The Hunger for Heroes

Maybe it is because we are desperate for heroes.

We scroll through chaos and want someone to believe in. Politicians turn into saviours. Preachers turn into politicians. And people crave clarity in a world that feels uncertain and divided.

It is easier to anoint a martyr for our side than to become a witness of Christ’s love.

But the call of Christ has never been about winning the culture war. It is about loving the world that crucifies us. It is about carrying the cross through the noise and trusting that resurrection still happens in small, hidden ways.

When we forget that, we turn the gospel into a slogan. We trade the mystery of grace for the certainty of outrage.

And maybe that is the deeper sorrow behind Charlie Kirk’s story. Not that one man lived or died in vain, but that so many have mistaken zeal for discipleship and anger for faithfulness.

A Better Witness

To say Charlie Kirk was not a Christian martyr is not to dishonour him. It is to remember what martyrdom truly means. It is to keep sacred what belongs to God and not give it to Caesar.

I grieve his death. I grieve the confusion that made it so easy to sanctify politics in the language of faith. I grieve that we have forgotten how to die without hating those who stand against us.

Perhaps his story can still lead us somewhere better, not toward more division but toward deeper reflection.

Because the world does not need more martyrs for movements. It needs witnesses to love.

It needs people who, when faced with darkness, choose forgiveness instead of fury. People who refuse to mistake power for holiness. People who, like the martyrs of old, live and die bearing the likeness of Christ.

The only martyrdom worth claiming is the one that looks like Jesus, the one that whispers mercy even as it bleeds.

If we can remember that, maybe we will stop crowning our politicians as saints and start learning again what holiness really looks like.

Theological Reflections on Spiritual Formation

scribblingtheologyLeave a comment

Guest Post by Alan P. Stanley

The outcome or ultimate goal of spiritual formation is described in Scripture in a variety of general ways: “righteousness” (Matt 5:20; Eph 4:24), doing the Father’s will (Matt 7:22; 12:50; 1 John 2:17), transformed into Christ’s image (Rom 8:29; 2 Cor 3:18) / God’s image and likeness (Eph 4:24; Col 3:10), holiness (Eph 4:24; 1 Pet 1:15), godliness (1 Tim 2:2; 4:8), obedience (1 Pet 1:14), etc.

Other words or phrases are used to describe the outcome of spiritual formation more specifically: “fruit” (Rom 7:4; Gal 5:22), “works” (Jas 2:14–26), “a new life” (Rom 6:4), “no longer . . . slaves to sin” (Rom 6:6), to “live as Jesus did” (1 John 2:6), etc.

Love as the Umbrella

The ‘umbrella’ word used to describe what all the above terms and phrases are driving at is love (Rom 13:8; 1 Cor 13:13; Gal 5:6, 14; Jas 2:8; 1 Pet 4:8; John 13:34–35; 15:12; 1 John 3:14, 16; 4:7–11).

The reason love is the umbrella word used to describe the spiritually formed life is because every one of God’s commands is an expression of love (Rom 13:9). For it is love that sums up the Law and the Prophets (Matt 7:12; 22:36–40; Rom 13:8–10). Love, in other words, is the defining mark of a Christian.

However, love is not something that we define. Love has been prescribed for us: it is seen in Jesus laying down his life on the cross for us (Rom 5:6–8; John 3:16; 15:13; 1 John 4:10). Hence, to love others, in the way that the Bible thinks about love, is to love as Jesus loved (e.g., John 13:34; 15:12; Eph 5:2, 25).

Beyond Mere Obedience

None of the descriptions in the above two paragraphs can be achieved by merely keeping more laws or commands, regardless of how diligently or sincerely.

Real spiritual formation is not only outward and cannot even be summed up as mere obedience, even committed obedience. Obedience is certainly a way to describe the spiritually formed life, but outward obedience without inward change is nothing more than Pharisaic formation (see, e.g., Matt 15:8; 23:25).

Neither should we think that the above paragraphs describe a sinless state. Spiritual formation is a journey, hence the reason the Christian life is often described as a “walk” (e.g., Eph 4:1). Furthermore, one can be holy, righteous, obedient, bear fruit, etc. without being ‘sinless.’ This is clear from something like the Sermon on the Mount, which essentially describes the surpassing righteous life while at the same time acknowledging the need for forgiveness of sins (Matt 6:12).

Faith and the Spirit

Because spiritual formation is not limited to outward change, no amount of motivation and willpower can produce it. One may as well try and push a camel through the eye of a needle (Matt 19:24).

The two necessary ingredients, if I can call them “ingredients,” for spiritual formation are faith and the Spirit.

The Spirit is essential because spiritual formation is ultimately supernatural and not only beyond our mere human abilities but beyond our inclinations. Furthermore, because spiritual formation is also internal, the Spirit is the only one who is able to go to work in the deepest parts of our being (see Eph 3:16).

Faith (in Christ) is necessary because the Spirit only works through faith (e.g., Gal 3:1–5). This is best seen in Galatians 5, where faith in Christ produces love (Gal 5:6), but the Spirit also produces love (Gal 5:22). Hence, the righteous will live by faith (Rom 1:17), but it is the Spirit that enables one to live a righteous life (Rom 8:4). Faith produces obedience (Rom 1:5; 16:16; 1 Thess 1:3; Jas 2:14–26) but so too does the Spirit (Rom 7:6; 1 Pet 1:2). Both faith and the Spirit are necessary (Gal 5:5).

We Become What We Worship

To explain this further, the basic principle behind spiritual formation is that we become like what we worship, or in the words of Psalm 115:8, we become like what we have faith in. (Thus, genuine faith and worship cannot be separated).

This is true of those who have faith in idols (e.g., Ps 135:18; Isa 44:9; Jer 2:5), but equally true when talking about Christian spiritual formation. For example, faith in Christ who “loved” us by dying for us (Gal 2:20) produces “love” for others (Gal 5:6).

The principle is best summarised in 2 Corinthians 3:18 where those who behold “the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.” But notice how this happens: through “the Spirit” (2 Cor 3:18).

Such was Moses’ experience who upon seeing the glory of the LORD, “worshipped” (Ex 34:8) and was subsequently transformed (34:29–35). Isaiah, likewise, saw the LORD—described as Jesus’ “glory” in John 12:41—and was transformed (Isa 6).

Thus, when we finally see Christ face to face “we shall be like him” (1 John 3:2). In summary, then, worship of Christ, seeing Christ, faith in Christ leads to transformation. And because one can only worship, see, or have faith through the Spirit, transformation, or spiritual formation is ultimately something that is God’s doing.

But it is only God’s doing in the sense that he is forming himself in us and working to transform every part of us, so that as Paul says, we might “be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God” (Eph 3:19).

The Role of the Heart

The dynamic at work here, briefly, is that our hearts influence our conduct, attitudes and how we live (e.g., Matt 15:18–19), but it is “treasure” that influences our hearts (Matt 6:21).

Treasure is simply that which we worship or trust in; treasure engages our affections. Hence, it is treasure and not law that moves the heart, and it is the heart that determines how we live.

The point is that it is not enough to simply fix or deal with the heart. One must focus the heart on the right treasure, which is Christ and his rule (e.g., Matt 13:44).

This explains why the apostle Paul, for example, resolved to “boast” in and “preach” nothing “except Jesus Christ and him crucified” (1 Cor 2:2; see also Gal 6:14). For in the cross is power to save and transform (1 Cor 1:18—2:5).

In the cross, we see the glory of Christ (John 7:39; 12:16, 23; 17:1, etc.), which among other things means that in the cross we see the full heart and character of the Father revealed in his Son (John 1:14, 18). In short, we are put in contact with treasure, that which we can trust in and worship.

Walking by the Spirit

This gets to the heart of what Paul means by walking by the Spirit. The Spirit’s goal is to glorify Christ (John 15:26; 16:14), and it is only through trusting and treasuring Christ that we have any hope of resisting the desires of the flesh (Rom 8:13; Gal 5:16) in a way that brings glory to God (see also 1 Pet 2:11–12).

Formation Is Not Passive

To put this another way, everyone will experience transformation, but the transformation we will experience will be determined by what we treasure, worship, or trust in.

This process then will happen regardless. This helps explain why spiritual formation is not passive. The person who treasures money or career does not sit idly by waiting for money or their career to change their life. The same is true for those who treasure Christ and the life he offers (see, e.g., Matt 6:33). We do not become transformed people through some kind of divine osmosis.

Effort and Faith

Hence, while God’s “divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through” knowing Christ (2 Pet 1:3), we are also to “make every effort” (2 Pet 1:5, 10; 3:14).

And yet making every effort, as defined by Peter here, is not and cannot be the kind of effort that produces outstanding outward obedience, but with no or little change in the heart.

The rich young ruler serves as a good example. By all accounts, he was a man characterised by effort in his approach toward God’s commandments. However, his effort was powerless to move his heart when asked by Jesus to sell his possessions and give to the poor (Matt 19:16–22).

The kind of effort that Peter is talking about is the effort required to trust in God’s “very great and precious promises,” for it is through these promises that we “participate in the divine nature” (2 Pet 1:4).

Since promises are received by faith, making every effort is to trust that one has been “cleansed from their past sins” (2 Pet 1:9), that is, to grow in grace (2 Pet 1:18), to trust in the sure and reliable Word of God (2 Pet 1:16–21; 3:2), to be vigilant about those that would seek to distort God’s Word and his promises and trust the warnings against those who don’t (2 Pet 2; 3:3–7, 16–17), and to patiently rely in the future restoration of the new heavens and new earth (2 Pet 3:8–15).

Faith Driven Effort

Effort must be driven by faith; otherwise it is powerless. And “everything that does not come from faith is sin” (Rom 14:23).

Faith produced effort will be Spirit or divine produced effort (see, e.g., Phil 2:12–13). For example, if we become like what we trust in or worship, this means that those who trust in idols will lack the ability to speak, see, hear, smell, feel, etc. since that is what idols are like (Ps 115:4–8). In other words, those who trust in idols will lack the ability to “experience”[1] God.

One way to illustrate how this works in spiritual formation is from Hebrews 12:14:

“Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness, no one will see the Lord.”

“Every effort to live in peace,” defined here as “holiness,” is driven by the desire to “see the Lord,” whether that being seeing the Lord in eternity (1 John 3:2) or now (Eph 1:18).

Or Matthew 5:8:

“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.”

Again, the effort required to be pure in heart is driven by the desire to want to see God.

In this way, a number of things from above come together:

  • Faith or trust produces transformation
  • We increasingly “participate in the divine nature” “through” God’s “very great and precious promises”
  • Treasure influences the heart, which in turn affects our actions and attitudes
  • Worship leads to transformation

Spiritual Disciplines

When this is understood, the role of spiritual disciplines (e.g., prayer, reading God’s word, etc.) is understood as various means of serving us in the spiritual formation process.

They serve us in the same way that a phone or cutlery might serve us: they put us in contact with the person on the other end of the phone or with the food on our plate. They are not an end in themselves, and neither do they necessarily define a spiritually formed person.

Clouds are necessary for rain, but the presence of clouds does not mean rain. Similarly, spiritual disciplines are essential as we seek to know Christ, but their presence in our lives by no means indicate a healthy knowledge of Christ. The Pharisees being a case in point.

A Journey of Grace

Life, of course, is not as neat and tidy as the above suggests. Tests are always coming at us, in the form of trials and temptations, to test our faith (Jas 1:2–4; 1 Pet 1:6–7).

They may either rule us, in which case, escape, pleasure and comfort become more of a treasure than clinging to Christ (Luke 8:13–14). Or they may serve us, in which case, clinging to Christ becomes more of a treasure than escaping, pleasure or comfort offers (Rom 5:3–5; Jas 1:2–4).

The reality is that “now we see only a reflection as in a mirror” (1 Cor 13:12), in other words, “what we will be has not yet been made known” (1 John 3:2). But once again, spiritual formation is a journey, and it is a journey of grace.

The ego, because of its need to accomplish and be rewarded, resists grace and unconditional love. Grace effectively puts the ego, think of the “flesh,” out of a job.

But there is power in grace to transform (Titus 2:11–12 cf. 1 Cor 15:10; Acts 11:23 and Isa 6:6–8). In fact, Paul articulates it well by indicating that it is only by experiencing Christ’s unconditional love that we experience “the fullness of God” (Eph 3:17–20), indeed this is the goal of spiritual formation.

Thus, as we experience more of Christ’s grace and love, we become more like what we worship, Christ formed in us, loving others as Christ himself has loved us.

[1] I am using the word “experience” to summarise what idols cannot do in Ps 115:5–7.

By Alan P. Stanley