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Spiritual Fitness
By David W. T. Brattston
Sloth or laziness is a sin in itself that can be the source of many kinds of sins of omission. It leads to a decline in spiritual fitness.
The sin of sloth consists of reluctance through sluggishness of soul to make the effort necessary to perform a good work, either a physical one or a spiritual one, e.g. attending church. The sin of laziness or sloth also occurs when a person is disinclined through inertia to make the exertion necessary to maintain a good relationship with God.
Americans today tend to overlook the sinfulness of sloth or laziness. So many labor-saving devices and service industries are available and willing to perform so many kinds of tasks that Christians are tempted to regard the spiritual life and friendship with God to be just another part of life that we can leave to tradesmen, professionals, or machines. This was not so for the earliest, work-ridden Christians, who were far closer than we are to the culture, mind-set, and daily concerns of Jesus and the apostles.
In the New Testament, the first generation of such Christians clearly spoke against unwillingness to exert effort to maintain friendship with God through good works. The Apostle Paul exhorted Christians, “Let us not become weary in doing good” (Galatians 6:9) and “never tire in doing what is right” (2 Thessalonians 3:13). The Letter to the Hebrews was written partly so its readers would not be “lazy in imitating those who through faith and patience inherit what has been promised” (6:12). Hebrews also teaches that people obtain maturity in the Christian life “who by constant use have trained themselves” (5:14). Thus, Christian life requires practice, i.e. effort, and repeated effort. Paul even commanded believers to “keep away from every brother who is idle and does not live according to the teaching [or tradition] you received from us” (2 Thessalonians 3:6).
The tradition to which Paul referred was partly written down by the earliest generations of Christians after him. We should look at what these early believers said about sloth because, like the New Testament, their teachings were descended from Christ or the apostles while they were still fresh in Christian memory. The value of such traditions about sloth and the practice of godliness in these ancient writings is not confined to Roman Catholics, for they were recorded at a time before the division into modern-day denominations, at a time when most Christians today believe the Holy Spirit was guiding the church.
The second generation of Christian writers, the first successors of the apostles and the authors of the Bible, produced two long epistles touching on the sin of spiritual laziness. So many early Christians held these letters in such high regard that they were included in some copies of the New Testament. One of them, The First Epistle of Clement, was written toward the middle or end of the first century A.D. The Epistle condemns being “slothful in well-doing” and reproves those who “cease in the practice of love.” The next chapter exhorts readers to “be prompt in the practice of well-doing” and “be not lazy or slothful in any good work.” Note again that “practice” is necessary: Christians must work repeatedly to gain virtue and godliness.
Written sometime between A.D. 70 and 132, The Epistle of Barnabas contains a passage on what is necessary for progressing in or maintaining a Christian life:
Thou shalt love, as the apple of thine eye, every one that speaketh to thee the word of the Lord. Thou shalt remember the day of judgment, night and day. Thou shalt seek out every day the faces of the saints, either by word examining them, and going to exhort them, and meditating on how to save a soul by the word, or by thy hands thou shalt labour for the redemption of thy sins.
We are to pursue godliness or the Christian life in conjunction with local ministers and churches, always remembering God will one day judge us. Note especially “by thy hands thou shalt labour for the redemption of thy sins”: in this time so close to the apostles, godliness, or spiritual fitness, was not regarded as easy or to be attended to at leisure but was seen regarding hard, constant effort.
About a century later came the church father Origen. The leading teacher of the early Greek-speaking church, his knowledge of our faith was so great that bishops throughout the eastern Mediterranean consulted him. Origen also taught that hard, positive effort is necessary to maintain progress in the Christian life. In his Homilies on Luke and his Commentary on Romans he told his audience to work hard to be free from sinfulness, exerting hard work and sweat. The sincere Christian must engage in constant practice and vigilance because progress in the spiritual life does not come to the slothful or inactive. He warned that grace from God could be compromised through negligence of mind and laziness of life.
Origen’s Homilies on Joshua touches on the natural inclination to spiritual inertia and its role in the sin of sloth. Progress in Christian commitment and overcoming sin do not come if we are lazy or drowsy. Weak Christians are slack and sluggish; they should stir up their idle and neglectful spirits in order to practice godliness and the other precepts of the gospel. His Homilies on Genesis condemns laziness of mind and sluggishness of soul accompanied by bodily lusts and pleasures.
These early authors, those whose importance is generally recognized by Christians of most denominations today, were united in affirming that exertion is necessary for performing good works and maintaining friendship with God, and that constant practice is necessary in the Christian life. Another term for these is godliness, of which 1 Timothy 4.7f says: “train yourself to be godly. For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come.”
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