I made an appointment to see the Doctor for a specific health concern. But before he came into the examining room, the nurse checked my pulse, blood pressure and a couple other vital signs. If there is a serious problem, it will likely show up in the vital signs, the indicators of over-all health. Let me suggest five vital signs to check to verify a healthy Christian life. As we come to yet another new year, it would be good to have a spiritual check-up.
First: How is Your Spiritual Heart? Your Conscience?
Watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it flow the springs of life [Proverbs 4:23].
Your heart is the center of worship. Sanctify Christ as Lord in your heart [1 Peter 3:15]. Your heart is a little temple, the dwelling place of your God or your idols. Ezekiel 14:4 warns against setting up idols in the heart and indicts the Exodus generation for their heart continually went after their idols [Ezekiel 20:16]. Our hearts instinctively go after something for which we live. We are innately worshipers and desirers. We go after that which gives us meaning, purpose; that which we esteem, honor and worship. The heart is where we obey both the tenth commandment [You shall not covet what is not yours and is forbidden], and the first commandment [You shall nave no other gods before Me].
Your conscience is a moral monitor [Romans 2:15] which assesses the integrity of your commitment to the Lord Jesus. Paul did his best to maintain a blameless conscience both before God and before men [Acts 24:16]. Put a spiritual stethoscope over your conscience. Are you living for Christ or for idols?
Second: How Are Your Spiritual Lungs? Your Prayer Life?
As soon as a baby is born, the doctor clears its lungs and we listen for its first cries. If you are born again, you have an inherent inclination to pray to God as your Father. You have received a spirit of adoption by which we cry out, “Abba! Father!”… In the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words; and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God [Romans 8:15, 26-27]. As those born of the Spirit, we experience a Spirit-prompted compulsion to pray to our heavenly Father, even if all we can do is lie in our cribs and whimper. He yet recognizes the voice of His children and knows their heart’s inner yearnings. Those who are born of the Spirit pray as sure as those who are born of the flesh breathe. How are your spiritual lungs?
When the Lord sought to sooth Ananias’ concerns about his assignment to go to meet Saul the Terrorist from Tarsus, He said, Behold, he is praying [Acts 9:11]. We are to devote ourselves to prayer [Colossians 4:2]. As the Lord considers your private life, domestic life, and ecclesiastical life, can He say of you, Behold, he is praying?
Third: How Is Your Spiritual Digestive System? Your Bible Intake?
Right after the new-born cries, we are eager to see the child begin to feed. I recall watching my first-born placed in his mother’s arms. Without any instruction, he immediately began to feed. How did he know to do that!? He was born hungry and he fed simply because he’s alive. So too, living Christians are hungry for the Word of God. They know, by experience, that man dos not live by bread alone, but man lives by everything that proceeds from the mouth of God [Deuteronomy 8:3b].
In 1 Peter 2:2, Peter tells us that we are to be like newborn babies, longing for the pure milk of the Word. Peter is not describing new converts, but encouraging us to be hungry for the Word throughout the course of our Christian lives. The believer instinctively gravitates to the milk of God’s Word as a newborn instinctively gravitates to its mother’s milk.
I shall delight in Your commandments, which I love. And I shall lift up my hands to Your commandments, which I love; and I will meditate on Your statutes [Psalms 119:47-48]. Our love for Jesus makes us hungry for His Word. Our God has given us a book. Why? To read it. To hear it expounded. To know its contents. To live out its teachings. Jesus asked the Pharisees, Have you not read? If the World is analogous to milk, we can readily understand that our spiritual health can be maintained only as we ingest the Word of God.
Fourth: How Are Your Spiritual Muscles? Your Service?
We can be liable to become cartoonish Christians who have big heads, pot bellies, and little, atrophied arms and legs. We can take in more spiritual calories than we burn up in the exercise of our gifts in ministry. We cannot allow ourselves to be hearers but not doers of the Word [James 1:22].
I’m speaking here about our churchmanship. We need to understand that we are saved and placed by the Spirit in a local church, and equipped with gifts, in order to serve Christ. We serve Christ by being vitally joined with other disciples as a local church and then by ministering to Christ’s brethren as the Church engages in the tasks assigned to it by King Jesus. The church is Christ’s body. God has placed the members, each one of them, in the body, just as He desired [1 Corinthians 12:18]. We should not think of church as we do the YMCA. I go to the Y for my health, not the other guy’s health.
We are all in this together. We are mutually dependent on each other for our respective health and spiritual vitality. This means that we all have a contribution to make. See 1 Corinthians 12:12ff. Now you are Christ’s body, and individually members of it [1 Corinthians 12:27]. We are vitally knit together in the body of Christ, the church [Ephesians 4:11-16]. We are all united to Christ our Head and to each other in His body. We each minster to Christ and minster Christ to each other as we are fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part [Ephesians 4:16].
Fifth: How Are Your Spiritual Vocal Chords? Your Personal Proclamation?
If we are living as subjects of King Jesus, devoted to prayer, growing in our knowledge and implementation of the Word of God as committed churchmen, we will have occasion to explain ourselves to others. Peter tells us that we have been privileged to be God’s people so that we may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called us and that we should always be ready to make a defense to everyone who asks us to give an account for the hope that is in us [1 Peter 2:9; 3:15]. 2016 is dawning on a world full of fear and foreboding. As we express our confidence in Christ’s care and our hope in His return, we will arouse people’s curiosity. How can we have hope in a day like ours?
A healthy Christian has the heart of Christ for others. We cannot be indwelt by the Spirit of Jesus and not have hearts of compassion and evangelistic longing for the lost. But it is our heart for Christ that drives us to tell others about Jesus. We have no greater joy than to see Jesus honored by an increasing number of people. Witnessing is a form of praise that issues into praise.
Conduct yourselves with wisdom toward outsiders, making the most of the opportunity. Let your speech always be with grace, seasoned as it were, with salt, so that you may know how you should respond to each person [Colossians 4:5-6]. Are there people in your life who do not know the gospel? If so, does that concern you? Why are you in their life if not to tell them about Jesus?
An Appeal to be a Healthy Christian
How did your check-up go? How are your vital signs?
Are you willing to pray Psalm 139:23-24? Search me, O God, and know my heart. Try me and know my anxious thoughts. And see if there be any hurtful way in me, and lead me in the everlasting way. Are you willing to be taught by the Spirit and to resolve that you will commit yourself to the personal and corporate disciplines and habits that foster real spiritual health?
An Appeal to be a Christian
Maybe you’ve taken this spiritual check-up and have discovered that you have no vital signs! You do not pray, read your Bible, or intentionally serve Jesus. You could very well be spiritually dead. We don’t send corpses to a doctor for a check-up. You don’t need a doctor. You need a Savior who can raise the dead! You need new life in Christ. You need to turn to Him by faith in repentance and enter 2016 following Him as His disciple.
Maybe you’ve thought about becoming a Christian at some point. It’s 2016! How much longer will He allow you to live in this, the day of salvation? Why not make today, not the first day of the New Year, but the first day of your eternal life with Jesus?