SPIRITUAL GUIDANCE

Recently, my good friend P**** asked me for some spiritual guidance. (He is an amazing Brussels-based musician, who can play everything from early Baroque harpsichord to Bossa Nova with a 2-3 clave.) After thinking about it a bit, this is what I had to say to him…

Dear P****

I’m really glad you asked me about spiritual guidance. It’s a good thing to ask because we need to know where we are heading in life. A person who doesn’t know where he is going shouldn’t be surprised to arrive where he didn’t want to go. To arrive at a desirable destination, we need guidance and a plan.

Now the thing about spiritual guidance is that it is a bit like health advice. Go to the doctor and say, “Doctor, how can I be healthy?” And the doctor will reply, “Get good sleep, eat a well-balanced diet, exercise regularly, don’t smoke or use drugs, keep alcohol use to a minimum, avoid situations where you may contract infection or disease. Do these things and you’ll be healthy.”

In the same way, ninety-five percent of spiritual guidance consists of basic steps that are the same for everyone. If you do them, it will go well for you, you will be happy, and you will arrive at a good destination. So here are the most important five steps…

SPIRITUAL GUIDANCE STEP #1: PRAY

Pray the Lord’s Prayer—the Our Father—every day with your family. The best time to do it is round the table just before or just after breakfast. It’s also good if you say it together in the evening, after dinner, before you go to bed. Of course, you can add other requests for anything you need afterwards. You can pray it in your own language, Spanish. Or in French for your family. Or maybe Spanish in the morning and French in the evening. But, whatever language you use, the “Our Father” is basic to Christian spirituality. Jesus told us to say it when we pray. He said, “This is how you should pray: Our Father in heaven…” (Matt. 6:9). So if you pray the way Jesus taught, then you and your family will be blessed. Read more about Praying the Lord’s Prayer.

SPRITUAL GUIDANCE STEP #2: READ THE BIBLE

Read the Bible every day. God speaks to us and guides us and tells us how to live through the Bible. You should read the Bible just before you pray the “Our Father”. Your daughter is little, so you should read her children’s Bible with her once a day. But you should also read a real grown-up Bible every day. Perhaps you could read the real Bible in the morning and the children’s Bible before she goes to bed in the evening. Of course, you can vary between Spanish and French, just so long as everyone understands.

In my family, we do it this way:

• Morning: One chapter from the book of Proverbs and another Old Testament reading.
• Evening: One reading from the Psalms and a New Testament reading.

Doing it this way, means we read all through the Bible regularly. It means we all know the Bible, and God can speak to us whenever he wants. You can start reading John’s gospel right here in Spanish, French, or English.

Of course, if you want to understand the Bible better, you can also read it on your own, without your family. It’s very important to read ALL the Bible. Bits of it might be easier to read, like the Gospels and Genesis. But reading it all through means that we get a better view of God’s whole story for history and humankind.

SPIRITUAL GUIDANCE STEP #3: JOIN A CHURCH

Find a Christian community and join it. In other words, you need to find a church where you feel at home and attend there regularly. Churches are important. We need to travel the Royal Road with others who are going in the same direction. So find a church where you are all happy with the language. For your daughter’s sake, find a church with a crêche and a ministry for young people.

Churches can be difficult. They are full of people just like ourselves: sometimes stubborn and opinionated, and not always as holy as they should be. That is what communities are like. But the church is a community that believes in God and in his son Jesus Christ. So you should stick with it.

Of course, if you haven’t been baptized into the Christian faith, you should get baptized, along with your family.

SPIRITUAL GUIDANCE STEP #4: GIVE

Start to give. God encourages us to be generous. He says, “A generous soul will prosper” (Proverbs 11:25). He tells us we should give to support his work. And giving is good for your mental health too. The American psychiatrist Karl Menninger said, “Generous people are rarely mentally-ill people.”

Of course, when you don’t have very much, giving can seem like a burden. But I suggest you start by giving a little. Give, say, €5 a week to your church. If you survive a month like that, then put it up to €10. As you do this, you will find that God will bless your finances and you will have more money available. In that case, keep giving. The ideal target is to give away ten percent of your income, which is the amount the Bible recommends. If you do that, you will find that you will not lack.

You should support your local church. But you can also give to other projects that fund the gospel in other ways, like the Bible Society. It is also good to be generous with your time and your talents.

SPIRITUAL GUIDANCE STEP #5: HOME LIFE

Finally, one should try and conform one’s domestic set-up to the biblical pattern. So, for instance, you should marry Delia [that’s not her real name of course]. She is the mother of your child. You should marry for her sake and for your daughter’s sake. It will make them both happy if they feel like they have a strong and secure home. But it will be good for you too. Marriage mellows a man and teaches him gentleness. God blesses married couples. And it will be good for your wider family. I imagine it would make both your parents proud and happy to see you married.

Marriage is not always easy either. It can be difficult. Men and women are very different. And we all fall short in many ways. But stick with it. The Bible says, “A man must not divorce his wife” (1 Cor. 7:11). And, honestly, looking at people I know, divorce is a very bitter road to take. I always say, “You think marriage is bad? Just try divorce!” So marriage is not always easy. But it’s better than the alternatives. It’s usually better than living your life alone, it’s better than going from one illicit relationship to another, and it’s better than divorce. So get married and stick with it.

SO THAT’S IT

That’s my recipe for spiritual guidance. Five steps to happiness. Five steps to obtaining the blessing of heaven on your life. If you do these five things, you will find that other little things—like which country you should live in, or which work opportunities you should take, or where you should send your children to school—will begin to fall into place. Your life will be easier and blessed all round.

Of course, that doesn’t mean that you will never have troubles. God sends troubles to teach and mature us. But if you do these things, you will have a happier life than if you don’t do them. And in the end, you will receive eternal life.