Philippians 4:9 Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me-put into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.
Every expert in a field has done some practice in the past and is still doing it. A lot of times, the word practice is seen to be needed in sports discipline or maybe music or learning skills such as sewing, cooking, swimming, etc. But God also expects practice from us. And this practice entails our faith. The Bible says in James 2:17 that Faith without works is dead. Hence, our faith must be accompanied by actions.
As I searched for the meaning of the word Practice, I saw things like:
- The application or use of an idea, or belief as opposed to theory.
- The habitual way of doing something.
- To perform an activity in order to improve one’s proficiency.
Looking at these three definitions, we see the application of a belief. So if we truly believe in God, it must show. We must put the principles we know, to use. It’s not enough to just know.
Doing what you know is key and that is the practice the opening scripture talks about. Practicing must be genuine because Matthew 6:1 says, Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven. You don’t want to come off as doing things because others are watching you. Outside of their watch, what do you do?
I came up with an acronym for practice:
Proactive Rehearsal And Commitment To Incessant Challenging Exercises.
Proactivity is basically making things happen instead of waiting for things to happen. So you want to think and do things ahead of time. You don’t want to be caught up in an embarrassing situation before you learn but rather do the learning now and get it over and done with.
2 Timothy 2:15 says Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth.
A rehearsal is a trial performance before public display. So for anyone who has succeeded in any field, there were moments they did practice in privacy when no one was around, and then by the time they came out to display, people were marveled.
Remember that when David was killing the lion and bear, there was no one but when He finally got to display his ability with Goliath as an experiment, He blew the minds of people.
Practice also requires commitment. Dedication to a cause is important. No matter what it takes, you want to win the trophy just like a sportsperson. The honor you have in view at the end of the day should motivate you to keep the faith. Paul mentioned in 2 Timothy 4:7 that he had fought the fight and won the race because there was definitely a prize to be won. But before the prize, was the price he had to pay: Practicing the faith.
Incessant describes how unceasing, continual and consistent we must be in the practice of our faith. Because we sow what we reap, we must continually sow and nurture the seed to see it bear fruit.
Challenging exercises… Practicing anything is challenging. If it’s not challenging, then it’s not supposed to be practiced. But thanks to God we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us.
The Word In Clarity 