Being a Christian takes work, I hate to say it, but it does get easier, like building a muscle, preparing to run a marathon, or building good habits.  Paul says ‘be serious and discipline yourselves’ (v.7).  You can look to some Christians who read the Bible daily, pray, have the right ‘Christian’ attitude, who don’t swear, who love others well and think “wow, they’ve got it all together, how do I become like that”, well, just as you can look at an amazing musician and put it down to talent, the truth is, it takes work, discipline, making the right decision a hundred times until it becomes a natural reflex.

A lot of this work either comes because you either need to make a physical change (to get up early to read the Bible you may need to go to be earlier, or not snooze the alarm) or you need to rebuild your neural pathways to change how you react to being treated badly. It’s not natural for someone to put others first but with all these things, the more you do it, the more you are able to do it and the more it becomes second-nature.  There is a quote (not from the Bible) that explains it, “We are what we repeatedly do… therefore excellence is not an act, but a habit." or to put it another way, “we are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.” (2 Corinthians 3:18) - the desire comes from the Spirit, we just need to move our body in the way the spirit wants it to move, that’s a choice of ours and that’s the discipline Paul is talking about.

Afterall, we are disciples of Jesus and the word disciple comes from the word discipline.

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Action:

For a week, do one thing, daily, that you want to become a habit.  Whether it’s reading the Bible, changing your language or not joining in with gossip.  Be ready to explain why you’ve changed if anyone asks, Paul says to do that too.