Your Spiritual Type And Your Shadow Side

Spiritual formation is a lifelong process. It’s simple and at the same time is constantly rooting deeper into our lives and affecting all areas of ourselves.

But it can be overcomplicated when we try to make rules that work for us apply to everyone like daily devotionals have to be done at 5:00 a.m. or prayer must be so long or church is only right if you feel God like “THIS.”

But how we practice spiritual disciplines and how we end up growing from them to conform to Christ’s image will look different from one person to the next. When we look at the Bible, we see God created us to be part of a larger body where we each show different characteristics and preferences and gifts to glorify God. We each struggle differently. We each love and feel love differently.

As we try to get a grip on how our personality, gifts, and stories can be used in God’s kingdom, we sometimes pigeon hole ourselves. We can end up playing only to our strengths (or stereotypes) and copping out of the rest. I’m all for playing to our strengths in certain scenarios. You can’t make an ant sing like bird, but God desires all of us to be conformed to Christ’s image.

M. Robert Mulholland, Jr.’s “Invitation to a Journey”, almost like a workbook, takes us through how to practically integrate our faith into all areas of our life.

Mulholland consistently presents that there is more than one right way to practice spiritual disciplines that grow us in our walk with Christ. He also continually adds reminders that we are whole people and we must lean into what doesn’t come naturally.

The chart he uses to show where we can grow naturally and where we need to work a little harder references the Myers-Briggs Personality Assessment. Before you tap out on yet another personality test, the great thing about Myers-Briggs is how open it is. If you hate being put in a box, you might enjoy this one! It doesn’t claim to be your core identity. Myers-Briggs puts you on a spectrum of four categories where you ebb and flow through different seasons of life.

The great thing about how Mullholland uses this chart is you see

• your natural inclinations to spiritual disciplines and experiencing God
• what happens spiritually when you ignore or over emphasize parts of your life
• where to lean in to find a wholeness to your walk with God

So throw what you think you know out the window. Take a quick Myers-Briggs test. Let’s see what where we can grow.

Download a PDF version!