Taken from The Common Rule by Justin Earley
Habits form our hearts.
Our lives are full of habits that form us. A habit is a behavior that occurs automatically, over and over, and often unconsciously: we wake up and scroll Instagram, we get in the car and drive home without thinking twice, we get to a stoplight and check our messages. This wouldn’t be so bad if it weren’t for the fact that habits form much more than our schedules — they form our hearts. And so, like liturgies, these habits are actually quite central to our worship.
When we have no set of formational practices, we end up following those of our surrounding culture.
Without bedrock habits of our own, we unwittingly abide by unspoken ways of life chosen by the contemporary western culture around us. Far from neutral, these practices can breed individualism, consumerism, vanity, and anger. In short, we are being formed in the worship of self, which isolates us from God and neighbor. If we want to be formed in the love of God and neighbor, we must take hold of our habits.
The “Common Rule” comes from an ancient practice called a rule of life, a set of communal patterns adopted for spiritual formation.
The Common Rule is a communal pattern of four daily and four weekly habits designed to counter the chaos of our modern life. These habits are meant to be done with other people and also to help us love both God and neighbor in our daily lives. They are designed to disrupt the individualism and consumerism that frame our lives, and to push us toward community, presence, and believing the gospel more deeply. We don’t need new strategies or goals to become more Christ-like — we need a better rule of life, full of counter-formational habits that will invade our rhythms of work and life, and reshape our patterns of community. We need tiny habits that point us to the gospel of Jesus in moments both big and small.
It can be hard to make new habits. But anything worth trying is hard and involves failure. What is important in the pursuit of habit is to focus more on the rule than on the exceptions. The goal is not to check off some habits, but rather to fail together, experience grace, learn, and all the while become formed in the Gospel of Jesus. So grab a friend or a few and try a couple or all of the habits, and curate your new rule of life.
Visit the Common Rule Book Website ↗
