The spiritual life - Input versus Output

My wonderful wife said something last night which caught my ear. She mentioned that we focus so often in the Church and in our spiritual lives on what we put out, which is to say the 'fruit' of what we do. I'm thinking of what we contribute to the world and the church. The problem with this mindset is that it can lead us to make our spiritual lives - which Jesus tells us are about receiving God's gift for us - into another race for success, albeit with an outwardly 'valuable' goal.

That got me thinking. Would we be better to focus on input rather than output? What is input? To my mind this would be things like the spiritual disciplines; study, prayer, meditation, solitude, service, silence, giving etc. If we secure our input then surely our output will take care of itself? This is perhaps a better place to be but it is still short of where we should be.

An inappropriate fascination with both input and output can lead us into the same trap, that of seeking to earn our place with God. We end up making a spiritual quest into yet another rat race. We start with faith and end with works. Only when we focus on God's will alone will we properly unite both input and output.

Bonhoeffer says this when he suggests that both the question 'how can I be good?' and 'how can I do good?' are the wrong ones for us to ask. Principally this is because behind these questions lies a decision to locate reality in us and not God. These questions actually have 'me' at the centre. The correct question is 'what is the will of God?' as this locates all reality in God rather than us. The benefits of doing this are not merely theoretical, they are completely practical. Only when we ask this question, seek the answer and obey the one who answers will we unite input and output. Moreover, when we seek the answer to this question we unite ourselves with the source of all being, life Himself, and are then able to truly become alive.