Tag: #transformation

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Discipleship Devotional #6 – Listening to God Through Appreciation Memories

A foundation of the Authentic Joy discipleship model is that we focus on the head, heart, and hands to bring holistic transformation to the human being. We do this by focusing on mindsets, values, and habits (also called practices or disciplines). So today we introduce our 1st practice: Listening to God Through Appreciation Memories.

Now, we have been talking about discipleship to Jesus that looks more relational and experiential than transactional and academic. Last time we discussed being loved by God not as an intellectual belief but as a felt reality. The practice we introduce today is a pathway for us into this relational experience of God and Love.

But first, let’s talk a little bit about the brain. The brain has two hemispheres – right and left. These hemispheres are highly interconnected but perform different roles.

Left Hemisphere
• Language and Speech: Dominant for most people in tasks like grammar, vocabulary, and literal meaning.
• Analytical Thinking: Handles logic, reasoning, and step-by-step problem-solving.
• Mathematics and Calculation: Processes numerical and symbolic information.
• Sequential Processing: Prefers structured, linear approaches.

Right Hemisphere
• Spatial Awareness: Important for visual-spatial tasks like map reading and recognizing faces.
• Creativity and Imagination: Associated with artistic ability and holistic thinking.
• Emotional Processing: Plays a role in interpreting tone, facial expressions, and emotional context.
• Pattern Recognition: Good at seeing the “big picture” and integrating information.

Relational circuits are neural networks in the brain that enable us to stay connected, engaged, and emotionally regulated in relationships. They are located primarily in the right hemisphere, which is heavily involved in processing social and emotional information. These circuits help us:
• Experience joy and connection
• Maintain flexibility and resilience
• Respond to others with empathy rather than defensiveness

When these circuits are functioning well, we can manage emotions and stay relational. When they “dim” or shut down (due to stress, trauma, or overwhelming emotion), we enter what some researchers call “enemy mode”—becoming rigid, self-protective, and disconnected from others.

The sad truth is that we have become a very unbalanced left-brained society and, as a consequence, unbalanced left-brained Christians. To deeply connect with God (and people) will require us to understand how we connect with God and others and engage in practices that help us to exercise the ‘relational muscles’ of our right brain.

This is the backdrop upon which I want to introduce Appreciation Memories. Gratitude or appreciation is a fast track to turning our right brain relational circuits on and putting us in a mode that is open to connection. The practice, in simplest terms, is like thinking about all the good things that you appreciate about somebody before initiating a conversation with them, not in an academic, ‘make a list ’ kind of way but by engaging our imagination.

Psalm 100:4 says, “Enter into His gates with thanksgiving.’

God knows that our gateway to connection with Him is gratitude!

So here is the practice:
• Recall an experience that you have had (recently or in the past) where you felt a sense of being at peace, being loved, joyful, grateful, full of awe, or connected to God. It can be a time in nature or with family or with God or doing some activity you love.
• Relive the event in your imagination. What did you see, smell, hear, taste, feel? What emotions did you experience?
• Tell God what you are grateful for in this memory.
• Now ask God: “What do you want to say to me now through this memory?”
• Write down any impressions that you get.
Practice this as often as you can this week.

REFLECTION
• How was this practice for you? Was it easy? Difficult?
• What came up for you as you engaged with God in this way?

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Disciplship Devotional #4 – The Growth Process Model

Remember we said that spiritual growth is both a journey and a process. The Growth Model codifies the internal processes involved in your spiritual growth.  

The person at the center of the model is you and inside of us are the aspects of our character that we must work on to achieve maturity. On the left side is where we all start – the immature version of ourselves. On the right is where we are trying to get to – the mature version of ourselves. In the center there are six characteristics of maturity that we all need to work on to move from immaturity to maturity: 

  • Intimacy with God 
  • Identity 
  • Responsibility 
  • Wholeness 
  • Resilience 
  • Competence 

Everything starts with intimacy with God. This is the center of our model. Nothing else works without intimacy. It is first in sequence and in importance to the transformation process. Here are some definitions of the six characteristics: 

Intimacy with God: Your connectedness to God in heart-to-heart relationship. How well your hear Him and enjoy His presence. 

Identity: The story you tell yourself about whose you are, who you are and who your tribe is. Your value, significance and belonging. 

Responsibility: How well you take accountability for your growth, the outcomes of your life and how you affect others. 

Wholeness: Complete wholeness and health of your spirit, mind, emotions, body and relationships. 

Resilience: How well you deal with hardship and suffering. The ability to grow through trials and see God at work in them. 

Competence: Influencing your sphere for the kingdom of God. Being a good ambassador for Christ of His love and power. Using your gifts to serve humanity for Christ. 

Growth also takes place in the context of a community where we feel we belong. Our community greatly influences our progress (or lack of) to maturity. We cannot become fully mature without the support of and contribution to a healthy community. 

In addition, our growth (and the growth of our community) takes place in the context of the sovereign purposes of God. God’s purpose not only directs our growth but as we mature, we should witness our life experiences becoming more and more purposeful.  

Finally, everything about this work of maturity really starts with love. God, outside of our initiative or ability, sovereignly and mercifully calls us, sanctifies us and glorifies us because He loves us.  It is God’s love for us that initiates, sustains and completes this good work in us. His love is bigger than we can imagine. As we yield to His work in us, we become more and more full of His love, and we walk more and more in His purpose. However, we do not work on these things directly, but as we address the six aspects outlined above, we will begin to see the love and purpose of God increase in our lives. 

I would also like to show you how the model hearkens back to our scriptural foundations. Ephesians 3:14-19 speaks to intimacy with God, identity and wholeness. Ephesians 4:11-16 speaks to identity, responsibility, competence and community. 2 Timothy 3:16-17 speaks to competence and wholeness. And James 1:2-4 speaks to resilience. 

When we have fully developed in love, intimacy with God, identity, responsibility, wholeness, resilience, competence, purpose and community, then we would have attained the fullness of the stature of Christ. 

REFLECTION 

  • Can you identify times in your life when God was working on these aspects of your character? 
  • What do you believe the Holy Spirit is working on in you in this season? 
Copyright 2026, Matik Nicholls. All rights reserved.
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My Tanager Tragedy

It was over a month ago when I first noticed her… A rich copper coloured bird, flitting from tree to tree in my garden. Always with a black companion which seemed to have white markings under its wing. With the help of Merlin (credit for the photo as well), I soon discovered that they were a white-lined tanager couple. The males are black and the females are rufous-coloured. (Who knew rufous was a colour? Derived, apparently, from the Latin rufus, which means red.) They are often seen in pairs.

I was over the moon to have this ‘exotic’ couple in my backyard. Over the weeks that followed, they became my companions as I did my devotions each morning. The female, especially, would perch in the railing on the porch as if to say, “Hello friend!” while looking at me with one eye and then turning her head to inspect me with the other one. The male was much less friendly. He would keep an eye on his mate from a nearby tree. Soon, I realized that they had a nest in the palm trees right next to my porch and probably a baby or two. (I never looked for fear of scaring them off.)

Then one morning, as I was meditating, caught up in my love affair with Jesus, my friend flew right over to me and landed on my arm. Immediately, I was in tears. She landed on me! I felt like the recipient of a heavenly kiss, a feathered friendship undeserved. “What are you saying to me God?”

Soon her husband became at ease enough to also visit me in the porch, and I sooo looked forward to spending time with Jesus and my avian friends every morning. To me, they were more than just birds. They were a message from heaven. A ray of hope in a valley season.

For many years, my Christian community was informal. My wife and I had online groups (which we still do) as well as a group of seven of us that met in our home at first and then at a community centre in East Trinidad. These small, informal groups have been a place of tremendous growth and support. We have been blessed to have been able to host spaces where people feel safe, free to question and to struggle, and where there is a tangible experience of God’s presence.

A couple of years ago, I felt led to re-enter formal church. I have a lot of trauma associated with formal Christian organizations, so this was not a venture that I embarked on lightly. In the past, church has not been, at times, a safe space for me to bring my questions, unique perspectives, or failures. Nevertheless, I was optimistic. However, the challenges of institutional church have not changed, and the process has been more painful than I expected.

So, my birds… my birds were symbols of hope. Hope that fragile, beautiful creatures could find safe places to land and be met with welcome… with love… with celebration… with safety.

Then today happened…

I went out onto my porch, and there, next to my chair, was a dead baby bird. No tanagers. No “Hello friend.” Only emptiness and death.

The culprit? No doubt my cat Billee.

 It felt like the final death sentence over my dream. There is no safety on this side of heaven. Not in the world. Not in the church. Only predators and prey.

“Why Lord?” “Why would you allow this to happen?”

“Why Billee?” “Why did you have to kill her?”

But I could not even summon anger toward the cat as he rubbed against my feet. All I had was sadness. He didn’t know what he did anyway. I found myself stroking his back.

Isn’t that like church? People you love hurting people you love. Not because they are cruel (most of the time). In fact, often they think they are doing what is right and good.

So, this is it then. Pain, loss, death.

I sat with my communion cup and wafer, forlorn… and as I looked at it, these words entered my consciousness. “Predators eat prey. For one to live, another must die. And then Christ says:

“I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you cannot have eternal life…””

(John 6:53b NLT)

Jesus changes the script by becoming the voluntary prey – voluntarily offering up His flesh and blood that we may live.

There must be something powerful in that. I can feel it, but I don’t have words strong enough to communicate it.

The only way out of this vicious cycle is voluntary sacrifice. The willing sacrifice resets everything.

Isaiah 11:6-9 (NLT)

6 In that day the wolf and the lamb will live together;

    the leopard will lie down with the baby goat.

The calf and the yearling will be safe with the lion,

    and a little child will lead them all.

7 The cow will graze near the bear.

    The cub and the calf will lie down together.

    The lion will eat hay like a cow.

8 The baby will play safely near the hole of a cobra.

    Yes, a little child will put its hand in a nest of deadly snakes without harm.

9 Nothing will hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain,

    for as the waters fill the sea,

    so the earth will be filled with people who know the Lord.

Maybe the baby bird will be safe with the cat as well.

I think that maybe Jesus is saying something to me through this tanager tragedy. The religious institution wasn’t a safe space for Jesus either. They killed Him, and He offered up His life willingly so that one day nothing would hurt or destroy. Perhaps this season is an invitation for me to join Christ’s sacrificial mission of transformation from violence to non-violence.

There is much violence everywhere I turn these days. In my country. In the world. Isaiah 11 seems far off. But it’s not just drones, missiles and machine guns, it’s the daily micro-aggressions of not seeing, not listening, not valuing the people around us. We may think that we can’t make a difference in Iran or Palestine, but we can. By treating the human being in front of us with compassion and kindness, we can be a part of a rising tide that lifts humanity upward. Especially in the church. Yes, I hold the church to a higher standard. Because we are the people of the sacrificial lamb. As we eat the flesh and drink the blood, let us remember who we are – the body of Christ. Through us, Christ offers life to the world – through our sacrificial love. His blood flows not through dogma and doctrine and self-righteous proclamations, but through love that stubbornly reaches out to the ones who behave like our enemies.

Copyright 2026, Matik Nicholls. All rights reserved.
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Your Discipleship Devotional

Hello Disciples!

I am pleased to share a new development at Authentic Joy. But first, a back story:

Eight months ago, we started something new – online discipleship small groups. We have two groups that meet every other week, and the experience has been nothing short of transformational. I am not exaggerating when I say that these meetings are the most life-giving get-togethers in my life. I look forward to every session and leave our time together feeling refreshed, encouraged, and revitalized in my walk with God. And I’m not alone. Many have said that these groups are a tremendous source of life, learning and community that they cannot find anywhere else.

The format we follow is simple: I send out a short reading with a few questions for reflection a week ahead of our meeting. So, when we meet, there is no teaching, just conversation. We share deeply about how the material intersects with our lives and the down-to-earth (sometimes messy) ways in which we are being transformed and challenged to become like Jesus. There are no experts. We all share from the heart. We all listen deeply. We all hold each other before God and encourage each other to pursue Him.

So, we at Authentic Joy thought, “Why not take these reflections and share them with our online community as a bi-weekly devotional?” So, from today, that is just what we will be doing! We hope that it will be of great value to you on your discipleship journey! Here is installment #1:

1. Discipleship Introduction

What is the formula for spiritual growth?

Many of us may have grown up in faith traditions where the formula or model for spiritual growth was something like this:

TRUTH + CHOICE = TRANSFORMATION

This model emphasizes learning truth and then choosing behaviour that aligns with what we have learned.

Question: Is it working?

I propose that our traditional model for transformation is not working. There are two reasons why this model cannot work:

  1. It emphasizes external behaviour modification rather than internal transformation.
  2. It emphasizes truth rather than love as the most important factor in our spiritual growth.

If we look at the anatomy of the human soul, we can see why this is a problem.

If we focus solely on truth (which is important for transforming our thoughts and beliefs) and external behaviour (which addresses our words and actions), without addressing the emotions, values and desires of the heart, then we have omitted a critical part of the human being!

Jesus’ model is quite different. Have a look at what He says in these 3 scriptures:

Matthew 5:27-28 (NLT)

Matthew 23:25-26 (NLT)

John 13:34-35 (NLT)

Jesus’ model focuses on the heart and only one thing transforms the heart – love. You can’t teach love. Jesus came to earth give us an experience of love that is transformative. Something the law was powerless to do.

Jesus’ model is called discipleship. John Mark Comer states it this way: “Be with Jesus. Become like Him. Do what He does.” The disciples didn’t just follow Jesus’ teachings; they literally followed Jesus wherever He went. Jesus’ invitation to “follow me” was never anything less than an invitation to do life with Him from that point forward.

Interestingly, it seemed that Jesus also thought that a group of disciples worked better than walking with Him alone. Companionship was also an integral part of Jesus’ model.

REFLECTION

  • What does the distinction between learning truth about Jesus versus experiencing love through being with Jesus bring up for you? Process with Holy Spirit.
  • What does the distinction between managing our behaviour to be in line with Biblical principles through force of will versus words and actions that naturally flow from having the same thoughts, beliefs, emotions, values and desires as Jesus bring up for you? Process with Holy Spirit.
Copyright 2026, Matik Nicholls. All rights reserved.
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How Is Waiting Changing You?

This Advent, I am stirring my heart up for Jesus with the aid of a series of Advent meditations from John Mark Comer and the Practicing The Way community. Their first meditation is by Gemma Ryan and comes from Luke 2, where Simeon encounters the baby Jesus in the temple.

As I meditated on this man Simeon, I wondered what made him different from his peers.
Between Malachi and Jesus’ arrival is the 400-year period known as the ‘silent years’ because God did not speak to His people during that period. It is this 400-year wait in silence from which the Scribes and Pharisees emerged. Four hundred years without a word from God. Four hundred years waiting for the Messiah to deliver them from oppression. So, what did they do? They doubled down on what they did have – the Torah. They dissected it, memorized it, debated it, and built culture around it. All the while, drifting further and further from God. To the extent that when the Messiah finally arrived, for all their knowledge of and dedication to the laws of God, they had no ability to recognize Him when He stood right in front of them.

But Simeon was different.

Whereas the Pharisees pressed into practices that relied on their cognition, reasoning, and intellectual ability, Simeon was a man of the Spirit. The Bible says that the Holy Spirit was upon Simeon, and he was led by the Spirit. In a time before the Holy Spirit was poured out on all flesh! Somehow, Simeon has stepped into a dimension of relationship with God that was uncommon among his peers.

While the Scribes and Pharisees depended on knowing the Law, Simeon depended on knowing the Spirit. The Bible says that he was righteous and devout. I believe these words are significant. I believe the word righteous suggests that Simeon was probably as dedicated as the Scribes and Pharisees were to observing the Law. However, I believe the word devout indicates that he also had a commitment to and holy reverence for God Himself. Simeon was not just devoted to knowing the Law; he was devoted to knowing God. He engaged not only in cognitive practices but spiritual practices that honed his ability to host, be led by, and know the Holy Spirit.

Without a live connection with God, knowledge makes us puffed up, self-righteous, overly confident in our knowledge, and ultimately unable to recognize God because He isn’t recognized through intellectual reasoning but through spiritual discernment. That’s why the Scribes and Pharisees couldn’t recognize Jesus. They were using all the wrong senses and looking at all the wrong measures. They were concerned with whether He healed on the Sabbath, or which town He came from, or His outrageous claims to be the Son of God. We too have our boxes just as they had theirs, and if it doesn’t fit in the box, then it cannot be an authentic move/person/word of God.

However, Simeon was led by the Spirit. All Simeon desperately wanted was to see Jesus, and He was utterly dependent on God to orchestrate and define that encounter. There was nothing Simeon could do to achieve it; he just had to wait and be open to receiving Jesus, however He chose to show up.

What challenged me the most in this meditation was the idea that waiting changes you. There are many promises that I feel that I have been waiting on for some time in my life, and particularly in this season. And I’m wondering… am I becoming a Pharisee or a Simeon?
Am I engaging in practices that are making me puffed up and self-righteous? Or am I engaging in practices that are attuning me to the Spirit and what He is doing now while I wait? Am I waiting on God or on an outcome? Is my hope in Jesus or in the thing that I’m waiting for? Will I even recognize Him when He turns up in a way I didn’t expect or prefer? Will I still be happy to see Him if He doesn’t come the way I think He should? If He doesn’t deliver me from my ‘Roman oppressors’, will I still rejoice? Can I wait on God as an act of surrender that acknowledges everything will happen in His time and on His terms? And can I be joyful in that? Can I be full of joy and hope while I wait?

I think that that is the purpose of waiting – to change us. To shift the locus of our hope from something to Someone. To shift our dependence from self to God. To shift us from natural discernment to spiritual discernment.

If our hope and trust is in Jesus, we will never be disappointed. Because He always turns up, just not always how and when we want Him to. And that’s OK. In fact, it’s better!

Copyright 2025, Matik Nicholls. All rights reserved.
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Training Versus Trying Part 5 – Community

Welcome to the last instalment of our Training Versus Trying series! Today we are talking about Community.

A training approach recognizes that as spiritual athletes, we grow fastest when we train with others. However, it is a particular type of community that we need to grow. One that is not very common. When we think of community in a church setting, we normally think of the brothers and sisters with whom we attend church or maybe those who are a part of a ministry that we serve in.

However, the type of community that I am talking about is a training community – a small circle of people with whom we share our inner lives. It is a community committed to walking together in pursuit of God without trying to fix, or save, or advise each other. Often, as Christians, we try to force our training regimen on everyone else without honoring the unique person that they are and the unique work that God is doing in their lives.

This is something I have with very few people. Most Christians, in my experience, do not have deep conversations about the things that matter, or if they do, it is in the context of giving advice or holding each other accountable. Some even think it is their job to condemn and shame. However, what I have found is that what most people need is actually just a safe space to talk about the deep inner things that truly matter without being judged, reproached, corrected, or Bible-verse-slapped. In a supportive and safe environment such as this, there exists the ideal conditions for God to speak. Or to stick with our analogy, for God to coach us as a group.

I’m not saying that God cannot use another person to correct us or to give us feedback where we may have a blind spot. He does use people in our lives like that. I’m saying that in a training community, that is a small part of why we get together, and it is accomplished more indirectly through vulnerable sharing, asking each other probing questions, and discerning God’s voice together.

In a community of Christians-in-training there is safety and freedom to talk about what new training techniques we are trying, what is not working, and what we are working through with our Coach. In that kind of community, we are celebrated, encouraged, inspired, and supported. In that kind of community, we can give a voice to our soul and hear the heart of others in ways that bring redemption, healing, and transformation.

Well, we have come to the end of this little series. I hope it has been helpful to you.

Train well, my fellow disciples of Christ!

Copyright 2025, Matik Nicholls. All rights reserved.
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Training Versus Trying Part 4 – Coaching

A training mindset approaches our relationship with the Holy Spirit like a coach who is deeply invested in and committed to our growth. We have a coach who longs to be a partner in our progressive sanctification.


Remember those moments of reflecting on our failure that we mentioned earlier? Well, those moments are also an opportunity to process with God. This is powerful. The Holy Spirit knows you better than you know yourself and knows how to help you to grow like no one else does!


If we can release ourselves from the guilt and shame that often keeps us from approaching God and realize that He sees us through eyes of deep compassion, then we can unlock a level of healing and wisdom that is simply transformative.


Every time I have brought my darkest desires (the ones I would never even voice), my deepest fears, or my most shameful thoughts to God, it has resulted in something transformative. (Even if it has simply been a revelation of just how loving and compassionate God is.)

All champions know that a coach is essential to their success. A coach sees the potential in us that we don’t see in ourselves. A coach also sees the barriers to our progress that we don’t have the wisdom or objectivity to see. He can see when our stride is too long or when our follow-through is an issue. In like manner, the Holy Spirit knows what to target to move us forward and how to encourage and motivate us in a language we can relate to.

Up next, community!

Copyright 2025, Matik Nicholls. All rights reserved.
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Training Versus Trying Part 3 – Roots Not Shoots

Someone training for a marathon may need to focus on their diet, mindset, and breathing to get to the desired outcome. It is the same with our spiritual growth. To achieve the behavioural outcome we desire, we must address deeper issues like our mindsets, identity, beliefs, and values.

Often, we can become too sin-focused, which results in the very opposite of what we are trying to achieve. Obsessing over not doing something is the worst way to approach our growth. Instead, we need to find the roots of the issue and put a holistic training program in place.

For example, say I have a problem with over-eating. A trying mindset will be all about focusing on controlling how much I eat. However, the roots of my struggle may involve issues with my identity, stress coping mechanisms, and the relationships in my life. Therefore, a trying mindset will be ineffective and frustrating because all the underlying causes (the roots) remain untouched.

Training often seems unrelated to the outcome we desire, like the Karate Kid painting walls to learn karate. However, it is actually addressing the roots that impact the entire tree of your life.

Next, we discuss how a coach is essential to training.

See you then!

Copyright 2025, Matik Nicholls. All rights reserved.
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Training Versus Trying Part 2 – Self-Compassion

The first element of a training mindset is self-compassion.

A training mindset recognizes that we are all imperfect beings on a path of sanctification and healing. We are all works in progress. There is no benefit to beating yourself up when you fail. God does not beat us up when we fail. He meets us with mercy and compassion. So, why shouldn’t we do the same?


This is extremely difficult to grasp when in many religious circles we equate a self-compassionate approach as being compromising or soft on sin. But it does not have to be. We can maintain an uncompromising view of sin while being gentle on ourselves. Our aim is progress, not perfection.


When we have a compassionate view of ourselves, it frees us to learn from failure. And this is one of the huge superpowers of a training mindset – every failure becomes an opportunity to learn about ourselves and what is not working in our training programme. This is so critical for real growth. When we give in to a temptation, if we can carefully examine the thoughts and emotions that led us to the sin without turning away in shame, then we gain the insights needed to heal and grow. Without these insights, we will never truly grow. Without these insights, the most we can hope for is to cope, never to overcome.

Self-compassion enables us to move from hiding and repression to exploration and discovery of the root causes of our afflictions. But that’s for the next instalment…

See you then!

Copyright 2025, Matik Nicholls. All rights reserved.

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Training Versus Trying Part 1

One of the concepts that we teach at Authentic Joy is the idea that in pursuing spiritual growth we need to have a training mindset not a trying mindset. We often use the metaphor of running a marathon to explain. In the metaphor, the ‘marathon’ is that challenge in your life that you are trying to overcome. Some examples are impatience, unforgiveness, pornography, a short temper, anxiety, racial prejudice or over-eating.

A trying mindset would be like waking up on the day of the marathon and saying, “Today I will finish this marathon! God says I’m more than a conqueror!” And so, we set off to try our best to complete the marathon… without training. Our determination and grit may get us halfway there, but without putting in the training, we inevitably end up face down in a puddle of sweat and tears.


A training mindset, on the other hand, would be like waking up every morning and training for the marathon. Training prioritizes consistency and progress over the end result. It embraces learning from failure as a necessary pathway to growth.


One of the most damaging things about a trying mindset is the cycle of guilt and shame that results when we do not achieve our goal. This has been one of the most difficult mindsets to change in my own life. In the areas where I struggle with an ongoing sin issue, every time I fall, my tendency is to beat myself up and wallow in shame. Then, to comfort myself, I end up even deeper in self-destructive behaviours. When I finally muster up the courage to go back to God in repentance (again), it resembles something like this: “This time, this time, I mean it God. This time I will stay the course.” And so, the cycle begins again. With no real plan, change is unlikely.


A training mindset has the potential to break this cycle, but there are several components to the approach that need to be implemented:

  • Self-compassion
  • Roots not shoots
  • Coaching
  • Community

I will unpack each of these facets of the training mindset in this series.

See you for the next instalment!

Copyright 2025, Matik Nicholls. All rights reserved.