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Personal Formation Plans
formation plan
Template
Growing in your love for God with your entire being. The personal formation plan is modeled after the vision of holistically and intentionally living towards the presence of God and our purpose to love him with all we are.
how to make your Formation Plan
The best way to make these plans is within community. This is the step-by-step process in how to make and keep these plans within your DNA Group over the course of three weeks.
FORMATION PRACTICES
Heart
rhythms
Shape, process, and discern your desire, dependence, renewal, emotions with and before God. In the Bible, the heart is a term for the part of us that makes decisions, that understands, that believes, and that feels. The heart is our “desires” factory!
Soul
rhythms
Submit your entire self to God and enjoy the realities of God’s work, presence, and grace tangibly. Essentially, it’s all the stuff that makes you you, including your body!
Strength
rhythms
Steward your body and bring you into understanding of your finite abilities as a human. We grow in our love for God by living within our limits and by stewarding our physical capacity.
Head
rhythms
Renew your mind and increase your thoughts about God and his ways.
How to Create Your Formation Plan
Preparing
Thinking about your current season of life, how would you answer these questions:
What do you desire from your relationship with God? If you’re struggling to name your desire, we encourage you to listen to this podcast with Ruth Haley Barton.
How do you long to grow in your love for God and a turning of your affections toward him? What have been some hindrances to your formation with God in recent times?
You can also use the notes from our Formation Training to help orient you to this process, too.
DNA Session 1
Meet with your DNA group to talk about what you processed with your desires. Discuss the holistic nature of the personal formation plan.
Later that week, spend time thinking through the options and practices for each aspect of your formation.
DNA Session 2
Meet again to talk through these questions and make a sketch of your plan.
First, set a timeframe (1 month, 3 months, or until a life-changing event happens like getting married, changing jobs, having a child, school ending, etc.) As you do this, you define and you set up a time to rethink it when that season is done.
What are you already doing? (fill in a bit)
How can it be transformed into an intentional pursuit of God? (i.e. counseling, DNA, Gatherings, working out, etc.)
Choose a box, or two, you want to work on that match your desires.
What’s something within that area you would like to try?
Are there ways you can combine rhythms? Can you batch those?
How can you build momentum overtime
Who should you tell so you can try these rhythms?
Ongoing
Encourage one another toward this plan by following up with these questions that are not just about if you’re doing the plan but how you are experiencing God’s presence and truth in your life. You will discover, as a group helpful ways of asking these questions.
How is your heart (practices and experience)?
How is your Soul (practices and experience)?
How is your strength (practices and experiences)?
How is your mind (practices and experience)?