How To Discover Someone’s Spiritual Condition

Would you like to know the spiritual condition of the people you help? Or examine your own spiritual condition? We have created a simple form for that which you can download here! (It will remain available on our website.) We call it the Spiritual Life Questionnaire.

We find that this simple assessment tool is very helpful in quickly discovering where someone is spiritually. It also makes it easy to cover many different topics quickly. The Spiritual Life Questionnaire doesn’t rate someone’s spiritual life but asks the important questions for examining one’s own spiritual condition. It is up to the individual to decide how to proceed based on how they answered the questions.

People will often be more open when answering written questions than when talking face to face. Sometimes there is something they have been wanting to say and they are willing to say it on paper.

More importantly, an assessment tool gives you very helpful information that allows you to better understand how you can help someone. You can give it to the staff at a church, to someone you might coach or mentor, to family members, to someone who is considering involvement in a ministry including missions, to fellow members of a small group, or to people in any kind of ministry.

Also, it is very helpful for assessing your own condition. This might be its greatest benefit for you. We recommend taking it yourself before giving it to others so you know what it is like for them.

Feel free to make as many copies as you want for as many people as you want. There are no copyright restrictions. Please download and use!

Here are some of the questions from the Spiritual Life Questionnaire:

1. On a scale of 1 to 10 how committed are you to doing whatever it takes to grow in Christ, with 1 being “not very committed”, 5 being “moderately committed”, and 10 being “fully and absolutely committed.”

______  Commitment to doing whatever it takes to grow in Christ.

2. On a scale of 1 to 10 how strong is your desire to be close to God, with 1 being “not very strong”, 5 being “moderately strong”, and 10 being “it consumes my thoughts and my life.”

______  Strength of love for God in Jesus and your desire to be close to Him.

3. On a scale of 1 to 10 how much have you been feeling the enjoyment of God’s presence over the last 30 days? (1 is none, 5 is moderate, 10 is elation) This is not a measure of maturity.

_____  Enjoyment level

4. Answer the following questions on a scale of 1 to 10 with 1 being “no development, ” 5 being “half as developed as possible in this life,” and 10 being “as developed as possible in this life.”

1. 1. 1. 1. 1. _____  Victory over external, intentional sins (e.g. excess-shopping, substance abuse, pornography, unhealthy eating, lying to or misleading people, talking too much)
            2. _____  Victory over external emotionally impulsive sins (e.g. impulsive hurtful words, speaking or acting in anger, shading the truth, poor at listening, expressing opposition to authority or correction, acting impatiently)
            3. _____  Victory over internal intentional sins (e.g. choosing lust, choosing anger , holding grudges, choosing materialism, selfishness, neglect of good spiritual habits, )
            4. _____  Victory over internal ingrained sinfulness (e.g. prideful thinking, pride in one’s spiritual experiences or spiritual gifts or spiritual disciplines, fearfulness, insecurity, anxiety, unwanted lust, unwanted materialism, unwanted anger)

5. On a scale of 1 to 10 how strong is your average experience of each of the following over the last 60 days? (1 is not at all, 5 is strong enough to make my life somewhat difficult, 10 is almost unbearable.)

_____  Anxiety and/or fear

_____  Depression

_____  Loneliness

_____  Anger

_____  Hyperactivity or hyperactive thinking

_____  Bad physical health

_____  Bad eating patterns (e.g. too much, too little, binging, vomiting)

_____  Financial problems

_____  Emotional pain inflicted by one or more people in your life

Again, you can download it here. We hope the Spiritual Life Questionnaire is helpful and we welcome any feedback you have (meatmature@gmail.com)!