Reading...

Currently Reading Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth By Richard J. Foster

I just this morning started reading this book. I did not even get past the introduction! But in that short portion, I found enough to make me want to finish the rest of it with gusto! It's great! This book has been sitting around ever since I bought it over a year ago; one of many! But I finally determined to crack it open....and i'm certain it will be time well spent.

Here's an excerpt. You don't have to read all of it, but at least, do yourself a favor, and read the underlined portions. That was the work of my pen. >>grin<<>

If all human strivings end in moral bankruptcy (and having tried it, we know it is so), and if righteousness is a gracious gift from God (as the Bible clearly states), then is it not logical to conclude that we must wait for God to come and transform us? Strangely enough, the answer is no. The analysis is correct - human striving is insufficient and righteousness is a gift from God - but the conclusion is faulty. Happily there is something we can do. We do not need to be hung on the horns of the dilemma of either human works or idleness. God has given us the Disciplines of the spiritual life as a means of receiving his grace. The Disciplines allow us to place ourselves before God so that He can transform us.

The apostle Paul says, “he who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption; but he who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life” (Gal. 6:8). Paul’s analogy is instructive. A farmer is helpless to grow grain; all he can ado is provide the right conditions for the growing of grain. He cultivates the ground, he plants the seed, he waters the plants, and then the natural forces of the earth take over and up comes the grain. This is the way it is with the Spiritual Disciplines – they are a way of sowing to the Spirit. The disciplines are God’s way of getting us into the ground; they put us where He can work within us and transform us. By themselves the Spiritual Disciplines can do nothing; they can only get us to the place where something can be done. They are God’s means of grace. The inner righteousness we seek is not something that is poured on our heads. God has ordained the Disciplines of the spiritual life as the means by which we place ourselves where He can bless us.