By Richard J. Foster
Review by Jason Souza
Of all the books written on the subject of spiritual disciplines, Celebration of Discipline and The Spirit of the Disciplines are two of the best. I only mention both at the outset of this review because it is best if they are read together as companion pieces. While Dallas Willard covers the “why” (the psychology, history and theological basis) of the disciplines in “Spirit”, Foster focuses more on the “how” of the disciplines in “Celebration”. When read together, the truest picture of spiritual disciplines is revealed.
While both of these books are excellent, I personally preferred Celebration of Discipline over the other. Essentially, it’s a well-written, not overly complicated, howto manual for the spiritual life. The book is broken up into three sections covering the different types of disciplines: The Inward Disciplines, The Outward Disciplines and the Corporate Disciplines. The first part of each chapter is an explanation of a discipline and its background while the remainder of the chapter is dedicated to a step-by-step practice of it.
The Inward Disciplines are those which are, obviously, inward focused and mental in nature. This category of disciplines consists of meditation, prayer, fasting and study. I personally found the chapter on meditation most interesting. All to often these days, meditation brings to mind images of closed eyes, crossed legs, mindless chanting all in an effort to make your mind as blank as humanly possible. Christian meditation is about removing all distractions from the mind in order to more fully focus on Christ.
The Outward Disciplines are those requiring action and physicality. This group is made up of the disciplines of simplicity, solitude, submission and service. While the chapter on submission is a lesson everyone can stand to learn, I found benefit in the chapter on solitude. While I’ve long known that God was calling me to the practice of solitude, I wasn’t necessarily sure what that meant. I came away with several new ideas, none of which was as difficult and time consuming as I thought they would be.
The third group, The Corporate Disciplines, are those which believers engage in together. The body of Christ unites in practicing confession, worship, guidance and celebration. For me, seeing confession listed in the table of contents was a little shocking. It immediately made me think of the way it’s practiced in Catholicism and I wasn’t necessarily comfortable with that. I was not at all enthusiastic when I realized, after finishing the service chapter, that confession was next. When I finished it I was greatly amazed and a little ashamed. The discipline and service of confession is one of the most grace-filled gifts granted to the church. I would recommend reading this chapter at least twice.
As I said at the outset, The Spirit of the Disciplines and Celebration of Discipline really should be read together in order to gain a complete understanding of spiritual disciplines. But, in the long run, Celebration of Discipline really provides the step-bystep, how-to necessary for someone just approaching the issue of disciplines. And approaching the disciplines is something I encourage all of you to do. In fair weather, they can be a play date with God. And when the storms come, they will be the walls and roof built on his foundation.
