Introduction
What is Spiritual Formation or more importantly how does one become spiritually formed as a Christian? This is the topic of this portion of the web site. If you are able, join us on Tuesdays (EMU), Thursdays (UM) and learn more about this journey of growing in your faith and becoming more like Jesus with each passing day.
Here are some definitions and scriptures to launch us into thinking about Spiritual Formation.
Spiritual Formation:
“How the life of the person is formed into Christ-likeness. The formation of the soul, of the heart, of the life, into Christ-likeness.”1
Galatians 4:19 19My dear children, for whom I am again in the pains of childbirth until Christ is formed in you, … NIV
Romans 8:29 29For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. NIV
Discipline:
“Any activity I can do by direct effort that will help me do what I cannot now do by direct effort.”2
“A disciplined person is someone who can do the right thing at the right time in the right way with the right spirit.”3
Spiritual Disciplines:
“Doing what we can do with our body, with our mind, with our spirit, in order to receive from God the power to do what we can’t.”4
“Following Jesus simply means learning from him how to arrange my life around activities that enable me to live in the fruit of the Spirit.”5
“Spiritual disciplines are to life what calisthenics are to a game.”6
“Any activity that can help me gain power to live life as Jesus taught and modeled it.”7
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1 Richard Foster, Pastor To Pastor: Spiritual Formation, interview by H.B. London, (Colorado Springs: Focus On The Family) (CD), 2005.
2 John Ortberg, The Life You’ve Always Wanted: spiritual disciplines for ordinary people (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2002, c1997), 47.
3 Ibid., 50.
4 Foster, Pastor To Pastor: Spiritual Formation.
5 Ortberg, The Life You’ve Always Wanted, 44.
6 Ibid., 45.
7 Ibid., 48.