After 13 weeks of focusing on the Spiritual Disciplines in worship and Bible study, we conclude our series this Sunday by exploring the Discipline of Celebration.
Learning to Celebrate Life through all of our highs and lows, through all of our joys and all of our burdens, and through all of our triumphs and all of our trials really does require spiritual discipline.
I hope that each of us will continue to grow in our daily practice of the spiritual disciplines. At the conclusion of his book, Celebration of Discipline, Richard Foster offers these words of summary, words that become a challenge for me and for you:
We have come to the end of this study but only to the beginning of our journey. We have seen how meditation heightens our spiritual sensitivity which, in turn, leads us into prayer. Very soon we discover that prayer involves fasting as an accompanying means. Informed by these three Disciplines, we can effectively move into study which gives us discernment about ourselves and the world in which we live.
Through simplicity we live with others in integrity. Solitude allows us to be genuinely present to people when we are with them. Through submission we live with others without manipulation, and through service we are a blessing to them.
Confession frees us from ourselves and releases us to worship. Worship opens the door to guidance. All the Disciplines freely exercised bring forth the doxology of celebration.
The classical Disciplines of the spiritual life beckon us to the
These are exciting days at
