Spiritual Formation 06

WHAT: I am taking a class in Seminary called “Spiritual Formation”. One assignment is to write about a page worth of thoughts that interact with content of each lecture and readings or somehow connect with my own spiritual formation. It’s meant to be more introspective than scholastic.

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I missed class last week, so my Spiritual Formation reflection will be based on our assigned reading - Richard Fosters chapter seven titled "The Discipline of Solitude" (found in his book, Celebration of Discipline). On a side note, I've read this book before (many years ago) and I would not hesitate to recommend it to any/everyone.

On another side note, I bought this book via amazon.com and it was previously owned, aka "used". The book was in incredible condition, no marks, dog ears, or coffee stains, except for chapter seven. The previous owner made several marks in chapter seven, but in no other chapter.

CHAPTER SEVEN – The Discipline of Solitude.

"Settle yourself in solitude and you will come upon Him in yourself."

--- Teresa of Avila

My Interaction with the above statement: (which are the first words in the chapter) is that it's only true for Christians. I think that there is plenty of biblical material concerning God dwelling in believers, but the same is not true for non-believers. The amazing experience of finding God WITHIN is only a benefit (and it's a great benefit!) to true followers of Jesus. Yes, we were all created in God's image, but that's not to say that the Holy Spirit, in a very literal sense, dwells inside an unregenerate person. When you add that with Paul's insistence that we are "in Christ", Christians are unique to all humanity in this way: we are in Christ and Christ in us. It's in this way that solitude can lead to an informed investigation of God's dealing in us and our dealing with God; Spiritual Formation is the result.

I liked how the author differentiated solitude from loneliness. He calls loneliness and "inner emptiness" while he describes solitude as an important factor for inner fulfillment.

The author brings up Dietrich Bonheoffer's, Life Together, to point out his consecutive chapters titled, "The Day Together" and "The Day Alone". This provided a certain amount of motivation and conviction for me as he describes how both Day's are essential for spiritual success. I found this quote from the Bonheoffer to be very profound.

"Let him who cannot be alone beware of community"

"Let him who is not in community beware of being alone"

--- Dietrich Bonheoffer

I think that the person who can't be alone will have a very difficult time addressing the brokenness found in their inner world. The person who can't be in community will probably struggle some sort of self-infatuation. Both extremes will inevitably cause problems for spiritual formation. I have a personal acquaintance with both extremes; I have flirted with both camps over the years. Currently, I'm in a situation where solitude is more prominent than community. I own some responsibility for being in this solitude-heavy situation…

…On the other hand, I have grown to believe that God has brought me to what St. John of the Cross called, A Dark Night of the Soul. Richard Foster devotes some time to this in my reading for the week. If God is indeed part of this Dark Night, then it's to be expected that my life would (for a time) be more focused on Solitude than Community... not to the exclusion of community (I'm not advocating extremes).

To end this journal entry, I want to point out what the previous owner of my book found important enough to mark…

"Therefore, we must seek out the recreating stillness of solitude if we want to be with others meaningfully."

--- Richard Foster