Rescuing Our Focus

In a recent series of roundtables at Renovaré, we asked people in all sorts of fields — education, mental health, the marketplace, church leadership — about the biggest challenges their communities are facing — challenges we might be able to address through the work of Renovaré.

One thing that came up in every meeting was the erosion of our capacity to concentrate and focus, often coupled with a lowered ability to stick with something when it gets hard. It’s not unusual to find ourselves struggling these days to do something as simple as reading a book.

This is serious. Many of us know firsthand that the right book at the right time can broaden the mind and stretch the soul. Sometimes, a book can even become a conduit for God’s love and healing in a way few other things can.

It will be tragic if we lose our capacity to receive those gifts. 

After the roundtables, I felt deeply discouraged. I sent an email to some of the folks who had attended them:

What should we do? Should we stop trying to read challenging books? Should we lower the bar?

I got a reply from Richard Foster:

No, we don’t give up. We don’t lower the bar. We keep inviting each other to read good, nourishing, challenging books.

But we don’t leave each other to our own devices. We do this in community. When we get stuck, confused, or discouraged, we help each other dig in and keep going.

Richard’s reply made me so grateful for the Renovaré Book Club. This fall, we’ll begin our twelfth season accompanying thousands of people on a journey of renewal through four deep, potentially life-changing books.

The Club has always offered special ingredients, like a well-thought-out reading schedule, reflection questions and online discussions, and helpful articles and resources from our author-facilitators. 

But in recent years, we’ve wanted to find even more ways to come alongside members and put our arms around them to say: Keep going! You can do this! 

So we now offer podcast conversations for each reading week in the Club. Any time a member gets stuck or needs a little inspiration, they can listen (or read the transcript) and receive some help mining the gems and navigating the roadblocks in that week’s reading. 

We also doubled down on our Readers’ Questions webinars, which give members the chance to help shape a live conversation with the facilitator at the end of each book. 

And we continue to emphasize our smaller in-person and online discussion groups, which members can opt into for the most supportive experience. I love how a previous Book Club member described these groups:

We’re seeking God hard and at a level previously unknown. The bonding and love that [the Book Club] facilitates as we put our heads together and work out our salvation is priceless.

This year’s Book Club will run from September through April.

To kick things off, we’re going to dive into a classic from Richard Foster himself: Celebration of Discipline, which Christianity Today included in their list of the Top Ten most significant Christian books of the 20^th Century. We’ll read it in tandem with a new book from Dr. Miriam (“Mimi”) Dixon called Worth Celebrating, which explores the unlikely backstory of Celebration of Discipline, the movement it started, and the invitations it offers, which are more desperately needed now than ever. 

If you’ve read Celebration of Discipline before, you know it’s one of those rare books that has more to give each time through. And we’re pretty excited that we’ve coaxed Richard temporarily out of retirement to join Mimi in facilitating our reading.

In the season’s third spot, we’ve got pastor and author Rich Villodas to help us explore all the challenges and gifts of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. Rich’s new book, The Narrow Path, offers fresh and vital guidance on the way of Jesus.

And then we’ll wrap up the season with a spiritual classic called Abandonment to Divine Providence, from the 18^th-century Jesuit writer, Jean-Pierre de Caussade. British publisher and long-time Renovaré Ministry member James Catford will help us mine this treasure, which contains a breathtaking vision of the freedom that comes through surrender to Christ:

The only condition necessary for this state of self-surrender, is the present moment … in which the soul, light as a feather, fluid as water, innocent as a child, responds to every movement of grace like a floating balloon.

The members who get the most from the Renovaré Book Club are those who long for their souls to become progressively lighter, freer, and more responsive. These are folks who discover that the Book Club offers much more than a chance to discuss some good books. It is a journey that takes them from distraction to focus, from isolation to connection, and from disintegration to the wholeness only God can offer.