Richard J. Foster

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Articles & Essays by Richard J. Foster

Book Excerpt from The Making Of An Ordinary Saint

Understanding Solitude

Published October, 2014 • Featured September 21, 2018

“Solitude empowers us to walk away from all human pretense and manipulation.” Richard Foster gives us a clear snapshot of this vital spiritual discipline.

Article

Facing the Fear of Solitude

Published April, 1997 • Featured September 7, 2018

Solitude strikes right at the root of our fear of becoming unimportant, unneeded, insignificant, useless— which is precisely why we need it. Richard Foster helps us learn how to resign as CEO of the universe.

Article

Embracing Suffering

Published February, 2006 • Featured August 30, 2018

Richard Foster writes about our culture’s “suffering avoidance” and Christ’s call to identify with those who suffer.

Book Excerpt from Freedom of Simplicity

Christ the Center

Featured August 1, 2018

Richard Foster draws a profound lesson about simplicity from Matthew 6. How are we to live with glad and generous hearts? With eyes focused singly on Christ the center.

Journal/Magazine Article

Four Paradoxes of Christian Simplicity

Published January, 2005 • Featured July 18, 2018

Christian simplicity is not just a faddish attempt to respond to the chaotic and materialist world in which we find ourselves; it is a call given to every Christian in every age to follow Christ.

Book Excerpt from The Making Of An Ordinary Saint

Understanding Simplicity

Published October, 2014 • Featured July 13, 2018

“Simplicity is an inward reality that results in an outward lifestyle. Both are necessary. ” Richard Foster explains why.

Blog Post

Guidelines for Simplicity

Featured July 11, 2018

Richard Foster provides a short, simple list of practical suggestions for living a life of simplicity.

Book Excerpt from Life with God

Seeing the Bible Afresh

Published April, 2008 • Featured June 13, 2018

Is it time to see Scripture with new eyes? For anyone “starving at the spiritual feast,” Richard Foster offers a paradigm for Bible study called the Immanuel Principle—God with us.

Book Excerpt from The Making Of An Ordinary Saint

Understanding Study

Published October, 2014 • Featured June 6, 2018

“Study is the process whereby our minds take on an order conforming to the order of whatever we concentrate upon.” Richard Foster succinctly introduces this month’s discipline of study.

Article

The Purpose of Fasting

Published January, 1978 • Featured May 23, 2018

In this excerpt from Celebration of Discipline, Richard Foster helps us see that “[f]asting must forever center on God. It must be God-initiated and God-ordained.”

Book Excerpt from The Making Of An Ordinary Saint

Understanding Fasting

Published September, 2014 • Featured May 9, 2018

“Fasting is the voluntary denial of an otherwise normal function for the sake of intense spiritual activity.” Richard Foster explains the what and why of this month’s focus discipline.

Book Excerpt from Prayer: Finding the Heart's True Home

We Never Outgrow Asking

Published August, 1992 • Featured April 25, 2018

Adoration or contemplation may seem nobler than asking God for something. But Richard Foster kindly insists that petition isn’t a lower form of prayer—it’s our staple diet.

Book Excerpt from The Making Of An Ordinary Saint

Understanding Prayer

Published September, 2014 • Featured April 11, 2018

In April 2018, we’re looking together at the discipline of prayer. With whom better to start, then, than Richard Foster, whose book Prayer: Finding the Heart’s True Home has blessed so many over the years? Join us in exploring a discipline that God uses to welcome, embrace, and change us.

Interview

Forty Years of Celebration of Discipline: An Interview with Richard Foster

Featured April 6, 2018

Richard Foster chats with Paul Anderson of George Fox University about the 40th anniversary of Celebration of Discipline, how that first book led to many others, why Renovaré came into being, the ways being a Quaker shaped his interdenominational outreach, and what the future holds.

Book Foreword from Becoming Dallas Willard

Model of a Life Well Lived

Featured March 22, 2018

Richard Foster reflects on the “human supernova” who changed his life forever: Dallas Willard. In this foreword to Becoming Dallas Willard, Richard shares memories of his friend and why he believes that Dallas’s life is a model for our time.

Book Excerpt from Celebration of Discipline

Technology Cannot Nourish the Soul

Featured March 15, 2018

Forty years ago, traditional ways of growing in grace had largely fallen by the wayside of western Christianity. Yet, many had a strong desire to find practices to enter more fully and deeply into Christlikeness. Richard Foster penned Celebration of Discipline as a response to this need.

Book Excerpt from The Making Of An Ordinary Saint

Understanding Meditation

Published October, 2014 • Featured March 7, 2018

Prayer is the interactive relationship we have with God about what we and God are working on together. Christian meditation is the listening side of this interactive relationship.

Article

Lent and Ignatius' Spiritual Exercises

Published April, 1993 • Featured February 16, 2018

In this classic newsletter article, Richard Foster shares his experiment with the rhythms of Ignatius’ Spiritual Exercises during Lent.

Book Excerpt from The Making Of An Ordinary Saint

Understanding Submission

Published October, 2014 • Featured February 5, 2018

Richard Foster joins us to help us understand the discipline of submission. How does Jesus call us to follow him not only to a “cross death” but a “cross life”? How can we only be truly free when we are captives of the Lord? Richard introduces us to February 2018’s spiritual discipline.

Book Excerpt from Prayer: Finding the Heart's True Home

Prevail with God

Featured January 22, 2018

Richard Foster joins us today to offer “a magnificent model” of intercessory prayer from the Exodus 17 story of Moses, Aaron, and Hur. Why is nothing more important than this type of prayer in the “ongoing work of the kingdom of God”? Foster explains in this excerpt from his book on prayer.