Go to home page - diocesan shield

The Anglican Church in Tasmania                                                             Search

a healthy church...transformingLIFE

Tasmanian Anglican

June 2003

 

 

 

 


Spiritual Classics
Edited by Richard Foster and Emilie Griffin
London: Harper Collins, 2000 , 431 pages pb RRP: $39.95

 

Spiritual Classics

review by Paul Arnott

 

 

This book has been staring down at me from our bookcase in our home in Forest Hill for the past few months, making me feel guilty.

Before we left Tasmania sixteen months ago I ordered a review copy of Spiritual Classics for the Tasmanian Anglican, on the recommendation of my dear friend Ross Flint. However, in the midst of all that was happening it didn't get reviewed, so now I need to put things right.

Spiritual Classics is an anthology of the writings of such diverse Christian giants as Thomas Merton, Agnes Sanford, Simone Weil, William Law, George MacDonald, A.W.Tozer, Thomas ý Kempis, Alan Paton, Charles Wesley, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Frederick Beuchner, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Hildegard of Bingen, Martin Luther King, Jr Andrew Murray and Christina Rossetti.

It's divided into three main sections:

  1. The Inward Disciplines of meditation, prayer, fasting and study
  2. The Outward Disciplines of simplicity, solitude, submission and service
  3. The Corporate Disciplines of confession, worship, guidance and celebration.

The book contains fifty-two chapters, designed to be used by individuals and groups. Each chapter contains a biography of the writer, selections of their writings, a relevant passage of scripture, discussion questions, suggested exercises, reflections and a bibliography to enable readers to go further. Those who read it are encouraged to read it with the heart, not only the head:

'Probably one of the most important things we could ask of you as you work with these readings is to slow down, breathe deeply, and read with the heart.'

Practical bent

In case you feel that this sounds like hard work let me say that Spiritual Classics is full of Christian wisdom and insight from down the ages, with a practical bent. For example, from Agnes Sanford on prayer: 'Let us lay aside our worries and cares, quiet our minds and concentrate upon the reality of God. The second step is to connect with this life by some such prayer as this: ìHeavenly Father please increase in me at this time your life-giving power.' The third step is to believe that this power is coming into use and to accept it by faith and the fourth step is to observe the operations of that light and life.' (pp.43-44).

Or from Martin Luther, quoting Jesus' teaching in Matthew 6 about trusting God, not money, by observing the birds of the air: 'You see, He is making the birds our schoolmasters and teachers. It is a great and abiding disgrace to us that in the gospel a helpless sparrow should become a theologian and a preacher to the wisest of men.' (p.136)

Naked truth

One of my favourite gleanings from this book were these words about the power of silence from Christian psychiatrist, Paul Tournier: 'Silence has the power to dig deep inside yourself. It was a phenomenon well known to Jesus, who would go off to spend a whole night in the desert. St Paul was aware of it and all the mystics as well. The naked truth comes out. We are dealing with simple matters, and modern people have lost their understanding of such things.' (pp.184-5).

Spiritual Classics is a superb devotional guide and an excellent resource for both preachers and bible study leaders. And it contains both an alphabetical and scripture index. While the UK edition is out of print it is available from the US.

Paul Arnott is the State Director of CMS in Victoria. A new edition of his book No Time To Say Goodbye will be published by Acorn Press in June.