Upward and Outward

Tullian Tchividjian:

When a lot of Christian’s think about “spirituality” they tend to think of it monastically, individualistically. In fact, in his book on sanctification, Harold Senkbeil writes, “What has developed under the guise of the practice of the Christian faith borders on a new monasticism.” Many of us, in other words, think about spirituality exclusively in terms of personal piety, internal devotion, and spiritual formation. We focus almost entirely on ourselves and our private disciplines: praying, reading the Bible, and so on. That, we conclude, is what spirituality is first and foremost. And while personal disciplines are indispensable aspects of staying tethered to the truth of gospel (you’ll shrink without them), it’s interesting that when James makes his strong point in 2:14-26 about faith without works being dead, what he describes are not works of private spirituality but public service.

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