goodreads | Celebration of Discipline - Richard Foster (Reply)

Title: Celebration of Discipline
Author: Richard J. Foster
Genre: Christian non-fiction
Rating: 3,5
# pages: 200
Date read: April 2008, March 2016

When Richard Foster began writing Celebration of Discipline more than 20 years ago, an older writer gave him a bit of advice: "Be sure that every chapter forces the reader into the next chapter." Foster took the advice to heart; as a result, his book presents one of the most compelling and readable visions of Christian spirituality published in the past few decades. In succinct, urgent, and sometimes humorous chapters, Foster defines a broad range of classic spiritual disciplines in terms that are lucid without being too limiting and offers advice that's practical without being overly prescriptive. For instance, after describing meditation as a combination of "intense intimacy and awful reverence," he settles into such down-to-earth topics as how to choose a place and a posture in which to meditate.

Reread in 2016: Exceedingly weird... my opinion of this book keeps changing!

I read this in 2004 and absolutely adored it. Back then I'd have rated it 5+/5 because of how much it touched me.

I reread it in 2008 and was slightly disappointed that it couldn't live up to my expectations. I downgraded the rating to 4/5, as I thought it still started out really good and I learned a lot from the inward disciplines (prayer, meditation, study, fasting) but the outward (simplicity, solitude, serving and submission) and the corporate disciplines (confession, worship, guidance and celebration) seemed less important and less poignant to me than I felt they ought.

Then I reread it again this year, figuring that with lower expectations, it wouldn't disappoint me yet again... but that's exactly what it did. The contents of the book is still fine, but the writer's voice annoyed me exceedingly and I did think he made some arguments I didn't feel there was suitable reasoning behind.

Probably not a book I'll revisit - a shame, as I loved it SO much back when I first read it.