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And so I urge you: carry on an ongoing conversation with God about the daily stuff of life, a little like Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof. For now, do not worry about “proper” praying, just talk to God.

Richard J. Foster

We really must understand that the lust for affluence in contemporary society is psychotic. It is psychotic because it has completely lost touch with reality. We crave things we neither need nor enjoy. We buy things we do not want to impress people we do not like.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

People Reality Sick
Superficiality is the curse of our age. The doctrine of instant satisfaction is a primary spiritual problem.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Age Satisfaction Spiritual
Spiritual direction is an interpersonal relationship in which we learn how to grow, live, and love in the spiritual life.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Grows Love Spiritual
Inward solitude has outward manifestations. There is the freedom to be alone, not in order to be away from people but in order to hear the divine Whisper better.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Order People Solitude
Our problem is that we assume prayer is something to master the way we master algebra or auto mechanics. But when praying, we come “underneath,” where we calmly and deliberately surrender control and become incompetent.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Assuming Prayer Way
Just as worship begins in holy expectancy, it ends in holy obedience. If worship does not propel us into greater obedience, it has not been worship.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Holy Obedience Worship
In intellectual honesty, we should be willing to study and explore the spiritual life with all the rigor and determination we would give to any field of research.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Determination Honesty Spiritual
It is Stoicism that demands a closed universe, not the Bible.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Demand Stoicism Universe
In the context of Quaker worship, it is perfectly appropriate for any person in the congregation to speak a timely word from the Lord.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Lord Speak Worship
Simplicity enables us to live lives of integrity in the face of the terrible realities of our global village.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Integrity Life Live Reality
It is an occupational hazard of devout folk to become stuffy bores. This should not be. Of all people, we should be the most free, alive, interesting.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Hazards Interesting People
Silence is one of the deepest Disciplines of the Spirit, simply because it puts the stopper on all self-justificat ion
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Discipline Ions Self
Grace saves us from life without God-even more it empowers us for life with God.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Empowering God Grace
The person who does not seek the kingdom first does not seek it at all, regardless of how worthy the idolatry that he or she has substituted for it.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Doe Firsts Kingdoms
He is inviting you – and me – to come home, to come home to where we belong, to come home to that for which we were created. His arms are stretched out wide to receive us. His heart is enlarged to take us in.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Arms Heart Home
Four times a year withdraw for three to four hours for the purpose of reorienting your life goals
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Four Goal Years
Prayer is – listening for the still small voice of God. Listening with the “ear of our hearts.”
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Heart Prayer Voice
Pride is one of the socially acceptable sins in some corners of the evangelical culture. Its just straight-out ego gratification – how important I am; whether my name gets on the building or on the TV program or in the magazine article.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Ego Names Pride
Prayer involves transformed passions. In prayer, real prayer, we begin to think God’s thoughts after Him: to desire the things He desires, to love the things He loves, to will the things He wills.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Passion Prayer Real
Our Adversary majors in three things: noise, hurry and crowds. If he can keep us engaged in “muchness” and “manyness,” he will rest satisfied.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Crowds Noise Three
What is urgently needed is a bold new move from a consumer economy to a conserver economy in all of the developed countries, and particularly in the United States.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Country Environmental Moving
Loneliness is inner emptiness. Solitude is inner fulfillment.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Emptiness Loneliness Solitude
The spiritual discipline of simplicity is not a lost dream, but a recurrent version throughout history. It can be recaptured today. It must be.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Discipline Dream Spiritual
When we determine to dwell on the good and excellent things in life, we will be so full of those things that they will tend to swallow our problems.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Excellent Life Problem Things
..the true test of spirituality [is] in the freedom to live among people compassionately….Prayer frees us to be controlled by God.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

People Prayer Test
Simplicity is freedom.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Freedom Happen Simplicity
Conversion does not make us perfect, but it does catapult us into a total experience of discipleship that affects – and infects – every sphere of our living.
RICHARD J. FOSTER

Doe Perfect Spheres

And so I urge you: carry on an ongoing conversation with God about the daily stuff of life, a little like Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof. For now, do not worry about “proper” praying, just talk to God.

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And so I urge you: carry on an ongoing conversation with God about the daily stuff of life, a little like Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof. For now, do not worry about “proper” praying, just talk to God.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Richard J. Foster Quotes