Richard J. Foster > Quotes

“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.' ...It is time to awaken to the fact that conformity to a sick society is to be sick.”
― Richard J. Foster, Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth

“A farmer is helpless to grow grain; all he can do is provide the right conditions for the growing of grain. He cultivates the ground, he plants the seed, he waters the plants, and then the natural forces of the earth take over and up comes the grain...This is the way it is with the Spiritual Disciplines - they are a way of sowing to the Spirit... By themselves the Spiritual Disciplines can do nothing; they can only get us to the place where something can be done.”
― Richard J. Foster, Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth

“..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

“Jesus Christ and all the writers of the New Testament call us to break free of mammon lust and live in joyous trust...They point us toward a way of living in which everything we have we receive as a gift, and everything we have is cared for by God, and everything we have is available to others when it is right and good. This reality frames the heart of Christian simplicity. It is the means of liberation and power to do what is right and to overcome the forces of fear and avarice.”
― Richard J. Foster, Freedom of Simplicity: Finding Harmony in a Complex World

“Submission reaches the end of its tether when it becomes destructive.”
― Richard J. Foster, Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth

“In our day heaven and earth are on tiptoe waiting for the emerging of the Spirit-led, Spirit-intoxicaed, Spirit-empowered peole. All of creation watches expectantly for the springing up of a disciplined, freely gathered, martyr people who know in this likfe the life and power of the Kindgom of God. It happened before, it can happen again.”
― Richard J. Foster

“The desperate need today is not for a greater number of intelligent people, or gifted people, but for deep people.”
― Richard J. Foster, Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth