The Wisdom of Stability: Rooting Faith in a Mobile Culture

by Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove, Kathleen Norris (Foreword)

“In whatever place you live, do not easily leave it.” –Abba Anthony
In an age where we might email a friend in Africa, skype a co-worker in Brazil, and teleconference with people in different time zones–all in one day–the sheer speed of life can be dizzying. Like children stumbling off a merry-go-round, says Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove, we are grasping for something to anchor our lives in a sea of constant change.   In The Wisdom of Stability , Wilson-Hartgrove illuminates the biblical and monastic understanding of why staying in one place is both a virtue, and good for you. “For the Christian tradition,” he writes, “the heart’s true home is a life rooted in the love of God.” When we cultivate an inner stability of heart – by rooting ourselves in the places where we live, engaging the people we are with, and by the simple rhythms of tending to body and soul – true growth can happen. The Wisdom of Stability is a must-read for pastors, leaders, and anyone seeking an authentic path of Christian transformation.

Genres: Theology, Christian, Spirituality, Nonfiction, Christian Living, Faith, Christianity

164 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2010

Reviews

[Jeff · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'd like to do a longer review at some point, but wanted to take a second to recommend this book highly to anyone interested. I first heard Wilson-Hartgrove speak at a conference here in London with Shane Claiborne. His ideas about stability and place remind me (and are derived from) those of Wendell Berry. I found them very compelling and, to the extent that I've experienced staying in one place for the last few years, they resonated strongly. Staying in one place, he argues, is like a spiritual discipline. It's a hard exercise in patience and grace-giving that rewards because it forces us to give God space and time in which to work. Wilson-Hartgrove's section on "midday demons" is particularly good: boredom, ambition, vainglory... these are all things that I've encountered even in our short time here, and it was encouraging to hear him name these for what they are. On top of it all, he's a good story-teller, a skill that he put to work in short anecdotal pieces interleaved through the book.

[Laney Dugan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was really looking forward to reading this book, as I feel like a sense of rootlessness or restlessness often drifts through my soul, and the message of hyper-mobility and constant movement that circulates in our society (as well as in some Christian circles) has begun to lose some of its shine for me… so while this book may not have been the silver bullet I deep down hoped it would be, it was a great read and I am grateful for the perspectives and thoughts presented throughout. In a very gentle but clear way, Wilson-Hartgrove paints a picture of the very real beauties, challenges, and necessities of commitment — of being rooted among people in a physical place — and pulls heavily from the desert fathers and mothers as he explored the wisdom of stability throughout the ages. I feel like this was a breath of fresh air in a world constantly on the move, with much temptation to see movement as the same thing as growth or progress, and I was encouraged by what a spirituality of staying could look like.

I don’t entirely know how this culturally-contrary book will shape my thoughts and decisions going forward, but I know that it has shifted my thinking and the way I think about stability and mobility — even if in the smallest, gentlest way possible. I would recommend this!

[Cory Shumate · Rating 4 out of 5]

Refreshing and insightful

A convincing and insightful call to remain in one place for the sake of fruit and mission, in the midst of a culture of wandering and mobility. A wonderful and challenging read.

[Rachel · Rating 1 out of 5]

For a slim little book, this sure was hard to get through.

Based on the title, I think I was expecting something a little more practical. Something that would be a kind of guide for developing a sense of stability in the midst our frenzied and hyper mobile culture. But that’s not really what this is at all. I think a more accurate title might have been: Thoughts on Stability: Meandering Musings on the Value of Staying Put.

While there are nuggets of wisdom scattered across the text, I found the structure a bit dizzying and the tone a little pretentious. The central problem, however, is that there is no clear definition of terms. “Stability” and “the practice of stability” and “the fruit of stability” all get bandied around without a consistent meaning. Is stability about staying put in a specific location? Is it is about having roots in a community? Or is it a more spiritual concept of a solid foundation through faith in God? The word is used to mean each of these things at one point or another, and sometimes even seems to be meaning all of them at the same time. I found this tendency to conflate a firm faith foundation with the act of staying put in a physical location problematic. Sometimes God calls someone to stay; sometimes He calls them to go. Going isn’t inherently unstable.

Toward the end, the author finally kind of stumbles on to that, but it really felt like he wrote himself to what should have been his starting point. This made me ponder whether a book on the “wisdom of stability” might be better written by someone much farther along in both life and “the practice of stability.”

[Mala · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great read and thoughts on staying in one place. Living in a hyper-mobile society, we are constantly told success is found in distant lands, that we won't understand diversity of tolerance or culture unless we move away, and never settle down. This book challenges that thinking and heavily references the wisdom of monks/nuns, especially Benedictine fathers, however, remains applicable to everyday people. Would like to read similar books on this topic.

[Laura Fabrycky · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thoughtful, full of important insights, and appreciated how he tethers issues of justice/injustice (poverty, racial discrimination, as well as wealth and hypermobility) to spiritual practices.

[Tim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mixing personal stories of his life in the Durham neighborhood of Walltown, with Scripture, the desert fathers and mothers, and the wisdom of the monastic tradition, Wilson-Hartgrove gently and winsomely reminds us of the necessity of community and its impossibility if we capitulate to the restless movement and consumerism of our modern culture. Instead community must be sought in God's house (his economy) and received as the gift that it truly is. "Without the gift of God's presence in the place where we are, stability is only an ideal for humans to aspire to - the unachievable goal of spirits whose reach must exceed their grasp. But the stability God invites us into is a practice that entails a way of life. To dwell in the house of God is to be transformed into people who know the ways and means of God."

Stability, becoming rooted over time in one place, is not valued in American culture and stands against its dreams of upward mobility and personal fulfillment. Instead of those dreams Wilson-Hartgrove advocates patience and rest, ("Rest is coming home to the way of life that fits, learning to inhabit the story of God's people and practice the craft of life with God wherever we are.") prayer and a rhythym of life that welcomes limitations and structure. His vision requires establishing deep roots of love that recognize other people as "gifts from God to help me grow in love." No matter how difficult they may be.

In contrast to such deep and long term relationships he has a wonderfully brutal reflection on the nature of internet friendships. "The great advantage of a Facebook friendship, of course, is that it is so easy. I get to choose who I want to 'friend' and whose friendship requests I respond to. We gather around our common interests, share the stuff we want others to know, and log off when we feel like it. In many ways what we have is connection without obligation. But intimacy without commitment is what our society has traditionally called 'infidelity.'" In such a setting relationships too often become arms-length transactions, trading in the commodity of friendship.


This is not an insistent, guilt-inducing book. Instead it offers a better way and does so with realism and joy.

[Robert Irish · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an excellent reflection on the role of "stability" in Christian growth. Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove lives in an intentional community called Rutba House in Walltown, North Carolina. In this book, he shares the learning about what happens when a group takes seriously Benedict's Rule requiring "stability" or staying where you are planted.
He develops the idea that staying put and staying engaged is a discipline that requires attention and effort. "The stability God invites us into is a practice that entails a way of life." It may be easy to exist in a place, but requires attention to root oneself into a community in a way that means you are both drawing nutrients from its depth and providing fruit and influence within the "drip line" -- he uses this tree metaphor throughout. The drip line is the edge of the tree's canopy, and indicates (approximately) how broad its roots spread. For the person whose roots have been established, it is useful to understand the sphere of influence within your drip line and work within that, however humble that achievement.
At the same time, he is presents the significance of God's engagement in making stability: "The ground of stability is always God's gift." For W-H, the beauty of the gift is that it places us into authentic community, it enables us to engage productively and fully with our neighbours without asking the trivial question, "Who is my neighbour?" Aside: I am reminded of Bonhoeffer's brilliant observation that "I am the neighbour" -- that is I have the opportunity/responsibility to behave in a neighbourly way to every person, thereby determining who my neighbour is. W-H offers some tangible experience and grounding wisdom for how to do that. Moreover, his approach allows us to limit our responsibility of "neighbourliness" by providing the useful idea of working within one's sphere of influence. Of course, this isn't to abdicate global or national concerns (W-H did, after all, go to Iraq during the Gulf War to stop bombs from being dropped on innocent Iraqis), but to make an honest space for our significant interactions to become deeper, more rooted, and consistent over time scales of years and decades rather than moments or nanoseconds.

[C. Christopher Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

http://erb.kingdomnow.org/featured-th...

In a nutshell:
Stability is essential to our faithfulness as we share life together in our church communities, and Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove’s The Wisdom of Stability is the finest reflection on stability in the contemporary world. Through stability, we learn to mature together in a place toward the fullness of Christ (Eph. 4), becoming, by the grace of God, a vibrant contrast to the madness of our hypermobile culture. In The Wisdom of Stability, Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove orchestrates the voices of those before us who have set out to cultivate the practice of stability and poignantly calls us to the threshold of this journey of growing into stability. May we have the courage to heed his call and set out together on this journey and the even greater courage needed to weather the many demons that will assail us as we continue to be faithful in our place, day by day and year by year.

[Ellie Lynn · Rating 2 out of 5]

Wise content, but the books was underdeveloped.

[Jeff Colston · Rating 4 out of 5]

I must say that I went into this with a natural leaning toward living in one place forever, so I am a bit biased and was already sort of sold on the idea before reading the book. Nevertheless, I was still really challenged and convicted reading this, and I think this is something that the average American would benefit from hearing: “In whatever place you find yourself, do not easily leave it.”

I love this quote:
“Without roots of love, we easily become slaves to our own desires, using the place where we happen to be as a staging ground for our ambitions and manipulating the people around us so they might serve our objectives. We do this, of course, with the best of intentions—even in God’s name. But until we give ourselves to a place—until we care enough to learn the names of its flowers and its second cousins—stability’s wisdom suggests we cannot know very much about the One who so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son.

Stability teaches us something about the importance of particularity. God’s omnipotence and omnipresence may be attributes we can contemplate in the abstract realm of ideas, but the love of God is as particular as a Jewish man named Jesus who was born of a woman named Mary in a town called Bethlehem. We know what love looks like when we know it among particular people in a given place. If the love of God and neighbor is our end goal, roots of love in stability are the means God has given for making progress in this life.”

As I have found reading other older cultural commentaries, I also just mourn the fact that technology has only progressed since 2010 (when this book was published) and we are even farther apart socially and more distractable.

Finally, I think Wilson-Hartgrove asserts a fascinating reason for why some poor neighborhoods just aren’t getting better: the upwardly mobile move away and never return. The antidote: “perhaps stability is the great leveler in a society of widening gaps.”

My only caution: I think he doesn’t leave room for real, godly reasons to move and, perhaps, oversimplifies the situation. Regardless, I think a lot of Christians need to hear this message!

[Rebekah · Rating 5 out of 5]

You should read this book. We truly do live in a hypermobile culture--schools, jobs, residences, even churches, are changed so easily, and as they change so do those people we call neighbors and friends. The Wisdom of Stability is a wonderful reminder of the benefits of staying put, committing yourself to a place and the people in it. Wilson-Hartgrove explores how we are meant for community, and quickly dispels the idea that stability is something we can find solely within ourselves. This doesn't mean God never calls us to leave where we are, a question the author addresses in the book's final chapter, but Wilson-Hartgrove does suggest (and I agree) that "maybe none of us are safe to respond to God's call until we've stayed put long enough to face our demons."

Honestly, this book sat on my shelf for years before I finally read it. I'd fallen into the trap of believing I needed stability, but needed to find it somewhere else, and therefore didn't want to read anything that might tell me to stay put. I finally broke down and read it for the first time in the fall of 2019, and I can tell you even in just the past year I've experienced the life-giving benefits of staying put and facing my demons where I am. So much so that I decided to read it again just as a reminder.

I hope you read this book, and that it causes you to rethink whether you're trying to extend your reach too far beyond your roots--or whether you even have roots. Second Kings 19:30 and Isaiah 37:31 both say, "And the surviving remnant of the house of Judah shall again take root downward and bear fruit upward," reminding us of the vital connection between having roots and bearing fruit. The Wisdom of Stability reminds us of the same.

[Brian Wilcox · Rating 3 out of 5]

The author is a superb writer, and the narrative flowed easily. He draws well upon personal experience and utilizes the monastic tradition, referencing mostly the early desert fathers. He, likewise, draws from the Christian Scriptures.

A weakness of the work is in the treatment of stability almost exclusively as to longevity in physical location ~ this seems to comport with the author's affiliation with what is called the new monasticism. Rarely is stability as an inner experience referred to, even though the author treats the inward fruition of locational stability. One could get the sense this is a book about the superiority of locational stability over, say, professionals who move often due to work, which has been my experience for much of my adult life. The book would have been a stronger presentation with guidance for persons who live mobile lifestyles in cultivating an inward posture of stability.

That said, the book well points to the need for and blessings of stability, and it can remind us of the need for sustenance of relationships over time, or as they say from the community of my own upbringing of rootedness ~ being rooted being an analogy used in this work ~, over the long-haul. And, likewise, for many of us who have lived more mobile lifestyles, as we may shift to settling down, we can cherish the gifts of such geographical stability shared with us within this work, especially as many of us, in older years, will settle down in one location permanently.

[Diana (diana_reads_and_reads) · Rating 1 out of 5]

I never thought Wilson-Hartgrove’s thesis was clear and he seemed to talk in circles a lot of the time. What he called boredom, I would call depression, I did not find the paragraph where he tried to draw the distinction between the two persuasive. Overall, that discussion, like much of the book, suffers from a lack of definition of terms. I anticipated this being more about being stable in yourself through relationship with God than the actual stability of staying in one place. Even there, though, he seemed not to be clear on which one he was talking about all the time. My biggest problem with this book is where he says the man who was struggling with sexual thoughts just needed some physical work. That’s how we get those Christian “reformatories” for sexual predators, folks. If these were non-hurtful or damaging sexual thoughts, how about we start with talking about how it’s normal for adults in their 20s to have sexual thoughts instead of trying to constantly suppress them?

[Michael Munson · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you are new to the idea of a rhythm of intentional life in a very over digitally connected and saturated life, this book will give language to the rumblings of your heart. If you have long battled the restlessness that comes with living in a society which has "everything" you want and gives it to you, this book will also give you a vocabulary to help find a way through the mess. And if you have already begun the journey of seeing that a life devoid of deep friendship, community, spirituality and suffering is not worth it, then you will find a friend in these pages.

[J.F. Ethan Rose · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove explicates the life of rootedness in this wonderfully written book. Staying put in community, putting down firm roots, and living the call of Christ in a local context are things that I have been thinking about for a while now, and jonathan's words have helped me think more so about the importance of firmly planting my feet where I am and letting God work through me here and now. If you are looking for a book to convince you not to go off to a far away place, or to not go seeking God in a distant land, then "The Wisdom of Stability" may just be that book.

[Jacob Hudgins · Rating 4 out of 5]

Short but not always to the point. The author challenges the rootlessness of modern American culture, which belies either ambition (success is elsewhere) or shallowness (fulfillment is away from these people who are hard to love). I was challenged (positively) by the call to love deeper and try to correct the prejudices and problems of the places we know best...instead of leaving. The main drawback for me was the constant emphasis on the monastic fathers. There is no critical examination of whether monastic life is actually preferable; it is assumed this is the best way to live in the world.

[Jenny · Rating 5 out of 5]

Our highly-mobile, low-commitment culture prevents us from really digging in and being productive.
If we want to flourish in life and really make an impact in the community, we have to be willing to commit to it...for life. A really solid argument in favor of "blooming where you are planted" and just staying put!

[Alex Long · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is solidly okay.
If you're Christian and you feel like modern culture is too fast-moving and impersonal, this offers a spiritual context/ justification for slowing down and being happy where you are with the people around you. It's not academic or theological, it just focuses on feelings. It's really short, which is a plus.

[Joshua · Rating 2 out of 5]

Maybe I missed something. I empathize with the premise of the book but it didn't feel developed to the extent it could have been. Ties back to scripture felt tenuous. I was looking for more depth and perhaps need to re-read.

[Kelly Sauskojus]

Deeply thankful for this book.

[Amy Jacobsen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thematically this fit the intention and of my sabbatical. Brought together important values and practices and have me language and imagery to use.

[Coleman Yoakum · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has made a huge impact on our work in community. Be rooted, move slow, do it together.

[Lisa Lewton · Rating 3 out of 5]

Norris’s forward is of course quite lovely. This book is focused on staying rooted, tending to God’s call in the here and now. Relies on The Rule of Benedict and other desert fathers.

[Dave Courtney · Rating 4 out of 5]

In a world where change is more and more constant, the idea of stability (in life, work, relationships, finances, social responsibilities) feels like a foreign concept. There is irony in the idea that we live in an age that demands multi-tasking and where multiple things demand our attention at any given time, and yet boredom and discontent appears to be growing. It is here Wilson-Hartgrove argues that stability is more than simply a state of mind or a feeling. It is a gift and a virtue. Perhaps more telling, which Hartgrove spends most of his time on developing, is that the stability is a discipline.

Hartgrove is the leader of the new monastic movement. In the Wisdom of Stability he frames much of his thought around the monastic way of life, connecting it back to the desert fathers and the ancient Biblical tradition leading back to Jacob (whom he describes as a man on the run through whom God promises to build a home for his people). This idea of staying and building where we are carries over throughout the exile to call a displaced people to make a home in a foreign land. It is here, in these places where we are called to stay, to grow, to build and to develop that God uses us to affect the world around us.

As the discussion moves forward, it shows us the tendency to run and to move in the face of competing forces. This might be boredom. It could be adversity. It can be conflict with others that causes us to move on from a workplace or a neighborhood where we might otherwise find opportunity to grow in positive ways. In fact, it is often in the act of staying put (the concept of stability at its heart) that allows us to learn the disciplines that can enable us to work through conflict successfully. Staying put in the face of pressures that tempt us to move on is difficult (to be sure), but it can also be life giving and character shaping.

Perhaps most importantly, learning the art of stability (being content where God has us) is a centring process that brings our focus on to what really matters (the interior journey rather than an outward physical journey). It allows us to invest in to things that take time to grow. And, as Hartgrove's imagery develops, it allows us to take root and to become stronger for it. In this we can then find opportunity to give outwards in to a context that we might not otherwise have when we are in constant change and in constant movement.

Hartgrove suggests that a part of learning the wisdom of stability is becoming attuned to when God desires us to stay and when He desires us to go. But the truth of the wisdom of stability is that more often than not the harder discipline is the act and choice of staying.

[Keith Long · Rating 4 out of 5]

Here's a link to my review and reflection from my blog "Becoming Anew": https://becoming-anew.blogspot.com/20...

[Sylvia · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book over several months and finished it during one of the most transitional periods of my life...newly married, moved to a different country, an as yet an unknown language, loss of a job I loved not to mention family and friends, and having sold 80% of my belongings. In the midst of these circumstances, The Wisdom of Stability allowed me to feel as if the ground beneath me was a much stronger foundation than it felt like at times. I especially loved the last two chapters, "Midday Demons" and "Blooming in the Dessert."

JWH reflects on stability with a trusted sense of knowledge and a beautiful simplicity. Moving back and forth from keen information to small events and gleanings from his daily life, I enjoyed reading the things JWH finds most helpful as he reflects on the importance of stability, and the difficulty we have giving ourselves to it. As expected, his reflections include an appreciation for the ordinary, the necessity of fellow-travellers, a willingness to commit to the flawed among us and within us, the audacity to hope together, and the belief that stability, not mobility, is what we are radically called to.

"The trouble for most of us isn't so much that we cannot afford stability as it is that we don't value it."

"Maybe none of us are safe to respond to God's call until we've stayed put long enough to face our demons."

"To imagine stability as mission is not to assume that we will change our neighbors and the broken places where we are if only we can muster the resolve to stick it out. Rather, it is to acknowledge that there is good news in this place-stability that we might not have seen at first, but without which we could not even begin. If God is faithful in exile and present in human flesh, then everything - every place - is now holy."

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've been meaning to read this book since it came out and just finally got around to it. With a nod toward the desert fathers and St. Benedict, Wilson-Hartgrove makes his case for stability in a mobile culture. If monasticism (old or new) seems too daunting of a commitment, you will still find plenty to consider in these pages. This is an accessible introduction to the idea, not a sustained theological reflection on it.

But that doesn't mean there isn't plenty to think about. Wilson-Hartgrove commends a spiritual stability resting in God, an active stability embodied in a commitment to a particular place by entering into it, routines of stability and warnings about the temptations and pitfalls to avoid. While I was reading, I was reminded by advice a campus minister and mentor once told me about growing deep, versus growing wide. If you want to grow deep, that means committing to something, and not everything. If you want to grow in love, you need to commit for the long haul. While this book is called the "Wisdom of Stability" Wilson-Hartgrove could have also called it growing in fidelity.

I don't think this book is the be all and end all, but Wilson-Hartgrove is trying to get you to commit to a place. I think he's right, though I haven't found the place to commit to yet. Still the fruit I want to see in my life and in ministry do not come instantly. It takes time and years of commitment to a people, a relationships, to a place. It takes choosing to enter into a real-time encounter with the world I find myself in and trust that God has something for me there.

[Lee Bertsch · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fine, thought provoking book. In the past I have focused a lot on the mobility aspect of the Christian life inherent in the words "follow me, and "go and make disciples", and "As the Father sent me, so I am sending you". Perhaps it is partly my stage in life, but I was quite ready to hear the author make the case for the wisdom of stability. The frequent analogies in scripture of our lives as well rooted trees provide an essential counter balance. His argument that our compulsion to move on to other locations, jobs, churches, etc, reflects a deep seated problem with vain ambition and boredom was convincing. Loving our neighbor does include our response to happening upon a needy person on a road to Jericho, but to love our neighbor or fellow member of Christ's household in a deep and mature way requires a long and uninterrupted living together.

Here are a couple of many memorable quotes:
"Stay put and pay attention - learn to trust God in the place where you are - and you will have a front seat for the revolution that Christian tradition calls conversion". (the author)

It is not at all safe to leave a certain good for an uncertain hope ... since what we easily desire when we do not have it often becomes unbearable once experienced, for we unreasonably want a thing one minute and reject it in the next. (Bernard of Clairvaux)

[Tim · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book caught my attention because it seemed very counter to a lot of Christian books out there. He argues that the best and perhaps most important way we can grow in our faith is to develop roots in a community and place instead of bouncing around. Drawing on the wisdom of the desert monks and relevant Scripture passages, he makes a good case for finding a place to stay put and people to develop long term relationships with. I thought the chapter on Midday Demons was especially helpful and interesting, as he discussed the challenges we inevitably face when we stay put and the reasons why we might want to pack up and run somewhere else.

I think I only gave it 3 stars because it just felt like something was lacking- it's such an interesting subject and yet the book never fully grabbed me aside from the chapter I already mentioned. I would have liked to see him spend a little more time unpacking his thoughts and applying Scripture to support his points. Other than this complaint, I think it's a much needed balance to the "travel the globe and have one adventure after another" ideal that has pervaded the thinking of many Christians in their 20's.