[BOOK REVIEW]: Sanctuary of the Soul

In Sanctuary of the Soul, Richard Foster looks deeply into the realm of meditative prayer, a spiritual practice mostly gone missing in this age of status updates and cable companies. Though the content of the book centers on the oftentimes mystical experience of “descending with the mind into the heart,” the admired author of the classic Celebration of Discipline shares practical steps on entering into worthwhile meditative prayer and how to make it a daily spiritual practice that could revitalize your walk with Christ.

Distraction
Few would disagree with Foster’s assertion that “distraction is the primary spiritual problem in our day.” While he points the accusatory finger at our hyper-connected world, he’s careful to note that distraction has always been the bane of the Christian life.

“The moment we genuinely try to be collected we become painfully aware of how distracted we really are.” In attempting to release the things that often consume our minds, we become aware of the hundreds of issues that we believe require our attention. Fortunately, Foster reminds the reader that grace abounds, and that even the fight to become collected is a form of meditative prayer. With each step taken to become undistracted, a believer has taken another step closer toward Christ.

Watch Richard Foster talk about Sanctuary of the Soul.

Hearing God’s Voice
Inspired by Dallas Willard’s Hearing God, Foster includes a compelling section on discerning God’s voice.

“The quality of God’s voice is one of drawing and encouraging. The spirit in God’s voice is all grace and mercy. And the content of what is being said is always consistent with what God has said before . . . “

When adding the practice of meditative prayer to your schedule, you may turn away after a few days of supposed failed attempts, much like eager exercisers may turn away from a new exercise program after a few days when no perceivable weight loss has occurred. The reason for such surrender often lies in the fact that the voice of God is not heard or not discernable above the din of your daily life.

You may sit in silence for 30 minutes, then think your time was spent in vain. But, just like muscles that can only be formed with continual use over a lengthy period of time, the practice of meditative prayer must be given time until “we experience the perpetual presence of the Lord not as theological dogma but as radical reality.” Yet grace abounds, even when words don’t: “As with good friends there does not need to be any words.”

Conversely, some of us fear meditative prayer because it may lead to our undoing. Knowing the depravity of our own souls and the issues that plague us, we hesitate to enter into a deeper relationship with God. We don’t want to listen because we fear having to change. As Foster says, “If certain chambers of our heart have never experienced God’s healing touch, perhaps it is because we have never welcomed the divine Scrutiny.”

Hear and Obey
According to Foster, if meditative prayer fails to lead a person to action in some way, then it hasn’t served its purpose. As Joshua 1:8 attests, “Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it.” Foster quotes William Penn to reinforce this idea: ”True Godliness does not turn men out of the world, but enables them to live better in it and excites their endeavors to mend it.”

Foster then lists and elaborates on three basic steps to meditation, each receiving their own chapter: recollection, beholding, and listening. However, he’s quick to point out that ”Five easy steps or ten quick lessons simply are not sufficient to a living relationship.” In other words, these steps are to be taken as a suggestion, a starting point for those unfamiliar with meditative prayer, or for those who desire to inject a new practice into their daily time with God. A living relationship is elastic; it breathes and cannot be conformed by the rigidity of rules.

The Mystical Meets the Practical
While given to prolonged descriptive passages on the beauty of nature and the mystical experience of entering into meditative prayer (like a strange, Dali-esque metaphor he uses called “pull the plugs” for dealing with a wandering mind), Foster remains immanently practical, even including a Q&A at the back of the book that answers basic questions that any reader may have. Sanctuary of the Soul is a short read, but replete with inspiration to encourage you toward making meditative prayer an aspect of your spiritual life so that you too may be able to speak the words of Brother Lawrence:

“The time of business does not with me differ from the time of prayer; and in the noise and clatter of my kitchen, while several persons are at the same time calling for different things, I possess God in as great tranquility as if I were upon my knees at the blessed sacrament.”

This review was based on a review copy provided by the publisher.

Originally posted on September 26, 2011.