Spiritual Disciplines

It’s safe to say that one of the major reasons for the general lack of zeal and fervency among evangelical Christians today is because of the lack of spiritual disciples in our lives. What are spiritual disciplines? Things like Bible reading, prayer, fasting, solitude, intentional corporate worship – these are all ways for our spirits to engage with God. Back in ’91 a pastor/professor named Don Whitney wrote a book called Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life. In it he explains the need for the spiritual disciplines and then how we can do them. Don graciously joined us this week to talk about the disciplines. I ask him a bit about how we are to understand them, and I also ask what specific spiritual discipline is lacking most among evangelical Christians today. Oh, I should also say that our conversation reveals one of Don’s “unique” collections and hobbies.

 

Who’s Our Guest?

Don Whitney has been Professor of Biblical Spirituality and Associate Dean at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, KY since 2005.  Before that, he held a similar position at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City, MO, for ten years.  He is the founder and president of The Center for Biblical Spirituality. Don lives with his wife Caffy in their home near Louisville. The Whitney’s have a married daughter, Laurelen, and a grandson.

Episode Links

Don’s book is called Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life.

 

Also, be sure to check out The Center of Biblical Spirituality where Don has lots of resources.

Read It

*Below is an edited transcription of the audio conversation.

With me today is Don Whitney. Don is the professor of biblical spirituality and associate dean at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He’s written quite a few books, some of which I’ve read and have really enjoyed, ‘Praying the Bible’, ‘Family Worship’, probably your smallest ones, but anyways thanks for chatting with me today, Don.

Yes Isaac. It’s good to be with you.

But it also says Don, and I wanted to say this, that your hobby is restoring and using old fountain pens. What’s that about?

Yeah. Since high school I have enjoyed pens. I got into fountain pens fairly early when I first started college, but they were just three dollar cartridge pens on a blister pack, but I kind of got hooked on them. I really enjoy using them. I am a writer after all, too. I’ve always enjoyed using pens. The vintage pens, the older ones, I really like a lot. I have a bunch from the teens, the 20s, the 30s and I’m able to restore some of them if they’re simple enough.

That is awesome. Do you have a case with some of your most precious ones?

Yeah, I do. I don’t collect pens to have a collection. It’s hard for me to imagine getting a pen that I wouldn’t use, but yeah, I have that, because people know I like pens, so occasionally they’ll give me one or my wife gives me one for a special occasion. Over the decades I have a few so I put those in a case.

I love it. Anyways, if listeners haven’t heard of you, all they know is that you are a professor and that you like fountain pens. I would like to ask, who are you, how you met Jesus and a snapshot of what day to day life looks like today.