Bassett, Ryan

Christian Life
Kevin Greer
Oct 5, 2010

The Life You've Always Wanted Book Review

I've read 100% of John Ortbergs book “The Life You've Always Wanted”.

John Ortberg's book, The Life You've Always Wanted, is primarily a practical resource

for 'ordinary people' to implement spiritual disciplines, (what is), or practices, that will greatly

affect their lives. The purpose of this goal is spiritual transformation, which he calls morphing.

Before we discuss the spiritual disciplines, it's first important to know what Ortberg views as

true spirituality and what pseudo, or fake spirituality, means to him. On page 30 Ortberg

writes, “The great danger that arises hen we don't experience authentic transformation is that

we will settle for what might be called pseudo-transformation. We know that as Christians we

are called to “come out and be separate,” that our faith and spiritual commitment should make

us different somehow. But if we are not marked by greater and greater amounts of love and

joy, we will inevitably look for substitute ways of distinguishing ourselves from those who are

not Christians.” The idea is that, unless we are transformed by the inside out by spiritual

disciplines, then we are not growing spiritually at all. In fact, all we do is divert our attention to

external things for spiritual superiority. He continues, “If we do not become changed from the

inside-out—if we don't morph—we will be tempted to find external methods to satisfy our

needs to feel that we're different from those outside the faith. If we cannot be transformed, we

will settle for being informed or conformed.”

John makes it clear that the purpose of his book is not to give the reader a list of must-

do things in order to grow spiritually. He lets us know that the discipline itself is not the end of
the goal, but the means to the end. On page 45, Ortberg writes “..a true indicator of spiritual

well-being is growth in the ability to love God and people. If we can do this with out the

practice of any particular spiritual disciplines, then we should by all means skip them. We are

free of having to impress God or anyone else with our spiritual commitment.” Essentially,

spiritual disciplines are 'training grounds' for our every day lives. Sometimes, doing less is

more: “It is possible to spend every waking moment 'practicing spiritual disciplines' but doing

them in such a way as to make us less rather than more loving. In that case, of course, we

would be better off if we did none at all.” Our goal is to conform to the image of Jesus Christ,

which means being fully loving to God and to all people.

Now that we've defined what the goal of spiritual disciplines are, what fake spiritual

disciplines or pseudo-transformation is, and the fallibility of spiritual discipline as an end rather

than a mean, let's look at what authentic spiritual transformation includes. 1) Do we have a

preoccupation with appearing to be spiritual? Do we try to say spiritual sounding things, for

example? 2) Are we becoming judgmental or proud? Do we look at spiritual growth as

something that makes us superior to others? “As soon as we start to pursue virtue,”

Bonhoeffer states, “we become to wonder why others aren't as virtuous as we are. (p36). Are

we actually becoming more humble as we grow spiritually? 3) Are we becoming more

approachable, or less? Would we give the same attention and importance to a homeless guy

on the street as to a fashion model? 4) Are we growing weary of spiritual growth? Are we

trying to conform ourselves to boundary markers or a religious subculture? These things are

“not a compelling enough vision to captivate the human spirit.” Finally, 5) Are we measuring

our spiritual life in superficial ways? Do we consider reading the Bible and praying as the only

means to spiritual growth? Do we measure our spiritual growth by how many entries we make

to a journal, how many pages of the Bible we read, or how fast we read them?

The benefits of spiritual disciplines for the ordinary person are as follows: by training
our minds and our hearts and our souls to be more loving, more joyful, more at peace and

still, we are exercising mind, body, and soul, to be able to utilize these qualities in every day

life more readily and easily, allowing us to live more like Jesus. “The need for preparation, or

training, does not stop when it comes to learning the art of forgiveness, or joy, or courage. In

other words, it applies to a healthy and vibrant spiritual life just as it does to physical and

intellectual activity. Learning to think, feel, and act like Jesus is at least as demanding as

learning to run a marathon or play the piano.” Essentially, spiritual discipline can be related to

lifting weights for our soul.

Ortberg discusses the difference between trying to do something and training to do

something. “Spiritual transformation is not a matter of trying harder, but of training wisely...

There is an immense difference between training to do something and trying to do

something.” He discusses the Athenian games, and how a competitor, before being able to

even enter the contest, must go through at least 9 months of training, or else he would be

rejected immediately. “That a competitor would strive for the crown by simply “trying really

hard” apart from training was unthinkable. (44). Essentially, training is consistent, disciplined

action that builds upon each prior training session, session by session, to build one's skill or

ability in something.

Each chapter lists a specific spiritual discipline. The book is written in a way where one

can skip through and select a single chapter to focus on. There isn't a build-up on the prior

chapters. It's a practical book. The spiritual disciplines listed, based on chapter titles, are as

follows: Celebration, Slowing, Prayer, Servanthood, Confession, Receiving Guidance from the

Holy Spirit, Secrecy, Reflection on Scripture, Developing your own Rule of Life, and

Experience of Suffering.

One Spiritual discipline that really hit home for me as something that I should utilize

and implement in my life to become more like Jesus is the practice of disciplining my mind to
view life from a Biblical perspective. My history is in psychology and philosophy, and much of

my thinking prior to conversion was based upon thoughts of emotions, my psychological

desires and needs, and personal goals. Ortberg talks about the New Testament characters

who who were engaged in “eschatology thinking.” He defines by following, “That is, they

viewed all events in light of the Resurrection and the ultimate triumph of the risen Christ.

Essentially, I've slowly replaced thoughts and the vocabulary of my thoughts to those that are

Biblical and Christlike. As a practical example, I started using words like Joy, service, sin,

suffering, trial, temptation, love, victory, free, and holy to describe experiences in my life

(through introspection). In reality, as David Martyn Lloyd-Jones says in his book “Spiritual

Depression: It's Causes and Cures“, we are in a “constant, never-ending conversation with

ourselves.” Therefore, the best practice we can do to grow in our thinking is to speak to

ourselves, instead of listen to ourselves. To do this is to improve our thinking, and renew our

mind, and the means to this is to preach the Gospel to ourselves. This is illustrated beautifully

in the Psalm of David, number 46.

5 Why are you downcast, O my soul?

Why so disturbed within me?

Put your hope in God,

for I will yet praise him,

my Savior and 6 my God.

My [c] soul is downcast within me;

therefore I will remember you

from the land of the Jordan,

the heights of Hermon—from Mount Mizar.

The psalmist begins by asking his soul, “Why are you downcast?” He is acknowledging his

depressed state of mind. Instead of speaking terms found in pop-psychology to make him feel
better, (for example, an affirmation as discussed in the New-age psychology if The Secret, “I

am successful, happy, and complete.”), the Psalmist responds to this event by telling his soul

to rejoice, proceeded by reminding himself of putting his hope in Christ, for the Christ has

risen! Essentially, the psalmist is viewing his thoughts and his mind from a Christ-centered

view. This concept has radically changed my life as I've been implementing it into my personal

thoughts, especially during solitude and extended periods of reflection.

The next spiritual discipline that has helped me is the act of solitude. As a Ozark

student, I am constantly surrounded by people. I wake up and I see people in the bathroom

showering, and immediately I go to class and I usually run into some friends walking to class,

only to sit down in a full classroom ready to take notes. Then, I walk between classes to the

next class with people. This cycle continues until lunch, where I sit down with people. It's only

until after all my classes are done that I return back to my dorm. It's then that I have the time

to be alone for a short while. My roommate Robbie is usually either asleep (he naps often),

resting before his next class, or gone entirely. I use this time to either sleep or sit in solitude. A

practice of mine that I use is meditation on Christ with a repetition of phrases. Lately I have

been saying “Lord Jesus Christ, take me, break me, and make me yours.” and also “Lord,

Savior of the Universe, have mercy on my soul.”. Ortberg quotes Francis de Sales in the

metaphor that even a clock needs time for resetting: “There is no clock, no matter how good it

may be, that doesn't need resetting and rewinding twice a day, once in the morning and once

in the evening.” This metaphor is that we need rest and solitude to perform well in community.

Ortberg mentions the benefit of solitude from the perspective of conforming to the image of

Christ: “Solitude is the one place where we can gain freedom from the forces of society that

will otherwise relentlessly mold us.” He discusses Jesus' need for solitude and the times in his

ministry when he left people in order to be alone: in the beginning of his ministry, Jesus went

to the wilderness for an extended period of time, at the end of his ministry, he went in the
garden of Gethsemane for the entire night, when he heard of the death of John the baptist,

when he had been involved in healing a leper, and after his followers had engaged in minsitry.

There is no other convincing argument that solitude is healthy and essential to the argument

that Jesus did it multiple times and even commanded us to do it when praying: Matthew 6:5-

6 "And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the

synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have

received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to

your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward

you.”