More and more evangelicals are discovering the importance of spirituality. This can be seen from the large number of conferences and books devoted to these themes, often featuring such leading evangelical writers in this field as Eugene Peterson, Marva Dawn, and Dallas Willard. This new interest in biblical spirituality is greatly to be welcomed. In this article, I would like to offer some personal reflections on the importance of biblical spirituality, and why I have found it to be immensely enriching.

When I began my life as a Christian, I found my attention focussing on understanding my faith. I continue to regard this as being of the utmost importance. There is a marvellous coherence to Christian doctrine, and wrestling with the great truths of our faith provided me with both spiritual encouragement and intellectual challenge. Yet it often seemed to me that my ‘knowledge’ of the Christian faith was rather dry and cerebral. My faith seemed to lack depth. It was as if my emotions were untouched by what I believed. Sometime, it seemed to me, was wrong.

My realization of the importance of spirituality began about 1989, but really blossomed from about 1992. I was invited to lead a regular summer school course in Oxford on ‘medieval and Reformation spirituality’. This allowed me to engage with some of the great texts of Christian spirituality. As my students and I wrestled with these texts, we found ourselves challenged to deepen the quality of our Christian faith though being more open to God. I found that the quality of my Christian life deepened considerably as a result.

My basic understanding of Christian doctrine has not changed over the last ten years. I remain deeply committed to the fundamentals of Christian orthodoxy. I believe nothing new; I have simply gone deeper into what I already know to be true. What has happened is that these ideas have taken on a new depth, both as I appreciated more of their implications, and as I realized that my grasp of the totality of the Christian gospel had been shallow. I came to experience a deepening in the quality of my faith, rather than any change in what I believed.

Traditional theology makes a distinction between two senses of the word ‘faith’. On the one hand, there is the ‘faith which believes’ – that is, the personal quality of trust and commitment in God. On the other, there is the ‘faith which is believed’ – that is, Christian doctrines. Using this way of speaking, I could say that, in my case, the ‘faith which is believed’ remained unaltered. What developed, matured and deepened was the ‘faith which believes’. The New Testament often compares the Kingdom of God to a growing plant, or a seed taking root. What happened to me was that a plant which had grown to some extent underwent a new spurt of growth, leading to increased strength and vitality. I try to convey something of what I had discovered in a book called The Journey (to be published by Doubleday early next year), which aims to show how the Christian journey was both illuminated and assisted by reading Scripture in-depth, rather superficially.

Now it may well be that some readers of this article will feel that you can identify with my earlier and rather academic approach to faith, and are fed up being told by their doubtless well-meaning friends that they just need to know more facts about their faith. My experience is that we need to go deeper, rather than just know more. Perhaps we all have to discover that we have simply scratched the surface of the immense riches of the gospel. Beneath the surface lies so much more, which we are meant to discover and enjoy. The greater our appreciation of the wonder, excitement and sheer delight of the Christian faith, the more effective our witness to our friends, and the greater our enjoyment of the Christian faith.

Enjoyment? Yes! ‘What’, asked the Shorter Westminster Catechism, ‘is the chief end of man?’ The answer given is rightly celebrated as a jewel in Christianity’s doctrinal crown: ‘to glorify God and enjoy him for ever’. This brief statement sets us on a journey of personal exploration – to gain a fresh apprehension of the glory of God, so that we might return that glory to God and have our spiritual lives enrichened by the knowledge of such a God. To catch such a glimpse of the full splendor of God is also a powerful stimulus to evangelism. Was it not by catching a glimpse of the glory of God in the temple that Isaiah reponded to the divine call to go forth in service? Good theology is essential to mission and evangelism! By catching a vision of God in all his radiance and glory, we long to serve him now and finally be with him in the New Jerusalem.

So how can we deepen our faith in this way? As I wrestled with deepening my appreciation of the rich spirituality of the Bible, I found three principles to be helpful:

1. When dealing with a biblical image, it is essential to pause and allow the passage to generate a mental picture. We have to enter into the world of that image. We need to project ourselves into the image, and become part of it, experiencing its richness and implications. Our faith stimulates our imaginations as well as our minds! One of the reasons why writers such as C S Lewis and George MacDonald enjoy such popularity is that they nourish both reason and imagination.
2. When dealing with a gospel story, we must enter into it, standing alongside those who witnessed the saviour of the world. We need to meditate on these gospel narratives as though they were happening in the present moment.
3. When dealing with a biblical idea or theme, it is not enough to understand it. It needs to be applied to our lives, so that it becomes a lived reality, rather than an abstract and lifeless notion. Christianity is not simply about ideas; it is about the transformation of spiritual reality. It needs to become real to us, instead of just rattling round inside our minds.

So let’s try applying these ideas. As space is limited, we shall only have time to look at one of these points – how to make the best use of biblical images, and be nourished by their richness. The New Testament offers us a powerful series of pictures which allow us insights into the meaning of the cross. They are like snapshots of the promised land, hints of the glory of the kingdom of God. Each demands to be savoured and studied slowly, as if it were a fine vintage wine. One of the most important and helpful pictures that of a ‘ransom’. This image is of especial importance to Christians, as it is used on the lips of Jesus himself, who declared that he came ‘to give his life as a ransom for many’ (Mark 10:45). The image is also found elsewhere in the New Testament. 1 Timothy 2:5–6 speaks of Jesus Christ being a ‘mediator between God and human­ity . . . who gave his life as a ransom for all’.

To appreciate the richness of this image, let us carry out a thought experiment. Imagine that you come from a rich family, and have cherished a lifelong ambition to visit the island of Sicily. On your arrival, you happily begin to explore its many Roman archeological sites and its beautiful yet rugged landscape. You become impatient with the regular tourist guides, and decide that you will explore the island by yourself. On the second day of this adventure, you are confronted by two men, one of whom is carrying a shotgun. They invite you to share their humble hospitality, while arrangements are made to transfer a suitably large sum of money to secure your release.

You realize that you have been kidnapped, and that there is nothing that you can do about it. Your emotions are a complex mixture of anger, guilt and fear. How could you have allowed yourself to get into this situation? And will you ever get out? Try to think yourself into this situation, and appreciate the sense of helplessness and hopelessness that goes with it. Whether you get out of it depends totally on someone else being prepared to pay a ransom for you. Your life is in their hands. What happens if the folks back home would be glad to be rid of you? As day after day passes, you sink into despair.

Now try to imagine the sense of utter relief and delight you would experience if the news came through that your family had ransomed you. You would be free! And (perhaps just as important) you would have mattered enough to your family for them to pay the price that was demanded. Can you see how overjoyed you would be that someone loved you like this? And that’s what the love of God is like. He loved us so much that Christ came into the world to pay the price to set us free. That’s how much we matter to him. It is an amazing thought.

Now I have only had time to scratch the surface of one biblical image – and there are countless others remaining to be explored! There is so much richness awaiting us! And there are biblical ideas – such as redemption through Christ – and biblical narratives – such as the Parable of the Prodigal Son – which have much to offer us as well.

Another major principle which I have found of immense value is to realize that I am not alone in my faith. Others have made the same journey before me, and I can learn from them and be encouraged by them. The image I find especially helpful here is that of ‘the Rutter’. As this word and idea are unfamiliar to most, I will explain what I mean. The sixteenth century was an era of exploration on an unprecedented scale. Following the discovery of the Americas in 1492, many European nations set out to explore the known world, opening up new routes to hitherto unknown regions. The secrets of the seaways of the world were being opened up, as routes to Asia were discovered and carefully recorded. The Portugese navigators unlocked the secrets of the Pass of Magellan and the Cape of Good Hope, and established new trading routes to the rich markets of Asia. The captains of these voyages of discovery became national heroes in Spain, Portugal and England.

Yet these voyages of discovery were undertaken at great cost. The seaways to the New World destroyed many who had hoped to conquer them. Those who returned had learned the secrets of the routes, and recorded them in a small book – the rutter. (The word probably derives from the French routier­, meaning ‘a roadmap’). Rutters were the key to the secrets of the world’s seaways, and the best hope for a captain who wished to return home alive.

A rutter was basically a book in which the ship’s pilot recorded every small detail of the voyage, so that his steps could be retraced in safety. It related exactly how he got to his objective, and how he returned home. The rutter was priceless, because it contained the detailed navigational records of someone who had been there and lived to tell others of what he found, and how he got there. The rutter related how the pilot had steered for so many days on such and such a bearing, and what he had encountered along the way. The location of dangerous shoals, the bearings of landmarks such as headlands, the depths of channels, the location of safe harbours – all were meticulously recorded. Anyone getting hold of these rutters would be able to retrace the steps of those who had been there before, and gain access to the riches that lay ahead.

The rutter was thus a powerful amalgam of expertise and personal experience on the part of its author. It did not aim to offer a complete chart of the oceans of the world, but simply to ensure that one specific route could be travelled safely. Those who followed their author could do so in the knowledge that he had been there before them, and passed his hard-won knowledge down to them. The voyage ahead would be long and difficult. Yet it helped those making it enormously to know that someone had successfully completed it before them and that he had passed on to them a detailed notebook of how he achieved it. A rutter is thus more than a map. It mingles geography with personal experience, explaining how the journey was made so that others can do the same.

A physical rutter pointed out rocks and other such dangers; it also identified safe harbours, and sources of food and water. Spiritual rutters allow us to identify some of the main difficulties we may encounter along the road of faith, so that we may make good use of strategies that others have devised before us. They help us find spiritual refreshment and safety, and offer us a vision of our final arrival at our destination. We can read the writings of authors such as C. S. Lewis, J. I. Packer, Jonathan Edwards and others, who have been blessed with the gift of explaining the Bible to us, and learn from them. They can encourage us as we travel! Through God’s good grace, there are others who have made this journey before us. They have travelled through the wastelands and drunk deeply at the oases. They have shed tears in times of loneliness; they have shouted with joy in moments of refreshment. They can be our companions on the journey to the heavenly city.

Many have read Daniel Defoe’s great novel Robinson Crusoe. The book is set on a desert island, on which Robinson Crusoe has been shipwrecked. He believes that he is utterly alone. He begins to face the challenge of loneliness, and prepares to cope with all the difficulties that he knows must lie ahead. Then something happens which changes his entire perspective on his situation. While walking along the shoreline, he notices a human footprint in the sand. Suddenly, everything is changed. Someone else is there. Crusoe is not sure whether to be frightened or delighted!

So often we try to get on with the life of faith as if we were hermits, struggling on our own. Perhaps we are too proud to admit that we need help; more likely, we have simply failed to realize that others are accompanying us. Every step of the long kingdom road has been graced by the presence of others before us, and moistened with their tears, whether of joy or sorrow. We may learn from what they have already experienced, just as we may find reassurance in the knowledge that they have been through the wildernesses of this world before us. We may take comfort from the presence of others who even now are making that journey alongside us.

And - finally! - we may rejoice in sure knowledge that one day we shall join them in the New Jerusalem, our journeying finally ended, as we raise our voices together in praise at the glorious sight of our Lord and Saviour, and eat and drink with him in the kingdom of God. The journey will then have ended; something else more wonderful will have begun.

Alister McGrath

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