Water from a Deep Well: Christian Spirituality from Early Martyrs to Modern Missionaries

Just finished Gerald Sittser's book Water from a deep well for my next D.Min. class. I have to admit, this is not a book that I would have sought out or even stumbled across in a bookstore, but it is a treasure. This is one of the most powerful books I have ever read, and that is saying a lot, since I've read a few.What Sittser does is something that every Christian needs, not just leaders, but everyone who claims to follow Jesus. He gives us a history lesson.So many of us have no idea about the history of Christianity, why at its heart it is a missionary religion, the passion of those who have gone before, the blood that was spilled for the movement of Jesus to be where it is. It is so rich, so powerful and gives us such passion and enables us to continue following after God to this day.It starts by looking at martyrs throughout church history. For many of us in the Western world, the idea of dying for your faith is remote, if not a non-thought. But, as "missiologist David B. Barrett estimates 160,000 Christians were martyred in the year 2000 alone. They died that year for the same basic reason they died in the year 155, when Polycarp was marytred, or in 202, when Perpetua was martyred. The early martyrs believed that if Jesus is Lord and the only Savior, then he accepts no rivals - no person or religion or ideology or empire. They affirmed that the Christian faith requires nothing less than a firm and joyful commitment to this conviction. Jesus came as God in human flesh to show the way to God and to be the way to God for us. This is the only Jesus there is. A lesser Jesus is not the real Jesus at all, at least not according to the testimony of the martyrs, from Stephen to the present."Here are a few things from the book I highlighted:The only way to understand something is to love it first, that is, to study it with sympathy, patience and appreciation.That we might not have to die for Christ is irrelevant. How we live for Christ is the real issue.It is easy to gawk but not learn, listen by not sympathize and thus trivialize what is sacred. These stories are not fanciful, fictional accounts that have been recorded and passed down for our entertainment. The martyrs were real people who did in fact die horribly. They had families and friends, hopes and longings, and they wanted to live a long, peaceful and prosperous life, just like us. They chose to accept death rather than renounce their faith because they believed something was more valuable than the long and happy life for which they longed.The early church lived by a different ethic, which impressed the very people who suffered the most as victims of Rome's immorality and injustice.The appeal of Christianity still lay in its radical sense of community: it absorbed people because the individual could drop from a wide impersonal world into a miniature community, whose demands and relations were explicit.To love all members alike, pastors have to love them all uniquely.Struggle is normal, necessary and even healthy in the spiritual life. Struggle proves that we are taking the Christian faith seriously.Mystical spirituality is concerned with one basic question: how can we truly know God?Preaching is the Word of God only if the sermon itself actually proclaims the Word of God.This statement summarizes the essence of the book: "The Bible tells the story of human resistance and God's persistence. The story is full of flawed heroes and strange twists of plot, of the wretchedness of evil and the triumph of good, which was accomplished in a way that no one could have predicted, namely, through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ."This book was one of those books that impacted me on a personal and professional level, which is quite rare for a book to do. The stories, especially chapter 5 "holy heroes" left me with a sense of awe for the legacy and history of Christianity and what God calls each of us to.Chapter 9 on the reformation showed me the high view of God and the Bible that the reformers and their churches had. Their role in communicating the words of God and their love and passion for the people they were called to lead was inspiring.This is one of those rare books. If you want to know more about how Christianity got to where it is today, this is the book to readMore at [...]

Water From a Deep Well: Christian Spirituality From Early Martyrs to Modern Missionaries (2007, IVP) by Gerald Sittser was an excellent book, but perhaps a bit difficult to classify. It is part church history, part Christian spirituality, and part practical living. In engaging prose, Sittser explores the history of Christianity, stopping along the way to reflect on what lessons we have learned from those who have gone before. He effectively shows different movements over the history of the church: the witness of the early Christian martyrs, the belonging of early Christian community, the struggle of the desert saints, the rhythm of the monastics, the holy heroes celebrated in the eastern church through biography and iconagraphy, the importance of the sacraments during the Gothic period, the importance of ordinariness among medieval lay people, the importance of the Word to the reformers, the centrality of conversion to evangelicals, and the essence of risk to pioneer missionaries. As you can imagine this book is sweeping and ecumenical in its scope. Though Sittser highlights components that featured centrally in different movements of the church, there is no doubt overlap.Sittser wisely not only identifies the positives that modern Christians can learn from each of these periods or modes of spirituality, but also points to their potential risks and abuses. For example, during certain movements of the church, it was considered more spiritual to abstain from sexual relations, and some couples would make vows of chastity within their marriages. Broadly, it seems that any of these approaches, taken to the extreme, lead to rather significant legalism, which Sittser explicitly shows.There is material here to challenge all. There are things here that will resonate deeply with most Christians and things that may unsettle them. Regardless, there is much for all to learn.On the second to last page, Sittser wrote, "The church as a community, however, is capable of advancing the cause of the kingdom, if only just a little. Through sheer numbers alone that 'little' can amount to 'much.' There are well over 150 million Christians in America (out of some two billion in the world), though of course not all are serious about their faith. What if just one third of those--50 million--began in modest ways to live more earnestly and deliberately for the kingdom? What if these believers consecrated their lives to God, began to practice spiritual discipline and committed themselves to serve God's kingdom? Just one hundred extra dollars a year would provide 5 billion dollars to help fight AIDS in Africa and battle sex trafficking in Asia. Just one hundred extra hours a year (only two a week!) would provide 5 billion volunteer hours to man soup kitchens in cities and pound nails for Habitat for Humanity. Just ten letters a year would send five hundred million pieces of mail to Washington to lobby for worthy causes. What if ordinary Christians used a little less water every day, consumed less energy and ate healthier food, recycled more conscientiously, purchased fair trade products, rode buses more often, and invested in just one cause outside their normal routine? Churches move slowly, just like glaciers, which is why activists become so impatient. But when they do change, they can become as powerful as an advancing glacier that sweeps away everything in its path. In the end, slow, incremental, concrete change might be the most effective kind" (page 294).Read this book. I promise you won't agree with everything, but you will benefit.

The information provided in this book should be a textbook but it reads like fiction. Sittser has masterfully retold the history of the church in a very readable way. I couldn't put it down, especially when recalling the desert saints. This is an important read for the church concerning the rich and diverse history calling believers to engage with their rich and dynamic history.

This text was an enjoyable walk-through Church history as it relates to the wide variety of perspectives on Christian spirituality throughout the centuries. I found it intriguing and helpful to have a greater understanding, particularly of the early history and practices of the church (AD 300-500), which I have given little attention in my own thought. While it was difficult to discern if some of the practices and disciplines that were followed flowed from a genuine understanding of God’s character and the work of Christ on the Cross, I was enriched to consider the sincerity (and even simplicity) of devotion to God of those who have gone before me. It is helpful, in our decadent, materialistic and sensuous age to consider the piety of those who sought Christ by faith through personal surrender to various orders, communities and disciplines that seem so foreign to me now. For the purposes as a devotional and inspirational guide, it was helpful that the tone remained positive and descriptive rather than evaluative and critical.

WOW I am a student studying life the universe any everything and of late christian ministry. I used to think poorly based on my bias that others projected and for my lack of knowledge I was the poorer and more ignorant for that. In reading this book I now appreciate the power and beauty of thought and purpose and spirit that inspired others to follow Christ's spirit and the formation of religion, unfortunately religion does not always follow the True Spirit that was its inspiration of faith, but in reading this book you have a clearer idea of this and a structural understanding of growth and development of faith. If you are a christian you will be richly rewarded by the power of the early churches and humble beginnings and mindful of the growth and political use of faith for control, but though it all we are made stronger in knowing that the foundation it build on rock and marvel at what truth powerful faith can endure and create. A must read.

Fascinating, encouraging and beautifully written, this is an accessible read to introduce the history of Christian Spirituality and to encourage each of us in our personal Christian walk.

A very positive account of spirituality over the course of history. An uplifting read, but glosses over some of the more awkward parts of church history.

Great overall view of the history of Christian spirituality, easy to read and very understandable.

Another good book for anyone interested in the inportant things of life. Keep up the good work. Arrived in very good condition.