Passionate Spirituality

Passionate Spirituality At ACR

The Passionate Spirituality section of the NCD survey answers the question: To what extent is the spiritual life of our members characterized by prayer, enthusiasm, and boldness? These verses get at the heart of Passionate Spirituality:

 

 

Jesus replied, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” (Matthew 22:37) 

 

 

Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord. Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. (Romans 12:11-12)
  
The Fall 2008 survey administered to ACR members showed Passionate Spirituality to be our minimizing factor. This page sets forth our strategies to address Passionate Spirituality, as well as resources to help the church grow in this area. Additional devotional resources can be found on the Helpful Links & Audio Sermons page of this site.

 

 

ACR's Strategies:
  
Four guiding principles were established to guide the development of ACR's strategies:
  • Make use of ACR's current strengths and existing structures to grow Passionate Spirituality
  • Don't overwhelm the church by too many changes at once
  • People, not programs, are our priority
  • Make sure each strategy ties back to the goal of increasing Passionate Spirituality

 To further guide the development of ACR's strategies, 6 goals were established:

  1. Sharing: Increase openness in sharing about personal spiritual experiences with each other

  2. Prayer: Increase in prayer, both corporate and personal

  3. Devotions: Increase in practice of personal devotions

  4. Disciplines: Increase in knowledge and practice of all the spiritual disciplines
  5. Groups: Increase in small group attendance

  6. Gifts: Increase in members ministering according to their spiritual giftings

With the guiding principles and goals in mind, the following strategies were developed and will be implemented at ACR:

  • Conduct a sermon series on spiritual disciplines

  • Add a structured devotional to the ACR daily prayer emails
  • Hold a worship and prayer meeting Wednesday evenings during Lent
  • Hold a prayer vigil on Good Friday
  • Have all members (who want to) take a spiritual gifts survey

  • Hold a 20-minute “Sermon & Snacks Chat” after the service

  • Other minor initiatives to be be introduced as appropriate

  

The Spiritual Disciplines

"Superficiality is the curse of our age…. The desperate need today is not for a greater number of intelligent people, or gifted people, but for deep people."
-Richard Foster, "Celebration of Discipline"

 

 


"The spiritual life is first of all a life. It is not merely something to be known and studied, it is to be lived."
-Thomas Merton, "Thoughts in Solitude"

 

 


"Everybody thinks of changing humanity and nobody thinks of changing himself."
-Leo Tolstoy 

 

 

At ACR, we will be learning about the spiritual disciplines: what they are and how to apply them to our lives. The disciplines that we will explore are divided into disciplines of disengagement and disciplines of engagement:

Disciplines of Disengagement & Abstinence:
Disciplines of Engagement:
  • Solitude
  • Silence
  • Fasting
  • Frugality
  • Chastity
  • Secrecy
  • Sacrifice
  • Study
  • Worship
  • Celebration
  • Service
  • Prayer
  • Fellowship
  • Confession
  • Submission

This page will be periodically updated with additional content as ACR moves through this journey toward greater Passionate Spirituality.