Freedom of Simplicity

Rating:
Summary: A Tool for the 21st Century spiritual traveler
Review: This book gives a delightfully profound look at the need for simplicity in life. It forces us to look at the way we live, use our time, and relate to others. Foster searches many of the great spiritual leaders from Pascal to Kempis to provide documentation and perspective on the spiritual life. His writings help to rediscover prayer, meditation, and the "Divine Center" necessary for walking daily with Christ... This is a book to read and re-read. It is one gift that any Christian would find liberating and inspiring

Rating:
Summary: A great disappointment
Review: This book was written in 1981 and, unfortunately, it hasn't aged well. It is loaded with unfulfilled sky-is-falling, doom-and-gloom predictions that look pretty silly in retrospect. I have great respect for Foster's other books, but this one is in desperate need of a rewrite -- with a lot less agitprop and a lot more spirituality.

Rating:
Summary: More Challenging Than I Thought
Review: This was a good book on voluntary simplicity. I've read enough of such books, but this one offered more of a biblical perspective than I've seen in a lot. The first couple of chapters are really great, as they offered some great insights about how God views wealth and our responsibility to others. It's good information, too, because in our society, we are mostly concerned about how we can get more money to take better care of SELF, not others. Other countries are a lot more community oriented.
In later chapters, though, the book shifts gears a bit and shows us some things we can do to embrace simplicity outwardly and inwardly. Because of these chapters, I don't think that this is exactly the book for simplicity beginners. It gets pretty challenging, and not that this is a bad thing, but it can be a little intimidating and feel a bit "burdensome". The wise reader, however, will know what to apply, and what is fitting for his or her life, and the direction God is leading him or her in. It is a good book, though, and I would recommend it.

Rating:
Summary: The only book you need on simplicity
Review: Why did it take me so long to find this book? Kudos to Harper for reissuing it after years of being out of print. I have read a number of recent, popular books on "voluntary simplicity" and "downshifting," but none approach the beauty of Foster's clear and compelling treatise on the "complexity of simplicity." After outlining the spiritual foundation of the notion of simplicity, he offers practical means of working to achieve it. If you're interested in "living the simple life" BUY this book and check all those other titles out of the library! A great book for "downshifters" regardless of their spiritual background.