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Summary: Great work by a great Christian
Review: If you are tired of the bumper sticker, "Christians are not perfect, just forgiven." This book is for you! Dallas goes deeper into the transformation process into Christlikeness and discusses the necessary prerequisites to even being a growing disciple. Unlike others here, I think it's his best book yet. However, I'm a fairly intense thinker, so I'm biased. Let's all start learning how to be like Jesus, from Jesus, the Master! If you ever have the chance to meet Dallas, you'll truly understand what it means to be like the Lord.
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Summary: A Christian Perspective on Human Personality
Review: In a culture awash in psychology, Christian perspectives on the human personality have been sadly lacking. Dallas Willard has entered this void with his characteristic incisiveness, overarching vision, unique insights, and wealth of footnoted resources. The purpose of Renovation of the Heart is intensely practical - assisting Christians in becoming Christ's disciples. Willard's premise is that by better understanding ourselves, we can better participate in God's transforming work in our lives. Renovation of the Heart complements three earlier books by Willard: A Divine Conspiracy, Spirit of the Disciplines, and Hearing God. A Divine Conspiracy describes Christian discipleship and underscores its centrality and importance in Christ's own preaching. Spirit of the Disciplines outlines specific spiritual practices that are foundational and even indispensable in changing our thoughts, feelings, and actions to conform with those of Jesus. Hearing God addresses the loss of an intimate, conversational relationship with God in the contemporary church and how such a relationship can be recaptured and cultivated. Renovation of the Heart methodically explores the multiple dimensions of human personality and provides direction for participating with God in the renovation of the whole person. It is, as with all of Willard's books, dense with thought and meaning and requires careful, prayerful reading. For the diligent reader this effort will be well rewarded. In an age of stifling confusion about what it means to be human, Renovation of the Heart brings clarity, hope, and specific suggestions that will be of invaluable assistance along the journey toward likeness to Christ.
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Summary: dull, Duller, DULLEST...
Review: It is bad enough that Dallas Willard has writen the same book four times. The shame of it all is that they get progressively duller. I believe deeply in a spiritually disciplined life (That is why I've slogged through his books). It is a shame that Willard makes it seem so DULL. He does make good points. Transformation is God's work. The disciplines just help set the table so God can come over and eat with us. Maybe Willard should get one of the Ghost writers the folks at Willow Creek and Jim Cymbala use. It'd make for a much more readable book.
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Summary: The best book on spiritual formation I have ever read
Review: Most books on spiritual formation are superficial and/or offer cookie cutter formulas for how to grow. This book presents a well thought out formulation of the human personality that is consistent with scriptural teachings and then offers practical advice on how to surrender all aspects of that personality to Christ so that we might become like him. The practical advice is not formulaic but suggests the types of thinking, praying and actions one should consider in trying to develop into a more Christ-like person. I read it too quickly the first time and now I need to go back through and absorb it more carefully. Dallas has set forth a sound theory and a sound method to slowly grow in the image of Christ, which is refreshing in a culture of fast food spirituality.
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Summary: The best book on spiritual formation I have ever read
Review: Most books on spiritual formation are superficial and/or offer cookie cutter formulas for how to grow. This book presents a well thought out formulation of the human personality that is consistent with scriptural teachings and then offers practical advice on how to surrender all aspects of that personality to Christ so that we might become like him. The practical advice is not formulaic but suggests the types of thinking, praying and actions one should consider in trying to develop into a more Christ-like person. I read it too quickly the first time and now I need to go back through and absorb it more carefully. Dallas has set forth a sound theory and a sound method to slowly grow in the image of Christ, which is refreshing in a culture of fast food spirituality.
Rating: 
Summary: Spiritual Formation Step by Step
Review: Renovation of the Heart is a step by step guide to spiritual formation, in which Dallas Willard talks about how to change in mind, heart, body, and soul. Willard has a wonderful grasp of the psychology of human beings to which he applies his insights from Scripture in teaching us how to put on the character of Christ. If you have ever wanted to get beyond doing the right things to being the right person, if you long for transformation not just in your external behavior but in your automatic responses, if you want to avoid not only committing acts of sin but being driven by sinful desires, you can hardly afford to miss this book. It is one of the most powerful books on transformation available today.
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Summary: Richard Foster says must read
Review: See below for what Richard Foster (renowned author of _Celebration of Discipline_) has to say about this stellar book.I (Richard Foster)want to stress the importance for you of Dallas Willard's new book, Renovation of the Heart. I want to be sure you know what a treasure this book is. To a small group of us Dallas once said '(and here I am quoting him from memory)', "Without a proper theology of God and a proper ontology and anthropology of the human self, religion will always degenerate into superstition or legalism, and often both." Well, Renovation of the Heart gives us the very best "ontology and anthropology of the human self" found anywhere. This teaching is so very important. Today people throw around words like "soul," "spirit," "heart," "will," etc. without the slightest idea what they mean. Well, this book explains exactly what such terms mean. It gives us a clear, biblical understanding of the depths of the human self. Even more, it gives us a clear, biblical understanding of how our inward selves can be deeply transformed so as to take on the character of Jesus Christ. You see, we all have been spiritually formed, but usually our formation has been in very bad ways. Indeed, we are "de-formed," if you will. And we need to be "re-formed," that is to say, we need reformation. Even more, we need "trans-formation." But to effectively and consciously enter into this spiritual forming, re-forming, trans-forming process we need a clear understanding of the human self. An ontology and anthropology of the self. Exactly what is the heart, the spirit, the will, the mind, the body, the soul? How are they to be spiritually re-formed and what is their role in our overall spiritual formation? Now, this understanding is given to us in Scripture, but it is not given systematically. The Bible could not accomplish what it needed to accomplish and do it systematically. But we do need to understand what the depths of the person are, and then we need to relate this to the Gospel of Jesus Christ and its transforming power. Then we need to relate all of these matters to the larger social realm. All of this is given with precision and care in Renovation of the Heart. Have you gathered by now that I (Richard Foster) hope you will get this book? Even more, I hope you will read it carefully and prayerfully . . . even more still, I hope you will apply it to the warp and woof of your daily life.
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Summary: An Addition to the Canon on Spiritual Formation
Review: The 2nd half of Renovation of the Heart is by far the most insightful look into the "mechanics" of how spiritual formation happens I have ever read. Willard is a philosopher, and a philosopher of phenomenology at that, making him well-positioned to explain the elements of human personality and will, and the process by which these can be changed. For readers who have given up on actually becoming a new creation in Christ, particularly those who have received little instruction along these lines beyond 'just pray harder', this book will play a critical role in your growth into Christlikeness. Willard has yet to reveal the overlap between Edmund Husserl - the 20th century German phenomenology philosopher - who Willard masterfully translates and interprets for his colleagues, and Jesus. I'm real curious, as I know many others are, to know. Renovation - a book on human nature - seemed like the perfect opportunity to reveal the Willardian ontology, and to situate it next to those of Plato, Descartes, Kant and Nietzsche. But he chose, for good reasons I'm sure, not to do that. Willard writes a paragraph on existentialism in Renovation, and drops in one-liners about philosophers in Divine Conspiracy. But I'm sure Willard could take the 2,000-year-old conversation on the relationship between Athens and Jerusalem a couple steps forward if he were to write on the topic. Unfortunately, from the list of his current projects on his web site, it doesn't look like that's coming down the pike any time soon.
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Summary: The Divine Conspiracy
Review: The book speaks for itself. The idea of the Kingdom of God seems to be lost when reading the Gospel, and this book really brings the idea of the Kingdom of God to life. Highly recommended. Its a great book.
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Summary: The Greatest Offer You Will Ever Receive in Life
Review: There is little question that apart from the renovation and transformation of the inner life, humanity continues its path of misery and tendency towards self-destruction. Willard once again demonstrates that Jesus Christ has given us the invitation to become the kinds of persons who are increasingly able to respond to all of life with the stength, character and joy that completes and fulfills our God given value and dignity as human beings. Life does run from the heart, and a well kept heart is the longing of every one of us. Apart from a whole hearted response to this invitation, it is difficult to see much hope for any great change in human history or our personal lives. This book is a major contribution and recovery of understanding the human being and the possibility of authentic Christlikeness. It is not out of our reach. But neither is it without our having the vision, intention, and means of making it our own with God's grace. There is not a better offer in this world than to become that kind of person! Willard opens us to the dynamics of the human person in such a way that the bibles anthropology and psychology of the human being becomes brilliantly clear, and by that clarity helps us in the actual pursuit of true spiritual formation. It is a great synthesis of the spiritual life, and one that actually works! Read it with a hungry heart and you will rejoice and say: thats the person I want to be! That's the person I actually can be!
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