Kleinig, 2008. Chapter 5, “Hidden Holiness”

Chapter 5, “Hidden Holiness” pp. 271-287

“Our spiritual life is a hidden journey with the risen Lord Jesus. As we travel with Him, we receive everything from Him. We share in His divine life as the Son of God the Father; we stand in His shoes and identify ourselves with Him. With Him we travel on a holy way in which He makes and keep (sic) us holy” (p. 271). This holy pathway, Kleinig says, is in our life of holiness found “in the Divine Service and our daily devotions” (p. 273). The way we go along this journey is incidental. It is not our journey. The path is “the way by which the triune God comes from heaven to earth to join us in our journey from birth to death and admit us to heaven even as we are here on earth” (p. 276). As we share with Christ in this journey, taking in God’s Word, we are cleansed and become partakers of a holy vocation. We live out the grace of God in our world and serve as his instruments of redemptive love.

Kleinig, 2008. Chapter 4, “The Hidden Battle”

Chapter 4, “The Hidden Battle”  pp. 218-270

In chapter 4 Kleinig turns his attention to spiritual warfare. Since prayer is a spiritual work we can expect spiritual opposition when we pray. This battle requires a level head. “Satan promotes a reckless kind of spiritual intoxication with the offer of heady experience, mind-blowing ecstasy, and disembodied spiritual highflying. We therefore need to remain ‘sober’ so as not to confuse spiritual darkness with light and lose our sense of spiritual reality (1 Thess. 5:8; 2 tim. 4:5; 1 Pet. 1:13; 4:7; 5:8)” (p. 220). It is our tendency to look for vivid and dynamic, public battles. Kleinig discusses the idea that true spiritual warfare in light of Romans 5:10 must “begin with Paul’s teaching that we were all, without exception, God’s enemies” (p. 222). The battle lines are confusing and the war is one we cannot actually fight. The battle “is won by retaining and using what we have received from God, faith in Christ and the good conscience that comes through faith in Christ” (p. 226). Satan’s attack, says Kleinig (p. 230) is against the Church and against individual consciences. Jesus fights back with his forgiving blood shed for us (p. 231) and his word (p. 232). At the same time, attacks against our consciences and trust toward God try to distract us from the truth. Kleinig continues with examples of how Jesus guards his people who are under attack in the Gospel records. He is the mighty one who is known by Satan as the victor.

On p. 244 Kleinig begins to discuss resisting spiritual attacks. He compares our lives to a compost heap which attracts rats. If there were nothing attractive the enemy would not care. Jesus fights off our enemy by cleaning the garbage from our lives. He does this by his own work, as we faithfully believe he can bring us forgiveness and life. We resist the devil by trusting Jesus’ resistance.

Kleinig, 2008. Chapter 3, “The Mystery of Prayer”

Chapter 3, “The Mystery of Prayer” pp. 151-217

Christians are called by the Lord to be people of prayer. Yet we fail in prayer. Maybe we need to try harder, maybe we need special empowerment. Yet we fall short over and over again. Kleinig’s answer to this frustration follows.  “I now no longer regard prayer as an obligation, a duty that I must fulfill, but as something that is given to me, something that I receive from the triune God. The main thing in prayer is a trustful, receptive heart that takes in what God has to offer” (pp. 152-153). Kleinig compares us to friends of an ancient king. We know the plans and will of God through the Bible. In prayer, we ask the Lord to work according to his will in the situations we think he should change (p. 155). Why do we fail in prayer? “Christ lets us fail when we pray by ourselves so that we rely on His intercession for us” (p. 157). “Jesus taught that God-pleasing prayer depended entirely on Him rather than the person at prayer” (p. 162). How do we identify this God-pleasing prayer? Kleinig tells us it is prompted yb the words Jesus gave us. As we pray, we pray what God has already spoken (p. 173). We learn to pray as we attend church regularly and practice in communal prayer, which was historically the normal way to pray (p. 179). As we pray together we realize the depth of our dependence on Jesus (p. 182). We are also able to turn our needs over to God, knowing He is the one who gives all the gifts (p. 200).

Kleinig, 2008. Chapter 2, “The Mystery of Meditation”

Chapter 2, “The Mystery of Meditation” pp. 87-150

In 1 Kings 3, Solomon asks God for wisdom. God gives him a heart to hear, which results in great wisdom. This is consistent with the classic view of Christian meditation, which emphasizes listening and considering God’s Word. Kleinig details a decline in this practice, then a renewal of interest, which unfortunately sent many to Eastern and New Age forms of meditation and prayer (p. 89).

Kleinig suggests that spontaneous meditation often takes the form of daydreaming or worrying (p. 90). “Meditation is, if I may hazard a definition, a relaxed form of concentration; we dwell on something, so that it, in turn, affects us in some way” (p. 92). Meditation is, then, almost the opposite of a process. It is something that happens.

How is this different in Christian meditation? “The key is not how we meditate, but on what we meditate” (p. 95). “Christian meditation focuses on Christ and His Word. It starts with Jesus and ends with him” (p. 96). Kleinig continues to explain in some detail how various people, including Jesus, meditate on God’s Word and are shaped by that Word. This is how we are fed spiritually (p. 104). On pp. 107-111, Kleinig considers that the Holy Spirit is our guide as we meditate on Scripture. What outcome do we expect? We expect a fruitful spiritual harvest (p. 114). Kleinig spends the rest of the chapter illustrating how God’s Word can speak to us at any and every time of the day, all the more as we meditate eagerly on it.

Kleinig, 2008. Chapter 1, “The Mystery of Christ”

Chapter 1, “The Mystery of Christ” pp. 27-86

Begging in antiquity was always despised. Yet Jesus begins the Sermon on the Mount by affirming those who are spiritually destitute (p. 28). “This countercultural beatitude sums up the whole of Christian spirituality. It contradicts popular religion and common piety. Popular piety presupposes our unrealized spiritual potential” (p. 29). Jesus says we do not have any spiritual potential. It is only in Jesus that we take on an exalted status and may approach God the Father. Kleinig then views our growth in Christ as a moving away from trust in ourselves and toward trust in Jesus (p. 33). This, Kleinig says, is contrary to the piety seen often in Christians, which frequently resembles that of the Pharisees. “Their problem was that they put their own brand on their acts of piety; they claimed their achievements for themselves rather than for God” (p. 37). On the contrary, Scripture calls us to trust Christ’s work for us. This is no one-size-fits-all faith, but just as we are different so Jesus engages us differently (p. 44). As Jesus engages us through Word and Spirit we learn to breathe, so to speak, receiving and being nourished by what he gives us (p. 46). Kleinig ties this work to our conscience, which is fed by God’s Word. “Our conscience functions properly only when it is governed by faith in God’s Word and when it attends both to the voice of the Lw and the voice of the Gospel” (p. 53). We need both the check of the Law and the freedom of the Gospel.

Beginning on p. 56 Kleinig begins describing the Christian life in terms of a mystery. It is not a secret, but something revealed. Yet it remains a mystery because it is rather hidden no matter how much we know. Jesus, in fact, is that revealed mystery, the one in whom we hope. It is the mystery of his life and death which brings us life. Jesus, in fact, is the one who presents us beggars to the Father. In response to that, Christians act as God’s messengers of grace to the world (pp. 63ff). Yet even in that act, Kleinig sees spirituality as receptive, comparing it with the Sabbath rest (p. 70). To conclude the chapter, Kleinig turns to daily prayer on p. 71, drawing from Old Testament roots of worship which contiue into the New Testament context. In daily devotion and prayer we continue to live in Christ, being nourished by his grace.

Kleinig's Grace Upon Grace - Introduction

Kleinig, John W. Grace Upon Grace: Spirituality for Today. St. Louis, MO: Concordia Publishing House, 2008.

“Introduction: Receptive Spirituality” pp. 7-26

Kleinig’s thesis is that we receive our spirituality from others. We never create it for ourselves, in a vacuum. “We do not invent spirituality for ourselves; we do not cobble it together to suit our desire for personal fulfillment. Its power does not depend on us or on our performance. Rather, we receive our spiritual life from others and are drawn into it, just as we are initiated into family life and marriage” (pp. 8-9). Specifically, all our life of worship, according to 1 Corinthians 4:7-8, is something we receive. On p. 13 Kleinig ties this idea to Luther’s concept of “the interplay between three forces as we pray, meditate and are tempted: the Holy Spirit, God’s Word, and Satan.” Kleinig continues describing this process for several pages. Luther “does not envisage the spiritual life as a process of self-development, but as a process of reception from the triune God” (p. 16). What is the means of our receptivity? Not our internal impressions or even an illumination of the Holy Spirit, but God’s Word itself (p. 17). Because of this view, Luther sees meditation as a very verbal thing, based on God’s read Word from outside ourselves. As this life goes on we are changed and find many opportunities to evaluate what Christ is doing in us. Though Satan would attempt to undo us, we are driven again into God’s Word.