Summary of James K. A. Smith's You Are What You Love

Everest Media

Description

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book.
Sample Book Insights:
#1 The intellectualist model of the human person assumes that learning and discipleship are primarily a matter of depositing ideas and beliefs into mind-containers. But this model ignores the power of habit.
#2 That is, even versions of Christian faith that are hostile to intellectualism are still intellectualist in how they approach discipleship and Christian formation, focusing on the acquisition of biblical knowledge.
#3 We need to recognize the limits of knowledge, and understand that we are not just thinking things. We are also feeling things, and we need to embrace those aspects of our person.
#4 Instead of starting from the assumption that humans are intellectual beings, we could start from the assumption that humans are first and foremost lovers. The center and seat of the human person is not in the heady regions of the intellect but in the gut-level regions of the heart.

Sujets

• Religion
• Christianisme
• Love
• Love (disambiguation)
• Spiritual Growth
• Christian Living
• Philosophie et théologie
• Sexualité
• sexualité
• Sexualité

Informations

• Publié par: Everest Media LLC
• Date de parution: 25 juillet 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9798822549456
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Insights on James K. A. Smith's You Are What You Love
Contents Insights from Chapter 1 Insights from Chapter 2 Insights from Chapter 3 Insights from Chapter 4 Insights from Chapter 5 Insights from Chapter 6 Insights from Chapter 7 Insights from Chapter 8
Insights from Chapter 1

#1

The intellectualist model of the human person assumes that learning and discipleship are primarily a matter of depositing ideas and beliefs into mind-containers. But this model ignores the power of habit.

#2

That is, even versions of Christian faith that are hostile to intellectualism are still intellectualist in how they approach discipleship and Christian formation, focusing on the acquisition of biblical knowledge.

#3

We need to recognize the limits of knowledge, and understand that we are not just thinking things. We are also feeling things, and we need to embrace those aspects of our person.

#4

Instead of starting from the assumption that humans are intellectual beings, we could start from the assumption that humans are first and foremost lovers. The center and seat of the human person is not in the heady regions of the intellect but in the gut-level regions of the heart.

#5

The human person is made for something, and that something is found in relationship to the Creator who made us. We are not just static containers for ideas, but dynamic creatures directed toward some end.

#6

The human person is fundamentally erotic, and this explains why we will find rest when our loves are rightly ordered to God. But we will experience anxiety and restlessness when we try to love substitutes.

#7

To be human is to be on a quest, and to live is to be engaged in a sort of unconscious journey toward a destination of your dreams. We are oriented by our longings and directed by our desires. We adopt lifestyles that are motivated by such visions of the good life, not because we think through our options but because some picture captures our imagination.

#8

The human heart is a multifunctional desire device that is part engine and part homing beacon. It points us in the direction of a kingdom and propels us toward it. We are what we love because we live toward what we want.

#9

The process of growing in discipleship is similar to the process of growing in love. Our loves are like a sort of gravity that pulls us towards inferior things if they are absorbed with material things, but if they are animated by the renewing fire of the Spirit, then our weight tends upward.

#10

Love is a choice, but love as we are discussing it here is more like a baseline inclination. It is a subconscious desire that generates the choices we make. Good moral habits are like internal dispositions to the good, and virtues are good moral habits.

#11

To become virtuous, you must internalize the law and the good it points to. Virtue is not acquired intellectually but affectively. It is a form of formation that changes the very fiber of your being.

#12

The Christian tradition has held up the saints as examples of Christlike dispositions. We learn the virtues through imitation and practice. Our most fundamental orientation to the world is shaped and configured by imitation and practice.

#13

To be a disciple, you must first be what you love. If you are a lover, and love is a habit, then discipleship is a rehabituation of your loves. This means that discipleship is more a matter of reformation than of acquiring information.

#14

We must constantly calibrate our hearts, tuning them to be directed towards God. We must recognize that our ultimate loves, longings, desires, and cravings are learned, and that we can change them through intentional Christian formation.