What comes to mind when you hear the phrase spiritual formation?

Is it prayer and fasting, spiritual encounters, carefully designed programs meant to accelerate growth?

Today, many popular approaches to spiritual formation simply drift away from Scripture.

In A Heart of Flame for God, Matthew C. Bingham draws from the Puritan tradition to show how

believers can cultivate spiritual disciplines rooted in grace alone. This book explores prayer, meditation,

and self-examination within a reformed framework that keeps Christ at the center of the Christian life.

Support our work with the gift of any amount, and we'll send you a copy.

Visit solarmedia.org slash offers to get yours today.

You know, when I was in college, I wrestled with this because I had a low, I would say,

I had a pretty low view of the local church.

I, you know, became a Christian when I was in high school.

It really started to, to, you know, walk with the Lord, as they say, when I was in high school,

was going to a church every Sunday that did not have church membership. But, you know, they had

Bible studies and these other things. And when I went to college, I started attending other churches,

but I never really got plugged into one of them.

And my thing was, I have solid Christian community and friends. I go to a Christian college.

We go to chapel three times a week. I'm just hanging out with Christians all the time. Yeah, all the time. And we're having theological, you know, because I was studying the Bible in college,

so we're having theological conversations. Like, I really don't need church. And so I created my own sort of Christian

fellowship community that, and I think this is what happens a lot of times, looked just like me,

in terms of stage of life, in terms of strength, but also in terms of weaknesses.

We had what I sometimes like to say, you know, like the same shared idols, you know, shortcomings.

And a lot of times, you know, that's what we're looking for a kind of affinity group.

...