Dallas Willard Quotations: Annotated

A) Various Sources

“Since making disciples is the main task of the church, every church ought to be able to answer two questions: What is our plan for making disciples of Jesus? Is our plan working?”​ [Dallas Willard, Audio Interview with John Ortberg, June (?),2010, Catalyst West conference.]

Church growth is not just more Christians, but bigger Christians, flush with Christ’s character. [Dallas Willard, foreword to: Kent Carlson and Mike Lueken. Renovation of the Church: What Happens When a Seeker Church Discovers Spiritual Formation, InterVarsity Press, 2011]

“Discipleship is learning how to live in heaven before you die.” [attributed to Dallas Willard, Matt Trendall, “Now and Not Yet: What the Bible says about the Kingdom of God,” Christianity Today, Dec. 27, 2018]

“Grace is not opposed to effort; it is opposed to earning. Earning is an attitude. Effort is an action. Grace, you know, does not just have to do with forgiveness of sins alone.” [Dallas Willard, Audio Interview with John Ortberg, June (?),2010, Catalyst West conference.]

"A mature disciple is one who effortlessly does what Jesus would do if Jesus were him." [Dallas Willard, Renovation of the Heart, 2002, NavPress, 241.]

“A disciple is a learner, a student, an apprentice – a practitioner… Disciples of Jesus are people who do not just profess certain views as their own but apply their growing understanding of life in the Kingdom of the Heavens to every aspect of their life on earth.” [Dallas Willard, The Great Omission: Reclaiming Jesus's Essential Teachings on Discipleship, 2006, Harper, p. xi]

"We are coming into a time when many churches and Christians who are in leadership positions will be able to say, 'It’s all about discipleship and transformation into Christlikeness.'" [Dallas Willard, Living in Christ's Presence: Final Words on Heaven and the Kingdom of God, 2013, Page 10.]

“We don't believe something by merely saying we believe it, or even when we believe that we believe it. We believe something when we act as if it were true.” [Dallas Willard, Renovation of the Heart: Putting on the Character of Christ, NavPress, 2002, p. ?]

“Sadly enough, [Christian faith throughout history] has failed to transform the human character of the masses, because it is usually unaccompanied by discipleship and by an overall discipline of life such as Christ himself practiced. As a result, when faced with the real issues of justice, peace, and prosperity, what is called faith in Christ has often proved of little help other than the comfort of a personal hope for what lies beyond this life.” [Dallas Willard, The Spirit of the Disciplines - Reissue: Understanding How God Changes Lives, 1991, HarperCollins, p. 221?]

A “head trip” of mental assent to doctrine and enjoyment of pleasant imagery and imagination is quietly substituted for a rigorous practice of discipleship that would bring a true transformation. / but the new life in Christ simply is not an inner life of belief and imagination, even if spiritually inspired. It is a life of the whole embodied person in the social context.  [Dallas Willard, The Spirit of the Disciplines: Understanding How God Changes Lives, 1988, Harper & Row, p. 111]

The missing note in evangelical life today is not in the first instance spirituality but rather obedience. We have generated a variety of religion to which obedience in not regarded as essential. … I don’t understand how anyone can look ingenuously at the contents of the scripture and say that Jesus intends anything else for is but obedience. So my first point is simply: life in Christ has to do with obedience to his teaching. If we don’t start there, we may as well forget about any distinctively Christian spirituality.  [Dallas Willard, “Spiritual Formation in Christ: A Perspective On What It Is and How It Might Be Done,” Lecture, Fuller Theological Seminary, Oct. 22, 1993; repr. in: Dallas Willard, The Great Omission: Reclaiming Jesus's Essential Teachings on Discipleship, 2006, p. 44, 45]

“The gospel of the kingdom does not call us to “get saved so we can go to heaven when we die,” that is an almost ubiquitous idea in the evangelical world, but one that is fundamentally selfish. The good news of the Kingdom, instead, calls us to be reborn into a new humanity, and to live out this humanity in this world now. So instead of talking mostly about how we want to go to heaven when we die, we ought to be focusing on how to live heaven before we die.” [Tom A. Jones and Steve D. Brown, The Kingdom of God, Volume One: The Future Breaks In, Ch. 3, section 6, DPI, 2010]

In the New Testament, discipleship means being an apprentice of Jesus in our daily existence. A disciple, then, is simply someone who has decided to be with another person in order to become what that person is or to become capable of doing what that person does. What does Jesus do that I can be discipled to do? The answer is found in the Gospels: he lives in the kingdom of God, and he applies that kingdom for the good of others and even makes it possible for them to enter it.  [Jan Johnson, “Apprentice To The Master: Interview With Dallas Willard,” Discipleship Journal, Sep./Oct. 1998, 22-24]

Prayer is a power-sharing device that God has worked out for a world of recovering sinners. He wants to get you involved in his Kingdom work and he gives you this opportunity. [Dallas Willard, “Considering the Whole Person: Heart, Soul, Mind, Strength and Neighbor,” The Hideaway, Monument, Colo., Jan. 4, 2010, @ 25:58]

Behavior will take care of itself if we get the inside right. The emphasis is on what kind of person am I becoming. What kind of person. That’s inside. That’s who I really am. [31:34] And we understand that the issue is not so much getting into heaven as heaven getting into us. [Dallas Willard, “What To Do After You Decide to Do What Jesus Said to Do,” Oct. 3, 2008 Renovaré conference, Memorial Drive Presbyterian Church, Houston; @31:12]

The current Evangelical understanding of salvation has no essential connection with a life morally transformed beyond the “ordinary.” Evangelicals are good at what they call “conversion.” They’re not good at what comes later, because what is preached by them as the gospel has no necessary connection to character transformation. [Dallas Willard, “The Failure of Evangelical Political Involvement in the Area of Moral Transformation,” transcript of talk, God and Governing Conference held at Trinity International U, Feb. 2008. Pub. in Ed. Roger N. Overton, God and Governing: Reflections on Ethics, Virtue, and Statesmanship, Wipf & Stock, 2009; also, Dallas Willard, Renewing the Christian Mind, Ch. 34, 2016, HarperOne]

First, there must be no mistaking the fact that discipleship to Jesus means primarily learning from him how to do—easily and routinely do—the very things he said for us to do. Obedience is the only sound objective of a Christian spirituality. Of course, we do not obey to earn anything—earning is out of the question—but we obey because doing the things that Jesus said is what is best for us and for everyone around us. [Dallas Willard; in Bill Hull, Choose the Life: Exploring a Faith That Embraces Discipleship, 2004. Baker Books, p. 6]

“The greatest issue facing the world today, with all its heartbreaking needs, is whether those who, by profession or culture, are identified as ‘Christians’ will become disciples – students, apprentices, practitioners – of Jesus Christ, steadily learning from him how to live the life of the Kingdom of the Heavens into every corner of human existence.”  [Dallas Willard, The Great Omission: Reclaiming Jesus's Essential Teachings on Discipleship, 2006, p. xv.]

“Our most serious failure today is the inability to provide effective practical guidance as to how to live the life of Jesus. And I believe that is due to this very real loss of biblical realism for our lives. [Dallas Willard, The Spirit of the Disciplines - Reissue: Understanding How God Changes Lives, 1990, HarperCollins, p. 110.]

​“Does the Gospel I preach and teach have a natural tendency to cause people who hear it to become full-time students of Jesus? Would those who believe it become his apprentices as a natural 'next step'? What can we reasonably expect would result from people actually believing the substance of my message?”  [Dallas Willard, The Divine Conspiracy: Rediscovering Our Hidden Life in God, 1998, Harper, p.?]

B) Dallas Willard, The Great Omission: Reclaiming Jesus's Essential Teachings on Discipleship, 2006, Harper. - Original sources noted

Introduction

xii He told us to make disciples, not converts to Christianity, nor to some particular “faith and practice.”

3-12 - CH. 1 - “Discipleship: For Super-Christians only?” (1980) [“Discipleship: For Super-Christians only?” Christianity Today, Oct. 10, 1980]

10 We are not speaking here of perfection, nor of earning God’s gift of life. Our concern is only with the manner of entering into that life. While none can merit salvation, or the fullness of life of which it is the root and natural part, all must act if it to be theirs. By what actions of the heart, what desires and intentions, do we find access to life in Christ? Paul’s example instructs us. He could say, in almost one breath, both “I am not perfect”(Philippians 3:12) and “Do what I do” (Philippians 4:9). His shortcomings – whatever they were – lay back of him, but he lived forward into the future through his intention to attain to Christ. He was both intent upon being like Christ (Philippians 3:10-14) and confident of upholding grace for his attention. He could thus say to all, “Follow me. I’m found! (“Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ” – 1 Corinthians 11:1). [“Discipleship: For Super-Christians only?” Christianity Today, Oct. 10, 1980]

13-17 - Ch. 2 – “Why Bother With Discipleship?” (1995) [pub. in, The Journey, Biola University conference on spiritual transformation, 1995]

13 [Decision] First, there is absolutely nothing in what Jesus himself or his early followers taught that suggests you can decide just to enjoy forgiveness at Jesus’s expense and have nothing more to do with him.

15 [Duplicity] This requires a long  and carful learning from Jesus to remove the duplicity that has become second nature to us – as is perhaps inevitable in a world where, to “manage” our relations to those about us, we must hide what we really think, feel, and would like to do, if only we could avoid observation. Thus, a part of the Jesus’s teaching was to “avoid the leaven, of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.” (Luke 12:1).

32-42 – Ch. 5 - “The Key to the Keys of the Kingdom” (1998) [shorter version: Leadership Journal 19, No. 4 (Fall 1998) : 57]

34 The abundance of God  to our lives, to our families, and our ministries is not passively received or imposed and does not happen to us by chance. It is claimed and put into action by our active, intelligent pursuit of it. we must seek out ways to live and act in union with the flow of God’s Kingdom life that should come through our relationship with Jesus. / There is, of course, no question of doing this purely  on our own. But we must act. Grace is opposed to earning, not effort. And it is well-directed, decisive, and sustained effort that is the key to the keys of the kingdom and to the life of the restful power in ministry and life that those keys open to us. [“The Key to the Keys of the Kingdom,”  shorter version publ. in: Leadership Journal, Fall 1998, p. 57]

43-67 – Ch. 6 - “Spiritual Formation in Christ Is for the Whole Person” (2000) [“Spiritual Formation in Christ Is for the Whole Person,” lecture, Beeson Divinity School, Stamford U, Birmingham, Oct. 2-4, 2000]

44 Jesus said, “I will show you  what sometimes is like who comes to me, hears my words, and acts on them. That one is like man building a house, who dug deeply and laid the foundation on rock; when a flood arose, the river burst against the house, but could not shake it, because it had been well built (Luke 6:47-48). And Jesus said, “Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not tell you? (Luke 6:46). Again he said, “All authority is given to me in heaven and earth. Go therefore and make apprentices to me from all kinds of people, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:18-20). I hope you will agree with me that he didn’t just mean getting them thoroughly wet as we say the words over them, but rather that “baptizing them in the name” refers to surrounding them, immersing them in the reality of Trinitarian community. And then we are to “teach them to obey everything I have commanded you.” That would be a natural next step, completing the process Jesus assigned to his people.

44 The missing note in evangelical life today is not in the first instance spirituality but rather obedience. We have generated a variety of religion to which obedience is not regarded as essential.

47 [W]e have a serious problem within our usual evangelical hermeneutic of reading passages that are not about forgiveness of sins as if they were, when they are really about new life (that is, foundational spirituality) in Christ.

49 Spirituality . . .  cooperatively interacts with God and the spiritual order (“kingdom”) deriving from God’s personality and action. the result is a new overall quality of human existence with corresponding new powers.

51 And now I’m going to say something really terrible, so brace yourselves or stop your ears. The church of Jesus Christ is not necessarily present when there is a correct administration of the sacrament and faithful preaching the Word of God.

52 We have generated a body of people who consume Christian services and think that is Christian faith. Consumption of Christian services replaces obedience to Christ.

53 Spiritual formation in Christ is the process whereby the inmost being of the individual (the heart, will, or spirit) takes on the quality of Jesus himself.

55 [S]piritual formation is a whole life process dealing with change in every essential part of the person. We don’t work on just our spirit, but on everything  that makes up our personality.

56 And one of the greatest temptations that we face as evangelicals – for the moment I include in that what is sometimes called the charismatic stream of the church – is the idea that the personality of and the heart are going to be transformed by some sort of lightning strike of the Spirit. You can call it revival or whatever you want. There is going to be this great boom, and then suddenly you will be transformed in every aspect of your being. There will be no need for a process –it will all be accomplished passively and immediately.

58 We have a problem with activity and passivity in our theology.

58 We have to think about working with God on the contents of our minds. David says in Psalm 16:8, “I keep the Lord always before me.” I Keep the Lord always before me. What do we say to David?  Synergism! Works! “I keep the Lord always before me; because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.” Her is our action at the heart of that great messianic Psalm, which I had more time to talk about because it has so much to say about spiritual formation.

61 I do not know a single denomination or local church in existence that has as its goal to teach its people to do everything Jesus said?

64 But if we divide between justification and regeneration in such a way that the gospel is only “Believe Jesus died for your sins and you will go to heaven when you die,” we are struck with a theology that is inherently resistant to a vital spirituality.

65 [Charisma] Generally expressed, baptism in the Spirit, spiritual experiences, high acts of worship, and other experiences of worship do not transform character.

68-79 – Ch. 7 - “Spiritual Formation in Christ” (1993) [“Spiritual Formation in Christ” A Perspective on What It Is and How It Might Be Done,” lecture, Fuller Theological Seminary, Oct. 22, 1993]

69 The reason for the recent abrupt emergence of the spiritual formation theology into religious life is, I believe, a growing suspicion or realization that we have not done well with the reality and the need. We have counted on preaching, teaching, and knowledge or information to form faith in the hearer and have counted on faith to form the inner life and outward behavior of the Christian. But, for whatever reason, this strategy has not turned out well. The result is that we have multitudes of professing Christians who well may be ready to die but obviously are not ready to live, and can hardly get along with themselves, much less with others.

73 As we depart from the mark set by the Great Commission, we increasingly find it harder to differentiate ourselves from those who are non- or even anti-Christians.

73 Christian spiritual formation works from the spirit or will and from its new life “from above.” But its work is not done until we have put off the old person and put on the new (Ephesians 4; Colossians 3).

73 We teach people to do “all things whatsoever” by shaping their hearts to love Christ and his commandments, and by training their entire personality (soul, mind, body, and to some degree even environment) to side with their new heart or spirit, which is the creative element of the self that we all call the will.

73 Christian spiritual formation works from the spirit or will and from its new life “from above.” But the work is not done until we have put the old person and put on the new (Ephesians 4; Colossians 3).

74 The processes of spiritual formation thus understood require precise, testable knowledge of the human self. Psychological and theological understanding of the spiritual life must go hand in hand. Neither of them is complete without the other.  A psychology that is Christian, in the sense of a contemplative understanding of the facts of spiritual life and growth, should be a top priority for disciples of Jesus, particularly those who work in the various fields of psychology and who consider it an intellectual and practical discipline. No understanding of the human self can be theoretically or practically adequate if it does  not deal with the spiritual life.

77 But actual obedience to Christ as Lord would transform ordinary life entirely and bring those disciples who are walking with Christ together wherever their lives touch. Christians who are together in the natural contexts of life would immediately identify with one another because of the radically different kind of life, the eternal kind of life, manifestly flowing in them. Their mere non-cooperation with the evil around them would draw them together as magnet and iron. Any other differences would have no significance within the unity of obedience to the who is present in his people.

79 How much of what goes on in ourselves, local assemblies, our denominations, and our schools, is dictated only by “futile ways inherited from [our] ancestors (Peter 1:18).

79 Are we seriously and realistically about the business of Christian spiritual formation as measured by unqualified love of Jesus Christ, and as specified by our “job description” in the Great Commission?

80-90 – Ch. 8 – “The Spirit Is Willing, But …: The Body as a Tool for Spiritual Growth,” (1998) [“The Spirit Is Willing, But …: The Body as a Tool for Spiritual Growth,”  Kenneth Gangel et al, eds., The Christian educator’s handbook on Spiritual formation,” 1998, Baker]

80 This process of “conformation to Christ,” as we might more appropriately call it [rather than “spiritual formation”], is constantly supported by grace and otherwise would be impossible. But it is not therefore passive. In fact, nothing inspires and enhances effort like the experience of grace.

80 [B]ecoming Christ-like never occurs without intense and well-informed action on our part.

84 Christ-likeness Must Be Planned For – Admittedly, all of this sounds strange in today’s religious context. It is a simple fact that nowadays the task of becoming Christ-like is rarely taken as a serious objective to be thoroughly planned for, and the reality of our embodied personality death with accordingly. I have inquired before many church and parachurch groups regarding their plan for putting to death or mortifying “whatever belongs to your earthly nature” or flesh (see, for example, Colossians 3:5) I have never once had a positive answer in response to this question. Indeed, mortifying or putting things to death doesn’t seem to be the kind of thing today’s Christians would be caught doing. Yet, there it stands, at the center of the New Testament teachings.

88 Of course it is because it gives us a sense of power over the “jerk.” It lies on a continuum with shooting him. that insight then opens up better ways of viewing what is actually going on in traffic or elsewhere – indeed in life. Suddenly we see what pathetic behavior our “exploding” is, and we discover attractive alternatives to it. We can even begin to develop the habit of blessing now, for we see the goodness of it and know that we are capable of silence, where we find God present. The words of James become very meaningful: everyone should be “quick to listen, slow to speak, [and] slow to anger”   (James 1:19). / We enter into each of the teachings of Jesus by choosing different behaviors … are not mental.

89 But Christ shows us how to bring the body from opposition to support of the new life he gives us, “the Spirit” now in us. He calls us to share his practices in sustaining his own relationship to the Father. Indeed, these practices – of solitude silence, study, service, prayer, worship – are now the places where we arrange to meet regularly with him and his Father to be his students or disciples in Kingdom living.

91-102 – Ch. 9 “Living in the Vision of God” (2003), [“Living in the Vision of God,” booklet, Church of the Savior, Washington, DC., 2003]

100 At the center of care for the heart  is the love of God. This must be the joyful aim of our life. This must be the joyful aim of our life. That is why Jesus, underlining the deep understanding of life worked out through the Jewish experience, stated that the first commandment is to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, in all your strength. (Mark 12:30). This is a command. It is something we are to do, and something we can do. We will learn how to do it if we intend to do it. God will help us, and we will find a way.

103-121 – Ch. 10 “Idaho Springs Inquiries Concerning Spiritual Formation” (1999) [previously unpublished]

105-6 Spiritual formation, without regard to any specifically religious context or tradition is the process by which the human spirit or will is given a definite form, or character. Make no mistake. It is a process that happens to everyone. . . . Christian spiritual formation, in contrast, is the redemptive process of forming the inner human world so that it takes on the character of the inner being of Christ himself. In the degree to which it is successful, the outer life of the individual becomes a natural expression of outflow of the character and teachings of Jesus.

122-34 - Ch. 11- “Personal Soul Care: For Ministers … and Others” (2002) [In: William H. Willamon, The Pastor’s Guide To Effective Ministry, Beacon Press, 2002.]

123 The inner dimensions of life are what are referred to in the Great Commandment: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and all our soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself” (Luke 10:27). This commandment does not tell us what we must do so much as what we must cultivate in the care of our souls. This is true for all believers and is certainly true for ministers of the gospel. Our high calling and sacrificial service can find adequate support only in a personality totally saturated with God’s kind of love, agape (see 1 Corinthians 13). // But we must be very clear that the great biblical passages  on love -- those already cited and others, including 1 John 4  -- do not tell us to act as if we loved God with our whole beings, and our neighbors as ourselves. Such an attempt, without the love of God indwelling us, would be an impossible burden. We would become angry and hopeless -- as, in fact, happens to many ministers and their families, trying to be “nice.”

124 The quality of our souls will indelibly touch others for good or ill. So we must never forget that the most important thing happening at any moment, in the midst of all our ministerial duties, is the kind of person we are becoming.

137-58 Ch. 12 - “Spiritual Disciplines, Spiritual Formation, and the Restoration of the Soul” (1998) [“Spiritual Disciplines, Spiritual Formation, and the Restoration of the Soul,” Journal Of Psychology And Theology, vol. 26, no. 1, 1998]

159-70 Ch. 13 – “Christ-Centered Piety: The Heart of the Evangelical” (1998) [considerably revised version of a talk]

C) Dallas Willard Books

Dallas Willard, The Divine Conspiracy: Rediscovering Our Hidden Life in God, Mar 24, 1998, Harper.

Dallas Willard, The Great Omission: Reclaiming Jesus’s Essential Teachings on Discipleship, Jun 13, 2006, HarperOne.

Dallas Willard, The Spirit of the Disciplines: Understanding How God Changes Lives, May 5, 2017, Harper.

Dallas Willard, The Allure of Gentleness: Defending the Faith in the Manner of Jesus, Feb 10, 2015, Harper.

Dallas Willard & Gary Black Jr., The Divine Conspiracy Continued: Fulfilling God's Kingdom on Earth, Jun 17, 2014, Harper.

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Dallas Willard, Renovation of the Heart in Daily Practice: Experiments in Spiritual Transformation, 2002, NavPress.

Dallas Willard, Renovation of the Heart: Putting on the Character of Christ, June 28, 2012. NavPress.

Dallas Willard, Renovation of the Heart: An Interactive Student Edition: Putting on the Character of Christ. March 9, 2005, TH1NK; Student

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Jan Johnson, Keith Matthews, Dallas Willard, Dallas Willard's Study Guide to The Divine Conspiracy, Apr 10, 2001, HarperOne.

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