Ten Questions to Diagnose Your Spiritual Health [Paperback]

Donald S Whitney (Author)

Book Description

Release date: May 4, 2001 | Series: TrueColors

Are you spiritually healthy or just spiritually busy?

These 10 probing questions will help you look beyond your spiritual activity to assess the true state of your spiritual health.

This book by Donald S. Whitney provides thought-provoking insights that will help you on your spiritual transformation journey. See how the spiritual disciplines--including prayer, worship, and meditation--can take your spiritual health from fair to excellent.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Christians today are busier than ever before, doing the "spiritual" work they feel called to out of devotion for God. But are these earnest followers of Christ actually living their faith in a manner that is pleasing to Christ? Whitney (Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life; How Can I Be Sure I'm a Christian?) effectively challenges this "busy hands, empty heart" epidemic. Whitney poses intensely introspective questions to aid Christians as they gauge their own level of spiritual health. Do they have a driving thirst for God, as well as behavior dictated by God's holy standards? How loving to others and sensitive to the Holy Spirit are they? Do they experience genuine grief over personal sin and a willingness to forgive repeat offenders? Whitney also discusses the spiritual disciplines of prayer, fasting, meditating upon Scripture, taking communion and fellowship with others of like faith, showing readers how to transform these often automatic enterprises into faith-building activities. He advises Christians to spend more energy enjoying God and developing a Christlike nature, rather than accomplishing ever-accelerating goals. He notes that seekers must be acutely aware that following Christ is a lifetime commitment and that they should resist the temptation to seek "spiritual" shortcuts to intimacy with God. This timely text is full of gentle admonitions to unearth deeply entrenched habits and dig for the treasure found only in a carefully honed relationship with God.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Review

"...An updated version of some of Johnathan Edwards' best work, this book poses the questions we need to ponder..." -- Mark Dever, Pastor, Capital Hill Baptist Church, author of Nine Marks of a Healthy Church

"...For believers who long for Revival, these are questions to which we'll regularly return. What a tool...!" -- Ron Owens, author of Return to Worship and They Could Not Stop the Music; Music and Worship Consultant for the International Mission Board, SBC

"...the questions the he supplies for this assessment not only help us examine our spiritual health, but...impart divine nutrition..." -- Bryan Chapell, Ph.D., President - Covenant Theological Seminary, Author of Christ-centered Preaching

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 112 pages
• Publisher: NavPress; 1St Edition edition (May 4, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1576830969
• ISBN-13: 978-1576830963
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.5 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #40,287 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #16 in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Religious Studies > Education

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 23 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Tool To Diagnose Your Spiritual Health January 18, 2005

By Tim Challies TOP 500 REVIEWER

Format:Paperback

As believers, we often fall prey to the assumption that those who are busiest, are most spiritual. We look at the people in our churches who are involved in all the committees and are at every meeting and assume that they are the ones with the greatest measure of spiritual health. But do you think that is the measure God uses? Or does he have a different set of criteria by which He judges spiritual health? This short but powerful book examines the Bible's teaching on this matter.

As one might expect by the title, Ten Questions To Diagnose Your Spiritual Health, this book presents the reader with ten criteria that can point towards spiritual health. The crux of the matter, the theme that flows throughout the book, is this: is your character becoming more like Christ's? Here are the ten questions the reader faces:

1. Do you thirst for God?

2. Are you governed increasingly by God's Word?

3. Are you more loving?

4. Are you more sensitive to God's presence?

5. Do you have a growing concern for the spiritual and temporal needs of others?

6. Do you delight in the bride of Christ?

7. Are the spiritual disciplines increasingly important to you?

8. Do you still grieve over sin?

9. Are you a quicker forgiver?

10. Do you yearn for heaven and to be with Jesus?

Each of the questions is approached and evaluated in the light of Scripture and in a way consistent with Reformed theology. In the introduction Whitney writes "In our day, as in theirs [the Puritans], the timeless process of discerning one's spiritual health involves questions and tests. My purpose in writing these pages is to act as a physician of the soul - to ask questions and suggest spiritual tests that can, by the help of the Holy Spirit, enable you to self-diagnose your spiritual health." This book bears a great resemblance to the writing of the Puritans in the sense that they were continually searching their hearts before God to discern where sin had taken hold of their lives. Their honesty and diligence in this matter was clearly influential in Whitney's writing.

There are a couple of places where the author could have taken a misstep but did not. When I saw that a chapter was dedicated to sensitivity to God's presence I began to wonder how the author would approach this topic, and was glad to see that it bore no resemblance to the practices of Brother Lawrence and the other mystics that are so popular today. Instead he introduces the six ways we should understand the Bible's teaching on God's presence and how the believer is to practice them.

Far from being yet another self-help or an easy-answer, ten-step book, this one is deep and penetrating. Reading this book and meditating on the questions will be sure to move believers towards a deeper relationship with Jesus. I highly recommend it!

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Spiritually Fit May 11, 2003

By Bob Aubuchon

Format:Paperback

Donald Whitney asks ten questions that examine and probe the Christian like a medical doctor would his patient to bring about a healthy result. This is a solid read and is not based upon a modern spiritualized "self-help" measure. Each question is biblically based and presents a real challenge to the sick as well as healthy Christian. Whitney states, "Nothing in the world is more important than an eternal, life-giving knowledge of God, through Jesus, who is the only way to the Father. I urge you not to take for granted the existence of such relationship between yourself and God. The Bible implores you to 'make you call and election sure.'" Anyone wishing to take a true examination of their spiritual health will do well to read and re-read this book with the Bible in hand. But be ready to discover you may not be as healthy as you think you are in your spiritual health. The Christian looking to become healthy in their relationship with Christ will want read this book.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Useful 10 Questions December 10, 2009

By Derek Robinson

Format:Paperback

I do like this book for two specific questions that were asked; Do I Thrist for God and Do you Feel God's Presence? The do you thrist for God involves a basic yearning that all believers should posses at some level or another to get to know the God of the Bible better. It gives three specific stages that most people would fall into. The other question about God's presence was great because I'm a fairly low key even keel guy and do not express tons of excitement. This chapter encouraged me in regards to understanding God's presence in a the evidence of Him working within your life and knowing that He will never forsake us even when we can't necessarily "feel'' Him. Also, it distinguished the three specific ways that God usually always makes Himself known to us and that those are the means to commune with Him, not the mystical experience stuff that many see now. Overall good read, but I would just continue to ask yourself the ten questions of each chapter.

1. Do you thirst for God?
2. Are you governed increasingly by God's Word?
3. Are you more loving?
4. Are you more sensitive to God's presence?
5. Do you have a growing concern for the spiritual and temporal needs of others?
6. Do you delight in the bride of Christ?
7. Are the spiritual disciplines increasingly important to you?
8. Do you still grieve over sin?
9. Are you a quicker forgiver?
10. Do you yearn for heaven and to be with Jesus?