Sacred Pathways: Discover Your Soul's Path to God

Sacred Pathways: Discover Your Soul's Path to God

by Gary Thomas

Profiles nine spiritual temperaments from their characteristics to their strengths and weaknesses, explaining why some people demonstrate worship through prayer while others engage in other devotional activities, and revealing how to discover one's own natural means of expression. Reprint.

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Paperback, 240 pages

Published January 22nd 2002 by Zondervan (first published 1996)

tags: theology, spirituality, faith, christianity, christian non fiction, religion, nonfiction, christian living, discipleship, christian

Book Quotes

“Finding fulfillment in God is the most powerful antidote to any sin.”

― Gary Thomas

“Good spiritual directors understand that people have different spiritual temperaments, that what feeds one doesn’t feed all. Giving the same spiritual prescription to every struggling Christian is no less irresponsible than a doctor prescribing penicillin to every patient.”

― Gary Thomas

“I’ve learned that we must first create a space of time, quiet, and isolation before we can truly see God. Three elements are necessary for this. We need to first believe, then learn to perceive, and finally receive.”

― Gary Thomas

“A mask partially conceals, but it also tells us that something is behind the mask.”

― Gary Thomas

“I no longer call you servants,…I have called you friends.”14 Servants is a “doing” word; friends is a “being” word. What do servants do? They cook, clean, et cetera. A friend, however, is something you are, not something you do. A servant is Martha, a friend is Mary.”

― Gary Thomas

“One of the most powerful antidotes to addiction is participating in different activities, lifting the addicts out of themselves and into positive, constructive acts of creation.”

― Gary Thomas

“Healthy Christians create. It is the nature of our God to create. He’s introduced in Genesis 1 as the Creator of everything. One of the last images given to us in the book of Revelation is God creating the new heaven and the new earth. The Bible is literally framed around the act of God creating.”

― Gary Thomas

“In the study of Christian spirituality, real contemplation is actually an experience with a beginning and an end that Christians pass through. Contemplation is not generally considered a life-state that one exists in, so I’m adapting the word somewhat when I use it as a label for a spiritual temperament.”

― Gary Thomas

“Seeking miraculous experiences simply for the sake of experiencing the miraculous makes us spiritual drug addicts who simply want to get “high.” This book is about learning to love God, not learning to join a spiritual circus. Enthusiasts need to be especially careful to remain true to seeking and loving God rather than searching for new experiences. When we seek “spiritual experiences” for their own sake, they can actually become, and be used for, evil.”

― Gary Thomas

“God has much to say to us, but we are often too busy to listen. Our minds have a tendency to get too occupied during the day, or sometimes we are too busy praying to God with our own agendas and have lost our listening ears. Dreams are one way God can “break in” and get something across to us that we might not be open to hearing during the day.”

― Gary Thomas

“When I first began spending daily time in prayer, I often grew frustrated at how I could forget about God’s presence by lunchtime, even after praying for an hour in the morning. Shorter but more frequent times of prayer may actually help us to live with an increasing awareness of God’s presence in our lives. How difficult would it be for us to set aside five minutes in the morning, five minutes at noon, and five minutes before or after dinnertime to meet God in prayer?”

― Gary Thomas

“A Christian who has a hard time living by his or her faith while driving, for instance, could hang a symbol—a cross or a fish—on their rearview mirror to challenge them when their temper begins to flare. (That’s certainly preferable to putting a Christian bumper sticker on the back of the car for all to see, and then driving like a son of perdition!) A pastor friend of mine uses a pond near his home as a symbol. As soon as he drives by that pond, he is reminded that he is going home and needs to prepare himself to focus on his wife and children, leaving the cares, worries, and concerns of the church on the north side of the pond. He can pick them back up the next morning when he passes the pond on his way to work. A symbol can be found to meet virtually every need in every situation. Men”

― Gary Thomas

“Ultimately, it’s a matter of spiritual nutrition. Many Christians have never been taught how to “feed” themselves spiritually. They live on a starvation diet and then are surprised that they always seem so “hungry.”

― Gary Thomas

“Expecting all Christians to have a certain type of quiet time can wreak havoc in a church or small group. Excited about meaningful (to us) approaches to the Christian life, we sometimes assume that if others do not experience the same thing, something must be wrong with their faith. Please, don’t be intimidated by others’ expectations. God wants to know the real you, not a caricature of what somebody else wants you to be. He created you with a certain personality and a certain spiritual temperament. God wants your worship, according to the way he made you. That may differ somewhat from the worship of the person who brought you to Christ or the person who leads your Bible study or church.”

― Gary Thomas

“I may not receive any new insights and God may not feel particularly close. This has taught me that the demand for spiritual experience can be as gluttonous as the desire for food, money, or sex. Desire for spiritual highs needs to be contained so that we can develop other parts of our being.”

― Gary Thomas

“How often do we Christians “take the Lord’s name in vain” during our worship? It matters to God if we lie, even if we’re singing, and even if everybody around us is singing the same thing. Music can make us feign a commitment that just isn’t there, causing us to become callous, insincere believers.”

― Gary Thomas

“Christians who demonstrate compassion because they are passionately in love with God will thus speak prophetically to a selfish culture and, sometimes, a selfish church. Selfishness distorts true sacrifice, and sacrifice is at the heart of true care. Mother”

― Gary Thomas

“It wasn’t easy. In junior high, I was voted “most polite,” and it took some time for me to realize that being perceived as a “nice guy” and being a faithful Christian don’t always go hand in hand.”

― Gary Thomas

“There are three elements of the traditionalist pathway: ritual (or liturgical pattern); symbol (or significant image); and sacrifice. Evelyn Underhill, a popular Christian writer in the early part of this century, calls these three elements “sensible signs of supra-sensible action.”9 They are ways we use the physical world to express nonphysical (spiritual) truths.”

― Gary Thomas

“God will speak to us through creation if we’ll only listen. If you feel like your time in front of books or listening to sermons has become stagnant, grab a coat, pick up a walking stick, and step outside into a school that never closes.”

― Gary Thomas

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