Dallas Willard
Dallas Willard
Dallas Albert Willardwas an American philosopher also known for his writings on Christian spiritual formation. Much of his work in philosophy was related to phenomenology, particularly the work of Edmund Husserl, many of whose writings he translated into English for the first time. He was longtime Professor of Philosophy at The University of Southern California, teaching at the school from 1965 until his death in 2013 and serving as the department chair from 1982 to 1985...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPhilosopher
Date of Birth4 September 1935
CountryUnited States of America
What we think is, in the adult person, very much a matter of what we allow ourselves to think, and what we feel is very much a matter of what we allow ourselves to feel. Moreover, what we think is very much a matter of what we wish and seek to think, and what we feel is very much a matter of what we wish and seek to feel. In short, the condition of our mind is very much a matter of the direction in which our will is set.
Today it is the skeptics who are the social conformists, though because of powerful intellectual propaganda they continue to enjoy thinking of themselves as wildly individualistic and unbearably bright.
The will is transformed by experience, not information.
Disciples are those who have been so ravished with Christ that others want to be like them.
Unless you have already put God first, for example, what you will have to do to be financially secure, impress other people, or fulfill your desires will invariably lead you against God's wishes. That is why the first of the Ten Commandments, “You shall have no gods who take priority over me,” is the first of the Ten Commandments.
We live in a culture that has, for centuries now, cultivated the idea that the skeptical person is always smarter than one who believes. You can almost be as stupid as a cabbage as long as you doubt.
Happiness in reality consists only in rest, and not in being stirred up. This instinct conflicts with the drive to diversion, and we develop the confused idea that leads people to aim at rest through excitement.
Solitude well practiced will break the power of busyness, haste, isolation, & loneliness.
I would say the soul would be more than the engine. The soul would be like the computer system that coordinates everything, from the smog device to the fuel injection system to the brakes.
God may not guide us in an obvious way because he wants us to make decisions based on faith and character.
Suppose our failures occur, not in spite of what we are doing, but precisely because of it.
So when Jesus directs us to pray, “Thy kingdom come,” he does not mean we should pray for it to come into existence. Rather, we pray for it to take over at all points in the personal, social, and political order where it is now excluded: “On earth as it is in heaven.” With this prayer we are invoking it, as in faith we are acting it, into the real world of our daily existence
The Bible defines almost nothing because it isn't a book for scholars and philosophers or free thinkers. It's a book for people who want help. It's primarily a book for pastors. They're the ones that can use it in a way so that it actually achieves its purpose.
We are unceasing spiritual beings with an eternal destiny in God's great universe.