Corporate Accountability. Our Spiritual Formation Group began meeting in November of 1989. For the first six months we went over our covenant disciplines each week. Then we decided we wanted some type of study, and the Renovaré Devotional Readings seem to best fit our needs.

We have done one reading a week with leadership rotating weekly. The length of the selection and Bible study have fit well into our one-hour meeting time. We have found that they make us think with both our heads and hearts!

The Readings provide an excellent opportunity to sample some well-known authors we would not have taken the time to search out on our own. The questions at the end of each selection have helped to keep us on track and to find the writer's message. We especially appreciate Richard Foster's reflections at the conclusion that give us good, solid insight.

We have recently recommitted ourselves to our covenant and plan to do Devotional Readings every other week with covenant disciplines between readings. They have been a real blessing to all of us.

-- Becky Grant, Judy Stanton, Elna Van Dyke, Wilma Ambrose, Deborah Phelps, Wanda Urquhart, Karen Self, Barbara Bausman, Linda Manderino

Pastoral Insight. I think, and I find real hope and encouragement in this thought, that the efforts of Renovaré to stimulate individual believers and churches in the knowledge and practice of spiritual theology may make it one of the most significant modern ministries to the Christian Church.

The Devotional Readings and suggested group structure offer good discipline for depth discipleship and an effective means of combating the curse of superficiality.

We are beginning to use the Renovaré readings in small groups because we want to invest as much, and more, energy in spiritual development as we do numerical growth. We are finding the material well conceived and well done.

I am also very appreciative of the way in which the material introduces the reader to the great historical figures, the great practitioners and teachers, of Christian spirituality. Many people, with ties to Western Christianity, have turned to more fanciful traditions and "pop" movements because, being ignorant of their own heritage, thought it to be lacking in richness and depth of spirituality. The Renovaré readings help to remedy this situation.

-- Larry Hart, Grace Community Church