Essentials In Spiritual Formation

Your elemental life is just beginning.

ESSENTIALS IN SPIRITUAL FORMATION is a 4 week online worship course (6 hours/week) that focuses on foundational spiritual habits for the follower of Jesus.

Receive a PDF Certificate when you complete the course. Join today and receive a complimentary 1 year WorshipTraining Membership.

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Download A Spiritual Formation Preview

WL Sample Enjoy a taste of the delicious content of Essentials In Spiritual Formation in the form of a reflection tool for your worship team.
Click here for a FREE download with a short audio focused on THE ELEMENTAL LIFE.

Register Today; Take Any Time.

Mar. 5 – April. 1, 2010 (Register by February 26) :: July 9 – Aug. 6, 2010 :: Nov. 5 – Dec. 3, 2010

How Will FORMATION Benefit Me?

Mine the ancients for fresh strength in your journey with Jesus.
Gain spiritual formation ideas from that will change your life.
Create tools for leading others in their own Spiritual Formation.
Receive a PDF Certificate when you complete the course.

In ESSENTIALS IN SPIRITUAL FORMATION, you’ll explore the riches of spiritual formation ideas across history, and engage with spiritual habits essential to every 21st century worshiper and spiritual leader.

Formation is all about being transformed into the likeness of Christ by attending to our interior life of devotion. When our interior life of devotion becomes “larger,” and more “expansive” than our exterior life of activity, we are beginning down a pathway that leads to spiritual health for the long haul.

We do this by studying together Dan’s new eBook, The Elemental Life, reflecting on the earth (a grounded life), wind (an inspired life), fire (an empowered life) and water (a communal life) of a healthy spirituality.

This module also has a view to equipping you with spiritual formation practices gleaned from historic, Benedictine, Ignatian and contemporary tradition that you can use to lead others in their journey toward the likeness of Christ.

Start A Spiritual Formation Group.

We strongly encourage you to you consider doing FORMATION with 3-4 others in a Spiritual Formation Group. This has proven to be an optimal way for participants to get their most out of the experience. We will utilize small group tools that can even be used across continents with friends far or near!

ESSENTIALS IN SPIRITUAL FORMATION is a life-changing, online, 4 week module course for worshippers, creative leaders, worship leaders, musicians, pastors and anyone desiring growth in spiritual formation. Dan Wilt, M.Min. will lead us in studying the spiritual formation of the worshipper and our faith journey across a lifetime. Packed with media from spiritual formation voices such as John Eldredge, Spiritual Director Lorna Jones, Dallas Willard, and others, the course only takes 4-6 hours a week.

Connect with an international learning community of peers. FORMATION is the study of spiritual formation and the ways of the heart in the leader – giving tools for growth and influence.

Build A Creative Project Throughout The Course.

In Essentials In Spiritual Formation, you will create a spiritual formation exercise from beginning to completion, with training via our course book and online media. Students have selected readings and media to get familiar with each week, and then post/interact on a weekly discussion question as a community.

At the end, the Creative Project is a unique spiritual formation experience you will create, honed throughout our online studies together, which gets posted to our Creative Commons for others to use, comment on and encourage you in. It could be for your family, your small group, church, your fellow participants and beyond. It’s an exciting part of our course.

Here is a summary course outline for the 4 weeks, and a detailed manual will be sent to all registrants close to the course start date.

Course Outline

WEEK 1

Essential Spiritual Formation: Earth – A Grounded Life.

In this week, we will explore the necessity of living within the Story of God as its riches, promises and reminders fill our hearts and minds through the study of the Scriptures. We will also explore the importance of reading and thinking “outside” of our current faith tradition, and even our current worldview. We’ll look at our devotional patterns, life habits and other elements that create a life rooted solidly in Jesus in the midst of change.

WEEK 2

Essential Spiritual Formation: Wind – An Inspired Life.

In this week, we will begin by listening to ancient voices calling us to the habits of prayerful conversation and meditation. It is not until we have embraced the silent place, the ways of a life lived in inner quietude, that we can truly learn to pray. Prayer was never intended to emerge from an ongoing, inner angst about the world, but rather from the soil of a soul that listens to the whispers of the Father. Meditation becomes the natural fruit of such a prayerful life – we linger in the presence of God not because we are compelled, but because His presence has become our source of life. We’ll talk about the importance of remaining inspired in all arenas of life, as well – exposing ourselves to renewing experiences unique to each of us.

WEEK 3

Essential Spiritual Formation: Fire – An Empowered Life.

In this week, we reflect on our vital need to have a constant outflow of spiritual life from us as we learn to receive the empowering gifts of the Father. We turn our attention to action in this week, but action that overflows from a life that has a substantial centering in intimacy with God. Here, our shared mission with Christ rises to the surface, and we embrace the call to “go into the all world” by understanding what exactly the good news is that we are called to exemplify to the human family. Again, ancient voices will give us clues to being missional peoople in a self-absorbed world. We will discuss the importance of being prayed for, living a life empowered by the Spirit, and inviting the Spirit of God to constantly renew our minds.

WEEK 4

Essential Spiritual Formation: Water – A Communal Life.

In our final week, we will bring all of the elements together that we have reflected on in a rich statement of personal formation. This creative week will involve embracing the most compelling Story of faith imaginable, and then seeking to incorporate our own lives into that rushing river. The power of symbolic actions, personal liturgies, and more will form our final week’s learning together. The importance of spiritual friendships will also be explored as we talk about the necessary habit of community-building in the life of the follower of Jesus. His friends were his disciples, and the life-to-life exchange the Spirit of God initiates happens within true community.

Which Books/Resources Are Required?

Devotional Classics, Revised Edition: Selected Readings for Individuals and Groups. Edited by Richard Foster and James Bryan Smith. San Francisco: HarperOne, 2005. - Required for all Participants. Buy Now
The Elemental Life. Dan Wilt, M.Min. This new eBook will be provided free of charge to anyone taking the course. Required for all participants.

Join The Course Today!

Our next 4 week session begins soon, so sign up today!