“We are shaped every day, whether we know it or not, by practices – rituals and liturgies that make us who we are.” .

Our daily habits and practices can form us spiritually, and open our eyes to God’s presence in our everyday lives. Tish Warren explains how our ordinary habits and practices play a part in our spiritual formation.

“What makes us who we are – the way that we spend our time in life – is not so much just about getting the right ideas in our heads or getting Christian truths or scriptural truth in our brains, but actually learning practices that get scriptural truths down into our imaginations and into our habits.”

Tish expands on the importance of allowing God’s Word to transform our lives.

“We love Jesus. We want to learn how to be disciples of Jesus. And we think that if we just sort of shove Christian truths into our minds that our lives will change. But I think all of us, from our own experience – and from seeing people who know a lot of good Christian truths but are still struggling deeply with addictions or sin – know that it doesn’t seem to work.”

“I can have the right ideas in my head, I can stand up every week and say The Creed and confess that I believe in Jesus and in who He is and say all the right things, and yet, so often my life in the daily grind doesn’t seem transformed by that.”

The Christian life is not just knowing the truth of God’s Word, but it’s allowing the Holy Spirit to change the way we live our lives.

“I think that the concept of discipleship isn’t just about teaching, just getting the right Christian doctrines in our head, but it’s about learning practices of the Christian life, and habits of the Christian life that will form us to be a kind of people who live by the fruits of the Holy Spirit; who can live in gentleness, who can live in faithfulness, etc.”

“I don’t mean at all to denigrate Christian doctrine in any way, because I think it’s incredibly important that we do have orthodoxy and that we learn it. But it has to affect our habits and practices if it’s going to change who we are.”


Tish Harrison Warren is a priest in the Anglican Church in North America, serving at Resurrection South Austin. She writes regularly for The Well, InterVarsity’s online magazine for women in the academy and professions, Her.meneutics, and Christianity Today. She is author of the book .

Formation to the Christian life