The Good and Beautiful Life: Putting on the Character of Christ

James Bryan Smith

Dec 2009 · InterVarsity Press

About this ebook

Finding the Good Life through the Sermon on the Mount

"I have never met a person whose goal was to ruin his or her life. We all want to be happy, and we want it all of the time."

So begins James Bryan Smith in The Good and Beautiful Life. The problem is, he tells us, we have bought into false notions of happiness and success. These self-centered decisions lead us further into the vices that cause ruin: anger, lust, lying, worry, and judging. Eventually we find ourselves living a beautifully packaged life of self-destruction.

Following the Sermon on the Mount, this follow-up to The Good and Beautiful God guides us to look behind these character flaws and to replace our false beliefs with Jesus' narratives about life in the kingdom of God.

The Good and Beautiful Series includes four essential discipleship books from James Bryan Smith. Work through these proven Bible study resources individually or with a group to learn who God is, what it means to be a Christian, how to live in community, and how to address toxic self-narratives that hinder spiritual growth.

Ratings and reviews

This book along with the other 2 in the series make up a great resource to help us along with our apprenticeship/discipleship to Jesus. James Bryan Smith does an excellent job of distilling the best teachings by Dallas Willard, Richard Foster, Henri Nowen and many others; and making them accessible to the lay person and clergyman/woman alike. I highly recommend this series if you, your group, your Church or all three want to get serious about becoming and/or making disciples of Jesus - Matt 28:19

This book felt a little thin as it worked through the Sermon on the Mount. It was difficult for me to follow the idealogical journey through the narratives of vice.

About the author

James Bryan Smith (MDiv, Yale University Divinity School, DMin, Fuller Seminary) is a theology professor at Friends University in Wichita, Kansas, and a writer and speaker in the area of Christian spiritual formation. He also serves as the director of the Apprentice Institute for Christian Spiritual Formation at Friends University. A founding member of Richard J. Foster's spiritual renewal ministry, Renovaré, Smith is an ordained United Methodist Church minister and has served in various capacities in local churches. Smith is also the editor of A Spiritual Formation Workbook, Devotional Classics (with Richard Foster), Embracing the Love of God, Rich Mullins: An Arrow Pointing to Heaven and Room of Marvels.