Kingdom Apprenticeship

A Groundbreaking Analysis of Dallas Willard’s Theology of Spiritual Formation

Dallas Willard’s formational theology begins with the claim that the aim of God in human history is the formation of a community of loving persons apprenticed to Jesus—and ends with the promise that such apprenticeship prepares us to share in God’s governance of the cosmos.

This apprenticeship to Jesus is the path to human flourishing, the renewal of the church, and the healing of the world.

In Kingdom Apprenticeship, Keas Keasler offers the first comprehensive study of Willard’s theology of spiritual formation. He argues that while the three D’s of disciples, discipleship, and disciplines made Willard famous, his formational theology is much deeper than that. Willard’s unique grammar of transformation is grounded in ordinary life, for it is in our present reality that we are trained to participate in God’s eternal purposes.

Mining Willard’s philosophical works, theological writings, recorded lectures, and unpublished papers, Keasler shows:

Willard’s theology serves as a practical curriculum for spiritual growth, offering a remedy for the character crisis we see in the church and in society.
Apprenticeship to Jesus is both for growth in Christlikeness and preparation for reigning with God in the fullness of his kingdom.
Spiritual formation is not secondary or supplementary to God’s mission; it is its very strategy.

Against the drift of modern theology into abstraction, Willard calls the church back to a clinical theology—one aimed at the transformation of character through an interactive life with God. Formation and mission, contemplation and action, inner renewal and outward vocation—all are inseparably linked in Willard’s vision.

Kingdom Apprenticeship offers a fresh and urgent call: to recover apprenticeship to Jesus as the heart of the Christian life—and the hope of the world.

Author Biography

Keas Keasler (PhD, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam) is associate professor of spiritual theology at Friends University, where he also serves as program director of the MA in Christian Spiritual Formation and Leadership.