Noted here:
Kasich cites the late University of Southern California philosophy professor Dallas Willard as one of his theological inspirations—an unusual choice because Willard was not always accepted by the Christian establishment. His teaching that the Kingdom of God is available here and now—“eternity is already in session,” he was known to say—follows a school of thought known as spiritual formation, or the idea that with discipline and spiritual development, ordinary Christians can grow to become more like Jesus.
Much of Dallas Willard's writing assumes that personal transformation of the disciple was the object of discipleship as taught by Jesus because the expectation of the kingdom's imminent coming is not granted. Jesus' expectation of the in-breaking of the kingdom, of course, means that any concern with spiritual formation is a distraction. The call to discipleship instead is in reality a call to escape the judgment that is coming perilously soon. Discipleship is actually a form of radical repentance, a turning away from a world about to be cleansed by fire, analogous to embarking Noah's Ark.
Accordingly Willard actually trivializes the teaching of Jesus, an example being the teaching on personal poverty, which in Willard's description and understanding of discipleship is ridiculed even though it is the very first thing embraced by the disciples of the historical Jesus. Instead Willard offers a list of spiritual practices, which are not meant to be exhaustive, which includes the practice of "frugality" as one example of what it means to follow Jesus.
You know, as in "Be frugal with what ye have and give alms" (Luke 12:33).
