Category Archives: need to read

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You Need To Read (with caution!)

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unapologetic

The title of this sporadic blog series, You Need To Read, is a bit of an overstatement. I do think these books are worth reading, though. So, as I wrote in an earlier post, every once in a while I’ll be telling you about books that are helping me preach. My reviews will be fairly brief compared to some and will focus on how the book/author has helped me. I will not spend hardly any words on my disagreements with the book. I don’t read these books in order to be able to state my disagreements. I read them to profit and realize I won’t agree with everything (we hardly ever read a book like that, right?).

Unapologetic: Why, despite everything, Christianity can still make surprising emotional sense by Francis Spufford (HarperOne, New York, 2013)

Unapologetic: Why, Despite Everything, Christianity Can Still Make Surprising Emotional Sense

Okay, this is a helpful book, but for two reasons, it may not be a book for everyone. First, Spufford is nowhere near being what I would call a conservative evangelical of the US variety. Second, he swears like an unsanctified sailor. I grew up in an extended family that was adept at swearing in both English and French, so I’m used to hearing profanity. But, at times, thankfully, it still jars me; and Spufford did jar me at time.
Spufford explains his approach: “Why do I swear so much in what you are about to read? To make a tonal point: to suggest that religious sensibilities are not made of glass. do not need to hide themselves nervously from whole dimensions of human experience.” (p. xiii) So, you have been warned.
However, the book helped me like I was hoping it would: by giving me new ways to explain life and the Christian faith to un-Christian attendees.
Reacting to a sign on the atheist bus in London (yes, that’s a real thing! “There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life” p. 7). Spufford writes, “But enjoyment is one emotion. The only things in the world that are designed to elicit enjoyment and only enjoyment are products, and your life is not a product…” (p. 8). That’s such a good way to challenge the goal of non-Christians. Or, concerning the subject of science versus Christianity: “This world believes that it has science on its side. Indeed, by an act of oblivious metaphorical digestion, it tends to believe that it is science…” (p. 70).
Spufford also made me think about the Christian faith in new ways. For instance, “…it is…a mistake to suppose that it is assent to the propositions that makes you a believer. It is the feelings that are primary. I assent to the ideas because I have the feelings; I don’t have the feelings because I’ve assented to the ideas” (p. 19). I don’t know about you, but I never think about faith at the level of the affections. He actually frames his writing by saying, “This…is a defense of Christian emotions—of their intelligibility, of their grown-up dignity” (p. 23).
Spufford accurately captures the conundrum Jesus creates when He raises the morality bar extremely high in places like the Sermon on the Mount: “He talks as if virtue is almost unachievable, yet still compulsory” (p. 115).
I wished I would have read the book before preaching through all the “one another’s” in the NT. Spufford describes loving each other dearly as: “Our hearts are in our eyes as we look at each other” (p. 200).
I found the author’s definition of sin very insightful: “[sin] always refers to the pleasurable consumption of something….’indulgence’ or ‘enjoyable naughtiness’…. our active inclination to break stuff, ‘stuff’ here including moods, promises, relationships we care about, and our own well-being and other people’s, as well as material objects whose high gloss positively seems to invite a big fat scratch” (pp. 25, 26, 27). (as a huge bonus, the last part of this definition highlights Spufford’s excellent writing style; you will enjoy reading his sentences when he’s not swearing).
And how about his description of our broken world: “We do entirely agree that there’s a crack in everything. (That’s how the light gets in? Oh yes; that most of all) The vision is of an intrinsically imperfect cosmos, hairlined through and through with flaws, chipped and battered and patched” (p. 46).
I especially profited from chapter 4,  Hello, Cruel World. Spufford writes: “Every one of our voyages ends in disaster. Every ship of ours is the Titanic” (p. 92).
And Spufford doesn’t pull punches as it relates to attempting to come to grips with a sovereign God’s part in it all. After seeing a church newsletter where the “Almighty” is thanked for fixing the minister’s car via a miraculously cheap quote from a garage, “For if God was willing to exert Himself over the minister’s sparkplugs, but wouldn’t get out of bed to stop the Holocaust, what sort of picture would that draw?” (p. 94).
Jesus and miracles were never intended to stop the brokenness completely: “One man doing miracles in West Asia doesn’t even move the leprosy statistics. The cruelty of the cruel world reproduces itself far faster than his slow hands can move. He brings sight to blind eyes, and all the causes of blindness rage on” (p. 131).
 And, then, I loved this statement: “We don’t have an argument that solves the problem of the cruel world, but we have a story” (p. 106). That’s what we preach each Sunday: the Story of how our God is redeeming His world through our Lord Jesus Christ and His Holy Spirit.
Preach the Story well for the sake of God’s reputation in the Church and in Christ Jesus.
Randal

C. S. Lewis–A Life: Eccentric Genius, Reluctant Prophet by Alister McGrath (Tyndale, 2013)

Some of my readers enjoy reading C. S. Lewis and biographies in general. If that’s you, you will enjoy Alister McGrath’s book, C. S. Lewis–A Life: Eccentric Genius. Reluctant Prophet. I am not an avid reader of biographies, but I’m glad I read this one. As usual, Lewis’s own insights did not disappoint. However, I also found McGrath’s insights very helpful.

Here are a few things that captured my attention:

“An emotionally unintelligent father bade his emotionally neglected sons an emotionally inadequate farewell” (p. 24, describing the situation of Lewis and his brother as they were being shipped off to school only two weeks after their mother died! Like all of us, Lewis brought baggage with him when he went to work.)

“Lewis is a failed poet who found greatness in other spheres of writing” (p. 64. I didn’t expect that! I guess I figured someone like Lewis succeeded at everything. It gave me some hope.)

“His maiden lecture, given on Tuesday, 14 October at University College, was attended by a mere four people” (p. 108. Wow! What a way to start your professorial duties!).

One of the more interesting features of the book was information about Lewis’s relationship with Tolkien: “Tolkien was a niggling perfectionist, and he knew it. Indeed, his late story, ‘Leaf by Niggle’–which deals with a painter who can never finish his painting of a tree because of his constant desire to expand and improve it–can be seen as a self-parodying critique of Tolkien’s own difficulties in writing. Someone had to help him conquer his perfectionism. And what Tolkien needed he found in Lewis….it is no exaggeration to say that Lewis would become the chief midwife to one of the great works of twentieth-century literature–Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings” (p. 130).

You’ll also enjoy reading about Lewis’s arriving at saving faith: “In Surprised by Joy, Lewis sets out the series of moves which led him to faith in God, using a chessboard analogy. None of these is logically or philosophically decisive; all are at best suggestive. Yet their force lies not in their individual importance, but in their cumulative weight. Lewis portrays these, not as moves which he made, but moves which were made against him. The narrative of Surprised by Joy is not that of Lewis’s discovery of God, but of God’s patient approach to Lewis…. ‘Amiable agnostics will talk cheerfully about ‘man’s search for God.’ To me, as I then was, they might as well have talked about the mouse’s search for the cat'” (pp. 136, 138).

Read well. Preach well.

Randal

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Pastor, Scholar, or Both?

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google-scholar

How do you see yourself? More of a pastor or more of a scholar?

I’m fortunate each year to study with pastors from all over the world who are both pastors and scholars. They are pursuing advanced degrees partly because they enjoy studying hard. But I also rub shoulders with pastors who do not see themselves as the scholarly type. If you see yourself like that, you need to read John Piper’s segment of the little paperback, The Pastor as Scholar and the Scholar as Pastor. Professors will enjoy Carson’s take on how the professor functions for the Church.

Piper writes, “[God] did not have to give the church a book….So the very existence of the Bible as a book signals that the pastor is called to read carefully and accurately and thoroughly and honestly. That is, he is called to be a ‘scholar’….If I am scholarly, it is not…because I try to stay on the cutting edge in the discipline of biblical and theological studies. I am far too limited for that [Piper is very open about his limitations in his, largely autobiographical chapter]. What ‘scholarly’ would mean for me is that the greatest object of knowledge is God and that he has revealed himself authoritatively in a book; and that I should work with all my might and all my heart and all my soul and all my mind to know and enjoy him and to make him known for the joy of others. Surely this is the goal of every pastor” (pp. 66-67).

When you put it like that, surely this is our goal. Let me give you two ways to move in that direction if you don’t see yourself functioning as the scholarly type:

  • Subscribe to a scholarly journal, read at least two articles and the book review section in each issue. I enjoy BibSac, JEHS, and Preaching journals, but there are many good ones to choose from .
  • Make reading in biblical and theology studies a regular part of your week. There is a lot of pressure on us to read only church growth or practical ministry material. Find authors that will stretch your ability to think theologically.

Study hard and preach well for the sake of His reputation in the Church and in the world.

Randal

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You Need To Read, Princeton and Preaching

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If you’ve read my blog, you know I refer to books from time to time. This new sporadic series, You Need To Read, will introduce you to some of the authors that have stimulated my hermeneutical, theological, and homiletical thinking. I am linked with WTS’s bookstore and also Amazon and will receive colossal cash from them if you ever decide to purchase a book directly from my blog. Okay, maybe colossal is an overstatement.

Over the years, my students have heard me talk about the importance of reading-to-become-a-theologian. I am indebted to so many authors! I know you feel the same way about the value that good reading adds to your preaching ministry.

So, you need to read Garretson’s, Princeton and Preaching. Some of my readers will be interested in Garretson’s first goal: “to enable church historians and students of American history to better understand the significant role that ministerial training played in shaping the ethos of American church history” (p. xix). Most readers will appreciate the second goal: “to assist pastors and preachers in their ministry and care of the people of God” (p. xix).

I benefited from Garretson's assistance, especially the sections on the qualifications for the ministry, preparing the preacher's heart, minister as shepherd, and the difficulties and challenges of the ministry. Garretson's description of Alexander made me want to be a better Christian even more than wanting to be a better soul-watcher.

Preach well for the sake of Christ's reputation.

Randal