March 20, 2022

• Book reviews

  Here are some more book reviews. To see all, click the book reviews category/tag link on the left side.

   

  Deeper: real change for real sinners, by Dane Ortlund
  This is an extremely good book, highly recommended for everyone. Its theme is how to grow closer to God. Here is how the author himself summarizes the book (p. 172)- "The nine chapters of this book are not sequential steps in growing: they are different facets of the one diamond of growth. In order to grow, we need to see who the real Jesus is (chap. 1), collapsing into his arms and continuing to do so all our lives long (chap. 2) as those united to him (chap. 3), drinking down his undeserved love (chap. 4) and full legal exoneration on the basis of his own finished work (chap. 5), being therefore freed up to walk in the light (chap. 6) and receive the anguish of this life as the gentle hand of God to help us rather than to punish us (chap. 7), seeing the love of Christ by inhaling the Bible and returning our love to him in exhaled prayer (chap. 8), and actually experiencing the love of heaven through the indwelling Spirit (chap. 9). This is a book with one point: Be astonished at the gracious heart of Jesus Christ, proven in his atoning work in the past and his endless intercession in the present. Receive his unutterable love for sinners and sufferers. Stop resisting. Let him draw near to you. Gaze upon him. As you do so, transformation will come in the back door. If you try to change simply for change's sake, you can only change your behavior. You can't change your heart. But mere behavioral change isn't change at all. Peel your eyes away from yourself -- even your change or lack thereof -- and ponder Christ. Commune with him. Open the vent of your heart. Receive his love and counsel from Scripture. See him in the preached word and sacrament at your local church. Look at him."

   

  Chasing Love: Sex, Love, and Relationships in a confused culture, by Sean McDowell
  In this book, Sean (son of Josh) McDowell presents a case for following the Biblical pattern for sexual purity and many topics related to it, including marriage and singleness. This book is aimed very specifically at high school students, and all of its application points are targeted for them. It is well-written and easy-to-read, with short, focused chapters. I think it would be a good book for most Christian high school students to read and ponder and discuss.

   
  Liberty to the Captives, by Mark Durie
  In this book, the author first discusses the three ways that Islam recognizes for people to interact with it... either becoming a Muslim ("shahada"), accepting the status of a "dhimmi" ("dhimma") (2nd-class citizen accepting oppression during life in an Islamic-majority country), or death. Next, the author compares and contrasts the life of Muhammad and Jesus, both of whom experienced significant rejection by people. However, the way they responded to it was extremely different. Muhammad basically took up arms (later in his life) to get revenge on people who disrespected or rejected him, whereas Jesus repudiated revenge and warfare and allowed himself to be killed... then raised up from the grave. Next, the author explains how Muslims who leave Islam and come to Christianity need to specifically reject the patterns of shahada/dhimma and prounounce God's promises, officially trusting in God's way. I was a little skeptical of his focus on cultural curses and family sin patterns etc in the last chapter, but I was intrigued by his point that Christians who grow up in Muslim-majority countries can accidentally, subconsciously, imbibe the cultural mindset of dhimmitude (e.g. constantly apologizing to Muslims for their Christian beliefs and living in constant fear and shame), instead of the attitude of the glorious freedom of the children of God that the New Testament talks about. I think this book, with its very unusual perspective, could be worth reading and helpful for people, especially people coming out of a Muslim background. It would pair well with Richard Bailey's book "Who God Is".

   

  Josh (McDowell): The Excitement of the Unexpected, by Joe Musser
  This is a biography of Josh McDowell that goes through 1980 (so it doesn't cover the most recent 40 years of Josh's life, as he is still alive). It goes through his background and tough family background, how he came to know Jesus, and early ministry years. It describes some of the things he learned, such as learning humility through being forced to take care of conference logistics/cleaning instead of preaching which is what he wanted to do. It talks about the various romantic relationships he had, and how he met his wife. The book had a slightly hagiographical flavor. The final chapters of the book show some of the downsides/stresses/problems/critiques of his extremely busy ministry life. I think it could be useful to learn some things about ministry (the importance of humility, the importance of doing things in God's strength rather than human strength, the perfect timing of God and that God never wastes anything, how God protects those who are doing His work, the importance of godly friends supporting ministry leaders, etc), and as a window into the Christian subcultures of the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s.

   
  Soul Care: Seven Transformational Principles for a Healthy Soul, by Rob Reimer
  This book presents 7 principles: Identity, Repentance, Overcoming Family Sin Patterns, Forgiveness, Healing Wounds, Overcoming Fears, and Deliverance. He presents his points relatively clearly, with a nice mix of stories (especially about his marriage and about various interactions with his students and conference attendees) and Bible discussion. I found myself agreeing strongly with about half of his points that seemed very biblical, and being extremely skeptical of the other half which seemed quite extra-biblical. Points that seemed biblical were the ones about finding our identity and sense of worth in Christ rather than in our accomplishments, the importance of repentance and forgiveness, and trusting in God and focusing on His opinion in the Bible rather than on human popularity or fears about being rejected by humans. Points that I was skeptical about were Overcoming Family Sin Patterns (I think it's likely that such patterns do exist, but if it should be a huge focus of the Christian life, why didn't the Bible say more about it?), and his anecdotes about healing emotional wounds and deliverance (from demonic spirits that are oppressing Christians). I do think that emotional wounds are real and often need healing, and I do think that demonic spirits are real and Christians may sometimes need deliverance from them, but I was skeptical about some of the anecdotes and techniques he shared, and about the relative importance of focusing on those topics, which the Bible seems to put less emphasis on. However, he seems to have more experience than me in those topics, and I didn't notice much that was overtly unbiblical (except for his tendency to assume when talking to people that whatever image or thought popped into his mind was a message from God... this seems dangerous if not deliberately/consciously checked against Scripture)... so I hesitate to "condemn" it... I would suggest that if you read this book, read those chapters with skepticism and compare them constantly to what the Bible says. The other chapters (Identity, Repentance, Forgiveness, Overcoming Fears) seemed great and well worth reading for everyone.

   

  Christianity and Wokeness, by Owen Strachan
  This is a powerful and beautiful book. Strachan discusses "wokeness", which he defines as "the state of being consciously aware of and 'awake' to the hidden, race-based injustices that pervade all of American society; this term has also been expanded to refer to the state of being 'awake' to injustices that are gender-based, class-based, etc." He also says that "in intellectual terms, wokeness occurs when one embraces the system of thought ... called Critical Race Theory." His chapters cover (1) How Wokeness is entering the culture, (2) How Wokeness is entering the Church, (3,4) Why is Wokeness an ungodly system? (Theological issues, Cultural issues), (5,6) What does the Bible teach about Identity and Ethnicity? (Old Testament, New Testament), and (7) Hard questions on American History and other hot topics. Strachan shows how wokeness provides wrong doctrines of humanity, sin, and salvation, while actually promoting racism (while claiming to fight against it) and partiality. He shows that wokeness and the closely related intersectional worldview seek to tear down God's created order in other areas, such as Biblical complementarianism in the home, and how they see "hierarchy of any kind as evil abuse". Wokeness also "overturns the Gospel's 'no condemnation in Christ' promise", and thus turns people away from the true gospel, the true good news that the Bible contains. He discusses the difference between "equality of opportunity" vs "equality of outcome", and "distributive" justice vs "retributive" justice. He points out the problems with how wokeness pushes for "standpoint epistemology" and a "resulting contest for power". The chapters about the Biblical view of identity and ethnicity are really good. Strachan reminds that God created one human race, with diversity (male and female), in the image of God... then the fall brought enmity and strife. Then God spread out the nations, ensuring diversity and distinctiveness. Then when God founded the nation of Israel, He constantly told them to welcome the strangers into their community (Leviticus 19:33-34), and demonstrated this with stories such as Ruth. Then in the New Testament, God united Jews and Gentiles as one family, through Jesus Christ (Ephesians 2:13-18). Now we can have true unity between people of every ethnic background (and socioeconomic status, etc), through Christ. Yet this "does not cancel the fact that image-bearers have natural affinities... nor does it cancel out our own backgrounds and ethnicities." Strachan carefully discusses the ethnic tension that arose in the early church in Jerusalem (Acts 6) and how it was handled, dealt-with, and basically solved. In the future, (Revelation 5, 21) people from all nations will praise God together, and will bring the "glory and the honor of the nations" to God, indicating continuing diversity along with unity. Says Strachan, "Our secular age urges us to do this, telling us our sex, our skin color, our language, our economic status, our educational pedigree, our looks, and many other factors matter most about us. While these characteristics are a part of our story, they are not and must never be ultimate in our Christian identity. ... We must remember that Jesus takes embittered and hostile ethnic groups and makes them one. Our ultimate identity is only and always in Christ." (p.172) His final chapter has excellent discussion of some hard questions on slavery, systemic racism, and various pushbacks, as well as practical applications of the rest of the book. I recommend this book.

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