So, all the cool kids are reading Mark Driscoll these days and I guess I’m no different. The fact remains, whether you like Driscoll or not, he writes good books that are easily approachable by just about anyone, but that address really good theological material as well. In other words, Driscoll writes as a pastor-theologian, not as an academic.
Religion Saves belongs on your shelf as another great work of Driscoll. I picked up my Copy at Advance09 and just now got around to reading it. I’m glad I got this read under my belt, but I was not as impressed with Religion Saves as I have been with some of Driscoll’s other works, especially Death by Love.
Though the content of the book was good, I found some of it repetitive from some other works. For instance, his chapter on the Emerging Church, though good, is a repeat from some stuff in Confessions of a Reformission Rev. I even found that the chapters on Sexual Sin and Dating were difficult to differentiate from one another (maybe he should have seen those as one question and tackled another).
However, his ability to take some difficult issues (like predestination and the regulative principle) and write about them in such a way that lay people will both understand and enjoy is absolutely worthy of praise. I thought the chapter on Birth Control was the best chapter in the book and maybe the best treatment of this difficult issue I have ever read.
In the end, if you have read other works by Driscoll, you will no doubt find some of that material in Religion Saves, but you will still enjoy the read and will grow from it. I would recommend this book, just not as highly as some of his others. If you want to read only one Driscoll book, pick up Death by Love.
