Are you an evangelical snob? In his book, The First Five Pages, Noah Lukeman recounts the difficulty of getting a book published as an unknown author:

Getting a novel published is extremely difficult, especially if you are an unknown author. Chuck Ross, a freelance writer, decided to test the system. He retyped the first twenty-one pages of a novel by Jerzy Kosinski, title Steps, which had won the National Book Award six years before and sent them to four publishers, using the name Erik Demos as a fictitious byline.

All four publishers rejected the manuscript. Two years later, Ross retyped the entire novel Steps and submitted it under the pen name Erik Demos to several more publishers, including the original publisher, Random House. It was rejected by all with unhelpful comments, including Random House, which used a form letter. All told, fourteen publishers and thirteen literary agents failed to recognize a book that had already been published and had won an important award.

I wonder how many pastors are missing something important because they ignore the “unknown” writer, or thinker, or preacher, or church member? Is it possible that God has more to say from the unknowns than from the famous? Our intellecutal and social snobbery is probably robbing us of much that God would have us to hear.

After all, he did bring a baby into the world to an unwed mother of little standing in the community in a backwoods town in the middle of the sticks with little or no means and used him to change the world now and forever. Would we actually listen to a carpenter from Bethlehem before we would hear from the pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church? Probably not.

Weigh ideas and hearts, not names and titles. Maybe God has something to say to you from the sticks just as much as from the city. Just a thought.

“mission is the mother of theology.”

-Martin Kahler

missiology.org

With so much talk about who Southern Baptists really are historically and what theological stream we fall into (or are birthed from), I am inclined to remind us all that we are neither Calvinist nor Arminian nor even are we all somewhere in between. Emir Caner’s recent essay that can be found in the Christian Index on Daniel Marshall and Kiokee Baptist Church (which I have visited) traces the Sandy Creek tradition from North Carolina into Georgia and essentially makes the argument that from the beginning, Southern Baptists have been descendants of Anabaptists and have been a theological hybrid who’s only ardent theological perspective was the perseverance of the believer.

Though well written and done so specifically for the Georgia Baptist Convention, all (including Caner I have no doubt) know and agree that Southern Baptists are and have been formed not only from the Sandy Creek tradition, but from the Charleston tradition as well.  The fact remains that we as Southern Baptists are an eclectic blend of staunchly reformed stiffs and free wheeling almost Arminians.  We cannot be packaged into a neat theological box, but we must find the things upon which we can agree, and that must be evangelical faith.

To be Southern Baptist is to be more than our Theological perspectives, but it must never be less. Certainly, there is room in our tradition for varying theological convictions, but must there continue to be room for theological wars. There is room for Baptist churches who extend an alter call and there are multitudes of people who have been saved in this kind of tradition, but there is also room for churches who have no alter call. After all, tons of people have come to know Christ without an alter call as well.

Timothy George’s presentation from the Union University Baptist Identity Conference in 2007 has been referenced on this site before and I will point to it again as a great place to begin a conversation for reconciliation in SBC circles.

Further, I wonder what could be accomplished if we of different theological stripes spoke to one another rather than about one another or if we could focus on our agreements rather than our differences.

Spurgeon is always a safe model to look to. He was an ardent evangelist, a strict biblicist, an advocate for church autonomy, a scholar, and (gasp) a Calvinist. Spurgeon didn’t practice an alter call, he prepared his sermons on Saturday nights (and didn’t preach through books of the Bible), he smoked cigars, and impacted the world with the gospel. Spurgeon was the Prince of Preachers, yet his reformed theology did not some how make him less evangelical, nor did it cause him to separate from godly preachers who held to different theological convictions–he even opened his pulpit to D.L. Moody and had a great friendship with the fiery evangelist.

Could Spurgeon have been a Southern Baptist? I hope so, but I’m not sure he would be welcomed in many circles–Small church pastors would be weary b/c the Tabernacle is too big, traditionalists would be offended because he is too animated, academics would call him crass, non-Calvinists would have called him unevangelical, and many Calvinists would question his passionate pleading to lost sinners (we better not even speak of the cigars). Seriously folks, if Spurgeon wouldn’t fit in, are we really where we ought to be?

May we come together for the sake of the gospel and in so doing let us not be arrogant about what the gospel is (see Bill Streger’s blog, Gospel-Centered Legalism). The gospel is a historical fact and event that we can all agree upon. Jesus lived a perfect sinless life, was killed by evil sinful men and suffered that death for our sin, was buried in a borrowed tomb, rose on the third day, and ascended to the right hand of the Father where he sits as our advocate today. The world is lost and dying and the SBC is not making an impact. Let’s wake up and rally around the gospel for the sake of the lost world around us. Spurgeon did, and the world is better for it.

I must admit that when I first learned Bruce Ware had written a book for children, I was both excited and skeptical. I was excited because there is possibly no one more qualified to teach theology to anyone than Bruce Ware, and to know that he was devoting his efforts to teaching children is wonderful. I was skeptical because I have had problems in the past processing some of the ‘big truths’ Ware teaches, and I wasn’t sure that they would be approachable by kids.

My excitement was well placed and my skepticism was unfounded. Bruce Ware has written a wonderful book in Big Truths For Young Hearts. It was written to be understandable for a nine year old (so I was right at home). The wording is approachable for kids, but probably more important is the fact that the book is broken down into very small chapters (3-4 pages) each of which includes study questions and a memory verse. Kids might struggle to read through a 240 page book, but lots of kids would be excited to read 3 or 4 pages a night with their parents and then discuss the reading and focus on a memory verse.

C.J. Mahaney gives this nice blurb on the back cover:

“Imagine a respected theologian devoting himself to training a new generation of pastors and scholars in the seminary classroom. Now imagine him driving home at night to teach that profound theology in simple terms to his children at their bedsides. Now imagine this father compiling those bedside conversations into a book available to all pastors, parents, and children alike. Imagine no more. My friend Dr. Bruce Ware has done it.”

Ware doesn’t shy away from teaching the big truths and the big words. This book is about more than Arks, rainbows, and coats of many colors. Ware has forged a new path away from moralistic teaching from narrative stories, and has created a veritable systematic theology for children that is filled with scripture quotations and references. I can hardly wait for my kids to be able to wrestle with this book. In fact, I was blessed by reading it and challenged to understand my own theology so well that I could formulate it in words that children can understand.

I’m not the only person impressed by this book, Big Truths For Young Hearts, is number 447 on Amazon’s overall sales rankings. I encourage you to share this book with your kids now, or in the future, or even with your grandkids. We need to start our kids on the meat of God’s word early so that they grow into spiritual maturity as they mature physically and mentally.

UPDATE:

See Owen Strachen’s “Big Truths: #287 on Amazon”

At the Crossway blog: “Big Truths Climbing the Charts”

Time magazine has just declared the New Calvinism one of the 10 Ideas Changing The World, and so it is worth our while to read Collin Hansen’s journalistic endeavor to understand and report upon this New Calvinism.  In, Young, Restless, and Reformed, Hansen writes of his journey across America investigating the current resurgence of Calvinistic and Reformed soteriology.  This journey was prompted by his own conversion as an evangelical to this New Calvinism and he desired to know if his experience was unique, and if not, what was leading the charge to drive others to reformed theology.

He soon discovered that the resurgence of reformed theology was far reaching, and found many reasons as to why this might be the case.  Timothy George of Beeson Divinity School put it this way:

We live in a transcendence-starved culture anda  transcendence-starved evangelicalism.  We’ve so dumbed down the gospel and dumbed down worship in a good effort to reach as many people as we can that there’s almost a backlash.  It comes from this great hunger for a genuinely God-centered, transcendence-focused understanding of who God is and what God wants us to do and what God has given us in Jesus Christ.  All of that resonates deeply with a kind of pastoral Reformed position that Piper articulates so well.

George’s allusion to John Piper in the above quote seems to Hansen to have been one of the unifying themes everywhere he went.  Though probably unwittingly, the preaching and writing ministry of John Piper have probably done more than any other ministry to drive young evangelicals to the New Calvinism.  In Hansen’s view, the passion of Piper combined with his emphasis on the sovereignty of God has done much to jolt young evangelicals, not from Arminiansim, but from the semi-pelagianism that “maybe the default heresy of American Christianity.” 

In Hansen’s view, the New Calvinism has offered a response for young evangelicals to a works based righteousness and a health and wealth prosperity gospel. 

Hansen also discovers that the resurgence of reformed theology has roots that are more closely tied with Jonathan Edwards in many places thatn John Calvin.  Though Edwards himself was devoutly Calvinistic in his soteriology, he like many young evangelicals, did not subscribe to an entire belief system that fit in with Calvin.  One of his interview subjects had this to say about Edwards:

If Edwards has one thing, it’s an integrated worldview.  And if there’s one thing evangelicals of the early 21st century–people spun out of seeker-friendly churches–are looking for, it’s an integrated worldview.

One of the arguments he answers well in this book is the fear by many that Calvinism will naturally lead to hyper-Calvinism.  The groups and individuals with whom Hansen speaks in this book are sold out to their theological system of beliefs, but they appear to be even more sold out to the God whom they serve and to the command of Christ to go.  These are evangelical Christ-followers first and Calvinists second. 

If you have found a home in the New Calvinism, you will enjoy this book as it will seem at times as though you are connecting with long lost friends.  If, however, you are not a Calvinist, you can appreciate the noncombative tone with which Hansen writes.  This book is short, but thorough–A great read!

In Jesus and the Feminists, Margaret Elizabeth Köstenberger tackled the issue of feminism’s theological approach to the person of Jesus Christ. She examined the historical development of feminism throughout the last half century.  Beginning with radical feminism Köstenberger traced the theological conclusions concerning Christ which feminism has expressed.

 Köstenberger pointedly evaluated the various theological positions concerning Christ espoused from different feminist writers. She dealt with an overarching, though by no means uniform, hermeneutic that describes the feminist movement.  Köstenberger defined the various positions as radical, reformist, new, or evangelical. Each position approached Christ from a different biblical hermeneutic.  The radical feminists essentially disregarded the Bible as a whole, thus making their own view of Christ supreme. Reformist feminism viewed Scripture with suspicion and accepted or rejected passages based on their patriarchal or feminist bent. Instead of rejecting large amounts of Scripture as the radical or reformist feminist would do, the new feminist sought to find the answers about Christ and feminism in the biblical text though their evaluation of every text and picture of Christ came through a feminist lens. The evangelical feminists argued that an egalitarian view of women/men relationships, as pictured in Scripture, is God’s intention.

As a female driven to understand the truth, Köstenberger critiques many of her feminist colleagues for their rejection of Scriptural authority in developing their theology of Christ.  This book is helpful in its historical overview of feminist theology as well as its prescription of a solidly biblical hermeneutic in examining Christ’s view of and relationship with those of the female gender.  Köstenberger would stand solidly on Christ as a perfect male in a clearly biblical egalitarian world. 

I am becoming increasingly aware of the importatance of biblical theology in the church.  I just ran across a list of suggested books on biblical theology from Grace Baptist Church and I’ve added a few of my own.  The list can be found be

“Beginner” Reading:

1.  According to Plan: The Unfolding Revelation of God in the Bible by Graeme Goldsworthy
2.  Life’s Big Questions: Six Major Themes Traced Through the Bible by Vaughan Roberts
3.  New Dictionary of Biblical Theology by IVP
4.  The Goldsworthy Trilogy by Graeme Goldsworthy
5.  God’s Big Picture: Tracing the Storyline of the Bible by Vaughan Roberts
6.  Central Themes in Biblical Theology: Mapping Unity in Diversity by Scott Hafemann and Paul House
7.  Biblical Theology: Old and New Testaments by Geerhardus Vos
8.  Biblical Theology: Retrospect & Prospect by Scott Hafemann

“Intermediate” Reading:

1.  Biblical Theology: The History of Theology from Adam to Christ by John Owen
2.  The God of Promise and the Life of Faith: Understanding the Heart of the Bible by Scott Hafemann
3.  The Drama of Scripture: Finding Our Place in the Biblical Story by Craig Bartholomew and Michael Goheen
4.  The Promise-Plan of God: A Biblical Theology of the Old and New Testaments by Walter Kaiser
5.  The Ways of Our God: An Approach to Biblical Theology by Charles Scobie
6 . The Christ of the Covenants by O. Palmer Robertson
7.  The Christ of the Prophets by O. Palmer Robertsonlow.

“My Additions”

1. We Become What We Worship by G.K. Beale            
2. Preaching The Whole Bible as Christian Scripture by Graeme Goldsworthy
3. The Epic of Eden by Sandra Richter (disclaimer, this is actually an OT Introduction, but it has a strong biblical theology undercurrent throughout.

 HT: Timmy Brister

Mark Driscoll has turned out several books in recent years, and Death by Love is one of those that is great.  Several reviews can be found for this book on the internet, so I will not waste your time with an in-depth review, but more of a taste and see reccommendation.

This book is written as a series of letters to different people from Mark’s life, each of whom is in need of a touch from the cross.  Examining the theological results of the crucifixion such as propitiation, expiation, atonement, ransom, and justification, Driscoll writes theology that is easily understandable and applicable by all.  I personally found this book to be a very helpful tool for gaining a better understanding of Christ’s work on the cross. 

As we approach Good Friday and Easter, we could all benefit by focusing on the cross of Christ.  After all, that cross is the only reason we can celebrate our life in Christ.  Without the cross, there is no salvation.

In his chapter on Gift Righteousness, Driscoll outlines ten differences between religion and the gospel.  I’ve summarized those in the list below.

1. Religion says that God will not love me until I obey his rules…gospel says that because God has already loved me and expressed this through the person and work of Jesus, I am now free from sin to live a new life dedicated to him.

2. Religion says the world is filled with good people and bad people…the gospel says that everyone is a sinner separated from God and in need of a savior.

3. Religion is about what you do…the gospel is about what Jesus had done–for you, in you, and through you–by grace.

4. Religion is about receiving from God…the gospel is about Jesus giving to us, he gave himself.

5. Religion sees hardship as unloving punishment rather than sanctifying discipline…the gospel reminds us that God is a loving Father who’s discipline is never vitrioloic and who has provided an escape from eternal punishment.

6. Religion is about you…the gospel is all about Jesus Christ and his work on the cross.

7. Religion focuses on the external, visible life of a person and overlooks the internal, invisible life of teh heart where motives lie…the gospel gets right to the heart changing people from the inside out.

8. Because religion is about what we do, we lack assurance regarding our standing before God…The gospel telsl us that because our standing before God is contingent on Jesus alone, we can know with assurance that we are secure as redeemed people (1 John 5:11-14).

9. Religion does not work because it results in either pride or despair…the gospel leads us toa humbley confident, joyous obedience because it teaches us that our rightousness is not our own, but rather a gift from Jesus because of his work on the cross.

10. People pursue religion to possess righteousness…the gospel says that no one is righteous, but that because of Christ’s sacrifice, we can have his righteousness.

I reccommend this book to you, and would recommend it especially to lay people because it makes theology understandable.  Driscoll has a great way of doing that.  I’ve imbedded the video trailer below.

Michael Horton has written a challenge that needs to be issued to all Christians in America. In his latest book, Christless Christianity, published by Baker Books, Dr. Michael Horton draws stunning comparisons between the evangelical church of today and the liberalism of the early Twentieth Century and even Pelagianism, Semi-Pelagianism, and Gnosticism.

Writing in the foreword, William Willimon has this to say:

This is a tough book, but well written, fast paced, and wonderfully grounded in classical Reformation Christianity. Our poor old, compromised, accomodating church is here subjected to withering theological critique. Here the roots of our current theological malaise are exposed and we see the wrong turns we took when we began taking ourselves more seriously than God.

That phrase aptly introduces the reader to the hard-hitting critique of Horton who sees the church rewriting redemption history to make God a supporting character of our personal dramas rather than allowing the grace of God and the gospel to rewrite us into his story of redemption. Horton puts it this way:

assimilating the disruptive, surprising, and disorienting power of the gospel to the felt needs, moral crises, and socio-political headlines of our passing age, we end up saying very little that the world could not hear from Dr. Phil, Dr. Laura, or Oprah…My concern is that we are getting dangerously close to the place in everyday American church life where the Bible is mined for “relevant” quotes but is largely irrelevant on its own terms; God is used as a personal resource rather than known, worshiped, and trusted; Jesus Christ is a coach with a good game plan for our victory rather than a Savior who has already achieved it for us; salvation is more a matter of having our best life now than being saved from God’s judgment by God himself, and the Holy Spirit is an electrical outlet we can plug into for all the power we need to be all that we can be.

But, make no mistake here, Horton realizes that his critiques of the church, that which he calls Christless Christianity do not go so far as to constitute heresy. In other words, what we see is the slippery slope of slothful Christianity that focuses more on the believer than on the one in whom to be believed. He says this, My argument is not that evangelicalism is becoming theologically liberal but that it is becoming theologically vacuous. Without a theological center, Horton argues that we revert to our natural sinful bent which is self-centered and not God-centered.

Citing Moralistic, Therapeutic Deism as the church’s captor, Horton shows that some of its greatest propents are well-known prosperity preachers such as Joel Osteen and Robert Schuller. Moralistic Therapeutic Deism is defined as a belief that holds

1. God created the world 2. God wants people to be good, nice, and fair to each other, as taught in the Bible and most world religions. 3. The central goal of life is to be happy and to feel good about oneself 4. God does not need to be particularly involved in one’s life except when needed to resolve a problem. 5. Good people go to heaven when they die.

Of course, this message rings loud and clear from the Crystal Cathedral, but Horton goes on to suggest that this same message is ringing loud and clear from First Baptist, Second Presbyterian, and Middle of The Road Methodist Churches as well. God is not the God of the universe who demands our complete obedience, instead God is our friend. God becomes more of a Santa Clause figure than a Holy, fear-inspiring, awe-inducing God. Horton’s remedy is a return to strong reformation faith that de-personalizes the message of Christ and centers it instead in the faith community where it is communicated through the preached word, baptism, and the Lord’s supper (the means of grace).

Many evangelicals will find areas of disagreement with Horton as he focuses so much on the community of faith and seems to push us away from “personal relationship with God.” But, lest we throw the baby out with the bath-water, it is worthwhile to note, as Horton does, that “personal relationships” are subjecive at best and often devoid of critical analysis from either the Bible or the faith community.

I strongly encourage you to read this book. Many times during the reading of this book I was driven to my knees to repent of the works-based gospel that I often resort to out of my sinful nature. Horton is reformed to the core and you will not agree with everything he says, but this book will challenge you as it calls all evangelicals to the woodshed.

*For more information & resources concerning this book go to Christless Christianity.  You can also view another article on this book written by the author of this review Churched Teens Have Little Knowledge of the Gospel.

The first book in Crossway’s Theology in Community series is Suffering and the Goodness of God edited by Christopher Morgan and Robert Peterson. If this first book is any indicator, Crossway has knocked a home run with a theology series that is both approachable and practical. The question of suffering and the problem of evil are probably near the top of reasons why people reject belief in God. Even for obstinate theists, the problem of evil presents a formiddable challenge.

In Suffering and the Goodness of God the authors meet the challenge with frankness, scholarship and experience. Walter Kaiser writes of suffering in the Old Testament with astute knowledge of the subject matter. John Frame tackles the problem of evil from a theological and philosophical perspective. William Edgar addresses the evils of oppression and slavery in history and in our society today. David Calhoun writes of his experience with cancer and the grace of God that has made itself so evident. And, the last chapter of the book is a moving personal account of John Feinberg’s journey alongside his wife who has Huntington’s Disease.

The questions are often more telling than the answers, but the authors have addressed suffering and evil with a keen eye to the scriptures and a pastor’s heart. How do we see God’s goodness in the midst of pain and suffering? Many of the authors concede that suffering opens our eyes to the goodness of God all around.

Jesus was not blind to suffering himself, but he did not resign to miss the opportunity to teach in the midst of suffering. In the opening chapter, Robert Yarbrough writes:

Jesus did not evade the issue of suffering and neither should we. One day as he was teaching (Luke 13:1–5), he was informed of Pilate’s murder of some Galileans who were in the very act of worshiping God. We do not know all Jesus said. But we know he leveraged the shock of the hour into an object lesson, urging listeners to make a life change. He even took it a step further by pointing to a building collapse that claimed the lives of eighteen people. The lesson he drew from this tragedy was the same: Repent, lest you too perish!

There is much more to say about suffering than “Consider your ways and turn to God!” But Jesus reminds us of that standing imperative. If we dare deepen our comprehension of suffering vis-à-vis God’s goodness—cognizant that “he who increases knowledge increases sorrow” (Eccles.1:18)—we do well to seek ways to emulate Jesus’ acknowledgment of suffering as an occasion for human affirmation of God.

We have already argued that this does not make suffering in itself a good thing (Thesis 1 above). But it does encourage us to enlarge our outlook to incorporate suffering into our view of what it means to come to Christ and then to honor and serve him. We do not trust in him so that we can evade suffering, nor do we present Christ as an assured means of escape from hard times. Rather we trust so that in good times and bad our lives will reflect fidelity to him and the courage that Jesus modeled and imparts. The same suffering that hardens some or drives them to faithless despair can be an occasion for the bold move of hope in Christ in spite of suffering’s disincentives to affirm and believe in God.

We do well to remain intent on enlarging our spiritual understanding so that we become tougher and wiser when it comes to absorbing and responding to suffering. As we do so we will become more effective messengers of the gospel to others whose sufferings may likewise be the occasion of making the right choice when faced with the question: should I let adversity drive me away from the Bible’s testimony to God’s good purposes and eternal promise, or should I believe that the message of Jesus and the cross are still adequate grounds for personal faith in him? It is often suffering that makes this anguished but fruitful outcry unavoidable and that also paves the way for the best, though usually not the easiest, response.

Suffering and the Goodness of God reminds us through biblical exposition, philosophy, theology, and personal experience that suffering, though a part of life, is not the end of the matter. In the midst of our pain God is present. Where is God when we hurt? He is with us as only He can be. I encourage this book as a tool and guide to the suffering and as an aid to pastors who are searching desperately for answers to give to the hurting.