| Made to Stick by Chip Heath & Dan Heath
Progress: Still Reading
A non-profit marketing exec handed me this book as a gift, telling me that he has everyone on his staff read it. He raved on about the book, enough for me to at least dig in and give it a try. Here we go...
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"The problem is [when people] have been given knowledge that makes it impossible for them to imagine what it's like to lack that knowledge...This is the Curse of Knowledge. Once we know something, we find it hard to imagine what it was like not to know it. Our knowledge has "cursed" us. And it becomes difficult for us to share our knowledge with others, because we can't readily re-recreate our listeners' state of mind." (page 20)
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| The Irresistible Revolution by Shane Claiborne
Progress: Still Reading
A friend of the author passed his copy of this book along to me, promising I would connect with much of the book. I've read through the forward and it looks like he may be right. From what I can tell, this may just be a story of at least a few folks taking Jesus at His word and leaving it all behind.
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"I bought books, devotionals, T-shirts. I developed a common illness that haunts Western Christianity. I call it spiritual bulimia. Bulimia, of course, is a tragic eating disorder, largely linked to identity and image, where folks consume large amounts of food but vomit it up before it has a chance to digest. I developed the spiritual form of it where I did my devotions, read all the new Christian books and saw the Christian movies, and then vomited information up to friends, small groups, and pastors. But it had never had the chance to digest. I had gorged myself on all the products of the Christian industrial complex but was spiritually starving to death. I was marked by an over-consumptive but malnourished spirituality, suffocated by Christianity but thirsty for God." (page 39)
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"I think I've lost hope in the church," I confess, brokenhearted, to a friend. I will never forget her response. "No, you haven't lost hope in the church. You may have lost hope in Christianity or Christendom or all the institutions, but you have not lost hope in the church. This is the church." At that moment, we decided to stop complaining about the church we saw, and we set our hearts on becoming the church we dreamed of. (page 64)
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"So there I was my senior year in college, still feeling like I had no clue what I'd be doing after I graduated...and folks were asking me what I was going to do when I graduated from college. People always want to define you by what you do. I started saying, 'I'm not too concerned with what I am going to do I am more interested in who I am becoming. I want to be a lover of God and people.' I was convinced that what we do is not nearly as important as who we are. The question is not whether you will be a doctor or a lawyer but what kind of doctor or lawyer youw ill be." (page 108)
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"If you ask most people what Christians believe, they can tell you, 'Christians believe that Jesus is God's Son and that Jesus rose from the dead.' But if you ask the average person how Christians live, they are struck silent. We have not shown the world another way of doing life. Christians pretty much live like everybody else; they just sprinkle a little Jesus in along the way. And doctrine is not very attractive, even if it's true. Few people are interested in a religion that has nothing to say to the world and offers them only life after death, when what people are really wondering is whether there is life before death." (page 117)
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| Humility: True Greatness by C.J. Mahaney
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 4 stars
At the suggestion of friend R.E. Sagers (and the added encouragement of the Holy Spirit) I picked up this book from a local store and have "dug in". Humility is not an easy trait to study, but I've been more and more convinced that humility, above all else, is absolutely necessary in a relationship with God. The book did not disappoint. Mahaney dove into the topic with the necessary humility coupled with great wisdom and encouragement. For this battling pride (the enemy of humility) like myself, the cure is straightforward: immerse yourself in the cross. How can we be anything but humble in light of such grace? Such wisdom blessed me richly - this is well worth a read.
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"God is decisively drawn to humility. The person who is humble is the one who draws God's attention, and in this sense, drawing His attention means also attracting His grace - His unmerited kindness." (page 20)
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"Pride is when sinful human beings aspire to the status and position of God and refuse to acknowledge their dependence upon Him." (page 31)
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Jesus does not categorically criticize or forbid the desire and ambition to be great. Instead, He clearly redirects that ambition, redefines it, and purifies it: 'But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all' (Mark 10:33-34)" (page 43)
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"An ungrateful person is a proud person. If I'm ungrateful, I'm arrogant. And if I'm arrogant, I need to remember God doesn't sympathize with me in that arrogance; He is opposed to the proud." (page 71)
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"To effectively encourage or edify a person I must know something about that individual, which comes through studying that person, asking questions, and carefully listening. That's what we'll do if we're trying to truly serve others with our words and not simply impress them." (pg 115)
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| Ever Increasing Faith by Smith Wigglesworth
Progress: Still Reading
Wigglesworth has been mentioned to me by several people, so I figured it was about time to pickup his book that a friend had given to me. Heading into the first chapter, the only thing I know about Wigglesworth is his reputation for healing many people. Hope to learn more as I read on...
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"...The train began moving, and I crouched down and in the name of Jesus commanded the disease to leave. The old lady cried, 'I'm healed! I know I'm healed!' She stamped her leg and said, 'I'm going to prove it.' So when we stopped at another station, she marched up and down and shouted, 'I'm not going to the hospital.' Once again our wonderful Jesus had proven Himself a Healer of the brokenhearted, a Deliverer of one who was bound." (page 29)
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"No man is able to win any victory except through the power of the risen Christ within him. You will never be able to say, 'I did this or that.' You will desire to give God the glory for everything." (page 95)
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| The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 3 stars
For awhile, this book was second only to the Bible in copies purchased worldwide. I've heard of it through the years, and figured it was finally time to pickup a copy and see what all the hubbub is about. I know the story's about a man on a journey - and is straight allegory to the Christian life. Unfortunately, I discovered I'm not a fan of allegory! I struggled through the first half of this book and had to put it down after realizing I just couldn't find anything insightful about what I was reading. I know it's a classic, and I'm sure I missed a lot of the "meat", but this book just didn't do it for me. It's a classic, so I had to at least give it 3 stars - but I'd suggest passing this one up if you're looking for a good read.
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"I dreamed, and behold I saw a Man cloathed with Rags, standing in a certain place, with his face from his own house, a Book in his hand, and a great Burden upon his back. I looked, and saw him open the Book, and read therein; and as he read, he wept and trembled; and not being able longer to contain, he brake out with a lamentable cry, saying What shall I do?" (page 13)
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| So You Don't Want to Go to Church Anymore by Jake Colsen
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 5 stars
Originally published online over the period of a couple years at www.jakecolsen.com, this book could serve as the handbook for my heart about the church today. Of course, that is a bit of a paradox, since the point is that there is no "handbook" (in the traditional sense of the word) for church life. The book was a fascinating and engaging read online, and even more fascinating in its final print form.
The book is basically a conversation between a disillusioned pastor and a mysterious man named John, who may or may not be the apostle John. (The premise for this mystery is the end of the gospel of John where Jesus told his disciples "What if I want him (John) to remain alive until I return?". A bit cheesy in its premise...but the core of the story is full of rich goodness. The conversational format is a brilliant way to communicate the beauty, joy and truth of the church.
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"It doesn't matter what leads people away from God's life. Anything will do, as long as it preoccupies them enough to serve as an adequate substitute for the real thing. It's easier to see the problem when the standard is circumcision in Ephesus than when it is Sunday morning attendance in Kingston. But both can lead to the same place - bored and disillusioned believers, no longer embracing Father's life." (page 34)
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"Don't you realize that the most powerful thing about the gospel is that it liberates us from the concept that God dwells in any building? For a people steeped in the rites of temple worship this was either great or terrible news. His followers thought it was great. No longer did they have to think of God as cloaked in the recesses of the temple, available only to special people at select times." (page 41)
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"That really isn't the issue, is it Jake? I'm talking about your relationship to the Living God, not fixing this institution...Instead of putting on a show, we would gather to celebrate his work in the lives of his people. Instead of figuring out how we can get people to act more 'Christian,' we would help people get to know Jesus better and let him change them from the inside out. It would revolutionize the life of the church and the lives of its people." (page 52)
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" 'Doesn't Hebrews talk about people being accountable to leadership in some way?'
'No,' John chuckled, 'it talks about leaders giving an account for the lives they touch. Al the accountability in Scripture is linked to God, not to other brothers and sisters. When we hold each other accountable we are really usurping God's place It's why we end up hurting each other so deeply.' " (page 56)
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"The institution provides something more important than simply loving each other in the same way we've been loved. Once you build an institution together you have to protect it and its assets to be good stewards. It confuses everything. Even love gets redefined as that which protects the institution and unloving as that which does not." (page 69)
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"What I hope you'll do is simply let God connect you with those brothers and sisters he wants you to walk with for now. Think less about 'starting' something than just learning to share your life in God with others on a similar journey. Don't feed off your need to be more right than others, then you'll know more clearly what he is doing in you." (page 97)
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"Those who treat leaders as if they have some special anointing are the most susceptible to being deceived by them. It seems people who assume or who are given the most human authority forget how to say no to their own appetites and desires. It is so easy for any of us to end up serving ourselves when we think we're serving others by keeping an institution functioning. But not all of those who do it end up so broken. Many are real servants who only want to help others and they've been led to believe this is the best way to do it. Always separate the failure of the system from the hearts of the people in it." (page 105)
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"The great lie of this broken universe is that God cannot be trusted and that we have to take care of ourselves." (page 107)
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" 'Jesus didn't' leave us with a system; he left us with his Spirit - a guide instead of a map. Principles alone will not satisfy your hunger. That's why systems always promise a future revival that never comes. They cannot produce community because they are designed to keep people apart...
...To keep the system working you have to obligate people through commitment or appeal to their ego needs by convincing them this is the last, best, greatest place to belong. That's why so many groups create false expectations that frustrate people and focus on each other's needs, or even their gifts, rather than on the ever-present Christ." (page 121)
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"The church thrives where people are focused on Jesus, not where they are focused on church." (page 151)
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| Fifth Business by Robertson Davies
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 4 stars
A gifted friend (also a writer) passed this along to me, saying nothing more than "read this - it literally changed my life". Strong words indeed. Who could refuse? It's a fascinating fictional tale of a guy in Canada. While it didn't change my life, it was a great read full of engaging characters. Davies' descriptions of characters and their thought-process were vivid and more real-to-life than most books I've read. If you're looking for a good, interesting read - this would be a great choice.
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"A boy is a man in miniature, and though he may sometimes exhibit notable virtue, as well as characteristics that seem to be charming because they are childlike, he is also schemer, self-seeker, traitor, Judas, crook, and villain - in short, a man. Oh these autobiographies in which the writer postures and simpers as a David Copperfield or a Huck Finn! False, false as harlots' oaths!
Can I write truly of my boyhood? Or will that disgusting self-love which so often attaches itself to a man's idea of his youth creep in and falsify the story? I can but try." (page 15)
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"Who are you? Where do you fit into poetry and myth? Do you know who I think you are, Ramsay? I think you are Fifth Business.
You don't know what that is? Well, in opera in a permanent company of the kind we keep up in Europe you must have a prima donna - always a soprano, always the heroine, often a fool; and a tenor who always plays the lover to her; and then you must have a contralto, who is a rival to the soprano, or a sorceress or something; and a basso, who is the villain or the rival or whatever threatens the tenor.
So far so good. But you cannot make a plot work without another man, and he is usually a baritone, and he is called in the profession Fifth Business, because he is the odd man out, the person who has no opposite of the other sex. And you must have Fifth Business because he is the one who knows the secret of the hero's birth, or comes to the assistance of the heroine when she thinks all is lost, or keeps the hermitess in her cell, or may even be the cause of somebody's death if that is part of the plot. The prima donna and the tenor, the contralto and the basso, get all the best music and do all the spectacular things, but you cannot manage the plot without Fifth Business! It is not spectacular, but it is a good line of work, I can tell you, and those who play it sometimes have a career that outlasts the golden voices. Are you Fifth Business? you had better find out." (page 227)
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| You Shall Know Our Velocity by Dave Eggers
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 3 stars
At the urging of several good friends, I read this fictional story about 2 guys who set out to give away $32,000 in a rapid journey around the world (in just one week). Having a passion for "rough" traveling in strange places (see my Morocco story), the book found a special place in my heart. Still, it dragged at a few points and didn't seem to have any kind of strong message I resonated with. The writing style is fascinating, and almost enough to keep you engaged the entire book (regardless of what you're reading). In the end, it was a good experience, but not excellent.
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"If we kept traveling west, we'd lose very little time. We could easily make our way around the world in a week, with maybe five stops along the way - the hours elapsed would in part be voided by the crossing, always westerly, of time zones. From Saskatchewan we'd get to Mongolia, we figured, having lost only two or three hours riding the Arctic Circle. We would oppose the turning of the plant and refuse the setting of the sun." (page 5)
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| AIDS and You by Patrick Dixon
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 3 stars
I've recently recognized my utter ignorance about HIV and AIDS. I've heard the statistics like everyone else....thousands dying etc. etc...but for some reason I feel compelled, now, to learn. To overcome my ignorance. And see what God does once I move beyond ignorance. This book was given to me a year ago, and has sat on a shelf until now. It seems to be designed for people just like me - ignorant Christians - willing to start by overcoming that ignorance. The "meat" of the book is solid, but it's a practical tool and not a book that "flows" very well. The writing is a bit disjointed and repetitive at times. Content is great...structure is lacking.
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"When a church volunteer goes into a home that person carries the presence of Christ. Jesus had no body of his own: the church is his body. We are his hands, his feet, his smile, his voice, his heart, his touch.
The only part of God that people see could be the life of Jesus in you or me. As we go into the home, and give someone a hug, bring water or medicines or food or take someone's hand we too are making a bit of history: a powerful declartion of God's love, a prophetic statement of his heart to people who often feel totally alienated from the church." (page 15)
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"Many pastors have their heads in the sand. 'We don't have a problem of AIDS in our church' they tell me. 'In that case your church must be unique' I reply. Whenever a church is growing, people are finding faith and lives are changing, but infection remains, unless there is a miracle.' (page 25)
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"If many people are finding faith in Christ, and if HIV survives conversion unless there is a miracle, then we should find many in the church who later become ill although they have been Christians for many years and have been celibate or faithful since finding faith." (page 70)
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"Someone once said to me she was shocked that Christians were involved in compassionate, unconditional care for people with AIDS, because she knew that they disapproved of many of the lifestyles that had caused people to become infected.
I told her she had confused agreeing with caring. They have never been the same thing in medicine. If, as a doctor, I only looked after people who voted for the same party, who held the same faith, who worshipped in the same kind of church, who never did anything I personally could not approve of, I think I should be struck off the medical register right away. Doctors and nurses are expected to give good compassionate care to all who need it and for all illnesses, regardless of how people come to be ill." (page 90)
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"If we are going to look after people who are dying then we need to have come to terms ourselves with what we think about death...
...It is this fear of death, the fear of the unknown that is the main reason why AIDS is so scary. People often ask me how I could spend so much time with people who are dying...The answer was because I know where I'm going." (page 92)
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"In summary then, AIDS is a terrible disease that kills a great number of people, spread by a virus through sharing needles or sex with infected people. It hits us in two areas where we feel most vulnerable: our morality and our mortality, and makes us question what we do and what we are.
Now is the time for action." (page 100)
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"The aim in all HIV/AIDS care and prevention work should be the reduction of the spread of HIV. Here is the greatest challenge to those in HIV-related work: are you spending as much effort and resource on saving lives, as in caring for those affected. You only have today to save someone's life and the next 10 years to plan their care. We must do all we can to fight this terrible problem. Care programmes, while vitally needed, are no answer on their own to the spread of AIDS." (page 110)
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| The Cost of Discipleship by Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Progress: Still Reading
I began reading this book a couple years ago, and was being fed with great food every time I read it....but it was the kind of food that you could only eat in small portions...too rich or heavy to digest all at once. So I put it aside for awhile, and am now picking it up again. We'll see how far I get this time around...
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"Revival of church life always brings in its train a richer understanding of the Scriptures. Behind all the slogans and catchwords of ecclesiastical controversy, necessary though they are, there arises a more determined quest for him who is the sole object of it all, for Jesus Christ himself." (page 35)
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| Christ the Lord by Anne Rice
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 4 stars
This is a novel about the life of Jesus....as a child. The book's received a bit of publicity since the author, Anne Rice, is famous for writing very dark vampire novels. She recently had a powerful conversion to Christianity, and has done a great deal of study about how Jesus might have grown up as a child. It's a fantastic read, especially since it presents Jesus in all His "Jewishness", which is often lost in the evangelical church. Every Christian should read this book! Apparently it's the first of a triology about the early life of Jesus.
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"I was seven years old...Late afternoon. We were playing, my gang against his, and when he ran at me again, bully that he was, bigger than me, and catching me off balance, I felt the power go out of me as I shouted: 'You'll never get where you're going.'
He fell down white in the sandy earth, and they all crowded around him. The sun was hot and my chest was heaving as I looked at him. He was so limp..." (page 3)
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Author's Note: "Every novel I’ve ever written since 1974 involved historical research. It’s been my delight that no matter how many supernatural elements were involved in the story, and no matter how imaginative the plot and characters, the background would be thoroughly historically accurate. And over the years, I’ve become known for that accuracy. If one of my novels is set in Venice in the eighteenth century, one can be certain that the details as to the opera, the dress, the milieu, the values of the people – all of this is correct.
Without ever planning it, I’ve moved slowly backwards in history, from the nineteenth century, where I felt at home in my first two novels, to the first century, where I sought the answers to enormous questions that became an obsession with me that simply couldn’t be ignored.
Ultimately, the figure of Jesus Christ was at the heart of this obsession." (read more)
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| George Müller of Bristol by Dr. A.T. Pierson
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 4 stars
A dear friend and blessed saint in Belfast, Northern Ireland gave me this book with his encouragement to read it. It's a biography of the life of George Müller, a man who lived more than a century ago. As promised, the book was a compelling testimony of a man who loved God, and believed what He says in His word. Müller's entire life was a testimony to God as the source of all provision. Never once did Müller ask people for help with his financial needs (or otherwise)...he went to God alone with his needs, trusting that God would always meet his needs. Without fail (ever!), Müller and the thousands of orphans who spent time under his care never once went without their needs being met. This biography is stirring and compelling. It was a bit slow at times, but it is well worth a read for anyone wondering what a life that sincerely trusts God might look like.
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"[George Müller] was a man of like passions as we are and tempted in all points like as we are, but who believed God and was established by believing; who prayed earnestly that he might live a life and do a work which should be a convincing proof that God hears prayer and that it is safe to trust Him at all times; and who has furnished just such a witness as he desired. Like Enoch, he truly walked with God, and had abundant testimony borne to him that he pleased God." (page 14)
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"George Müller believed, and because he believed, prayed; and praying, expected; and expecting, received. Blessed is he that believes, for there shall be a performance of those things which are spoken of the Lord." (page 90)
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"Here Mr. Müller had the grace to detect one of the foremost perils of a busy man in this day of insane hurry. He saw that if we are to feed others we must be fed; and that even public and united exercises of praise and prayer can never supply that food which is dealt out to the believer only in the closet - the shut-in place with its closed door and open window, where he meets God alone." (page93)
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"If, when there were no funds, there must be no leaning upon man, no debt incurred, and yet no lack allowed, clearly the only resort or resource must be waiting upon the unseen God; and so, in these straits and in every succeeding crisis, they went to Him alone. The orphans themselves were never told of any existing need; in every case their wants were met, though they knew not how. The barrel of meal might be empty, yet there was always a handful when needed, and the cruse of oil was never so exhausted that a few drops were not left to moisten the handful of meal. Famine and drought never reached the Bristol orphanage: the supplies might come slowly and only for one day at a time, but somehow, when the need was urgent and could no longer wait, there was enough - thought it might be barely enough to meet the want." (page 154)
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"One sentence from Mr. Müller's pen marks the purpose which was the very pivot of his whole being: 'I have joyfully dedicated my whole life to the object of exemplifying how much may be accomplished by prayer and faith.' " (page 291)
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"During a season of great straits Mr. Müller received a sealed parcel containing money. He knew from whom it came, and that the donor was a woman not only involved in debt, but frequently asked by creditors for their lawful dues in vain. It was therefore clear that it was not her money, and therefore not hers to give; and without even opening the paper wrapper he returned it to the sender - and this at a time when there was not in hand enough to meet the expenses of that very day." (page 337)
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"If Mr. Müller had any great mission, it was...to teach men that it is safe to trust God's word, to rest implicitly upon whatever He hath said, and obey explicitly whatever He has bidden; that prayer offered in faith, trusting His promise and the intercession of His dear Son, is never offered in vain; and that the life lived by faith is a walk with God, just outside the very gates of heaven." (page 362)
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| Searching for God Knows What by Donald Miller
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 3 stars
Donald Miller wrote Blue Like Jazz, which was one of my few 5-star ratings...but Searching for God Knows What wasn't quite up to par.
It almost achieves a 4-star rating, but several chapters around the middle of the book lost my interest. However, the beginning section and closing sections are on par with the goodness of Blue Like Jazz...almost. Definitely worth a read. You'll find fresh, meaningful goodness about life, the church etc., but if you only have time to read one Miller book, Blue Like Jazz is the obvious choice.
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"I remember watching that television show I Dream of Jeannie when I was young, and I wondered at how great it would be to have a Jeannie of my own, complete with the sexy outfit, who could blink a grilled-cheese sandwich out of thin air, all the while cleaning my room and doing my homework. I realize, of course, that is very silly and there is no such thing as a genie that lives in a lamp, but it makes me wonder if secretly we don't wish God were a genie who could deliver a few wishes here and there. And that makes me wonder if what we really want from the formulas are the wishes, not God. It makes me wonder if what we really want is control, not a relationship." (page 12)
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"One of the things you notice about Jesus in the Gospels, that He is always going around saying, You have heard it said such and such, but I tell you some other thing. If you happened to be a person who thought they knew everything about God, Jesus would have been completely annoying." (page 21)
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"If the gospel of Jesus is relational; that is, if our brokenness will be fixed, not by our understanding of theology, but by God telling us who we are, then this would require a kind of intimacy of which only heaven knows." (page 46)
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"Considering this couple, and what Adam went through to appreciate Eve to the utmost, I wondered at how beautiful it is that you and I were created to need each other. The romantic need is just the beginning, because we need our families and we need our friends. In this way, we are made in God's image. Certainly God does not need people in the way you and I do, but He feels a joy at being loved, and He feels a joy at delivering love. It is a striking thought to realize that, in paradise, a human is incomplete without a host of other people. We are relational indeed. And this book, the Bible, with all its understanding of the relational needs of humans, was becoming more meaningful to me as I turned the pages. God made me, He knows me, and He understands me, and He wants community." (page 67)
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"Maybe the gospel of Jesus...is all about our relationship with Jesus rather than about ideas. And perhaps our lists and formulas and bullet points are nice in the sense that they help us memorize different truths, but harmful in the sense that they blind us to the necessary relationship that must begin between ourselves and God for us to become His followers. And worse, perhaps our formulas and bullet points and steps steal the sincerity with which we might engage God. Becoming a Christian might look more like falling in love than baking cookies." (page 155)
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"Imagine how much a man's life would be changed if he trusted that he was loved by God? He could interact with the poor and not show partiality, he could love his wife easily and not expert her to redeem him, he would be slow to anger because redemption was no longer at stake, he could be wise and giving with his money because money no longer represented points, he could give up on formulaic religion, knowing that checking stuff off a spiritual to-do list was a worthless pursuit, he would have confidence and the ability to laugh at himself, and he could love people without expecting anything in return. It would be quite beautiful, really." (page 177)
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"The hijacking of the concept of morality began, of course, when we reduced Scripture to formula and a love story to theology, and finally morality to rules. It is a very different thing to break a rule than it is to cheat on a lover. A person's mind can do all sorts of things his heart would never let him do. If we think of God's grace as a technicality, a theological precept, we can disobey without the slightest feeling of guilt, but if we think of God's grace as a relational invitation, an outreach of love, we are pretty much jerks for belittling the gesture." (page 184)
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"I assure you, once we leave the fight over our country's future and enter the spiritual battle for the hearts and souls of the lost, the church will flourish, and the kingdom of God will grow. God is not in the business of brokering for power over a nation; He is in the business of loving the unloved and pulling sheep out of crags and bushes." (page 194)
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"Religion is a big, beautiful, ugly thing. I read recently where Augustine said, 'The church is a whore and it is my mother.' And for reasons I don't understand, Jesus loves the church. And I suppose He loves the church with the same strength of character He displays in His love for me. Sometimes it is difficult to know which is the greater miracle." (page 213)
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"Maybe the gospel of Jesus...is all about our relationship with Jesus rather than about ideas. And perhaps our lists and formulas and bullet points are nice in the sense that they help us memorize different truths, but harmful in the sense that they blind us to the necessary relationship that must begin between ourselves and God for us to become His followers. And worse, perhaps our formulas and bullet points and steps steal the sincerity with which we might engage God. Becoming a Christian might look more like falling in love than baking cookies." (page 155)
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"Imagine how much a man's life would be changed if he trusted that he was loved by God? He could interact with the poor and not show partiality, he could love his wife easily and not expert her to redeem him, he would be slow to anger because redemption was no longer at stake, he could be wise and giving with his money because money no longer represented points, he could give up on formulaic religion, knowing that checking stuff off a spiritual to-do list was a worthless pursuit, he would have confidence and the ability to laugh at himself, and he could love people without expecting anything in return. It would be quite beautiful, really." (page 177)
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"The hijacking of the concept of morality began, of course, when we reduced Scripture to formula and a love story to theology, and finally morality to rules. It is a very different thing to break a rule than it is to cheat on a lover. A person's mind can do all sorts of things his heart would never let him do. If we think of God's grace as a technicality, a theological precept, we can disobey without the slightest feeling of guilt, but if we think of God's grace as a relational invitation, an outreach of love, we are pretty much jerks for belittling the gesture." (page 184)
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| Don't Rock the Boat - Capsize It by Rick Bundschuh
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 4 stars
A friend involved in a church plant I'm a part of gave me this book. From the back cover: "It's sink or swim time for the church. Has the church become more ornamental than piercing? Have we lost our ability to speak with both authority and attractiveness to a lost, seeking world? Rick Budschuh gives us a clear reminder that we aren't here to do church; we're here to be church."
This book will bring a blast of fresh air to anyone who is burdened and discouraged by the state of the church in America. I loved it, and tore through it in a couple short hours. It's an easy read, but a worthwhile one, especially for anyone in ministry. My one request if you read this book...don't just smile and have an attitude of "oh that's nice". Hear the deeper challenge the stories present...would I be able to take these steps of faith? How far am I willing to go to dismantle the unhealthy church structure we're all so used to? Do I really long for every believer to be empowered in ministry?
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"The disturbing thing is that the Christian church, along with the rest of the secular culture, long ago surrendered her imagination. And the result has been a kind of faith that is often dull, uninspired, clone prone, and dependent upon a few creative minds to do all the heavy lifting.
Personally, I have this sneaking suspicion that the God we serve is wildly imaginative and creative. I also suspect that the process of becoming transformed into His image is not only one of increasing in personal holiness but of taking on other family trats as well, such as God-breathed imagination." (page 121)
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"The more I think about it, the more I am convinced that while it is a great thing to get those who are unsaved into church, it is equally important for the church to get out into the realm of the unsaved by doing something effective, meaningful, and personal. Or, in other words, rather than just inflate the church with people coming from the world, it is equally important to inflate teh world with people coming from church." (page 136)
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"Failed leaders are not necessarily a problem. Leaders who think they are above failure definitely are." (page 150)
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"I find it refreshing and liberating to commune with a group of people who are more than willing to vote themselves a screwup than to play the holier than thou game. Perhaps it is because we don't believe that God throws away sinful and fouled-up folks, that failed and hurting Christians seem drawn to our congregation." (page 151)
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"Pastors and the churches that give them a paycheck often think they are paid to do things. They think they are paid to deliver sermons. They think they are paid to counsel people. They think they are paid to teach Bible studies or lead others to the Lord.
I think we would do better if we paid our leadership to empower other people to do things, especially if they are as capable or more capable to do the task than the pastor is." (page 163)
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| The Younger Evangelicals by Robert Webber
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 5 stars
From the back of the book..."A new evangelical awakening is taking place around the world. And the ahcnges are being introduced by an emerging genreation of leaders - The Younger Evangelicals. Who are they and what is different about their way of thinking and practicing church? How are they keeping ministry up to speed with our rapidly changing culture? In this provocative and energizing book, they will tell you."
Now that I've finished the book...let me say that what "they will tell you" is music to my soul! I've read a bunch of stuff on the postmodern, emergant church etc...but this book makes sense. Webber compares the younger evangelicals to the major movements from the past century...and in doing so, tons has become clear for me. Praise God for the direction it seems the church is heading. READ THIS BOOK if you are at all interested in where the American church is heading. So refreshing!
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"The church's shift from reliance on print communication to the recovery of the ancient concept of communication through immersion and participation in community is a distinct mark of the younger evangelicals. It provides insight into how they have distanced themselves from modern evangelicalism and why embracing tradition, narrative theology, communal apologetics, and the church visible is necessary for the survival, spread, and witness of the church within a world caught between the anarchy of postmodern relativistic thought and the fiery fundamentalism of Muslim extremism." (page 70)
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"There is a general agreement among younger evangelicals that the emphasis in apologetics has shifted from reason to embodiment...reasons by themselves don't motivate too many people to become Christ followers. I don't think evidence is absolute one way or another, so both the acceptance and the rejection of God can be to some degree justified...reason may have had a greater purpose to earlier generations that were more concerned about proving the existence of God...but I think postmoderns are more concerned about seeing the real impact of what this means on life...the power of embodied experience to communicate the reality of the gospel. This is the heart of a younger evangelical apologetic." (page 101)
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"The image of the church as the 'body' of Christ has resulted in a new awareness that the church is the continuation of the presence of Jesus in and to the world. Even though there is only one actual incarnation of God, and that is in Jesus Christ, the church as the 'body' participates in the incarnation as an 'extension of God's presence in the world.' God continues by the power of the Spirit within and through the church to have a special presence in the world...
For this reason the church does not have and eschatology, it is an eschatological people...The younger evangelicals want to be an eschatological community. They want to be a people formed by a theological understanding of the world and the presence of the Spirit, who makes this people a community that prefigures the future and expresses a foretaste of the kingdom to come.
In sum, to say the church is the body of Christ is to affirm the church is the continuation of the presence of Jesus in the world." (page 113)
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"The church's mission is to show the world what it looks like when a community of people live under the reign of God. The true gospel is portrayed best by the community that believes it, embodies it, and testifies to it in the midst of any given culture in all places and at all times. The church is not the same as the predominatn culture. It is an alternative culture that points to the kingdom of God and the reality of the new heavens and the new earth." (page 133)
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| New Way to Be Human by Charlie Peacock
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 3 stars
The book is subtitled "A Provocative Look at What It Means to Follow Jesus." A group of twenty-somethings I recently met is in a sort of Bible study, going through this book...so I'm hopped on board. The book is refreshing and full of truth...but he says some things that will rattle any "religious" bones in us...which I think is wonderfully healthy! Lot's of good stuff. I recommend it to anyone wondering what the Christian life is all about. So why only 3 stars? I don't feel like I gained a ton from the book, but it was seeping with truth. It's just stuff I feel like I've already come to terms with for the most part. But it is solid, and well worth a read!
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"we are storytelling humans living in a world full of stories, and there's a problem with the stories we tell one another. For example, because I tell you one story and not another, you may become one kind of follower and not another, and that could be tragic. It could mean that you might never speak and act in this world as God intended you to." (page 15)
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"notice that the faith the people of Israel recounted to their children was a communal one - not so much the testimony common today of one's personal relationship with God, but rather a witness to the way in which God has led and dealt with the community...The goal is to tell a community story before you tell a personal story." (page 16)
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"What Christians call the church in the world is nothing less than all the gifted ones living and gathering as communities of kingdom people. Long before it's an institution, though, every church is meant to be a collective embodiment of the new way to be human - living in a right, free, and confident relationship with God, each other, and the creation. Together, followers are like living stones God is using to build a spiritual house - a house not made with hands." (page 61)
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"We don't live like the Fall is real, like sin is real. We think that if we're careful and clever enough, we'll make a great choice in a mate and avoid a lot of pain and suffering." (page 115)
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"English literary journalist A.C. Grayling says that 'a major source of hostility to sex is religion.' He quotes Nietzsche: 'Christianity gave eros poison to drink.' " (page 132)
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"In the new way, people know they've married wounded sinners who have no chance for recovery outside the grace of God. Marriage is a covenant of two people agreeing to recover together, each in different ways at different paces, both under the tutelage of the Teacher, Jesus." (page 153)
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"One of the strange upside-down things about the life of following Jesus is that you really want it to cost your life. If it doesn't, you've yet to step into the Story with intentionality. That's dangerous. It's the danger of dishonesty, of saying, 'Yes, you are Messiah,' and then going about your life as if he isn't. This is the lesson Peter learned, the one that caused him to weep bitterly." (page 188)
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"If you're like me, you're haunted by the feeling that something is very wrong with God's house. You know something, and so do I. Guess what? The only way to make it go away is to do something about it, or cover it over with faking and forgetting. I ask myself, What am I prepared to do?" (page 193)
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"The work of a student-follower of Jesus is to push back the effects of the Fall, restore health whenever and werever possible, encourage people to be fully human, holy, imaginative, and creative, and actually do what Jesus commanded his followers to do. If student-followers of Jesus took this way of living seriously, imagine the richness, meaning and purpose each hour, day, month, and year would hold." (page 202)
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| The Power of Extraordinary Prayer by Robert Bakke
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 2 stars
I had the privlidge of meeting Dr. Bakke at the Lausanne conference in Thailand. After learning he had written a book on prayer, I decided to track down a copy and read it....I must confess, I just can't finish this book...and I ALWAYS finish a book. Bakke tries to build a historical case for the model of a "Concert of Prayer" where Christians unite to fervently pray for revival. I just got fed up with wading through long quotations that weren't compelling, and quite frankly was bored. I don't have time to read a boring book, so I stopped! There are a few nuggets, but it's too much work to find them.
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"Prayer isn't fundamentally communication with God...prayer is essentially communion with God. I use communion in a popular sense - warm, intimate fellowship." (page 17)
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"So prayer was the precursor to Pentecost. This is a story told many times, but when the Hol Spirit was poured out upon the first church in Acts 2, it was in the context of a prayer meeting. With tongues of fire dancing on their heads and overflowing their hearts - manifesting the power and the presence of God - the Christians made a ruckus, Peter preached, and thousands were swept into the kingdom. Someone once said, 'The disciples prayed for ten days, Peter preached for ten minutes, and three thousand were saved. The same would not have happened had the disiples prayer for ten minutes and Peter preached for ten days.' " (page 120)
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| Your People Shall Be My People by Don Finto
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 4 stars
This book deals with Israel, the Jews, and the Christian church. The back of the book says, "Too many Gentile believers think of Christianity as a replacement for Judaism - and Israel as something apart from God's plan." This book tries to correct that problem....it came highly recommended to me and there is a lot of compelling stuff in this. I recommend every Christian read this book!
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"God promised Abraham, 'I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you' (Gen. 12:2,3). If this ancient promise is still true, and it is, then no person, no congregation, no nation or people group will ever receive their fullest blessing until they learn to love the Jewish people." (page 23)
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"It is important that Jewish believers in Jesus be allowed to find their way to biblically orthodox faith, within a modern Jewish expression." (page 137)
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| Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 3 stars
This short book by was recommended to me by a friend after one of our many discussions about church and true community (especially how unrelated they often are...and how interchangeable they need to be!) I really enjoyed the book. It is solid, but I don't think many people would find it engaging...I'd recommend it for those who are disillusioned with "church" as we know it. Sheds a lot of new light.
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"The Christian belongs not in the seclusion of a cloistered life but in the thick of foes." (page 17)
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"It is grace, nothing but grace, that we are allowed to live in community with Christian brethren." (page 20)
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"Christianity means community through Jesus Christ and in Jesus Christ. No Christian community is more or less than this." (page 21)
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"God has willed that we should seek and find his living Word in the witness of a brother, in the mouth of a man. Therefore, the Christian needs another Christian who speaks God's Word to him." (page 23)
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"This spiritual love will speak to Christ about a brother more than to a brother about Christ. It knows the most direct way to others is always through prayer to Christ and that love of others is wholly dependant upon the truth in Christ." (page 36)
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"It is in fact more important for us to know what God did to Israel, to His Son Jesus Christ, than to seek what God intends for us today." (page 54)
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"We are members of a body, not only when we choose to be, but in our whole existence. Every member serves the whole body, either to its health or to its destruction. This is no more theory; it is a spiritual reality. And the Christian community has often experienced its effects with distrubing clarity, sometimes destructively and sometimes fortunately." (page 89)
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"A community which allows unemployed members to exist within it will perish because of them." (page 94)
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"If my sinfulness appears to me to be in any way smaller or less detestable in comparison with the sins of others, I am still not recognizing my sinfulness at all...Brotherly love will find any number of extenuations for the sins of others; only for my sin is there no apology whatsoever. Therefore my sin is the worst...How can I possibly serve another person in unfeigned humility if I seriously regard his sinfulness as worse than my own?" (page 96)
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| The Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 4 stars
There is a ton of good stuff in this book...and it takes awhile go get through! It tooks me a couple months to finally finish it, but I think I will be meditating on the deep, practical truths in it for years to come. A highly recommended read for anyone truly desiring to be a serious disciple of Jesus Christ.
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[speaking of today] "What is truly profound is thought to be stupid and trivial, or worse, boring, while wht is actually stupid and trivial is thought to be profound." (page 10)
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"Helmut Thielicke points out that we often wonder if the celebrities who advertise foods and beverages actually consume what they are selling. He goes on to say that this is the very question most pressing for those of us who speak for Christ. Surely something has gone wrong when moral failures are so massive and widespread among us. Perhaps we are not eating what we are selling. More likely, I think, what we are 'selling' is irrelevant to our real existence and without power over daily life." (page 39)
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"...the Christian message is thought to be essentially concerned only with how to deal with sin...life, our actual existence, is not included in what is now presented as the heart of the Christian message." (page 41)
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" 'Jesus is Lord' can mean little in practice for anyone who has to hesitate before saying, 'Jesus is smart'. He is not just nice, he is brilliant. He is the smartest man who ever lived. He is now supervising the entire course of world history (Rev. 1:5) while simultaneously preparing the rest of the universe for our future role in it (John 14:2). He always has the best information on everything and certainly also on the things that matter most in human life. Let us now hear his teachings on who has the good life, on who is among the truly blessed." (page 95)
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"To understand Jesus' teachings, we must realize that deep in our orientations of our spirit we cannot have one posture toward God and a different one toward other people. We are a whole being, and our true character pervades everything we do. We cannot, for example, love God and hate human beings. As the apostle John wrote, 'Those who do not love their brother who is visible cannot love God who is invisible' (I John 4:20). And: 'The one who does not love does not know God, who is love" (4:8). " (page 232)
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"Prayer is never just asking, nor is it merely a matter of asking for what I want. God is not a cosmic butler or fix-it-man, and the aim of the universe is not to fulfill my desires and needs. On the toher hand, I am to pray for what converns me, and many people have found prayer impossible because they thought they should only pray for wonderful but remote needs they actually had little or not interest in or even knowledge of.
Prayer simply dies from efforts to pray about 'good things' that honestly do not matter to us. The way to get to meaningful prayer for those good things is to start by praying for what we are truly interested in. The circle of our interests will inevitably grow in the largeness of God's love." (page 242)
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[speaking of examples from the Bible like Moses and Hezekiah 'changing God's mind'] "It is not inherently 'greater' to be inflexible. That is an unfortunate human idea of greatness, derived from behavior patterns all too common in a fallen world. It turns God into a cosmic stuffed shirt. This unfortunate idea is reinforced from 'the highest intellectual sources' by classical ideas of 'perfection,' which stressed the necessity of absolute inalterability in God. But in a domain of persons, such as The Kingdom Among Us, it is far greater to be flexible and yet able to achieve the godo goals one has set. And that is an essential part of the Divine Personality shown in the Bible and incarnated in the person of Jesus and presented in his message. So far from fitting the classical pattern of God as 'the Unmoved Mover,' the God shown in the historical record is 'the Most Moved Mover.' This is the One who lives with us and whom we approach from within the community of prayerful love." (page 253)
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"One of the greatest weaknesses in our teaching and leadership today is that we spend so much time trying to get people to do things good people are supposed to do, without changing what they really believe. It doesn't succeed very well, and that is the open secret of church life." (page 307)
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"Because of so much misunderstanding on this particular point, we must reemphasize that in speaking of the kingdom of the heavens being 'at hand' Jesus was not speaking of something that was about to happen but had not yet happened and might not.
In the course of human events there are always plenty of things that are on the horizon of possibility but do not come about or that come about later. And there certainly is a dimension of still future realization of God's rule. But...it is best translated simply 'has come'.
The reality of God's rule, and all of the instrumentalitites it involves, is present in action and available with and through the person of Jesus. That is Jesus' gospel. ... New Testament passages make plain that this kingdom is not something to be 'accepted' now and enjoyed later, but something to be enetered now (Matt 5:20; 18:3; John 3:3, 5). It is something that already has flesh-and-blood citizens (John 18:36; Phil 3:20) who have been transformed into it (Col. 1:13) and are fellow workers in it (Col. 4:11)." (page 28)
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"Interestingly, 'growing up' is largely a matter of learning to hide our spirit behind our face, eyes, and language so that we can evade and manage others to achive what we want and avoid what we fear. By contrast, the child's face is a constant epiphany because it doesn't yet know how to do this...Those who have attained considerable spiritual stature are frequently noted for their 'childlikeness'. What this really means is that they do not use their face and body to hide their spiritual reality. In their body they are genuinely present to those around them." (page 76)
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"The bane of the more liberal branches of Christian theology today is that they are unable to present a God who could be actually loved. They say a great deal about love - especially in connection with things such as community and respect and liberation - but what comes out in the end is something very like the words of the song, "Falling in Love with Love." what is to be loved is love itself, very often identified with nothing more than a certain sense of community. And then perhaps some words about God being love are tacked on." (page 329)
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"Now we must not worship without study, for ignorant worship is of limited value and can be very dangerous. We may develop 'a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge' (Rom. 10:2) and do great harm to ourselves and others. But worship must be added to study to complete the renewal of our mind through a willing absorption in the radiant person who is worthy of all praise. Study without worship is also dangerous, and the people of Jesus constantly suffer form its effects, especially in academic settings. To handle the things of God without worship is always to falsify them." (page 362)
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| Street Saints by Barbara J. Elliott
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 4 stars
I picked up this book at our 2004 Mission America Coalition annual meeting, as the author was present there. It was a roundtable meeting with national church and ministry leaders, with the goal of formulating a strategy for transforming cities and communities around the country. This book tells the story of several cities that have been powerfully transformed, and Elliott offers fascinating insight about these transformations. It is a bit academic, but anyone with a heart for the Lord is doing today would benefit from reading this.
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"Someone who does not know the kingdom [of God] should be able to peer into the church and get a glimpse of what the kingdom is like." (page 8)
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"There is a big difference between saved souls and changed lives." (page 69)
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"The relationship of church and state is this: the state depends on the fruits of faith for its survival." (page 228)
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| Amazing Grace by Jonathan Kozol
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 4 stars
The author went into inner New York City and spent hours and days talking with the kids that live there. He tells their stories in a very compelling format...and ultimately he is simply recording what they said, which is often astounding and heart-breaking. The book lags at some points, but in the end I felt the need to help transform America's cities...something must be done, and we (the church) are called to be the vessel through which God works!
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| Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 5 stars
Absolutely fantastic! Very refreshing "nonreligious thoughts on Christian spirituality" (the subtitle). The book also has a number of meaningful and moving chapters. The author rights in a very down-to-earth tone that allowed me to connect with him quickly. I can't wait to read his next book. This is a MUST READ!
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"A friend of mine, a young pastor who recently started a church, talks to me from time to time about the new face of church in America - about the postmodern church. He says the new church will be different from the old one, that we will be relevant to culture and the human struggle. I don't think any church has ever been relevant to culture, to the human struggle, unless it believed in Jesus and the power of His gospel. If the supposed new church believes in trendy music and cool Web pages, then it is not relevant to culture either. It is just another tool of Satan to get people to be passionate about nothing." (page 111)
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"If we are not willing to wake up in the morning and die to ourselves, perhaps we should ask ourselves whether or not we are really following Jesus." (page 185)
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[telling a story] "Mr. Spencer then asked us about another area in which he felt metaphors cause trouble. He asked us to consider relationships. What metaphors do we use when we think of relationships? We value people, I shouted out. Yes, he said, and wrote it on his little white board. We invest in people, another person added. And soon enough we had listed an entire white board of economic metaphor. Relationships could be bankrupt, we said. People are priceless, we said. All economic metaphor. I was taken aback.
And that's when it hit me like so much epiphany getting dislodged from my ateries. The problem with Christian culture is we think of love as a commodity. We use it like money...If somebody is doing something for us, offering us something, be it gifts, time, popularity, or what have you, we feel they have value, we feel they are worth something to us, and, perhaps, we feel they are priceless...This was the thing that had smelled so rotten all these years. I used love like money. The church used love like money. With love, we withheld affirmation from the people who did not agree with us, but we lavishly financed the ones who did." (page 218)
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| Houses That Change the World by Wolfgang Simson
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 3 stars
This book chronicles the development of house churches in the past and in modern times. It provides some good insight into the house church movement. For me personally, I read it at a time when my heart was really turning towards being a part of (or even helping to start) a house church, so I was very hungry for its content. It is weak in some areas, and definitely has a bias, but if you're interested in house churches it's a great book to read to fuel your thoughts.
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"church as we know it is preventing church as God wants it." (preface)
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"The Roman Catholic Church went on to canonize the system. Luther reformed the content of the gospel, but left the outer forms of 'church' remarkably untouched. The Free Churches freed the system from the State, the Baptists then baptized it, the Quakers dry-cleaned it, the Salvation Army put it in uniform, the Pentecostals anointed it and the Charismatics renewed it, but until today nobody has really changed the system. The time to do that has now arrived." (page xvi)
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"From the time of the New Testament there has been no such thing as 'a house of God'. At the cost of his life, Stephen reminded us: God does not live in temples made by human hands. The church is the people of God. The church, therefore, was and is at home where people are at home: in ordinary houses. There the people of God share their lives in the power of the Holy Spirit, have 'meatings', i.e. they eat when they meet; they often do not even hesitate to sell private property and share material and spiritual blessings; they teach each other in real-life situations how to obey God's word - and not with professional lectures but dynamically, with dialogue and questions and answers. There they pray and prophesy with each other, and baptize one another. There they can let their masks drop and confess their sins, regaining a new corporate identity through love, acceptance and forgiveness." (page xvii)
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| Red Moon Rising by Peter Greig
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 5 stars
God gripped my heart as I read this book. It tells the story of the 24-7 prayer movement that began in Europe, and gives thrilling testimony of God moving in powerful ways as a direct result of his people humbling themselves and praying! God revealed to me his heart about prayer, and inspired me to truly become a man of prayer through this book. It is both stirring and refreshing. I firmly believe every follower of Jesus Christ should read this book.
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"Revolutions always begin in the streets with the dispossessed-never in the corridors of power. Think of the early Church, the French Revolution, the Bolshevik revolution, and the American wars for 4 independence. Think of William Booth's Salvation Army and the birth of pentacostalism in a back street of Los Angeles." (page 7)
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"[God] spoke to me one day as I meditated upon Proverbs 16:9: 'In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps.' As I explored the meaning of this verse, I found myself in dialogue with God.
'Pete?' He said. 'Congratulations! Your way of taking Jericho makes perfect sense...' There was an uneasy pause as I guessed the next bit. 'The only trouble is, son, it doesn't actually work.' I knew it was true-after eight years of hard work, and now these thoughts of networking new churches, no matter how hard we tried and planned, our efforts were achieving a mere fraction of what we wanted to see. 'On the other hand,' God continued with relish, 'My way of taking Jericho makes NO SENSE WHATSOEVER.' He punctuated each word, no doubt smiling with delight at the irony of it all: 'And yet' - and here was the killer - 'MY WAY WORKS!'
...I began to wonder what the Jericho metaphor might mean in practice. Was I supposed to abandon common sense and go around yelling at walls? I had to admit that had I been around when Joshua was sizing up Jericho, I would have advised him to start making ladders. Maybe he could build war machines or try besieging the fortress city - perhaps with a prayer strategy alongside? I would almost certainly have advised Joshue against yelling at the walls. As a military strategy, shouting sucks. But the wild and strange voice of God told Joshua to get the people moving and shouting - and of course the walls came down. The power was not in the technique; the power was in Joshua's ludicrous obedience. God is not a mindless dispenser of demolition techniques; He is looking for relationship with those who dare to trust Him against all other odds." (page 32)
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[The author writes of a brilliant motto of the Moravian church, which began in the 1700's in Germany, centered around prayer.]
"In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty; and in all things, love."
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"Perhaps [Jesus] longs that we would vacate our buildings from time to time, that we would turn our temples into tabernacles, that we would become like Him, the friend of sinners. We are the light of the world, but no one wants to stare at the bulb. We are the salt of the earth, but a whole plate of the stuff will make you sick. The people of God are called to scatter and mix, to mingle and move, to influence from a position of weakness, like a small child in a large family, like yeast in a loaf, like a mustard seed beneath a pavement."
Could it be that the Holy Spirit is weary of attending our meetings and hungers for our presence at His?..." (page 191)
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| Back to Jerusalem by Paul Hattaway
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 4 stars
This is a fascinating book about mighty work God is doing in the Chinese church (especially the house church movement). A growing number of Chinese believers feel a unique calling to take the Gospel of Jesus Christ "Back to Jerusalem", that is, to all the area between China and Jerusalem. There are many amazing testimonies of God speaking independently and supernaturally to a number of chinese Christians with the same vision: to take the Gospel back to Jerusalem!
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The author outlines key strengths of the Chinese house churches:
"1. The house churches are indigenous. They have cast off the trappings of the West and have developed their own forms of ministry. The dynamics flow from their freedoms from the trappings of the West and have developed their own forms of ministry. The dynamics flow from their freedom from institutional and traditional bondage.
2. The house churches are rooted in family units. They have become part of the Chinese social structure. The believing community is built up of little clusters of Christian families.
3. The house churches are stripped of nonessentials. Much that we associate with Christianity is not found in Chinese house churches today. Thus they are extremely flexible. One believer remarked, 'In the past we blew trumpets and had large evangelistic campaigns. Some believed, but not great numbers. Now we have very little equipment...and many are coming to the Lord.'
4. The house churches emphasize the lordship of Christ. Because Jesus is the head of his body, the church must place obedience to him above every other loyalty; it cannot accept control by any outside organization. The word of God is obeyed and every attempt to force unscriptural practices on the church is resisted.
5. The house churches have confidence in the sovereignty of God. When there was no hope from a human point of view, Christians in China saw God revealing his power and overruling in the history of their day.
6. The house churches love the word of God. They appreciate the value of the Scriptures and have sacrificed in order to obtain copies of the Bible. Their knowledge of the Lord has deepened as they have memorized and copied the word of God.
7. The house churches are praying churches. With no human support and surrounded by those seeking to destroy them, Christians were cast on God, and in simple faith expected God to hear their cry. Prayer was not only communion with God but also a way to share in the spiritual conflict.
8. The house churches are caring and sharing churches. A house church is a caring community in which Christians show love for one another and for their fellow countrymen. Such love creates a tremendous force for spontaneous evangelism.
9. The house churches depend on lay leadership. Because so many Chinese pastors were put into prison or labor camps, the house churches have had to depend on lay leaders. The leadership consists of people from various walks of life who spend much time going from church to church teaching and building up the faith of others.
10. The house churches have been purified by suffering. The church in China has learned firsthand that suffering is part of God's purpose in building his church. Suffering in the church has worked to purify it. Nominal Christianity could not have survived the tests of the Cultral Revolution. Because those who joined the church were aware that it was likely to mean suffering, their motivation was a genuine desire to know Jesus Christ.
11. The house churches are zealous in evangelism. No public preachign was allowed. People came to know Christ through the humble service of believers and through intimate contact between friends and family members. The main method of witness in China today is the personal lifestyle and behavior of Christians, accompanied by their proclamation of the gospel, often at great personal risk.
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"Many Western missionary organizations pull their workers out of a place as soon as there is any sign of trouble. Advance will be very slow with such a mentality! If self-preservation is that important, then there is no point in going in the first place. God looks for children who are willing to die for him if necessary. The countries in the Back to Jerusalem vision do not welcome the gospel and there will certainly be trouble when anyone attempts to take it to them." (page 99)
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"Western Christians often ask us why there is persecution in China and other countries and not in the West. There are several possible responses to this question, but we would like to start by asking one question in return: Do you boldly preach the truth of God's word to sinners inside and outside of your churches? If you do, you will soon find out that there is persecution wherever you are." (page 101)
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| The Open Church by James Rutz
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 3 stars
Rutz presents a passionate argument for some dramatic change in the way we do and view "church". I find myself agreeing with a ton of what he says, especially the idea he advocate of the "open worship" service. Some strengths: he outlines the history of the church, showing how far off track we have come! He also gives 3 examples of current churches in the U.S. that are practicing what he is talking about. The book is not wonderfully written and seems a bit scattered at times, but worth reading for anyone with a heart to see the church restored to what God is calling it to be!
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| The Final Quest by Rick Joyner
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 4 stars
This book is intense, and may even be "out there" for a lot of people. The entire book is basically Joyner recounting a long vision he had over the course of a year. (by vision, I mean a supernatural experience where God speaks vividly through a dream-like experience) I found a ton in the book that really resonated with me as truth, and while I wouldn't recommend it to everyone, it was a great thing for me to read. Because the book is a long vision, it is a story that isn't really quotable, so my quotes are minimal!
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"Many today make errors because they know the Scriptures but do not know the power of God. Those who know His power often make mistakes because they do not know the Scriptures as they should. If we are going to keep from making mistakes, we must know both the Scriptures and the power of God. Prophecy was never intended to replace the Bible, and the Bible was never intended to replace prophecy.
I have spent many hours with conservative evangelical leaders of major ministries to whom God has begun speaking through dreams, visions and prophecy. In many cases, He began to do this even when it violated their theology...
...prophetic people also need their help every bit as much as conservative evangelicals need the help of those who have some experience with the prophetic gifts. For the church to achieve the maturity to which she is called, there must be a union between those who know the Scriptures and those who know the power of God, and this is now happening at a fast pace." (page 17-18 in The Call - sequel to The Final Quest)
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| Revolution in World Missions by K.P. Yohannan
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 3 stars
This book is given out for free by a missions organization called Gospel for Asia. I read it at the 2003 Urbana conference, and it resonated with where my heart was, especially in the things he said about the American church.
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"North American Christians alone, without much sacrifice, can meet the needs of the churches in the third world." (pg 44)
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"There is such an emphasis on church buildings in America that we sometimes forget that the church is the people - not the place where the people meet." (page 45)
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"[in the U.S.] believers are ready to get involved in almost any activity which looks spiritual but allows them to escape their responsibility to the Gospel." (page 46)
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"85% of all Bibles printed today are in English for the 9% of the world who read English. 80% of the world's people have never owned a Bible, while Americans have an average of 4 in every household." (page 47)
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"God did not shower such great blessing on this nation for the Christians to live in extravagence, in self-indulgence and in spiritual weakness." (page 50)
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"I would submit to you that the single most important hindrance to world evangelization right now is the lack of total involvement by the Body of Christ." (page 85)
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"Social concern is the natural fruit of the gospel. But to put it first is to put the cart before the horse...if we intend to answer man's greatest problem - his separation from the eternal God - with rice handouts, then we are throwing a drowning man a board instead of helping him out of the water." (pages 98 and 105)
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"The single, most important social reform that can be brought to Asia is the Gospel of Jesus Christ." (page 129)
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"Have Asians rejected Christ? Not really. In most cases they have rejected only the trappings of Western culture that have fastened themselves onto the Gospel. This is what Paul was talking about - becoming all things to all men in order to win some." (page 135)
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"The body of Christ in the east is looking to the west to link hands with them in this time of harvest and to support the work with the material blessings that God has showered upon them...nothing is more indicative of the moral decline of the west than Christians who have lost the passion of Christ for a lost and dying world." (page 156 and 157)
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"Human compassion will not lead [men] to the cross which alone can relieve their real suffering...Even [Jesus] did not heal all those for whome [he] had compassion, but [he] only did what [he] saw his Father doing. You must not just do things out of compassion, but in obedience to My Spirit. Only then will your compassion have the power of redemption." (pg 158)
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| In the Name of Jesus by Henri Nouwen
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 4 stars
It's a quick read with a lot of meat in there. We had to read this as we prepared for Head RA training, and I think it really lay a great foundation and got our minds thinking about what it is to be a leader as a follower of Jesus Christ. This is not just another servant leadership book!
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"I am deeply convinced that the Christian leaders of the future is called to be completely irrelevant and to stand in this world with nothing to offer but his or her own vulnerable self. That is the way JEsus came to reveal God's love. The great message that we have to carry, as ministers of God's word and followers of Jesus, is that God loves us not because of what we do or accomplish, but because God has created and redeemed us in love and has chosen us to proclaim that love as the true source of all human life." (pg 17)
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"Are the leaders of the future truly men and women of God, people with an ardent desire to dwell in God's presence, to listen to God's voice, to look at God's beauty, to touch God's incarnate Word and to taste fully God's infinite goodness?
The original meaning of the word 'theology' was 'union with God in prayer.' Today theology has become one academic discipline alongside many others, and often theologians are finding it hard to pray. But for the future of Christian leadership it is of vital importanc eto reclaim the mystical aspect of theology so that every word spoken, every advice given, and every strategy developed can come from a heart that knows God intimately. I have the impression that many of the debates within the Church around issues such as the papacy, the ordination of women, the marriage of priests, homosexuality, birth control, abortion, and euthanasia take place on a primarily moral level. On that level, different parties battle about right or wrong. But that battle is often removed from the experience of God's first love which lies at the base of all human relationships. Words like right-wing, reactionary, conservative, liberal, and left-wing are used to describe people's opinions, and many discussions then seem more like political battles for power than spiritual searches for the truth.
Christian leaders cannot simply be persons who have well-informed opinions about the burning issues of our time. Their leadership must be rooted in the permanent, intimate relationship with the incarnate Word, Jesus, and they need to find there the fsource for their words, advice, and guidance. Through the discipline of contemplative prayer, Christian leaders have to learn to listen again and again to the voice of love and to find there the wisdom and courage to address whatever issue presents itself to them...
...When we are securely rooted in personal intimacy with the source of life, it will be possible to remain flexible without being relativistic, convinced without being rigid, willing to confront without being offensive, gentle and forgiving without being soft, and true witnesses without being manipulative." (pages 29-32)
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| The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning
Progress: Finished
My Rating: 4 stars
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