spurgeon

My favorite (used)bookstore

Tony Reinke spurgeon

OMAHA, NE—My favorite used bookstore is an unkept mess. It’s the neighbor to a tattoo parlor and a bar—an unlikely location for literature.

Inside, the bookstore is drastically underlit to begin with and smoky from all the cigarettes burned by the owner at his junk-strewn desk. The fire chief would not be happy. Bookshelves stretch 15 feet into the sky, far out of reach of customers and to an altitude that makes the spines illegible (except for the oversized tomes). The owners have stuffed the overflow book stock wherever they find open air, either horizontally over jammed shelving or—what appears to be the favorite option—in piles of books strewn on the floor. This overflow further congests the tight walkways. To view the recent additions to the store, shoppers must humble themselves on one knee and squat down to the floor level to view the spines. Other shoppers step over each other as the walkways. Just by posture you can determine whether someone is new to the store or a frequent visitor. The curiosity of a newbie will be satisfied by walking upright. The frequent shoppers snail along at floor level.

This makes me question who is prioritized in the store landscape. Is it the frequent shoppers or the books? And will there come a point in the store when there is no longer room for the shoppers and it becomes a pool of books with no outflow? How many more books must be added to the collection until the morning unlocking of the store will include a routine avalanche of books pouring out from the front door and out upon the sidewalk and into the street?

I have friends who despise such used bookstores and will never buy or read a used book. They watch too much Seinfeld. I love used bookstores, and especially this one.

Vacationing, planning, writing

Tony Reinke spurgeon

For the next two weeks I am vacationing with my wife and kids. It will be a loooong road trip (1,250 miles each way) and I’d appreciate your prayers for safety. We are presently in Nebraska and enjoying the unseasonably tolerable July weather.

jon+babeOne of the road trip highlights was our stop at the Bob Feller museum in VanMeter, Iowa. Housed at this museum are all types of uniforms and baseballs from Feller’s hall of fame pitching career in baseball. Included is the bat that Babe Ruth leaned on in 1948 during his famous farewell photo taken at Yankee Stadium shortly before his death. The Yanks were playing Cleveland that day and somehow Ruth grabbed Feller’s bat. Cool to see such a treasure of baseball lore buried in a tiny farm town hidden by the Iowa countryside. After leaving the little museum we stumbled upon the high school baseball field and my son and I tossed a ball for about an hour. Surely Feller learned to throw a fastball here on this grass. I yelled across the field to my wife who was setting out lunch on a picnic table, “Is this heaven?”

As time has allowed on this trip I’ve been using the downtime during this vacation to write and finalize a book proposal. While I cannot yet reveal the book’s topic, I mention it for your prayerful support. I’ll be submitting my proposal to the publisher within the next month and find myself in need of your prayers (as always).

And because one or two of you care, here were the three books I chose to bring along on summer vacation:

I’ll blog as time allows (which may be infrequently until I return to D.C.). I appreciate your prayers.

Off to a day at the zoo.

Tony

Review: Notes from the Tilt-A-Whirl

Tony Reinke Apologetics, BR > Thomas Nelson, N.D. Wilson, Nietzsche, spurgeon

I don’t recall the last time I sprinted to Barnes and Noble to shell out full price for a book. Come to think of it, I can’t remember sprinting for much of anything.

But that’s exactly what I did when I heard N.D. Wilson’s new book had been published early and was stocked in stores earlier than expected. I jumped in the car, drove to the nearest B+N, jogged over to the Christian / Inspiration section, scanned past Osteen’s big smiley cover shot, and down until I found the “W”s. There, out of sight on the floor-level shelf, was the store’s one copy of Notes From The Tilt-A-Whirl: Wide-Eyed Wonder in God’s Spoken World (Thomas Nelson 2009). Happy Father’s Day to me!

Wilson is a Fellow of Literature at New Saint Andrews College and the managing editor for Credenda/Agenda magazine. He’s the son of Douglas Wilson. And of all the children’s fiction authors my family reads, Wilson is one of our recent favorites. His books are a gift for families who enjoy reading together (Leepike Ridge and 100 Cupboards). [Although Notes From The Tilt-A-Whirl is not for children. I kinda guessed from the table of contents that it wasn’t, and this suspicion was confirmed by one or two vulgarities.]

The framework for the book is mixed metaphor, and Wilson piles on the metaphors with each page. Life is a bit like a carnival, a serious carnival. Or life is like the four seasons. Readers who seek a literary buzz of metaphorical intoxication will find it hard to put this book down, and once they do, may find it impossible to touch their nose with their fingertips.

Notes reads like C.S. Lewis. Like Lewis, Wilson pries our sleepy eyes open to the marvelous work of God all around us—in the snowflakes, leaves, galaxies, laughter, sunshine, ants, thunder. Wilson stops us to appreciate God’s creative handiwork one molecule and one insect at a time.

But like Lewis, Wilson nudges us into deeper waters to discuss the origin of evil, God’s purposes behind personal tragedy, the vanity of human philosophy, and the absurdity of evolution. As I have already shown you on this blog, Wilson is quick to slap philosophers around like Kip Dynamite in a Rex Kwon Do (see the post Nietzsche’s Pity for an example).

Notes is interesting as an autobiographical sketch, capturing the complexity of the inner life in short and clean sentences.

Notes is good as Theology, singing a song of praise to our sovereign God who created the wonder and majesty before our eyes.

Notes is very good as literature, featuring stunning metaphors that pile and build as the book develops.

Notes is a good example of how to develop from general revelation towards the substitutionary death of Jesus for sinners.

Notes is a very good apologetic. It may be, in the words of my friend Justin Taylor, a gospel tract for postmodern times. It will prove valuable when discussing the gospel with skeptics, atheists, or even Christians who are not running barefoot through fields of God’s creative wonder.

But unlike so many contemporary apologetic works, Wilson is careful to preserve God’s active judgment in the condemnation of sinners (see p. 179). Far too often, followers of C.S. Lewis have followed him in his ambiguity here. Wilson is careful and clear.

I suppose if I could suggest one disappointment it would be this. I kept waiting for Wilson to turn his attention to the spectacular, awe-inspiring, work of God’s voice captured in two words spoken over the blood-bought sinner—”Not guilty!” Luther rightly teaches us that justification is God’s spoken declaration. His “Not guilty!” judgment is as real as the phrase “Let there be light!” This God-spoken, reality-making, “legal fiction”-shattering, voice of God over the sinner is one of the most wonderful acts of God. Yet it was a wide-eyed wonder in God’s spoken world that seemed to go missing.

All said, Wilson’s Notes from the Tilt-A-Whirl is a rare treasure. Few living writers I’ve read match N.D. Wilson in imagination, creative articulation of orthodox theology, and ability to write in a simple prose style. That his attention has turned—however briefly—to an adult audience has resulted in a wonderfully modern, C.S. Lewis-like treasure.

Enjoy it, but beware. The book’s conclusion may leave a bad taste in your mouth.

(LOL!)

Happy reading.

———–

Title: Notes From The Tilt-A-Whirl: Wide-Eyed Wonder in God’s Spoken World
Author: N.D. Wilson
Boards: paper
Pages: 203
Topical index: no
Scriptural index: no
Text: perfect type
Publisher: Thomas Nelson
Year: 2009
Price USD: $14.99 / $10.19 from Amazon
ISBN: 9780849920073

David Powlison on Literature

Tony Reinke David Powlison, Literature, Reading, spurgeon

cj-powlison--studio2Over at the Sovereign Grace blog, my friend C.J. Mahaney has posted the transcript of his dinnertime conversation with biblical counselor David Powlison. A few weeks back I mentioned this conversation on the blog. C.J.’s posts contain further details.

Dr. Powlison’s literature recommendations included two “pastoral” titles:

And six “dark realism” titles:

For more background on the pastoral usefulness of these literary works, please read C.J.’s interview posts:

David Powlison on Literature (1)

David Powlison on Literature (2)