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Reading Digest #2 (Dec. 1, 2008)

Tony Reinke .Reading Digest, spurgeon

Reading Digest #2 (Dec. 1, 2008)

Thanks for all the comments on reading digest #1. And thanks for all the emails, too. Although I cannot respond to each comment and email I do read them all. I am grateful that you have taken the time to share with me the books you are reading, your current reading priorities, and even your willingness to contest my own book ratings. Keep them coming!

New to digest #2 you will see that I’ve added my devotional reading from scripture which will bring for me a level of needed accountability. And (for fun) I’ve added a list of books I will not be reading.

So here is the latest update on my reading schedule. For each book I’ve attempted to aggregate the following information: % read, rating out of 5 stars, category the book fits into in my library, and a brief summary.

DEVOTIONS …

• John 12:23-26. Because my great sin struggle is against the idol of ease.

• James 1. Reading through James slowly. This chapter has helped me see the importance of faith in perseverance and the danger of unbelief in trials.

CURRENTLY READING …

• “Unpacking Forgiveness: Biblical Answers for Complex Questions and Deep Wounds” by Chris Brauns (10%). Christian living. Too early to rate.

• “Uprooting Anger: Biblical Help For a Common Problem” by Robert D. Jones. (20%, 3.50 stars). Christian living. Very good so far. Anger may manifest itself as red-hot or ice-cold. Anger is the manifestation of sin rooted in selfish unmet desires, fears, idols, comforts, passions etc (James 4). Q: Will the book help the reader define the specifics of these idols?

• “Instructing a Child’s Heart” by Ted and Margy Tripp (20%, 4.50 stars). Parenting. The newest from Tripp and a gem. Highly recommended for all parents.

• “Gilead” by Marilynne Robinson (25%, 4.00 stars). Novel and winner of the Pulitzer. Reflections of an old pastor. The prose sip like vintage wine.

• “Outliers” by Malcom Gladwell (30%, ^3.40 stars). Talent is overrated–the “greats” flat out worked harder. The 10,000 hour rule = work for 10,000 hours at something and you will do it well. Success is not defined by IQ or natural ability alone but by situation, hard work, and street-smarts. Getting better. This is helping to inform how I should be parenting my children for success.

• “Our Reasonable Faith” by Herman Bavinck (30%, 5.00 stars). Systematic theology. Fantastic condensed theology noted for its carefulness in composition and its moments of breakout doxology.

• “Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies” by Li and Bernoff (30%, 3.75 stars). Online marketing. How to interact with the inevitable web 2.0 phenomena and collective power of the online user. More technical than Godin. Reading this for a discussion group and need to get on this this week.

• “Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die” by Chip Heath (30%, 4.50 stars). Marketing and communication book. “Sticky” has become a new word in my daily language and a persisting challenge to rethink what I say and how I say it. Looks like I’ll be reading this in a group soon so I’m putting it off for now.

• “Getting Things Done” by David Allen (40%, 4.30 stars). Personal planning. Classic book on how to schedule well and get things done efficiently.

• “Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us” by Seth Godin (60%, ^2.80 stars). Leadership. Groups stand around together, tribes communicate and provoke one another. How do leaders harness the potential of these online tribes and lead them via Web 2.0—blogs, Facebook, Twitter. The book greatly improved at about the 30% mark.

RECENTLY COMPLETED …

• “The Back of the Napkin” by Dan Roam (100%, ^4.00 stars). Business strategy and problem-solving book. Thinking through, solving, and explaining complex problems on a napkin with a pen, icons, and stick figures. Wonderful book for visual thinkers like myself and bearing immediate fruit at work. Highly recommended.

• “Assassination Vacation” by Sarah Vowell (100%, 3.50 stars). Secular history and travel writing. Vowell’s thorough research on presidential assassinations is presented in a way that allows the reader to join her as she travels to various locations. It should be noted that in this book (and all her books) she views life through a lens of wry irritability. She is a non-Christian and this book includes a section on the Oneida sex cult. Beware of this if you decide to read.

• “Discourse on the Trinity” by Jonathan Edwards (100%, 4.00 stars). Theology. This little work helped me understand how Christ is the duplicity of the Father for God to delight in Himself. A fundamental truth to understanding the entire theology of Edwards.

• “We Become What We Worship: A Biblical Theology of Idolatry” by G. K. Beale (20%, 2 stars). Scholarly and hard to apply. Not what I expected.

• “The Wordy Shipmates” by Sarah Vowell (25%, 1 star). Vowell—a liberal—on the Puritans! Who could pass this up? Except for a few highlights, this was a let down.

ON THE DOCKET …

• “Concise Reformed Dogmatics” by J. van Genderen and W. H. Velema, translated by Gerrit Bilkes and edited by M. van der Maas. Dutch systematic theology. At first glance this book appears to be a contender for the 2008 book of the year award. More photos and review forthcoming on the blog.

WILL NOT BE READING …

• “Pagan Christianity?: Exploring the Roots of Our Church Practices” by George Barna and Frank Viola. Argument for house churches (who knew Barna went house church?). Labels as ‘unbiblical’ the practices of preaching, tithing, meeting in a building, and really everything institutional. I love the publisher’s preface note which states (my paraphrase): “Please don’t stop buying our books just because we decided to print this nonsense.” Ben Witherington has already reviewed the Barna + Viola logic circus (and did a great job).

Reading Digest #1

Tony Reinke .Reading Digest, Book Notes, spurgeon

I love to read and try to burn through books at a good pace. Since this reading schedule prohibits full reviews of many of the books I’m reading, my friends have encouraged me to publicly list my reading schedule and brief thoughts on books. To that end I’ll be posting a biblio-update once a week. I don’t post this to sell books (no hyperlinks) and I don’t post this to impress you. I will be prioritizing this list for 4 distinct purposes:

  1. as a means of provoking diligence in your own reading schedule
  2. as a means of helping others make wise book investments (let me buy the bad ones)
  3. as a means of personal accountability (no room for slacking off)
  4. as a means of hearing from you about what you are presently reading (use the comments).

So here is my present reading schedule, complete with the present % read, thoughts, and ratings (5 stars being the highest recommendation, 1 star meaning the book is more useful as a recycled paper product.

  • Gilead by Marilynne Robinson (25%, 4 stars). Novel and winner of the Pulitzer. Reflections of an old pastor. The prose sip like vintage wine.
  • Outliers by Malcom Gladwell (25%, ^3.2 stars). Talent is overrated–the “greats” flat out worked harder. Note the 10,000 hour rule = work for 10,000 hours at something and you will do it well.
  • The Back of the Napkin by Dan Roam (70%, ^3.85 stars). Business strategy book. Thinking through, solving, and explaining complex problems on a napkin with a pen, icons, and stick figures. Wonderful book for visual thinkers like myself and bearing immediate fruit at work.
  • Our Reasonable Faith by Herman Bavinck (30%, 5 stars). Intro level systematic theology. Fantastic condensed theology noted for its carefulness in composition and its moments of breakout doxology.
  • Instructing a Child’s Heart by Ted and Margy Tripp (20%, 4.5 stars). Parenting. The newest from Tripp and a gem. Highly recommended for all parents.
  • Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die by Chip Heath (30%, 4.5 stars). Marketing and communication book. “Sticky” has become a new word in my daily language and a persisting challenge to rethink what I say and how I say it.
  • Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell (70%, 3.5 stars). Secular history and travel writing. Vowell’s thorough research on presidential assassinations is presented in a way that allows the reader to join her as she travels to various locations. It should be noted that in this book (and all her books) she views life through a lens of wry irritability. Includes ‘mature’ content.
  • Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us by Seth Godin (50%, ^2.5 stars). Leadership. Groups stand around together, tribes communicate and provoke one another. How do leaders harness the potential of these online tribes and lead them via Web 2.0—blogs, Facebook, Twitter. The book greatly improved at about the 30% mark.
  • Getting Things Done by David Allen (40%, ^4.3 stars). Personal planning. Classic book on how to schedule well and get things done efficiently.
  • Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies by Li and Bernoff (30%, 3.75 stars). Online marketing. How to interact with the inevitable web 2.0 phenomena and collective power of the online user. More technical than Godin.

Recently completed (% read, final rating) …

  • Discourse on the Trinity by Jonathan Edwards (100%, 4 stars). Theology. This little work helped me understand how Christ is the duplicity of the Father for God to delight in Himself. A fundamental truth to understanding the entire theology of Edwards.
  • We Become What We Worship: A Biblical Theology of Idolatry by G. K. Beale (20%, 2 stars). Scholarly and hard to apply. Not what I expected.
  • The Wordy Shipmates by Sarah Vowell (25%, 1 star). Vowell—a liberal—on the Puritans! Who could pass this up? Except for a few highlights, this was a let down.

On the docket …

  • Unpacking Forgiveness: Biblical Answers for Complex Questions and Deep Wounds by Chris Brauns. Christian living.
  • Uprooting Anger: Biblical Help For a Common Problem by Robert D. Jones. Christian living.

So what are you currently reading? I’d love to hear in the comments!

Tony

Powlison on Self-Pity

Tony Reinke spurgeon

“Feeling sorry for yourself is one of the strongest, most addictive narcotics known to man. It feels so good to feel so bad. Self-pity arises so easily, seems so plausible, and proves so hard to shake off.”

– David Powlison, Journal of Biblical Counseling (Summer 2007, Vol. 25, No. 3) p. 7.

C.J., Jerry Bridges, and the Cross

Tony Reinke spurgeon

Tuesday afternoon C.J. recorded an interview with Dr. Jerry Bridges, author of so many excellent cross-centered books like The Discipline of Grace and The Gospel for Real Life. I’ll let you know when the audio is posted online.

It was humbling to sit in the studio and listen to them talk about the importance of the cross. When it comes to learning what it means to live a cross-centered life, God has more effectively used no two living authors in my life than C.J. Mahaney (on the left) and Jerry Bridges (on the right). Sitting in the studio and listening to these men talk about the cross ranks as one of my life’s highlights.

A friend snapped this photo during the recording.

2001118bridges2

Improving our Gospel Communication

Tony Reinke spurgeon

In the last post I wrote: “Showing people sin is the easy part. Showing people the grace of God is not so easy.”

A profound—but plagiarized—thought.

The simple truth is that convincing someone of personal sin is not hard. I remember reading the story of a horror film writer on opening night of his movie sitting in the front row and watching the ghastly evil on the screen and realizing that this entire movie had been born in his heart. It was a sort of Ah-ha moment of his own sin. He was no Christian and I’m not certain he ever became a Christian. Every sinner knows that they are sinful, this is a truth none of us can escape–we can only suppress its reality.

And for those of us who are Christians, who have openly and honestly looked into the eye of that heinous beast of sin residing in all our hearts, a preacher can convict us of sin with little trouble. But if we are more aware of sin than grace the conviction of sin can easily dominate and suffocate a more important truth of the person and work of Jesus Christ.

In the last post, this led Tom post this comment: “As a pastor I desire to present Christ in all His goodness and glory in such a way that He is beautiful desirable, attractive and appealing, and yet I feel I so often fall short. You would think that it would be easy to present Christ in such a way that people would have a natural hunger and yearning for Him, yet I find it to be a great challenge and am frustrated that I fall so short of proclaiming Christ’s glory winsomely, fruitfully and effectively.”

Great thoughts, Tom. Its worth taking a moment to understand how we can better communicate the grace of the gospel.

And I begin by realizing that I will never sufficiently communicate the glorious gospel. We live by faith now, which has its inherent limitations. But one day we will look at Jesus and be overwhelmed with affection like never before. Yet the promise holds true to us that although “you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory” (1 Pet. 1:8).

But how?

Three topics come to mind when I read your comment.

1. Study the Gospel

It may be that the content of messages could be improved. And for this the solution is fairly straight: Read Scripture and read excellent books on the cross. What better way to saturate our words with grace than by filling up our hearts and affections with appreciation for what Christ has accomplished for me on the cross!?

Thankfully there are dozens of excellent books on the gospel. My friend C.J. Mahaney—the author of my personal favorite book on the gospel, Living the Cross-Centered Life—has published a list of recommended books on this topic of supreme importance. Reading these books frequently, and slowly enough to be personally affected by the gospel on a regular basis, will fill your soul with love for the cross and that will be communicated.

But I would caution us from thinking that the key to better communicating the gospel of Jesus Christ is only about speak more frequently, affectionately, clearly, or eloquently about the gospel. I think there are two other critical factors that help determine (promoting or limiting) the effective transmission of the gospel to others.

2. Assault Legalism

We are all prone to think God is pleased with us to the degree we pleased him during the week. If I didn’t do so well, I’m more likely to be shut off from the gospel and words of grace. And if your hearers do not understand the depth and severity of legalism in their hearts they will be gullible to a hardness towards the grace of God (and may not even know it). A while ago I posted an outstanding excerpt from Sinclair Ferguson on the importance of ministers preaching strong indicatives (the gospel) to support the imperatives (commands) of Scripture. I encourage you to read it.

Because the simple truth is that if we think God’s approval of us pivots upon our spiritual performance—and not what Christ accomplished on the cross—our appreciation for the gospel will never seriously affect us.

3. Communicate Christ’s Affections

Paul tells the church in Philippi that he loves them with the affections of Christ Jesus. His exact words: “For God is my witness, how I yearn for you all with the affection of Christ Jesus” (Phil 1:8). Paul’s affections towards the Philippians is an extension of the affection of Christ to the saints. Which means (if I’m reading this correctly) that ministers have an opportunity to communicate, to some (obviously) imperfect level, the affection of Christ to their people.

A genuine Christian who is unfamiliar with the joy of Christ and the gospel may (notice I said may) have a pastor that does not reflect, model, and communicate a Christ-centered love to them. Those people with loving, caring, humble, sacrificial pastors who tell them how much they love them—and from an unconditional love unhinged from their responsive performance—will more likely be familiar with the unconditional love of Christ displayed in the gospel.

So could it be that a church unfamiliar with the unconditional love of Christ—as displayed in the gospel—have not experienced the affection of Christ through their pastor?

Two great questions to ask yourself are these: (a) Upon what condition does Christ’s love for me depend? (b) Upon what condition does my love for ______ rest upon what he/she does or does not do? And this love is obviously one that has first escaped the entrapment of legalism.

Conclusion

So those are three categories I would raise for your consideration, Tom. Read and study fill your own soul with the gospel, assault legalism in your heart and church, and seek to incarnate the love of Christ in caring for your flock. In all things praying the Holy Spirit would burn hot so your church will gather and sing with tear-filled eyes:

O the deep, deep love of Jesus, vast, unmeasured, boundless, free!
Rolling as a mighty ocean in its fullness over me!
Underneath me, all around me, is the current of Thy love
Leading onward, leading homeward to Thy glorious rest above!