Okay, I’m a little behind.  First Gilead, now Peace Like a River.  They aren’t 2009 “Best Books,” but I am just now getting to them.  Perhaps I am waiting until I get independent confirmation that they are marvelous.  Or perhaps I am just cheap and wait until I can borrow them for free.

Leif Enger’s Peace Like a River is fiction.  I can classify that much.  But a friend asked me, “What’s it about?” and I was kind of stumped.  It’s about an older brother in trouble, and a family that follows him. It’s about loyalty. It’s about wilderness.  It’s about an 11-year old boy with asthma who has a fiercely amazing little sister and a quietly astounding father.  It’s also about faith, but kind of faith from the outside.  A quote:

   People fear miracles because they fear being changed – though ignoring them will change you also. Swede said another thing too, and it rang in me like a bell: No miracle happens without a witness.  Someone to declare, Here’s what I saw. Here’s how it went. Make of it what you will. 
   The fact is, the miracles that sometimes flowed from my father’s fingertips had few witnesses but me. Yes, enough people saw enough strange things that Dad became the subject of a kind of misspoken folklore in our town, but most ignored the miracles as they ignored Dad himself.
…as a witness, let me say that a miracle is no cute thing but more like the swing of a sword.

Remember the standard high school essay prompt? “What does the title of this book mean?”  I don’t miss high school essays, but they did force me to process a book a little more deeply.  The title is from the hymn It is Well With my Soul.  And I suppose this is intended to indicate the peaceful state of the father, Jeremiah Land, because of his faith.  And to point out that bad things happen, but life is more than the bad things.  According to our young narrator, life is about being a witness to the good things that are more powerful than the bad.

For me, be it Christ, be it Christ hence to live:

If Jordan above me shall roll,

No pang shall be mine, for in death as in life,

Thou wilt whisper Thy peace to my soul.

This book brought back to me what fiction is supposed to be.  Written by Marilynne Robinson, Gilead is simply marvelous – sweet, wry, historical and yet timeless.  It’s ostensibly about an elderly pastor deciding to write down the things he wants his young son to know when the boy  grows up… but that’s really just the vehicle.  The story is really about fathers and sons, and the consequences of even the most just of wars, and the source of real wisdom.  It’s about being a pastor, and spending time thinking, and how love and forgiveness are always possible.

The book starts out with this beautiful weaving of the narrator’s life, and that of his father’s and his grandfather’s.  And I was loving even that, but then Robinson brought in the requisite conflict that all books seem to think they need.  After I adjusted to that change in rhythm, I found even the hard things added depth to the story. 

Gilead is a gentle story.  The narrator is old and shabby, his church is worn, the town where he has spent his entire life is barely surviving.  But there is a recognition that all relationships are valuable – even those in Gilead, Iowa.

This is an important thing, which I have told many people, and which my father told me, and which his father told him.  When you encounter another person, when you have dealings with anyone at all, it is as if a question is being put to you. So you must think, What is the Lord asking of me in this moment, in this situation? If you confront insult or antagonism, your first impulse will be to respond in kind. But if you think, as it were, This is an emissary sent from the Lord, and some benefit is intended for me, first of all the occasion to demonstrate my faithfulness, the chance to show that I do in some small degree participate in the grace that saved me, you are free to act otherwise than as circumstances would seem to dictate. You are free to act by our own lights. You are freed at the same time of the impulse to hate or resent that person. He would probably laugh at the thought that the Lord sent him to you for your benefit (and his), but that is the perfection of the disguise, his own ignorance of it.

Mark Batterson is very enthusiastic.  He probably is as a person as well, though I haven’t ever met him.  But his writing brims with energy and passion.  His new book Primal is his passion to get Christians excited again about the Great Commandment: Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength.  The book is in four main parts, each one dedicated to bringing the earnest Christian back to a new appreciation for God by thinking about how we can love him with our heart (compassion), soul (wonder), mind (curiosity), and strength (energy).

The book isn’t my normal God-type of book.  I would classify it as a Friendly-God read – not hard to understand, easy to absorb in short segments.  In fact, it kind of felt like a series of blog posts, as each section (“compassion,” for instance) had several shorter essays in it.  Many of the segments start like this:

Nothing in all creation is more mysterious or majestic than the three pounds of gray matter housed within the human cranium.  It’s the magnum opus of God’s creative genius. Nuclear imaging has given our generation a glimpse into the inner sanctum of the human mind. Dr. Harry Chugani, a pioneer in positron emission tomography (PET scans) likens the millions of neurons firing across trillions of synaptic pathways to a nuclear reactor. Even the simplest of processes sets off a firestorm of brain activity.

The segment continues to talk about how different parts of the brain do different things, and then Batterson asks, “So how do you love God with your medial ventral prefrontal cortex?”

So… there we are.  The book has a clear sense of theme, and Batterson makes a valuable point, and I agree that if we all spent a lot more time loving God we’d all be less stupid as Jesus-followers.  It’s just that his writing doesn’t grab me.

If you like an enthusiastic author applying lots of interesting things he’s read or heard to a life of following God, delivered in digestible bites, then you will like this book.

This book was provided for review by WaterBrook Multnomah.

How would you describe Jesus?  Probably “loving.” And “sacrificial.” A guy with good teaching about loving others and being kind. 

Jared Wilson is a pastor in Nashville, and has written a book that tries to get a fuller, more biblical picture of Jesus into your hands.  The theology is deep, the language is slightly snarky.  He spends 12 chapters emphasizing the powerful, holy…. well, “non-tame” aspects of Jesus.

• Jesus the Prophet
• Jesus the Provision
• Jesus the King
• Jesus the Judge

and so on. 

Your Jesus is Too Safe is solidly and tightly written.  Wilson is evangelical and rather reformed – those who are into that sort of thing will take note when he goes on the record as supporting penal substitutionary atonement (which he does in a footnote, and doesn’t expect the reader to particularly care).  I’m less interested in that, but I particularly applaud his chosen quotations by other authors.  Anyone who recommends I read Eugene Peterson AND John Piper AND N.T. Wright AND Dietrich Bonhoeffer is okay by me.

Perhaps it isn’t Wilson’s fault, but this book took me months to get through.  It sat in the car, and then sat on the coffee table.  I wasn’t reading anything  in its place, so maybe it’s just part of my current low-reading phase.  But I never found myself intrigued.  I didn’t scramble for Twitter just to post a great quotation.  I didn’t think, “Wow, so-and-so should really read this.”

The book was fine.  It is very gospel-based.  He actually acknowledges the Kingdom of God.  He is a theology nut who refrains from blasting the reader with his “nerditude.” His footnotes are funny (I think all the posted reviews likely mention the footnotes).  I think you’ll either really like his style, or he won’t make a big impact on you.  From the conclusion:

The most important way that I’ve tried to synchronize the disparate portraits is by tracing throughout the entire journey the great unifying presence of the gospel.  The gospel is the hope of the world – and these days it’s a hope that many inside our churches are just as starved for as those outside. My prayer is that more and more churches in Western evangelicalism will repent of their relegating of the gospel to a place inside the Trojan Horse of attractive programming and performance-driven worship services and self-help sermons, and once again herald it boldly as the only and supreme hope of a dying world.

I live in the suburbs.  I wear my seat belt. I wash my hands after using the bathroom. 

I live a safe life.

It turns out I also live a safe Christianity.   I read books and the Bible. I go to a small group.  I go to church every Sunday.  I give to the poor, and bring up Jesus in the conversation a lot.   But I don’t live as if Jesus was the real treasure in my life.   If I felt God might be telling me to invite the single mom with her children to live in our spare bedroom, I would decide I was mistaken.  If God wanted me to go to India to help rebuild homes after the recent floods, he would pretty much have to pick me up and put me on a plane.

But not everyone lives that way.  There are some who have realized that this safe, dull Christianity is not what God had in mind.  Gary Haugen’s Just Courage is a book that is dedicated to helping God pick me up and put me on planes.

International Justice Mission was founded in 1997 to meet the needs of the poor beyond food and medical aid.  The book describes how much of the suffering of the poor comes from violence by those with power.  The mission of IJM is to work around the world to bring justice to those who cannot afford to seek it themselves – from slavery, from loss of land, from sexual exploitation.  And because those who are in power do not want to lose it, the workers of IJM are regularly threatened and sometimes physically hurt. 

Haugen shares story after story about what becomes possible when Christians step out in faith, and put the call to serve above their fears about safety.  Oh, it’s so refreshing.  The utter dependence on God, and the complete freedom that it provides.

Haugen ends his book with a discussion of the Gospels’ Rich Young Ruler story.  He points out that too often, we interpret this as some spoiled king who refuses to let go of his great wealth (and, since we are not “rich” or a king, the story doesn’t apply to us).  But Haugen points out a different emphasis of the story.  The young man RAN to Jesus.  He was respectful and deeply interested in Jesus’ words.  He was more spiritual than most of us – carefully following God’s guidelines for living and wanting to fully live in God’s will.  And Jesus didn’t scorn this young man – he loved him.  Loved him enough to show him the one weakness, the one fear that was hindering this man.  And it wasn’t that Jesus was mad at him for being rich…

Jesus looked at him and loved him. "One thing you lack," he said. "Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me."
At this the man’s face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth.

Mark 10

Jesus was sad that the young man’s fear was stronger than his faith. 

And I’m afraid that is WAY too applicable to me.

Recommended to any Christian who is wondering why Christianity seems so bland and powerless.

I have heard about churches, universities and other organizations using the Strengths Finder assessment tool.  When Thomas Nelson listed Find Your Strongest Life in its book review program, I thought I would get an opportunity (read: free key) to take this online inventory, since the book is written by the person who developed the tool – Marcus Buckingham.  Which seemed useful.  But it turns out that the Strength Finder inventory isn’t part of this book.  This book is directed at women, and Buckingham has developed a new inventory for their needs. 

The book was a quick read and interesting.  It can be broken down into three major sections:

1. Women are over-busy, stressed and unhappy
2. Find out your strengths and make decisions that enable you to use these strengths
3. Examples and applications in work and family

The reader is directed to a free online “Strong Life Test,” an inventory that gives you your primary and secondary strengths.  These strengths have names like Influencer, Caretaker, Pioneer, Teacher, etc.  It is the choosing to use these strengths that are supposed to keep women from feeling frazzled and helpless, because it is when we are doing work we are good at, we are energized rather than exhausted.

I got the same feeling from this book that I get from eating a big bag of Skittles.  I enjoyed it while I was reading it, but there was a sugar crash almost immediately afterward.  Perhaps this is somewhat my fault – I don’t have the same goals as Buckingham does.  My goal in life isn’t to be happy and fulfilled.   I certainly enjoy moments of happiness and fulfillment, but my goal in life is to proclaim God’s kingdom in all my circumstances.  Since that is the case, I don’t really want to make major life choices based on what makes me feel strong. 

Other petty problems with the book:

• If you are a man who has decided to write a book for women, don’t put yourself on the cover.  Really.  There’s no need for that.
• The website for the Strong Life Test is rather cheesy looking (though the test itself is free – google it).
• The Test itself was not particularly appropriate for me.  Most of the questions seemed framed for those who work in an office environment.  When I got my result, I read the relevant sections in the book and decided no, I wasn’t a “teacher.” I was more of an “advisor.”

All other things being equal, I suppose, I should not choose a job or a volunteer position or family role that I am bad at or find boring.  And I do have a somewhat better sense of what I am good at, thanks to this book.   The trick for me, now, is not demanding the right to do what I want.  I like finding the joy in both good and bad circumstances.

Do you remember, back in high school, when you had to read To Kill a Mockingbird?  And then you had to write an essay? And the prompt for the essay was “Explain how the title of this book relates to the book’s theme?”  This book reminds me of that.

Donald Miller’s new book is called A Million Miles in a Thousand Years.  It is essentially a continued memoir since his bestseller Blue Like Jazz.  To oversimplify, Miller is invited to help convert his first book into a movie, he discovers his life needs more purpose, then he gives his life more purpose.  But the plot both is and is not the purpose of the book.  In learning about screenplays, Miller researches the idea of “story.”  He learns about the necessity of ambition, and inciting events, and conflict.  And he becomes more and more aware that he, the average American, does all in his power to NOT have those things happen in his own life. 

The ambitions we have will become the stories we live.  If you want to know what a person’s story is about, just ask them what they want.  If we don’t want anything, we are living boring stories, and if we want a Roomba vacuum cleaner, we are living stupid stories. 

And so this book is really about story, and choosing to live a story instead of choose safety and comfort.  Miller shows how this works in his own life and in the lives of others.

One of the things I liked least about this book is that Miller makes no attempt to really tie the whole book together tightly.  The bones of the book is this story about story, about how Don the slob becomes Don the character who wants something and overcomes conflict to get it.  But it is a gentle, rather meandering journey.  Miller is very self-deprecating, and seems almost surprised that he learns things along the journey, and doesn’t seem to have much belief that he will remember what he’s learned. 

But this is also what I liked most about the book.  The wisdom that the Don of the book finds is out there for anyone to find – it isn’t because he is some genius.  Miller writes in his blog:

…many of the Christian authors I read make the same mistake the secular authors do, though to a greater degree, and that is the writer gets in the way of the truth. The truth is in there, but so is the writer. The writer wants you to know about his message, but also that he or she is smart. The writer wants you to know about their message, but also that he is tough and you better not mess with him, and that you are a coward in comparison. The writer wants you to know about his message, but also wants you to know he is a good writer! The trick is, even if you are talking about yourself, to get out of the way. Tell the truth.

And that is the kind of book Miller has written.  It is full of truth, and he stays out of the way.  Or he is in it, but is honest enough that I think – geez.  If he can get off the sofa and live a story, then I can too.  Anyone can.

Which brings us back to the title of the book, and how it relates to the theme.  The title is mentioned right at the beginning of the book, as Miller picks up these two screenwriter guys from the airport.  And he talks about how his favorite movies are the slow, literary ones that don’t seem to be about anything but are really about everything.  And I suppose, though I really don’t see this very clearly, that the title of the book means that life is like our trip to heaven.  We’re in a car, driven by angels, on a journey that goes on way too long before we get to happiness.  And the trick is to make the car ride, even though it’s long and not much seems to be happening, important and meaningful to the people in the car with you.

Thanks to Ed Cyzewski, who sent me one of his two copies of A Million Miles, just because he thought I would like it.  Read his review and blog here.

Many Christians would like to interact with better love and understanding toward Muslims.  But Islam and Christianity have had a contentious history, and North Americans today have little training in the Muslim faith.  Most of what we know is a reaction against terrorism.   Unfortunately, this painful history, our fear, and our ignorance makes our attempts to share the gospel largely ineffective, especially against the strong decrees about apostasy that are part of Islam.

Nabeel Jabbour’s book The Crescent Through the Eyes of the Cross is a short, readable book that seeks to narrow this breach and improve our relationships with Muslims.  Jabbour is an Arab Christian who has lived and worked for many years with Muslims, and he has a doctorate in Muslim fundamentalism.  In this book, he presents the Muslim worldview towards Christians, from the point of view of a fictional Egyptian student visiting America.  “Ahmad” and his “family” represent a composite of many of the Muslims that Jabbour has interacted with over the years.  This literary device allows Jabbour to present a series of 15 problems that Muslims have with Christianity and Christians, which he can then discuss in turn.

The 15 points are:  

1. The Arab Bible and Christians who speak Arabic use a vocabulary that doesn’t match the Muslim vocabulary
2. Western Christians see the gospel through the lens of guilt and righteousness. But the Muslim worldview is based on shame vs. honor, unclean vs. clean, power vs. fear. 
3. Christians don’t understand the Qur’an or Muhammad, and falsely assume that the Qur’an is to Muslims as the Bible is to Christians, or that Muhammad is equivalent to Jesus.
4. Why should Muslims give up the Qur’an, which was dictated by God, for the Bible which was written by men?
5. The Christian history of crusade has been exacerbated by current American Middle East policies, which is fueling fanaticism rather than reducing it.
6. The West has a history of colonizing Muslim countries, and current occupations feed fears of neocolonialism.
7. American support of Israel and other policies hurt and offend all Muslims, not just the Muslims directly affected by the policies.
8. America wants moderate Muslims more than fundamentalist Muslims, but do not see how the unwavering American support of Israel over Palestine drives Muslims toward fundamentalism.
9. Since 9/11, the main American strategy against terrorism is to blow it up. This does not promote moderation either.
10.   Muslims feel their theology is closer to Christianity, since they accept Jesus as a prophet. They do not understand why we don’t feel theologically more sympathetic to them compared to Jews.
11. Christians should not see all Muslims as fanatics.
12. Christians seem to package Jesus with American politics, economics and culture.  American culture of immorality and sex is highly offensive to Muslims.
13. A Muslim who converts to Christianity shames his entire family
14. A Muslim who converts to Christianity loses his entire support system: jobs, literature, family, culture.
15. Many Muslims are told to change their name to a Western name when they convert, which is interpreted as treason.

This is my first book on Islam, so I am not in a position to judge whether these are really the 15 problems that most represent the Muslim problem with Christianity.  I also have no objective comparison to the responses that Jabbour gives. 

But what I like about this book is that it is humble in spirit. I respect authors who admit wrongs and suggest love and a listening heart as good solutions.  It helps, of course, that I already think the US has missed several opportunities to improve relations with Muslims by choosing invasion over nonviolent support (Three Cups of Tea, anyone?).  But I was especially intrigued by the ideas of using the stories of fear/power and dirty/clean to better describe the Gospel. Jabbour also describes the difference between converting a young student and thus forever isolating him from his old life, versus reaching out to the family of the young student and earning the right to discuss Jesus through honoring the Muslim parents.

My least favorite part of the book is the “construct” of Ahmad.  Jabbour made it very clear that Ahmad and his family were fictional composites, but I found this device to be distracting.  It seems like a simple listing of these 15 problems and examples of Muslim responses would have worked just as well. 

Jabbour also does not make an effort to defend some of these “problems.”  In the first problem of the Arab Bible using a different name for Jesus than the Qur’an, I was curious and looked this up for myself.  The explanation I found was that Mohammed’s description of Issa is not related to either the Hebrew/Aramaic or Greek names of Jesus, and is associated with a theology that denies Jesus’ divinity. So Arab Christians use the more Arabic equivalent of Jesus’ name, Yasou,’ to avoid both the incorrect nomenclature and associated incorrect theology.

There is no way, of course, that Jabbour could fit all of the complexities of Christianity and Islam into one small book.  And this book does fulfill its goal – I do have a more sympathetic understanding of Islam, and I do feel like I could love and listen and share in a way that would better reach the Muslim mind.  Jabbour encourages additional research, and provides more to interested readers if they ask by email.

This book is recommended to those who are willing to separate Jesus from American culture, and approach interactions with those who are different with a humble spirit.  An excellent start to improving interactions with Muslims.

I suppose books on apologetics might be oversimplified into two types – those that Christians read to better talk to non-Christians, and those that Christians hand to non-Christians for them to read on their own.

Both of these, of course, are not ideal.  The first seems like it’s planning for an attack, and the second says, “I can’t defend my faith, but this other guy can.  So read him.” 

What would be ideal?  Perhaps a book that Christians could read, and think to themselves, “Wow!  That’s such a wonderful way to describe Jesus, or the world, or heaven!  I can’t wait to see if my neighbor X likes this idea as much as I do!”  To me, Simply Christian: Why Christianity Makes Sense was that book.  Written in 2006 by N.T. Wright, it is a beautifully written story of why the world is the way it is, and why we wish it were different, and how God has made the right world possible.

To give you a quick overview, the book is divided into three sections.  In the first, Wright explores the ideas of justice, spirituality, relationships, and beauty.  How we ache for these things, but can see that none of them is fully realized.  In the second section,

Wright gives a great summary of biblical theology.  He uses the full Old and New Testaments to talk about the big pictures of covenant, exodus, tabernacle, and word, and how Jesus fits into and fulfils God’s plan to fully redeem his creation.  And in the third section, he talks about how Christians are to live this new plan through worship, prayer, scripture, communion and baptism. 

I greatly enjoyed this book for both structural and theological reasons. 

First – structure. Wright has the ability to write a supremely organized book with set ideas (justice, spirituality, relationship, beauty) and return to them again and again. He does this with these longings, with worldviews (pantheism, deism) and with his themes of heaven, word, and kingdom.  But the bones of the book are highly organized, his tone is lyrical and readable and thoughtful without being academic.

Second – theology. N.T. Wright is someone who thinks that the gospel is about God bringing his whole creation back to rights.  That we do have a responsibility after we are saved to help God in his kingdom. We become God’s children by believing in his saving grace, and then we are to be “agents, heralds and stewards” of God’s new kingdom.  I love this.  I’ve given a couple samples of his words here and here.

I do feel like the book would have been strengthened with a larger discussion of sin and grace.  Wright spends very little time on this.  I suppose I should go read a similar book by John Piper to get the full story.

But overall, this is the sort of book that I would love to talk about with someone who was interested in God and the world.  Do you know someone who is interested in justice and beauty, and thinks Christianity is all about rules and hell, and who isn’t interested in that?  Offer to read this book with them, and have some great conversations. 

Larry Crabb had an interesting thought in Real Church, which I finished reading this past week.  He talks about the feeling of emptiness (the quintessential “God-shaped hole”) that all Christians feel.  His point is that it’s easy to fill that hole with stuff – with alcohol or porn, or even books and coffee and friends.  But his deeper point is that you can’t just fill that hole with God instead.  God isn’t in the business of making us feel good.  He’s in the business of bringing us into relationship with him.

Anyway, that is my attempt to introduce you to the newest book I’ve finished, written by Susan E. Isaacs, called Angry Conversations with God: a Snarky but Authentic Spiritual Memoir.  Isaacs has written for television and movies, but this is her first book, and it is excellent.  Her main premise is that although she has been a Christian from childhood, she has struggled with her relationship with God throughout her adult life.  She has tried to put him first (her true “husband,” biblically), but it seems like God has pretty much stomped on her in return – struggles with family, church, career and relationships abound.  So she drags God to “couples counseling,” with an actual therapist who is willing to help Susan work through her issues with God.  The format of the book takes us through major events in Isaac’s life, with each one followed by the therapy session.  Susan provides both her own voice and that of God’s.

I enjoyed this journey for several reasons.  First, Isaacs is funny.  She shares my “spiritual gift” of sarcasm, so reading her life story is just inherently entertaining.  Her life is also interesting.  I have no idea what the world of TV and film is like, and we are introduced to a wonderful selection of her friends through the years. Second, Isaacs is transparent and honest.  She is willing to share her ugliness and fears and her attitude towards God.  I loved that she WANTED to be in relationship with God, and was ANGRY with him for making it so difficult. 

Third, Isaac’s theology is great.  The book is very helpful for exploring why God would allow things to be painful for someone who loves him.  She provides interesting insight that, perhaps, God brings imperfect people and things into our lives because we’re the best he’s got to work with at that moment.  That’s actually kind of encouraging (though I bet it’s depressing for God).  And while God starts out pretty snarky and sarcastic (as “spoken” by Isaacs), by the end we see his deep determination to follow and love us through our life journey. 

A good quote, where Isaacs ponders the commitment God is asking of her:

   “Come on, I defended myself.  Who would love someone who offered a life of disappointment and hardship?  Sure, people made wedding vows: for better or worse, for richer or poorer.  But what sane person would knowingly sign up just for the worse, the poorer, the sicker, the sadder? Who on earth would do that?  Come on, who?
   A list of heroes and saints, real and fictional, came to my mind.  Frodo Baggins, William Wallace, Dorothy Day, Mother Theresa. Mom. Each was dogged by pain and suffering. They fought evil without, doubt within. Some of them died, but I loved them for their courage. And then there was Jesus, who did not consider his equality with God something to hold on to tightfistedly (the way I hung on to my promises) but emptied himself, became a servant, was stripped, filleted, and hung on a cross to die a horrifying death.
   Why had they done it? For the goodie bag? For the glory? No. For the worse, the poorer, in sickness until death.  For the love.”

I highly recommend for anyone who has wondered why loving God seems hard.