Reading and Readers

Whoever subtitled this book, "Faithful, Flawed and Fruitful", said more than he knew. For he was not only describing the saints in this book, he was also describing the book itself.
Hi, my name is Terence and I'm your host for Reading and Readers a podcast where I review Christian books for you. Today's episode is Part 2 of my review on John Piper's "27 Servants of Sovereign Joy: Faithful, Flawed and Fruitful." 1024 pages, published by Crossway in September 2022. This book is available in Amazon Kindle for USD34.99, and in Logos for USD35.99, but as I revealed in the last episode, you can get this Piper book, for free in desiringgod.com. That's desiringgod.com. (I feel like I'm revealing a secret, something publishers don't want me to tell anyone but Piper's books are free, legally free.)
Recap
A brief recap of the last episode. 27 Servants of Sovereign Joy is a collection of nine books. Each book consists of three biographies. In the last episode, I picked one man that best represents the theme of the entire book, and that man was Augustine. So if you are wondering whether you will like this book, you can listen to the last episode or even better you can read the 26 pages that make up Piper's biography on Augustine.
I also pointed out that each book has a theme and that theme is conveyed from a Reformed base. Before these biographies were written books, they were first messages spoken in the Bethlehem Conference for Pastors, a 'conclave of Calvinists'. Piper tells these stories to teach and encourage those pastors first and later to all Christians how to live in joy, in endurance, in contending for the faith, in suffering and more, the more that we will see today.
The Most Piper-Like Book
In Part 1, I looked at Books 1-5 now I look at Books 6-9.
I thought I would have an easy time doing Part 2. I expected the remaining books to be the same well-written God-magnifying, Christ-exalting, Holy-Spirit-edifying reading that I enjoyed. Looking ahead to the final book, I expected a climatic conclusion with Jonathan Edwards (Piper's hero), Martyn Lloyd-Jones (my hero) and Bill Piper (Piper's father). Those were my expectations, but after finishing the book, I'm disappointed to say... well, let's not get ahead of ourselves. You must listen till the end.
We have here the last four books in this collection.

• Book 6 is titled, "Seeing Beauty and Saying Beautifully", we have here the lives of George Herbert, George Whitefield and C.S. Lewis.
• Book 7 is "A Camaraderie of Confidence" with Charles Spurgeon, George Müeller and Hudson Taylor.
• Book 8 is "The Power of Doctrinal Holiness" with Andrew Fuller, Robert Murray McCheyne and J.C. Ryle.
• Book 9 is "The Passionate Pursuit of Revival and Christ-Exalting Joy" with Jonathan Edwards, Martyn Lloyd-Jones and Bill Piper.

Book 6 is the most Piper-like book. Piper did not launch a Reformation like Martin Luther (Book 1), nor suffered in the Indian wilderness like David Brainerd (Book 2), nor contended against the world like Athanasius (Book 4).
Book 6 is a special book because here, we have George Herbert the poet. Piper is a poet. We have George Whitefield the dramatic preacher. Piper is a dramatic preacher. We have C.S. Lewis, who makes Christianity simple and beautiful. Piper makes the faith simple and beautiful.
Vividly Speaking of Spectacular Realities
Let's focus on one man. George Whitefield, the Preacher of the Great Awakening. In an age without cars or planes, thousands upon thousands came from far away to hear him. Thousands upon thousands stood in the field under the night sky under the rain just to hear him. There were many preachers so why does Whitefield stand out? Because he saw beauty and expressed it beautifully.
Piper quotes Benjamin Franklin who said:
Every accent, every emphasis, every modulation of voice, was so perfectly well turned, and well-placed, that without being interested in the subject, one could not help being pleased with the discourse: a pleasure of much the same kind with that received from an excellent piece of music.
Strong praise from a non-believer. But maybe it is damning praise. Piper quotes a critic, Harry Stout, who claims that Whitefield was plying a religious trade, pursuing religious fame, craving respect and power, driven by egotism and putting on 'performances' and 'integrating religious discourse into the emerging language of consumption'.
Piper writes, "I do not doubt that Whitefield was 'acting' as he preached."
If Piper himself concedes that Whitefield was acting on stage, is it wise of us to look up to an actor, no matter how gifted or devout the showman may be?
Then Piper asks the crucial question, "Why was Whitefield 'acting'?"
Piper quotes Whitefield. Whitefield is speaking.
I’ll tell you a story. The Archbishop of Canterbury in the year 1675 was acquainted with Mr. Butterton the [actor]. One day the Archbishop ... said to Butterton ... “Pray inform me Mr. Butterton, what is the reason you actors on stage can affect your congregations with speaking of things imaginary, as if they were real, while we in church speak of things real, which our congregations only receive as if they were imaginary?” “Why my Lord,” says Butterton, “the reason is very plain. We actors on stage speak of things imaginary, as if they were real and you in the pulpit speak of things real as if they were imaginary.”
Soon after that, Piper concludes:
This means that there are three ways to speak. First, you can speak of an unreal, imaginary world as if it were real -- that is what actors do in a play. Second, you can speak about a real world as if it were unreal -- that is what half-hearted pastors do when they preach about glorious things in a way that implies they are not as terrifying or as wonderful as they are. And third, you can speak about a real spiritual world as if it were wonderfully, terrifyingly, magnificently real, because it is.
So Piper takes the essence of Whitefield, the great preacher, and asks what does the man see and why does he express it the way he does.
He does the same with the next person is C.S. Lewis.
Romantic, Rationalist, Master Likener, Evangelist
In previous biographies, Piper showed us how the Reformed doctrine is the ground from which Bunyan, Machen, Paton would tower mightily and shine for Christ. But not all Reformed. For example, Piper makes a footnote that in one of William Wilberforce's letters, he writes, "I myself am no Calvinist." Yet Piper notes that many of Wilberforce's closest and admired friends were Calvinists. And when he looked for a church to attend, he often chose to sit under Calvinists. So we will always get a Reformed perspective on all these men, whether they are Reformed or not.
And C.S. Lewis is not. Piper has a sub-heading that reads: "Lewis's defective views" which includes views on inerrancy of Scripture, salvation without Christ and atonement. Those are fundamental doctrines that fill up Piper's theology.
Piper writes:
Lewis rarely shows his exegesis. He doesn’t deal explicitly with many texts. He is not an expositor. His value is not in his biblical exegesis. It lies elsewhere.
Piper shows that it lies in him as a romantic, rationalist, master likener and evangelist.
What is a master likener? C.S. Lewis famously wrote:
Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.
I'm not sure whether Piper was the first to see Lewis as romantic, rationalist, master likener and evangelist, but those categories fit him well and I've taken to think of Piper on those terms as well. And in doing so, shows us how to distinguish the man from his doctrine, and that we can embrace one without the other.
Why No Women?
For the second half of this episode, I want to present two criticisms against the book. The first criticism is all too prevalent, especially in today's race- and gender- sensitive culture and it's a criticism I refute.
The second criticism comes from my finishing the book and I want to express my disappointment because this should have been a much stronger book.
Let's start with the first criticism. When I started the book, I went through the list and, without meaning to, noted that in this list of 27 people, they are all men. Not only that, they were all white men. And without any malice or hidden agenda, without being in one political party or denomination, or ideology or theology, one could innocently ask, "Pastor John, are there really no women or non-white people in all history who could make your list?"
Nowhere in the book does Piper directly answer that question but I think I can draw out a reasonable response based on what he wrote here and the complementarian view I know he holds. The complementarian view is that God created men and women to hold different and complementary roles. For example, the role of the pastor is only for men, and not for women.
This is not the podcast or the book to get into this debate. My purpose is not to persuade you the complementarian view, but it is to show how that view permeates the book and helps explains the all men list.
Consider the genesis of this book. These were not messages to married couples, or to the family, or to the church in general.
These were exemplary men that Piper picked to encourage and teach pastors. Only men can be pastors. So his examples are men.
Does this mean that women have nothing to offer to pastors? No. Piper never says that. You would be making an argument from silence. He brings out men as examples because he believes men need to see men being manly.
"To see men being manly?"
Yes. And there is a chapter in Book 8 that proves my point. The title of that chapter is: "The Frank and Manly Mr. Ryle: The Value of a Masculine Ministry".
As part of the lessons from the life of J.C. Ryle, Piper gives us 8 traits of a masculine ministry.
Listen to the first one: "A masculine ministry believes that it is more fitting that men take the lash of criticism that must come in a public ministry, than to unnecessarily expose women to this assault."
Piper goes on to explain how this masculine ministry is seen in J.C. Ryle. What about women? For this first trait, Piper ends by saying:
Courage in the midst of combat, especially harsh and painful combat, whether with arms or with words, is not something a woman can’t exercise, nor even something she shouldn’t exercise under certain circumstances. The reason we call such courage “manly” is not that a woman can’t show it, but that we feel a sense of fitness and joy when a man steps up to risk his life, or his career, with courage -- but we (should) feel awkward if a woman is thrust into that role on behalf of men. She may be able to do it, and we may admire her for doing it, if necessary. But we wish the men were numerous enough and strong enough and courageous enough that the women could rejoice in the men, rather than take their place.
And he does this for all of the 8 traits. First, what he means by it and how J.C. Ryle demonstrates it, followed by how masculine ministry works with respect to women, with the expectation that both men and women welcome it.
You may agree or not agree with Piper's complementarian view but we have to agree that Piper is consistent within the confines of this worldview.
Why All White?
That explains why they are all men, now let's attempt to justify them being all white.
Can you name me ten Christians who have impacted your faith? And if you can do so, praise God for surrounding you with ten witnesses of Christ! The question is should you be expected to pick names to fulfil a diversity quota? And how does that diversity quota even look like?
Does Augustine fulfil it? He is from modern day Algeria. Or Athanasius from Alexandria in Egypt? Does Hudson Taylor count? A British man who gave his life for the Chinese. Does Adoniram Judson count? An American who gave his life for the Burmese. Because in his time, you couldn't find a Burmese Christian, so would he do?
There is a place for diversity because God has created a diverse human race. But even though I'm not white, I find I have a deep connection to these men, not because of the skin colour or even gender, but because they are Christians.
I saw a meme the other day where on the top you have a group of girls agonising over the right skin tone for Ariel in the Little Mermaid. While at the bottom, we have boys of all colours looking at a giant robot, thinking, "I am Optimus Prime."
In the same way, all of us should look at these giants of faith and say, "I am a Christian."
Ramming A Theme Distorts A Life
So that's my rejection to what I consider as an invalid and unfair criticism against Piper's list of heroes. What I say next, is my criticism against what should be a stronger book.
After completing the book, my conclusion is "Less is More". The book should have ended with 21 servants instead of 27. And if listened to Part 1 of this review, you will remember that it was 21 but it was expanded to 27, with the inclusion of Books 8 and 9.
In Books 1 to 7, the theme works. For example, in Book 5, Tyndale, Paton and Judson suffered for Christ. In Book 6, Herbert, Whitefield and Lewis saw beauty and gloried in it. These themes jump at you. You would naturally group these men together.
The problem I have is the theme for Books 8 and 9 don't work.
Book 9 is titled the "Passionate Pursuit of Revival and Christ-Exalting Joy." We have Jonathan Edwards, Martyn Lloyd-Jones and Bill Piper. In order to make the theme work, Piper distorted the the life and ministry of Lloyd-Jones.
It would be like describing the life and ministry of John MacArthur by Strange Fire, a cessationist position, rather than his crowning achievement of expounding through the New Testament book-by-book, verse-by-verse, and completing this task in 42 years.
Or it would be like describing the John Piper's life's work by saying he objected to women being pastors. That's not wrong. But imagine reading a 40 page biography on Piper and the emphasis and concluding thought was John Piper doesn't like women pastors. Is that the emphasis? What about Christian Hedonism? Or you know... desiring God?
So I am not saying that what Piper wrote on Martyn Lloyd-Jones is wrong. It is a possibly good analysis of Lloyd-Jones' position on revival, Pentecostalism and his practice. The section that ends the chapter is titled, "Did He Practice What He Preached?". And I would say that is not how the story of any of these 27 men should end. All of these men, including Martyn Lloyd-Jones deserves a better conclusion.
Where Is The Conclusion?
And that is the second part of my criticism. Where is the conclusion? In Books 1 to 7 we have a concluding chapter after the three biograhies. We have a separate chapter that ends the book.
In Book 1, we have a chapter on Augustine. We zoomed into the life of Augustine, then we switched targets and zoomed into Martin Luther, then lastly we zoomed into John Calvin. The most important part of the book is when Piper zooms out and tells us how Augustine, Martin Luther and John Calvin all connect to the theme of the Legacy of Sovereign Joy.
Piper puts these men side-by-side, standing shoulder to shoulder, we can see their similarities and differences with respect to, say, Sovereign Joy. Or Hidden Smile of God. Or The Roots of Endurance. I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say the conclusion is what sets this series of biographies apart from all the other biographies you can get out there.
So when I get to Books 8 and 9. It is missing. And I'm left guessing. The revival connection between Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Jonathan Edwards and Bill Piper is very tenuous. Do you know who would be a better replacement for Lloyd-Jones? Billy Graham. From what I heard and read elsewhere, Bill Piper and John Piper have a stronger personal connection to Billy Graham than they do with Martyn Lloyd-Jones.
And that personal connection would work well with the personal touch that Piper ends with.
21 is Better Than 27
In conclusion, 27 Servants of Sovereign Joy is a splendid book. These are all men you want to know. They will encourage you. They will teach you many things. These short biographies will show you the wide spectrum of what it means to be faithful, some came to faith early, some late, for some their faith bloomed in a short life, some live a good long life of service.
We see here flawed saints. We have depression, loneliness, sexual addiction, pride, it's all here. Whatever trials and temptations you face, you will find solace in these companions.
And they were fruitful. Some saw their fruits while they lived by God's mercy, but some never saw any fruits. But how they would wonder to see what amazing things God has done to bring entire nations to faith and inspire missionaries, martyrs and ministers. We thank God that their faith is proclaimed in all the world.
If I had a wish, it would be that Piper would re-write Books 8 and 9. This could have been a much stronger book. A go-to classic for biographies for everyone. If not for the fatal flaws in the last two books. Less is more. 21 is better than 27.
But don't let that stop you from getting and reading and profiting from this book. You can always stop yourself at 21.
This is a Reading and Reader's review of 27 Servants of Sovereign Joy: Faithful, Flawed and Fruitful. 1024 pages, published by Crossway in September 2022. Available for USD34.99 in Amazon Kindle, USD35.99 in Logos and free in Desiring God. You can check out all the links in the show notes of this podcast or you can go to the website at www.readingandreaders.com. That’s www.readingandreaders.com.
The next episode will be a special episode where I do a long term reflection. Of all the books that I have reviewed, which books have made a lasting impression in my life? As we know, we could read a book and rave about it but it's forgotten after the next great book. On other other hand, we could read a book and didn't think much of it, at first, but later we could trace the unexpected impact of that book. And I have one book in mind. Let me tell you about it in the next episode.
Why don't you join me in this reflection? It's the end of year, why not take a minute to reflect which books or book reviews you enjoyed and drop me a note. You can contact me at www.readingandreaders.com, that's readingandreaders.com. I look forward to hearing from you. Thank you for listening. Have a Merry, Merry Christmas!
Book List

• 27 Servants of Sovereign Joy: Faithful, Flawed and Fruitful" by John Piper. Amazon. Logos. Desiring God.

If you were on a deserted island, what one book would you bring with you (other than the Bible)? Think about it, if it's only one book, it should be a big, big book cause you might be spending a long time on the island. Seeing that you will have no friends on the island, you should bring some spiritual friends. How about bringing exactly 27 spiritual friends?
Hi, my name is Terence and I'm your host for Reading and Readers, a podcast where I review Christian books for you. Today I review "27 Servants of Sovereign Joy: Faithful, Flawed and Fruitful" by John Piper. A whopping 1024 pages, published by Crossway in September 2022. Available for USD34.99 in Amazon Kindle, USD35.99 in Logos, but listen to the end to get this book for free.
A Collection for the Generation
Preacher, teacher, writer, poet. Pastor John Piper has made many, many grown men and women all around the world cry with joy through his sermons, books and podcasts. But what will be John Piper's most enduring work? Will it be one of his books? Perhaps "Desiring God"? It is after all the book that gave the name to his ministry. Or his magnum opus, "Providence", a book I reviewed in Episode 7. Another likely contender is today's book, "27 Servants of Sovereign Joy". This book is an update of his 2018 book titled, "21 Servants of Sovereign Joy".
That book was a collection of 7 books. This book is a collection which adds the never before published Books 8 and 9. This is a great deserted island book. It's kind of like cheating cause it's 9 books in 1 but it's not because it is technically one book.
In today's review, I'll review Books 1 to 5. In the next episode, I'll review the rest. You might think that it's because it's such a good book that it deserves two dedicated episodes. That might be true but real reason is I haven't finished it. I'm only up to Book 7. I don't want to delay the podcast release nor do I want to rush through the book. I'm taking Piper's advice here. To read good books, slowly.
To get an idea on how these books are organised and how they can help you, let me ask this question: If you could phone three friends, who would you call to remember joy, to endure or to suffer well? Well here are the names Piper picked.

• Book 1: The Legacy of Sovereign Joy. Augustine. Martin Luther. John Calvin.
• Book 2: The Hidden Smile of God. John Bunyan. William Cowper. David Brainerd.
• Book 3: The Roots of Endurance. John Newton. Charles Simeon. William Wilberforce.
• Book 4: Contending for Our All. Athanasius. John Owen. J. Gresham Machen.
• Book 5: Filling Up the Afflictions of Christ. William Tyndale. John G. Paton. Adoniram Judson.

Do you know those names? Do you have some idea on the richest men, or the prettiest women, or the strongest, fastest, smartest sportsmen in the world? Then it is only right and good that Christians know the saints who have rejoiced the most, endured the most and suffered the most.
Though They Died, They Still Speak
In the preface to this book, Piper writes:
I think that what was said of Abel in Hebrews 11:4 can be said of any saint whose story is told: “Through his faith, though he died, he still speaks” (ESV). It has been a great pleasure as I have listened to these voices. But not only a pleasure. They have strengthened my hand in the work of the ministry again and again. They have helped me feel that I was part of something much bigger than myself or my century. They have showed me that the worst of times are not the last of times, and they made the promise visible that God works all things for our good.
There is more but you get the purpose of the book, the reason why Piper presents these lives to the pastors in the Bethlehem Conference.
This means that if you are looking for critical scholarship, if you are looking for a new perspective on George Herbert, or George Whitefield, or George Muller, this is not the book for you.
Piper did a good study. The evidence is in the footnotes. Lots of them. Lots of quotes. Quotes from their own sermons and writings. Quotes from contemporaries, family and friends. Even quotes from critics and skeptics and modern scholars, but I repeat myself.
In Piper's own words:
Throughout the year before each conference, I would read about the life and ministry of some key figure in church history. Then I would decide on some thematic focus to give unity to the message, and I would try to distill my reading into an hour-long message. The messages -- and the edited versions -- are unashamedly hortatory. I aim to teach and encourage. I also aim never to distort the truth of a man’s life and work. But I do advocate for biblical truths that his life illustrates.
You may ask, "Why read Piper?" You could read Augustine's Confession or David Brainerd's Journal. Why not get it straight from the saint's mouth? Because Piper takes what he reads in a year and distills them. Augustine's Confession is 161 pages long, Brainerd's Journal is 426 pages. And if Piper read what the saints wrote, he might even have read John Owen's commentary on Hebrews. All 3600 pages of them.
For the rest of us mere mortals, we benefit from Piper's biographical portrait, each person has, give or take, 40 pages long. And after reading these short portraits, nothing would give Piper more pleasure than to know how you thirst to better know such true pilgrims.
The Man Who Best Represents The BookLet's pick one man as an example. And I struggled at this! From Books 1 to 5, I have fifteen man to choose from. Do I choose my favourite? Oh, how can I choose?
I can't even choose my favourite John! The book has John Calvin, John Bunyan, John Newton, John Owen, John G. Paton, John Charles Ryle (a.k.a. J.C. Ryle), John Gresham Machen. All the men have impacted me in different ways in different times of my life, it is an impossible choice. I was going to roll a dice until I thought of a different question.
"Who best represents the book? Whose life crystallises the theme of the book?" And when I asked that, one name rose above the rest. And it's a name that I believe the other 26 men would agree with a smile on their face.
Let me read the prayer he wrote in his most famous book, titled "Confessions".
How sweet all at once it was for me to be rid of those fruitless joys which I had once feared to lose. ... You drove them from me, you who are the true, the sovereign joy. You drove them from me and took their place, you who are sweeter than all pleasure, though not to flesh and blood, you who outshine all light, yet are hidden deeper than any secret in our hearts, you who surpass all honor, though not in the eyes of men who see all honor in themselves. ... O Lord my God, my Light, my Wealth, and my Salvation.
This man coined the phrase "Sovereign Joy", which is the title of the book and the theme of the whole series.
Remember, before this collection was published as one big book, it was a series of small books. The series was titled, "The Swans Are Not Silent". You can read the origin story in Book 1. The man I'm thinking of is the swan, the original swan, in that story.
Martin Luther was a monk in his order, John Calvin quotes him extensively in his writings, and John Piper listed him as the first of the twenty seven, he is none other than St. Augustine of Hippo. He coined the phrase "Sovereign Joy".
What Sets This Book Apart From Other Biographies
This sovereign joy is what sets this collection apart from other biographies. Someone else might tell a better story of William Cowper, or William Wilberforce or William Tyndale. A biographer like Iain Murray can undoubtedly do a masterful work of art with these subjects. Iain Murray inspired Piper to do this series.
Even so I can't think of any one better than John Piper to tell the story of the sovereign joy in these 27 men, in their persevering, in their suffering, in their contending. I can't think of anyone better than John Piper. Merely because his entire life and ministry is an extension of Augustine's.
Piper writes:
Few people in the history of the church have surpassed Augustine in portraying the greatness and beauty and desirability of God. He is utterly persuaded by Scripture and experience “that he is happy who possesses God.” “You made us for yourself, and our hearts find no peace till they rest in you.” He will labor with all his might to make this God of sovereign grace and sovereign joy known and loved in the world.
And what may turn some readers off is the Reformed flavour of the book as captured in Piper's quote of Augustine here:
A man’s free-will, indeed, avails for nothing except to sin, if he knows not the way of truth; and even after his duty and his proper aim shall begin to become known to him, unless he also take delight in and feel a love for it, he neither does his duty, nor sets about it, nor lives rightly. Now, in order that such a course may engage our affections, God’s “love is shed abroad in our hearts” not through the free-will which arises from ourselves, but “through the Holy Ghost, which is given to us” (Romans 5:5).
Unabashedly Reformed
If your blood pressure goes up every time you see a tulip, then allow me to put things in perspective.
John Piper is unabashedly Reformed but Piper does not set out to be tribal or controversial.
I say this because of how he groups the people. In Book 4, Contending For Our All, the theme is to contend, to fight! Piper could be tribal here. He could have rallied people to the Calvinist cause. In the blue corner, George Whitefield the Calvinist. In the red corner, John Wesley the Arminian. Piper could have called us to join Charles Spurgeon to contend against the Arminian belief.
Instead, Piper puts George Whitefield in Book 6: Seeing Beauty and Saying Beautifully, where he brings out Whitefield's preaching power. Every Christian can celebrate Whitefield's preaching prowess. Piper puts Charles Spurgeon in Book 7: A Camaraderie of Confidence, where he brings out Spurgeon's common man ministry.
And who does he put in Book 4? He introduces to us Athanasius who contended against Arianism, the belief that Jesus was not truly God. He picks John Owen who contended for holiness, public and private. And lastly he gives us Machen who contended against modernity a.k.a. liberalism.
As he tells the story of all these men, he brings out the Reformed doctrine -- not to persuade you to take Reformed, he doesn't want you to take the Reformed doctrine, he wants you to take Jesus. The doctrine is the bedrock from which they grasp Jesus and they contend, they fight. You may ask, "How can Piper ask us to take Jesus and not the Reformed system if he brings out the Reformed system to present Jesus?"
Piper articulates it better than I ever can. Let me read what is currently my favourite paragraph. Piper starts Book 4: Contending For Our All, with these words.
Some controversy is crucial for the sake of life-giving truth. Running from it is a sign of cowardice. But enjoying it is usually a sign of pride. Some necessary tasks are sad, and even victory is not without tears—unless there is pride. The reason enjoying controversy is a sign of pride is that humility loves truth-based unity more than truth-based victory. Humility loves Christ- exalting exultation more than Christ-defending confrontation—even more than Christ-defending vindication. Humility delights to worship Christ in spirit and truth. If it must fight for worship-sustaining truth, it will, but that is not because the fight is pleasant. It’s not even because victory is pleasant. It’s because knowing and loving and proclaiming Christ for who he really is and what he really did is pleasant.
And to the Christian who thinks that the time spent on endless arguments about doctrines should be better spent doing good. Or for Christians who cannot see how doctrine can be a bedrock to faith. Piper says this:
There are more immediately crucial tasks than controversy about the truth and meaning of the gospel. For example, it is more immediately crucial that we believe the gospel, and proclaim it to the unreached, and pray for power to attend the preaching of the gospel. But this is like saying that flying food to starving people is more immediately crucial than the science of aeronautics. True. But the food will not be flown to the needy if someone is not doing aeronautics. It is like saying that giving penicillin shots to children dying of fever is more immediately crucial than the work of biology and chemistry. True. But there would be no penicillin without such work.
Thus the Reformed doctrine is not an ends but rather a means to seeing Jesus. And that's why I think this book is useful for all Christians. Piper's enthusiasm for Jesus is contagious and as you read, you wish you can see Jesus the way Piper sees Jesus. You wish that you can live wholeheartedly for Jesus the way these 27 men lived for Jesus. Don't you wish for that?
Finding Joy in Suffering
Especially, and this is my final point for this episode of this review, when we see them persevering, enduring and suffering. As is my custom when I read a good book, I shared excerpt with people I who I think can benefit.
On the life of John G. Paton, a name I didn't know before this book, Piper writes:
Over and over this faith sustained him in the most threatening and frightening situations. As he was trying to escape from Tanna at the end of four years of dangers, he and Abraham were surrounded by raging natives who kept urging each other to strike the first blow.
Then Piper quotes from Paton's autobiography:
My heart rose up to the Lord Jesus; I saw Him watching all the scene. My peace came back to me like a wave from God. I realized that I was immortal till my Master’s work with me was done. The assurance came to me, as if a voice out of Heaven had spoken, that not a musket would be fired to wound us, not a club prevail to strike us, not a spear leave the hand in which it was held vibrating to be thrown, not an arrow leave the bow, or a killing stone the fingers, without the permission of Jesus Christ, whose is all power in Heaven and on Earth. He rules all Nature, animate and inanimate, and restrains even the Savage of the South Seas.
The story of John G. Paton is far more exciting than any Marvel or DC or Hollywood movie. This is a true story of our brother in Christ battling the kingdom of darkness. It's not a scriptwriter's comic book adaptation where an actor pretends to be a god of thunder in front of a green screen. I tell you, on that Day, many who ridiculed Christians worshipping Jesus, those people will be ridiculed for idolising men and women who pretended to be gods.
My life is richer as I read of William Cowper's depression, David Brainerd's loneliness and Adoniram Judson's lost after lost after lost. One of Adoniram Judson last words were, "How few there are ... who die so hard!"
The movies you watch, the books you read and the music you listen to can be inspiring, but where does your hope come from? In Piper's book, for these 27 men, their hope comes from the Lord.
Ending Part I
This is the end of Part I of this book review. It's a 1000 page collection of nine books of 27 servants of God picked by John Piper to encourage Christians to savour joy, to endure, to contend, to suffer and so much more.
There are plenty of biographies out there, but what you get here is a determined expression of sovereign joy from a poet-writer whose whole ministry is caught up in that heavenly joy.
You know those shows where a soldier reviews war movies and he tells you things that you never noticed or consider those behind the scenes clips where we see the movie makers produce their work.
In this book, we have John Piper, himself a servant of sovereign joy reviewing the lives of other outstanding servants of joy and as he rejoices and his joy bleeds out from the pages, we also rejoice. And he also shows us what goes on behind the scenes. We see their flaws, struggles and pain. They have every reason to reject God, except for one, they know him and love him.
So that's all for this episode. Give me two weeks to finish the book and put my thoughts in order. In the next episode we will see how Piper deeply admires and firmly disagrees with C.S. Lewis. Something for us to learn there. Looking ahead, Piper has saved the best for last because the final book lists Jonathan Edwards, Martyn Lloyd-Jones and Bill Piper (his father). I can't wait to get there.
This is a Reading and Readers review, Part I, of "27 Servants of Sovereign Joy: Faithful, Flawed and Fruitful" by John Piper. A whopping 1024 pages, published by Crossway in September 2022. Available for USD34.99 in Amazon Kindle, USD35.99 in Logos and free in Desiring God. You can check out all the links in the show notes of this podcast or you can go to the website at www.readingandreaders.com. That's www.readingandreaders.com.
Thank you and I'll see you for the next episode.
Book List

• 27 Servants of Sovereign Joy: Faithful, Flawed and Fruitful" by John Piper. Amazon. Logos. Desiring God.

"Do you want to be possessed by a Spirit that is like Jesus -— a Spirit that is pure, gentle, sane, wise and loving?" That's a quote from A.W. Tozer. And if you want to take him up on his offer, keep listening.
Hi, my name is Terence and I'm your host for Reading and Readers, a podcast where I review Christian books for you. Today I review "The Counselor: Straight Talk about the Holy Spirit" by A.W. Tozer. 192 pages, published by Moody Publishers in May 2015. Available in Amazon Kindle for USD7.99 or you can get it for USD1.99 in Faithlife.
Every month Faithlife gives away a free book, and for November the free book is "Choosing Gratitude: Your Journey to Joy" by Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth. Along with a free book, they give a list of generously discounted books. And in that list, for this month, we have "The Counselor" by A.W. Tozer for USD1.99. And I thought it would be nice to review Tozer, one of the most quoted authors in the Christian world. He is so quotable, I have two books, "The Quotable Tozer I" and it's sequel "The Quotable Tozer II".
Aiden Wilson Tozer was born in 1897 and died in 1963. He did not graduate from any seminary, university, not even a high school. He only had a sixth grade education. He was self-taught and he read widely. Tozer served as a pastor for more than 40 years. He published 12 books while alive. Another 40 books, minimum, were published after he died.
Today's book, "The Counselor: Straight Talk About The Holy Spirit" is one of them. He has books on holy living, discipleship, worship and many others but in all those books, he is a straight talker.
I hope you have a band aid ready because Tozer's words might just cut you to the heart.
So let's open the book.
Structure
The book has ten chapters. I'll read the titles for the first five chapters, so that you get a sense of what the book is about and it's tone.

• Chapter 1: "Whenever Jesus Christ is Glorified, the Holy Spirit comes"
• Chapter 2: "The Holy Spirit is Not Known through the Intellect"
• Chapter 3: "The Presence and Ministry of the Holy Spirit: All That Jesus Would Be"
• Chapter 4: "Pentecost: Perpetuation, Not Repetition"
• Chapter 5: "The Promised Filling of the Holy Spirit: Instantly, Not Gradually"

Through these ten chapters, Tozer tells reader who is the Holy Spirit, our need for him and how we can be filled by him. He does this by unpacking Scripture, rebuking wrong ideas -- he is not afraid of calling them out -- and he does all this with fiery passion, like an Old Testament prophet.
The book doesn't have a preface or introduction, but from what I understand after Tozer's death, publishers have collected from Tozer's sermons and writings and published them in book form. This explains why the chapters in this book are self-contained. They don't deliberately move the argument from one chapter to the next.
I commend the editors though. First for the organisation. The first chapter is a good chapter to begin a book on the Holy Spirit and the rest flows quite well, considering Tozer did not preach a series.
Secondly, the editors did a good job of selecting a broad range of materials. Tozer's words are rapier-sharp, they are like weapons of war, wielded by many Christians from all denominations. Even from opposite sides of the topic. By reading this book, you will get a clearer sense of what Tozer meant by those quotes. Those favourites quotes of yours might not mean what you think they mean.
Straight Talk It Is
When we study the words of a biblical prophet, like Ezekiel, Amos or Jonah, it is necessary to study the time and place so that we know why they said what they said. Why such strong words? Why the intensity?
Similarly, when we read Tozer on the Holy Spirit, it helps to remember that Tozer lived in the early 20th century. It was at this time that the Pentecostal or Charismatic Movement kicked off. Every church was forced to consider (or reconsider) what they believed of the Holy Spirit. In those turbulent times, Tozer offered sorely needed guidance.
He was unquestionably zealous for the Holy Spirit. Every Christian must have the Holy Spirit. Tozer rebuked the churches at large, "You don't even know that the Holy Spirit is absent!" A fiery prophet calling God's people back to God.
He called out the craziness, and instructed Christians to not let the craziness impede their pursuit of God. Let me read a long quote here:
This is a crude illustration, but let me tell you what we did after planting a field of corn when I was a young fellow in Pennsylvania. To save the field of corn from the crows, we would shoot an old crow and hang him by his heels in the middle of the field. This was supposed to scare off all of the crows for miles around. The crows would hold a conference and say, “Look, there is a field of corn but don’t go near it. I saw a dead crow over there!” That’s the kind of conference that Satan calls, and that is exactly what he has done. He has taken some fanatical, weird, wild-eyed Christians who do things that they shouldn’t, and he has stationed them in the middle of God’s cornfield, and warns, “Now, don’t you go near that doctrine about the Holy Spirit because if you do, you will act just like these wild-eyed fanatics.” Because there has been a lot of this weird stuff, God’s children are frightened, and as soon as you start to talk about it, they run for cover. They say, “Oh, no, none of that for me! I have seen dead crows out there in the middle of the field.” Well, my brother, I will not be frightened out of my rightful heritage. I will not be scared out of my birthright because some others didn’t know what to do with the birthright or have found something else that has nothing to do with the birthright. I want all that God has for me!
Even if you did not live in those confusing and fearful times -- those events were a long time ago -- if you have been a Christian for any length of time, you know battles were fought. Questions on the Holy Spirit still come up, as they should with every new generation of believers, but thankfully we have sort of settled many of those questions today. Where ever you fall on the question, churches have main settled on their beliefs. Many were helped by Tozer and his writings.
When it comes to Tozer, the danger is people read a few pointed quotes and believe they know everything they need to know about Tozer. They pick his teachings up like a loaded pistol, not realising that they are holding the wrong side of the gun.
Intellect, Creed or Not
Consider, for example, the second chapter titled "The Holy Spirit Is Not Known through the intellect".
In the second paragraph of the chapter, Tozer says:
It is quite plain in the scriptural revelation that spiritual things are hidden by a veil, and by nature a human does not have the ability to comprehend and get hold of them. He comes up against a blank wall. He takes doctrine and texts and proofs and creeds and theology, and lays them up like a wall—but he cannot find the gate! He stands in the darkness and all about him is intellectual knowledge of God—but not the true knowledge of God, for there is a difference between the intellectual knowledge of God and the Spirit-revealed knowledge.
Someone hears this and says, "Yeah man! Preach it brother. What a hilarious image. Lay up the creeds and theology and the guy can't find the gate. They are so blind!"
On the need for spiritual illumination, Tozer writes:
... Bible study does not, of itself, lift the veil or penetrate it. The Word does not say, 'No one knows the things of God except the man who studies his Bible.' It does say that no man knows the things of God except by the Holy Spirit."
"Exactly. We are wasting time with Bible study!" They clap their hands vigorously, celebrating the comeuppance of those Bible study nerds with their highlighters, then we can imagine Tozer turning around to say, "Why are you clapping? I don't agree with you!"
If you only read a quote, you might not know that Tozer also says in that same chapter:
We ought to read everything we can read about Him [Jesus], for reading about Him is legitimate and good -- a part of Christianity.
And if you think Tozer ditches the creeds, you are in for a surprise.
To explain who is the Holy Spirit, Tozer quotes the Athanasian Creed. After he quotes it at length, Tozer concludes:
These old saints of God were learned scholars who knew the truth, and they came there and wrote these things and gave it to us for the world and for the ages. On my knees I thank God for them!
When someone says, "Tozer says we need more Holy Spirit, not more Bible studies!" And another says, "No! Tozer says we need more Bible study, how else will we know who is the Holy Spirit."
They might just be reading their favourite Instagram or Twitter quotes. If you read this book, you can come in like a boss and settle the argument. Quote Tozer right back at them:
He [The Holy Spirit] is Light to the inner heart, and He will show us more of God in a moment than we can learn in a lifetime without Him. When He does come, all that we have learned and all that we do learn will have its proper place in our total personality and total creed and total thinking. We won’t lose anything by what we have learned. He won’t throw out what we have learned if it is truth -- He will set it on fire, that’s all. He will add fire to the altar.
Tozer doesn't dismiss Bible study, he dismisses the notion that you can read and understand the Bible without the Holy Spirit.
Instant, Not Gradual
Overall, I find this book helpful and I find myself applauding his straight talk. Oh! He cuts to the heart!
However, I advise discernment because there are parts where his rhetoric exceeds what he can prove.
I give you one example. In the whole book, I have minor points of disagreements with him here and there but this issue, the one I'm going to talk about, is not peripheral to Tozer. He dedicates a whole chapter to it. This is a contentious one, it affects how we look at the Holy Spirit in our lives. And he doesn't mince words. He believes that anyone who takes a different position to him is on the side of carnality.
The chapter is Chapter 5: "The Promised Filling of the Holy Spirit: Instantly, Not Gradually".
Early in the chapter we read:
... none of the persons in the Bible and none that I can find in Church history or biography was ever filled with the Holy Spirit who didn’t know when he was filled. I cannot find that anyone was ever filled gradually.
And he continues:
Now, as I said, Satan opposes the doctrine of the Spirit-filled life about as bitterly as any doctrine there is. He has confused it, opposed it, surrounded it with false notions and fears. The devil knows that if we will just say that we want to be filled gradually, he will have no more worries from us—because that process is so slow. You might encourage yourself: “Well, I am a little fuller today than I was yesterday,” or at least, “I am a little fuller this year than I was last year.” This is a place for carnal creatures to hide. It is a place for carnal church members to hide. In the Scriptures, it was never a gradual filling. It says that He fell upon them, He came upon them, He filled them -- it was an instantaneous act.
When I read something I disagree with, I highlight it in red. This was bright red. So I looked forward to see how Tozer would substantiate his claims.
The next big question he answers is, "Are you sure you can be filled?"
Next, "Do you really want to be filled?"
Next, "Do you really need to be filled?" Then, the rest of the chapter is answering the question, "How do I be filled?"
Those questions don't address the topic: Gradual vs. Instant filling of the Holy Spirit. "Can you? Do you want to? Do you need to?"
"Yes. Yes. Yes."
Tozer does share his experience.
It is probably quite generally true that any Christian who has not been filled with the Spirit since his conversion does not have genuine Christian joy. I know this was my experience. I had a lot of joyful feeling when I was first converted. I was a happy Christian. But if this is the kind of happiness that is half carnality and animal spirits, God will want to deliver you from it.
Brother, sister. Have you experienced genuine Christian joy? Because that is the experience of the Spirit-filled Christian. You might be happy before you were Spirit-filled, but whatever happiness you had before pales in comparison with what comes after.
Tozer later write:
Not everyone who listens to me is going to be filled with the Spirit. Some are going to be filled, for every once in awhile someone comes with a shining face and says, “Well, it happened! God has done it!” From that time on, that life is transformed. Spirit-filled Christians are changed people.
Maybe I'm one of those Christians who are not Spirit-filled. Tozer will not deny that I am a Christian. He would just deny that I am Spirit-filled because a person who is Spirit-filled knows it.
Let me briefly respond to his claim.
Tozer says that, "Nobody in the Bible has a gradual filling of the Holy Spirit. Everyone's experience was instant."
We tend to report the spectacular, the dramatic. The New Testament doesn't have a longitudinal study. It doesn't track the people from spiritual birth to physical death, reporting on their spiritual state and breakthroughs.
But Paul did write in Romans 7, my paraphrase: "I do what I should not do, I don't do what I should do." I believe Paul is writing as a Christian, as a Spirit-filled Christian.
Paul writes, "Rejoice in the Lord always, again I will say rejoice." (Philippians 4:4)
Peter writes, "... you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory..." (1 Peter 1:8)
When the apostles speak of joy, they point believers to the gospel and not on a singular, one-off, spiritual experience.
In the Parable of the Sower, does Jesus say of the seed that fell in good soil, "As for that in the good soil, they are those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with patience." (Luke 8:15)
Can we bear fruit without the Holy Spirit? We are to bear fruit with patience.
Jesus commands us to take up our cross daily. Can we take up our cross without the Holy Spirit? We are to take up our cross daily.
Bearing fruit and taking up our cross is a command and experience of all Christians whether they experienced an instant filling of the Holy Spirit or, as I argue, a gradual filling.
The problem with Tozer's claim is that it can be true for some. Tozer and many others can truthfully, claim that they experienced such an amazing filling of the Holy Spirit that transformed them forever more. But just because Paul was struck blind on the way to Damascus doesn't mean that you and I should be struck blind on our way to the mall. Just because Tozer had his experience doesn't mean we all have to.
If you read this chapter, you will see that Tozer's emphasises an instant filling of the Holy Spirit because he sees believers are complacent. They say, "It's okay to sin because I am gradually growing in holiness." This should not be! Christians, by the very definition of the word, must make a full and immediate commitment to Christ. There should be no lingering with sin. Or acceptance of it as simply a part of life.
However, Tozer's good intentions here, intentions that are wholesome and righteous, has pushed him to an unsustainable position.
Thus, in Chapter 5, Tozer does not make a strong case for an instant filling of the Holy Spirit. He makes a strong case for a full and immediate commitment to Christ. That I welcome.
Conclusion
In your Christian journey, you will meet Tozer. You might welcome him, you might push back against him, but before you do either, you should read a bit more broadly on him. Go beyond the quick quotes.
I hope from this review, you hear how sharp his words can be. Sometimes sharp words are needed for correction and healing. But sometimes, they can inflict unintentional wounds. Which is why I spend so much time on that one chapter, I don't want you to miss out on Tozer, but because Tozer is such a forceful writer, if you are not careful you might be carried away by his candour and passion.
He cuts. And when you are bleeding from a heart wound, sometimes the head gets a bit woozy and can't think straight.
Tozer's teachings on the Holy Spirit were very much needed in his time. And I believe the peace the church enjoys today regarding the Holy Spirit is partly due to his teachings then. If I can make an over-exaggeration, when it comes to Tozer's influence, the churches took the parts they liked, claim Tozer as a friend, and no longer neglected the Holy Spirit. So they accepted Tozer's cutting criticism and have learnt to passionately teach about the Holy Spirit and to embrace him as the Third Person of the Trinity.
Let me close this review with a Tozer quote:
The only Christian you want to listen to is the one who gives you more of a hunger for God.
And the reason why Tozer is so widely read today is because he gives us more of a hunger for God.
This is a Reading and Readers review of "The Counselor: Straight Talk about the Holy Spirit" from A.W. Tozer. 192 pages, published by Moody Publishers in May 2015. Available in Amazon Kindle for USD7.99 or you can get it for USD1.99 in Faithlife for the month of November.
I hope you have enjoyed this podcast, but more than that, I hope that by listening to the Christian book reviews, you have more of a hunger for God. One book can change the trajectory of a man or woman, boy or girl, Christian or non-Christian.
If any of my reviews have helped you or led you to a book that has made an impact (hopefully for good!), please let me know. As you know, encouragements can go a long way. You can email me at [email protected]. You can find me on Twitter if you search for readingandreaders. Or you can contact me via the website at, you guess it, www.readingandreaders.com.
Happy reading. Thanks for listening.
Book List

• "The Counselor: Straight Talk about the Holy Spirit" by A.W. Tozer. Amazon. Faithlife.

What is the best way to do missions? That is possibly the wrong question to ask. The right question could be, "What are the ethical means and goals of missions?" Or "How does missions produce virtuous Christians?"
Hi, my name is Terence and I'm your host for Reading and Readers, a podcast where I review Christian books for you. Today I review "Virtuous Persuasion: A Theology of Christian Missions" by Michael Niebauer. 320 pages, published by Lexham Academic in July 2022. This book is part of the Studies in Historical and Systematic Theology series. It's USD19.99 in Amazon Kindle and USD26.99 in Logos.
I got this book for free to review. Lexham the publisher has no input in this review.
Author and Ethics
Michael Niebauer is a pastor of Incarnation Church, Pennyslvania, a teaching fellow at Trinity School for Ministry and a podcaster for the Christian catechesis podcast, "This We Believe". He was a church planter for 15 years in North America. He has a PhD in Systematic Theology from Duquesne University and specialises in Christian Ethics and Missiology.
You may wonder: "Christian Ethics? That's about abortion, or capital punishment, or the future of A.I. in war, isn't it? How is it used in missions? Oh! Is it used when missionaries do bad things like taking away children from their families? Or when people kill twin or albinos because they believe the babies are demonic or kill widows because they believe wives should follow their husbands into the afterlife?"
That is a narrow and limited view of what ethics is. And nothing to do with this book. Niebauer quotes Herbert McCabe's definition for ethics which is, "the quest of less and less trivial modes of human relatedness." Don't you want a less trivial life? Of course you do, that's why you are listening to this podcast.
Let's open the book.
The Critical and the Constructive Task
Apart from the Introduction and Conclusion, the book has seven chapters divided into two parts. Part I is titled, "The Critical Task: Three Models, Three Problems".

• Chapter 1: Mission and the Missio Dei
• Chapter 2: Mission as Growth
• Chapter 3: Mission as Dialogue

Part II is titled, "The Constructive Task: Mission, Virtue and The Practices of Proclamation and Gathering". The chapters are:

• Chapter 4: Mission as Virtuous Practice
• Chapter 5: Proclamation
• Chapter 6: Gathering
• Chapter 7: Entering into the Craft of Mission: Tragedy, Tradition and Telos

Three Attractive Yet Flawed Models
I'll briefly, very briefly, explain what are the three models.
In the first model, Mission and the Missio Dei, the idea is mission is God's activity. God the Father sent Jesus the Son, Jesus sent the Holy Spirit, and the Trinity sent the church into the world. So the church's mission is inseparable from God's mission. The problem is when the church's mission is indistinguishable from God's mission. Where does the work of God begin and end? Where does the work of Man begin and end? By conflating the two, we cannot meaningfully speak of Man's role in mission. We have here a problem of distinction.
In the second model, Mission as Growth, the idea is the success of mission is measured by numerical growth and the activity of mission is to achieve that numerical growth.
Niebauer write:
For the mission as growth paradigm, the controlling image is the advancement of God’s kingdom through the increase of the number of Christians to the ends of the earth. This exerts a control over the types of Scriptures used (parable of the sower, Peter’s speech in Acts 2) and also how such missiological texts are construed. Here, because the goal of mission is the increase of converts and churches, and such goals are advanced through an understanding of the mechanics of human nature, biblical texts related to mission are construed as missional contrivances—they provide replicable models for how to produce effective mission.
You might not see a problem here. "Problem, what problem? The Great Commission means we need to go save all the souls out there. And if we are not thinking this way, the problem is not here the problem is you."
Let me put it this way.
When a mission effort fails, how do you respond? If you are thinking: "What went wrong? What went right? How can we improve? What can we do next?", then whether you realise it or not, you are pinning your hopes to the yet-to-be-discovered method. If only you could discover it, or tweak what you have, then you would win those souls. You just need to push the right buttons, pull the right levers, and all these souls will come tumbling out of Hell into Heaven. Niebauer points out that the mission as growth model diminishes agency, the ability to make a choice, of both the missionary and the people he is reaching out to. The problem here is agency.
Finally, in the third model, Mission as Dialogue, the idea is missionaries of the past did terrible wrongs: colonisation, Westernisation, forced coercion. That's not what the Bible teaches. According to this model, rather than trying to convert unbelievers into Christianity, Christians should be having respectful dialogues with unbelievers. The purpose is to self-convert, to be a better person at the end of the day.
How can this model be Christian? Where is the Great Commission? How can its criticism of persuasion stand in light of Peter's sermon to convert thousands, Stephen's defiant speech or Paul's testimony before kings. King Agrippa recognised Paul's attempt to convert him. He asked, "In a short time would you persuade me to be a Christian?" Paul did not reply, "I am just having a dialogue." Paul said, "Whether short or long, I would to God that not only you but also all who hear me this day might become such as I am -- except for these chains."
Since persuading unbelievers to convert is obviously part of missions, why did Michael Niebauer include this model? At first, I thought he needed a foil to contrast with his definition of mission, which includes proclamation. I just cannot see Christians accepting the mission as dialogue model.
Which got me thinking. Instead of trying to locate ourselves in one of these models, it may be better to see how these models have influenced how I think of missions.
Because Mission as Dialogue seems to be what most Christians are doing. Many think it is better to dialogue than to proclaim. Better to delay proclamation indefinitely.
So we profess the Great Commission and are righteously indignant when it is set aside but we set it aside in practice. So just because we don't recognise the name of the model, we don't know the people who invent it, teach it or promote it and we would never identify ourselves with the model, it doesn't mean the model is not in us.
For instance, everyone agrees that everyone is created equal but many don't know that this from the Bible, Man are created in God's image. People who would never describe themselves as Christian nevertheless take that Christian concept and have made it their own.
So if you do read this book, it is not helpful if you think tribally. You will not see yourself in any of these models. And reject them. And thus, not hear what Niebauer has to say.
Perhaps you can think of it this way. We can describe models of government in Ancient Rome, or Israel, or the Byzantium Empire. It should not be difficult for us to admit that our system of government may be influenced by those models. And we can critique those models.
And that's what Niebauer helpfully does. He uses theological ethics to criticise models that may simultaneously influenced at varying degrees our understanding of missions.Begin With Aquinas
So that's Part I: The Critical Task. Now we move to Part II: The Constructive Task.
Niebauer writes:
In highlighting the ways in which the problems of distinction, agency, and persuasion perpetually recur throughout these various models of mission, I am suggesting that the potential solutions to these issues lay outside of dogmatic and anthropological approaches to mission, and that the field of missiology lacks the resources to adequately solve them. While the discipline of theological ethics has provided the primary critical tools for identifying the perpetual problems of mission, it also provides the resources for solutions.
The answer, and main takeaway from this book, is this: Mission is a virtuous practice. Mission is a virtuous practice. It sounds axiomatic, "Of course! Mission is virtuous! What can be a more virtuous practice than missions!"
Stop. Stop. We can't just assume things. We need to unpack what mission is a virtuous practice means and then what are the implications. Niebauer does that in four chapters. Along the way, he addresses the problems in the three models.
Just taking one example (because we don't have a lot of time to do the rest), in the Missio Dei model, we had the problem of distinction because we conflate, we merge, the mission of God and the mission of the church. In missions, where does God start and end? Where do I start and end?
Niebauer shows us how Thomas Aquinas, that really smart guy from 800 years ago, how he would resolve that tension. Aquinas saw the relationship between God and creation as asymmetrical. That is the key.
Niebauer writes:
God is not in space or time and, as such, can act in created things without displacing created things. God’s agency is thus not competitive with human agency: “Because of God’s infinity, the two agencies are not competitive, as if God acts 75 percent and the creature 25 percent.” The activity of God is differentiated from the activity of human beings: God is able to send himself in ways that human beings cannot. God’s agency functions in a way that human agency cannot. God can go to where he already exists; humans go to where they do not exist. God can act without displacement; human beings act through displacement.
As I reflect on this answer, I thought about breathing. We breathe. We say God sustains life. Without God, there would be no air, no oxygen. But when we say God sustains life, we mean more than God providing the air we breathe. We believe that without God, we cannot breathe. Not that God and I are taking turns to work my lungs like a ventilator but in a way that I don't yet understand, God's work is differentiated from my work, so that I can say I breathe yet it is God who makes me breathe.
Even though I don't understand the mystery of how God and I come together for me to breath, my ignorance doesn't stop me from breathing. In a similar way, I don't understand the mystery of how God and I come together for missions, but my ignorance doesn't stop me from doing missions. With that I echo what Niebauer says here:
God exercises divine agency in a way that is different from and only analogous to human agency. For Aquinas, God exists in all things: “God exists within all things and intimately so.”
And that's not all Aquinas has to say.
Niebauer writes:
A key assertion by Aquinas is that the ultimate goal, or telos, of the human being is the vision of God. God is the greatest good, and since the good is that which is desirable and the terminus of desire, God is what human beings are created to desire, as well as where their desires terminate: “Final and perfect happiness (in Latin beatitudo) can consist in nothing else than the vision of the Divine Essence.” Aquinas here quotes St. John: “When He shall appear, we shall be like to Him; and we shall see Him as He is” (1 John 3:2)
I am shortcutting the discussion to reach the conclusion, if you want to see how the argument unfolds, you have to read the book. So from 1 John 3:2, we get our goal which is to see God, to know Him, to glorify him. In this life, we are moving towards that goal and so what we do today, what we do now, matters because we are moving towards that goal.
Niebauer writes:
All activity that is deliberate bears a moral character, providing the opportunity for human beings to act according to their good and move toward their final end.
This is a big claim. Read the book to see how he substantiates it. We will assume it's true, that all deliberate activities bear a moral character. This thus leads us to Niebauer's next step to show that mission is a virtuous practice.
Stir In Some McIntyre
And that next step is the definition of a virtuous practice. Alasdair McIntyre defines it as:
Any coherent and complex form of socially established cooperative human activity through which goods internal to that form of activity are realized in the course of trying to achieve those standards of excellence which are appropriate to, and partially definite of, that form of activity.
Sounds like gobbledygook. Niebauer breaks down each part of that definition, but I'll only pick out one because it's the most striking.
A virtuous practice is an activity through which goods internal are realized. Not external. Money is external. When people commend you for your good deeds. That commendation is external. When many people come to church, get baptised and be faithful Christians, as good as that good is, it is external.
What is an internal good? Niebauer gives examples of temperance, prudence and faith. And so a virtuous practice is one in which goods internal are produced.
Do you see how that unanimously agreeable description of mission as a virtuous practice is not so agreeable now? It clashes with the mission as growth model?
There are still missing pieces, and so we come to the next point.
Proclamation and Gathering
Niebauer adapts Kevin Rowe's analysis of the Book of Acts to conclude:
mission is proclamation with the hope of confession of Jesus as Lord, and mission is the gathering of those who confess into Christian community.
He says:
My assertion is that proclamation and gathering are the two essential missional practices because the removal of either renders mission (particularly as it is portrayed in Acts) incoherent.
And that's it. We put everything together. This is Niebauer's thesis: Mission consists of proclamation and gathering, activities that produce virtue in the missionary that orients him toward the goal of his life, God.
And this definition makes an impact. It's not just another entry into a dictionary. It guides us on how to think of missions. He unpacks them in one chapter on proclamation and one chapter on gathering.
Even the most anti-intellectual would appreciate what Niebauer does here.
Proclamation start with prayer. Can I get an amen to that? Then preparation, communication, the response and finally a return to prayer. Niebauer takes everything we have talked about, the models, the problems, Christian ethics, and shows us how proclamation should be best understood as a virtuous practice.
And if my review so far gives you the impression that this book is very dry, listen to this:
And so the missionary actively delights in what God has done through the act of proclaiming the gospel. They delight in the opportunity to speak about the resurrection, they delight in convincing others of its validity to the best of their ability, they delight in the responses to the affirmative, and they even delight in their fidelity to the gospel in the face of its rejection.
To participate in God’s mission is to participate in the fullness of God. Delighting in the act of proclamation sediments God’s goodness in the soul of the missionary, and because God’s goodness is an infinite and inexhaustible plenitude, it spurs the missionary on to further proclamatory actions.
Do you hear in that joy, delight, doxology, the echoes of everything we have been talking about?
And that theology climaxing with doxology can also be seen in the next chapter on gathering. Niebauer writes:
The joy is not in seeing simply a community established, but a community that is in communion with God and each other, a community that is growing in their love and knowledge of God through Jesus Christ, and a community that has been given every spiritual gift needed to thrive.
The Robust Model
And that brings me to my next observation. To me, a model is robust when you can take that model, put it under conditions it was not designed for, burn it, freeze it, throw it into space, and if that model survives, it is robust.
Niebauer convinced me on the power of this virtuous model because it is robust enough to answer questions that other models can't. How should the missionary learn his craft? Are there professional and amateur missionaries? How does a missionary handle being simultaneously a citizen, a son or daughter, a parent and a pastor?
Can you hear the tension in that last question? Well, if you reflect on the virtuous model, you can actually come up with an answer yourself, the models gives you the tools to answer it. And I suspect your answer will not be too far off from Niebauer's here.
Among all the implications of this virtuous model that Niebauer has written here, the one that jumped out to me was this. I quote:
... my conception of mission and virtue calls for a recovery of a now faded literary genre, that of the missionary biography.
When I read this, I was so happy. I imagined for myself, "What would the other models say about missionary biographies?"
The Missio Dei missionary would say, "These stories show God's sovereignty and purposes coming to pass. They are a call to worship God. Stop looking at the missionary, he didn't do much."
The growth missionary looks at these books and say, "These guys, were great guys, but they did what they did a 100, 200, 500 years ago. The world, people, technology, culture, has changed so much since then, that there is little we can learn from them. Stick to the mission guys."
The dialogue missionary is aghast at these books. He will either hide them or apologise for them.
The virtuous missionary he looks at these stories. "Oh! How they honoured God!"
John Allen Chau died alone on a beach because he wanted to share the gospel to the Sentinelese in India. Jim Elliot was speared to death by the Huaroni tribe in Ecuador. He wrote these haunting lines, "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose."
Their lives, their stories, can only resonate, call us forward, because Christians share the same goal, and we should recognise and applaud that virtue that is in their lives.
Virtues that all the other models are blind to.
In the Hands of Everyone
If you are a missionary or a serious student of missions, you must read this book. And if you are reluctant because you like what you are doing in missions and you don't want Niebauer giving you grief, don't think that way. These are all models, they are not tribes. Nobody is asking you to change citizenship, and I honestly think mission is important enough that does who can, should reflect on the theology of missions.
But other than missionaries, this book is also for you. Let me ask you: "Are you a virtuous person? Do you see what you are doing now, right now, whether you are driving, drinking coffee or getting ready for bed, do you see your actions as moral actions?"
These are alien questions. And here I recall that Socrates quote, "The unexamined life is not worth living."
That's a bit much but the point stands. And here is the beautiful part. The offer in this book is saying, you should live a virtuous life. You can live a virtuous life.
This book applies Christian ethics into missions but as I read it, you and I can, with some effort, apply this robust virtuous model into our non-missionary work. My recording this podcast episode for a book review, is a virtuous practice. And that is an eye-opening, soul-enriching realisation of Colossians 3:17: "And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus..."
Let me end this book review with this quote.
D. Stephen Long, Cary M. Maguire University Professor of Ethics, Southern Methodist University wrote an endorsement for this book, it goes like this:
Virtuous Persuasion is the most important work on moral theology and missions that currently exists. It should be in the hands of everyone, scholar, clergy or lay, involved in missions.
That is an outstanding endorsement, one I heartily echo.
This is a Reading and Readers review of "Virtuous Persuasion: A Theology of Christian Missions" by Michael Niebauer. 320 pages, published by Lexham Academic in July 2022. This book is part of the Studies in Historical and Systematic Theology series. It's available in Amazon Kindle for USD19.99 Kindle and USD26.99 in Logos.
I got this book for free to review. The publisher has no input in this review.
OutroAnnouncement. The free books for Logos and Faithlife are out. We have two commentaries from Logos, the Preacher's Commentary on Luke and Jon Courson's Application Commentary on the New Testament. That commentary is 1824 pages and I won't be reviewing that.
Instead I will be reviewing a discounted book from Faithlife. The Counselor: Straight Talk About The Holy Spirit by A. W. Tozer.
So if you like Tozer or have never heard of Tozer, be ready to listen to my review of his book in the next episode of Reading and Readers, a podcast where I review Christian books for you. Bye bye!
Book List

• "Virtuous Persuasion: A Theology of Christian Mission" by Michael Niebauer. Amazon. Logos.

Proverbs 1:5-6 reads: "Let the wise hear and increase in learning, and the one who understands obtain guidance, to understand a proverb and a saying, the words of the wise and their riddles."
Hi, my name is Terence and I'm your host for Reading and Readers, a podcast where I review Christian books for you. Today I review "Proverbs: Wisdom That Works" by Ray Ortlund. This volume is part of the Preaching the Word commentary series edited by R. Kent Hughes. 224 pages, published by Crossway in March 2012. It is available for USD24.99 via Amazon Kindle or free from Logos in October.
The author is Raymond C. Ortlund Jr. He is in his 70s, having spent most of his life as a pastor and served for a season as professor of Old Testament and Semitic Languages at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. He has written several books, most recently "The Death of Porn: Men of Integrity Building a World of Nobility" which I reviewed and recommended in Episode 25.
Writing must be in the Ortlund gene. His father and his sons wrote many books. I have Dane Ortlund's "Gentle and Lowly" in my Kindle. I have read Gavin Ortlund's "Finding the Right Hills to Die On", which you can listen to my review in Episode 34. I haven't counted but I think it's possible to find a hundred books written from the Ortlund household.
More noteworthy and praiseworthy than the amount of ink they have spilled is their faith. Ray Ortlund, who is in his 70s, is still going strong in the faith, he is a pastor to pastors. His parents finished well. And his children are going strong as well.
If only we could tap on what has worked so well in the Ortlund household. What wisdom can Ray Ortlund share with us? And as we will see, Ortlund would say, any wisdom he has is not his but God's and it is available to all, if only we would seek it.
So let us seek it. Let us open today's book "Proverbs: Wisdom That Works" by Ray Ortlund.
Structure
Proverbs the book in the Bible is a difficult book to outline. Compared to Genesis, a child could pick out the stories of Adam and Eve, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as self-contained stories. Or compared to Romans, an attentive reader could outline Romans as a series of logical arguments. But Proverbs? The short sayings seem random. They are not grouped into any discernible topic.
Ortlund guides us. First he shows us that chapter 1 is where we read God's purpose for this book. Proverbs 1:7, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction."
He explains that chapters 1-9 is:

a series of poems selling wisdom to us, motivating us to get into the book and receive its teaching with an eager heart.
Then you turn the page to Proverbs 10:1 and read, "The proverbs of Solomon" and this kickstarts the collection of proverbs from Solomon, Agur, King Lemuel and other unnamed wisemen which culminates in Proverbs 31, the wisdom of a godly woman.
In writing a commentary on Proverbs, there are two approaches. Ortlund could comment chapter by chapter, verse by verse. Or he could group the proverbs into key themes. And in his wisdom, Ortlund chose to do both.
Ortlund's commentary has 21 chapters. The first 14 chapters is a slow and steady exposition of the first 9 chapters of Proverbs. He dedicates three chapters on Proverbs 1. That's laying down the foundation. And later three chapters on Proverbs 3, an integral part of the book.
You may wonder why Ortlund takes so much time to unpack what seems obvious: "Of course, wisdom is important!" But just look around you. Do you see more fools or wise sages? Is the world suffering from an oversupply of wisdom? Wisdom calls out but no one heeds her.
After we understand what is wisdom, only then does Ortlund give us samples of what wisdom offers. He does this with 7 topics in 7 chapters:

• Chapter 15: The Tongue (18:21)
• Chapter 16: Humility (22:4)
• Chapter 17: Family (22:6)
• Chapter 18: Emotions (15:30)
• Chapter 19: Friendship (18:24)
• Chapter 20: Money (10:22)
• Chapter 21: Life and Death (12:28)

The book then ends with a scripture index, general index and index of sermon illustrations.
Long Term Review, Ten Years Later
I have told you that this book is available for free from Logos in October but I have not told you that I have, in my hand right now, a physical, hardcover of this book.
I bought this book ten years ago, when it first came out. So this is my second time finishing this book. This is a rare opportunity for me to do a long term review of a book. Ten years later, how has this book influenced me?
To be honest, I don't remember much of it. I remember thinking this was a good book and that it made a lot of sense. That's not exactly a ringing endorsement of this book.
Now, after finishing this book for the second time, I have to say, this is a good book and it makes a lot of sense.
You know how it is that you don't appreciate good advice until after you messed up? Wise people tell us, "don't go into debt" and we only see the wisdom of it after we get out of terrible debt. Then you look back and you write a post with the title, "10 Things I Wish I Knew When I Was 20 years old".
Well, ten years ago, I was a young Christian. I didn't have as many decisions to make (compared to now), children were still young and 'easily manageable' (diapers are easier than discipline). I hadn't seen the dark underbelly of the church. I shouldn't say that. My church is not a bad one, the people are a blessing. It's just that as a young Christian, I had to grow to understand that Christians are simultaneously saints and sinners.
And I confess I didn't, I don't always handle the interpersonal relationship problems well. Anger is an issue. One which I didn't fully appreciate was a problem in my heart.
So ten years ago, I read Ortlund's chapter on emotions, specifically on anger. Let me read it for you:
Conquering a city is child’s play compared with ruling the turbulent, demanding, upset world inside us. The one is only the battle of a day. The other is the conflict of a lifetime.
In those days, I read that and I nodded my head. Yup. Sure. I agree 100%. Now I read the same passage and I recognise this. I know this!
It's like how war veterans see war movies differently from the rest of us. They can tell what is real and what is Hollywood.
In a somewhat similar way, after I have lived life a little more -- only ten years -- I recognise folly and wisdom, not the theoretical but the hard realities of it. I have grown to know people who have wrecked their lives with alcohol, adultery, drugs, very poor life decisions which if I had only one word to describe what they all had in common, it would be folly. Foolishness. A lack of wisdom.
And may the Good Lord protect me from the folly of my ways!
So in terms of a long term review of this book, what is amazing is how little I cared for what is here at that time. I liked the book. I agreed with the book. But it did not resonate as much then as it does now.
Learn and live
Aside from the long term review, another way to look at this book is it's the only self-help, self-improvement book you ever need.
Consider the seven topics Ortlund has: the tongue, humility, family, emotions, friendship, money, life and death.
Psychologists, counsellors, publishers, gurus, social media influencers, family therapists, sex therapists, life coaches, the list goes on. Their existence and proliferation just demonstrates how utterly useless we are in handling the tongue, humility, family, emotions, friendship, money, life and death.
If you want to make friends, do you read "How to Make Friends and Influence People" by Dale Carnegie or "Proverbs: Wisdom That Works" by Ray Ortlund? Don't get me wrong. Dale Carnegie's book is helpful. But does it offer the wisdom of the world or the wisdom divine?
This is why the first 14 chapters of Ortlund's commentary is so important. What is wisdom? You have a long line of people knocking on your door offering wisdom. But what is it?
Repeat after me:
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
Sure you can memorise it, repeat it but do you embrace it? Does that fear of the Lord, that beginning of wisdom grip you? Ortlund writes:
Biblical wisdom is more than what we find in a fortune cookie. It is more than an optional add-on for people who want to upgrade their lives from, say, 4 to 7 on a scale of 1 to 10. This wisdom from Christ is a matter of life and death.
Life and death. That is what is at stake.
Later he writes:
If we have love but not wisdom, we will harm people with the best of intentions. If we have courage but not wisdom, we will blunder boldly. If we have truth but not wisdom, we will make the gospel ugly to other people. If we have technology but not wisdom, we will use the best communications ever invented to broadcast stupidity. If we have revival but not wisdom, we’ll use the power of God to throw the church into reverse gear.
After Ortlund convinces the reader on the source and importance of wisdom, he presents the seven topics. And I'm not saying that these seven chapters are the final word on the topic, by all means, read Dale Carnegie, read whatever the world's experts or fellow Christian writers offer, but read them knowing what is true wisdom.
Galadriel
For much more can be written on these topics. Ortlund knows that. That's why he wrote a whole book on pornography, "Death of Porn".
Just a quick aside, I've only read two of Ray Ortlund's book and in both books he uses Galadriel, the elf queen in Lord of the Rings, as an illustration.
In Proverbs, wisdom is personified, wisdom is pictured as a woman. Ortlund casts Galadriel in that role, because as he says, she is, "lovely, dignified, wise". In "Death of Porn", Ortlund invites us to see every woman as Galadriel, so that we would treat every woman as royalty.
Then we have the "Rings of Power", the Amazon series that centres on Galadriel. I wonder what Ortlund thinks of that show. If anybody knows, please tell me.
Do You Need A Commentary To Read Proverbs?
Coming back to the book, his commentary on Proverbs. Has it occurred to you, "Why would I want to read a commentary on Proverbs? It's so easy to understand."
"Sure, maybe you need a commentary to understand the history or culture behind Genesis. Or a commentary to get to grips with the theology in Romans. But Proverbs? You don't need a commentary for that."
And this is the part where the book shines. You are right. The book of Proverbs is incredibly accessible. It's so practical, so easy to read that one almost makes the mistake of forgetting that it's actually part of the Bible. It's a part of the historical-redemptive story in which Christ is the key.
And it's not so obvious to see how Wisdom, or wisdom applied in the tongue, humility, family, emotions, friendship, money, life and death, can be traced to Jesus Christ. And I think this is where Ortlund's book really shines because every chapter just overflows with Jesus Christ. You don't just learn how to live a godly life, you must want it and you must have Christ who enables you to live that godly life.
Oh, what a contrast this book is to the last one I just reviewed. Even after the episode was published, it's done, I was still second guessing myself. Was I too harsh? The book, "Living in Christ's Presence" by Dallas Willard is in essence his life's work and I dare suggested there was a fatal flaw.
But I was not the only one who saw it. Someone heard him define the gospel and asked, "Why does your definition of the gospel not have forgiveness of sin in it?"
I don't want you to misunderstand, Dallas Willard does not deny forgiveness of sin, he affirms it. He says it's central. It's essential. But, the way he frames it, the church has done a good job explaining the forgiveness of sin but not as good a job at explaining how to live in grace, which is where, to him, the spiritual disciplines come in.
I quote: "The idea is not to grow in being forgiven for your sins. It's to grow in learning how to live by grace..." The book puts a contrast when it should be a basis.
Dallas Willard and his ministry is much beloved and endorsed by many Christians. Am I too insistent with the way he defines the gospel? Does it really matter if the cross of Christ is there but not on the exact spot that I think it should be?
Then I read Ray Ortlund.
In Chapter 14, he asks:
Do you have a taste for sin, vulgarity, and folly? We all do. We all know what it is like to be stuck down there in that abyss of Self where we cannot even choose Christ. What do we do then? How can we choose him as the passion of our lives when we are passionate for lesser things, even wrong things? How can we jump out of a hole that has no bottom? There is only one way. We hear the gospel again.
I don't think we can ever hear enough of the Gospel. Maybe the problem is we don't know how the Gospel works in our lives.
Ortlund explains:
For your sake, Jesus lived a perfect life, he chose wisdom every time, and against intense seduction. Then Jesus died on the cross a death he did not deserve, a sacrificial death for the stupidity of the rest of us. That is what the gospel announces. If you will receive this Jesus by mere faith, he will give you his perfect record as a gift. He wants your conscience to be happy and free again. Why? Because in the strength of being forgiven, you will change.
Did you get that? "In the strength of being forgiven, you will change."
I have read so much from this chapter, I'm just going to go ahead and read the final paragraph.
Knowing that Jesus covers your sin when you deserve to be exposed, but he accepts you and rejoices over you—that stunning new awareness will lift your heart and take you further with him than you have ever dreamed of going. His love creates your wise choice, moment by moment. Look up to him by faith, see his love for you right now, and receive it. Then, whatever might be your next step of obedience, that bold new step that maybe you have been putting off, you will take it. You will be able to choose, and you will choose wisely, to the praise of the glory of his grace.
When you have these two books in front of you, the contrast between the two is stark. I don't know how Raymond Ortlund sees the ministry of Dallas Willard. For all I know, the two of them were best pals, speaking at each other's churches, recommending each other's books. But from where I'm sitting, in Willard the cross of Christ is placed in the background but in Ortlund the cross of Christ is front and centre.
Conclusion
Let's wrap up.
First, the book was good the first time I read it 10 years ago. And it was even better reading it the second time.
Second, we mess up in so many places. We obviously need wisdom, not the world's wisdom but God's wisdom. And Ortlund shows us where it's at.
Third, Christians who know Proverbs -- They hear Wisdom calling and they come running -- will get from this commentary, a clear line from Lady Wisdom to the Lord Jesus Christ.
This is a Reading and Readers' review of "Proverbs: Wisdom That Works" by Raymond Ortlund Jr. This volume is part of the Preaching the Word commentary series edited by R. Kent Hughes. 224 pages, published by Crossway in March 2012. It is available for USD24.99 via Amazon Kindle or free from Logos in October.
It's available for free only for this month, you would be a fool to miss this deal! Subscribe to Reading and Readers to hear reviews of free books, good books and often, free and good books. Thank you for listening.
Book List

• "Proverbs: Wisdom That Works" by Raymond Ortlund Jr. Amazon. Logos.
• "Death of Porn: Men of Integrity Building a World of Nobility" by Raymond Ortlund Jr. Amazon. Logos.

This is the situation: You accepted Christ, you affirm everything your church believes but you are not growing spiritually. In fact, what does growing spiritually even mean?
Hi, my name is Terence and I'm your host for Reading and Readers, a podcast where I review Christian books for you. Today I review "Living in Christ's Presence: Final Words on Heaven and the Kingdom of God" by Dallas Willard. 192 pages, published by InterVarsity Press in, according to Amazon, 2017. But this is a mistake because Amazon also describes this book as the:

• Logos Bookstores' 2014 Best Book in Spirituality
• 2014 Readers' Choice Award Winner
• 2014 Leadership Journal Best Books for Church Leaders (The Leader's Inner Life)

The publication year will be important as we will soon see.
The book is available for USD9.41 in Amazon Kindle at the time of this recording but you can get this book for free through Faithlife's Free Book of the Month programme. For the month October, and only October, you can get this book for free.
Last Word(s)
When I saw the book's title I thought the author was a tad presumptuous. The final word on Heaven and the Kingdom of God? The final word as in nothing else needs to be said? That's a big claim cause Heaven and the Kingdom of God are not straightforward topics. I soon discovered how wrong I was in my premise.
Let me begin by reading the author's biodata, found in the last pages of the book:
Dallas Willard (1935-2013) was a professor in the School of Philosophy at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. A highly influential author and teacher, Willard was as celebrated for his enduring writings on spiritual formation as he was for his scholarship. His books include The Divine Conspiracy, The Spirit of the Disciplines and Hearing God.
Today's book, "Living in Christ's Presence" is based on a conference titled "Knowing Christ Today". That conference was held on February 21-23, 2013. According to Wikipedia, Dallas Willard died after a short battle with cancer in May 8, 2013. When was the book published? 2014. So the book was published posthumously. That is not the noteworthy part.
When I finished the book, I went back to the title of the book and I was confused. The book made no attempt to be definitive, to make the case on Heaven and the Kingdom of God as to silent all other views. How is this the final word?
Then I re-read the subtitle. It's not "Final Word on Heaven". It's "Final Words on Heaven". The book is not offering the final word on the topic. The book is offering the final words of a man who came to a conference to encourage pastors and believers, knowing that he has cancer and would soon die.
In the Amazon page for this book, John Ortberg writes:
I've known Dallas for about 25 years, and he has impacted me like nobody else has. His writings, his book Spirit of the Disciplines ― outside of the Bible has had the biggest impact on my life. And so the chance to do this conference together was really powerful. Then when he got sick and it was clear that barring a miracle he was not going to be on earth for a real long time, it took on a whole added dimension of substance. We actually thought about, just given his health, should we not do the conference? And Dallas said, "Nope, I want to do it. There are things that need to be said, and this is the chance to say it."
"There are things that need to be said, and this is the chance to say it."
Let's now look at the last words of Dallas Willard on Heaven and the Kingdom of God.
Seven Chapters, Seven Talks
The book starts with the preface written by Gary W. Moon, explaining that this book was created from the transcripts of a conference. He writes:
The primary passion for the conference was to provide an overview of Dallas’s writings and ministry—his most impassioned ideas. The conference was built around the theme “Knowing Christ Today” and as a way to present the golden thread that runs through all of his primary writing: that it is possible to know the Trinity intimately and to step into their glorious kingdom.
Thus, the seven chapters correspond to seven talks given in the conference. Dallas Willard is the speaker for chapters 1, 3, 5 and 7. John Ortberg is the speaker for chapters 2, 4 and 6. The chapter titles are:

1. How to Live Well
2. Who Are the Experts on Life Transformation?
3. How to Step into the Kingdom and Live There
4. Experiential Knowledge of the Trinity
5. Understanding the Person: Including the Invisible Parts
6. The Importance of Christian Disciplines
7. Blessing

In each chapter, you will first read a prayer prayed at the conference, then the transcribed talk, and lastly a Q&A with Dallas Willard and John Ortberg.
At the end of the book, we have a discussion guide, written by Gary W. Moon. It's not just a list of questions, he goes into details on what you need to prepare, how to organise the sessions and what to cover in each session.
Although the book lists Dallas Willard as the author, John Ortberg and Gary Moon are significant contributors. Let me briefly introduce them.
John Ortberg is the senior pastor for Menlo Park Presbyterian Church. The conference was organised in his church. He is a close friend and mentee of Willard, knowing him as he said for about 25 years.
Gary W. Moon is the founding executive director for the Martin Institute for Christianity and Culture and the Dallas Willard Center for Christian Spiritual Formation. The centre provided funding for the "Knowing Christ Today" conference.
Now that we know the structure of the book and the authors, let's get into the content.
Grow Spiritually
There is a good reason why there is a centre bearing Dallas Willard's name. He is a giant in the spiritual formation movement. Celebration of Discipline by Richard Foster and The Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard have helped generations of Christians escape from stunted religiosity.
Even if you have never heard of Willard or his books, there is a good chance that your understanding of Christian spiritual formation can be traced to him.
In the book, Ortberg recounts asking Willard, "How can I help people in my church grow spiritually?" Willard's answer was, "You must arrange your life so that you are experiencing deep contentment, joy and confidence in your everyday life with God."
Willard exudes warmth and care. Ortberg here honours Willard, not just for his teaching, but for the cherished friendship between the two.
And that warmth and care extends to the reader and to Christians everywhere. They want to see believers flourish. They see many Christians just waiting for death to come so that they can go to Heaven. "Oh finally! Now I'm in Heaven. I can get to the good part of my faith." Willard says:
Heaven is not someplace way out there, far away; it’s the range of God’s effective will. It can be right here, closer than the air we breathe. That’s good news.
According to Willard, Christians should ask themselves, "What is my gospel? What is my central message?" Is the gospel only "an arrangement made by God through Christ that involved his death on the cross"? Willard asserts:
Isn’t this the gospel: that when others not only hear the content of it but also see how we live it and present it, they say, “I want that. I want to be a disciple of Jesus. I want to be one of his students, learning how to live in the kingdom of God now as he lives in the kingdom of God”?
Willard believes Heaven and the Kingdom of God are present abiding realities that Christians need to know in order to live in Christ's presence. Even though the book title says Christ's presence, Willard rightly emphasises the Trinity. He writes:
The advantage of believing in the Trinity is not that we get an A from God for knowing the right answer. The advantage of believing in the Trinity is that we then live as if the Trinity is real, as if the cosmos around us is actually beyond all else a community of unspeakably magnificent personal beings of boundless love, knowledge and power.
The underlying hope for this book is that readers experience breakthroughs. Here are the problems in the church. This is you struggling to grow to be more Christ-like. Listen to the glorious truth, have a mind in Christ, believe, obey and be.
The conference was designed to bring out Dallas Willard's impassioned ideas. I have not read Willard's other books but just from this book alone, the passion is evident; the passion for the Triune God and spiritual formation for His church.
Transitional vs. Foundational
Thus, it gives me no pleasure to say what I have to say next. Willard said, "I try never to criticise the church, because I know who is in charge of it." In the same spirit, I say, "I try not to criticise a servant of God, because I know who is his master." Yet, both of us criticise, him the church, me him. Not out of malice, but to build the Kingdom of God.
There are a few concerns but I'll stick to one, the most serious one. It's not easy to see it and for a while I could not put my finger on why I was so uneasy. I have hinted at it. It's regarding Willard's good news and gospel.
Listen to these passages. Do you hear a problem?
Ortberg writes:
This gospel of Jesus, of course, includes the free promise of the forgiveness of sins by grace alone. It includes the promise that death is not going to be the end. It includes all of that. There’s a corporate dimension to it, but it speaks to individuals very, very deeply as well. But it is more than the forgiveness of sins, and it is more than just what will happen to me after I die. A lot of people think the only real reason Jesus came was to die on the cross. That is not the only reason. Jesus came as the kingdom bringer. His gospel was the availability of the kingdom. His purpose was to manifest the kingdom. His one command was to pursue the kingdom: “Seek ye first the kingdom of God.” His one plan was to extend the kingdom.
Can you see where there might be a problem? If you didn't, someone did. In the conference, Willard was asked:
as you lay out the gospel, the simple gospel of the availability of life in the kingdom of God, it doesn’t include, as you put it, the phrase “forgiveness of sins.” Where does the forgiveness of sins fit in the gospel? Do you make that less central than other formulations of the gospel make it?
Willard answers:
I wouldn’t say it is less central. It is essential, and you will not enter the kingdom of God without the forgiveness of sins. It’s like the story of Abraham, see? He believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness. When you put your weight on Jesus and the kingdom, all of that is taken care of. One of the things that made people maddest about Jesus was his talk about how easy it is to forgive sins. Well, if I may say so, and I hope I don’t mislead anyone, to forgive your sins is a load off God’s mind. He is happy to do it.
You can imagine the crowd nodding their heads. Pastors, church leaders, Christians who are deeply invested in helping their flock mature in Christ listening and thinking, "What he said makes sense."
I would say Willard is making the same error that he criticises the church making. In another question, someone asked Willard about doctrine. Willard answers:
So, doctrine properly understood is tremendously important, but if we think about doctrine as a separate, abstract series of statements that people need to affirm to get an A on their theology exam, but they become divorced from how it applies to actual living, it does no good at all.
No pastor worth his salt would think that doctrine should be a separate, abstract series of statements divorced from how it applies to actual living. But it does happen. Willard is correct here. It is a problem. We are to be doers not just mere hearers of the Word. The solution is grace. Listen to what he says:
we often think that it’s sinners that need grace so much, because we have shrink-wrapped grace into the forgiveness of sin, but grace is way more than that. It is the power of life, and the reality is that saints burn more grace than sinners ever could.
He asks, "How do we receive grace?" It's difficult to quote the passage in full, so I will summarise. We receive grace through the spiritual disciplines. There are other means like suffering or other experiences but spiritual discipline is a fundamental way. In them, the spiritual disciplines, we receive grace. Let me quote this sentence:
The idea is not to grow in being forgiven for your sins. It’s to grow in learning how to live by grace, to receive the power of God in your life to do what you can’t do on your own.
Okay, let me pull everything together. The book consistently trickles the idea that there is more to the gospel, more to the good news, more to forgiveness of sin, more to doctrine, more to grace. Come on! The Kingdom of God is available! Live life to the full in Christ!
To Willard, what Jesus has done on the cross is central, it is essential, but it is a pre-condition, pre-requisite, first step to the next, once you have reached the cross, you need the 'more'. As I picture it, to Willard, the cross is like a door. You enter it, you don't stay at the door, you walk forward. The cross is transitional.
In contrast, to me, what Jesus has done on the cross is foundational to all Christian living that comes after. The cross is like the ground I stand on. Without the ground, there is nothing for me to build up.
Do you get it? This is not a small matter. If I'm right, then we must keep bringing up forgiveness of sin and the cross in order to obey what Jesus commanded. If Willard is right, then we should spend less time dealing with doctrines we already know and move on to more mature things like the Kingdom of God.
If I'm right, then the Bible will repeatedly speak of the cross, atonement, the forgiveness of sin and present it as foundational to obedience, holy living and the abundant Christian life.
And here I'm fighting a temptation to preach a sermon. But I'll constrain myself and just say the whole Bible centres on the cross. I'm not saying the cross is the only thing but it is the focal point.
Read the Old Testament, the tabernacle (and later temple), holy priesthood and sacrifices is everywhere. What do they mean, read Hebrews. What does the name Jesus mean in Hebrew? What does John the Baptist say on seeing Jesus? "Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world!" (John 1:29) Read the Gospels, what does Jesus says of himself? If forgiving sins is easy, then God was dumb to send his Son to die on the cross and Jesus was dumb to do it. He should have lived out his natural life as a good teacher, die of old age, and be resurrected three days later. He didn't, why? Read Isaiah 53, Psalm 22 for a start.
What is the relationship of the cross to spiritual formation? Is the cross foundational or transitional? Read the epistles. Who were the epistles written to? Believers or non-believers? Believers!
How are the epistles structured? The first half is often theological. "We preach Christ crucified." (1 Cor 1:23) The second half then builds on the first. Therefore, walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called (Ephesians 4:1).
Paul teaches the cross of Christ to believers and he doesn't say, "now moving on to the next item" as if what he taught before were separate, abstract series of statements. He says, "therefore". This is the clear pattern in the epistles for anyone who cares to check.
Why Do Christians Praise It and Benefit from It?
Is my criticism valid? I guess for you to know that for sure, you should read the book for yourself. You can ask, "If there is such a fundamental flaw in Willard's teaching, then why do so many Christians praise it and benefit from it?"
With no data or proper study, this is my answer.
First, Christians praise it because it highlights a problem many Christians do not wish to admit. And Willard is a gifted speaker and writer, kind and caring, these are praiseworthy qualities.
Second, is the premise in the question valid? Did many Christians benefit? It may look beneficial now, but will it last? For the individual and for the churches?
Let's assume some do benefit. I think any Christian who has legitimately benefited in the long run has consciously or unconsciously have looked at the cross as foundational and not transitional. I say this because I believe that if you take the cross as a transit point to more things, greater things, you will lose everything.
Third, maybe I'm wrong. Not wrong in the cross being foundational but wrong in my interpretation of this book. Maybe Willard or Ortberg are not clear as writers. They write as hands on practitioners and not as precise theologians. Many things written here are correct. The book tells readers to be humble in learning. That's what I am trying to do now.
Other Books That Hold The Cross Dear
And if you are learning about spiritual formation, there are various other books to consider:

• If you are a pastor who wants to do soul care, I recommend "The Care of Souls" by Harold Senkbeil.
• If you are a believer who wants to mature in Christ, I recommend "Cultivating the Fruit of the Spirit" by Christopher J. H. Wright.
• If you love the church and want an alternate view to Willard's on what is the problem in the church, I recommend "The Real Scandal of the Evangelical Mind" by Carl Trueman, published around the same time as Willard's book.

You can read my reviews of these books in the show notes below. The big difference between today's book and the ones I mentioned is Willard believes Christians have spent too much time on the cross, thus not enough time doing soul care. The truth is you can believe the latter without believing the former. You can build on doctrine to do soul care. That's how the Bible teaches it.
In conclusion, "Living in Christ's Presence" is an answer to a genuine problem amongst Christians, offered with much love from the late Dallas Willard and John Ortberg. I think the book is best read by taking the good and spitting out the bad but it can be difficult to discern which is which. There are less complicated books out there.
The ultimate goal of the book is that we should live in Christ's Presence, that we can all agree. We disagree on the fundamental role of the cross of Christ, I say it's foundational not transitional, but those are my words, not Willard's. I doubt proponents of Willard's teaching agree with my description and assessment. But I hope, whether or not I misunderstood Willard, we can all affirm that the cross of Christ is the ground on which we live out the Kingdom of God. That means we must continually come back to it, not move past it, if we are to live in Christ's presence.
This is a Reading and Readers review of "Living in Christ's Presence: Last Words on Heaven and the Kingdom of God" by Dallas Willard. Available in Amazon Kindle for USD9.41 and free for October from Faithlife.
Today's book review can be contentious. I would love to hear from you, especially if you have read the book or follow Dallas Willard's teaching. You can contact me via email: [email protected] or Twitter: @readingnreaders or the website's contact form at www.readingandreaders.com. The website also contains all my contact details. For past book reviews, I have received comments from listeners, some critical, but always conveyed in Christian love and truth. I look forward to them. Thank you for listening to Reading and Readers, a podcast where I review Christian books for you. Bye bye.
Book List

• "Living in Christ's Presence: Last Words on Heaven and the Kingdom of God" by Dallas Willard. Amazon. Faithlife.
• "The Care of Souls" by Harold Senkbeil. Amazon. Logos. Review.
• "Cultivating the Fruit of the Spirit" by Christopher J. H. Wright. Amazon. Faithlife. Review.
• "The Real Scandal of the Evangelical Mind" by Carl Trueman. Amazon. Faithlife. Review.

Martin Luther said of the Epistle to the Romans:

This epistle is really the chief part of the New Testament, and is truly the purest gospel. It is worthy not only that every Christian should know it word for word, by heart, but also that he should occupy himself with it every day, as the daily bread of the soul. We can never read it or ponder over it too much; for the more we deal with it, the more precious it becomes and the better it tastes.
Hi, my name is Terence and I'm your host for Reading and Readers, a podcast where I review Christian books for you. Today I review "Romans: A Concise Guide to the Greatest Letter Ever Written" by Andrew David Naselli. 232 pages, published by Crossway in August 2022. It's available in Amazon Kindle for USD22.49 and in Logos for USD23.99.
I got a review copy from the publisher for free. Crossway has no input on this review.
The Author
Andrew or Andy Naselli is, to quote his website:
the associate professor of systematic theology and New Testament for Bethlehem College and Seminary in Minneapolis and one of the pastors of Bethlehem Baptist Church.
Since 2010, he has written or edited on average a book a year. Most of his books are on theology as you would expect from a professor of systematic theology.
I want to highlight a book here that gives some perspective on today's book. In 2012, Naselli wrote "From Typology to Doxology: Paul's Use of Isaiah and Job in Romans 11:34-35". This a 214 page book on two verses in Romans. Two verses in Romans. This book came from a dissertation. That dissertation came from a paper presented to the Evangelical Theological Society. That paper came from D.A. Carson's PhD Seminar where each student was asked to write a paper on the use of the OT in a NT passage. Naselli could choose any passage and he chose Romans 11:34-35 because those two verses were attached to his favourite verse in the Bible: Romans 11:36, which:
For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.
So we know that Naselli loves Romans. We know that he can write 200 pages on two Roman verses.
There are 433 verses in 16 chapters in Romans. Can Naselli write on the whole letter and be concise? That is a bigger challenge than you might think.
The Challenge to be Concise
Just to shed light on the challenge, let me share with you the longest book I have ever read, or more precisely the longest audio book I have ever listened to.
Some years ago, I got a free audio book voucher. I could pick any book I wanted from the catalog. Wanting to get the biggest bang for my buck, I picked the longest book. I didn't know at the time that John Piper's Romans was not a book but a compilation of his sermon series on Romans; all 8 years, all 225 sermons.
Before I listened to his sermons, Romans was impenetrable to me. I knew it was important, I just could not figure out what Paul was saying. After completing Piper's expository series, I was most satisfied in the beautiful truth I now hold so dear in my heart. That sermon series has been a life-changing experience.
So much so that I wanted more.
Soon after, I bought Dr. Martyn Lloyd Jones Romans set, his sermon series spanning 12 years set into 14 volumes. I started it but didn't finish. It sits on my shelf as my retirement project.
In Naselli's book, he frequently refers to top Roman scholars, Douglas Moo and Tom Schreiner. He even describes his own book as Moo-lite or Schreiner-lite. Now, since he said that, you might as well read Moo or Schreiner right? Why go for lite when you can go for the original?
You go for lite, when the original is too heavy.
Douglas Moo's book from the New International Commentary on the New Testament weighs in at 1184 pages. Tom Schreiner's from the Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament weighs in at 944 pages.
What's my point here?
Great preachers John Piper and Martyn Lloyd-Jones saw Romans as so substantial that they dedicated 8 and 12 years respectively of their lives to preach from it. Top Roman scholars, Douglas Moo and Thomas Schreiner wrote around a 1000 pages on this one letter.
So when Naselli says his book is a concise guide, it is against this backdrop: the Epistle to the Romans has so much to offer to the Christian.
Can a one page summary do it justice? Can a 200 page guide? Can Andrew Naselli capture in his little book what makes Romans great?
Let's find out.
Outline
In the preface, Naselli tells us that there are six ways to use this book. Those ways include reading this book with, on the side, a bible, or more than one bible, or with other bible resources; I recommend his Phrase Diagram book which I will speak more on later.
In the introduction, Naselli answers questions like "How Important is Romans?", "Who wrote it?", "Where did he write it?", "When?", "To Whom?", "Why?" and so on. If you are new to Romans, this gives you the motivation and the broader context to Paul's letter to the Romans.
Before we get to the main content of the book, we have a three-page outline. Here, we get our first hint of Naselli's love for outlines. His book is an outline of outlines, as you will soon see.
Let me list the 7 chapter headings:

1. Introduction (1:1-17)
2. The Universal Need for God's Righteousness (1:18-3:20)
3. The Means of Obtaining God's Righteousness (3:21-4:25)
4. Benefits of Obtaining God's Righteousness (5:1-8:39)
5. The Vindication of God's Righteousness (9:1-11:36)
6. Living in Light of God's Righteousness (12:1-15:13)
7. Conclusion (15:14-16:27)

This book could be titled, "The Righteous God Righteously Righteouses the Unrighteous" except Naselli has taken that clever title for another essay.
Near the end of book, we have Recommended Resources on Romans, which includes resources: Intermediate/Advanced and Introductory. There is a Study Guide which has questions for the individual or the bible study group. And a chapter titled, "Acknowledgments", which is the only chapter that reveals Naselli's personal life. The book closes with the General Index and Scripture Index.
I said that this book is an outline of outlines. Now, I'll explain why.
Chapter One
Let's look at chapter one. The chapter title reads "Introduction (1:1-17)". Chapter begins with:
Paul introduces the letter with a greeting (1:1-7), a thanksgiving (1:8-15), and the letter's theme (1:16-17).
Naselli gives us an outline of his chapter. There are three parts.
Now let us read the paragraph that follows:
1:1-7 The letter’s opening introduces Paul as the author and the Christians in Rome as the addressees. Several themes bookend the letter: the gospel, the Son, the Old Testament, Paul, the obedience of faith, and the nations (see 16:25–27).
So here, we see that Naselli breaks down verse 1-7 into three smaller parts. And in the three subsections that follow, he rapidly unpacks verse 1-3a, verse 3b-4 and verse 5-7. Boom. Boom. Boom.
But the pace changes when he reaches verses 16 and 17. He writes three pages, half the entire chapter to expound on Romans 1:16-17:
For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.”
He does so because these two verses are key to understand the rest of the book.
And that is Naselli's method. He takes a chunk. Then he breaks it down. He breaks it down until we get to easily digestible chunks. When he reaches a difficult to digest chunk or an important chunk, he spends time on it.
You Need the Bible
If you are a guy who has ever thought, "Can someone please slowly explain to me what is the book of Romans about? Slowly, step by step. I don't want to hear your opinion. What I want is to see for myselfhow the verses progress, how they come together. I want to see how the argument flows."
If you are that guy, then this book is for you.
Naselli takes the chunks that he broke down for us and shows how they come together. In fact, he insists that you follow the flow of arguments. He does this at the expense of making his book more readable. For example, let me read his commentary on three verses, 6:6-8.
6:7 This sentence supports the previous one(6:6) as a parenthetical statement. When we died with Christ, God set us free from sin’s power.
6:8 This sentence continues the argument in 6:6. We are identified with Christ. If we died with Christ, we will also live with him.
6:9 This sentence supports the previous one (6:8). Since Christ rose from the dead, he “will never die again” (unlike how Lazarus died again after Jesus raised him) because “death no longer has dominion [i.e., any power] over him.”
In order for me to even understand what he wrote, I need the Bible. He forces me to open up Romans to read those sentences and see the flow for myself.
This means that if you are going on a trip, and you are looking for a book to read on the plane or on the beach, if you are looking for something edifying to read as you kick back and relax, this is not the book for you. Kicking back and relax is not how Naselli wants you to read this book.
Naselli wants you to lean forward with pen, coloured pencils, highlighters, with a Bible in hand, more Bibles the better! He wants you to trace Paul's argument. Naselli's concise guide to Romans is for the serious adventurer not the Instagram tourist.
But, if I dare say so myself, there is another book better than the Bible. Oooh... heresy. Listen as I finish my sentence, there is another book better than the Bible to read alongside Naselli's book and that is his companion book: "Tracing the Argument of Romans: A Phrase Diagram of the Greatest Letter Ever Written". In his blog, Naselli writes:
Each book can stand on its own, but I designed the book with Logos to supplement the book with Crossway.
A phrase diagram is in simple terms diagrams of the text indented to outline or break down the clauses, where the text is coloured, highlighted, boxed and marked with arrows, so that we can see the relationship of the clauses. Or to trace the argument of the passage. In Naselli's words:
It's the most respectful and fruitful way I know of to take God's word seriously.
So if you read Naselli's concise guide to Romans, you must have, at minimum, the Bible next to you. Ideally, you would have the Romans book on the left part of your screen and the Phrase Diagram book on the right, so that you can closely follow Paul's arguments.
Following Paul's argument is the most important goal for Naselli. The way he has written this book, his priority is not to make the case for his views (he does) or to make you understand the minute details of various interpretations (for that he points you to scholars in the footnotes). His primary goal is to make you see the outline, the argument, of Romans.
Once you get that, you can fill the rest of the details from the scholars.
Scholarly
Douglas Moo, a distinguished scholar on Romans, endorsed this book. He wrote:
“Naselli’s book on Romans gives believers a brief and accessible overview of Paul’s great letter to the church in Rome. While written for a general audience, this book is rooted in a broad acquaintance with the many issues in recent interpretation of the letter.”
I would qualify what Moo means by general audience. His general audience is a tad different from my general audience.
Naselli has a long list of books he has written and edited for an academic, scholarly audience. So relatively speaking, in contrast, this concise guide on Romans is for a general audience. Relatively speaking. In contrast.
You see, the general audience in my circle do not read books with some Greek words. This book doesn't require you to have knowledge of Greek but Naselli does think it important to explain some of them.
This book has tables that clearly lay out: Faith vs Works in Romans 4 and James 2, Adam vs. Christ in Romans 5:12-21, Flesh vs. Spirit in Romans 8:5-13 and there are ten more tables where that came from.
And let's talk about the footnotes. There are some pages where the footnotes cover half the page. They often cite academic works from Moo, Schreiner, Carson, Beale, Hodge and Murray, to name a few.
In one footnote, Naselli writes: "I am condensing and paraphrasing Anthony A. Hoekema, Created in God's Image." In another, he writes: "This paragraph condenses and updates Moo and Naselli's work" and he cites the publication.
All this means is readers are getting the best scholarly answer to the question posed in the text. And there are many questions to be found in Romans.
For example, in Romans 9 is Paul speaking about corporate or individual salvation? This has giant implications on how one reads the rest of the letter.
Naselli doesn't go into the details. Understandably so. He can't write a concise guide that is also comprehensive. But he suggests that if I want to know more on this question, I should read three articles:

• Thomas R. Schreiner, "Does Romans 9 Teach Individual Election unto Salvation".
• Brian J. Abasciano, "Corporate Election in Romans 9: A Reply to Thomas Schreiner".
• Thomas R. Schreiner, "Corporate and Individual Election in Romans 9: A Response to Brian Abasciano".

So I did. I put down Naselli's book and downloaded those articles from the Journal of Evangelical Theological Society. And had a really good time reading the exchanges between Schreiner and Abasciano, which I would never have known existed if not for Naselli.
So one way to think of this concise guide is Naselli curates the best and most thoughtful resources on the questions that come up as we read Romans.
What I Unexpectedly Gained
And that's the weird thing about this book. I gained lots of new things but not so much about Romans. I love Romans. You can't listen to 8 years worth of Piper sermons and not love how Paul's argument flow. And since then, I have read for myself, studied and argued with others about Romans so I am somewhat familiar with the various questions.
If you are new to Romans, Naselli's book will guide you to glorious treasures.
As for me, let me outline for you what I gained from Naselli's book:

1. Martyn Lloyd Jones sermon series on Romans. As I read Naselli's book, I was dissatisfied because I have been spoilt by Piper. When it comes to Romans, I want expository exultation. Naselli reminded me of the thrill of discovery. Because of this book, I downloaded the Martyn Lloyd Jones app to listen to his sermon series on Romans on my work commute.
2. Memorising Romans. In his acknowledgements, Naselli thanked his youth leaders in high school for encouraging him to memorize Romans. I once tried to memorise Romans. (Piper makes you try things you normally would not do.) Naselli has spurred me to make the attempt once again.
3. Biblearc. I didn't know this tool existed. As soon as Naselli introduced it in his books, the phrase diagrams and all, I went to the website, subscribed and I'm using it for my next sermon. Once I've familiarised myself with it, I plan to introduce and teach it to others.

In conclusion, Naselli's concise guide to Romans is a great book if you are looking for someone to break down Romans into easily digestible chunks. He shows you how they come together and points you to in-depth answers to the questions that invariably come up.
This is not a book to kick back and read. You need to lean forward as the book guides you to study Romans. And as you read it, I hope you will gain, as I did, a great appreciation of the great truths Paul writes in the greatest letter ever written.
This is a Reading and Readers review of "Romans: A Concise Guide to the Greatest Letter Ever Written" by Andrew David Naselli. 232 pages, published by Crossway in August 2022. It's available in Amazon Kindle for USD22.49 and in Logos for USD23.99. I got the review copy from Crossway. They had no input on the review.
Let's see whether you can follow this line of argument. You have friends. Friends tell friends of good things. Reading and Readers is a good thing. Therefore, you should tell your friends of Reading and Readers, the podcast where I review Christian books for you. I hope you enjoyed this book review. Thank you for listening.
Book List

• "Romans: A Concise Guide to the Greatest Letter Ever Written" by Andrew David Naselli. Amazon. Logos.
• "Tracing the Argument of Romans: A Phrase Diagram of the Greatest Letter Ever Written" by Andrew David Naselli. Logos.

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's the amazing, fantastic, incredible, book that inspires children all over the world to read the Bible and enjoy reading it.
Hi, my name is Terence and I'm your host for Reading and Readers, a podcast where I review Christian books for you. Today I review "Action Bible: God's Redemptive Story" by Sergio Cariello. 832 pages, published by David C. Cook in September 2020. Available in hardcover for USD18.79 and in Kindle for USD9.99 in Amazon. Or you can get it via Faithlife for USD4.99 as part of their discounted books in their Free Book of the Month programme.
By the way, the Faithlife's Free Book of the Month is "Knowing God the Father: 52 Devotions to Grow Your Family's Faith". Normally I take the free book as an assignment and just review no matter what it is but I've been reading too many devotionals lately, and I just want to read and review something else.
Not to mention, I saw a comic book amongst the discounted books. I don't see that often. I'm a big comic book and manga fan, so I was happy to pay USD4.99 for the Action Bible, to enjoy and review.
A comic book Bible has obvious appeal. It's visual, easy to read and attractive to children, all of which your King James Version Bible is not. How often do you hear your children say, "Oh Mom, can I read another page of the KJV, please?"
If you are listening or reading this review in front of a bookshelf wondering whether to get the Action Bible for your children, grandchildren, nephews and nieces, I won't waste any more of your time. Yes, get it and get it for all of them. And while you are at it, you can get one for yourself too.
Now, my strong endorsement should not be understood as a universal endorsement of all picture book Bibles. There are picture books supposedly for children, with the Bible in the title, but are in fact subversive attempts to turn readers away from the Christian faith. And I'll give you one example at the end of the episode, after I review today's book.
Let's get to the book.
Origin Story
From the website, David C. Cook, the publisher announces:

The Action Bible family of products has more than 85 million units in print worldwide since it launched in 2010. The original The Action Bible has sold more than 2.3 million copies and has spent more than 515 weeks on the ECPA Top 50 bestseller list. It is available in 27 languages globally, with 10-15 additional language translations to be completed in 2020.
They have a family of products. They have a curriculum. You go to the website, sign up and they have resources you can download. It's a mini industry. And all that started with a humble little comic book that has gotten a second edition in 2020, which is what I'm reviewing today.
As befitting a comic book, let's do an origin story. This is my dramatised version taking some artistic liberties from the original source material. This is my comic book adaptation of what really happened.
It was a dark and stormy night, Sergio Cariello was hunched over, brush and ink in hand when the doors burst open. It was a summons from David C. Cook. They needed a wizard artist to rejuvenate the ageing Picture Bible. Sergio Cariello looks across the desk at his Portuguese translation of that very Picture Bible. The book was old, faded and well-thumbed. That Picture Bible was like the spider in Spiderman, the bat in Batman, the iron in Ironman, what turned the young Cariello into the Christian comic book artist he was today. How could he deny the chance to make a comic book Bible for a new generation?
And so Nick Fury, I mean David C. Cook, recruited Sergio Cariello, the man who drew among many others, the X-men, Batman, Superman, Ironman, he will now draw Adam and Eve, David and Goliath, Peter, John and Paul, not to mention the Lord Jesus Christ. Never before, has he faced a challenge as great and as noble as this.
And thus we have the Action Bible. It has more than 230 stories from Genesis to Revelation in 800 plus pages. A very motivated reader can finish it in a day and once he is done, he can go back and read it over and over again.
Personal Testimony on the Power of Comics
That's what happened to me. My grandmother gave me comic versions of Bible stories. At that time, her faith was not as strong as it is now. She just knew the Bible was a good thing. At that time, I had no faith at all. I knew nothing of the Bible.
I read those comics over and over again. If I close my eyes I can see Elijah riding in the chariots of fiery horses towards heaven. To me, these were just stories. They didn't make me a believer but they did make a claim that God was good, just, almighty and that he loves all.
And these ideas of God came back to haunt me when those simple days of reading comic after comic have passed. When life is not filled with comic book villains but with much troubles and despair but in the real world there is no Superman. Parents can't protect you. You have to make your way in the world and leave childish things behind. Unless those childish things have planted a grain of truth in your heart.
And that's why people buy and give these books. In the hope that a grain of truth, seeds of faith, may be sown in young hearts. Waiting for the day of harvest. Because of this, it's important that what is planted is true. It is biblical.
Is it Biblical?
As far as I can tell, the Action Bible is not based on any translation. Then where does the text come from? It says here that the copyright for the text belongs to David C. Cook, the publisher, while the copyright for the illustrations belongs to Sergio Cariello.
I don't know why the publishers didn't use a translation. There are children's translation or very simple English translations around, which could be included in the text. Maybe it's because they had to modify many verses to fit it into a comic book format with the pictures and a need for snappy dialogue.
Christians who know their Bible will quickly see artistic license, liberties, taken with the original Bible passage. In the first page, it says:
In the beginning, there was nothing. Except God.
"Except God" is in bold. Subtle. No 'Kapow'. Also that is not how Genesis 1:1 goes.
I am not nitpicking. Nor am I a purist. When you turn the Bible into a 800 page comic book, some things will not be in it and what is in it will be modified to fit the medium. As it should.
The question is whether the omissions and changes produce a work that remains true to the original source, to the Word of God. Because sometimes they don't.
In the 2nd and 3rd centuries, Marcionites ditched the Old Testament. They saw it was incompatible with the New.
Thomas Jefferson, no less, edited his own version of the New Testament. He removed the supernatural and dogma to bring out what he thought were the true and good parts.
Today, in China, the Chinese Communist Party limits the distribution of Bibles and according to Voice of the Martyrs, the CCP is writing a translation. I wonder what they will remove and modify.
And just in case you think you will never face the threat of a distorted translation, have you heard of The Passion Translation? That translation looks like it belongs on a shelf with other legitimate Bible translations, but one day it will jump out and yell, "Hail Hydra". This not the time, nor the place to explain why I say there is something wrong with the Passion Translation, but if you have it, I ask that you read up the problems with that translation.
Not are changes to the Bible potentially dangerous, but when we visualise the Bible, you can have the wrong picture in mind.
Wrong Picture in Mind
For example, in the Action Bible, in the story of Abraham interceding to the Lord on Sodom's behalf, Genesis 18:22-33, the Action Bible has Abraham speaking before an altar with burning, smoking, sacrifices. But if you read the Bible, we see that Abraham is speaking to God as one who appeared as man. A theophany which is concealed in the illustration.
If you didn't know before, you now know that there is a potential danger when people remove parts or change the Bible to produce a new piece of work. There is a potential danger when pictures can wordlessly convey a meaning apart from the text. And I am glad to report that I could not find any signs or hint of a problem with the Action Bible. And I was looking for trouble but there was none.
While I wished it would use a known translation, the comic sticks to telling the Bible stories. When it gives an interpretation, whether in the text or visually, it is safely within Christian understanding.
Every Book in the Bible Except One
Also, the reader knows that there they should refer to a Bible. Every story has a title. In the title, it clearly states where the story comes from. A Rainbow Promise based on Genesis 8-10. A Babbling Tower based on Genesis 11:1-9. Eat Your Vegetables based on Daniel 1.
When moving to a new historical period, it introduces the relevant books, for example:
The books of 2 Samuel and 1 Chronicles record the same period of history -- the reign of David, Israel's greatest king. 2 Samuel is the original history, as written down by the prophets, while 1 Chronicles fills in gaps from the perspective of the priests.
That's quite informative. More informative than you would expect for a comic book for 8 year olds.
I give you another surprise. The Action Bible could have skipped them and no one would notice, but they intentionally include the minor prophets and epistles into the comic.
There is one page titled "Four Prophets". The page is divided into four parts: Hosea, Amos, Joel and Micah. Under Hosea, we see a man looking at us with a kindly smile. A woman stands front of him, frowning or unsure of herself. The text above the two reads:
Hosea loves his wife Gomer, very much. But one day she leaves him. The Law says Hosea can divorce his wife, but he chooses to stay married to her. He tells the people of Israel that they have treated God the same way. God loves his people, but they have run away to worship idols.
The man in the picture, Hosea, says:
Don't you see how much God loves you, even though you don't love him back? If God can love an unfaithful people, then I can love an unfaithful wife.
It's hard to bring out the epistles in a comic. In one scene, we see Paul giving Epaphroditus a scroll. On the side, we see an open scroll with the headings: Paul's Letter to the Philippians, and to the Colossians, and to the Ephesians. Under the Colossians, we read:
But Christ wasn't just a man. He was truly God -- but in human form. Jesus is all we need.
When I read that, I wondered whether quoting a verse from a translation would have been better than a rough summary. It's not wrong. If I make a bigger deal out of this than I should, it's only because I'm impressed by scale and effort put in. So I speak as a fan, not as a hater.
It covers the whole Bible so well, they even include a Scripture index. 13 pages at the end of the book listing Bible verses book by book and its corresponding page reference. I went through it book by book and the only book that was not covered is Song of Songs. That is amazing, fantastic, incredible!
And More Than The Bible
The Action Bible does not only give a good coverage of the Bible, they even went beyond the Bible.
I was delighted to read the story titled, "Years of Waiting: Between the Old Testament and the New Testament". The opening sentence to this story is:
The land of Judah is still under the rule of the Persians when Alexander, the young king of Macedonia, sets out to conquer the world, riding his famous horse, Bucephalus, he leads his army against the countries of the mighty Persian Empire. One after another, they fall.
Here we read about Alexander the Great's approach to Jerusalem, the Maccabee revolt and the rise of Herod. The inter-testamental period is not covered in other bible books. I know because I have a few. So it's a nice addition.
In a few situations, they add to the Bible story. Imagining moments that are not explicitly in it. For example, there is a scene where Daniel sits together with his three friends. One asks, "Why are we studying the Babylonian history, their gods and astrology? We don't believe in any of it."
Daniel answers, "For better or for worse, this is the culture we live in. It's good to understand their ways, just not to follow them."
That is a commentary. Is it in the Bible? No. Is it helpful? Yes, it can be.
So there we have it. The Action Bible picks up many of the familiar Bible story, covers every book except for Song of Songs and occasionally, adds elements like the intertestament period, the death of Paul and some light applications.
Enough about the text. In comics, there are two parts. The words and the art. Let's now move to the art.
The Art, What More Can You Ask For?
You get what you would expect from an artist who has worked for DC and Marvel. Good quality stuff. But I know art is subjective, some would love it more than others.
For me, all I ask is that the art properly and clearly convey the story in the Bible. And it does.
The storyboarding is clear. He draws simple facial expressions and gestures that set the tone and move the story along. People look sad and happy when they are supposed to be sad and happy.
Then, there are the parts of the Bible which are notoriously difficult to imagine, much less draw. The prophecies of Daniel, the vision of Ezekiel and apocalyptic writings in Revelation for example.
Truthfully, I was a little bit underwhelmed by Cariello's portrayal of these scenes but after some reflection, I realised that I am looking at something that is meant to be much larger than life. When I read these passages I am supposed to shake and tremble with fear and confusion, and I should not fault him if I do not.
In terms of illustrations, I like Samson's story. His battle armed with a donkey's jawbone and enemies flying off the page is like a page from the Incredible Hulk.
Another one I liked was Blind Bartimaeus. He hears Jesus calling. He leaps from the ground and runs like the Flash.
Give you one more of my favourites: it is the Valley of Dry Bones in Ezekiel. We see an ancient battlefield of dry bones. God tells Ezekiel, "Prophesy to them, Ezekiel. Tell them that I will knit them back together again."
A box above Ezekiel reads, "Feeling a bit silly, Ezekiel obeys."
Ezekiel speaks, "Bones! Hear the word of the Lord! He will bring you back to life!"
We see the bones moving, tendons and flesh appear and skin covers the body. This scene made me ponder more than I expected it to probably because I never visualised it happening in my head. Now that I have seen it visualised, I am amazed at it.
And amazed because I know what that passage means for Christians today. Actually, there were more than a few occasions where I put the comic down just to think about the story. Wow. This is what the Bible says.
The Action Bible's NemesisIf the Action Bible is a superhero, then let me tell you of the imposter. The Bizzaro to Superman, the ManBat to Batman, the Venom to Spiderman, no... a better example would be that time when Dr. Octopus took over Peter Parker's body and became Spiderman. You can read that in the Superior Spiderman comics. Okay, back to imposter Bible comics.
What toy evokes childhood fun and innocence? Can you think of any toy better than Lego? Now, what if you see on the shelf a two volume hardcover titled "Lego Bible"? It uses Lego figurines to tell the Bible stories. It has obvious appeal right? Better or the same level as the Action Bible right?
No.
The Lego Bible is not what you think it is.
It does not build up the Christian faith, it attempts to show how ridiculous and violent the Bible is.
You have pictures of Lego figurines beheading other Lego figurines with blood spraying out of their necks. Supposedly the author wants to tell the Bible as it is but it is not. And if you pause just for a moment and read the reviews in Amazon, you will be horrified.
In pointing out the Lego Bible's deceitful nature, I remind us that we should not take for granted the illustrators, storytellers and publishers who give us books, picture books, to read to our children that build their faith. Also, we must always be vigilant. Lego is not always a go. Villains do not always look like monsters.
Physical Beats Electronic and Not Just For Children
Couple more things before I end the episode. I am reading the Logos version of the Action Bible, which is the cheapest of all the options.
I said this in the beginning and I'll say it again, if you are standing in front of a bookshelf wondering whether to get this for children, get it. A paperback or hardcover comic is much better than an electronic version. Trust me. I have spent many years huddled with a comic, reading and re-reading it. I love it when I see my children reading although it is occasionally frustrating when we try to call them to dinner. "Wait mom, dad, I just want to finish this page."
Don't get the electronic version. I don't know how it works in the Kindle or pdf versions but I can tell you that double page spreads don't work well in Logos. You are supposed to flip the page and be treated to a panoramic scene. You are not supposed to scroll down and figure out, "Oh... wait, this picture is cut off... oh this is the left page... cause when I scroll down, I get the right page... so all I got to do is merge the left page and the right page in my mind..." That doesn't give the same effect.
I have said that comic book bibles have obvious appeal to their target readers. Children. Preteens. But it is also appealing to adults. Especially those who are new to the faith. We live in a society where we cannot assume people know who is Adam, Moses or David. They don't know the Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
Give a new believer a comic book and they will catch up as fast as Quicksilver. Get the main redemptive story right and every sermon and bible study will make sense.
In conclusion, the Bible we hold so dear is a treasure, more precious than gold, more precious the first Action Comic. The Action Bible, is not the full Bible, but it introduces children and adults to our treasure, and we pray that it marks the beginning of many newcomers in their Christian journey.
This is a Reading and Readers review of the Action Bible by Sergio Cariello. 832 pages, published by David C. Cook in September 2020. Available in hardcover for USD18.79 and in Kindle for USD9.99 in Amazon. It's available in September from Faithlife for the low, low, price of USD4.99.
Do you want to feel like a superhero with a superpower for just one moment? Hit the subscribe button. You just don't know how much power you have on the future of this podcast. Hope you enjoyed listening to this book review as much as I enjoyed making it. Tell all your friends about Reading and Readers, the podcast where I review Christian books for you. Thank you for listening.
Book List

• "Action Bible: God's Redemptive Story" by Sergio Cariello. Amazon. Faithlife.

The book of Ruth is a beautiful story centred on Naomi, Ruth and Boaz. We see God and God's people reflecting God, his kindness and redemptive work. If you want to dig deeper into the text, you need to keep listening.
Hi, my name is Terence and I'm your host for Reading and Readers, a podcast where I review Christian books for you. Today I review Ruth, a volume from the Anchor Yale Bible Commentary or AYBC for short, by Edward F. Campbell Jr. 188 pages, published by Yale University Press in May 2003. It's available in Amazon as a paperback for USD31.99, strangely there isn't a Kindle version. If you want an electronic version, you can head over to Logos, which is offering this book for free for September.
I'm quite excited for today's review. This commentary on Ruth is the free book for September and I just concluded a sermon series on ... guess what... Ruth(!). In the month of August, there are four Sundays, four sermons for the four chapters in Ruth. My head is still living in the barley fields of Bethlehem.
If you are a new listener, I just want to quickly say that while I try to spend equal time reviewing light and heavy books, my aim is to make sure you gain something out of the review, no matter where you come from. Whether or not, you are familiar with the book of Ruth or the technicalities of studying the Bible. There will be some technical terms ahead which is true for any field, whether it's photography or dress-making but don't let the photographers, dress-makers or theologians' technical talk detract you.
Alright, with that, let's get to the book.
The first thing to note is the Anchor Yale Commentary Series describes itself as:

a project of international and interfaith scope in which Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish scholars from many countries contribute individual volumes. The project is not sponsored by any ecclesiastical organization and is not intended to reflect any particular theological doctrine.
Unlike other commentaries, the AYBC is an interfaith project. You ask, "How useful can a commentary series be if there is no theological tradition to bring them together?" Surprisingly useful as you will hear.
The book is divided into two main parts, the introduction and the commentary. In the introduction you will find among many things, a discussion on the genre of the book. Campbell says it's a novelle which implies the Ruth is fictional. He tells us about the original manuscripts related to Ruth. This tiny little four chapter book is not as simple as it seems. All these technical talk on the literature, history and theology can be very dry if not for the clarity and enthusiasm Campbell brings to this commentary.
At one point, Campbell writes in spontaneous praise:
I stand in awe of this author. He was a genius.
And that he is in awe throughout the whole commentary. Look at how the author has structured the story. Look at how he uses word-play. Look at this amazing piece of literature! Campbell's genuine love for the subject, getting into the mind of the author, makes it easier for readers to overcome the technical hurdles along the way.
Yet, you may not like how Campbell begins his book. And be tempted to close the book, not willing to read any further. Because Campbell who stands in awe of this genius, also thinks that the book of Ruth is not historical.
In the introduction, he tells us how other scholars have tried to draw out earlier versions of Ruth. For example, one scholar suggests that initially the story only had Naomi. Ruth was added later. Another scholar says the story of Ruth came from a piece of poetry, "perhaps an old nursery tale". To me, this discussion is so bizarre because it's so speculative and I was relieved to read Campbell's conclusion that trying to trace the development of Ruth is a blind alley.
However, in a subsection titled, "Historicity", Campbell says the better question is not whether it's historical but whether it's plausible. After affirming there is much historical accuracy in the book, he concludes:
This in no way diminishes the judgment that the Ruth book contains a fictional story; it is simply a plausible one, and its information is a good guide to life and custom, and to realistic expectations about human living under the rule of God.
And it is after this paragraph that he says, he stands in awe of the author. He was a genius. A genius not for the history that he recorded but for the story that he made up.
I disagree with him. And I hope you do too. At the same time, I hope you will get this book, read it and use it as a resource.
Campbell believes Ruth is not historical. I believe it is. So consider this: what does it mean if our starting position is different but our conclusions on some passages are the same? It could mean that these conclusions are not dependent on prior assumptions but stand alone based on the text itself.
On the other hand, what does it mean if our conclusions are different? It could prompt us to study why we differ and how did we arrive at those conclusions.
Everybody who reads a commentary should know this, but my repeating this is a good reminder for all. When we read a commentary we are joining a conversation with knowledgeable people. We are not going under an authority, in addition to Scripture. The big test is whether you can trace the steps to reach your favoured theological position without naming names.
The introduction is surprisingly spicy, but we still have the main dish, which is the commentary. There are seven chapters in the commentary. Each chapter is divided into three sections: Translations, Notes and Comments. Campbell did his own translation of the original manuscript, which is different to other translations in some parts and he explains and defends his translation in the Notes.
The Notes is where you get the fullness of his scholarship, he gets into the original manuscript, the Hebrew, the grammar and meaning and cites and engages with fellow scholars on these matters. If you don't know your Qumran and Syriac manuscripts, J and E narrative, masculine plural ending and reflexive Niphal form, then you can skip them and go to the Comments section.
If you only read the Comments section, you will finish the book quite quickly and you will know what Campbell thinks of the book of Ruth. If you want to know how he substantiates them, just go to the Notes. If you are using this book as a reference, you are not reading this book cover to cover, then you can zoom into that word or verse and see what scholars are saying about it.
I've given you a broad layout of the land, and now like Ruth, I'll go into the field, I will glean some fruit of the land and share them with you.
Knowing What You Didn't Know
The first thing I want to check in any commentary on Ruth is how does the commentary writer understand Naomi's complaint.
Naomi has lost her husband and her two sons. She asks her two daughter-in-laws to leave her and return to their father's house. Ruth refuses to leave her and follows Naomi home. When the people in Bethlehem see her and call out, "Is that Naomi?", Naomi says in Ruth 1:20–21 (ESV):
“Do not call me Naomi; call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. I went away full, and the LORD has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi, when the LORD has testified against me and the Almighty has brought calamity upon me?”
Campbell's translation is more colourful:
“Don’t call me ‘Sweet one,’ Call me ‘Bitter one.’ For Shadday has made me bitter indeed. I was full when I went away, But empty Yahweh has brought me back. Why call me ‘Sweet One’? For Yahweh has testified against me And Shadday has pronounced evil sentence on me.”
Naomi says very strong words. How do you take it?
Is Naomi wrong to say such things? Do we say she is speaking out of her grief and thus out of kindness we should not take her words seriously? Or do we say she is speaking clearly on who God is, there is Biblical truth here, and thus we must listen carefully to understand the believer's relationship to suffering.
In his commentary, Campbell analyses the use of the Hebrew word return, how the Ruth story-teller understands God's activity and hesed kindness, and covenant, and the legal aspect of Naomi's complaint, which leads him to assert:
... not only is complaint tolerated by God, but it can even be the proper stance of a person who takes God seriously! Anyone who ascribes full sovereignty to a just and merciful God may expect to encounter the problem of theodicy, and to wrestle with that problem is no sin, even when it leads to an attempt to put God on trial. Petulant Jonah, earnest Jeremiah, persistent Job -- Naomi stands in their company.
A commentary is helpful when you know what you don't know and you go to the relevant page to find the answer to your burning question. A commentary is especially enlightening when you don't know what you don't know.
Not Knowing What You Didn't Know
Did you know that Ruth uses different words for servant? In chapter 2, when she responds to Boaz's kindness to her, for letting her glean in the field among many other kindnesses, she says "you have spoken kindly to your servant." The word for servant here is siphah.
In chapter 3, when she comes to Boaz in the night to ask him to be her redeemer, she says, "Spread your wings over your servant." The word for servant here is amah.
You couldn't tell this from the English translation. And there is probably nothing to Ruth's changing words for servant. Translators and commentators say the two words are synonymous, they carry the same meaning. But Campbell shares a fascinating bit of trivia:
Over a century ago, a damaged inscription was found on a tomb facade nearly buried beneath a home in the village of Silwan, across the Kidron valley from the temple mount in Jerusalem.
Campbell tell us that a scholar by the name of Avigad was the first to make sense of it. The inscription on the tomb reads:
“This is [the sepulcher of …] yahu who is over the house. There is no silver and no gold here, but [his bones] and the bones of his ʾāmāh with him. Cursed be the man who will open this!” Avigad translated ʾāmāh here as “slave-wife.” Surely this is correct; it is more likely that the ʾāmāh was indeed a beloved slave-wife than that she was buried with her lord simply in order to serve him in the netherworld!
Personally, I think this begs more questions than it answers but if there is a shift in meaning, there is an intentional suggestion of marriage from Ruth to Boaz, then Boaz is one of the few men who got the hint.
This is an example of coming to this book, not knowing what you don't know, and profiting from the labours of scholars. They have done the hard work of digging up a tomb, translating the inscription, and connecting a word found there to what Ruth says to Boaz and adding flavour to the scene. All we do is just read and benefit.
However, this is an inconsequential piece of trivia. It has no major impact to the big story one way or the other. Let me share the one part of the book that made me most uncomfortable.
Let's Talk about Sex
As I mentioned, Ruth went to Boaz at night to ask him to be a redeemer. The way she did it is not something pastors would tell young vulnerable single woman to do. She went to Boaz at the place where the men were working in the middle of the night, uncovered his feet and laid down by his feet.
This is sufficiently scandalous. Campbell tells us there is more!
He tells us that as the storyteller tells the story, Hebrew listeners will hear words with double meaning. For example, when a man lays with a woman, it can have two meanings in English and also in Hebrew. Ruth lay at Boaz's feet. Another word with double meaning is peculiar to the Hebrew that is "to know". For a man to know a woman can be to know her in an intimate manner. Naomi told Ruth to not make herself known to Boaz until he has finished eating and drinking. There are others which got me uncomfortable.
For thousands of years, Ruth and Boaz have been examples of a chaste and pure relationship. Is Campbell telling us that's not true?
He writes:
Does this roster of double entendres mean that the story-teller is simply seeking to titillate his audience? Emphatically not. His intent is much more serious than that. Having led his audience to participate in the mystery and ambiguity of the scene, he obviously means to say that it is of extreme importance whether or not here at the threshing floor things will go forward according to what Israelite custom and Israelite ḥesed-living calls for.
Thanks to Campbell, that passage is a lot more mysterious and ambiguous than before because he highlights the Hebrew words. So did they or didn't they?
And thankfully, Campbell uses the Hebrew to set our hearts at ease.
Once again, the story-teller signals us: the verb he uses is not “lie down,” that ambiguous term, but Hebrew lwn/lyn, “to lodge,” the same term Ruth had used in her avowal to Naomi in 1:16. No ambivalence here! This term is never used in the Hebrew Bible with any sexual undertone. The dark ambiguity gives way to the clarity of the kinds of human commitments which characterize this story. Now it becomes clear that both of these people are worthy, and will do things in righteous fashion.
Imagine how complicated life would be if the storyteller had opted to say Ruth lay down with Boaz while waiting for the sun to rise. Or if Boaz to Ruth said, "Since we are here, let us get to know each other." Even if it was all innocent, the choice of words would compromise their reputation or give license for loose living.
Round Up and Other Recommendations
So just to round up, this commentary on Ruth from the Anchor Yale Bible Commentary Series is great to get into the Hebrew, grammar and literary aspect. I would use it as a reference but not as a main commentary. Call me old-fashioned or nit-picking, but I think it's important we both look at Ruth as a historical record rather than a fictional story, no matter how well-crafted the story may be.
I used a bunch of commentaries for my sermon prep, including the New International Commentary on the Old Testament by Robert Hubbard, Jr., Tyndale's by Leon Morris and I've always enjoyed reading the Reformed Expository Commentary and for Ruth it's by Iain Duguid. But I want to make special mention for the one from the New Studies in Biblical Theology. The title is "Unceasing Kindness: A Biblical Theology of Ruth" by Peter H. W. Lau and Gregory Goswell. It's not a verse by verse commentary like the others but it helped me pay attention to God's kindness and hiddenness and Ruth's place in the canon.
If a commentary on Ruth deserved a Razzie award for being the worst, I nominate the one from Berit Olam series by Tod Linafelt. Compare Linafelt against Campbell.
Campbell, in the Anchor Yale commentary, said we should take the characters as the story-teller presents them and not see Ruth as a "scheming woman trying to butter up a vain old man."
Linafelt, on the other hand, in the Berit Olam commentary, wrote this:
Boaz the kindly and pious pillar of the community slips easily into a blustering paternalistic figure who is caught off guard by the surprisingly quick-thinking and mock-deferential Ruth. When Ruth appears next to Boaz in the middle of the night in chapter 3, he is clearly flustered, more than a little frightened, and acquiesces to her suggestions quite easily.
I have little patience with Linafelt's creative and highly speculative analysis. So if you are going to study Ruth, get the New Studies in Biblical Theology one by Peter Lau and Gregory Goswell and stay away from the Berit Olam one by Linafelt, unless you are in the mood for alternate history novels.
This is a Reading and Readers review of Ruth, from the Anchor Yale Bible Commentary | AYBC series by Edward F. Campbell Jr. 188 pages, published by Yale University Press in May 2003. Available in Amazon as a paperback for USD31.99 and free in Logos for September and only September.
So if you want to listen to reviews on books that you never intend to read, subscribe to Reading and Readers, a podcast where I review Christian books for you. I read them so you don't have to. Joking aside, the books I review are not always so heavy, it's a 50-50 thing. So the next book, should hopefully, be a bit more light-hearted and fun. Maybe. Subscribe to find out. Thanks for listening.
Book List

• Ruth (Anchor Yale Bible Commentary | AYBC) by Edward F. Campbell Jr. Amazon. Logos.
• Unceasing Kindness: A Biblical Theology of Ruth | NSBT by Peter Lau and Gregory Goswell. Amazon. Logos.

There was a time in Israel's history, when the Word of God was lost. Then while renovating the temple, the people found the scrolls and they rushed it to the king. When the king saw it, he recognised it as treasure. In a similar way, today's classic is a treasure for Christian readers everywhere .
Hi, my name is Terence and I'm your host for Reading and Readers, a podcast where I review Christian books for you. Today I review that handsome piece of work I hinted at in the last episode. Cur Deus Homo by Anselm of Canterbury. Around 120 pages, published in the late 11th century. Cur Deus Homo translated from Latin is "Why God Man?" or "Why God Became Man?"
Translations
I read two translations. The first translation is the popular one, meaning the one that appears in Amazon and comes up first in Google. It's by Sidney Norton Deane, which was published in 1903. I read this translation, there were parts I didn't understand. So searching for an answer, I discovered this second translation by Jasper Hopkins and Herbert Richardson, which was published in the year 2000. It's more recent which makes it easier to read and so this is the translation I will be using for this review.
Both translations are available for free. I share the links in the show notes below.
I want to give a disclaimer up front, I'm not qualified to compare or evaluate Latin to English translations. I just want to read and review Cur Deus Homo by Anselm. If I misunderstood the translation, that's my fault. If the translator misunderstood the writer, that's the translator's fault. If the writer misunderstood God, that's the writer's fault. Just remember it's never God's fault.
Anselm's Achievement
Before Anselm, the church taught that Christ redeemed us by paying a ransom to the devil. It was Anselm who argued that the debt was paid not to the devil but to God.
Augustus Hopkins Strong in his Systematic Theology wrote:

[But,] although many theologians had recognized a relation of atonement to God, none before Anselm had given any clear account of the nature of this relation. Anselm’s acute, brief, and beautiful treatise entitled “Cur Deus Homo” constitutes the greatest single contribution to the discussion of this doctrine.
An even stronger praise is John Miley's Systematic Theology where he writes:
The treatment of the atonement in a scientific or more exact doctrinal manner really began with Anselm, late in the eleventh century. His book, though but a small one, is not improperly characterized as an “epoch-making book.”
Later he writes:
Reviews of Anselm are so common to histories of doctrine, systems of theology, and monographic discussions of atonement, that there is little need of special reference.
Reviews are so common such that there is little need of special reference. If only that was true today for the general audience.
In Amazon, there are less than 100 reviews for the various editions of this book. In Amazon it ranks at number 1046 under the category of Christian Salvation Theory. Not bad for a 1000 year old book with a Latin title.
Cur Deus Homo is an epoch-making book that is sadly unknown to the common man. Let's try to remedy that with today's episode. Let's re-introduce a classic to a podcast generation.
Dialogue
The book is written as a dialogue between Anselm, the writer, and his fictional creation, Boso. So it's appropriate that this book be a dialogue between myself, the reviewer, and my own fictional creation, Sobo.
Sobo: It is an honour to be part of this book review. Let's start by asking why did Anselm wrote it as a dialogue?
Terence: Because we are slow. That's what he said:
Now, issues which are examined by the method of question-and- answer are clearer, and hence more acceptable, to many minds— especially to minds that are slower.
This probably explains why this book is surprisingly easy to read. Sure, there are long sentences that seem to circle the globe before it reaches a point. This is characteristic of older writings. But there are parts where the dialogue is snappy, the question and the answers come in fast and to the point.
Bulletproof Case
Sobo: It's nice to know that it's easier to read. I guess what readers want to know is: "Is there any reason to read this classic when there are newer books on the same topic written for modern audiences?"
Terence: In the past, in some circles, you just have to drop the book title in an argument and everybody knew what you were talking about.
The argument is so tight, it's bulletproof. Forget everything else I read, Anselm's answer is now my answer to the question, "Why did God become a God-Man?"
If your answer is, "He became Man to save us, you misunderstood the question." The question is why must God save us in this way. To an unbeliever it is ridiculous for God to die at the hands of a mob.
What do you think if the President of the United States thought that the only way to rescue hostages held by the Taliban was to sacrifice himself in exchange? We would all think it to be ridiculous! Send special forces. Pay them the ransom. Use diplomatic pressure. Surely, anything is better than exchanging the hostages for the President of the United States or the President's son? And if he does so, it must be because he is either powerless or he is not too bright.
Structure of Argument
Sobo: In this book, Boso is a Christian who asks questions on behalf of unbelievers. How does Anselm seek to convince unbelievers?
Terence: First of all, Cur Deus Homo is divided into two books. In Anselm's own words, Book I "prove[s] by rational necessity -- Christ being removed from sight, as if there had never been anything known about Him -- that no man can possibly be saved without Him."
Book II "show[s] with equally clear reasoning and truth that human nature was created in order that the whole man (i.e., with a body and a soul) would some day enjoy a happy immortality."
It is too big of a task to summarise what the great Anselm wrote, 25 chapters in the first and 22 chapters in the second, within a few minutes for this podcast.
Debt to God
Sobo: Undoubtedly so, but please for the benefit of listeners who may need encouragement to read for themselves this wonderful book, what is the gist of Anselm's argument?
Terence: I don't feel up to the task to give you what you ask for but I will try my best. As you say, readers should read the book to properly judge how bulletproof is Anselm's argument.
In my own words, here is how I understand it:
Man owes God a debt. Who pays the debt? God?
God cannot clear this debt because that would be unjust. Man would enjoy Heaven at God's expense.
There is a debt. Who pays the debt? What if God creates another man to pay the debt? But that new man has no relation to us. Adam sinned. We are the children of Adam. That new man cannot pay because he is not of Adam's line.
There is a debt. We cannot pay. God must not pay. And God cannot create a new being to pay it.
Now, leave the question of who pays aside, Anselm asks, "What will you pay to God in proportion to your sin?"
Boso answers, "Penitence, a contrite and humbled heart, fasting and a variety of physical toil, the mercy of giving and forgiving, as well as obedience."
I thought that was an excellent answer. Wouldn't you say the same?
Anselm brings the hammer down. I'll quote him at length to give you a sense of how he answers questions.
When you render something which you would owe to God even if you had not sinned, you ought not to reckon it as payment of the debt which you owe for your sin. Now, you owe to God all of the things you have just mentioned. For in this mortal life there ought to be so much love, and so much desire to arrive at that end for which you have been created (an arrival whereunto prayer is relevant), and so much sorrow because you are not yet there, and so much fear lest you not arrive, that you ought to experience joy only over those things which give you either assistance in arriving or the hope thereof. For you do not deserve to have what you do not love and desire in proportion to its nature, and over which you do not grieve because you do not yet possess it but are still in such great danger as to whether or not you will ever possess it. To possess this, it is also a prerequisite to flee from the repose and worldly pleasures (except insofar as you know them to conduce to your aspiration to arrive at this possession) which call the soul away from that true rest and delight.
Yes, it's the type of sentence that modern readers may have to read and re-read to follow along.
Let me give a picture for how I understand it: If I ask you, "What will you pay to God in proportion to your sin?" What do you say?
Sobo: I feel bad, I repent and promise not to do it again. And I commit to live a better life.
Terence: But that's what you are supposed to do!
For example, if I borrowed your car. And I crashed your car. You ask me, "What are you going to do to make things right?" I say, "I feel bad, I repent and I promise I won't crash your car again. I commit to be a better person. That's all. Bye bye." What do you say to that?
"That is all and good but my car is now wrecked so how will you make things right? A debt needs to be paid, how will you pay?"
Then you might say, "Alright then, to pay my debt to God I will give to God my money, my time and even my life. Full time missionary into a far away land. Even a martyr if God so will it."
Your grand offer is noted. But what do you have that does not come from God? Everything you have comes from God! After crashing someone's car would you now take his wallet to pay for the damages?
The question stands. So how will you pay? As I read the book, my answer echos Boso's. Nothing. I have nothing to pay with.
Now let us suppose, let us imagine, that there is something that can be given to God. First, this something must be something that God gives, right? Otherwise, it's paying for damages from the person's wallet. Second, this something must be of great worth. Something valuable to God himself.
So we come to the riddle, the dilemma in Cur Deus Homo. Which I simplify as:
A debt that Man must pay but cannot. A debt that God can pay but must not.
So this debt demands a person who is both God and Man to pay.
I can say more but I believe this summary is the crux of the whole book.
More to the Book
Sobo: Indeed your summary seems so simple that I now wonder whether there is any point to read the rest of the book.
Terence: There is! My summary is just a drop and there is far more goodness from the book. You read classics not just to get the conclusion, the answer to the big question, but to see how they get there. The classical writers are often pioneers. They look at things differently. They ask different questions.
For example, in the book Boso and Anselm reach a point where we see it was necessary for God to save in this way. Boso asks the natural follow up question, if God saves out of necessity, then why should we be grateful since he was compelledto do so?
Anselm answers:
... when he willingly submits himself to the necessity of doing a good work, and does not merely endure this necessity against his will, surely he deserves greater gratitude for his good work. For this “necessity” ought not really to be called a necessity but [ought to be called] a grace, since he voluntarily incurred it or holds to it, without anyone constraining him. For suppose you willingly promise today to bestow a gift tomorrow; and tomorrow you do bestow it with this same willingness. Although it is necessary that, if you can, you do tomorrow give what you have promised (or else be caught in a lie), nonetheless the one to whom you give this benefit is no less indebted to you for the bestowal of it than if you had not made a promise. The reason for his indebtedness is that you did not hesitate to make yourself indebted to him prior to the actual giving.
Who the Book is For
Sobo: You say it's easy to read but from the quotes, it still sounds intimidating.
Terence: I didn't say it's easy, I said it's easier. Easier than some of Puritan books. Books that I cannot finish, that I fall asleep reading and never got back to. In comparison to those, Cur Deus Homo is a fun read.
But practically, this book appeals to two types of readers. The first reader wants to get a good solid answer to the question, Cur Deus Homo, "Why did God become a God-Man?" This is it. Read this, be convinced and Anselm's answer will be your answer.
The second type of reader wants to read something old. If this is your first book, I would suggest Pilgrim's Progress or Charles Spurgeon's Morning and Evening devotions. Cur Deus Homo is a better read when you have already built up an appetite and some idea of what to expect from old books.
You see, there are some hard going chapters. For instance, chapters 16, 17 and 18 looks into the question of how and why the number of fallen angels will be replaced by redeemed mankind.
Sobo: Say what?
Terence: Yes, it is an odd part of the book. If 100 angels fell, God intends that 100 people be redeemed to replace them. That's the topic of their discussion. Anselm and Boso argue whether God has a perfect number in mind. That notion seems awfully dated 1000 years later but it did make me wonder whether we make similar arguments today? Do we have such blindspots?
For example, one of the reasons I have heard for limited or definite or particular atonement is if Jesus died to atone for all, then Jesus' blood was wasted because some were not saved. Jesus' blood is never wasted. Therefore, Jesus did not die to atone for all. But is the idea of wasted blood something that we assume is true, that's how we would look at it. Is it true of God?
Sobo: Are you saying Limited Atonement is wrong?
Terence: No, I'm not saying it's right or wrong, this is the wrong place for that discussion, I'm just saying I have heard arguments such as those for limited atonement that may 1000 years later sound as strange as Anselm's insistence that God loves perfect numbers. I'm just showing how an old book can help us look and ponder at what is happening today from a different angle.
Critique
Sobo: Come to think of it, is there anything that Anselm says here that is wrong?
Terence: The parts where I understand, the debt that we owe God that only Jesus Christ can pay, I see it is absolutely right and books, and movies, and songs should be written to make the whole world know this truth.
The parts where I don't understand, or not confident of, I don't dare to comment.
However, I do share a common critique of Anselm's approach. If you recall, Anselm made his arguments in this book without any reference to Jesus Christ. He said let us assume Jesus Christ is not in the picture and just by the power of reason show that Man owes God a debt which is a debt that only a God-Man can pay.
The problem is how far can reason take you? What happens when your impeccable reasoning contradicts the clear words of Scripture?
It didn't in this case, which I would argue is not by coincidence but by design. I believe that as Anselm organised his thoughts on the question, he rejected logical paths that contradicted the Bible. We never got to see those rejected paths because he showed us his final solution.
There is a limit to where reasoning can take us because the Fall didn't only affect our behaviour and morality, it also affected our affections and our faculties, our ability to reason. Today we hear statements like "If God is love, then..." and we fill it in with what seems perfectly logical and reasonable to us, regardless of what God tells us.
Anselm as a man of his time, puts too much confidence in reason not aware how people after him will abuse reason to deny God.
Children's Book
Sobo: A sobering thought. Do you have any final thoughts for this book review?
Terence: There is a temptation to read classics for bragging rights alone. Yes, I managed to climb this mountain, finish this book. But classics are to be read for the satisfaction of journeying with a great mind for a worthy quest.
If I was in charge of the world, I would turn Cur Deus Homo into a comic or a children's book. When I was younger, I read comic books on Western and Eastern philosophy. It is more than doable to turn Cur Deus Homo into a comic or children's book.
This is a Reading and Reader's review of Cur Deus Homo by Anselm of Canterbury. 100 pages, published in 1093. There are two translations. The popular one is Deane's. A more recent one is Hopkins and Richardson's. And I am hoping there will be a comic or children's version one day.
The next book I review will be a free book. So subscribe to the Reading and Readers podcast to hear that review and grab that book before the deal ends. Until next time, thank you for listening.
Book List

• "Cur Deus Homo" by Anselm of Canterbury, translated by Sidney Norton Deane. Website.
• "Cur Deus Homo" by Anselm of Canterbury, translated by Jasper Hopkins and Herbert Richardson. Book I pdf. Book II pdf.
• "Pilgrims Progress" by John Bunyan. CCEL website.
• "From Morning and Evening" by Charles H. Spurgeon. CCEL website.