Wednesday, March 3, 2010

February Book - Prodigal God

And now for the third addition of... "The world really does care about my opinion so I'll tell you what I think about the books I read." Or "Book Reviews" for short. I know nothing about literature. I can't tell you about imagery or prose or onomatopoeia... but I can tell you what I like or dislike so here goes.

Prodigal God:
Recovering the Heart of the Christian Faith
by Timothy Keller
pub. Penguin Group (USA) Inc.


"This volume is not just for seekers... Many lifelong Christian believers feel they understand the basics of the Christian faith quite well and don't think they need a primer. Nevertheless, one of the signs that you may not grasp the unique, radical nature of the gospel is that you are certain that you do... This book, then, is written to both the curious outsider and established insiders of the faith, both to those Jesus calls 'younger brothers' and those he calls 'elder brothers' in the famous Parable of the Prodigal Son." - Timothy Keller of Redeemer Presbyterian Church (Introduction)


Book's premise (no spoiler): It's one of Jesus' parables that many of us are quite familiar with. It's the story we call the Prodigal Son (Luke 15). His premise is that we tend to focus primarily on the "younger brother" and secondarily on the father. While it is appropriate and important for us to learn what we can from their examples, we cannot fail to learn from the attitude and response of the "older brother."

This was my introduction into the mind of Tim Keller. I'd never read anything by him or heard any of his sermons. I was actually skeptical of book because of its title (I know I'm not supposed to judge them by their covers, but I do... don't judge me). It wasn't until one of my students asked me about the book that I decided I needed to be familiar with it. I mean, if a teenager is picking up this book, it's probably either
really good... or really unsound/ unnecessarily provocative at the least, or theologically dangerous at worst.

What I liked about the book: Just about everything. It's a short book and easy to read. I'm not very smart so those are always wins for me. Aside from its brevity, I thoroughly appreciate what Keller has to say. I don't want to spoil it, so I won't expound beyond saying that like Keller hints in the introduction, the book has rekindled in me a desire to be ever close to the heart of the Father.
What I didn't like about the book: I was a little too long. I know I just said that its brevity appealed to me, but there were a few times where the book was a little redundant. And since I have a short attention span to begin with, I struggled at times to keep my eyes from glazing over.

Favorite passage: In Chapter 7: The Feast of the Father, Keller recalls the time a woman came to him to respond to a sermon in which he had just finished preaching about the fact that we are "accepted by God by sheer grace through the work of Christ regardless of anything we do or have done (pg 120.)"

"She said, '
That is a scary idea! Oh, it's a good scary, but still scary.'

"I was intrigued. I asked her what was so scary about unmerited fee grace? She replied something like this: 'If I was saved by my good works, then there would be a limit to what God could ask of me or put me through. I would be like a taxpayer with rights. I would have done my duty and now I would deserve a certain quality of life. but if it is really true that i am a sinner saved by sheer grace-at God's infinite cost- then there's nothing he cannot ask of me.' She could see immediately that the wonderful-beyond-belief teaching of salvation by sheer grace had two edges to it. On the one hand, it cut away slavish fear. God loves us freely, despite our flaws and failures. Yet she also knew that if Jesus really had done this for her-she was not her own. She was bought with a price (pg 121)."
Random passage: "In that society, most meals did not include meat, which was an expensive delicacy (pg 23)."

My Rating: 5 out of 5 stars!

1 comments:

Doug Franklin said...

Greg I have been thinking about reading this book and this review was helpful. I know the book has to be edgy for you to like it so I think I will read it now because of what you said - thanks