In the spirit of "shut up and listen," I present the best books that are full of things I do not affirm.
All in Art
Book Review: Thy Word Is Truth
If judged by Hunsinger's goal that "it will succeed only if it whets reader's appetite to read Barth" (xx), then Thy Word is Truth is an outstanding success.
The Republic of Malacandra
Perhaps C.S. Lewis meant for The Republic to stand as a prequel to the Space Trilogy!
Awakened From Cold Vulgarity
Lewis teaches us that the best way to defend children from believing in falsehoods is NOT by telling them that fairytales aren’t real. Rather, by inculcating the just sentiments that fairytales offer, children WILL be able to better defend themselves from falsehoods of the worst variety.
Lingua de Lewis
Take this “Language of Malacandra Quiz” and come back at the end of the week for the answers.
Book Review: Contagious Holiness
Blomberg’s Contagious Holiness is the technical background that many pastors and elders need to encourage their local churches to food-oriented ministries. However, Blomberg is technical and dry
Book Review: The Great Promise by Karl Barth
The beauty of Barth’s theology is obvious. Direct application to the church and the believer dominate Barth’s lectures.
second august (i would that you were)
if you were here
because i am choking at my desk
In Medias Res
We are characters in a story, we are not the author. We are placed in the plot and given roles. We enter stage right or stage left and are called upon to recite our lines and act.
Not a Book Review of Is God Anti-Gay by Sam Allberry
This is
The Unliterary Person
The main distinction Lewis makes between the literary and unliterary person can be seen in their approach to literature.
Reading the Bible as a Literary Person
Unfortunately, it is this type of pragmatic unliterariness that so pervades many Christians’
C.S. Lewis on Being a Literary Person
No doubt there are many morals and messages held in the great works of literature. However, to approach a work of literature with the sole intention of mining these things is to approach literature as an unliterary person. In the case of the literary person, they approach a great work with the main intention to sit under the author’s tutelage. In this
Relativism, Objectivity, & Fittingness
A recovery of beauty in the realm of aesthetics in the church is not going to be an easy task. It is going to take a long time and the odds are unlikely that our generation will taste the fruit of faithfulness. But what greater example of selfless love is there than laying down our own aesthetic preferences so that our great grandchildren can reap the fruit of a robustly beautiful church.
Book Review: Understanding Gender Dysphoria by Mark Yarhouse
“We do not want to artificially endorse rigid gender stereotypes that make cultural normative expression of gender roles a marker of obedience to God or something along those lines.” (150-151)
Book Review: Week in the Life of a Roman Centurion
A Week in the Life of a Roman Centurion fell short of it’s potential. The text boxes contained phenomenal information, the story was creative, and every detail researched – but in the end all was underwhelming.
City Planning and the Gospel
Before recent times, church architecture meant something. Recently the protestant faith in the West has come to be understood in (almost) entirely intellectual terms. “Belief” is the core and sole tenet. Due to this emphasis on an intellectualized faith, aspects like architecture, city planning, and aesthetics in general, have gone by the wayside.
firstfruits
they told me they didn’t want my blood.
the ink (got up north, then carried south,
words carved deep into my heart over winter
etched fresh on skin before
rendered me unwanted by more than a few
Book Review: An Introduction to Biblical Ethics
Churches interested in Bible Study or Sunday School material will love the format, discussion questions, and overall tone of the David Jones.
Tom Bombadil and the Christian Life
Jesus once said that whoever believes in him with overflow with rivers of living water (John 7:38). Bombadil is this type of character. The typical modern man is like a void or a vacuum: hoping to fill itself with something. Bombadil is like a spring or a river: full and simultaneously filling those around him.