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My Recommended Christmas Gifts: Books

It is no question that I like books, and if you can probably expect that if you are getting a Christmas present from me, it will be a book. I'm sure that many of you write this off as, "Jacob, just because you love books doesn't mean that everybody should love books." I recognize that my bibliophilia is a little more extreme than average, but I think that my desire to give books as gifts does have a little more to it than just, "I love books; you should too."

Behind each book that I give, there is quite a bit of thought. If you are giving books, think about what books you are giving and to whom you are giving them. As I consider your life, your strengths, your weakness, your season of life, I may wish that I could sit down with you for hours upon hours of uninterupted time. But alas, we don't have that many hours together and I am not able to say clearly all that I wish to say. Rather, my mind runs to books, to authors with whom I have sat for hours upon hours. I consider what these authors have taught me, how they have affected me and I long for that for you too. So I give you a book. So each book gift has much thought behind it. I pray right now that if you get a book(s) from me for Christmas, God would draw you to himself or deepen the depth of love and faith in the relationship He already has with you.

Likewise, if you want to get me a gift for Christmas, I ask for a book (here's my Amazon wishlist) and I pray that the same effect would be had for me as a result of your gift.

Nevertheless, many have asked me, "What book should I get for my husband?" or "What book should I get for my wife?". So while I might give you specific advise, here's the best books that I have read for general heart-loving, gift-giving purposes:

Not convinced? Go read Unashamed Workman's 20 Reasons to Read and then come back and buy some of these for yourself or that special someone in your life.

Keywords: books,christmas,reading

MacArthur's Tale of Two Sons on PreOrder

I first heard John MacArthur preach on the Parable of the Prodigal Son at Resolved a couple years ago; I even liveblogged a summary of it. I remember it as one of the most impactful sermons that I have ever heard, revealing God's self-shaming love demonstrated in saving me, in a way that moved my heart to love him more deeply. I am excited that I stumbled across the preorder page of the new book based on the sermon (sermon can be downloaded here; transcript here): A Tale of Two Sons (in Spanish: Memorias de Dos Hijos)

I cannot wait to read this book (If anyone from PR at Nelson reads this, as a top-1000 I'd be happy to do a prepublication review of the book, just send me a copy :-) )

Keywords: macarthur

The Great Elephant, Reviewed By Expository Thoughts

A few months ago I would have clicked next as fast as my little mouse could carry me if I saw a post on one of my frequented blogs about a children's book. But now as I am a father, still waiting for my baby to pop out of my wife though, I seem to be strangely drawn to children's books with visions of cuddling up on my reading chair for hours at a time. I doubt his/her attention span for books will be anything like mine, but for now, I'll let my dreams live.

So anyway, Expository Thoughts posts a review about what sounds like a pretty cool children's book written and illustrated by Nik Ranieri with a foreword by John MacArthur: The Great Elephant. Nik has been an animator for Disney, so the art will obviously be superb. But what about the content? Well, Nik says it's excellent too. I guess I'll have to put The Great Elephant. next to The Jesus Storybook Bible on the shelf in my growing collection of books for my child that isn't even born yet:

Nik Ranieri has accomplished what few could or will ever do. He is an award winning Disney animation artist who has contributed to classics like Beauty and the Beast, Pocahontas, and The Emperor’s New Groove. What’s even better is that Nik has employed his amazing artistic ability for the glory of God.

If you’ve ever wondered what Disney animation and redemptive content would look like married together then Nik’s children’s book The Great Elephant should answer your curiosity. The story follows a young mouse named Quinn who goes on a journey in search of “the great elephant.” Along the way, Quinn meets a vast assortment of characters who challenge his trust and even a snake that persuades the young mouse to take a “wide road.” This being an allegory, we learn that there is more to this “elephant” than meets the eye.

Many allegories are short-sighted and leave very little to the imagination or for further discovery. Ranieri, however, manages to plot the story at a good pace. Our three year old holds on to every word and can practically finish every sentence. The illustrations are what you would expect from a Disney professional and offer more detail than any book on my kid’s bookshelves. The Great Elephant lays a great foundation through child-friendly literary eloquence. Your kids will want to read it again and again and it’s rare for adults when a children’s book doesn’t wear thin after repeated readings. I highly recommend this great book, The Great Elephant.

Keywords: childrens_book,review,the_great_elephant

Review: The Gospel & Personal Evangelism by Mark Dever

Mark Dever writes to help a Christian who is convinced that he or she needs be evangelizing know how to and how not to. The Gospel and Personal Evangelism is a good implementation of that goal. In fact, it is page-for-page the best book on evangelism that I have read written in the last 100 years. Dever's personal friend, C.J. Mahaney, writes in the foreword, "Mark, thank you for writing The Gospel and Personal Evangelism. THank you even more for your compelling example of compassion for the lost and for your faithfulness to proclaim Jesus Christ and him crucified. May there be many gosepl conversations and abundant evangelistic fruit as a result of this book." I echo those sentiments. Thank you, Mark.

Among evangelicals, there are generally two common incrrect responses to Jesus' call to evangelize the nations. One, ignore it. Two, preach something that isn't the gospel, say that we are evangelizing, and then count people as conversions before there is any evidence of faith besides a confession that they want to go to heaven. This book tackles both common errors, rather trying to cultivate a biblically informed, gospel-motivated, Spirit-empowered heart that proclaims the good news of Jesus Christ with a balance of honesty, urgency, and joy.

The chapter titles give a good summary of what the book is about. Each chapter is usually between 10 and 15 pages and would make a good daily reading for personal edification or reading for a group study (I am seriously thinking about going through this book with my church smallgroup):

Why Don't We Evangelize?
What Is the Gospel?
Who Should Evangelize?
How Should We Evangelize?
What Isn't Evanglism?
What Should We Do After We Evangelize?
Why Should We Evangelize?
Conlusion: Closing the Sale (We are not salesmen)
Appendix: Recommended Reading
Appendix: Word to Pastors

Mark Dever writes to affect the heart. Evangelism devoid of the correct motivation does not give God the glory, will tend to be legalistic, and doesn't aim for disciples but numbers. I would love to go chapter-by-chapter through the book giving highlights of each, as there is not a weak chapter in the entire book. I have posted and will continue to post some quotes from the book on my blog. Just search for "Dever Evangelism". I will say that two of the most helpful points of the book are (1) Differentiate evangelism from the fruits of evangelism, and (2) We are not salesmen who need to "close the deal" but witnesses.

Dever has effectively engaged my heart and affected the way that I think about evangelism and has begun to affect the way that I have patterned my life in order that I can build a lifestyle of evangelism. I hope and pray that time will tell by my life that this book deserves the 5-star rating that I have given it.

Keywords: dever,evangelism

Review: Safe In the Arms of God by John MacArthur

My wife and I rushed to the emergency room early last week for what the doctors are calling "threatened miscarriage." When I asked myself, "What would happen to our baby if he/she died," I couldn't give an answer from Scripture that I was convinced was God's position on the matter. As I asked myself the question, I had to honestly respond, "I don't know." My hope is that all would go to heaven, even though we're all fallen, but that means very little if that's not how God sees it. So I picked up a copy of John MacArthur's book, Safe in the Arms of God: Truth from Heaven About the Death of a Child (actually I downloaded a copy from Logos for Libronix). MacArthur writes in the second chapter regarding our approach in answering that question:

"When we look into the grave of a little one, we must not place our hope or trust in a false promise, in an unbiblical theology, in the instability of sentimentalism, or in the cold analysis of human logic. Rather, we must look to what God's Word has to say on the matter."

John MacArthur spends 170 short pages trying to do just that, look to God's Word on the matter. When he does so he responds as he did on Larry King Live when asked the same question: "Instant heaven."

The book may not read like a typical "mourning" book. It is not full of well-intentioned, positive platitudes whose sole intention is to bring comfort with little though of what is true or not. No, the point throughout the book is to say, "This we know is true, take comfort in this." This is the approach we must take. Comfort devoid of truth is deception; comfort rooted in truth yields true peace. That being said that book is appropriate and comforting; not the theology of classrooms or studies, but the theology of the knowledge of God who is active in all of our life. If you have lost a child, may lose a child, or know anybody who has, I do recommend this book.

Keep reading

Keywords: abortion,bereavement,death,heaven,infant,mourning

Review: Message of the Old Testament - Promises Made by Mark Dever

As I have made my way through the Bible, I have been weekly interacting with Mark Dever in his two summary-of-the-Bible books, Message of the Old Testament: Promises Made and Message of the New Testament: Promises Kept. For the last many years Mark Dever, pastor of Capitol Hill Baptist Church, has periodically preached single messages covering an entire book of the Bible. Modified transcripts of these sermons make up the bulk of the content of these two books.

Trying to reveal the intent and message of the author of each book and God's design for how that message would fit into the whole of the Bible and redemptive history, Dever attempts to fly us above the details to get the big picture of the Bible. Message of the Old Testament opens with a chapter on the big picture of the Bible. Then, he follows with a chapter on the overarching theme of the Old Testament, which he summarizes as "Promises Made". Finally, grouping the books of the Old Testament into groups (i.e. Pentateuch: "The Great Story", Historical Books: "The Other Millennium", Wisdom Books: "Ancient Wisdom", Major Prophets: "Big Hopes", and Minor Prophets, "Eternal Questions") he delves into the message of each book, each having its own chapter of approximately 20-25 pages apiece.

How helpful is this book! Rightly, we are directed to dig deep into a text, and we have this modeled in excellent expository sermons that may spend weeks on a single verse and years on a single verse. This type of expository preaching is good; it is right, and it is to be emulated in personal study. But without Dever's model, the Christian may be very prone to lose his or her way. If we truly want to know the God of the Bible we must know His message, and in order to know God's message in a single verse we must know the message of the chapter, and to know the message of the chapter, we must know the message of the book, and to know the message of the book we must know the message of the Bible.

I imagine what Dever is doing is similar to how I play with the map program, Google earth. Sometimes to better understand what I'm looking at up close, I need to zoom out. We must be in the habit of doing this, and that is exactly what Dever does: He zooms us out. He describes what he is doing as flying over the Biblical landscape rather than walking (or crawling) through it.

Not only is the concept of the book an excellent one, but so is the implementation. This book has been years in the making. Written with knowledge and precision of the scholar, but at a level that a lay Christian can easily understand, I know of no other resource like this that I can recommend as highly. The hours and hours of hard work, reading, prayer, and research that went into each sermon is evident. Each chapter, full of excellent content and providing a good introduction and expository summary of the book, is made even better by the pastoral bent of the work. Dever will not settle for mere knowledge, but pushes the knowledge all the way to the heart, with the hope that the reader will love the Holy, redeeming, loving, and self-giving God that His Word reveals.

Beginning in December 2006, I have been leading my smallgroup on a study through the entire Bible, focusing on one book of the Bible for 2 weeks at a time. We have been using Message of the Old Testament as a supplement to our daily reading and study precisely for all the reasons stated above. The consensus of the more than 20 people who have likewise been weekly interacting with Dever is "Excellent". You would do well to purchase this book and make good and slow use of it. I do not have the same level of familiarity with the Message of the New Testament that I have with this one but will post a review of it as soon as I do; I expect that it is more of the same (but I can tell you that just the foreword by John MacArthur makes it worth the price).

Here are some good purchase options:

Amazon: get free shipping with no tax.
Good News Publishers: Get a Free PDF with purchase. It's more expensive here, but the book is thick (960 pages) and a digital copy might be worth the cost.
Westminster Books: A Little Cheaper, $5 shipping, but save money if you add other books to the order

Keywords: bible,dever,old_testament

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