I hope you saw our Hearts & Minds Facebook page where I thanked the salt of the Earth folks from small and struggling churches who we served again this year at Wee Kirk — Scottish Presbyterian-ese for small church. Every year we gather at the great Laurelville Mennonite camp in Mt. Pleasant, PA, and hear great speakers, take in important workshops, and eat lots of food, laughing and worshiping with mostly rural and small town Presbyterians friends.  They buy a lot of books from us, and we thought we’d share a few of the best sellers, or at least some that were nicely discussed.  I have to be quick — let us know if you have questions, or want other such resources.                                 

Shrink: Faithful Ministry in a Church-Growth Culture Tim Suttle (Zondervan) $16.99  I raved about this from up front, indicating how very well written it was, about how great the foreword by Scot McKnight was, and for all the great pull quotes on nearly every page that are themselves great gems for those who aren’t serious readers. It is dedicated to pastors of small churches, and carries endorsements such as this by Chris Smith (author of Slow Church), “Shrink is one of the wisest and most significant evangelical books that I’ve read in the last decade; it is essential reading for every pastor and church leader!”  I agree. This book is extraordinary, offering critique to our fascination with bigness and growth, and calling us to fidelity and maturity.

Slow Church: Cultivating Community in the Patient Way of Jesus C. Christopher Smith & John Pattison (IVP) $16.00  Okay, maybe I was a little prideful, showing off when I announced this, since our BookNotes blog was one of the first places to review this amazing book, and we are hosting Chris Smith to speak  here on November 7th.  But my own gushing aside, Wee Kirk folks — who may or may not have heard of the “slow food movement” — intuit that church is about quality, not quantity, and that relationships and patience are the way of the Kingdom.  We celebrated this good book, assured the gathering that it was perfect for book clubs and classes in their own small congregations, and — yes — it will challenge them, since even small churches often try to row faster, work harder, fret more then they should, trying to give the appearance of success.  This counter-cultural book commends a radical critique of the modernist worldview and the typical American “fast food” franchise habits, re-framing the way we even think about our lives, and re-imagining the very nature of the faith community. Slow Church is one of the most radical church books I’ve read, utterly faithful, and brilliant.

A Beautiful Disaster: Finding Hope in the Midst of Brokenness  Marlene Graves (Brazos) $15.99  Two things we find everywhere we go: many people are hurting, or have been through serious anguish in their lives, and people of faith long for greater experiences of God, and are interested in practicing spiritual disciplines which make room for God to work in their lives.  That is, the two things this book is about — spirituality during hard times — is exactly what folks need. Marlena (who grew up in rural North-Western Pennsylvania, where many of our Wee Kirk friends are from) has been through a lot, tells her story well, and offers Biblical insight about God making a way in the wilderness.  Beth and I knew it would be a hit.

If you’ve recently dropped in to the Hearts
& Minds Facebook page, you’ll know we were just in Boston selling books
with the Christian Legal Society, a fascinating organization of Christians who
are lawyers, judges, law profs and such. 
This is a large challenge and huge privilege for us.  When we work with these kinds faith-based
professional associations or hang out with activist folks, we are glad for their
ministries and service, scattered in the world. That God’s Kingdom is advanced in some way through their
witness and work – or at least signposts are created that point the way – seems
evident and reminds us that God cares about God’s whole world, not just the
institutional church where believers gather. God’s people are still church even
when they leave the worship space, where they’ve first processed to gather, and then been
commissioned to leave in service. It is obvious that the commonwealth of God
grows – like that parable of the tree flourishing so that even the birds find
refuge – and that the Kingdom of God is a unifying theme of the entire covenant
story of Scripture.

 But what is God’s
Kingdom? 

Thanks for asking. It’s a million
dollar question, and we’ve got a new book that explores it well.  Unless one is willing to settle for an
undeveloped simple view, or work to wade through weighty theology tomes, this
may be one of the best ways into this important conversation.

We are very excited about the new
Brazos Press hardback release, Kingdom Conspiracy: Returning to the Radical
Mission of the Local Church by Dr. Scot McKnight (regularly $21.95; our BookNotes sale
price is $17.60) and want to commend it to you.  But first, some of my own thoughts about it, such as they
are.

One the large assumptions behind the
nature of our store and the diverse array of topics we offer — books on
science, art, media, education, psychology, environmental science, war and
peace, politics, film, outdoor adventure, engineering, urban affairs,
parenting, nutrition, literature, and so much more — is that the redemptive
work of God in the world (Jesus called it the Kingdom of God) includes all
areas of life (not just church and “religion”) and He has inaugurated a trajectory
that promises the full and glorious restoration of all creation.  I think it is our wide selection of
books in so many categories, and our hope to suggest “Kingdom perspectives” in
all fields that appeals to those who invite us to serve their events, like the
aforementioned CLS.  If somebody
asks us why we carry books on faith and law or faith and art or faith and
science, we suspect they simply don’t have a very fully developed understanding
of the Kingdom of God.

There are many authors who in recent
years have underscored this vision of the reformation of all things (think of
N.T. Wright, just for instance, or our celebration of the For the Life of the World DVDs.) Many mainline denominational
churches have an implicit vision of the restoration of all things, but seem a
bit embarrassed by eschatology, not wanting to get mixed up in any goofy “left
behind” stuff. So their own best resources for an “all of life redeemed”
whole-life discipleship lie too often undeveloped or untapped.

One of our favorite authors along these
lines who does offer a wide and wholistic vision is the remarkably productive
New Testament scholar Scot McKnight. His excellent King Jesus Gospel: The Original Good News Revisited (Zondervan; $19.99)
and the very useful, fun, One.Life: Jesus
Calls, We Follow (Zondervan; $14.99) are both fine books. Both offer this broad Kingdom vision
and are very helpful as we explore how to bear witness to the coming Kingdom “on
Earth as it is in Heaven.”  His
book on how to read the Bible well, Blue
Parakeet: Rethinking How You Read the Bible (Zondervan; $14.99) offers the
very story of God’s faithfulness to the creation, and Christ’s redemptive story
to heal and restore all things, as the key to read the plot line of the
Bible.  He really gets this big
picture story of God’s creation-restoring good news. (McKnight’s very popular Jesus Creed, by the way, was just re-released
in an updated and slightly edited edition; that guide helps us live out the way
of Jesus in daily life, learning to love God and others – wow, what a book!)

WHAT IS THE KINGDOM?

Many of us have been wishing for
McKnight to spell out more of what he means by the Kingdom, what the reign of
God is and isn’t, sort of a deeper follow-up to the very good King Jesus Gospel.  This brand new Brazos Press book, Kingdom
Conspiracy, may be his best effort yet. Despite my own disagreement
with its biggest conclusion, it is going to be very, very helpful and we are
happy to help promote it.  It is a
book that loyal Hearts & Minds friends, especially, should consider owning.  It is very seriously informed by wide
reading of the best scholarship – how does McKnight do it, knowing so much
about so many sub-categories? — and offers learned, but clear and interesting explanations.  It is a fine, fine book.

SKINNY JEANS AND PLEATED PANTS

Without a doubt, Mr. McKnight is sounding
a bit of an alarm, and insofar as he is truly picking up concerns, I applaud
his calling us to better formulations. 
I don’t know how many people really say this, but McKnight seems to
think that some writers and leaders believe that any good effort in the world —
say, a social justice campaign or deeds of public righteousness, mercy, art,
kindness, seeking the peace of the city — necessarily builds God’s Kingdom.  He claims that many younger
post-evangelicals, especially (and he should know, he teaches them at Northern
Seminary and is exceptionally involved in on-line writing and discussion) are
not dissimilar to the older (mostly bankrupt) social gospel movement that
seemed to think any decent human action could be considered a mark of the reign
of God and in some way redemptive. God’s Kingdom a-coming was so combined with
the hopes of human progress that serious consideration of salvation, the role
of the cross, and the necessity of the church was pretty much left behind. In
that view, which McKnight cleverly calls the “skinny jeans” view of the Kingdom,
there is such an emphasis on cultural engagement and social witness that there
isn’t much concern about evangelism or personal piety.  He contrasts this, perhaps with a nod
to Willow Creek baby boomers, with the “pleated pants” gospel, which, as you
can guess, overemphasizes personal evangelism and conventional views of
constricted salvation aimed at getting people to heaven and perhaps a
moralistic view of one’s inner life.

(Of course there are also old school
fundamentalists with a conservative, narrow faith who wear skinny jeans, and
there are some pretty radical voices coming from guys in pleated pants. So,
yeah, his clever set-up is only somewhat helpful, as if age or aesthetics were
the determining factor as to whether one has a typically liberal view of a
social gospel or a more typical evangelical view of a privatized one. These
caricatures do help get the conversation started, at least, so don’t let that
trip you up. Skinny jeans or pleated pants.  Ha.)

In contrast to both kinds of wardrobe
malfunctions (that’s my little contribution to the cleverness afoot) Scot wants
to say clearly that the Kingdom of God is more than personal salvation or the
promise of a heavenly afterlife, but he also insists it is more than working
for social justice, much more.  In The
Kingdom Conspiracy, McKnight covers Biblical and theological ground
that others have explored, although he brings his own urgent angle. The must-read
book on this part of the story in my view is the impeccable Good News and Good Works: A Theology of the
Whole Gospel by Ronald J. Sider (Baker; $20.00) which, interestingly, insists
that the theme of the Kingdom of God is the central Biblical motif that brings
together the personal and the public, word and deed, spiritual renewal and social
action.

Still, in every age we need reminded of
the epic tragedy of this terrible dilemma, this tendency for so many towards
imbalance. How sad that there are still those that are all about social concern but care little for winsome
evangelism, or those who ignore our cultural obligations and social witness due
to their overemphasis of church planting or evangelism or spiritual formation. It
seems easy to say it is “all of the above” and proclaim “the whole gospel.”  Ahh, but it isn’t so easy to convince
everyone who follows Christ that it is “both/and” and that the gospel is
multi-faceted, and the Kingdom is creation-wide.  Which brings us back to this question of what we mean by the
Kingdom, the reign of God, Christ’s Lordship, God’s will done “on Earth… ”
And — wait for it, there’s more… and there is the questions of the relationship
between the Kingdom and the church.  As you can tell from the subtitle of McKnight’s book, this is
his biggest burden.

In this very contemporary assessment,
our author is convinced that both the Biblical material and the needs of the
day demand that we reassert the primacy of the local church as being the
crucible of the Kingdom.  Yes, yes,
the Kingdom of God is the longed for creation restored, and Christ’s Lordship
is to be proclaimed (and lived out) in all of life, across all of culture. The
weight of the argument of The Kingdom Conspiracy, though, is
that this happens through the local church.

Even now, I can imagine eyes rolling as
some readers say – well, duh; of course. For others, I can hear the
possibilities of them buying this book slamming shut from States away. Those
pleated pants and skinny jeans are acting up again, resisting McKnight’s
challenges, even though both camps really need to consider this book. We all do.

Again, to be clear, this isn’t a new
idea. It seems to me that it has resonance in one way or another with both the
Roman Catholic and Episcopal traditions and with the Anabaptist views of the
Brethren and Mennonites.) Consider, for instance, the exceptionally important
work of Catholic Scripture scholar Gerhard Lohfink and his massive, celebrated
work, Does God Need the Church? (Michael
Glazier Books; $39.99) a title that
McKnight surprisingly doesn’t cite. Think
of lovely recent books like Slow Church:
Cultivating Community in the Patient Way of Jesus (IVP; $16.00) that surely have a culturally-engaged,
socially involved Kingdom vision, but put the locus of God’s redemptive work
within the community of faith living together in a world falling apart. (By the
way, co-author of Slow Church,
Christopher Smith will be here in Dallastown for a book talk on Friday night,
November 7, 2014.)

Another personal favorite, a wonderful
book that needs mentioned here is The
Community of the King by Howard Snyder (IVP; $18.00.) It remains one of my all-time favorite
books, and certainly one of the best on the local church, and he argues that
the church, while not the entirety of the Kingdom coming, is at the heart of
it.  McKnight agrees, and his willingness
to assert this clearly is a large, important gift.  It is a good book about the Kingdom of God, but he laments
our recent Kingdom visions to be somehow unconnected to the work of the church.

***

McKNIGHT’S KINGDOM VS. NEO-CALVNISM & KUYPER

Some of us who have encouraged followers
of Christ to have a prophetic imagination and Christian mind about all manner
of things — all spheres of life are being redeemed and we must be “kingdom
people” in all we do, after all — have drawn on the reformational worldview of
what some call neo-Calvinism.

(Please note that neo-Calvinism is a
theological tradition and social movement these days stemming from the feisty and
wholistic cultural reforms of the Dutch theologian of the late 1800s and early 1900s, a
journalist, academic, statesman, and Prime Minister, Abraham Kuyper and is not the same as the popular, strict “new Calvinism” which is how some
journalists describe the recent gospel coalition of those new to older forms of
Calvinism and Puritanism. Neo-Calvinists are those who make much of the
wide-as-life, creation-regained vision of renewed thinking in the line of the Dutch
public theologian Kuyper; neo-Calvinism is the wholistic
creation-being-redeemed vision that informs important voices as diverse as
Francis Schaeffer and Brian Walsh, Neal Plantinga and Richard Mouw, Nicholas Woltersdorff
and Calvin Seerveld, Herman Dooyeweerd and James Skillen, Anthony Bradley and Al Wolters, Comment magazine and Jamie Smith. I name these authors to offer further hints, spots on the map, for
whom these names might ring a bell.)

It is a fascinating aspect of Kingdom
Conspiracy that Scot McKnight interacts with this tradition, realizing that
his Anabaptist vision is at odds with this reformational heritage.  You see, if, as Kuyper explored and as
most neo-Calvinists proclaim, Christ’s Kingship includes all dimensions of life
and all zones of cultural affairs, then non-church spheres are every bit as
much as God’s Kingdom as is the churchly sphere.  Bankers and teachers and dancers and engineers are as much
priests as are, well, priests in the church.

McKnight seems to realize that some form of Kuyperianism is
capturing the imaginations of many these days (Andy Crouch’s wonderful CT review of For the Life of the World was titled “Kuyper Goes Pop”) and McKnight
seems to realize that a robust creation-regained worldviewish vision of the
Kingdom incarnated in all of life is one excellent way out of the dilemmas
posed by the inadequacies of the individualized traditional gospel of the
pleated pants crowd and the socially engaged emerging faith of the skinny jeans
tribes.  And so, he takes on this
ascending perspective. 

He briefly examines Mouw’s delightful
little book on Kuyper (Abraham Kuyper: A
Short and Personal Introduction; Eerdmans; $16.00) and ponders “Kuyperian
secularism.” In a footnote he applauds Steve Garber’s splendid book Visions of Vocation: Common Grace for the
Common Good (IVP; $16.00) calling it “important” but suggests it doesn’t
talk enough about the church, a fault he attributes to Andy Crouch’s Culture Making: Recovering our Creative
Calling (IVP; $20.00) as well.

I point this out because I know that
some of our BookNotes readers will be glad for this conversation, and will want
to follow the discussions prompted by McKnight’s re-assessment of Kingdom
theology.  It is great to see a
good thinker and writer of McKnight’s stature (and popularity) grappling with
these themes of neo-Calvinism that have so influenced some of our favorite
thinkers and writers and leaders.

Allow me a big aside, a story which might help you
unpack this a bit, if you don’t intuit where this is going. Or at least it might clarify my concerns with the implications of this.

I mentioned my appreciation for the
great book The Community of the King
by the radical Wesleyan Howard J. Snyder. 
I’m glad that book is still in print, and I still recommend it
regularly.

You may want to know that it was the
second book I ever reviewed in a real magazine, a brief review appearing in Sojourners back in the 70s.  I suggested, however, after glowing
remarks, that to insist that the Kingdom is mostly found in the supportive
relationships within the local fellowship, the church, is to not only to fail
to enunciate the wide-as-creation scope of Christ’s Kingdom, but to fail
church members by not adequately honoring the complexity of their callings to
work in the world, outside the proverbial walls of the sanctuary.  I took Snyder to task, as I recall, for
telling the story of his friend and parishioner Archie, a good man and fine grocer,
with nary a word of his Kingdom obligations as
a grocer. From where does he buy his food, how does he work with vendors that
mistreat their migrant workers, what is his role in the global food industry of
cash cropping? How does Archie educate consumers about chemical additives and
such? What does it look like to be a Christian grocer, not just a grocer who
happens to be a good churchman? One person replied to me in a letter, those
decades ago, suggesting I was nuts.  Another thought I was needlessly hard on old Archie.

Well, perhaps God has caused the stones
to rise up, like Jesus predicted, since we now have a major culture movement
about these very things, concerns about GMOs and healthy food and fresher
produce and fair trade, most of which have been raised by folk not known for
their Christian religiosity.  If
the Kingdom is conflated with the church, you see, and the church therefore
minimizes member’s work in the world as holy vocations, we end up with a
disconnect between Sunday and Monday, and guys like Archie, good church members
that they may be, fail to create wholesome grocery stores, fail to fight for
innovations in the supply chain, for more sustainable policies, for fair
treatment of migrants, etc. etc. 
Whole Foods has done that, of course, and the Biblical God of the
renewed creation is pleased, I’m sure, although Christ should have gotten the
glory.  This critique of
over-emphasizing the communal/relational/liturgical aspects of the local
church, a (minor) frustration with Community
of the King remains my concern with the present McKnight volume.  He may criticize Crouch, Garber, Mouw,
or Kuyper, but what does he say to
Archie the Grocer?  He is right to
poke the paucity of the skinny jeans kingdom and the old social gospel. But can
his favored sources — Yoder, say, or Hauerwas, even — provide an account of
Christian discipleship in the world that allows folks to make sense of their
workplaces, their citizenship, their engagement with the arts, with
entertainment and leisure, with the structures of media and technology that
surround them? Without a full-orbed Kingdom vision, will a churchy faith enable
us to make noble sacrifices promoting a prophetic imagination in these late
modern capitalist times? Or does a vision of the Kingdom tied so closely to the
church necessarily call us and our interests out of the institutions of life,
and unwittingly promote an escapist pseudo-gospel?  I know McKnight does not intend for his church-based Kingdom
approach to have this effect.  I
cannot see how it would not.

Of course, McKnight mostly expounds the
Scriptures, and this is mostly rich, good stuff. I was thrilled reading much of this, and learned quite a lot by
looking at his sources, his good footnotes and the two fabulous appendices.
Along the way he reflects helpfully on the strengths and weaknesses of the old
evangelical left and the Christian right, he explores the work of Tom Wright,
Jurgen Moltmann, Rauschenbusch and the social gospel, James K.A. Smith, Brian
Blount, and many more who have offered hints at the nature of the Kingdom and
the relationship between the Kingdom and the local church. We always need
reminded of “the Constantinian temptation” and in this, McKnight’s project isn’t
unrelated to the much-discussed To Change
the World by James Davison Hunter (Oxford University Press; $27.95.)  Again, I like that he tweaks both the “skinny
jeans gospel” of recent missional hipsters, and the “pleated pants gospel” of
the mega-church baby boomers – fully aware (I think, anyway) that these are
playful caricatures and goofy foils for his case. But with that, he leads us to
a more full-orbed and Biblically-solid explanation of the Kingdom and the
centrality of the church gathered.

So, his case, again, is two-fold: In
contrast to the inadequate formulations of the exclusively personalistic or
social gospels, he offers a robust, multi-dimensional, incarnational, wholistic
Kingdom that is Christ-centered and promissory about the renewal of the cosmos.
But he further insists, then, that this Kingdom of God a-coming is, in fact,
seen most clearly in the moral community called the local church. “Kingdom
mission creates communities of the redeemed” he insists.  So, if you aren’t a church planter,
well, I guess your work isn’t related to the Kingdom of God. You know that
lovely and provocative For the Life of
the World we have been promoting? 
Forgetaboutit.

Okay, sorry — I’m being a little
facetious. You’ll have to read it yourself to see if I’m being fair. He deserves a fair reading, as he is a
good author and important writer and this is his most significant work in years.

I will admit that I love reading nearly
anything on the gospel and anything that helps us understand and love and
promote the gospel is good. And McKight has always been a very reliable guide for me. (He has a book on Mary, a book on fasting, a book on the Sermon on the Mount, and more.) 

McKnight  inspires
us with missional energy and visionary hopes and big dreams – note the word “radical”
in the subtitle – even if he constricts the scope of the Kingdom and seems
therefore to minimize the significance of so much of what ordinary lay people do
in their day to day (non-church) life. Yet, I trust McKnight on this because,
in his aforementioned books, he elevates the “one life” we live, in Christ,
relating faith to our work, politics, recreation, sexuality and more. I don’t
know if his view of the Kingdom which is so thoroughly offered here will erode
the importance of his books on whole-life discipleship like One.Life but it seems like it might. (If
the church is really where it’s at, the locus of the Kingdom, then, really, why
must we fuss so much about public theology and aesthetics and justice and
living faithfully across the many zones of life?)

This is a question I’ve hosted since
the late-1970s when I studied both Richard Mouw (a Dutch Kuyperian) and the
late John Howard Yoder (a Mennonite, who has influenced McKnight) as they
engaged in Reformed/Anabaptist discussions about the role of creation and
creation’s order in our views of redemption and the vocation of being “in but
not of” the world of the fallen powers. 
I’ve heard Mouw tell how the distinctions between he and Yoder were once
summarized when Yoder said, “Mouw, you always want to say reality is created, but fallen, but I want to say
it is fallen but created.” Ponder
that!

The relationship of faith and real life,
church and world, Kingdom and creation, Christ and culture, remains a burning
question for me, and I think they are a constellation of questions that are
some of the most burning for the church of our era, at
least in the West. (McKnight certainly agrees that these matters are urgent,
and he has followed the debate and contributed to it, as well as most. In The
Kingdom Conspiracy he mentions many public theologians who grapple with
these matters, influential thinkers as diverse as Miroslov Volf and Os
Guinness, Walter Wink and Nicholas Woltersdorff; he discusses books such as the
recently-re-issued Resident Aliens by
William Willimon & Stanley Hauerwas.) 
This is a living conversation that gets to the heart of what the Bible
teaches, what Jesus said and meant, and what we mean by being Christians “for
the life of the world” as the recent, popular DVD by that name asks.  McKnight’s view of the Kingdom, it may
seem, would resonate with the last episode of FLOW, which reminds us that the
weekly gathered community worshiping together is a rehearsal of the
wide-as-creation restoration that is promised. Church is, finally,
eschatological.  Or at least I
think that is what he’d say…

So, a few big thumbs up to the always-interesting
Doc McKnight. Kudos for this good work, the inspiring reminder that the local
church has a huge role to play in the “radical mission” of the Kingdom of God.

Still, as I’ve already suggested, I
think he gets it wrong, here, or at least he overstates his case, but geesh, in
these days, inviting people to church certainly isn’t that bad of a fault (as
long as it doesn’t devolve into a fetish about churchy stuff and fail to equip
the laity to serve in their homes, neighborhoods, workplaces and such.) Despite
Kingdom
Conspiracy being so very important, so very insightful in so many ways,
so very interesting to read, I still want to insist that the local church need
not be over-emphasized and our view of the Kingdom should be as wide as the
Bible says it is – “the Earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof!”  McKnight is a careful and generous
scholar, and his serious, exciting book deserves to be studied carefully (and
reviewed seriously, more seriously than I am able to do here.)

The blurbs on
the back are notable and serious — Soong Chan Rah reminds us that

the
misappropriation of faddish terms can be an unfortunate reality for American
Christians. The casual manner in which we toss around phrases like “kingdom
theology” and “missional churches” can have an adverse effect on our efforts to
form a robust ecclesiology… With prescient analysis and pastoral insight,
Scot McKnight succeeds in providing a scriptural and theological text for those
who have heard the word so often but failed to think through its meaning.

Greg Boyd says,

McKnight brings much-needed
clarity to what ‘kingdom of God’ means -and doesn’t mean – and how it relates
to the church and its mission. This book needs
to be read by everyone – scholars and laypeople alike – who want to understand
and consistently live out what it means to be a follower of King Jesus.

I am glad for any author that calls us
to church: to deeper liturgy, to worship well, to intentional body life, to
parish commitments, to congregational revitalization. Yes, of course! We are confident
that this is an important book that is sure to deepen your understanding of the
Bible and contemporary theological trends, and make you think – hopefully with
others – about the purpose of our discipleship, what it means to be Kingdom
people, and the joy and implications of the Lordship of Christ, in the church
and, yes, in the world.

TWO MORE

Although they deserve much more time
and space to review fairly, here are two other great books that came to mind as
I wrote this, one quite new, one newly released in paperback:

Joy for the World: How Christianity Lost Its
Cultural Influence & Can Begin Rebuilding It  Greg Forster (Crossway)
$18.99  When reading McKnight and
his concerns about the hipster skinny jeans gospel that emphasizes social
reform to the exclusion of evangelism or sound doctrine (not to mention his
concern about the cheesy pleated pants gospel of merely personal salvation with
little concern about betterment of the world or social reform) This is an
amazing book and despite the fun retro cover, has little to do with any
romantic return to the 50s.  With a
stellar, foreword by rigorous Manhattan pastor Tim Keller, this offers ruminations
on the cultural mandate, the Kingdom coming in all of life, the promise of
restoration and hope, all inspired by lines from that marvelous hymn by Isaac
Watts. 

I love the Timothy George quote on the
back of Joy to the World: “This book is against sequestration – the
sequestration of Christian life into ‘spiritual’ enclaves and churchly ghettos.
But it also wants to the church to be the church – uncompromised, vibrant, and
filled with joy.” Our friend Amy Sherman notes that “Forster’s deft grasp of
history, philosophy, and theology enables him to offer up this rigorous yet
accessible book.”  Forster (PhD,
Yale University) is a program director at the Kern Family Foundation, a socially
engaged organization, even as he affirms the central role of the church. He
laments that the church has lost its culture-shaping voice and civilizational
influence.  He draws on the vivid
and very public language of Joy to the
World, where the “Earth receives her King” and blessings flow “far as the
curse is found.”  What would
McKnight say about this?  How is
McKnight’s view of the Kingdom different than Forster’s?

The Explicit Gospel  Tim Chandler (Crossway)
$14.99 I will admit that I love reading nearly anything on the gospel and anything
that helps us understand and love and promote the gospel is good.  Chandler is a passionate young pastor of
a successful Reformed church plant in Texas, and is a person who is
increasingly known and respected. (That he recovered from a dangerous brain
tumor is a great blessing. His latest book, btw, is a great study of Philippians,
To Live is Christ, to Die is Gain.) We
should always be immersing ourselves in these conversations – just what is the gospel,
why did Jesus so regularly describe the gospel as the gospel of the Kingdom and what does that mean and look like?  We should so value Christ and his beauty
and his saving work that we are explicit about our commitments. Ahh, but,
again: what is the gospel about which we are to be explicit.  

This wonderful book compares and
contrasts and holds in tension a mostly individual gospel understood mostly
through systematic theology which unpacks atonement/justification and the more
wholistic gospel of cultural restoration based on the Biblical narrative of
creation-fall-redemption-restoration. He wisely explains what happens when
faith communities (or individuals, I suppose) dig too deeply into a
personalized gospel of personal salvation without the Biblically-required
vision of the Kingdom.  And, similarly,
he shows how some of those who proclaim the full gospel of the Kingdom soon
neglect central theological truths (about salvation, about the cross) dreaming
big dreams of a renewed creation.  His point is clear: we need both vocabularies and both
approaches to b speak about the Kingdom and the gospel as the Bible does. This
isn’t exactly the “pleated pants gospel vs. the skinny jeans gospel” of
McKnight; as Chandler portrays these two ways in to the understanding of the
gospel, both are strong, faithful, solid approaches (at their best.) We need to
talk about Christ as simultaneously as savior and Lord; the good news includes
personal salvation and cosmic hope. The Explicit Gospel would be a good
book to frame why McKnight is so concerned about sloppy appropriation of
Kingdom language and missional projects that are unhinged from the local church
and confused about the nature of salvation, renewal, restoration and the like.   

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Mercy & Melons: Praying the Alphabet: Thanking God for All Good Gifts from A to Z  Lisa Nichols Hickman (Abingdon) $15.99  You may recall how we raved and promoted Lisa Hickman’s earlier book Writing in the Margins: Connecting with God on the Pages of Your Bible (Abingdon; $16.99)(for which I had the great privilege of penning the forward, by the way.) We knew she was a colorful writer and a good, if a bit unconventional, artisan of generative Bible study, but I was still unexpected for the wonderfully creative lines that flow from her pen, here.  Yes, the very “praying the alphabet” format, and the lovely design itself, are fantastic, a rare idea and beautiful execution that is almost certainly not duplicated elsewhere.  But the writing — what a joy to behold! Wow.

I haven’t been going through it A to Z, actually, but dipping in at my heart’s content, and the serendipity has been wonderful.  Hickman weaves together in each devotional essay a theological theme and a more mundane topic, although in her hands, the sacred and seemingly secular are not at odds, making it sometimes  hard to tell which topic is supposed to be the theological one.  She writes about “Down Comforters and Doubt” and “Grasshoppers and Glory” and “Imagination and Icicles” and “Justice and Jello.”  Z is a wonderful entry — “Zin and Zinnias” (do you know where Zin is in the Bible?) Her prose about the ordinary stuff of life is fantastic, and her linking these topics/items with theological themes or phrases is just brilliant.  I could tell you which I’ve most loved most so far, but you will have to discover these yourself. If you like things that come together, clever word-play, connecting the cosmic dots, you will love this.  “Soap and Sanctification” as a guide to prayer?  Indeed.  

Rev. Lisa Nichols Hickman is an adjunct teacher in the Religion Department at Westminster College and is a pastor at new Wilmington Presbyterian Church. She writes regularly for Faith and Leadership on line magazine, as well as its “Call and Response” blog. If you are drawn to this, you should buy two copies of Mercy & Melons, one for yourself, and another one which you will surely want to share almost as soon as you start reading it.  

Dwell: Life With God for the World  Barry D. Jones (IVP/Forge) $16.00  This certainly deserves a longer review than I want to give it here, and I am confident that it will be receiving a Hearts & Minds year’s end “Best Book of 2014” award — it is certainly that good.  And that important.  With a great foreword by Michael Frost, this wonder book makes the case that with all of our talk about being missional, we are often missing the need for being intentional about our inner formation (or, conversely, with those who are most interested about our interior lives and spirituality, often unhinge these from the missional project of God’s redemptive work in the world.) So we often get it wrong, imbalanced at best. This is age old stuff — I’ve written before about my own fascination with authors like Thomas Merton and Parker Palmer who have written profoundly about the relationship between what Betty O’Connor used to call “the journey inward and the journey outward.”  Yes, Psalm 24:1 reminds us that all of the Earth is the Lord’s and the “fullness thereof.” This implies that God shows up everywhere, and that our redemption is — as the popular Acton Institute DVD puts it For the Life of the World. This is a book that made me think about holy worldiness, about incarnational spirituality, about mystical earthiness, about what another author calls “missional spirituality.”  It is so, so good!

That FLOW DVD, by the way, has become our biggest selling item of the year!  This Dwell book is a fantastic follow up, inviting us to “dwell” as we incarnate the ways of God in God’s world. It is very well written, offers fresh insights and important wisdom about the nexus of living with God, in the world, with creative, valuable content.   Perhaps soon I will outline the ten great chapters, beautiful, good stuff, but for now, please know this is a wonderful book about spirituality, Christian living, Kingdom vision, and how we can incarnate in stories, practices and disciplines “an approach to Christian formation and discipleship that doesn’t neglect our individual person-hood but sets it in a missional context.” Not either/or but both/and, and that doesn’t even do this justice.  Hooray.  

Stories We Tell: How TV and Movies Long for and Echo the Truth Mike Cosper – foreword by Tim Keller (Crossway) $15.99  I will be brief: I adored this book, so enjoyed it, thought it was one of the very best books exploring pop culture that I’ve read in a long while.  Some (like the must read Eyes Wide Open: Looking for God in Popular Culture by William D. Romanowski) are broad and lay the Biblical basis for thinking faithfully about the popular arts.  Others examine certain films or trends within pop culture — I hope you know David Dark’s extraordinary Everyday Apocalypse: The Sacred Revealed in Radiohead, the Simpsons, and Other Pop Culture Icons which is my favorite example of this.) This new one, though, Stories We Tell, has an exceptionally clear and well balanced framework, is both pious and open-minded, celebrating the imagination God has given us and our disposition to tell and enjoy stories.  Ponder the subtitle a bit — this so rich. But it also spends most of its time looking at TV shows, past and present, and is as up to date as any book like this, including some ruminations on current reality shows.  The cover — that retro look with an old TV and a cheesy Jesus statue — is maybe supposed to appeal to the hip or ironic, but please know that this is a truly earnest, insightful, joy-filled and very helpful book that is very current.  Given how much time people spend watching TV and movies, I think this is a very important resource to have around.

Mike Cosper has already given us a fantastic book on worship (Rhythms of Grace: How the Church’s Worship Tells the Story of the Gospel) which shows his familiarity with narrative theology — the short-hand of talking about creation/fall/redemption/restoration — which also reveals how he enjoys pop music and the arts. His love for TV and movies is truly evident here, which is part of the goodness of this book.  He not only gets the broad, worldview-ish critical engagement piece, but he enjoys the stories that come at us, the higher-powered more intellectual ones and lower-brow, silly stuff, too.  Author Karen Swallow Prior (whose own thoughtful memoir about reading called Booked is a personal fav) calls it charitable, wise, and generous. Yes it is! You should read this book!  You should give it to anybody you know who likes TV and film, or anybody who really has a bone to pick with the artists in pop culture.  His gospel-centered grid, his good, Biblical wisdom, and his passion for stories makes him a great author for this vital topic.

Slowing Time: Seeing the Sacred Outside Your Kitchen Door Barbara Mahany (Abingdon) $15.99  The important industry journal Publishers Weekly said this was one of the top 10 books of the fall (in the “religion” category) and that made me eager to see it.  Abingdon has been doing some very lush, well-written, interesting books of late (think of Debbie Blue’s breathtaking Birds of the Bible or the two books, mentioned above, by Lisa Nichols Hickman, or the wonderfully little book on prayer called The Book of Not So Common Prayer by Linda McCullough Moore; I think editor Lil Copan and wordsmith Lauren Winner have something to do this glorious output.)

Anyway, this is truly an original work, offering litanies and prayers, poems and observations, essays and recipes, reflection ideas and action steps (and even some lines in italics running along the bottom edge of the back, a curious design feature) all nicely arranged by the season of the year. This really is a book one can live with through a year.  Barbara Mahany is a devout Catholic, a very good writer, with a large capacity, it seems, to see stuff; to attend. Rabbi Evan Moffic says, that she “writes with the eyes of a sculptor and the ear of a poet.” Mahany has been a writer for the Chicago Tribune  — often talking about her family and their making a way in the world that is sane and good — and this shows her journalistic chops quite nicely.  “Bracingly honest and heart-achingly daring, she explores the sacred mysteries with a voice that is recognizable and clear.”  Slow down, realize the beauty and wonder of the ordinary, take heart.  This is “balm for the hurried heart.” And it has seasonal recipes!

From Every Tribe and Nation: A Historian’s Discovery of the Global Christian Story Mark A. Noll (Baker Academic) $19.99  I have raved about this unfolding series of books before; this new one is the third in the “Turning South” series, which tells the stories of “Christian scholars in an age of world Christianity.” First up was Journey Towards Justice, the fabulous memoir/argument by Nicholas Wolterstorff who told passionately of how he came to take up his work as a political philosopher, inspired by meeting suffering Christians in Palestine and South Africa. Next was Reading a Different Story: A Christian Scholar’s Journey from America to Africa a wonderful, slim book by literature professor Susan VanZanten who wrote wonderfully about her coming to appreciate the stories of the developing world. This new one shows how this leading historian, by offering his own personal account, has come to do his work, and particularly his recent work on the global Christian story.  Rave, rave, reviews grace the back, from Richard Mouw, George Marsden, Philip Jenkins and Robert Louis Wilken. Who knew that Noll was such a good storyteller — he tells of his own boyhood growing up Baptist in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, his early love of baseball, and, now, to his groundbreaking work on global faith. 

Philip Jenkins says of it, “Yes, I’m prejudiced. I know that any new book by Mark Noll is undoubtedly a cause for excitement, both for myself and anyone interesting in the history of Christianity. I am especially delighted in From Every Tribe and Nation, which takes the literature on world Christianity to a whole new level.”  

True Paradox: How Christianity Makes Sense of Our Complex World David Skeel (IVP/Veritas) $15.00  I admire this legal scholar, a Presbyterian professor of Corporate law at University of Pennsylvania Law School. (Not too shabby, eh?) who has often engaged in thoughtful forums on campuses, nicely representing Biblical notions of goodness, justice, tolerance, and truth.  He’s a very impressive guy.

I admit, though, that I was afraid this might be rather dense, too detailed, arcane, even.  Alas, what a delight — this is an exceptionally well written, clear-headed, yet almost anguished plea to not “dumb down” the questions of meaning and faith, appealing to all sorts of thoughtful readers.  Not only does Skeel relish paradoxes, he notes that the complexity of reality is something for which we simply must give an authentic account. And here’s the kicker: both traditional older-school apologetics — defending the truth, making cases that demand verdicts, proving the reliability of the Bible and such — and the outspoken new atheists, each have a view of truth and reality that is, well, finally unrealistic. That is, complexity and paradox are truly part of our experience. Could it be that this itself is a signal of transcendence, that the gospel itself points us towards a vision/story/worldview that helps us live into this curious aspect of our existence? 

We need not deny the complexities of life.  As it says on the back cover, “they can lead us to the possibility that the existence of God could make sense of it all.”  Rave reviews on the back are from evangelical historian Mark Noll, Catholic social and policy activist John J. Dilulio, and a former editorial board member of the New York Times. Winsome, smart, profound, this is a very fine, approach book about life’s biggest mysteries, and how best to respond to our complex world. And thank goodness for this small Veritas Forum imprint of thoughtful books coming from IVP.  Kudos!

Lean On Me: Finding Intentional, Vulnerable, and Consistent Community Anne Marie Miller (Nelson) $15.99  Some of us know Anne Marie Miller as the former Anne Jackson, who wrote the funny, fabulous, helpful book on the epidemic of church leader’s burn-out called Mad Church Disease and the engaging, even horrific at times, yet wonderful collection of stories (and art pieces) of things people feel they couldn’t share in church, Permission to Speak Freely: Essays and Art on Fear, Confession, and Grace. This book seems to be the natural follow up to these two, and posits — in her beautiful, winsome, engaging style — that real community is the antidote to burnout and shame, exhaustion and loneliness. In other words, in religious institutions where “mad church disease” is so prevalent, and yet where we are discouraged from talking about our brokenness, fears, or foibles, we simply have to re-doubled our efforts to seek grace-filled, Christ-centered, life-giving friendships. It says on the back cover, “we live in a world and a generation where the world ‘community’ is often discussed. But how genuine and authentic are your relationships, really? Miller noticed an important tension all of us must recognize in order to have life-giving friendships. “We desperately want to belong yet as the same time, we yearn for independence.”  Yeah, there’s that.  I am very glad that Anne has attempted to tackle this.  She’s gonna tell it like it is, I’m sure.

There is little doubt in my mind that “community” is one of the most urgent topics of our day.  Living Into Community: Cultivating Practices That Sustain Us by Christine Pohl (Eerdmans; $20.00) is the serious gold standard in this category, but it may be a bit too heady for some to wade through. Life Together (HarperOne; $14.99) by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, written under the threat of Hitler’s Nazi repression, of course, has been a standard go-to book for decades, and remains a Hearts & Minds bestseller –a vital quote from it ends Miller’s good book. Lean on Me: Finding Intentional, Vulnerable, and Consistent Community is a nice starter book on this meaty topic, with a useful reader’s guide at the end making it ideal for book clubs, Sunday school classes, campus Bible study groups, church staff meeting reading, and the like. I believe it will help many deepen their relationships, form more intentional, supportive small groups, and to arrange our lives together in our churches and neighborhoods to be more open and honest about our deep need for others. 

Or-di-nar-y  Michael Horton (Zondervan) $15.99   This is a wonderful little book, thoughtful, gospel-centered, mature. It’s a book decrying the hip new trend of being over-the-top passionate, extraordinary, world-changing, transformational, emerging, missional, big and bold, radical,  celebrating instead the rhythms of the ordinary life of discipleship, and the ordinary means of grace. Offering “ordinary and content” in part two  instead of “radical and restless” is a useful rubric, and it works well, bringing grace and truth to those of us a bit too hyped up on making a difference.  Mark Galli notes that “Horton’s Ordinary is, well, extraordinary.”  And indeed, it is. As a confessional Presbyterian, especially, I’m fond of this approach (even though it would be reasonable to worry if such a message might create luke-warm faith or cultural accommodation.  Horton does not think so, and I suspect he is right.)

But, okay, let me get this wee little thing off my chest: the orange cover seems meant to evoke Radical: Taking Back Your Faith from the American Dream by David Platt and yet he doesn’t mention it.  Gracious of him, perhaps, but the cover sort of seems to imply something and alluding like this seems a bit snarky.  And, the cool dictionary-definition-graphic on the cover, with the word spelled in a nifty eye-catching way (and which shows the definition as “1. Sustainable faith in a radical restless world”) seems a minor capitulation to the hipster marketing thing that drives so much of the “we can change the world” schtick pop evangelicalism. I suppose it doesn’t matter much, but wanted to share this minor observation that even in the packaging of this book, the good marketing team had to give it some minimalist zip.  Which is to say, I guess, that ordinary need not mean bland or boring or routine.

More importantly, this is a wonderful reminder of what it means to be faithful and mature, not gunning for unrealistic expectations and setting ourselves up for disillusionment. That he brings older faith traditions to bear is commendable and good (and, for what it is worth, for the few people who notice such things, he cites Mercersberg’s Nevin against revivalist Finney, draws on Jamie Smith, and seems to agree much with Kendra Creasy Dean who worries about congregations not teaching their youth.

I especially recommend Horton’s Or-di-nar-y to those whose faith seems to be a little faddish or those whose faith seems over-the-top emotionall without corresponding inner growth and time spent in the local church;  also, I think it would be very useful for more mainline pastors or leaders who have long called for less sensational faith expressions in favor of the low-key long haul, but maybe need to understand the (newer) radical evangelicalism of our day.  By the way, after Horton’s compelling treatment, recall how we’ve promoted the sleeper of a little book called The God of the Mundane: Reflections on Ordinary Life for Ordinary People by Matthew B. Redmond (Kalos Press; $10.95) which I liked very, very much.

The Romantic Rationalist: God, Life, and Imagination in the World of C.S. Lewis edited by John Piper & David Mathis (Crossway) $17.99  This is a great collection of papers that were presented at one of the legendary “Desiring God” conferences run out of John Piper’s ministry.  Those who have followed Piper’s “Christian hedonism” know that much of his doctrine of joy comes from Lewis, who he has studied carefully for nearly a lifetime. It wasn’t surprising to know that Lewis and his writing was the theme of last years conference.  The first chapter tells us more about Piper’s appreciation for the Oxford don, and it is quite nice. The book is very useful, and the chapters are lively, passionate, concise.

Louis Markos says that this “paints a well-rounded, sharply observed portrait that balances criticism with a deep love and appreciation for the works and witness of Lewis.” Michael Ward calls it “altogether an interesting, lively and thought-provoking read.” With authors like Piper, Philip Ryken, Douglas Wilson, Kevin Vanhoozer, and Randy Alcorn. you can be assured this is thoughtful, evangelical, insightful. 

Alcorn, for instance, is trying to show how Lewis’ view of the new creation — this world renewed, like a paradise restored —  is similar to Al Wolter’s in Creation Regained and I suspect I will return to it often. (Piper has a similiar chapter, too, about the sanctification of the things of earth, drawing on CS and St Paul.) One chapter explores Lewis’ view of the Scriptures, another part explores his view of hell, another draws on his use of the imagination, suggesting its importance for ongoing theological work. Throughout there is this sense of he was both romanticist and rationalist (oh yes!)  I hope you read Lewis, and about Lewis, a bit each year.

I like the title, don’t you?  

C.S. Lewis and the Crisis of a Christian Gregory S. Cootsona (Westminster/John Knox) $16.00 Allow me to sneak in another new Lewis title, too, that just arrived last week: this one is written by a pastor of Adult Discipleship and College Ministries at Bidwell Presbyterian (USA) Church in Chico, CA, although he had previously served at the prestigious Faith Avenue Presbyterian Church. In this new paperback he shows us how Lewis can be a good guide for us in our own “ups and downs” as we cope with the hardships of our own faith journey.  Lewis felt the absence of God in his life, he wrestled with grief, with doubt, and he knew temptation.  Why haven’t we unpacked this more?

Lewis biographer James Como exclaims that “Greg Cootsona’s book is as distinctive a contribution to writing on Lewis as any I know. With no claim toward breaking new ground, the author nevertheless brings a perspective so fresh that even a veteran reader of the master will be instructed…”  

Mark Labberton of Fuller Theological Seminary says “Greg Cootsona’s treatment of C.S. Lewis reflects the passion and thoroughness of a devotee who savors the insights of a long-term mentor. He relishes handing on morsels of Lewis’s imagination and insight, while he also analyzes and measures Lewis’s enduring value. Reading this book will enhance your experience of the feast that is C.S. Lewis but will also fortify the heard and imagination for the “crisis” that all true faith must engage.”

BookNotes

                   Hearts & Minds 234 East Main Street  Dallastown, PA  17313     717-246-3333

Here are some fairly short, if not quite pithy annotations of some great new books. Most are brand new and I’ve only skimmed them, enough to say that they all deserve more then pith, even more than brevity. I’m too busy, though, for much more, now, but these are so good, I just had to tell you that we have them here in stock, on sale for BookNotes readers.  

We show the regular retail price, but will deduct the discount when you order.  As we say at our order form page, we can send you a bill so you can pay later by check, if you’d like, or you can use credit cards. Your digits are safe as our order from page is certified secure.

So here ya go.  We are awaiting your reply.

The Bible Tells Me So: Why Defending Scripture Has Made Us Unable to Read it Peter Enns (HarperOne) $25.99  Not too many professional Bible scholars have such deep history in places like an evangelical Christian college and Westminster Theological Seminary, where Enns was edged out having taught there for 14 years, as well as the more mainstream Jewish and liberal Protestant scholars at Harvard Divinity School where he was profoundly tutored about what to do “when the Bible doesn’t behave.” And none are as witty and entertaining as Enns as he walks us through the Bible’s big problems (Canaanite genocide, just for instance) and how to best understand them all.  Rachel Held Evans says it is a “game-changer” and Brian McLaren says it is “super-enjoyable, highly informative, disarmingly honest, and downright liberating.” Tony Campolo writes, “I, as an old-fashioned evangelical have some problems with what he has written, I think that many other readers will find answers to some of the most perplexing questions that they have about the Bible.” 

I love that he starts with a useful excerpt from C.S. Lewis (from Reflections on the Psalms on how to read the Bible.) It’s a small thing, perhaps, but I also loved the cleverly written acknowledgments, and his own story, “My Life, In Brief, and Such as it Is.” If his Bible teaching thing doesn’t pan out, maybe he could moonlight as a stand up comic.  He’s told us he already failed at baseball.  Agree or not, he’s right that we simply have to come up with better ways to read the Scriptures, and to be read by them. This is an upbeat books about a life-or-death matter, and we recommend it.

Shrink: Faithful Ministry in a Church-Growth Culture Tim Shuttle (Zondervan) $16.99 Listen to what Stanley Hauerwas of Duke says of this brand new book: “Church growth strategies are the death gurgle of a church that has lost its way. Suttle helps us see how God in our time is making us leaner and meaner. I hope this book will be widely read.”  Who writes a book blurb like that, wanting us to be “leaner and meaner”?  Ha!  Intriguing, eh?  

You may know we are bringing C. Christopher Smith (author of the fantastic Slow Church to D-town November 5th — more on that later) but here is what Smith says of this new book: “Shrink is one of the wisest and most significant evangelical books that I’ve read in the last decade; it is essential reading for every pastor and church leader!”  Wow, that’s quite an endorsement for a significant author and cultural critic. You may have heard the phrase “good to great.” Shuttle maintains that “great may not always be good.”  You may know that, or maybe this is a new idea.  Surely you know that there is often some kind of tension between quantity and quality, and that church shouldn’t be mostly about numbers.  I bet you need this book!

The Sacred Year Michael Yankoski (Nelson) $15.99  All right, I’ll admit it, I was drawn to this because of the cover.  Yankoski is an energetic speaker and his book about living with the homeless — Under the Overpass — is fantastic: clear, passionate and inspiring. He received his MA at Regent in British Columbia and is a novitiate Oblate of St. Benedict, which is pretty cool. Here is what it says on the lovely front cover: “Mapping the Soulscape of Spiritual Practice — How Contemplating Apples, Living in a Cave, and Befriending a Dying Woman Revived my Life.”

This memoir of a year’s experiment just may be the most fascinating, and insightful, book about spiritual practices I’ve ever seen.  Dear Phyllis Tickle says “This book is a joy to the soul and a delight to the heart. It is destined to become a classic within the genre of contemporary spiritual and religious writing.” 

The Making of An Ordinary Saint: My Journey From Frustration to Joy with the Spiritual Disciplines Nathan Foster (Baker) $14.99  We know Nathan is a storyteller — he wrote a captivating, raw book about the growing distance he felt from his famous father (Richard Foster) and the subsequent disillusionment about Christianity he faced as a troubled young adult, and how he wisely challenged his dad to hike a bunch of Colorado mountains with him, in a last-ditch effort to restore their relationship. (That was the very nice Wisdom Chaser: Finding My Father at 14,000 Feet.) I heard the two of them do a splendid, entertaining tag-team talk at the Calvin College Festival of Faith and Writing last spring, and have been waiting for this book ever since.  In a way, this is a second generation Celebration of Discipline as the hip, young son tells of his own frustrations (and restorative glories) of practicing the classic spiritual disciplines. Ruth Haley Barton says it is “Delightful…. simply delightful” and Eugene Peterson says “Read this book and find yourself a new companion as you follow Jesus.” Yeah, that’s it. He is a honest, ordinary, reliable companion.  Richard Forster, by the way, offers a nice foreword and good reflections throughout. 

Presence and Encounter: The Sacramental Possibilities of Everyday Life David G. Benner (Foreword by Richard Rohr)  (Brazos Press) $15.99  I am really drawn to these kinds of books, about the spirituality of the ordinary, the mystical embedded in the mundane, practicing the presence of God and so forth.  Some are truly luminous, beautifully done and so very helpful. I am sure that this book — inspired by the author’s early confrontation with the “I-Thou” worldview of Jewish philosopher Martin Buber — will help us realize that attentive presence is what allows for real encounters to occur. As it says in the advanced promo: “Drawing on over thirty-five years of experience integrating psychology and spirituality, Benner examines the transformational possibilities of spiritual presence and encounter in fresh, exciting, and practical ways.”  There are end-of-chapter reflection exercises for individuals or groups, and these are profound and experiential (that is, not just discussion-based study questions.) This is a bit deep, and may be important for those longing for greater discernment about God’s presence in their daily lives.

Yes or No: How Your Everyday Decisions Will Forever Shape Your Life Jeff Shinabarger (Cook) $15.99 I hope you recall how we raved about Shinabarger’s previous book about a more simple — and creatively generous — lifestyle (called More or Less: Choosing a Lifestyle of Excessive Generousity.) In a way this new one, Yes or No, travels similar territory, invites us to think our deepest motivations and how we can be more of who we really want to be. This is more than a simplistic self help book, but it is exceptionally practical. There are good chapters here, explaining how to assess our natural decision-making styles, gaining tools to define our own philosophy of choice, and even how to engage a team or group with targeted discussion questions.  This really is fascinating.

Check out www.yesornobook.com and come back and order this from us.  After you ponder the decision, of course.  It could shape your life forever, after all.  Ha-ha. But, I don’t think I’m kidding — Jeff makes a strong case about how decisions have huge implications, and how to make them well.  Do consider this; I trust this guy a lot, and admire his energy and insight, his storytelling and his clear teaching.  I am sure there are those who would benefit greatly from this visionary, but wise assistance.

Red Brown Yellow Black White: Who’s More Precious in God’s Sight? A Call for Diversity in Christian Missions and Ministry Leroy Barber with Velma Maia Thomas (Jericho) $26.99  I have been with Leroy on several occasions and just love him — he’s real, funny, dynamic, caring, and a true leader, bringing together folks to care about racial justice, wholistic ministry, urban renewal and more. He told riveting short stories of urban youth and how Mission Year communities work for renewal in their lives and in their neighborhoods in the creative small book,New Neighbor, and then wrote a more general book which I adored called Every Day Missions. (If you haven’t used that in your small group or book club, it works really well.) 

In this new RBYBW, Barber examines racial issues, especially within US ministries, and the implications of our racial dysfunctions upon who ends up taking up mission projects, domestically and globally. I think this may end up being a much-discussed, very significant book as it brings some things together about multi-cultural diversity and racism and missions that no other book has yet done. If you are in any para-church organization or mission agency, especially, it is simply a must-read — the sooner, the better, too.  As Jim Wallis says, “It is the start of a much-needed conversation on diversity in missions leadership from a man who has lived out these ideas in his own life in an exemplary way.”  Ground-breaking, yes, but with practical, action-oriented solutions. Let’s spread the word on this so the those who need to grapple with it learn about it.

Loving Our Enemies: Reflections on the Hardest Commandment Jim Forest (Orbis) $20.00  Those of us who have been involved in peacemaking ministries or anti-war activism know well the name of this author; he was an international leader of Fellowship of Reconciliation, a long-standing, vivid activist and advocate for nonviolent resistance, and wrote what some still think are the best biographies of both Dorothy Day (All Is Grace: A Biography of Dorothy Day) and Thomas Merton (Living with Wisdom: A Life of Thomas Merton.) I met Forest years ago, and admire his courage and depth and ecumenicity. He is now an Orthodox Christian (and has written a few good books on icons, too), living in the Netherlands. I am sure this will be very, very moving, insightful, a mixture of deep spirituality, Biblical study, and a bit of savvy public theology.  Rowan Williams says it is “a statement of the gospel challenge and the gospel hope so clear that it is frightening; this is real, this is possible, this cannot be written off…”  Even if one isn’t drawn to the bigger social issues of the day, all of us must learn to forgive, after all, and this certainly is a very helpful guide. 

Occupied Territories: The Revolution of Love From Bethlehem to the Ends of the Earth Garth Hewitt (IVP) $16.00  This surely deserves a more substantive review, but for now you may know that Hewitt was a British evangelical folk/rock singer, doing thoughtful, engaging Christian music with friends of his such as the late Mark Heard and other socially conscience faith-based troubadours. (Has he ever played with Bruce Cockburn? I wonder.) Hewitt has worked for the Micah Trust traveling all over the world as a storyteller and advocate for just solutions to some of the world’s most grueling problems, and has written widely, and beautifully, including liturgical resources for peace and justice.  I have a friend who knows him well, who worked on this manuscript a bit, and who assures me it is one of the best books in many a year! 

If you were inspired by our program last month with Jeremy Courtney and his book Preemptive Love, or have any interest in the tragedies unfolding in the Middle East, this would be a very useful, very poignant, very important follow-up.  Highly recommended. A beautiful cover design too — this is a very special book.

Overrated: Are We More in Love With the Idea of Changing the World Than Actually Changing the World? Eugene Cho (Cook) $15.99  I could hardly put this down, and could hardly stop grinning, so glad to hear an evangelical leader say this mature, wise, honest stuff about the recent rhetoric about changing the world, transforming the culture, serving the poor, et cetera, et cetera. (And, might I add, honest about his own foibles and lifestyle, motivations and family life.) The subtitle — Are We More in Love With the Idea of Changing the World Than Actually Changing the World? — says it all, but you will want to be warned that the author (who not only is a pastor but the visionary founder of One Day’s Wages) does in fact, want to change the world. His organization works to alleviate extreme global poverty and Cho does want to recruit us to make choices in our own lives to be more giving and active, more Christ-centered and faithful in our service to others.  There’s a cool foreword by Donald Miller, too, but listen to these blurbs on the back, with which I heartily concur:

I read every word and pondered what I read. Overrated challenged and chastised me, inspired and energized me. I highly recommend it.    Lynne Hybels

Eugene Cho shatters all our hipster coffee-shop talk of justice and dares you to dive into the trenches and do something real with your life.    Shane Claiborne

I encourage all believers to read Overrated.      John Perkins

Called: The Crisis and Promise of Following Jesus Today Mark Labberton (IVP) $16.00  This compact hardback is a gem — a small book elegantly written and exceptionally thoughtful and deeply moving about “first things.” It is not a rehash of the doctrine of vocation and calling, nor is it particularly about the interface of faith and the work-world as are many books with the word “called” or “calling” in the title.  This really is about how to live as followers of Jesus, written by a hero of many, a long-standing Presbyterian pastor (at the storied and vital First Presbyterian Church (USA) in Berkley, CA), active ministry leader (having served with the John Stott Ministries and more recently as a Fellow of the International Justice Mission) and who is now the President of Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena. Blurbs on the back are from very respected writers, Andy Crouch, Soong-Chan Rah, Gary Haugen, Ruth Haley Barton, who all rave, recommending it to one and all.   

As Andy Crouch puts it, “Too often we settle for a ‘calling’ that is really just sanctified individualism, paddling in the shallows of the self. This book pursues the deeper questions of flourishing, sacrifice, community and transformation that are the heart of the Christian life.” 

The Pilgrim’s Regress – Wade Annotated Edition C.S. Lewis; edited and introduced by David C. Downing (Eerdmans) $25.00 Wow! C.S. Lewis fans have been wishing for a volume like this for decades, and when word was out that this was in the making, it has been eagerly anticipated. It is a needed book, and will help enhance many a perplexed reader.

As Alan Jacobs (author of The Narnian: The Life and Imagination of C.S. Lewis) says, “Among all of C.S. Lewis’s books, the one most in need of annotation is The Pilgrim’s Regress, which fairly bristles with allusions to writers and ideas, some ancient, some recent, some famous, some obscure. It takes a learned and discerning scholar to tease out all these references. Fortunately, David Downing is just such a scholar, and this book is an outstanding contribution to Lewis studies.”

Lewis’s allegory, a nod to Pilgrim’s Progress, of course, is the first book Lewis wrote after becoming a Christian and some appreciate it as a personal window into his own journey “from cynical atheist to joyous believer” (as Devin Brown puts it.) Brown continues, “It is no exaggeration to say that David Downing’s superb annotations allow those of us who do not share Lewis’s vast philosophical, literary, and linguistic background to understand and enjoy this classic work in a way that was not possible before. A must for all Lewis fans.”

Lewis himself, it is interesting to note, wrote later in his life of the “needless obscurity” of this early fiction about important ideas.  Later, he added notes and a new preface; Dr. Downing happily uses these, and has done even more, explaining it all, making it accessible, clarifying and opening it up for us all.  

As the preface tells us,

This edition of The Pilgrim’s Regress, produced in collaboration with the Marion E. Wade Center of Wheaton College, contains nearly five hundred page notes, including definitions of unusual terms, translations from a half-dozen foreign languages, identifications of key characters, and cross-references to other works by C.S. Lewis…. Lewis’s own handwritten notes in an early edition of Pilgrim’s Regress are set in boldface in this edition…

In a fascinating introduction Downing invites us to revisit “Lewis’s inaugural work of prose fiction and to see it with new eyes.” 

He writes,

Apart from its intellectual acuity and spiritual perceptivity, Regress also reveals the imaginative vitality and sparkling prose that would eventually make Lewis an author of worldwide renown. Despite its limitations, which Lewis himself recognized, The Pilgrims Regress remains a seminal text for readers of Lewis — a rollicking satire on modern cultural fads, a vivid account of contemporary spiritual dangers, and an illuminating tale for a whole new generation of pilgrims.

Three cheerios for this large project, this good work, for David Downing’s dedication, and for Eerdmans’ lovely new slightly over-sized, hardback edition at such a reasonable price.  By the way, Eerdmans has also re-issued the excellent collection of Lewis essays (often over-looked) Christian Reflections in a paperback with new cover art, matching this new edition of Pilgrim’s Regress.  They look nice together…

BookNotes

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Our tears they speak a language that’s uniquely all their own… “Dover Beach (Out in the Cold)” on Winnowing Bill Mallonee & The Darkling Planes

In his splendid theological study of
literature, Frederick Buechner uses as the title a famous line from Shakespeare’s
King Lear: Speak What We Feel, Not What We Ought to Say. In another book —
I mentioned it in my BookNotes list of books about evangelism last month — Buechner’s
title is golden: Tell It Like It Is: The Gospel as Tragedy, Comedy, Fairy Tale.  He explores the characteristics of
these genres and shows how the gospel story itself can be described in these
enduring forms.

Music can help us “speak what we feel”
perhaps more viscerally than novels. 
As I wrote a few days ago about Beverly Lewis’ lovely visit to our store
to speak of her new Amish novel The River (Bethany House; $15.99) — which has some dark currents
sweeping through it — I did some free association to link it to Bruce Springsteen’s
anguished song “The River.”  Talk
about speaking what we feel, about redemption somehow coming in the form of
tragedy. “Is a dream a lie if it doesn’t comes true, or is it something worse?”
 Most, but not all, evangelical “Christian
fiction” ties things up pretty nicely, almost unable to host Springsteen’s
question (even though the Bible offers these very sorts of questions!)  Now, I’m glad there is reconciliation
at the end of Lewis’ The River and – spoiler! – that a
modern bit of technology, a pacemaker, is involved.) This is helpful and
inspiring and has its place in one’s reading diet.

But some of our best artists know that
the life is hard, and they help us cope, not with easy answers about the human
condition.  I hardly need to say
it, but that life can be a trail of tears is also true for people of faith (perhaps
especially so for people who have tasted glory and trust God’s promises and
seek real joy.) Need I really say that it is good to be honest about our
doubts? Does your throat not quiver when you sing that line “I’m prone to
wander, Lord, I feel it”?  We don’t
need to valorize or romanticize our pain or foolishness, but it does help to
give voice to our disappointments and troubles, to read books and listen to
artists that walk the dark side of the street, who tell it like it is. They
help us speak not what we “ought” but allow us to be honest about our own fears
and foibles, living as we do in a very broken world.

Brian Walsh has written brilliantly
about this – see his meditation on Bruce Cockburn’s “If I Had a Rocket Launcher”
alongside Psalm 137 in his “Wine Before Breakfast” sermon.  Perhaps you should read this, first, a short meditation on “Exile, Song, and Rage.” In fact, you could
read his whole book about the prophetic imagination of Cockburn in his
remarkably generative study Kicking at the Darkness: Bruce Cockburn and
the Christian Imagination (Brazos; $19.00) which I describe in detail,
in a long review, here.  

(Big aside: Cockburn’s hefty auto-biography
called Rumours of Glory: A Memoir is coming out from HarperOne
($28.99) the first week of November, and we are taking pre-orders for it, at
20% off. It is sure to be provocative.  There will also be a
commemorative boxed set selling for something like $150.00 which includes all
the songs Bruce mentions in the book, in order, making it a 9 disc soundtrack.  The admittedly pricy boxed set also
includes 16 previously unreleased or rare tracks, a 90 page booklet,
photographs, and a full live concert DVD film during his “Slice O Life” tour.
We’ll have it on sale, too. Send us a note for more info.)

Which brings me to my review of the
harrowing new Bill Mallonee album.  Almost.

Look. I am a huge, huge U2 fan. We carried
Boy and the others when we first
opened in ’82, right, alongside Petra and Amy Grant (and, yes, all of Bruce
Cockburn’s catalog) and we took great joy in introducing many folks to the
boys from Dublin’s early work, and continued to stock all they’ve done. I am
still just blown away by nearly every album – yes, I love Rattle and Hum and yes, I am even moved by some of the hyper-irony
of the electro-weirdness of the Zoo TV
years.  I saw them in Philly during
the Joshua Tree tour when Springsteen
showed up.  And I can’t tell you
how many times I’ve just wept and wept listening to that sad list of names at
the end of “Walk On.”  Haven’t you?
How can you not?

But I just can’t write about the new
iphone Songs of Innocence release because I am
absorbed in listening over and over to what has become my favorite album of the
year — the incredibly poignant release by the tell it like it is, speak what we
feel, gospel as tragedy Americana/rootsy graveling desert beauty of Bill
Mallonee and his new record Winnowing created with his musical partner and wife, Murriah Rose, singing together as the Darkling Planes.

To distract me from a new U2 album is
quite a feat. And Bill and Mariah do so, mister. 

I find it hard to review music. I can explain books, but it is difficult
to capture the aural experience of music, those wailing Rickenbacker guitar
solos, those acoustic chords that bring to mind “All Along the Watchtower” but
aren’t that, that crisp moment when a syllable is hit in falsetto, that whispered
one-two-three-four that launches so quickly the next track, that time when the
loud harmonica merges with the wailing electric guitar, and we don’t quite know
which instrument is which.  

We shouldn’t separate the lyrics from
the music, the timbre of the vocals, the whine, and the shout and the whispers,
the instruments, the arrangements, the production and engineering;  as we talk about records, we must
remember that the words are part of songs. But how to tell you about it, entice
you to listen? For those that don’t know Bill’s large body of work (50 + albums,
most now available as downloads, some as real CDs, this new one even available in vinyl) I think
the closest comparison to put you in the ball park of the sound is Neil Young,
with moments of Jackson Browne at his best, maybe Tom Petty. (And, oh, how
Bill’s voice ends each time in the chorus of “Got Some Explainin’ to Do” sounds
so much like Neil!) The fuzzy guitars, the distortion that is so gripping, the
high and lonesome beauty given a rock and roll edge. it is very, very moving
for those that appreciate that school of alt-rock.  You can hear tons of his songs for free at his Bandcamp site which I show below.

My own tastes include artists in this
very orbit: Robbie Robertson (and the entire catalog of The Band) and CSNY
and Mark Knopfler, Jackson, and Americana stuff, channeled nowadays by the
likes of The Civil Wars, Mumford & Sons, the Avett Brothers.  And did I mention Rattle and Hum? I appreciate smart, writerly indie bands from The
Head and the Heart to The National, The Airborne Toxic Event, and older school
passionate singer-songwriters like Peirce Pettis, Phil Maideria, country-ish
Buddy Miller. Bill is louder and rougher than Iron and Wine and Fleet Foxes,
but I had to mention them. Can you relate?

If you like rowdy, electric finger-picking,
fuzzy, jangly, Byrds-like soaring guitars, and vocals that can at time nearly
be called Dylan-esque, you should pick up Bill Mallonee. Founder and front man
of the stunning Vigilantes of Love, they were hot in the glory days of the
Athens, Georgia music scene, preaching the gospel in harsh, acoustic songs with
punk energy, allusive, dark lyrics, deep in the club scene that gave us REM
and the Indigo Girls, drawing insight about faith and songwriting from the
likes of the late great Mark Heard.

REM’s Peter Buck co-produced a critically
acclaimed album, Buddy and Julie Miller joined in occasionally, the world-class
alt-country legend Emmy Lou Harris did background vocals. Paste Magazine declared him to be one of the top 50 songwriters of
all time. VOL days long behind him, his output continued for a decade or two of
being on the road, putting out downloadable, low-fi, self-produced mostly
acoustic WPA series all with artwork cuffed from the old Works Projects Administration
(renamed in 1939, Bill might tell ya, as the WPA) of FDR.

Bill has always had this sense of being
rooted in the past. From songs
about the dust bowl to songs inspired by Jack Kerouac, from allusions to miners
or farmers (one great album, just for instance, is called Victory Garden) or historical incidents (“Andersonville” about the
horrific southern civil war POW camp still sometimes shows up in his live
shows) or several utterly romantic songs about the WW II-era romance of his
parents, he, more than nearly any folk/rock performer I know, can be called
rooted (even if his roots too often have him on the road; in a line on Winnowing he says “once I mistook her
for my home.”) Just look at that album cover from Audible Sigh, that historic train wreck.  

This may not be the old-timey roots
music with a lot of banjos or Appalachian fiddles, but the sound and tone and
lyrical allusions are often from other very American decades, from hardscrabble
people and places from the heartland. (The way he often says, about somebody, “kid”
or “mister,” sounds like some wiser blue-collar elder talk, doesn’t it?) Again,
think of the Steinbeck vision of Woody Guthrie, more fiery then Springsteen’s Dakota, maybe more like his Seeger
Sessions.

WINNOWING

In this new record, set clearly in his
high desert home in New Mexico, Mallonee mentions horses, a pick-ax, pistols under waistcoats, a skeleton key, a boxer (who “grabs all the prize money – and a few other
things”) and somebody with “an ace of diamonds up the sleeve” which somehow
perfectly creates the feel and mood of this song cycle about being down and out,
tumbling down out West, smack in the middle of (as the second song puts it) “Those
Locust Years.”

“There’s nothing left in Oklahoma,” he
sings in “Tap Your Heart On Your Shoulder,” “on your right hand or your left/ we
took God’s good green earth and turned it into sand.” Yeah, so that’s it, a
whole lot of remorse, for the loner who has to move on, and, it seems, for the
whole cosmos which is scarred, somehow, and what approaches despair.  But yet, this song is a plea to “tap
your heart on its shoulder and see if she’s still awake.”  Listen to that line a coupla times if
you don’t have time for a spiritual retreat or money for a shrink! 

Bill’s not giving up, and in this
jaded, secular age, he is nearly an evangelist, worth more to un-churched ears
then a dozen slick worship bands with goatees and nicely torn jeans and big
amps.

The first song is sublime, and, like
nearly all of his tunes these days, insists on a lot of harsh reality, but with
glimmers of light. The song is subtitled “Out in the Cold” and that is the
theme.  It is his life, these days,
road-weary, world-weary, tired but sober, feeling under-rated, left out, yet
committed to finding hope where one can. (“No, I am not a scoffer withholding
my thanks,” he sings, believably, “My purse? It is empty but my heart overflows
its banks.”) The proper title of this wonderful opener is “Dover Beach” and is
inspired by the famous Matthew Arnold poem about the restlessness brought on as
the waves of meaning receded in the modern world.

I can show you where my heart was broke there on Dover
Beach

Truth receding like a wave/too farther out of reach

Love may bring the tide back in/hard to live, easy to
preach

Mr. Mallonee’s raw song-writing and
passionate performance isn’t exactly depressing although he does confess much,
a practice that many of us might be well be instructed to own up to, as
well.  He sings,

Every conviction that I lived by, every truth that I was taught,

Every sermon that I sat through; well, it was all for naught.

I was always pretty bad at carryin’ my cross

Another slow, sad song achingly, but
yet somehow beautifully sung, offers the chorus, like a litany of confession —
“Now You Know.”  Perhaps it is more
than you want to know.  Or perhaps
it can serve as your own confession, too. 
“I can feel it all disintegrate/like paper in the flame.”  This is a line, by the way, following
an allusion to the pride of warriors – Caesar on his steed, crossing his
rubicon.

After speaking of the “sadness of this
place” (“Deserts speak in whispers but she rarely shows her face/ They say that
you get used to it, ah, but I’ve not found that the case”) he sings, “No matter
where I sing these songs/the devil’s always at my sleeve.” Now you know.

Speaking, literally, of the devil, one
brilliant song – for those that know his work, it almost reminds me of “Bolt
Action” or some of the louder ones from the Blister Soul-era  – is called “Got
Some Explainin’ to Do (Gotta Give the Devil His Due.)” The stanzas (without too
much gruesomeness, thankfully) highlight examples of brokenness and sin in the
world: “No matter what the disguise is, well ya gotta give the devil his due.
But whoever he is, has got some explain’ to do.”  That’s for darn sure.

He gets as preachy as he does on this CD at the end of this song,
countering the works of the devil with this cry:

Time for banishing darkness

Time for doing what is right

Time for loving the planet

Time for stepping into the light.

Winnowing isn’t
all lament and remorse, though. There is a lovely song about what I’m sure is a real tavern, somewhere
out there, called the Dew-Drop Inn. “Store-front glass & red brick, non-descript with a few old ghosts
roamin’ round.”  But there, “every
one’s yer friend and everybody’s got a story unsung.”  There’s some sad stuff there, too (“Sam’s tending bar,
brother, he’s seen it all, seen the good die young” and their the community can
realize “Some dreams get born but, most get beaten’ out /And some folks forget
how to dream at all.”) But, yet, “Stories got told and drinks were poured and
for a moment? It was Heaven here…” 

As in many of his songs, there is this
narrative of the broken and ordinary redeemed by community, even if of misfits,
and then also his own personal sense of being loved. The sub-title and refrain
here is “I love you just because.” Is it sung to his wife and band partner
Murriah Rose or to the loners and oddballs hanging out at the Dew Drop?  Maybe both.

Similarly, in a beautiful, passionate
song, “In the New Dark Age” he sings — lamenting the loss of a culture of love and hope and change — “the
only lamp burning bright/is you.” Murriah? Jesus? You and me? I don’t know.  He sings the words briskly, building
the case, singing, “the game was declared over, love was escorted out, there was hardly
a shout/I’ll take the crimson & clover.” (Don’t you love that reference to
the flower-power, Tommy James hit?) Dark as it may sound, this is a rowdy, fun
song, Beatle-esque, trippy with organ and what almost sounds like backwards electronic
stuff, like it would fit on his wonderful Locket Full of Moonlight album or
VOL’s Summershine, two of my own all time favorite CDs.

He says, wrongly, I think, “in the new
dark age, no one puts up a fight.” 
Ahh, but he does, doesn’t he? — even if he will go down swinging. Mallonee’s art
testifies, bears witness to his fight. This record makes you want to join him there, makes us want
to be that light burning bright. Is it a plea to his remaining fans? An altar call?  “All the dominoes fell/we sent under a spell/and all hell.
broke. lose.” It is a lament, but also an invitation to be the light, I swear it is.

“Hall Full of Mirrors/Room Full of Woe”
sounds ominous enough, but, I’m telling you, it is an encouraging song, great
melodies, great ringing guitar riffs, evocative lyrics.  It’s one of the more upbeat tunes,
despite the use of the word “woe” — and well-produced (Bill and Murriah as the Darkling Planes play
everything) and it is splendid. The acoustic guitar at the end trails out with
chords from “All Along the Watchtower” that just seals the thing, turning it into an
anthem.  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Several reviewers have highlighted the
gorgeous “Blame it on the Desert (Whisperin’)” which is surely one of the album’s
centerpieces.  In bouncy,
countrified boogey he sings,

What the mystic knows

What the Good Book does proclaim

You only ever own

What you give away

Blame it on the spirit

Blame it on the red wine

But then again,

Blame it on the desert whisperin’

Mr. Mallonee then sweetly sings a quick
line, “the mantra of the asphalt/road-side diner, communion table” and
reminds us of the Christ-like instruction “take only what you need/leave what
you are able.” We are naturally led
to think of the wine of Eucharist, of grace, of gospel.  Or, then again, maybe it is just the
desert whisperin’ — which the Bible itself says is God’s own Word, eh? 
(Calvin Seerveld, referring to the lines in Psalm 19 which tells us that
the creation speaks, calls it “God’s glossalia.”) Yes, Bill has heard, and
brings to us, The Word of the Lord. Thanks be to God, the God of the desert
whisperin’.

When Bill sings “what the Good Book
does proclaim” it makes me grin, brings me a joy each time.  Not only is “the Good Book” an old,
rural colloquialism, the “does” just nails it.  Who talks like this – Abraham Lincoln? Woody Guthrie? Your
great grandma?  Yet, it isn’t
affectation.  Bill is firmly
situated in the current century – there are lines about duo-jets and
the 1%.  But he’s also “betting the
farm, babe” on some kind of old wisdom, some deep truth gleaned from his
desert, dust-bowl (locust) years. 

The last song may be an allegory, or
may serve that way – I suppose he didn’t quite mean it as such, but, then again, who knows?
The first line is, with his keen ability to create the image of a place,
about a town in Oklahoma called Dalhart.
It sounds just like dull heart.

“If I ever make it out of Dalhart/to a place where I can stand tall/a
horse would do quite nicely/but if I have to…I’m gonna crawl.” 

This is one hell of a post-modern Pilgrims Progress, from Dover Beach to
making it out of the dull heart of Dalhart.

It is the journey of many of us, I
suspect. He sings, obtusely, of what may be the “hound of heaven” (the poet’s
phrase he has used on other albums) singing  “whatever keeps tugging at your sleeve/this old flesh and
blood has gotta find a reason to believe.”  Maybe this is your experience; Something tugging at your sleeve, Christ-haunted, restless,
yet not giving up on the search. Give Winnowing repeated listens, and something will break open.  Maybe, with a little luck, even what
the mystics know, what the Good Book does proclaim.

Thank you for reading my feeble effort
to explain this artist’s gifts to us, this music that means so much to me.  Because others have said it more
eloquently and with better insight, if you’re interested, see these two excellent
reviews from Wood Between the Worlds and from Lay It Down. Both are well worth reading.

Here is one of his many interviews, describing his history with VOL, his solo work, his concerns about the commodification of art, etc etc. Worth a read if you want his take on the not so recent past.

We stock his last two similarly great, jangly, alt-country rock CDs as well, The
Power and the Glory (2011) and Amber Waves (2012.)  Order them all from us, on sale, for
$15.00 each.  As Bill would say, “thank
you, ladies and gents.”

And, if you order all three, we will throw in as a special bonus, an old Mark Heard CD that is sure to please. Bill would dig this promo, too, I’m sure.

If you want to see his many, many downloadable projects, visit his amazing bandcamp cite, here. But buy these three from us, please! $15.00 each.

BookNotes

The River author Beverly Lewis (Bethany Publishing House) $15.99 BookNotes sale price 20% off; $12.79.

Although we’ve shouted it out on Facebook and Twitter, we
thought we should share here for those that were wondering that our “Evening
with Author and Activist Jeremy Courtney” went very well. Jeremy and his wife
Jessica, who features prominently in Jeremy’s book Preemptive Love: Nurturing Peace One Heart at a Time, did a great
job sharing with us about their brave work as peacemakers in Iraq, forging
creative collaborations with Arabs, Kurds, Christians, Muslims, Jews and
others… all focused on the audacious goal of finding a structural remedy to the
backlog of tens of thousands of sick Iraqi kids who need heart surgery to save
their lives.  The conversation
moved from dramatic stories and pictures of medical staff working in pediatric
surgery theaters to broader themes of peacemaking in such a tense and violent
context. 

Through stories and slides, pictures and even a live song (Jeremy
hails from Texas so his love for folkie blues music is strong) they humanized
the people and cultures of what was once the land of Babylon. Yes there is awful stuff going on, but there is also goodness and beauty.  Their stories were so good, and I thought of them when I read this powerful, splendid short piece at the High Calling blog by our friend Denis Haack called “The Power of Storytelling: From Understanding Ideas to Indwelling Them.”  

Iraq was, of course, once known as Babylon to whom Jeremiah wrote a famous letter (Jeremiah 29:7) from which we have the famous Biblical command to “seek the peace of the city.” Perhaps storytelling is part of that.

We had some lovely refreshments that Beth called “a Pennsylvania Dutch interpretation of Iraqi snacks” — Hadgi Bada, pistachio cookies, cardamom tea and stuffed dates were all fun to share. 

Our local newspaper, the York Daily Record, did a front page story the next day, too.

We have some autographed Preemptive Love paperbacks left, and our on-line price here at
BookNotes has been 20% off. They usually sell for $15.00; our sale price is just $12.00.  Let
us know if we can send one. Just use the order form which is secure for credit
card digits, or give us a call.

Jeremy left Central PA and headed in to mid-town Manhattan to
tape an episode of of the talk show with Mike Huckabee; I hope the Preemptive
Love Coalition lets their followers know when it will air. Then he was off to London to offer a briefing with members
of Parliament.  Pretty great, eh?

And so, thanks for caring about the things we do here at
Hearts & Minds.  I know some of
you prayed for us, and others pre-ordered the paperback. And some of you helped
spread the word to others who might want to order from us, or who might even be
able to attend.  I know some of our
friends and followers have contacts in our area.

***

On the heels of that, I’m going to ask you to share some new
information today, too, if it seem right.  Is there somebody to whom you could forward this?

We are hosting an autographing reception to meet and greet
New York Times best-selling author Beverly Lewis, this Thursday (September 11,
2014) here at the shop, starting at 7:00 pm.  There is free parking available at several lots nearby, and on the street in front of the store.

Her new book is called The River.

We have
enjoyed sponsoring a Beverly Lewis event before, and were delighted with how many
different sorts of folks enjoy her Amish-themed fiction.

As I said at the
Jeremy Courtney gig as I was announcing it – and I’m sure a few of my super
intellectual and sophisticated friends maybe thought I was reaching a bit to
connect the events – it seems to me that the heart of most of Lewis’
easy-to-read, breezy books are, in fact, of enduring, classic stuff: identity
(who are we? to what community do we belong?), hospitality (how do we relate to
others? who’s in and who’s not?) and can we get along despite our differences?  And what does it mean to know God’s grace and do right?

From Romeo and Juliet to the profound
work of Chaim Potok to Preemptive Love
(and, just to show off, I’ll add Exclusion
and Embrace the heady, award-winning theological work of Miroslav Volf
written in the context of the Serbian-Croation war and Bosnian genocide) this is familiar and fearful, yet vital territory.  If part of the gospel is about showing
hospitality to “the other” and serving “the stranger” and working towards
reconciliation, certainly learning about those who have had to cope with
forgiveness after being excluded, shunned or betrayed, can only
be an asset to our discipleship. 

Even if it comes to us in a fun, stirring story.

And so, we can suggest that although Beverly Lewis is a genre
writer and some may find her work a bit obvious with
the Christian messages and sentimental lessons learned, we are very proud to host her,
glad for her support of our shop, and eager to have you tell those who might
enjoy it, inviting them to swing by Thursday evening to meet her. She has an obvious care for her fans, and a heart to share the gospel through her storytelling and writing. Of course you may not know anyone nearby, but you can buy an autographed copy, here on line of almost any of her work — we’ve got it all.  We have plenty of her adult and kid’s
books, and we can easily have her autograph some for you or yours. (If you want them inscribed to a
person, just be sure to tell us the name, hopefully before Thursday evening!)

Beverly Lewis was born in the heart of Pennsylvania Dutch
country, but now lives (where she occasionally writes with her husband David) in
Colorado.  Her own mother’s
dramatic story of leaving the Old Order Mennonite tradition is told in her most famous book The Shunning which has sold more than one
million copies and was made into a Hallmark Channel movie. (In 2007 her similarly
popular novel The Brethren was
honored with a Christy Award.)

Here is a wonderful, enchanting video of Beverly briefly talking about her young years and her early love for writing, keeping a journal, doing short stories, and some of the early inspirations of her creative fiction.  It is very nice.

Beverly Lewis has written over 25 adult novels, 6 lovely picture books, over 50 youth books, a cookbook, and more…

The River is her newest novel, just released
last week. Beverly is doing a 25-stop tour to promote the new book and to have
the opportunity to meet her fans and readers.

We are pleased to host Beverly in part because she is so
gracious, and because so many of our local customers appreciate her books.  (One local Presbyterian leader is
related to her, and vouches that some of the landmarks and descriptions of the
homestead in The Shunning are spot on accurate!)

But I myself am drawn to this new story for a couple of
reasons. Let me explain.

Interestingly, a friend who is herself a sophisticated author
of non-fiction religious books offered a question just the other day at her
facebook page: are there rivers in America that we might consider holy or
sacred? (What does that mean, I asked, as I speculated about the iconic and
mythic role of the Mississippi in Americana roots music, which gave rise to gospel,
blues, and rock and roll, not to mention the title track from Paul Simon’s Graceland.)

Two things worth sharing:
scores of people immediately shared stories of their favorite rivers and why they
are spiritually attracted to them, revealing their own sense of place. This all was quite lovely and reminded me not only of
Wendell Berry and his novels that include a vivid sense of (rural) place, but
it also, oddly, brought to mind that powerful short story of a song, “The River,” by brother Bruce Springsteen. I can hardly listen (especially to the more raw, acoustic
versions) of that song without being overcome with anguish. The river may have some deep, good attraction for many, and maybe even some
redemptive meaning in the Springsteen story, but it ain’t easy, that’s for
sure; at the end “the river is dry” he it continues to haunt him.

One of my
favorite nature writers, Kathleen Dean Moore has a book called Riverwalking: Reflections on Moving Water which exquisitely explores
the deep beauty of bodies of water and those who appreciate them. I can hardly think of rivers without thinking of that wondrous book. But, again, this excellent writer and serious thinker is aware of the foreboding nature of moving water.

Around here, rivers are dangerous
(especially our own mighty Susquehanna with sink holes and weird currents and deadly low-head dams.) Some around here who enjoy boating and
swimming in rivers travel the tributaries of the Susquehanna, and love the many
streams around these parts, including the namesake river alluded to in this
tragic Beverly Lewis tale, the Conostoga. The Conostoga River winds its way through Lancaster County like a snake,
twisting and curving in geologically surprising ways. 

The deadliness of the river in The River novel is not due to exceptionally bad currents or particularly
bad water features, though.  No, it
came from human error. We learn in the first few pages that the protagonist,
Tilly, who has long ago left the Plain life for modern English ways, is haunted
by a catastrophic accident in which her younger sister drowned, years ago, while
playing in the river.

No need to explain it all, but the plot of this, not unlike
many others in this genre, explores the tensions of broken relationships and
complex ethical dilemmas as two sisters – both no longer in meaningful
relationships with their Lancaster county Amish parents and siblings – feel
compelled to return home to an anniversary celebration of their parent’s
marriage.  Their father is sick and
they surely cannot remain aloof much longer.  But there is this unresolved sadness and responsibility for
what happened at the river. As it asks even on the back cover, “Can they face
the future in the light of a past they can’t undo?”

Amish folks with their rejection of modern technologies and
Anabaptist commitments and old order ways are – it seems dumb to even say it –
quite human. They are not caricatures.  Any fiction that tells a story from within a subculture – Iraqi Muslims, Jewish New Yorkers, 
duck hunting rednecks down South, hipster atheists in Portland — can run the risk of
devolving into stereotype, and good storytelling will be careful.  Lewis
runs this risk, of course, in this sort of writing that isn’t attempting
extraordinary nuance. But there are rich
aspects of typical Amish life, and she plumbs them well.  From “letting it all loose” during the infamous rumspringa seasons to the difficulties of offering forgiveness (see Donald
Kraybill, Steven Nolt, and David Weaver-Zecher’s Amish Grace and the sequel, The Amish Way) there are fairly universal human emotions at play, and
to write stories about those who are, or are no longer, within this close-knit
subculture is certainly fascinating. 

The River is not only about the consequences of this tragic loss
of a little one, and the large matter of regret,  but is also about mended fences, reconciliation, learning to
love across differences. Is the river a symbol of danger? Is it a symbol of the
flow of healing that can wash over us? 
Or maybe it is not a metaphor for much, just a huge geographic fact in
the background of this story set in a particular geographic region.

Anyway, I suspect you know about, and have opinions about,
this mass marketed genre of Amish fiction.  If you are a brainy type and want to know more, we heartily
recommend Valerie Weaver-Zercher’s important semi-scholarly work, Thrill of the Chaste: The Allure of Amish Romance Novels (Johns Hopkins
University Press; $24.95.) It studies the
development of the genre and wonders about the appeal. Her thesis is fascinating and her study
– of everything from the book cover designs to the plots themselves, to the
small sisterhood of popular authors in this field – is well worth reading for anyone interested in
the interplay of religion in American commercial fiction.

All of which is to say I’m in the middle of this brand new
book by Mrs. Lewis don’t want to spoil anything, but am eagerly awaiting her visit with us here at Hearts & Minds. 
If you want us to ask her anything for you, or want any books — early
Christmas presents for mom or grandmother, perhaps? — just let us know.

By the way, I was struck by the importance of the river in The River (which may be why I get paid the big bucks — tee-hee) and wrote most of the above before I noticed, just a bit ago, an “author’s note” as an afterword on pages 315 – 316 of the book.  

She writes, 

The Conestoga River captured my attention one October afternoon two years ago — it seemed to call to my heart. I was preparing for the final shoot of the long day, the last segment of my documentary, “Glimpses of Lancaster County with Beverly Lewis” [which you can see at her website.] We were set up right near the historic Hunsecker’s Mill Bridge, and I had walked down the grassy slope to review what I’d planned to say, inching my way toward the wide river. There, as I stared at the rushing water, Tilly’s story presented itself to me, as did little Anna’s drowning. In that moment I knew I had to write The River, with all of its heartrending yet redemptive threads.

I will long remember the surge of emotions, the power of the story. And the way the river seemed to demand top billing in my lineup of Eden Valley characters. 

BookNotes

                   Hearts & Minds 234 East Main Street  Dallastown, PA  17313     717-246-3333

I thought my BookNotes review last week of Jeremy Courtney’s book, Preemptive Love, just out in paperback, ended up pretty good, so I do hope you read it.  It’s really a spectacular book, page-turning, informative and inspiring. 

And, we are hosting an event with Jeremy here in the area this Friday night. 

Here is an early (longer) draft of an op-ed column I sent to our local newspaper, which they chose not to run.  Somedays I rub my eyes at the silly stuff that gets in the paper, but I suppose I’m biased here. 

Hosting Jeremy is a great, great privilege and the event is going to be awesome, fun, even, amidst the horrific news of what is going on in Iraq these very days.  We are grateful that our church has partnered with us to bring this event to Central Pennsylvania.

Here’s how I tell tried to tell local folks about it.

In recent weeks the story of the terror waged in Iraq by the
army known as ISSI has exploded across the news and social media.  We have learned of religious hatred and
political crisis.  Some of us
despair of the reports of genocide while others rant against the political
party that we think has been most irresponsible.  The situation is tragic. There is very little good news
coming from the Middle East these days.

Central Pennsylvanians will have an opportunity to hear an
aid worker just in from Iraq, the founder of a medical NGO there, Jeremy
Courtney, who may be one of the most fascinating people I have ever met. Hearts & Minds Bookstore in
Dallastown named Courtney’s book, Preemptive Love: Pursuing Peace One Heart at
a Time, about his work with sick children in Iraq, one of the Best
Books of 2013. The first Friday of
September (9/5/14) we will be the first bookstore to officially launch the new paperback
edition of Preemptive Love with a guest appearance by the author himself.

The historic sanctuary of First Presbyterian Church in
downtown York is a perfect venue to host Mr. Courtney and his family, whose work in Iraq invites
racial and ethnic reconciliation by way of collaborating in the dramatic effort
to do much-needed pediatric heart surgeries. A binding 1967 document of the
Presbyterian Church (USA), called a “confession,” insists that peacemaking is part of the high calling
of followers of Christ, and First Presbyterian has long attempted to serve as
agents of reconciliation. In the tense days of race riots in York, First
Presbyterian merged with Faith Presbyterian, bringing together as a signpost of
inter-racial unity a primarily black church and a primarily white one. In the hot heat of the 1980s Cold War,
FPC hosted meetings of the nuclear freeze campaign, insisting that treaties for
bi-lateral disarmament were necessary and in keeping with a faithful politics. We hosted Russian clerics in a time when
that was not popular (indeed, an international religious service was picketed
by out-of-town hawks.) Drawing on our Confession of 1967, we use the word “reconciliation” a lot.

Like most
churches, the congregation has developed partnerships with ministries in other
lands, even sent our own health care teams overseas. We’ve hosted classes on peacemaking, understanding Islam, explored racial
concerns, and have taken other initiatives to explore how the gospel leads to
wise and fruitful relationship-building for the common good.

Ahh, but none of us have done the sort of audacious ministry
as has Mr. Courtney, whose work has earned him an Islamic fatwa, or death threat, and has landed him in foreign jails.  

Why?  

By helping Arab kids get life-saving heart surgery in Israel,
where they met, perhaps for the first time, real Jews, who showed themselves to
be kind and good. As Mr. Courtney
explains in his book, Preemptive Love: Pursing Peace One Heart at a Time, these medical miracles did just what the religious
extremists who opposed them feared: kids and their families learned to love
their enemies!  The standard-fare
demonization of enemies can’t stand when it is undermined by preemptive love.

Courtney’s PLC organization experienced further obstacles and agony in helping save
lives of countless children in the Kurdish region of Iraq when it became clear
that the only hospital in the region able to serve them was in Turkey
(interestingly, a Johns Hopkins affiliate.) Those who know the anguish of the people of Kurdistan know
that the Turks have committed their own genocide against them and have repressed
them for centuries. Can love win
in the effort to overcome such long-standing mistrust and animosity? Can a legacy of violence and abuse be
overturned? 

Courtney thinks that
the power of love can do what our bombs cannot: by building trust, families and
village can be transformed.

Of the children his Preemptive Love Coalition has served and
whose lives were saved by multi-ethnic, inter-faith cooperation, he says “they will
carry the scars on their chests into law school and parliament and tell a new
story of a new Iraq…” 

Perhaps we, too, can play a part, telling a new story, even here.

* * *

Medical missions are always complicated in the developing
world when infrastructure is problematic, funds lacking, and procedures
untried. When the needs include pediatric heart surgery, in a war zone, amongst
people groups who are hostile to Western ideals, the mission is extraordinarily
fraught.  And yet, this young Texan
continues to believe that love can overcome the worst of odds. He has been betrayed and threatened,
and yet, his Preemptive Love Coalition is finding success.  As he quickly says, he and his wife and
teammates have been shown hospitality and grace by new Iraqi friends and global
colleagues. Together, they are
learning to do the heart-mending operations in Iraq, building local capacities
and infrastructure. The backlog of kids needing heart surgery is immense (Iraq
has one of the highest amounts of childhood heart defects in the world, apparently thanks
to the enhanced radiation warheads used in the first Gulf War and the horrific gassing
of the Kurds by the brutal “Chemical Allie” serving the dictator Saddam
Hussein.)  And they are doing
something about it, in trainings they call The Remedy.

The war, the embargo, the limited worldviews, the radiation
and the poison gas have all conspired to create one of the most urgent health
crises in the world. Jeremy
Courtney has become a hero in the efforts helping to end the backlog of kids
awaiting life-saving surgery. 
While some still threaten him and his team, many more are joining the
Coalition, coming to believe that their motto —  “Love first, ask questions later” — is not only the need in
Iraq, but perhaps, a way into a new way of life for us all.

SEPTEMBER 5, 2014

You are invited to hear Mr. Courtney as he talks about his
book Preemptive
Love and his organization, The Preemptive Love Coalition, September 5^th
at 7:00 pm at First Presbyterian Church at the corner of Queen & Market in
York.  There will be a reception
afterword, with light (Middle Eastern) refreshments and a time for autographing books. There is free
parking behind the church. 

The LA Times said,
“this is the best news to come out of Iraq in a long time.” 

We can experience it right here in
Central PA.

WE CAN SHIP AUTOGRAPHED BOOKS

If you want an autographed copy of the book, we may be able to get you one.  Just tell us if you want the hardback or paperback, and to whom you want it inscribed. If we have books left over Friday night, we’ll get one for you, and ship it, happily.   Use the link to the order form, shown below, or give us a call. As they might say in Arabic speaking Iraq:  Shukran Jazeelan

BookNotes

                   Hearts & Minds 234 East Main Street  Dallastown, PA  17313     717-246-3333

I just love hearing stories of how churches have special liturgies or ceremonies to honor people’s work lives.  Of course, some do this during the Labor Day season; more than once I’ve helped organize litanies as people brought to the front of the church items from their workplace. 

The great new book that I mentioned last week, A Moveable Feast: Worship for the Other Six Days (ImaginationPlus; $12.00) by our friend Terry Timm, offers a whimsical, smart, and inspiring theology of worship that realizes and develops the inherent relationship between corporate Sunday worship and our various offices and tasks to which we are called on weekdays. (In fact, there is a wonderful appendix that offers an entire service around the themes of work, with worship aids, prayers and litanies and such.) It might be worthwhile Labor Day meditation for some of you.

Mainline denominational churches, it seems, were hot on this topic twenty or thirty years ago (with good books by standard denominational publishers.) Now, evangelicals have been the most thoughtful and — to use the overused word  — robust in promoting a uniquely Christian view of work, based on a mature theology of calling and vocation, drawing on themes such as common grace, public faith, the renewal of institutions, the dignity of labor, and the common good. From Os Guinness’ seminal and still essential, eloquent volume The Call: Finding and Fulfilling Your Life’s Purpose (Thomas Nelson; $17.99) to the exceptionally insightful book co-written by Timothy Keller and Katherine Leary Alsdorf, Every Good Endeavor: Connecting Your Work to God’s Work (Dutton; $16.00), we have seen in the last decade or so a remarkable consensus of the importance of themes of calling and vocation, leading to intentional reflection on the meaning of labor and the spiritual practices needed to be faithful and fruitful in the work-world.

I have written here about why all this is so vital and exciting for us (check out that live James Taylor video doing “Millworker” this Labor Day!) Here is a piece I wrote about this topic, inspired after a forum on faith & work here in our area with Steve Garber. Here is a piece I wrote after one of the Redeemer Presbyterian Center for Faith & Work annual conference. (I hope you find the rumination and reviews helpful, but the special sale announced there is over.)

Here is a large bibliography on vocation and work that I did a few years ago which some have found helpful. It is one of the most-visted pages at our website, I gather.

Through many, many of these conversations and in the development of new ministries, non-profits, think-tanks and publications from coast to coast, there has been one person, our good friend Steve Garber, author of Visions of Vocation: Common Grace for the Common Good (IVP; $16.00; our sale price = $12.80.) 

Steve has encouraged city-wide organizations helping professionals think and serve faithfully in their varied professions, and has helped seminaries develop curriculum to equip pastors to think about their priestly work among workers. I have written before how he has been influential in my own life,and my small connection to his earlier book.  He has been influential, and especially among our friends in Pittsburgh who run the Jubilee conference for college students. I know there are other strategic leaders and authors, but Steve has nurtured relationships and conversations around themes of caring for God’s world, taking up our places in various spheres and careers, that have been transformative and consequential. He has been showing up behind the scenes in church basements and coffee shops, workshop rooms, or retreat center spaces for years, inviting people to deeper discipleship, thoughtful, relevant orthodoxy, and an “all of life redeemed” sort of wholistic Kingdom vision.

Garber’s reputation as a mature thinker, eloquent speaker and author, and a caring friend and teacher grew nation-wide after the publication of his much-acclaimed book about the years beyond higher education called The Fabric of Faithfulnness: Weaving Together Believe and Behavior (IVP; $17.00; our sale price = $13.60) In that book he uses pop culture and heady philosophers and cultural critics to ask the huge questions of those trying to figure out the meaning of their lives: what does it mean to know something, and how can I keep on, with Christian convictions lived out with character and integrity, in community with friends. I has been very positively reviewed and is esteemed by very reliable authors and leaders. The new Visions of Vocation book has echoes of similiar themes, and in some ways it is a sequel. Yet, it seems more accessible, and will surely attract a broader audience. I think VoV is a good place to start if you haven’t worked through FoF.

So, again, this new book — which we helped launch into the world at Jubilee in February — is called Visions of Vocation: Common Grace for the Common Good. I had the great privilege of reading an early manuscript and so knew how very good the book was before it was released. We confidently announced as we took pre-orders last winter that it would doubtlessly be the 2014 “Book of the Year” and I have no reason, now more than a half a year later, to back down from that big claim. There are some fantastic books that have come out this year, but this truly is the most eloquent, wise, interesting, stimulating, and valuable book I’ve read in years. It surely will be the Hearts & Minds Book of the Year.

VoV speaks volumes of Steve’s long obedience in the same direction as he pursues his own calling to be a raconteur and traveling professor and friend to many, helping folks “weave together believe and behavior” as they consider their own tasks and callings and places to serve.

You know that famous Buechner quote about our vocations being that place where “your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet”? Garber agrees, it seems, that “neither the hair shirt nor the soft berth will do” and he helps people explore that, day by day by day and although he doesn’t say so, Visions of Vocation could be seen as an extended mediation on that potent quote.

I could ramble for way too long about the merits of this exceptional book, or citing the rave, rave views on the cover and inside pages (wow!)  but instead I will be relatively focused, naming four things I like about it, things that I think will benefit you as a serious reader. 

THE FIRST REASON

If you are familiar with the language we often use here — the integration of faith and learning, a wholistic Kingdom vision, the unfolding story of God’s redeeming work in the world, taking faith into public life — you will know that Garber’s worldview and vision are consistent with (in fact has helped shape) our perspective here. I hope you know I am sincere when I say that if you appreciate our work at the bookstore, our curating of books at events, and these BookNotes reviews, you should get this book!

That is the first thing. Steve, without using much of the breathy rhetoric and lingo to which I so often resort, stands in the tradition(s) that have helped evangelicals learn to speak so passionately about cultural engagement, social change, and a long-term vision of living with integrity “in the world but not of it.” He reads Kuyper, Al Wolters, N.T. Wright, writes for Comment magazine, The High Calling blog and more. Steve is humble, increasingly an older, capable friend to rising leaders, trusted because he himself has been guided by some of the best evangelical leaders of the previous generation, those that have held together solid theology, deep piety and prayer, and a non-partisan, sensible, radical Christian view of life and times. From Francis Schaeffer and Os Guinness to J.I. Packer and John Stott, Steve has been informed by lasting friendships with important leaders.

And, he reads widely, carefully, delightfully, even, awed, often, by good lines from Dickens and Marx, Walker Percy and Camus, Chaim Potok and Wendell Berry, the contemporary novels of Thomas Wolfe and classics like Victor Hugo and, always, the poetry of Steve Turner. For those who want to know these things, he often cites Church of South India missionary Leslie Newbigin and Jewish Biblical scholar Abraham Heschel. I love a guy who quotes Dutch Calvinist Geerhardus Vos and the famous British Archbishop Rowan Williams, the Lutheran intellectual Jean Bethke Elshtain and the poetry of Madeline L’Engle.

So, Garber gets it. God cares about all of life, we must move from thinking about worldviews to embodying restorative ways of life, and we do that over a lifetime of being shaped by worship and Word, reading and talking, slowly and carefully, drinking deeply from the deepest wells, renewed so that we can be the people God calls us to be in this creation being restored.

SECONDLY

Secondly, not only does Steve’s book call us to this wide-as-life, creation-regained worldview that pushes us to discern our vocations and callings and take up our places in the work God gives us to do, but he does this heavy lifting with eloquence and real tenderness.  He is an excellent writer, knowing how to develop a theme with quotes and stories, Scripture and song, drawing on older authors and the latest sociology, pacing things just so with some sophisticated analysis and some charming prose.

For those who just love a good book, this quite simply is one of the best.

There are many books these days written with whimsy and upbeat energy. These are cool and fun and commendable, especially for younger readers or those who need the hip banter and jokes to keep their interest. But these titles and their authors, I’m afraid, will not last, and will not guide us very deeply, not for a lifetime. On the other hand, I hardly have to say that dense, stodgy works that are dusty and dry don’t help many of us very much, either.  

Garber strikes a balance, with his gifted style, his deep knowledge, his mature guidance, and his very stimulating stories, richly told. He delightfully cites movies, mentions meetings with pop icons and rock stars. U2, Mumford & Sons, Dave Matthews Band, are quoted. He exegetes poems and rock songs and films, always offering exceptional insight, gifted as he is at doing these things. He doesn’t just cite a star so he can seem hip to a demographic, or because some editor asked him to lighten up. Steve is one of the most naturally gifted discerners of popular culture who can speak with profundity and intellectual acumen, keeping a foot properly planted in what some call the real world. 

So that’s the second thing: he not only gets the big picture of the Biblically-saturated mind and the way toward a reformingly Christian perspective, he writes really well, striking a rare balance between serious insight and great stories. I truly believe this to be one of the best written non-fiction books of applied theology I’ve seen in a long while. I know that Steve poured his heart into this manuscript for years and years, not rushing to complete it, letting his life and words simmer so they sounded out truth truly and nicely.

THIRD: A MAJOR THEME

Thirdly, besides the perspective and the prose: I think this book strikes an amazing tone of joy and sorrow, of idealism and realism, of honesty and hope. Books like this are all too rare. Many religious books are glib, happy-clappy, or superficial in their positivity. (There are also those that are so harsh and hard that, while beneficial, can be almost too somber or angry, creating agitation in the reader, not wisdom and hope.) So the third strength of this book is how it handles the hard stuff of our lives and our world.

Actually, this is a major theme of Visions of Vocation. That is, it is not just another rumination on the doctrine of calling or the joy of a purpose driven life or a rousing call to make a difference. It isn’t mostly about labor and the work-world, even though that is a large part of the consulting and teaching he does through his remarkable Washington Institute on Faith, Vocation and Culture. If it has “vocation” in the title, but isn’t a book mostly about callings and careers, exactly, what then does he mean by the title?

I think it is mostly this: we are, indeed, called by a covenant-making God who initiates redemptive work in our lives, recruiting us for God’s own purposes in the world. That invitation — that call to us — comes with a large consequence: like Jesus, the incarnate One who models this very calling to serve God, to pray and live “thy Kingdom come, on Earth,” we are called to behold the world, and realize its deep sorrow. This is our vocation: to care for the world as God does, to love, to take upon ourselves some of the aches of our time. If we are not to grow jaded or cynical or apathetic or pessimistic, we will simply have to figure out how to love well despite disappointment. Although not a cheap “self help” book,VoV will help you do that. 

I recall years ago, in a story that is hinted at inVoV, Steve shared how when he and his wife were first married, and she got to know him more intimately, privately, learning of his deepest flaws and foibles, he wondered if, knowing who he really is, could she continue to love him. That is a very fundamental question for us all, isn’t it?  Once we are known, we wonder if people will still love us as much as they did before they saw us as the broken, stupid sinners that we are.  And what kind of a person can do that?

And so it goes, as we are called to care about the world, to serve God in the world, to be Christ’s agents of change in the culture, to take up our own place in the choir, even as we find out that it isn’t as easy as we thought. It is messy. Change the world? I can hardly change my attitude. Make a difference in politics or business or media or medicine? I can hardly make a difference in my own skin or my own family. It’s a bumpy ride, this journey to live well in a screwy world, and Garber thinks we need a strong and lasting sense of vocation to withstand the tendencies to grow cold, to care less, to give up. We need to internalize deep and solid and fruitful visions of vocation, knowing just what we are called to do and be. 

So, this book, unlike almost any other, gets us to think about what we most care about, how we choose to live, in light of various images and ideas about our calling into the world. Can we know the world, and still care?  Can we care and not burn out? Can our relationship with the rabbi Jesus help us shed tears like He did, to flare up in righteous anger as He did, in holiness and mercy, to reach out and heal hurts, in some way, as he did? Can we be Christ-like image-bearers even in our public lives, in the spheres of influence where we spend our dollars and our days?

As Steve asks, more than once in this profound book, knowing what I know, what will I do?

That question really is the heart of the book.

I mentioned that he tells good stories, and that they aren’t cheap little inspirational nuggets gathered from some writer’s anthology of neat illustrations. Steve walks alongside people — medical researchers stationed in Africa, movies stars stationed in LA, college students stationed in Ivy Leagues colleges, mothers pondering the art and vocation of caring for families — and the stories he tells of them are inspiring and, frankly, somehow extraordinarily meaningful. He has a way of underscoring and illuminating the dignity and meaning of the struggles of these brave folks to serve God where they are, even in their own brokenness. I cannot put my finger on it, but Garber sees into the holy reality of these friends of his, and tells their stories in ways that capture dignity and purpose.

From his pals in Jars of Clay (and their Blood:Water Mission) to his friend Hans who started an environmentally-sensitive burger chain using organic ingredients and grass-fed cattle to a Korean friend who works at the World Bank to a Lawrence, Kansas, carpenter guy, a former student of his who now owns his own small construction business, rebuilding homes with integrity, stories are shared as examples of people who are intentional about their live’s callings and the fidelity needed in that arena or responsibility. In each case, these folks have stepped into a way of doing their work that starts with deep knowing. He describes one as a person with “a seriousness about things that matter and a softness of heart.”

One story he briefly tells is of a school teacher who struggled with the deep implications for education found in C.S. Lewis’ The Abolition of Man. Another is of a white South African, now in the states, who tells of his journey towards political action for public justice by his regular reading of the Psalms; yet another friend he tells us about is an Anglican priest who is recasting his vision of ministry, learning to be a pastor to people who take their work and public life seriously. Another couple has a gift of hospitality, serving good wine with good laughter among friends and guests. 

Of them, Steve writes, “People who keep at their callings for a lifetime are always people who suffer. The world is too hard and life too broken for it to be otherwise. And that is true for Deirdre and Claudius.” After describing some of their illnesses and surgeries and hardships, Garber continues, “But they live with gladness and singleness of heart, which at the end of the day is the best that any of us can do.”

As he reflects on this couple and the witness of their lives, he writes,

Their life for others is a window into the meaning of common grace for the common good. From the hospitality of their table to the way they live in their neighborhood to the work that is theirs in the worlds of law and psychology, they have chosen vocations that give coherence, making sense of what they believe about God and the human condition, and have unfolded habits of heart that are a grace to the watching world.

FOURTH: BEING A GRACE FOR THE WORLD

I suppose this captures the fourth reason I think Visions of Vocation: Common Grace for the Common Good is such a stellar book, a wise gift to us all, a work well worth reading. It offers an exceptional idea, really: that the Christian life is to be offered for the watching world, as a grace, as he puts it. It may not come as a surprise that Garber has been influential among those who made the popular For the Life of the World DVDs that I have raved about here. The title of that video series is an answer to the question “What is our salvation for?” Interesting, isn’t it?

“A grace for the watching world”, he says. 

I know there is much written these days about a gospel-centered life, about the doctrine of grace, both as it helps us understand the work of Christ’s cross (for our justification and sanctification) and as a style of nonjudgmental living, a gracious shift away from legalism. Yes, yes, we need gospel-drenched teachings. But Garber talks also about what some call “common grace” which is to say that God (in patience and mercy) upholds the creation for all creatures under the sun, and all of life somehow can point us towards the truth of the God who is there, and the sustainable abundance of life as it was meant to be. We can happily live in the real world, spending our ordinary days, in our ordinary occupations, knowing of God’s presence we can offer grace to a needy world. Perhaps our gift will be mundane; in our day to day we will learn to incarnate goodness, showing forth lives that embody meaning. In other words, living well for the sake of the world, because of God, makes sense, unfolds the meaning of our days. I think that may be close to what Garber means by a call to coherence — to craft lives that makes sense because the gospel is true. 

We take up our human calling to care and we find ourselves complicit and responsible; therein lies the beauty and the joy. We can, in Christ’s power, take steps to reverse the curse, to live for better things, to actually do what we know. Words can become flesh. 

Garber writes,

The Hebrew vision that echoes across the centuries through culture offers a different way to be human, where knowing becomes doing. And the Christian vision incarnates this conviction, telling the story of the Word become flesh, and of words becoming flesh in and through our vocations.  This vision calls us to know and to care about what we know; in fact to love what we know. And, strange grace that it is, it becomes possible to know without becoming disillusioned, to know the worst and to still love – not only people, but the world in which we live. We will never do that perfectly, only proximately, at our very best. But in this now-but-not-yet- moment in history, that is enough.

Here, then, a quick summary. 

FOUR GOOD REASONS TO BUY Visions of Vocation: Common Grace for the Common Good. And we have it at 20% off, too, a reason I hardly need to mention.

1.   1.    It is one more very good example of a growing body of literature about cultural engagement, about serving God in the world, especially in our work, and this big picture of how to imagine the Kingdom coming — moving from worldview to way of life — is timely, important, and offers insights into the best way to live out daily discipleship. If you like books about a Christian worldview (and I hope you do!) this is great. If, however, you don’t resonant with that word, this book is really great — I don’t recall that he uses the W word at all. Steve’s ecumenical, orthodox vision is broad and important, a transforming vision.

2.     2.  Visions of Vocation is very well written, eloquent and inspiring, without being cheap or glib. The stories are well-told, offering important clues into lives well-lived, but aren’t so dramatic or historic that we cannot relate. This is a beautifully-crafted book, profound and realistic, even as it is written with a seriousness of vision and an exceptional command of language. The sentences are good, the paragraphs and pages sometimes sublime. One reviewer said “love and vulnerability exudes from every page.” I think the artful cover even hints at this: this is a beautifully-done book to own and to share.

3.     3.  The heart of VoV, like FoF before it, is profound and vital, and something we just don’t hear much: not only are we invited to be agents of Kingdom transformation, serving Christ in all areas of life, but to do this will inevitably cause us to suffer. In fact, the deepest meaning of our human-ness is to know how to be responsible in a complex, broken world. Can we love well, even knowing what we know? Will we resist the tendency to sell out, burn out, or to grow cynical or apathetic? I predict that 20 years from now, some people will report that the reading of this book was one thing that helped them keep the faith, in part because it was honest about the human condition and the state of the world. To say it is realistic about our pain and the agonies of the world is a deep, good thing, and sets it apart, even making it urgent.

4.    Visions… points us to coherence, to a meaningful life that makes sense, a way of being that is sane and good and full of faith, hope and love. That is, it is an uncommon grace to us; God will use it to inspire you as you realize how you serve the common good. As you care about the world you will thereby find ultimate meaning: loving God and loving neighbor. Put simply, I am sure this rich book will help you discover a depth of meaning and significant coherence to the story of your life and will help you flourish, yes, for the sake of the world.

BookNotes

                   Hearts & Minds 234 East Main Street  Dallastown, PA  17313     717-246-3333

Over the years, we have hosted some famous people and
important authors here at the shop, or in partnership with nearby
churches.  We are always a bit
surprised, if truth be told, that folks of the renown of Jim Wallis, Os
Guinness, Ruth Haley Barton, David Kinnaman, Lauren Winner, Andy Crouch, Margot
Starbuck, or Tom Wright would show up here with us in south-central Pennsylvania.
We are always honored and grateful; it is a real encouragement to Beth and me
and our staff when writers visit. Of course it helps book sales when an
important author appears (which, for a struggling indie shop like ours, is
sorely needed.) Best of all, it is a delight for our customers.

For instance,
we know it will be a fantastic time for fans when we host novelist Beverly
Lewis on September 11, 2014 to sign her brand new Amish tale, The River.

My heart is especially full, though, as we prepare for what
feels like the most important event we’ve ever done, hosting a young author (on Friday, September 5th) that
has accomplished more in the last decade than most people have in a lifetime and
who has written a spectacularly thrilling book about it. 

Preemptive
Love: Pursuing Peace One Heart at a Time (Howard Books) $24.00 hardback; $15.00 paperback both editions include full-color pictures.

Jeremy Courtney is the author of Preemptive
Love: Pursuing Peace One Heart at a Time and founder of the Preemptive
Love Coalition. Both in his book and in person he has a way of bringing together important concerns of ours —
peace-making, multi-culturalism, global justice, interfaith dialogue, gospel-centered
nonviolence, Christian mission — in an accessible way as he tells the story of
his advocacy for sick children in war-torn Iraq. The “one heart at a time”
subtitle alludes to his work arranging pediatric heart surgery for children in
Iraq, but is also a large, large metaphor.

Jeremy and his wife Jessica are
people who are often guided by their hearts, their big hearts, and the book,
laden with political history and medical facts and edge-of-your-seat drama as
critical and controversial surgeries are done in dangerous locations such as
Kurdistan and Fallujah, Mosul and Kirkuk (the legendary burial site of the biblical Daniel) nevertheless uses beautifully a true language of the heart. They are
self-aware and honest about their deepest longings, their dreams, their faith,
their foibles and fears; they live out their desire to trust others, to do what
they think is right, and live out that line from Bill Mallonee’s song about
Vincent van Gogh, “sew your heart on to your sleeve and let the chips
fall.” 

And let the chips fall, they do. Preemptive Love tells the
amazing story of the consequences of “loving first and asking questions later.”
It is a way of life that is inspiring, even probing, for any
reader who longs to live with integrity — do you trust God, put the needs of others first, hedge your bets, hold grudges, maneuver for power, shade the
truth, live in fear, failing to heed the hints of the Spirit?  Although this book tells the tales of
stuff most of us will never experience, the confessional nature, about their
experiences exploring the efficacy of love, applies to us all.

Can love win,
after all?

This way of life, being intentional about being open to God
and grace, living in mercy and love, is also a way of life that leads to adventure, if
not some serious trouble. In their
desire to save the lives of kids with heart disease — Iraq has one of the highest
amounts of pediatric heart disease anywhere in the world! — they have to navigate
broken medical systems, deal with the results of bombings and embargoes (and the subsequent damage to
literal infrastructure and on the communal psyche of many people groups) not to
mention religious bigotry and fears. They face down donors that will give money to help “Arabs only” or “Kurds only.” They tried to build trust with fearful Iraqi
parents who have been convinced by certain mullahs that working with the
Preemptive Love Coalition and allowing Israeli doctors to help them is just a plot
to bring harm and dishonor. Alas, on the other side of the country, they’ve
faced parents whose religious leaders similarly forbid them, proud Kurds, to
send their children with the Coalition to hospitals in the land of their former
brutal enemies, the Turks.

Every chapter has its own drama, and it deepens and grows
more complex as the story unfolds. We eventually learn that Jeremy and Jessica
have been under surveillance — the betrayal that led to their offices and home
and bedroom being bugged is as stunning as anything you’d read in a spy novel —
and when radical Islamists issued a fatwa
(death threat) against their team (and anyone who cooperated with them)
they knew they had to evaluate if this medical mission was worth the dangers. 

Few of us have faced such challenges in our own efforts and
ministries, naturally.  But we can
learn much from these kinds of stories, and it is spectacular to hear of meetings
with sheikhs and imams and mullahs, of sharing the gospel of peace with angry
tribal leaders and offering hope to Turkmen, Yazidis, Muslims, Christians and
Jews alike. The book describes vivid internal organizational debates among the small, young staff of the
Preemptive Love Coalition about all kids or remarkable matters.  Should they serve the children of known terrorists, what
expenses might be spared (or justified) as they triage the backlog of tens of
thousands of needed surgeries. They nearly exhaust themselves trying hard
to be fair, learning how to be wise and just in such perplexing,
anguishing situations, with literal lives at stake.

(Like most places in the
world, those with money and power seem to be able to get themselves to the
front of waiting lines, pushing their own agendas and demands; when this is
combined with ethnic and religious hostilities, you can see that Jeremy and his
team were literally in the middle of life and death situations, sometimes
connected to significant back-stories of infamous people, with cultural/political
ramifications.) The ethical dilemmas and emotional tensions faced almost every
day among their teams makes for a gripping read. 

I couldn’t be more glad that we named Preemptive Love one of
our Hearts & Minds “Best Books of 2013” and am confident that you will
thoroughly enjoy reading it if you haven’t yet.

CHAI, COFEE, and KLASH,

It is fun, too, to read about the feasts and meals, complete with local
coffees, chai teas and other regional delicacies. What
a culture that can be so hospitable and relational, full of gift-giving,
charitable customs, and tangy food: eggplant and olives and humus and roasted
lamb and sometimes tobacco. The book tells of all sorts of celebrations as they hold
meetings and share long conversations about God and peace and hope
and almost always the growing crisis of a particular sick baby or handicapped child. (And how weird it is, reading about being with sheikhs and clerics
embracing Jeremy with kisses and hand-holding — “Brother Jeremy, you are a true
man of God!” — only to realize that some of these same new friends are also in
league with people who want to kill him.) 
Again, this book is fascinating to read as we learn about Kurdish klash shoes and fenjan cups of Arab coffee and jamming with the three-stringed
Persian tar. What fun!

And yet, let us be clear: Preemptive Love is a book
mostly about following God’s leading to be agents of healing and transformation,
reversing centuries of hatred and mistrust by providing life-saving medical
health to dying Iraqi children and showing gracious love to all.

The back-stories and description of
these surgeries — the drama of Arab families trusting Israeli doctors, of
Kurdish families submitting to the help of doctors in Turkey (from the region
that had committed genocide against them), of cooperating with all manner of
governmental agencies and mid-level autocrats and diplomatic rules, fighting
for money and visas and permits, always against the ticking clock of failing hearts — are
surprisingly moving. This
narrative is very well-written, with colorful language and vivid storytelling.
The pacing is just right as the book moves from the medical details of a
certain heart procedure to a father of a dying child bringing a bomb into
Jeremy’s office, from the struggle to procure funding for this or that child’s
surgery to the politics and drama of families learning to trust, to forgive, to
love, even after serious conflict or missteps.

For instance, read this account of a surprising move by an
important sheikh whose own baby was dying:

We made haste to get Hussein’s gutsy initiative to send baby
Noor to surgery under way. A group from Baghdad helped with logistics; a church
in South Carolina gave generously. The day of her departure, we spoke one last
time with her family by phone. Sheikh Hussein was intoning words of comfort in
Arabic as they sat in the airport waiting for their flight to take them out of
the country; they would be the first in the history of their entire family to
leave Iraq. I’m certain the sheikh’s smile was felt as much as it was heard on
the receiving end of the line. Suddenly, he said, “Okay, one second…,” as he
passed the phone to me.

Putting the phone to my ear in the home of this cleric where
I had never seen a woman, I felt like I was breaking some taboo as I heard
Noor’s mother on the other end whispering something to the person beside her in
Arabic. Turning her face back to the mouthpiece, she took a leap across the
Great Gulf of Language in an effort to get to me and convey her gratitude:

“Mister… my child,” she said haltingly, “good… is good. You
save my child.”

Her daughter’s name, Noor, means “light,” and is often
construed to mean “God’s light” or “light that guides.” And here she was this fifteen
month-old little baby girl in the Baghdad airport, illuminating the way into a
future where God’s light, unlike all the other luminaries by which we live,
does not cast a dark shadow across our ethnicity, geography, of history. Light
was driving back darkness. The obviousness of it all only made it more
profound, as though someone has planned it that way so we would all get the
message.

I handed the phone back to Sheikh Hussein, where he received
a final barrage of blessings for the both of us and hung up, fearful of what
still lay ahead, but overjoyed that we had risked it and taken the plunge
together. With the fatwa still looming in the distance, it seemed like the
history of a people hanged in the balance.

And who’s to say it didn’t? How many hearts were really
healed that day?

LOVE, ALWAYS

What does it mean to be loving in all things, to be merciful
and just and decent, even to one’s own enemies? Should you, for instance, re-hire a
staff person who have betrayed you? Should you confront someone you think is lying to
you, or give them the benefit of the doubt, if even to allow him or her to save
face? He only once quotes the classic spiritual book The
Imitation of Christ, but we gather that this is an extraordinary life
experiment in being formed in the ways of Jesus.

But yet, Courtney is quick to point out that this is not the story
of a do-gooder Westerner helping backward, hostile Arabs. In fact, he reminds readers of “the countless times in this story in
which Iraqis acted first, offering protection, intervening, or taking a risk to
welcome us in, even though we were often cast as their enemies.”

Such experiences have given Jeremy opportunities to learn much, and we will be better for having read his story. What does it take to tell a poor peasant mother that her
first born has died on the operating table? (Indeed, what does a young
Christian idealist like Jeremy know about repatriating the body of a child
who did not survive surgery back to a proper Muslim funeral, from a plane out of Turkey
to a pick-up truck heading to a desert village?) And how does all of this
effect the marriage (and parenting) of this young Christian couple, once from
Texas, now far away from family and friends and church?  Preemptive Love, we come to realize, is
not just a strategy for peacemaking in a war-torn society or the ethic for a
medical mission, it is also the way of life for couples and children, offering
counter-intuitive wisdom for friendship and fundraising.

Is it possible that preemptive love wins in this broken world, full of broken people like the
unlikely cast of characters in this amazing book?  Among people like you and me?  Can we actually step into a faraway country (as Jeremy
sometimes calls the beloved community of the reign of God)?  If so, this book and its witness of
healing hearts will surely help show us the way.

So, yes, this fascinating, page-turning book, so full of
edge-of-your-seat, page-turning drama, upbeat stories, intrigue and glory and
tragedy and insight, informative politics and gospel truth, is a winner.  The paperback is due out any day now, and
we are the first bookstore to help Jeremy launch it.

We are honored to sponsor this event and not unaware of the
gravitas of the moment; as Iraq explodes and the world watches in horror, we
are grateful for the opportunity to host a conversation with Jeremy and
Jessica, home for a bit as they make new contacts, raise money and
promote their hope that preemptive love is the way of the future.

Does all of this make a lasting difference, besides the obvious
difference in the lives of the kids and their families who are healed?  I love the last line of this paragraph,
written about Arab families who, against religious and political pressures,
allowed the Coalition to arrange surgery for their kids by traveling to Israel.

Thankfully, four of the families had the courage to stand
their ground in the face of intimidation and moved forward with their scheduled
surgeries in Israel. Like those who had gone before them, they found the
doctors and nurses and social workers in Israel to be wonderful people who were
full of kindness and love, absolutely nothing like the horror stories they had
heard. The mullah’s nightmare – and that of his friends in parliament – had
just come true: of these thousands of
children whose lives we would save, some would one day carry the scars on their
chest to law school and on to parliament, where a new story of preemptive love
would be told to the people of Iraq which would turn over a new page with the
people of Israel.

SEPTEMBER 5, 2014 at FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, YORK PA

If you are able, please join us for a public lecture, “Just
in from Iraq: An Evening with Author and Activist Jeremy Courtney” at First
Presbyterian Church, 225 East Market Street, York, PA at 7:00 PM.  There’s free parking in a lot behind the church, which is in downtown York.  After his presentation, there will be
time for questions, healthy discussion, and a reception (with some appropriate
refreshments, although we won’t sit on the floor or smoke hookah.)  Who knows, maybe even some music. Preemptive
Love books will be available for purchase in hardback or paperback, and
Jeremy will gladly autograph copies. 
We think it will be a splendid, informative and encouraging
evening.

Please help us spread the
word — if you know anyone anywhere near central Pennsylvania, this will be an
amazing opportunity.

If you are unable to attend and want us to get an
autographed copy of the book, just let us know. Tell us if you want hardback or paperback, and to whom it should be inscribed and we will try
our best to make it happen. It
will be a very full night, and we trust we will have copies left available for this, but customers present with us there will naturally get first dibs.

 * * *

Enjoy this short excerpt, from the closing pages of Preemptive Love: Pursuing Peace One Heart at a Time

Where you are sitting in the world as you finish this story
may influence how you interpret my idea of preemptive love. If you are in the
States, you may think first in terms of American kindness toward enemy Iraqis.
If you are in Iraq, however, you may be more quick to see the countless times
in this story in which Iraqis acted first, offering protection, intervening, or
taking a risk to welcome us in, even though we were often cast as their
enemies. The truth is, preemptive love does not begin in the heart of humanity.
Neither Americans or Iraqis are inherently better at loving first than the
other. We are all tribal, programmed to protect our own,

Instead, preemptive love originates in the heart of God. The
one who made the universe and holds everything in it – the one to whom Muslims,
Christians, and Jews are all ostensibly pointing – is the first and the last
enemy lover. And in the end, it is not our love that overcomes hate at all.  It is God’s…  Preemptive Love is who God is…

What Jess and I learned in that broken-down neighborhood so
many years ago is still true today: we don’t need power to live in peace.
Because even though fear, hatred, and violence conspire to unmake the world,
preemptive love unmakes violence. Preemptive love fulfills the fears of
fundamentalist fatwas, making children love their enemies. And preemptive love
overcomes fear.

And before all is said and done, the far country is the
near-and-now country for all who enter the marathon, lean on love, and make it
to the finish line.

BookNotes

                   Hearts & Minds 234 East Main Street  Dallastown, PA  17313     717-246-3333

I don’t usually just swipe other blogs for our BookNotes
reviews, but, as they say, there’s a first time for everything.  I found
these descriptions of these brand new editions of older Tom Wright books in an Eerdmans Publishing blog to be very helpful. And so, he says a bit sheepishly…