Month: October 2014

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Review of ‘Anxious: Choosing Faith in a World of Worry’ by Amy Simpson

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 Amy Simpson, Anxious: Choosing Faith in a World of Worry (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Books, 2014). Paperback / Kindle Tune in to the evening news, and you are likely to hear stories that cause fear and anxiety to well up within you. America’s struggling economy, the Ebola pandemic, radical Islamic terrorism. Or perhaps you don’t watch the evening news but still find yourself anxious about your spouse, your children, your job, your life. Then you read Amy Simpson’s new book. It says: “a lifestyle of worry is incompatible with a life of faith.” And you think to yourself, Is this … Continue reading Review of ‘Anxious: Choosing Faith in a World of Worry’ by Amy Simpson

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Review of ‘Know the Creeds and Councils’ by Justin L. Holcomb

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 Justin S. Holcomb, Know the Creeds and Councils (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2014). Paperback / Kindle Know the Creeds and Councils by Justin L. Holcomb “aims to provide an accessible overview of the main creeds, confessions, catechisms, and councils of Christian history.” In this, he mainly succeeds, giving chapter length-treatments of the Apostles’, Nicene, and Athanasian creeds; the councils of Nicea, Ephesus, Chalcedon, Constantinople, Carthage, and Orange; and the Council of Trent and Second Vatican Council (for Catholicism) and the Heidelberg Catechism, Thirty-nine Articles, and Westminster Confession of Faith (for Protestantism). His choices regarding what to include and exclude will … Continue reading Review of ‘Know the Creeds and Councils’ by Justin L. Holcomb

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Review of ‘A Complete Handbook of Literary Forms in the Bible’ by Leland Ryken

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 Leland Ryken, A Complete Handbook of Literary Forms in the Bible (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2014). Paperback / Kindle In the introduction to this marvelous little book, Leland Ryken makes a distinction that helps explain why his book is necessary. Some people, he notes, argue that “the literary forms of the Bible are only the forms in which the content comes to us.” By contrast, he argues that the Bible’s literary forms are “the only form in which the content is expressed.” He concludes: “Without form, no content exists. Form is meaning. Meaning is embodied in form.” If Ryken is correct—and … Continue reading Review of ‘A Complete Handbook of Literary Forms in the Bible’ by Leland Ryken

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Review of ‘How We Got the New Testament’ by Stanley E. Porter

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 Stanley E. Porter, How We Got the New Testament: Text, Transmission, Translation (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2013). Paperback / Kindle How We Got the New Testament by Stanley E. Porter deals with three important issues: (1) the text of the New Testament, specifically, whether it can be reconstructed reliably from the thousands of later manuscripts which are our only record of it; (2) the transmission of the New Testament in its early years; and (3) the translation of the New Testament into languages other than Greek in its early years, as well as into English in the last five … Continue reading Review of ‘How We Got the New Testament’ by Stanley E. Porter

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Review of ‘Church Membership: How the World Knows Who Represents Jesus’ by Jonathan Leeman

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 Jonathan Leeman, Church Membership: How the World Knows Who Represents Jesus (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012). Hardcover / Kindle What does it mean to be a member of a church? To answer that question, you must know what the church is. And to know that, you must understand who Jesus is. The New Testament speaks of Jesus in political terms: He is “Lord” and “Christ,” the one who announces and enacts the “kingdom of God.” On this understanding, the church is an embassy of the kingdom in the midst of a hostile world. Members of that church, then, are “citizens” of … Continue reading Review of ‘Church Membership: How the World Knows Who Represents Jesus’ by Jonathan Leeman

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Review of ‘D. L. Moody–A Life: Innovatory, Evangelist, Worldchanger’ by Kevin Belmonte

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 Kevin Belmonte, D. L. Moody—A Life: Innovator, Evangelist, Worldchanger (Chicago: Moody Publishers, 2014). Hardcover / Kindle The life of D. L. Moody is a quintessentially American and evangelical one. Born in 1837 in Northfield, Massachusetts, Moody worked hard, moved west to Chicago, Illinois, and rose from poverty to prosperity in his early 20s. That’s the American part of his story. Had he stuck with business, he would today be remembered as a millionaire alongside Marshall Field, with whom he in fact lived at a boardinghouse on Michigan Ave. But God had other plans for his life. Moody had converted to … Continue reading Review of ‘D. L. Moody–A Life: Innovatory, Evangelist, Worldchanger’ by Kevin Belmonte