Radical Reformission: Reaching Out Without Selling Out

Loved it. I have given Mark Driscoll a hard time in the past but I can tell you he is starting to change how I look at the culture and Jesus Christ, in a good way. The thing I like the most about Pastor Driscoll is that he does not water down the gospel or theology in any way to reach the lost, but instead focuses on going to where the lost are instead of waiting for them to walk through the church doors.

He walks through many things in this book, but the main theme is making sure that we are Hudson Taylor's here in the states and also to understand that sin is not contagious, you can't catch it like a cold. He walks you through how Christ lived and was around sinners so much that people, the religious people, called Him "glutenous and a drunkard." Mark tells the story of him running into one of the men that was crucial in his conversion, where the man reveals that he is gay. Mark then asks the man to visit the church again and the man balks by saying, "Why should I go to your establishment when you would never set foot in one of mine?" So Mark takes the challenge and goes to a gay bar with the man. Please don't judge this story until you read it and see the outcome of it. Because to be honest, it shook me up and brought me to my knees in repentance of thinking, "I would never be seen there!" Part of me was revealed that I was one of the religious people calling Christ, "a gluten and a drunkard."

We must engage sinners with the gospel where they are! We don't engage in their sin, but we must engage the sinner. That is what this book is about, engaging the culture because the culture is where the sinners are.

Please read this book no matter your perspective on ecclesiology as it will at least open your eyes to those around you a little more. There is some course jokes as usual from Pastor Driscoll, some funny, some a little tough to swallow, but get past that and see the content. I would highly recommend this book. Link to Buy

Living the Cross Centered Life

This book is truly a great one as C.J. Mahaney brings it all back to the cross. A lot of this book includes previous works, "The Cross Centered Life" and "Christ Our Mediator." I also had just listened to C.J.'s sermon from the 2005 Resolved Conference called "Interrogating the Legalist Within" so most of this was review. But if you have yet to read or listen to these, please pick this little book up, you will not be disappointed.

C.J. continues to bring out the cross in everything in this dissertation of the cross centered life. C.J. goes into understanding the cross in defining our lives, feelings (experience), God's love, Gethsemane, our part in the cross (sin), our suffering, legalism, condemnation (with much more) and then just the practical application.

C.J. gives five practical ways to live a cross centered life:

1. Memorize the Gospel: Memorize those scriptures that remind us of the gospel (2 Cor 5:21; Romans 8:31-34; Isaiah 53:3-6)

2. Pray the Gospel: Since the Gospel is the reason we can approach such a holy God, continue to pray the Gospel as a reminder of why you can speak to such an awesome God.

3. Sing the Gospel: Find songs and CD's whose focus in on the great and glorious Gospel and not on man. Those songs that concentrate on what He has done for us.

4. Review How the Gospel Has Changed You: Looking to your past, not for condemnation's sake, but for the reminder of mercy and grace

5. Study the Gospel: Don't only study books on the Gospel or only on the New Testament, but study the Old Testament and see Christ's fulfillment of It. Making sure that our studies don't leave the Gospel behind but builds itself upon It.

I would really recommend this to any and all Christians. Great reminders of how the Cross should impact our lives and how it has freed us from condemnation and the errors of legalism. Link to Buy

Corrie ten Boom: Heroine of Haarlem

This is an amazing story of perseverance. The book goes into detail of Corrie ten Boom's early years to help build up to the story that most know and love: Ms. ten Boom's time in Nazi concentration camps. It was fascinating to see the honesty given in the biography, showing that Ms. ten Boom was not some mystical creature but was an honest woman, who through strife, struggled with her faith.

I have yet to read any of Corrie ten Boom's other books and am now quite interested to her complete point of view of what was happening during these years leading up to her imprisonment and the year that she was behind abhorrent conditions under the control and continual belittlement of the Nazi regime.

But through it all, she continued to point to Christ. Even more so than herself, Corrie's sister Betsie, seemed to have an unshakable devotion and love for her enemies. Continual prayer for those who were beating them and calling them "cows." Anytime Corrie would have rage or anger (normal responses) it was always Betsie who brought Corrie back to the cross and forgiveness so that Corrie could once again refocus on the continual devotion to Christ and His forgiveness.

If you know little about Corrie ten Boom this is a great read that will show you it was not just herself, neither did she pretend it ever was, but it was also her whole family who placed their faith and strength on Christ even through the deep pits that they were put in.

When the Nazi's were going to allow Corrie's father, who was in his 80's when taken, to go back home they asked: "Listen up, old man. If I send you home will you behave yourself?"

Papa ten Boom answered, "If I go home, I will open my door again to anyone who knocks...it is an honor to go to prison for God's people, I pity you."

9 days after going to a federal prison in Scheveningen, Papa ten Boom died. Not hard to see where Corrie and her siblings got their faith from. This is only one of the many times in this book that you will see the faith of a people who were more entranced with the Gospel rather than any Nazi threats, including Hitler himself. Link to buy