It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old...or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!
You never know when I might play a wild card on you!
***Special thanks to Pam Mettler of Zondervan for sending me a review copy.***
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Andrew is the creator, writer, and illustrator of the Lost Sheep series. Way back in 1989 as a young Bible college student, Andrew was asked to give the dreaded “children’s talk” at a large church. Andrew possessed one talent: he could draw sheep. He bought some overhead projector sheets and drew up the story of Cecil and the Lost Sheep. T he congregation loved it, so Andrew continued to draw stories to use with kids and adults. Other students, pastors, and teachers started borrowing the stories.
MY THOUGHTS AND REVIEW:
This book is based on Mark 10:13-16. Jesus loves children and wants us all to have child-like faith. I personally don't like it when people try to draw Jesus because nobody knows what He really looked like. The illustrations in this book are lighthearted and funny. My boys laughed and laughed. The characters (except Jesus) are all dressed in modern outfits. The setting is also modern time. One of the disciples has a tattoo on his arm. One of the kids has a skateboard. At the end of the book, you will find "Cecil's Page" where there are questions to ask before the story, questions to ask after the story, and the Bible verses which the story is based on. This book tells a Bible story in a fun way that children will enjoy and remember.
It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old...or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!
You never know when I might play a wild card on you!
***Special thanks to Pam Mettler of Zondervan for sending me a review copy.***
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Nancy Rue has written over 100 books for girls, is the editor of the Faithgirlz Bible, and is a popular speaker and radio guest with her expertise in tween and teen issues. She and husband Jim have raised a daughter of their own and now live in Tennessee.
REVIEW:
Nancy Rue’s writing is delightful and she tells an interesting story! This book is a story about Jessie, a 15 year old girl with ADHD. Her mom has bi-polar disorder and her dad, whom she thought was dead, calls her up out of nowhere. All in the first chapter. Pretty exciting, huh?:) It was neat to be able to, at least partially, have a chance to get inside a teenage girl’s head who has ADHD and see that she’s not unlike everyone else. Everyone has his or her own problems and struggles to deal with. She’s not “crazy” or “dumb”...she’s unique and special. Through the “strange” book she finds, Jessie learns that God loves her just the way she is and that ADHD doesn’t have to control or define her life. It was a fun book to read. It is the first book in the series of four.
Note: Please turn off my music playlist at the bottom of this page before starting the video.
"In all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Romans 8:37-39
"And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge--that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God." Ephesians 3:17b-19
God obviously can and does heal. But does He always heal? No (Paul was a good example)! (Physical) death happens to everyone, sooner or later. Some do die from sicknesses. God chooses to heal or not to heal according to His wisdom and purpose, hence healing is in His hands. All God's children will eventually receive His ultimate healing in heaven; "He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain." (Revelation 21:4)
His love for us never changes and never fails. Being sure of and understanding God's love can bring us joy and contentment even in the midst of pain and suffering. "God may not remove the particular circumstances from your life that have caused you to suffer but He will remove the situation's ability to harm you (destroy your life). The spiritual strength that God gives you will overpower any physical pain that is present in your life."~Sean Nolan (p. 136, To Those Who Suffer: Understanding God's Purpose and Pathway through Pain) The quality of our life is not determined by our circumstances but by our relationship with God. Remember that we are complete in Christ. Keep trusting and obeying, keep praying, praising Him, and resting in Him! "Because Your love is better than life, my lips will glorify You. I will praise You as long as I live, and in Your name I will lift up my hands." Psalm 63:3-4
On July 4th, my mother-in-law, my 16 yo daughter, my 11 yo son, and I attended the 20th annual Civil War Reenactment at Willamette Mission State Park. Approximately 1,000 reenactors demonstrated the living and fighting conditions of the early 1860's. They were in period dress, living in period camps and recreating the battles of the civil war. We enjoyed the "Living History" demonstrations in the Union Camp, the Confederate Camp, and the Civilian Camp. We saw battles with all branches of service (infantry, cavalry, and artillery). We also listened to the medical demonstration which aimed to help people understand the terrible aftermath of the war that took the lives of over 620,000 American citizens. This event was organized by the Northwest Civil War Council. Here are some of the photos I took and one of the videos I recorded.
Note: Please turn off my music playlist at the bottom of this page before starting the video.
My fave five this week include:
1. Civil War Battle Reenactment at Willamette Mission State Park. It was very interesting and loud :). We also enjoyed walking through the Union Camp, the Confederate Camp, and the Civilian Camp, learning about the medical/hospital history, listening to the period music demonstration, and asking questions :).
2. Fireworks. We had fun doing fireworks (the kids' reactions were priceless :)) and watching spectacular firework shows from our front yard.
3. Korean Night at George Fox University. The Korean exchange students (from a Christian college in South Korea) put together a Korean Night for the host families (we hosted a Korean student for a weekend). We enjoyed Korean food and were thrilled to hear "Lord, I Lift Your Name on High" sung in Korean.
4. Playing tennis. We had lots of fun. Eric and I had not played tennis for 20 some years. Isaiah (8) picked it up so fast.
Sean Nolan, twenty-eight, was the youngest elected member of the executive branch of a local Christian political party in Sydney, Australia. Nolan resigned last year, but using his political experience he lobbies on behalf of abused children and consults to national leaders at a federal and state level for the development of Christian care in government.
Having completed his theological studies at Emmaus Bible College, Nolan spent many years in youth ministry before joining Glorious Hope Baptist Church in Sydney as an ordained minister. Working with this eight-year-old church plant that reaches out to the most marginalized in the community, Nolan ministers to those he has a passion for—the deeply suffering—and provides pastoral care to people trapped in extreme cycles of abuse and dependency. As a primary home caregiver for both his parents, the author has an intimate understanding of living with pain and is working to develop resources including social media tools to minister to those who are hurting.
Nolan lives in Sydney, Australia with his parents. He is soon to be married and enjoys rugby, cricket, and sci-fi. To Those Who Suffer is Sean Nolan’s first book.
List Price: $14.99
Paperback: 224 pages
Publisher: VMI Publishers (May 1, 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1935265229
ISBN-13: 978-1935265221
THE FIRST CHAPTER:
The Way of Our Master
“Therefore, since Christ suffered in his body, arm yourselves also with the same attitude, because he who has suffered in his body is done with sin.” 1 PETER 4:1, NIV
God Loves You.
My prayer for you at this point is not that you know that God loves you. All Christians ‘know’ this; my prayer is that you will understand that God loves you. There is a huge difference between knowing about something and understanding it. When I was at college I sold suits for a living. When I started the job all I knew about a suit was what one looked like. However, after four years of selling suits I understood everything there is to understand about a men’s business suit. I had such an understanding of suits that I could tell you what fabric a suit was made out of just by looking at it, or if a garment had been dry-cleaned just by touching the fabric. I found that in my early Christian years I knew of God’s love for me, but I had not known God’s love in a deep and meaningful way. It is not healthy for us to have an academic knowledge of God’s love; we must have a deep personal understanding of God’s love for us.
Sometimes we get so angry and upset with God because we cannot believe that He loves us when He has allowed us to go through so much in our lives. After much anguish, I have realized that my personal frustration with God was a result of my lack of understanding about God’s love for me. The most important thing that anyone can understand is God’s love for him or her. Living the Christian life without an understanding of God’s love is like driving a car without any understanding about how the car operates. I have ‘crashed’ my life many times because of my warped perception of God’s love for me and my misguided unbiblical view of how I thought God should have been manifesting his love in my life. This chapter contains some hard truths about God’s love and I do not encourage you to read it lightly. In it we will discuss misperceptions about God’s love and the true Biblical nature of God’s love for His children.
THE IMPORTANCE OF GOD’S LOVE
There is a story from the days of the early church that involves the apostle John. The story says that the apostle John would constantly tell the people in the church that they needed to ‘love one another.’ At first the members of the congregation saw this as good advice, but the apostle persisted in his dispensing of this vital piece of wisdom. The story holds that John would constantly speak about their need to ‘love one another’ in his sermons and that the apostle would constantly instruct the people to ‘love one another’ during their day-to-day interaction with him. This constant repetitious advice made the people wonder why their leader constantly told them to do the same thing over and over again. The people in the church got so perplexed with John’s fixation on their need to ‘love one another’ that they approached him and asked him why he was continually instructing them with the same piece of advice. When confronted with the question of why he was continually telling the people that they needed to ‘love one another’ the apostle John answered by saying: “because that is what the Master
(Jesus) told us!”
The way of our Master was and is the way of love. The Lord Jesus Christ said that the entire Old Testament hangs on the truth of love: Matthew 22:37–40 says, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.” The foundational truth of the entire Bible is love; if we fail to understand the love of God then we will never understand any part of God’s Word. No chapter or verse in the entire Bible should be interpreted out of the context of God’s love. This truth extends beyond the Bible and engulfs every aspect of human life. Every moment of every day in our lives, whether it sees us in church on Sunday morning, in a coffee shop with friends, in a hospital bed, or in a pub getting drunk should be viewed in the context of God’s love. Without this foundational truth in the forefront of our minds we will never have the ability to understand God’s working in our lives.
The Lord Jesus understood the integral part that love plays in our understanding of Him and His message for us. Jesus told the religious leaders of His day that they should interpret the entire Old Testament, every sentence and word in light of God’s love. We need to use this truth as a filter for all that happens to us. Everything we do and all that is done to us as well as all that comes to pass in our lives has to be comprehended and understood in relation to God’s love. Every thought that we allow into our minds has to pass through a mental filter that checks and analyzes it in relation to God’s love. If we do not do this then our perspective on what is taking place in our lives will be distorted. We will never be able to understand why God allows such suffering in the world and especially in the lives of those who follow Him. The apostle John understood this truth and tried his hardest to convey it to the Christians around him; we learn this from his writings in the Bible, particularly the book of First John. I believe that the reason why John taught the people about love to the point of frustration was that he knew how desperately they needed to understand it. I am sure that the majority of the people in John’s churches never really understood the power of God’s love for them. If they did then they would have never asked him the question that they did. John, like all great church leaders, understood something that he so desperately wanted the Christians around him to understand. He knew the power of a mind that understands all things in light of God’s love. Through his persistent attempts to pass on an understanding of God’s love, John conveyed the same truth the apostle Paul wrote about in his letter to the church in Ephesus when he divinely penned these words: “that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height—to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:17–19).
The love of God needs to be the foundation upon which our entire understanding of life is built. A comprehension of the love of Christ needs to be mixed into all the areas of our lives. If this is not done then we will never be filled with “all the fullness of God.”
Love is an attribute brought to this world by God from heaven. Faith and hope, however, were introduced to mankind by God because of sin. If there were no sin then they would not be needed; love, however, predates sin. Mankind knew of the love of God before sin entered into the world; and the whole purpose of God in the world and individually in our lives is to bring us back into his complete love. This purpose will be completely fulfilled when we arrive home to be with Him in heaven, but while we are on the earth, the Lord is teaching his children a heavenly lesson, that lesson being His love for us.
THE ROLE OF THE KING IN OUR LIVES
So many Christians look at Jesus as the all-conquering King of their lives, which He is. However, many fail to recognize that Jesus had another role that He fulfilled while on the earth. Jesus has two roles to play in history, His first appearance on this earth was as the Lamb of God who came to take away the sins of the world (John 1:29). The second role will be fulfilled when Christ returns as the Lion of God who comes to judge the world (Rev. 5:5). These roles, like the animals that represent them, are very different and they are symbolic of the different ways in which God acts towards His children.
It is said that many Jewish people at the time of Christ thought that there were going to be two Messiahs. The reason for this is that the Old Testament speaks about the coming King in two different ways. Firstly, it refers to Him as the suffering servant of Israel. This is highlighted in the passages of Scripture famously known as the suffering servant passages of Isaiah (42:1–9, 49:1–6, 50:4–11, 52:13–53:121). These passages, particularly 52:13–53:12, have been made famous because of their vivid prophetic description of the ‘suffering servant’ that parallels the account given in the Gospels of the Lord Jesus Christ. Secondly, the Old Testament talks about the coming king as the all-conquering King of Israel who will come to deal with their enemies and bring about a time of great prosperity for the nation (2 Sam. 7:16; Jer. 23:5–6; Zech. 14:5–17, etc.). The point here is that the Jews were right and wrong at the same time. The passages do describe the Messiah (Jesus) in different ways, but they were not describing different people; they were describing the same person in different roles. I have found through my own experiences that Christ can and does act in my life as an all-powerful King. However, these times have been few and far between. One of the hardest lessons I have had to learn is that Jesus has called me many times to follow in His footsteps and to suffer as my Master’s servant. I said above that the way of our Master is the way of love; however, the way of our Master is also the way of suffering.
When Jesus came to earth two thousand years ago, He came for one purpose and one purpose only, to reconcile mankind back to God. This first coming of the Lord to the earth dealt with the spiritual problem of mankind (Matthew 18:11). The return of Christ will see the Lord deal with the final spiritual problems of mankind but also the physical circumstantial ones. What I mean by this is that the primary purpose of the cross was not to remove the suffering from our lives, but to provide a way for people to be redeemed back to God and to give us victory over sin. The Jews wanted their coming Messiah and King to conquer their Roman oppressors and remove all the suffering from their lives. They were imagining a return to the days of King Solomon where silver was as common as wood and the nation and all its inhabitants lived in the lap of luxury. However, the Lord was much more concerned with the problem of sin and the atonement that needed to be made to free Israel and all people from the bondage of sin. This is why the Jews did not recognize Christ; they were looking at Jesus with human expectations of what the Messiah should be and do, whereas God had sent his Son to fulfill the role of the Messiah according to the divine perspective. I cannot speak for you but I can say from my own journey down the road of suffering that I have had this same problem. I thought God is loving, good, and all-powerful therefore He has come into my life to bless me with comfortable circumstances. Only in the last few years have I realized that God’s greatest purpose in my life is to conform me into the image of His Son, not to ensure my personal comfort. God is more interested in my character than He is my comfort!
Like the Jews of Jesus’ day, many of us do not understand the role of God in our lives and the purpose of Jesus’ dying on the cross for our sins. Jesus came to save you and me from our sins, which does not necessarily mean that He has come to save us from suffering. In fact Jesus suffered extensively while He was on earth and the apostles followed in His footsteps. All of the apostles except for John were martyred (and John might as well have been, he suffered so much) and the early church suffered horrendous persecution. The Roman Emperor Nero dipped Christians in hot tar and then put them up on poles. He would then have the poles with the believers attached set alight and he would use these poor saints as human lanterns at his parties. The Lord Jesus came to earth to suffer and his disciples
followed him down this path as do many Christians today in countries that persecute believers. It was a hard truth for me to accept when I realized that I am called to serve the all-conquering King but also follow in the footsteps of the great Suffering Servant.
The love of God and the suffering of Christ go hand in hand. God’s love for us cannot be viewed outside of Christ’s suffering for us; God loves us so much that He is allowing us to follow in the footsteps of His Son. If we gladly accept the blessing that comes from following Christ the all conquering King, we must also accept the hardship that is allowed in our lives by Jesus the Suffering Servant. We must always remember that the cross comes before the crown!
MISUNDERSTANDING GOD’S LOVE
In the church today there is a huge misunderstanding of who God is and what His purpose for our lives is. In my early Christian years I viewed God as a divine vending machine. I thought that praying to God is like putting money in a drink machine. I put my prayer in and through that prayer I would be making my selection of what I wanted God to do in my life and then God was obligated to give me what I wanted. So many Christians have ceased praying to God and asking Him for His will to be done as instructed to in the Lord’s prayer (Matthew 6:10; Luke 11:2). Instead we spend most of our prayer life counseling God and instructing Him on how He should be dealing with us in our lives. God does not want our advice; He wants our devotion; one of the most valuable commodities that the Lord values is trust (Proverbs 3:5–6). God wants us to trust Him with our lives; the reason that the Lord wants this of us is that He knows what is best for us. The Lord wants to implement a foundation of love in your life. This may not be easy and it may even be uncomfortable but it is essential for your spiritual growth. When we think of love, many of us conjure up images of roses on Valentine’s Day and long walks on the beach; our view of love has become narrow and distorted by the secular society that we live in. We see on TV people talking about ‘making love’ when in fact they are simply making lust. No one can ‘make love’ because God was and is the creator of love. Our society swaps love for lust and then has no comprehension of what a loving relationship or action is. Lust is Satan’s substitute for God’s love; so many Christians have bought into the lie of Satan that love is a lustful state of euphoria that is comprised of a constant ‘warm fuzzy’ feeling that should never end. This view of love is not the image of love that the Bible portrays. The Biblical view of love is strongly tied up with the area of suffering.
The cross was the most amazing manifestation of God’s love that the world ever has seen and ever will see. We know that the cross is amazing, we sing about it, read about it, and talk about it all the time. When we go to church we are told to be thankful for what the Lord has done on the cross for us, we remember the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ through communion. However, very few Christians understand exactly what took place on the cross; we think we do understand the cross but really we do not. Many people think that the suffering the Lord endured to save us was the physical suffering seen in movies like the Jesus Film and the Passion of the Christ. However, the physical suffering of Christ was just a drop in relation to the ‘ocean of suffering’ that Jesus Christ had to pass through to purchase our salvation. The real suffering that saved us was Christ’s separation from His Father in heaven and the spiritual torture that He endured during the hours of darkness while He was on the cross, when the wrath of God was being poured out upon Him for our sins. People have asked me how Jesus knows about them and I tell them that one reason why He knows all about you is because while He was on the cross He was made aware of all your sin in an intimate way as He suffered on your behalf. We focus on Christ’s physical suffering that He endured on the cross; however, the suffering that caused the Lord Jesus Christ to suffer beyond measure was His spiritual suffering. No one can understand exactly how the Lord suffered spiritually because the only person capable of suffering in this way was the Son of God. Jesus was the only one with the spiritual qualifications needed to fulfill this task and therefore any attempt to analyze His spiritual suffering and understand it would be woefully inadequate. The point that I am making here is that the cross was not only the greatest act of love that the world has ever seen and ever will see; but the cross was also the greatest act of suffering that the world has ever seen and ever will see. God loves you so much that He forsook, renounced, and abandoned His own Son so that He would not have to forsake, renounce, and abandon you. The love of God and the suffering of Christ go hand in hand. It has been said that loving another person is doing what is best for him at any given time. This does not mean that you are constantly being nice to others but it does mean that you should constantly be good to others. There is a big difference between nice people and good people. Nice people are loved by everyone whereas good people get nailed to crosses! Jesus was not always ‘nice’ to people but He was always good to them; there is a big difference. God’s actions in your lives may not always be pleasant or nice; however, they are always loving and good. Just like the cross was not pleasant for Jesus, our suffering is not pleasant for us. The suffering of Christ on the cross was the most productive and loving thing that has ever been done for the human race. Just like our Master’s suffering, our suffering is also the most productive and loving thing that will ever happen in our Christian walk (after our salvation). I realize how stupid and even cruel that statement seems; however, it was true for Jesus and His disciples and it is true for us. I find that in my own life I am happy to accept the part about God the Father allowing Christ to suffer out of love for me. However, I find that I am less willing to accept the part about God allowing me to suffer because He loves me. We need to remember at this point that God allows us to suffer at the expense of our physical lives so we can grow in our spiritual lives. The reason that our good, loving, holy, just and righteous God permits suffering in our lives is that He has a good, loving, holy, just, and righteous purpose for allowing this suffering in our lives, just as He did for Christ. It is not my intention to outline the good, holy, loving, just, and righteous things that God brings about in our lives through suffering and the reason why He cannot use another means to accomplish this. These things will be covered later on; however the point that I want to establish here is that God’s love for us is not made void because He allows us to suffer. God’s love for you is as real as the pain from your suffering. The thing we have to understand is that the suffering God allows in our lives is just as much a part of God’s love for us as the blessing that He brings into our lives. We need to have the perspective that Christ came to free us from our sin not necessarily our suffering. And that there is an amazing, loving, joyous peace to be found even if the Lord does not give us the removal of the painful circumstances that we so desperately seek.
MY THOUGHTS AND REVIEW:
Christians are not immune to pain and suffering. However, we often view our circumstances from our perspective and then feel hopeless and discouraged and question God why me...why this. This book helps us look at pain and suffering from God's perspective and encourages us to embrace God's good, loving purpose for allowing the suffering in our lives. God is more concerned about our character, rather than our comfort, our holiness, rather than our happiness, and our joy, rather than our pleasure. This book spoke to me so well that I underlined almost every word on some pages :). It is Biblically grounded and God-centered. I really appreciate the author's transparency and humility. The Lord has blessed him with spiritual wisdom and understanding (he's only 28!) It is very interesting that I found part of what the author shares in this book to be almost identical to what I wrote in my notebook regarding the blessings of sufferings. He and I are definitely on the same page on this issue :). This is a must-read for all who are going through pain and suffering. Please know that if you live for God and follow Christ, you never suffer in vain. Is God enough for you?...Not God and health, not God and a pain-free existence...just God!
Q&A with Sean Nolan Author of To Those Who Suffer
Q: You have just written a book called To Those Who Suffer. To whom were you writing this book? Is this book a message for anyone who has known life’s challenges?
A: The truth is that this book is not for everyone. I feel that you really have to have passed through extreme suffering in order to understand the ideas and conclusions presented within these pages. The reason for this is that this book is primarily written to those people in the kingdom of God who do not have the option of hoping for circumstantial relief from their suffering. These people cannot have the horrific circumstances that have caused their hardship reversed or removed. The people I am talking about here are those who have lost someone to death, people who have permanent physical medical conditions that cannot be healed like amputees and quadriplegics—people who have permanent physical pain. This book is written to the Christians who have faithfully believed and followed the Lord in the face of horrendous suffering and pain.
Q: You write that the love of God and the suffering of Christ go hand in hand. We don’t often think of love and suffering as two ideas that should go together. Can you explain?
A: The cross was not only the greatest act of love that the world has ever seen and ever will see, but the cross was also the greatest act of suffering that the world has ever seen and ever will see. God’s love for us cannot be viewed outside of Christ’s suffering for us; God loves us so much that He is allowing us to follow in the footsteps of His Son. If we gladly accept the blessing that comes from following Christ the All-Conquering King, we must also accept the hardship that is allowed in our lives by Jesus the Suffering Servant. We must always remember that the cross comes before the crown!
Q: In the book you state that God is more interested in our character than our comfort, yet why are we as Christians so uncomfortable with the idea that God allows us to endure suffering when He could instead choose to remove it?
A: When we suffer, we often view the situation through the human sin-stained perspective. This results in us immediately coming to the conclusion that this situation is extremely painful and, therefore, it must be wrong and not part of God’s will for our lives. However, from God’s perspective, He has allowed this suffering in our lives for a purpose, and because God is absolutely good, His purpose for allowing the suffering in our lives must be a good one.
Q: In To Those Who Suffer you have tackled one of the thorniest questions of the Christian faith. How can a good God allow bad things to happen to His children?
A: God’s goal for our lives is very different from ours. It is imperative that we understand God’s purpose for allowing mankind to encounter suffering. If we do not understand that God has done the right thing through allowing suffering into the world and our lives then we cannot expect to understand why God chooses to use suffering to conform us into the image of His Son, as opposed to a more pleasant method. If suffering were a tree, its fruit would be unique and extremely rare. The reason why the Lord uses the painful process of suffering to sanctify us (conform us into the image of His Son) is that suffering produces unique and extremely rare fruit that cannot be grown or cultivated by any other means.
Q: What do you want readers to take away from this book?
A: It is the goal of this book to help us understand that there is a strong relationship between this truth and the way in which God handles the suffering in our lives. The healing of our spiritual circumstances is God’s number one concern; our physical suffering is often used by God to make us aware of our spiritual problems. This is not always the case, but, regardless of whether it is true or not in your life, we need to understand that the Lord will not bring about an end to our physical problems until our spiritual ones are dealt with. God has a purpose for allowing you to suffer innocently and that purpose is of a spiritual nature. You may not have a huge spiritual issue that needs resolving. You may just simply be the victim of our cruel world. Whichever category you fall into, you need to take courage from the fact that God can and will bring about a glorious spiritual purpose through your suffering. You may not be getting a physical miracle from the Lord, but I guarantee that you will get a spiritual one. It may look hopeless and it may look like the Lord has forgotten you and failed you miserably. It may feel like you are the first person in the history of mankind that the great God of the universe has failed. This may be how it looks and feels, but I can assure you that this is not how it is. Jesus keeps His word and He came through for the disciples. All that He promised came to fruition and His promises proved to be amazing and purposeful.
***Special thanks to Audra Jennings of The B&B Media Group for sending me a review copy.***
It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old...or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!
You never know when I might play a wild card on you!
***Special thanks to Pam Mettler of Zondervan for sending me a review copy.***
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Nancy Rue has written over 100 books for girls, is the editor of the Faithgirlz Bible, and is a popular speaker and radio guest with her expertise in tween and teen issues. She and husband Jim have raised a daughter of their own and now live in Tennessee.
It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old...or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!
You never know when I might play a wild card on you!
***Special thanks to Karri James of Harvest House Publishers for sending me a review copy.***
ABOUT THE AUTHORS:
Over 40-plus years, Josh McDowell has spoken to more than 10 million people in 115 countries about the evidence for Christianity and the difference the Christian faith makes in the world. He has authored or coauthored more than 110 books (with more than 51 million copies in print), including such classics as More Than a Carpenter and New Evidence That Demands a Verdict.
Sean McDowell is an educator and a popular speaker at schools, churches, and conferences nationwide. He is the author of Ethix: Being Bold in a Whatever World, the coauthor of Understanding Intelligent Design and Evidence for the Resurrection, and general editor of The Apologetics Study Bible for Students. He is currently pursuing a PhD in apologetics and worldview studies.
List Price: $24.99
Hardcover: 512 pages
Publisher: Harvest House Publishers (June 1, 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0736928707
ISBN-13: 978-0736928700
AND NOW...THE FIRST CHAPTER:
What We All Want out of Life
It was a beautiful fall day. The car windows were all rolled down. I (Josh) was in my first year of college, and I was driving some of my friends from campus to downtown. We were laughing and just having a lot of fun. A woman pulled up beside us at the traffic light, rolled down her window, and with a scowl on her face said, “What right do you kids have to be so happy!”
Our Desire for Deep Happiness
Deep down all of us want to be happy. We want to live a satisfying life, a life of joy and contentment. Actually, God wants us to enjoy that as well. Jesus said, “I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete” (John 15:11 niv). Yet the quest for deep happiness often eludes us. Webster’s dictionary defines happiness as “a pleasurable or satisfying experience.” Happiness is often equated with pleasurable feelings. And of course there’s nothing inherently wrong with pleasurable satisfaction, except in how we pursue it.
Focusing on Self
I (Sean, Josh’s son and co-author) work as an educator. When I ask my students what they want most in their lives, their typical response is “happiness.” I ask them to define happiness, and most of them tell me that happiness is people feeling good and having fun. Many of us would define it that way. If happiness is about a pleasurable feeling or experience of fun, then it should follow that the greater number of fun experiences we have, the happier we become.
But somehow, it doesn’t seem to work out that way. For example, the earning power of the baby boomers increased dramatically over that of any previous generation in history. They have had more money, more leisure time, more access to sports, travel, and entertainment than any society has ever experienced. And yet according to happiness expert Dr. Martin Seligman, baby boomers experienced a tenfold increase in depression over any previous generation. The reason for the depression, Dr. Seligman concludes, was that people began a shift toward a focus on self.
When one’s mission in life is to pursue pleasure, the result is to become “me” focused. And “me”-focused happiness is generally short-lived. Sooner or later, and for most people it is later, when we focus primarily on our own pleasure, our lives tend to become empty, depressed, and void of any real meaning. We come to experience the reality that a self-centered focus doesn’t produce lasting satisfaction, joy, or real happiness. Christian philosopher and apologist J.P. Moreland suggests a conclusion to a self-absorbed life:
If happiness is having an internal feeling of fun or pleasurable satisfaction, and if it is our main goal, where will we place our focus all day long? The focus will be on us, and the result will be a culture of self-absorbed individuals who can’t live for something larger than we are.
Yet this is the current life philosophy that most people have bought into: The individual always comes first, with the number-one virtue being to feel good about yourself. The culture tells you to “be yourself, believe in yourself, express yourself.” That’s why we have YouTube and MySpace. Self, self, self. The prevailing view is that you do what it takes to feel good about yourself because that’s the most important thing in the world. That is the way to find happiness.
To some degree or another most of us have bought into that viewpoint. And it’s easy to understand why. If the goal is happiness, then why shouldn’t we pursue the things that will give us pleasure and thus make us happy?
Focusing on Jesus and His Worldview
Jesus, however, has another view on achieving genuine happiness and joy—one that encompasses a whole different set of priorities. Instead of seeking our happiness first, Jesus tells us to put him and his kingdom first (Matthew 6:33). He says we must die to ourselves; that to find our life we must lose it; essentially, that we must look beyond ourselves and pursue him first. In reading such things, many people wonder how we can expect to be happy if we set aside our quest for what gives us pleasure and follow someone who asks us for our total commitment. As a result, they think Christianity might spoil all their fun.
This is emphatically not the case. Jesus said he was “the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6) and our source of genuine happiness. According to Jesus, happiness is not based upon a certain feeling. Instead, it is a sense of contentment, peace, and joy that transcends our circumstances and feelings. When Jesus said that his joy would be in us and our joy would be complete, he was defining the true way to happiness—a happiness that does not fade, but grows and expands into true and lasting joy.
He was saying to focus on him and his way—his view of the world. And by doing this we would understand who we are, and thus we would experience our identity as a person of value and worth. We would realize why we are here, and thus we would experience our purpose and meaning in life. We would know where we are going, and thus we would experience our destiny and mission in a life larger than ourselves.
And in this process we will find we have attained something much bigger and better than the way our culture understands happiness, which is based on the pleasure of the moment. We will find true, deep, satisfying, and lasting joy. It will be a joy that remains intact through all of life, with or without pleasures, through ups and downs, through pains, sorrows, and losses. That is something we all want.
The way to achieve this lasting joy is to buy into Jesus’ idea of life—that is, his worldview. A worldview is what we assume to be true about the basic makeup of our world. A worldview is like a mental map of reality. We believe certain things about ourselves and God and life, and then we interpret our experiences through them. Everyone has a worldview, even though not everyone realizes they have one.
Jesus’ worldview—his view of life—is called a biblical worldview. Embracing a biblical worldview means understanding and living life from God’s perspective. It means understanding what we were meant to know and be and how we were meant to live. This biblical worldview works because it explains the truth about God and about us. That is what Jesus and the whole of Scripture does—it gives us the truth about life and happiness, and the power to live according to the kingdom of God. As J.P.
Moreland says,
This is why truth is so powerful. It allows us to cooperate with reality, whether spiritual or physical, and tap into its power. As we learn to think correctly about God, specific scriptural teachings, the soul, or other important aspects of a Christian worldview, we are placed in touch with God and those realities.
Nothing works right unless it conforms to reality. A plane flies because engineers design its shape to conform to the realities of airflow and gravity. A boat floats because its designers shaped it to conform to the realities of water displacement. Try to fly a boat or float a plane and the results will be disastrous. It’s the same with your life. If you want a significant life, you must run your life in accordance with what it was designed to do. Your life was created to work properly when it conforms to the reality of its purpose. And God has gone to great lengths to show us the reality of our purpose, which is diametrically opposed to how our culture understands happiness. He tells us that when we abandon self-absorption we will find significance. When we seek first His kingdom, all these things will be added unto us (Matthew 6:33). When we find the meaning he intends for our lives, we will gain a deep contentment even in the middle of the pain, loss, and abandonment that characterizes our fallen world. This is why it is vitally important to adopt God’s perspective on life. This, and only this, is the path to genuine happiness and deep, lasting joy.
My (Josh’s) Path
As a teenager, I (Josh) began my quest for happiness down the wrong path. Yet I sincerely wanted the answers to Who am I? Why am I here? Where am I going? So I started searching for answers. I certainly didn’t find answers at home. My father was the town drunk. I grew up watching in fear and horror as my father beat my mother and wreaked havoc at home. I experienced sexual abuse from a man named Wayne, whom my parents hired as a part-time cook and housekeeper. As I got older I eventually told my mother about what Wayne was doing, but she didn’t believe me. I can’t describe to you the pain of abandonment I felt when my mother refused to believe me. Also, growing up I never remember my father saying that he loved me. The only love I ever felt was from a struggling, abused mother who died suddenly when I was a teenager. So my home was not a place to find answers or happiness.
In the small Michigan community in which I grew up, everyone seemed to be into religion, so my search started there. I really got into the church scene. But I must have picked the wrong church, because I felt worse inside the church than I did outside. So I gave up on the church to provide me any answers.
Then I thought that education might have the answers, so I enrolled in a university. I soon became unpopular with my professors because I hounded them with so many questions. But I learned that my professors had just as many problems, frustrations, and unanswered questions as I did.
I remember seeing a student wearing a T-shirt that read, Don’t follow me, I’m lost. That’s how everyone at the university seemed to me. I concluded education wasn’t the answer.
Next, I tried prestige. I thought I could find a noble cause, commit to it, and in the process become well known. So I ran for various student offices. It was great at first. People got to know me and I enjoyed spending the university’s money getting the speakers I wanted. I also liked the idea of spending the students’ money for throwing parties.
But the prestige thing soon wore off. I would wake up on Monday morning, usually with a headache from the night before, dreading the next five days. I endured Monday through Friday just to experience the party nights on the weekend. But every Monday brought the meaningless cycle all over again.
About that time I noticed a small group of people who seemed different from the others. They appeared to know who they were and where they were going. They had a clear set of convictions about what they believed. And what really stood out was that they appeared to be genuinely happy. Their happiness and joy wasn’t like mine, which was dependent on my circumstances. I was happy only when things were going great—when I was having “fun.” But they seemed to possess an inner source of joy that I longed for, and I wondered where it came from.
I befriended these people and tried to figure out what they knew that I didn’t. One day I asked one of these students (a good-looking woman in the group) what made her so different, so happy. She had told me before she hadn’t always been that way but she had changed. So I asked her, “What changed your life?”
Her answer shocked me. She used two words as a solution, two words I never thought I’d hear at the university. She simply said, “Jesus Christ.” I immediately told her I was fed up with religion and the church and was certain it wasn’t a solution. Again, this woman had convictions and she knew what she believed. She shot back and said, “I didn’t say religion, I said Jesus Christ.”
She and her friends went on to explain that a relationship with God through Jesus Christ offered what I would come to know as a biblical worldview. They told me it was Christ and his worldview—seeing everything from a biblical perspective—that would answer all the questions I had. They didn’t offer to walk me through a shallow prayer or get me to go to “church meetings.” What they did was challenge me to intellectually examine the claims of Jesus and to determine, in essence, whether God’s worldview written in Scripture was credible. I accepted their challenge out of pride. I wanted to prove Christianity was a farce.
What I discovered was that I was the farce. My quest for happiness and meaning was found in Christ.
Most people who know my testimony know I set out to disprove Christianity, and they assume I came to Christ through the intellectual route. They think my examination of the evidence of Christ’s deity, his resurrection, and the reliability of Scripture convinced me that God had spoken and that it offered me a worldview that would establish my identity, purpose, and meaning in life—and therefore I trusted in Christ. Truth is, all the evidence I have documented in my books did not bring me into a relationship with Christ. The convincing evidence certainly got my attention, but it was God’s love that drew me to him. I saw love between a group of Jesus-followers who devoted themselves to God and one another. And God demonstrated his love to me through them. Through the power of the Holy Spirit my life was transformed through a relationship with God. I discovered a whole new way of thinking and living that brought pure joy. This new way of thinking and living was possible as God empowered me to live out truth from his perspective—a biblical worldview.
Most Christians believe Jesus’ worldview is what we need to follow, yet we encounter many who seem to have trouble making it work in their lives. Our experience tells us that the following quote represents untold numbers of people:
“I’m a Christian and I want to find real joy. I do believe I can find it in following Christ, but somehow it doesn’t seem to be happening. I do my best to live out my faith. But to be honest, I really don’t know a lot about why I believe what I believe. And when it comes to a biblical worldview, there are so many conflicting claims floating around about what that means, I’m not sure I’m forming the right one. How can I be sure?”
Answering these questions that we find on the lips of so many Christians is our first purpose in writing this handbook. We want to demonstrate a way to experience the happiness and joy that every person desires and that God wants us to have. We also have a second purpose in writing this handbook.
Our Desire to Pass the Faith to the Next Generation
We run across hundreds of Christians who tell us something like this:
“I’m a Christian and want to pass my faith on to my kids. Yet I don’t feel very equipped to do that. But I definitely don’t want to lose my kids to a godless culture. What can I do?”
The fear of the culture capturing our kids is real. This handbook is designed to better ground you in the essentials of the faith in a way that provides a greater understanding of what you believe, why you believe it, and how it brings you a deeper joy in life. That understanding in and of itself will serve as a platform to successfully instill a robust and active Christianity in the lives of the next generation. We know that passing on the faith is a real and vital need. And it doesn’t happen automatically.
Captured by the Culture
Many times we have heard stories similar to the following scenario:
Marsha hugged her son as he prepared to leave. “It’s been nice having you home again, honey,” she said.
“Yeah, Greg,” his father, Mike, echoed. “It really has been good.” He stepped in for a hug. “I miss the weekends as a family, going to church and all. But I assume you’ve found a church home there in the college area by now, haven’t you, son?”
Greg swung his backpack onto his shoulder. “Well, Dad, not really,” he said hesitantly. “Being a freshman is tough, so I’ve been really busy.”
Sarah, Greg’s 16-year-old sister, handed him his duffel bag. “Is college really that hard?”
“Well, I wouldn’t say hard, really. You just keep busy, you know?”
Mike gently gripped Greg’s shoulder. “If you’re too busy to be in church, son, I think you might be too busy.”
“Well,” Greg responded, “your kind of church just isn’t my thing anymore, Dad. I’ve got some friends and we do a group study once a week and that’s enough for me.”
“I’d rather do things with my friends too,” Sarah added. “Church is a bore.”
“Sarah!” Marsha said. “That’s a terrible thing to say!”
“Well, it’s true!” Sarah said.
“She’s right, Mom,” Greg said. “Church just doesn’t cut it for me anymore.”
“Honey, don’t say that.” Marsha touched her son on the arm. “That college isn’t turning you against God, is it?”
“No, Mom,” Greg chuckled, “I’m just rethinking a lot of things. God is still important to me, I just believe some different things from you guys, that’s all.” He adjusted the weight of the backpack. “Hey, I’ve got to get going.”
Greg moved on out the door as Sarah helped him with his things. Marsha and Mike stepped onto the porch and watched their son walk toward the car.
“We’ll be praying for you, son,” Mike called.
“Thanks, Dad,” Greg responded with a chuckle.
Marsha and Mike watched in silence as he backed down the drive and waved to them as he drove away. “I hope we’re not losing our son,” Marsha said.
Mike nodded. “I hope we’re not losing our son and our daughter.”
If we hear one dominating and recurring theme among the many church leaders and families we come in contact with, it’s the fear that Mike expresses above. There is a deep, abiding fear among Christian parents that their kids, having been raised in a Christian family and having spent their childhood and teenage years in the church, will nonetheless walk away from God.
A Generation Gap
The problem is, this fear is becoming a reality. Presently, within ten years of entering adulthood, most teens professing to be Christians will walk away from the church and put whatever commitment they made to Christ on the shelf. This doesn’t mean all our young people are rejecting God outright and becoming atheists. That’s not the case. It’s that they are adopting beliefs and a worldview that are definitely not “the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints” (Jude 3 nasb). A large portion of young people today would echo Greg’s remark to his dad: “God is still important to me, I just believe some different things than you.” These differences, often referred to as the generation gap, are wider and deeper today than ever before. According to a recent Pew Research Center study, almost 80 percent of adults see a difference between the beliefs and points of view of young people and themselves. Asked to identify where older and younger people differ the most, 47 percent pinpointed the areas of social values and morality.
Consider just some of what today’s Christian young people believe:
23 percent are not assured of the existence of miracles;
33 percent either “definitely” or “maybe” believe in reincarnation;
42 percent are not assured of the existence of evil as an entity;
48 percent believe that many religions are true.
It is difficult to lead a young person to adopt a Christian worldview when nearly one out of two can’t say that Jesus is definitively “the way, the truth, and the life.”
And even when our young people do begin to embrace a Christian worldview they are under intense assault from their high school years and up. According to a 2006 study by professors from Harvard and George Mason Universities, the percentage of agnostics and atheists teaching at American colleges is three times greater than in the general population. More than half of college professors today believe the Bible is “an ancient book of fables, legends, history, and moral precepts.”
Students are continually told by today’s culture that the Bible is unreliable, that Jesus was no different than any other religious figure, and that anyone who asserts there is an objective truth that shapes a worldview is intolerant and a bigot. It is very hard for young people to stand up against such pressures unless they are fully equipped, as the apostle Peter said, “always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you” (1 Peter 3:15 nasb). The truth is, few are equipped and ready to face a world that is increasingly hostile to Christianity.
If you have children or work with young people, you know how difficult it can be to get through to them. And it seems at times that all the advantages communication technology has brought us haven’t helped a bit. In fact, the pervasiveness of modern electronic communication may be one of the obstacles we must overcome. In his book Handoff Dr. Jeff Myers says:
The young people our organization has studied spend between 27 and 33 hours per week using communication technology—gaming, watching television and movies, text messaging, instant messaging, and surfing the internet. In short, they’re overwhelmed with information.
Information overload breaks down a person’s capacity for discernment. For example, C. John Sommerville argued that the 24-hour news cycle actually makes us dumber, not smarter. It presents so much information that we find it impossible to figure out what is truly important.
Then Jeff goes on to say:
With shopping and surfing available 24 hours a day young adults believe they can have whatever they want, whenever they want, however they want, and with whomever they want to have it. Nothing is more than a few clicks away.
Here’s the paradox: when there is nothing more to see or do, there is nothing more to look forward to. It’s easy to see why surveys of young adults pick up high levels of hopelessness, distrust, cynicism, and boredom.
The unceasing access to pleasure and the consequent unhappiness led evangelist Ravi Zacharias to reference G.K. Chesterton in saying that “meaninglessness ultimately comes not from being weary of pain but from being weary of pleasure.”
The task may not be easy, but if ever there was a time to make a concerted effort to instill a biblical worldview into the next generation—a way to think from a biblical perspective—it’s now. Their misconceptions and distorted views of what is important in life and what brings happiness and joy must be addressed. The consequences of failing to tackle this problem head-on are disheartening.
Young people must be led to align their beliefs and behavior with ultimate reality, which means, in essence, to adopt the biblical view of the world as their guiding principle. In The Scandal of the Evangelical Conscience, author Ron Sider concludes that people who have a biblical worldview live differently—in ways that are highly significant to the temptations today’s youth face. They are nine times more likely to avoid “adult only” material on the Internet, three times as likely not to use tobacco products, and twice as likely to volunteer to help the poor. What people believe about God, truth, and the world around them (for example, a biblical worldview), makes a tangible difference in the way they live.
Equipping the Mind
Some might think their young people won’t respond positively to addressing their beliefs and challenging them to examine why they believe what they believe. Some think that all today’s kids want is to deal with relationships and what they can experience emotionally. This simply is not the case. In the recent “National Study of Youth and Religion,” thousands of nonreligious teenagers said they were raised to be “religious” but had become “nonreligious.” These teenagers were asked, “Why did you fall away from the faith in which you were raised?” They were given no set of answers to pick from; it was simply an open-ended question. The most common answer—given by 32 percent of the respondents—was intellectual skepticism. That is a very high percentage given the fact that this was an open-ended question. Their answers included such statements as “It didn’t make sense to me”; “Some stuff is too far-fetched for me to believe in”; “I think scientifically there is no real proof”; and “There were too many questions that can’t be answered.” Our kids want answers they can grapple with in their minds as well as in their hearts.
When it comes to spiritual and character formation, Scripture attaches great importance to training the mind. “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world,” Paul states. “But be transformed by the renewing of your mind” (Romans 12:2 niv).
All of us want our kids to be equipped in mind, spirit, and character, able to resist the pressures of this increasingly godless culture so that no matter what temptations and opposition they face, they will live lives we can be proud of—lives that are pleasing to God and others. We want our kids to live out a biblical worldview. Yet actually living out a biblical worldview is impossible apart from a transformed relationship through Jesus Christ. Neither our young people nor any of us have the natural inclination or power in our human strength to live out “the way” of Jesus—his worldview. That means each of us and our young people must place our trust in Christ and surrender our lives to him so we all can stand strong with deep convictions for the unshakable truths of God.
This handbook will provide guidance to lead your young people to such a faith in Christ. Because through a transformed relationship with God they “will no longer be like children, forever changing [their] minds about what [they] believe because someone has told [them] something different or because someone has cleverly lied to [them] and made the lie sound like the truth” (Ephesians 4:13-14). You want to teach and mentor and empower them to think and live as “children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which [they] shine like stars in the universe” (Philippians 2:15 niv).
There is probably nothing more rewarding to us (Josh and Sean) than being able to pass the baton of the Christian faith to our children. Jeff Myers said it well in Handoff:
The universe is designed in such a way that passing the baton is the only way I can truly experience blessing, fullness, meaning, satisfaction, and joy in life. I may want to believe that serving myself leads to happiness, but my heart knows better. No matter how much stuff I buy, or what kind of house I live in, or where I travel, life only takes on meaning when I live for something bigger than myself.
Use This Handbook as Your Guide
Some books are designed for you to curl up on a couch with them and enjoy a “good read.” Others are reference texts from which you glean specific information. This book is a handbook. The best way to use it is first to absorb it, and then to engage in a long-term process of applying its content incrementally in your own life and in the lives of your children, grandchildren, youth group, or others to whom you wish to impart the faith.
This book will present the essentials of the biblical worldview by exploring what we have identified as the 12 basic truths of the faith, which are noted in the 12 sections of this work. The next two chapters will give you an overview of these 12 truths, and then the following 48 chapters will delve into each truth thoroughly.
Each foundational truth will be given four chapters. Some chapters will be short and succinct. The first chapter in each section will identify a particular truth and what we as Christians believe about it. The second chapter will examine why you can believe it with confidence. The third chapter in each section will explore how that truth is relevant to your life. The fourth chapter will offer practical ways to live that truth out in the presence of those around you. As you live these truths out more and more in front of your family and friends you will be better equipped to impart them to others.
It is not necessary to read each truth and its chapters in order. There is no problem jumping ahead to a particular truth of interest or to one that applies to an immediate situation in your life. For example, if you are nearing the Easter season you might want to skip to Truth Eight: “Jesus’ Bodily Resurrection.” Or if Christmas is around the corner you might want to go to Truth Four: “God Became Human.” The point is, while each truth of the Christian faith builds off the other, each stands on its own merits. So if a particular time of year makes it more appropriate to address certain truths, or if those around you are raising a certain question that makes focusing on a particular truth more timely, go for it. Eventually, however, we urge you to cover all the truths in this handbook—and to review them more than once.
There is a reason God instructed his people to “repeat [God’s truth] again and again to your children. Talk about them when you are at home…away on a journey…lying down…getting up” (Deuteronomy 6:7). No matter how young or how old we are, we will never exhaustively understand the depths and riches of God and his truth. The truths of the faith can become fresh and alive to you again each time you go over them. Absorbing them repeatedly can give them deeper relevance because in the process of filling ourselves with knowledge of his truth we are actually deepening our relationship with a relational, infinite God. We would not mislead you—the McDowells, this father-and-son team, do not claim to understand all the deep truths we present here. Nor have we mastered the Christian life. Far from it. It is important that you realize that we too are on a journey of constantly uncovering the richness of God and applying these truths to our daily lives.
Experience an Enriching Celebration with Your Family
The 12 unshakable truths you will discover throughout this handbook are rooted in the Old Testament, even though most of the passages we refer to are in the New Testament. And to help you instill these truths in your family we have adapted three Old Testament Jewish festivals and made them into mealtime celebrations.
For centuries Jewish families have gathered around the dinner table to celebrate those festivals God had ordained for them. Many Christians today are realizing the benefits and richness of these festivals in aiding us to better understand the meaning of God’s plan for each of us. So to help you impart the truths of the faith to your family and friends, you will find in the appendixes to this handbook a Judeo-Christian Feast of Unleavened Bread (Passover), Feast of Harvest (Pentecost), and Feast of Tabernacles. These three mealtime events focus on celebrating the God of relationship, redemption, and restoration, which are all found in the sweeping story from creation to God taking on humanity to Christ’s return. We have provided you detailed instructions on how to plan and execute these mealtime celebrations. Take advantage of them.
The development of these festivals has been greatly aided by the help of Harvey Diamond and his “Pathways to Glory” interactive devotional. Harvey has done a phenomenal job of explaining all the feasts of the Old Testament and their relevance to today and to the Christian life. Visit www.ariseinglory.org and click on “Pathways to Glory Relational Devotional.” You will benefit greatly from Harvey’s teachings and insights.
Our Prayer for You
As you begin your journey, we pray that you will come to know God more deeply, understand your place within him and the world more clearly. And above all, we pray that God will empower you more fully to live out your biblical worldview so you can more effectively impart the living truth of Jesus Christ to your family and those around you. We live in a scary world dominated by pain and suffering, sin and heartache, war and death. But we are not to fear the evils of this world. The only one we are to fear is God himself (see Matthew 10:28). We serve a conquering God who is working in you and me to transform the present kingdom of this world into the future kingdom of God. It is an honor to engage in this mission with you. Let the journey of unlocking the unshakable truth of God begin.
REVIEW:
I personally enjoy reading apologetics books. The Unshakable Truth: How You Can Experience the 12 Essentials of a Relevant Faith is another gem I now own :). Josh McDowell is a respectable apologist who has been effectively and uncompromisingly defending the faith and has taught others to do the same. He and his son, Sean, wrote this handbook together to equip Christians with the solid truth on the essentials of the Christian faith and thus help them understand why they believe what they believe and to be able to pass the faith and Biblical worldview to the next generation. The book covers the 12 unshakable truths of Christianity:God Exists, God's Word, Original Sin, God Became Human, Christ's Atonement for Sin, Justification through Faith, Living the Transformed Life, Jesus' Bodily Resurrection, The Trinity, God's Kingdom, The Church, The Return of Christ. The authors also include family/small-group activities for the Redemption Celebration, the Revelation Celebration, and the Restoration Celebration, based on Feast of Unleavened Bread (Passover), Feast of Harvest (Pentecost), and Feast of Tabernacles. This book is a wonderful tool that will help you apply what you know about God and His Word (theology and doctrine) to how you live as a light and salt in the world. A Relevant Faith!
It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old...or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!
Andrew is the creator, writer, and illustrator of the Lost Sheep series. Way back in 1989 as a young Bible college student, Andrew was asked to give the dreaded “children’s talk” at a large church. Andrew possessed one talent: he could draw sheep. He bought some overhead projector sheets and drew up the story of Cecil and the Lost Sheep. T he congregation loved it, so Andrew continued to draw stories to use with kids and adults. Other students, pastors, and teachers started borrowing the stories. 
