Category Archives: Book Reviews

Book Review – Delighting in the Trinity (Tim Chester)

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After thoroughly enjoying reading “Total Church“, I decided to get another book from the same author, and the subject of the Trinity was one that I felt I needed a better grasp of. In it Tim Chester seeks to explain the doctrine of the Trinity and show why it is such good news.

He starts off by noting that this has been something of a neglected doctrine, perhaps in part because it can be difficult to explain. However, though it may be a mystery, it is not an absurdity – God is not three in the same sense in which he is one.

The book is broken up into three sections (nice!). The first section deals with the Biblical foundations for the doctrine of the Trinity. He starts with the unity of God, and the Shema, before moving on to consider some Scriptures that speak of the plurality of God, in particular demonstrating the divinity of Jesus and the Holy Spirit. Finally, he shows how the oneness and plurality of God come together at the cross, and help us make sense of the atonement.

The next section deals with historical developments, starting with the early church, and moving right through to modern times. This is where things can get a little technical, but Chester does an admirable job of making it as straightforward as possible. There is a good explanation of the different emphases of the eastern and western churches, and Calvin is presented as providing a synthesis of these approaches. In more recent times, Chester highlights the contributions of Barth, Rahner, Moltmann, and Zizioulas, amongst others.

The final section applies the doctrine of the Trinity to the areas of revelation, salvation, humanity and mission. He draws on Barth to show that revelation is trinitarian – the Spirit enables us to see in the Son the revelation of the Father. In an excellent chapter on salvation, he explains a variety of theories of the atonement (substitution, moral influence, dramatic), and affirms that all have their place in a multi-faceted view of the atonement. However, he argues that the penal substitution model is primary because it is truly Trinitarian – because it presents salvation not as a transaction between God and humanity, or between God and Satan, but a transaction within God himself.)

The chapter on the Trinity and humanity is also helpful. He draws on a societal model of the Trinity, to show that it is in the Trinity that we see the diversity in unity that should characterise human society. This vision of humanity stands in stark contrast to modern day individualism, and the pressures towards homogeneity. Our identity as human persons, is found not in our independence, but in our relationships, just as the members of the Godhead are persons in relationship.

The final chapter on mission draws out some of the differences between the Christian understanding of the Triune God, and the Muslim understanding of God. The Christian community is called to be a demonstration of the nature of the Triune God.

I feel I have benefited hugely from reading this book, as it has clarified my understanding of the doctrine of the Trinity, and also helped me to see how it relates to so many aspects of Christian doctrine and practice.

Update: This book is now available in second edition from the Good Book Company.

Book Review – The Message of Jonah (Rosemary Nixon)

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This is one of the most recent additions to the Bible Speaks Today series. It immediately stands out for its size. 220 pages for just four chapters of Jonah, which is significantly longer than Kidner’s contribution on the 52 chapters of Jeremiah. It averages out at just over four pages per verse.

There are effectively two introductions to the book. The first is a general introduction, and the second examines the literary genre of Jonah. Nixon starts by examining the history of interpretation of Jonah. She compares and contrasts the book with the other Old Testament prophets, and also contrasts Jonah himself with Jesus. Under literary genre she points out that chapter two is almost entirely poetic, and argues that we do not necessarily have to take the whole account as historical – it may be some sort of parable. Having said this, she appears to hold that Jonah was a real person, who really went and preached to Ninevah, and presumably really boarded a ship to Tarshish, so I was left a little unclear as to how exactly she combines a historical / parabolic interpretation.

One of the main reasons for the length of the commentary is that Nixon will regularly take a word or theme found in the text and explore where else it is used in Scripture. Thus there is actually commentary on much more than the text of Jonah in here. For example, there is a discussion on Cain in the land of Nod, as well as word studies on “swallowed”, “walk” and “message”.

Jonah’s problem was that cooperating with God in the salvation of his enemies was anathema to him. To go to Ninevah, the evil city, was for Jonah, to go to hell. Jonah is an image of resistance to God.

On chapter 2, Nixon points out a chiastic structure to the Psalm. Though Jonah had been ‘saved’ by the fish, in its belly he was hardly better than dead. Similarly, the people of Israel at this time had been ‘saved’ by forming an alliance with Assyria. Thus Jonah becomes a parable of Israel running from God towards their death. After being vomited up, Jonah has been delivered, but not transformed.

In chapter 3, Nixon sees another chiasm, and points out that God does not negotiate mutually agreeable callings with us. His call is ‘unreasonable’. In the fourth chapter, we slowly come to see Jonah’s real problem – he thought God was weak on sin and justice. He appears as a legalist reacting against the salvation by grace alone that God had offered to the Ninevites.

The commentary closes with an appendix considering the theme of repentance. The repentance of Ninevah was effectively a judgement on the lack of repentance in Israel. Nixon concludes by examining Paul’s anguish over the unbelief of Israel in Rom 9-11.

Despite being initially put off by what appeared to be a long-winded volume by BST standards, I thoroughly enjoyed working through this book. The slower pace allows a lot of interesting themes and angles to be pondered and explored. She even cites a few poems in between chapters. The end result is a commentary that not only sheds light on the book of Jonah but develops several key biblical themes, especially God’s indiscriminate grace. There were one or two places where I wondered whether she was hinting at a universalist position, but it was no more than a hint.

Overall I would say that if you have the time to read it, this will be a very profitable read, and will be especially useful for preachers looking for fresh ways to present one of the most well-known stories in the Bible.

Book Review – The Message of Galatians (John Stott)

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This is one of the first volumes in the Bible Speaks Today series, and was originally published 40 years ago in 1968. Unlike later volumes in the series, there is no introduction. Stott dives right in and begins his exposition of the text. Naturally, he covers the issues like authorship, dating, recipients, and themes along the way, but not in so much detail as a typical commentary might.

Paul is writing, he argues, to the churches in South Galatia to defend his apostleship and his gospel, both of which have come under attack from false teachers. Stott often points out that Paul still has many modern day opponents who deny his authority and reject his gospel message.

Each chapter of Galatians is dealt with in three or four chapters in the commentary. Stott sees Galatians as more or less falling into three main parts which roughly correspond to two chapters each. The first (Gal 1,2) deals with a question of authority. Paul defends his authority based on his apostleship. Those who are familiar with Stott’s writings will know how keen he is to emphasise the uniqueness of the 12 apostles, and his denial of any kind of apostolic succession or modern day apostles, both of which he would view as challenging the apostolic authority of Scripture.

The second section (Gal 3,4) deals with a question of salvation. The gospel is presented as salvation through the death of Jesus Christ, and is received by faith alone. He sees the false teachers as proponents of salvation through keeping the law as a necessary ‘supplement’ to what Christ has done. He shows how the law of Moses ("thou shalt…") is contrasted to God’s promises to Abraham ("I will…"), and therefore the gospel is analogous to the promise, not the law. He regularly quotes Luther in this section.

The significance of the law is to show us our need of the gospel. Stott argues that this step cannot be bypassed – we must let the law show us our sin, before we can understand what the gospel is. Come to Moses first, and let Moses lead us to Christ.

The third section (Gal 5,6) deals with a question of holiness. Up until now, Paul’s message of Christian liberty may lead some to assume that anything goes in terms of behaviour. But liberty does not mean license. Stott argues that Christian freedom is primarily a freedom of conscience – we are not guilty before God. But freedom from law does not mean freedom from keeping the law – our sanctification involves us fulfilling the law, which Paul says is summed up in the command to love your neighbour (Gal 5:14). Similarly, we are called to fulfil the law of Christ (Gal 6:2).

Stott argues that the Christian has a conflict between what he is by nature (the flesh) and what he is by rebirth. In both Gal 5 and Rom 7 Paul presents walking by the Spirit as the solution to this conflict. We have nailed our flesh to the cross, but we need to keep it there until it dies. He describes holiness as a harvest. Paul speaks in Gal 6:8 about whether we sow to the flesh or to the Spirit. Holiness then is not automatic, but depends on where and how we sow.

Although the book has no introduction, a summary section at the end reiterates the main themes of the book and its key points for application. There is also a study guide at the end.

As with John Stott’s other contributions to the Bible Speaks Today series, this volume comes highly recommended. Due to its age, he does not address the question of the "New Perspective on Paul" (in particular, were the false teachers really teaching salvation by works?), and perhaps his approach to the issue of modern day apostles would be tempered by some of the clarifications that have been made by groups such as newfrontiers (that modern day apostles are not seen as having an authority equivalent to the 12, who were unique in that sense). I also felt that he could have explored more what it means to walk in the Spirit. Stott makes several comments throughout the book to state that the church are the inheritors of the Old Testament promises, and are in full continuity with the Old Testament believers, which is another key theme found in Galatians.

The strength of this commentary is an uncompromising proclamation of the message of salvation by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. Having laid this foundation, Stott then goes on to show how exhortation to holiness is not in conflict with this message. It will prove a valuable resource for anyone wanting to study or teach through the book of Galatians.

Book Review – Bind Us Together (John Fleming)

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The full title of this book is “Bind us Together … to be the church Jesus really wants”, and is subtitled “The restoration movement and its message for the church”. It grabbed my attention for two reasons. First, it offers a history of the Restoration movement in the UK, something that few other books have done (Andrew Walker’s “Restoring the Kingdom” being the most notable exception. And second, the author is from Southampton, where I live, so I was able to visit him to buy my copy and talk about it with him. John Fleming is a member of New Community Church in Southampton, a church which had its roots in the restoration movement in the seventies.

The book is broken into three main sections. The first offers a history of restoration in the UK, and although briefer than Andrew Walker’s book, it is perhaps broader, mentioning a wider variety of new church groups that have come out of this movement. He talks about the original desire not to create a new denomination but that restoration would become a focal point for unity amongst believers.

He traces the differences of opinion between restoration and “renewal” (mainly to do with ecclesiology) and quite perceptively draws out the key emphases of the early movement as well as those issues that became contentious.

After reviewing the various new church “streams” that have emerged from restorationism, a fairly lengthy chapter tells the personal story of the author, in particular focusing on three churches he was part of. The first was George Tarleton’s church “the Cong” in Chilford. The second was Kendal Avenue Pentecostal in Southampton. The main focus though is on the third – Community Church, also in Southampton. This section will be of particular interest to all those who like myself know this church and have lived in Southampton.

He goes on to examine the decline of many restorationist groups, due to disillusionment in some cases, and the vision becoming blurred in others. He notes that the emerging church takes a very different approach to ecclesiology, favouring being ‘experimental’ as opposed to the belief that churches can be built according to a New Testament “pattern”. He notes that many restorationist churches have embraced the idea of “cell church” but are actually becoming more “program based” in practice.

Part 2 of the book is entitled “What is the church?” In it he examines the Alpha course teaching on the church, before embarking on a tour of the Bible, starting in the Old Testament, moving on to Jesus, and then the book of Acts. In many ways, this section is almost like a second book. In places it felt like little more than a retelling of the story of Acts, but he did try to develop a model for church leadership based on the example of the early church.

The third part of the book is called “the way ahead”. Fleming asks “how is the church doing”? In particular his concern is that the New Testament teaches that there should not be many churches in a locality, but that there is just one church in a locality. Clearly we are a long way from this ideal. Even “churches together” initiatives are often little more than Christians “holding hands over the fences”, without any real desire to see those fences come down.

While he is generally very complementary about restorationist groups of churches such as newfrontiers, he is disappointed at their lack of vision to work with other local churches. For example, they would rather plant a new church into an area, than send people to join an existing church there. Much of the latter stages of the book could be described almost as John Fleming thinking out loud about the challenges associated with Christians joining together with all other believers in their locality to be the “church together”, not just “churches together”.

As an appendix to the book there is an essay from 1971 by George Tarleton entitled “glory in the church”, setting forth a restorationist vision of what the church should be.

It is hard to evaluate a book with three distinct parts. Section one is a great read for anyone interested in the story of the UK restorationist movement. Section two is useful perhaps as an introductory level overview of the Bible teaching and story of the development of the church. And section three is provocative in that the challenge for local churches to join together that is rarely heard amongst evangelicals, who tend to be pragmatic rather than idealistic with regards to ecumenism. The book is written in an informal, almost conversational style, and perhaps would have benefited from the second section being condensed considerably (or published separately). But despite having read over a dozen books on the church in the last year, this one managed to find some ground that had not been covered by the more prominent authors on ecclesiology.

It is not necessarily that easy to get hold of a copy. I can give you the author’s email address if you ask in the comments.

Book Review – The Message of Amos (Alec Motyer)

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Brief Summary

Published in 1974, this is one of the first volumes in the Bible Speaks Today series. It is an 208 page exposition of the book of Amos, with a short introduction. It is subtitled, "the Day of the Lion", drawing on Amos’ striking image of God as a fearsome Lion roaring out before he pounces on his prey.

The Introduction

Amos is introduced to us as a prophet living in similar days to our own – a society of affluence, exploitation and greed for profit. It was also a religious society, yet one that didn’t really care how far standards had fallen. Amos was effectively a prophet of doom – the people assumed they had privilege and security when in fact they were in peril.

One of the key themes of the book is the importance of ‘evidences’ to accompany the claim to be God’s people. Religion is repulsive and useless if not verified by evidences. Motyer does not believe though that Amos was prophesying an end to the covenant, but rather that the curses of the covenant were coming into effect.

The Commentary

The commentary takes the form of an exposition rather than merely an exegesis of the text, and Motyer unashamedly takes Amos’ message to be directly relevant to Christians today.

As he goes through the first chapter of Amos, which starts pronouncing judgments on the foreign nations around Israel, he shows how God judges these nations according to how they have treated their fellow man, irrespective of the fact that they have not been recipients of the same special relation as Israel.

But these judgements on the surrounding nations are in fact a noose of judgment that is tightening around their own necks. Israel’s sins are revealed as covetousness, indifference, oppression and self-importance – the very same sins the surrounding nations have been condemned for.

Motyer tackles the subject of "vengeance" within the covenant – yes there are blessings associated with the covenant, but there are also curses. He cites the churches in Revelation as examples that this truth still holds valid even in the New Testament era.

On Amos 5, there is an interesting section dealing with the way the Israelites flocked to visit shrines at Bethel, Gilgal, and Beersheba. These were places that God had met with the patriarchs, and there was an almost superstitious assumption that by visiting these places, they would meet God. But they were returning from their pilgrimage unchanged. They needed to make God himself, not Bethel, their place of pilgrimage.

Ultimately, Motyer shows us that Amos is speaking to a people whose religion was simply one of self-pleasing and pretence. The lack of justice (right behaviour in respect to fellow man) in society was evidence of the shallowness of their religion.

Strengths

The main strength of this exposition is the way that the challenge of Amos’ message is taken seriously for today, both at the level of the church and for society in general. He cites global corporations forcing small local companies out of business and our lack of care for the environment as examples of the same kind of selfishness that characterised those who Amos spoke to.

Weaknesses

Not a criticism as such but, one subject that will probably raise questions in the minds of readers is the relationship between law and grace, and how this applies to those in the New Covenant. Motyer does tackle this subject, and talks of the "law of grace" and the "grace of law". It is obviously a subject on which there are a spectrum of opinions amongst Christians, but I think he maintains a good balance here that does justice to the message of Amos without ignoring the rest of the biblical witness on grace. Here is a quote concerning Amos’ vision of the plumb-line to give a flavour for his approach:

When the Lord draws near with the plumb-line … [it is] to declare condemned all who try to live by law and forget grace, to declare equally condemned those who have sought after the grace of the sacrifices but who have forgotten the righteousness and the justice of the law, but to accept all those who have constructed the fabric their lives according to the horizontal foundation of grace and according to the vertical erectness of law. The plumb-line will try such and pass them as approved.

Why Buy It?

As usual with the Bible Speaks Today series, this is well suited for those who want to personally study or teach their way through a book of the Bible. It is valuable to have the necessary background (historical, cultural, geographical etc) explained where relevant so you can properly grasp the force of the message of Amos.

Book Review – NIBC Acts (David Williams)

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Brief Summary

A 455 page commentary on the book of Acts in the NIBC series, which is based on the New International Version. The focus of this commentary is on explaining more fully the meaning of the text, and providing the appropriate historical and contextual information.

The Introduction

He begins by quoting J B Phillips – the church we see in Acts is "the church as it was meant to be". The introduction is a fairly concise 17 pages, and presents Luke as the author and discusses his purposes in writing. Luke is not interested in writing a general history of the church, but in following the route of the gospel from Jerusalem to Rome. Williams takes up the challenge of defending Luke’s historicity in a number of places throughout the commentary, arguing that Luke writes with integrity.

The Commentary

The commentary itself does not include the biblical text, but where words or phrases are commented on they are included in bold. He does not often spend time on the Greek text, but is quite thorough in providing the historical and geographical background needed to fully appreciate what was going on.

The style of this commentary is not an exposition, so he does not often enter into discussion on the theological matters raised, but occasionally will add a comment (sometimes more freely in the footnotes).

He argues that the visit of Gal 2:1-10 is the same as that of Acts 15:1-29. He claims that Stephen believed the building of the temple to be a mistake – God had never intended for there to be a temple. On the matter of the baptism in the Holy Spirit, he sees this as a once-for-all historical event not to be repeated.

Strengths

The main strength is that he is thorough but has a good sense of what material to relegate to the footnotes, which avoids the commentary becoming too longwinded.

Weaknesses

While it is good at what it attempts to achieve (explain the meaning of the text), the real lack for me is reflection on theology. He seems reticent to enter into too many theological debates. To be fair, this may well be due to the nature of the commentary series, but with hindsight, it wasn’t the most thrilling commentary to read cover to cover (as I have found with a few other Acts commentaries!).

Why Buy It?

As I have said already, it is not the best for reading right through, but it will serve a purpose as a reference book. However, I would probably recommend the TNTC commentary on Acts by I. Howard Marshall or the NICNT commentary on Acts by F. F. Bruce ahead of it. My favourite Acts commentary remains John Stott’s "The Message of Acts", which has a much stronger emphasis on application (even though I don’t agree with all his conclusions). It might also be worth checking out the recently released Revised Expositor’s Commentary on Acts by Richard Longenecker and Darrell Bock’s new commentary on Acts.

Book Review – Dynamic Diversity (Bruce Milne)

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Subtitled, "the new humanity church for today and tomorrow", the central thesis of this book is that God intends for the church to display his glory through the unity in diversity of its members, and that therefore local churches should be actively seeking to promote diversity.

Bruce Milne begins his case by reminding us that already there is a great "worship wave" made up of people from all kinds of diverse cultures and backgrounds as each Sunday, Christians from every part of the planet meet together for worship. But he is not content for this staggering diversity to remain true only of the universal church – it must also be demonstrated in the local church.  He argues that if we can create a "new humanity" church, uniting people of all backgrounds, then this will have tremendous missional attractiveness.

The assertion of this book is that all Christian congregations, everywhere, are called to be … bridging-places, centres of reconciliation, where all the major diversities which separate human beings are overcome through the supernatural presence of the Holy Spirit.

It becomes apparent early on that this is not some kind of "politically correct" manifesto, but that Milne wants to root his message in Scripture. Racial diversity is a key theme in the book, but he sees many other diversities as equally important. He is careful to point out that it is not an unprincipled diversity though – we don’t blindly accept unbiblical doctrine or behaviour just in the name of "diversity".

In the early parts of the book, he sets out to make a solid biblical case for the importance of diversity within our local churches, and emphasises that this is a doctrine whose "time has come" as we live in increasingly culturally diverse communities. Churches therefore need to self-consciously set out to reflect the diversities of their surrounding communities.

… the calling of every local church, everywhere, if it is to be faithful to its New Testament roots, is, among other things, to be a community of reconciliation in which all the primary divisions and polarities of its surrounding culture are confronted and find resolution under the gracious reign of the Lord Jesus Christ.

He shows from the example of Jesus’ welcoming of women, children, and Gentiles that his intention was to create a new humanity that embraced those marginalised or considered disreputable. The Pentecost event shows the Spirit bridging racial,  gender and generational diversity.

We have no mandate to gather Christian communities, claiming Jesus’ name, that are surrounded by walls of exclusivity, whether or race, colour or ethnicity, gender, age or generation, social or economic status, mental and physical well-being; or communities entirely confined to those who come with impeccable histories of moral and spiritual propriety.

He warns against not just racial prejudices but cultural and class prejudices. "To reject a fellow believer is to reject Christ." The principle of diversity in unity is not simply a nice idea, but is a reflection of the very nature of the Triune God who is diversity in unity.

A few of chapters deal with some of the practical implications of building diverse churches, which are scattered with stories from his own culturally diverse church in Canada.

He is strongly critical of mono-cultural churches, and advocates involving a wide diversity of people within the worship service. Even when there are immigrant communities who do not speak the local language well, he encourages making a concerted effort to include and help them so that all can join together for worship. He even insists that where small groups structures are used, these too should be stratified, and also encourages a greater use of one-to-one discipleship, especially of new converts.

Sociologists claim that homogenous groups are stronger than diverse ones, and therefore are able to grow better, but Milne says that despite this, it is essential that we adopt a biblical rather than a pragmatic model. Ultimately, the only way we can make this succeed is if we can love one another with "grace-love" (agape), which itself requires a supernatural work of God and a death to ourselves.

As far as Milne is concerned, diversity is not optional for the local church. He ends the book with a stunning "dream" of a church that is a loving and accepting community made up of people from all kinds of diverse backgrounds. There is no denying that such a community would bring great glory to God, but it is hard work, and it is perhaps too easy for us to settle for the somewhat easier option of building church out of "people like me".

This book comes as a timely prophetic call to the church to be intentional about welcoming into the church all kinds of people. It provides theological foundations with very practical and down-to-earth application, and most of all builds faith and stirs a vision for the local church as the place people look to for unity amidst diversity in their local context.

Book Review – Stop Dating the Church (Joshua Harris)

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This book has to win the prize for the most innovative title of all the books I have read so far on the subject of church. Joshua Harris made his name with a book entitled “I Kissed Dating Goodbye” which argues for “biblical courtship” over against the custom of “dating”. In this book, he uses “dating” as a metaphor for the approach that many Christians have to church – ‘trying out’ churches, but without any intention of commitment. In other words, we have a consumer mentality towards the Church. The point of this book is to challenge Christians to stop dating the Church and “fall in love with the family of God”.

The church is earth’s single best place – God’s specially designed place – to start over, to grow and to change for the glory of God

He makes it particularly clear that he is talking about commitment to a local church. It is not enough to claim to be a part of the universal church if we have no vital connection with other Christians.

If you and I identify with and love the idea of church, we must consider how we can identify with and love an actual church

He reminds us that the Church is “the bride of Christ”. Jesus loves his Church, and we should do the same. He explains from Ephesians 3 that the gospel is not just about reconciliation with God, but with one another. He does not view the existence of many denominations as being a incompatible with unity, but calls us to reject a denominational spirit.

The strongest argument I know for why you and I should love and care about the Church is that Jesus does. The greatest motivation we could ever find for being passionately committed to the Church is that Jesus is passionately committed to the Church.

He explains why we need to be part of a local church. He cites John Piper who says “Sanctification is a community project”. He warns against the sins of selfishness, pride and a critical spirit that can keep us from community. We should see our church’s faults as an opportunity to love and serve. “Stop complaining about the faults of the church, and become part of the solution.”

We’ve believed the lie that we’ll be happier the less we sacrifice or give of ourselves and or time. But the more we clutch our time, money, and comfort and selfishly refuse to give to our church, the less we receive back.

He then goes on to list the ten most important considerations when choosing a church. He strongly emphasises faithful teaching of the Word and proclamation of the gospel. He also looks for a commitment to evangelism, serving, discipline and community. The omission that many of my friends have noted is that of the charismatic element. Maybe he was trying to be non-controversial and reach a broader audience with his message (and this message certainly does deserve a broad audience), but nonetheless it is a little disappointing that nothing was mentioned of the importance of an openness to the work and gifts of the Spirit.

There is a chapter devoted to Sunday, in which he calls on us to prepare ourselves before the Sunday meeting, because we should place a high priority on the gathering together. These days we are so attuned to the danger of “legalism”, that perhaps what he says in this chapter (for example, going to bed earlier on Saturday night) might be rejected without due consideration. That would be a shame. We might see more of the gifts of the Spirit in our meetings, if we arrived ready and prepared to meet with God, rather than barely awake because we watched television into the early hours of the morning. We also need to stop judging the quality of the worship and preacher, and be ready to receive what God has to say to us.

Most of the books I have read on the subject of church have been aimed primarily at leaders, and those affecting the direction of their churches, but this one is aimed squarely at ‘ordinary’ Christians. Its seven short chapters could be read in about 10 minutes each, so it should not be intimidating towards those who are not used to reading a lot. Joshua Harris has written a compelling book, and giving a copy to someone who is on the fringe of their church, or is church-hopping, may prove very beneficial to them.

Check out this video about the book here.

Book Review – Body Beautiful (Melvin Tinker & Nathan Buttery)

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Despite what the title might conjure up in your mind, this is actually another book on the church. The subtitle is "Recovering the Biblical View of the Church". It is written by a couple of Anglican Ministers in Hull, and their approach is to simply take 11 short New Testament passages relating to the church, and briefly expound them.

The book is 125 pages long, and fairly accessible. It was perhaps written with small-group study in mind, as it has a section of question for further discussion. The aim of the book is to present the Biblical model of the church and challenge us as to whether we view church in the same way.

The authors are particularly keen to emphasise the importance of the Word of God in the church, being the basis for what we do, and central to the life of the church. The Word of God, or the Gospel, is the ‘rock’ on which the church is built. Expository preaching and Bible ministry are seen as key to a healthy church.

They examine the "marks of a church" from Acts 2:42-47 arguing that success should not simply be measured in terms of numbers attending, but in being a learning, caring, committed and growing church.

There are two chapters looking at passages from Ephesians on the Call of the Church and Unity within the church. In a chapter on worship, they criticise Catholic and charismatic worship as being "BC" (before Christ) worship – as they go through a "mediator" of a priest or worship leader who draws us near to God. Rather they emphasise that the whole of life is to be worship, and worship should be defined as "engaging with God".

There is a helpful section on prayer. A praying church is a God-centred church and the their prayers will be God-centred. Prayer should be our natural reaction. If it is not, we are not a God-centred people.

In a chapter on the influence of the church, they encourage Christians to engage politically, but more importantly, to make a difference by being different where they are. Christians are called to be a people who leave a blessing wherever we go.

… central to all of God’s plans and purposes for his entire universe is his church.

Overall, this is a very helpful short book on the church. In perhaps a few places, as a charismatic, I might disagree with some of their statements, and a couple of the illustrations were a bit dated or Anglican specific. But on the whole, it is well worth a read, particularly if you don’t want to tackle something too long.

Book Review – The Message of Zechariah (Barry Webb)

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Brief Summary

A 186 page commentary / exposition of the book of Zechariah. It is part of the Bible Speaks Today series which generally follows an expositional format – not just explaining the Scriptures but applying it.  The subtitle is “Your Kingdom Come” and the whole exposition of the book takes a kingdom perspective.

The Introduction

The introduction is a fairly generous 30 pages, and Webb shows that the structure of the book is eight visions followed by two oracles. He sums up the main theme by saying “it is a book about the future coming of the kingdom of God, and the need to live now in the light of it”. He also points out sub-themes of repentance and cleansing as well as an key theme of the Messiah running through the book. He puts Zechariah’s prophecy into its historical context, but also is very careful to show how his message is directly applicable to us, as we have the same concern to see God’s kingdom come. He highlights how regularly the NT writers draw from the book of Zechariah.

The Commentary

The commentary itself is able to devote a couple of pages to each small section of Zechariah which gives enough space to explain and apply the text adequately. Webb generally avoids detailed discussions of historical context or Hebrew grammar, and is cautious in offering his interpretations of some of the more obscure visions.

He shows how there is a progression in the visions of the first six chapters that culminate in God’s judgment and rule over all the earth. He acknowledges that chapter 7 marks a new beginning, but argues that it is not unrelated to what had gone before. In chapters 10 and 11, he draws out a major theme of leadership – true shepherds are those who trust in God and lead others to do the same.

… it is impossible to be in relationship with God unless we are prepared to be ruled by him.

When he comes to chapter 13, he explains the links to Jesus, and there is also a brief excursus that deals in more detail with the use of Zechariah in the New Testament. He argues that the Old Testament prophecies concerning the kingdom of God are fulfilled in the events of Jesus’ life – his birth, ministry, death, resurrection, ascension and return. Hence there are elements of kingdom prophecy in Zechariah yet to be fulfilled.

Strengths

For me, the great strength of this volume is how he consistently draws us to the Christological and New Covenant implications and interpretation of the book. He takes what can be a perplexing book, and brings out a very challenging and practical message of the kingdom of God.

Weaknesses

Nothing to complain of. It was the right length. It obviously isn’t an academic treatment of Zechariah, and also those looking for detailed and speculative explanations of every last detail of the visions will be disappointed. But it ranks as one of my favourites in the BST series.

Why Buy It?

As with pretty much all the BST volumes, this is ideal if you are personally studying or planning to preach or teach on the book of Zechariah.