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This Week’s Book Notes

By Matthew Barrett

King’s Cross: The Story of the World in the Life of Jesus. By Timothy Keller. New York: Dutton, 2011.

When we think of various theologians and pastors engaging unbelievers with the truth of the gospel, Tim Keller, who ministers in New York City, comes to mind immediately. Keller is founder of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Manhattan. He is well-known for his New York Times bestseller, The Reason for God. Other books he is known for include Generous Justice, Counterfeit Gods, and The Prodigal God. In his most recent book, King’s Cross: The Story of the World in the Life of Jesus, Keller takes the reader on a journey through the gospel of Mark. Keller is pulling from his many sermons in which he preached through Mark’s gospel in order to give an account of the life and ministry of Jesus. As the title reveals, the gospel is at the center of Keller’s book, as he explains why Christ came, died on the cross, and rose again from the grave. The book is not merely meant for those who are believers, but for those who are skeptics. Newsweek has called Keller the “C.S. Lewis for the twenty-first century.” It is hard to imagine anyone as gifted as Lewis when it comes to writing to the skeptic, but nevertheless Keller is engaging the skeptic as Lewis did and, in Lewis like fashion, he is doing so in a way that glorifies the historical Jesus.

Mind Your Faith: A Student’s Guide to Thinking & Living Well. By David A. Horner. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2011.

It was my second year of college and there I was, sitting in a classroom at Biola University. The teacher: David Horner, D.Phil., University of Oxford. Expecting a boring, academic professor, I got instead a riveting, enthusiastic Christian scholar in both philosophy and biblical studies, who influenced my understanding of the Christian faith in a profound way. In his new book, Mind Your Faith, David Horner puts his years of experience in the classroom on paper in order to help college students go to college without losing their mind, faith, or character. But Horner’s aim in the book is not merely to help students survive college but to thrive within it as a believer. Horner especially seeks to aid the common “crisis of faith” experience that so many Christian college students experience when they, sometimes for the first time, encounter ideas that threaten the Christian faith. Horner shows that, contrary to popular opinion, Christianity is not stifling but “very much at home in the world of ideas.” He writes, “Many of the leading philosophers, scientists and artists of the Western intellectual tradition-Augustine, Aquinas, Johannes Kepler and Jonathan Edwards, to name a few-have been devout followers of Jesus. Indeed, it is difficult to overestimate the intellectual and educational influence of Christianity on the world. More than any other institution in history, the Christian church has promoted universal literacy and education, started schools, and put languages into writing.” Horner points to the University of Oxford, where he completed his graduate studies, showing how this university was actually “founded with the explicit aim of forming a community of Christian scholars to pursue knowledge in all areas of thought, informed by the light of Christian understanding.” The same could be said of other universities such as Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Columbia and Dartmouth. Today, however, evangelical Christianity is viewed with suspicion in many of these universities. Horner is an excellent guide for the college student seeking not only to survive the university experience, but thrive in it as a follower of Christ.

The World and the Word: An Introduction to the Old Testament. By Eugene H. Merrill, Mark F. Rooker, and Michael A. Grisanti. Nashville: B&H, 2011.

We need more good, evangelical books on the Old Testament. Whenever liberalism starts to seep into the cracks of our evangelical colleges and seminaries, you can be sure the Old Testament departments are the first to experience the assault. In The World and the Word, Eugene Merrill, Professor of Old Testament at Dallas Theological Seminary, Mark Rooker, Professor of Old Testament and Hebrew at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, and Michael Grisanti, Professor of Old Testament at The Master’s Seminary, come together to give students an introduction to the Old Testament. Unquestionably, this book will become a textbook in many Old Testament college and seminary classes. The authors work their way through the Pentateuch, the historical books (Joshua, Judges, etc.), the prophets, and the poetic books (Job, Psalms, etc.), giving the reader a better understanding of the storyline of Scripture and the context in which each book was written. Also helpful is the “For Further Study” bibliography at the end of each chapter, where the student is given a list of books for future study. One should also not miss Parts 1, 2, and 3. In Part 1 the authors explore the world of the Old Testament (historical setting, cultural world, Ancient Near Eastern context). Part 2 investigates the actual text: its composition, canonicity, and transmission. Part 3 outlines the different approaches to studying the Old Testament. Overall, this introduction appears to be a valuable textbook for students.



Matthew Barrett (Ph.D., The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary) is the founder and executive editor of Credo Magazine. Barrett has contributed book reviews and articles to various academic journals and he also writes at Blogmatics. He is married to Elizabeth and they have two daughters, Cassandra and Georgia. He is a member of Clifton Baptist Church in Louisville, KY.

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