Book Write-Up: The State of the Evangelical Mind

Todd C. Ream, Jerry Pattengale, and Christopher J. Devers. The State of the Evangelical Mind: Reflections on the Past, Prospects for the Future. IVP Academic, 2018. See here to purchase the book.

Mark Noll is an evangelical scholar and historian. His 1994 book, The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind, lamented that there was not much of an evangelical mind. What he meant was that there was a dearth of scholarly engagement and production from a distinctly evangelical perspective. The State of the Evangelical Mind reflects on Noll’s thesis and asks where evangelicalism is now.

The book contains contributions from Mark Noll, Jo Anne Lyon, David C. Mehan, C. Donald Smedley, Timothy Larsen, Lauren F. Winner, James K.A. Smith, and Mark Galli. The book’s editors, Todd C. Ream, Jerry Pattengale, and Christopher J. Devers, write the book’s introduction. The common view in the book seems to be that evangelicalism has made progress, yet there is substantial room for improvement. Evangelical support for Trump concerns one author, for example, as does the bestselling status of Tim Tebow’s book among evangelicals.

The best contribution, in my opinion, is that of C. Donald Smedley. Smedley advances a bold critique of Noll’s thesis. Noll says there is a scandal of the evangelical mind, Smedley contends, yet Noll marginalizes contributions from the evangelical mind, such as apologetics. Noll also dismisses dispensationalism, though it is a Baconian approach to Scripture. Is Noll right that there is a scandal of the evangelical mind, or is Noll’s problem that the evangelical mind does not look as Noll wants it to look? Smedley speculates that Noll’s conclusions may be shaped by his own academic training, as he went from a Christian college to a secular graduate program. Evangelical students at secular colleges, however, find apologetics to be useful as they interact with non-Christian students, so they support that expression of the evangelical mind. Smedley raises important points, but, as I read my notes on Noll’s book, it seemed to me that Smedley did not engage some of Noll’s reasons for his conclusions. Noll was critical of Scottish Common Sense Realism, for instance, because it highly valued intuition, a development that Noll saw as contrary to evangelical intellect.

Timothy Larsen’s contribution is noteworthy because it explains why evangelicals, and really anyone, should value learning, rather than just seeing education as training for the mundane responsibilities of adulthood. Larsen also defends faith statements by Christian colleges, claiming that they do not obviate academic freedom because they have been changed over the years, at least at some Christian colleges.

James K.A. Smith’s contribution is not overly optimistic, for Smith seems to doubt that modern evangelicalism has much of a deep well from which to draw; modern non-denominational churches, for example, lack a deep historical connection. Christianity, however, is a deep well, and evangelicalism can draw from that. Whether Smith is correct on this is a good question. There have been thinkers who could be classified as evangelicals, such as Jonathan Edwards, so perhaps the evangelical well is not completely dry. For some thinkers, their exact classification may be difficult to define: are they evangelicals, or simply conservative Protestants?

Mark Galli offers a stirring praise for evangelicalism on account of its zeal and its emphasis on Jesus.

Some of the essays are dry, in that they mentioned names and fields and made rather obvious points. Still, they contain information that may be of interest to those who want to know more about where evangelicalism is in terms of scholarly endeavors. What I mention in the previous paragraphs is what I consider to be the most insightful, or at least the most thought-provoking, parts of the book.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher. My review is honest.

Church Write-Up: Loving Enemies and God Picking Up the Pieces

Here is my Church Write-Up about this morning’s LCMS service.

Two of our texts were Genesis 45:3-8, 15 and Luke 6:27-38. Genesis 45:3-8, 15 is about Joseph revealing his identity to his brothers, who had sold him into slavery. Joseph reassures his brothers that this was part of God’s plan, to preserve the Israelites in the midst of famine. In Luke 6:27-38, Jesus exhorts people to love their enemies, to be merciful, and to give, not expecting anything in return.

A. The youth pastor talked with the kids about how Joseph’s brothers sold him into slavery in Egypt. If someone did something like that to you, he asked, would you want to do anything good for them down the road? One kid said “Yes,” and the youth pastor said, “Really? That’s good!” The other was hesitant, and the youth pastor replied, “Yeah, I understand.”

B. The pastor’s sermon revolved around the Genesis 45 text. He told four anecdotes. One was from when he was in high school, with some friends in the library. They were talking about a party that they had attended that weekend, and they were feeling guilty about some of the things that they did. They wondered if they were displeasing to God. One of the friends then asked why God would care so much about what they did. God is so big and has so many huge responsibilities running the universe, so why would God care about what they did at a party? This conversation has stayed with the pastor for forty-five years. I heard the pastor mention this comment in a previous sermon months ago, but this morning’s sermon set the context for that comment. In that previous sermon, the pastor cited that comment as an example of youthful immaturity: that teen questioned that God was concerned about our behavior, but the purpose of Lent is to remember that God indeed is concerned about what we do and how we are. In this morning’s sermon, the pastor cited that comment in another context: God is not just concerned about the big picture—-the galaxies, the nations, and the empires—-but about the small details of our everyday lives.

The second anecdote was about a young man who was struggling with things in life. He essentially expressed to the pastor Mackie’s conception of the problem of evil, only in his own words, and informed by his experience rather than a philosophy book: either God is not powerful enough to help him with his problems, or God is sufficiently powerful yet does not care enough to help.

The third anecdote was about a woman with brain cancer. She passed on, but she inspired people at that church with her faith.

The fourth anecdote was about airports. The pastor has just been on a trip to see his mother and grandchildren, and he had to go through airport security, taking off his belt and his watch, putting his computer and change through the procession, etc. He likened that to the Scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz: “they took this piece of me and threw it over there, and that piece of me and threw it over there!” A sign at the airport was entitled “recombobulation cenrer,” where people could put everything back together.

The pastor mentioned a song that kids learn: “My God is so great, so strong and so mighty, there’s nothing that God cannot do.” It focuses on God being great and in charge of the big picture (“the mountains are his, the rivers are his, the sun in the sky is his too, ooh, ooh”). But the song ends with “and you, and you, and you, and you.” God is concerned about each individual.

The pastor mentioned details about the Joseph story. Joseph was cast into prison for something he did not do. In those days, prisons were essentially dark holes where prisoners stayed; sometimes they were fed, sometimes not. Not much, if any, hope was there.

The pastor also said that God did not cause Joseph’s brothers to sell him into slavery, or Potiphar’s wife to falsely accuse him, but God was involved in the intricate details of Joseph’s dysfunctional family and experiences, picking up the pieces. The pastor made a similar point at Wednesday’s Bible study: God did not cause the famine in Egypt, but God worked good in the midst of it. I asked the pastor about verses that seem to suggest that God did cause the famine (Genesis 41:25, 28, 32).
Looking now at the Genesis 45 reading, I also question the view that God in the story did not cause Joseph’s brothers to sell him. In Genesis 45:5, 7-8, Joseph essentially says that God was the one who sent Joseph into Egypt. And how did Joseph get to Egypt? His brothers sold him.

The pastor’s interpretation is understandable from a pastoral perspective. Regarding that young man in the second anecdote, he had enough of a struggle accepting God’s apparent inactivity in the midst of his suffering. What would he think if he heard that God actually caused his sufferings? I would have a difficult time telling anyone that. I remember reading Randy Alcorn’s mammoth tome on suffering a while back, and Alcorn cited Exodus 4:11, in which God said to Moses: “Who hath made man’s mouth? or who maketh the dumb, or deaf, or the seeing, or the blind? have not I the LORD?” (KJV). Alcorn interpreted that to mean that God actually makes people with these disabilities, but God does so for God’s righteous purposes.

C. The Sunday School class engaged the two texts. Here were items that stood out to me:

—-After Joseph revealed his identity to their brothers, he asked them if his father was still alive. They then talked. They caught up. A lot of times, our differences make us into enemies, but we have more in common than we have differences. Joseph and his brothers had family in common.

—-We are to give, even if what goes around does not necessarily come around in this life. God wants us to be different from other people, who just love those who love them, but the reason for this is that God himself is different: God is merciful. God cannot help himself. It is who God is. The Greek word for mercy in the Luke 6 text refers to a visceral pity that comes from the core of one’s being, and that is what God has and what we should have. We do not do that to earn God’s favor, but due to what God already has done through the resurrection of Christ; another of our texts was I Corinthians 15, a chapter about Jesus’s resurrection. In light of that, we hear what Jesus says about how we should be.

—-The teacher shared three reasons for showing mercy that he found in a commentary. First, we extend the mercy of God to those who may not receive it otherwise. I could identity with that: this world can be an unforgiving place! Second, we deepen our own understanding, appreciation, and experience of God’s mercy: when we show mercy to those who do not deserve it, we remember God, who loves us even when we do not deserve it. Third, showing mercy serves as a model to the Christian community as to how it should be. Although we should show mercy, we should also make clear when something is wrong.

—-Back then, communities tended to take on the characteristics of their leader. God wants God’s community to take on God’s merciful and gracious characteristics.

—-The class was getting into definitions. Mercy is not giving people whatever bad that they deserve. Grace is giving people good that they do not deserve. Then we got into whether one can have pity or empathy without love, or mercy without love. People seemed to say “yes” to that. When I am empathetic, though, I see that as love; at least it is preferable to hating someone.

—-The teacher commented on Luke 6:38. The image there is of a merchant pressing down the grain in a customer’s container so he can fill it with more grain for the customer, up to the brim, and whatever spills over can be put into the customer’s apron so he or she can take that home. The picture here is one of abundance. The teacher may have been suggesting that this is how God is. In a sense, the text has that kind of message: God is merciful, and we should be like God by lavishing love and mercy onto others, even if they do not deserve it, repay it, or reciprocate. At the same time, v. 38 does seem to present a qualification: the measure that we give is the measure that we get back. Does that conflict with the abundance that v. 38 depicts, since we often give so sparingly, even at our peak?

I will leave the comments open, in case anyone wants to add anything. I would prefer the comments thread not to be a debate forum, though. Just state your view to me, and I will read it. 

Book Write-Up: Psychology and Spiritual Formation in Dialogue

Thomas M. Crisp, Steven L. Porter, and Gregg A. Ten Elshof. Psychology and Spiritual Formation in Dialogue: Moral and Spiritual Change in Christian Perspective. IVP Academic, 2019. See here to purchase the book.

This book is about the intersection between psychology and Christian spiritual formation. In this review, I will comment on each essay.

“Spiritual Theology: When Psychology and Theology in the Spirit Service Faith,” by John H. Coe.

This chapter starts strong, with a story about a person who is told by a pastor to pray more, to put off anger, and not to worry. The person responds that he knows about that and has tried doing it, but it does not work for him. As far as I can recall, the chapter did not revisit this issue. Still, it offers a compelling summary of St. John of the Cross’s “Dark Knight of the Soul,” with its descriptions of desolation and consolation. It also offers a biblical defense of psychology, treating it as part of the human wisdom to which the Bible and historical Christianity have been open.

“Is Spiritual Formation More Cultural Than Theo-Anthropological? An Ongoing Dialogue,” by James M. Houston.

A solid intellectual chapter, as it compares European and American Christianity in their emphases, discusses postmodern conceptions of the self, and engages Ignatian spiritual formation and Rene Girard. The conclusion may be a bit obvious: people need metanoia. But the journey is intellectually rich.

“‘End of Faith as Its Beginning’: A Christ-Centered Developmental Spirituality,” by Bruce Hindmarsh.

It just seemed to me that this chapter couched a basic point in a lot of advanced language: humans are made in God’s image, and there is more to them than what science can discern.

“Living ‘Before God’: A Kierkegaardian View of Spirituality,” by C. Stephen Evans.

This is one of the few down-to-earth essays in this book. It talks about Kierkegaard’s view on reading Scripture. Kierkegaard strikes me as rather legalistic, and the chapter would have been better had it addressed Kierkegaard’s own misanthropy, and how he may have reconciled that with the biblical imperative to love one’s neighbor. Still, the chapter summarizes Kierkegaard’s intriguing point that reading Scripture in community can be an attempt to shield ourselves from the personal conviction that reading Scripture can bring. That is refreshing, in light of the contemporary emphasis on communitarianism.

“Beyond Resilience, Posttraumatic Growth, and Self-Care: A Biblical Perspective on Suffering and Christian Spiritual Formation,” by Siang-Yang Tan.

The point of this chapter seems to be that therapy often seeks to remove or lessen suffering, whereas the Bible depicts suffering as a possible pathway to spiritual growth, depending on one’s response to it. This is a question worth addressing. Speaking personally, I feel that I do well to take anti-depressants instead of relying solely on prayer and Bible reading (not that the author suggests otherwise); they complement each other, and it makes me more tolerable to be around.

“Seeking the Tropological Import of Psalm 35,” by Ellen T. Charry.

There is not much here that I have not encountered before: the imprecatory Psalms are a cry for divine justice.

“On Specks and Planks: Psychotherapy, Spiritual Formation, and Moral Judgment,” by Earl D. Bland.

What enhanced this chapter was the case study. A Catholic named William does not think his wife is traditional enough, and he is understanding towards virtually everyone except his own wife. They work on their issues.

“Queen of the Virtues and King of the Vices: Graced Gratitude and Disgraced Ingratitude,” by Robert A. Emmons.

Basically, we should be grateful rather than seeing good things as our due and taking them for granted.

“Relational Spirituality, Differentiation, and Mature Alterity,” by Steven J. Sandage, David R. Paine, and Jonathan Morgan.

This on page 191 caught my eye: “Bonhoeffer spoke to this dialectic in saying the person who cannot be alone is not ready for community, and the person who cannot be in community is not ready to be alone.” How to move towards this state of wholeness is an excellent question. The quote rubs me the wrong way, but it also is refreshing in light of some of the pat answers that I have heard. Some say to loners: “You need to rejoice in being alone—by learning to be by yourself, you are developing a self that can be in community.” Well, that makes me feel better about being alone, but things do not necessarily work that way. Being alone for a long period of time can hinder one from having the skills to fit into communities.

“Cultivating the Fruit of the Spirit: Contributions of Positive Psychology to Spiritual Formation,” by Everett L. Worthington, Jr., Brandon J. Griffin, and Caroline R. Lavelock.

This chapter illustrates that being around generous, socially-concerned people can make us more generous and socially-concerned. Or at least we will try to act the part when we are around them!

“Born to Relate: In Trauma, in Transformation, in Transcendence,” by Marie T. Hoffman.

This chapter has a case study about a couple that learns empathy towards each other.

“Give Up Childish Ways or Receive the Kingdom Like a Child? Spiritual Formation from a Developmental Psychology Perspective,” by Justin L. Barrett.

This is the best chapter in the book. It talks about the cross-cultural awareness of the spiritual in children. It seems to associate the fruit of the Spirit with familial or tribal loyalty, treating political liberals as deficient because they supposedly lack that. I did not care much for that point and question how biblical it is, considering the biblical writings that challenge the societies of their day. This chapter does well, though, to address the question of how psychology and the Holy Spirit can interact. The book as a whole would have been better had it done that more, and in greater depth. I agree that people’s identity as agents is preserved once they become Christian: they are not automatons. At the same time, if people can become better through psychological means, or through doing spiritual practices, where does spiritual transformation from the Holy Spirit fit into the picture?

I apologize if I misinterpreted or missed the point of any of these contributions.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher. My review is honest.

Church Write-Up: Ethnocentrism, Assimilation, Potential Crumbling, and Theodicy in Reference to the Joseph Story

At the LCMS Bible study, the pastor talked about the story of Joseph. Here are some items:

A. The Egyptians thought highly of themselves. Of course, the Pharaoh believed that he was a god, but, according to the pastor, the people in the Egyptian hierarchy saw themselves as semidivine. The Egyptians saw themselves as above other nations, so the Egyptians would not eat with the Hebrews. Joseph asks the Egyptian staff to leave the room before he reveals he is Joseph to his brothers because he does not want those Egyptians to know he actually is Hebrew.

B. At this stage, there was not as clear of a definition of what being an Israelite meant. We are not yet in the Book of Leviticus, where God sets forth stipulations that set Israel apart from the other nations. Joseph has some conception that the God of Israel is opposed to adultery, which is why he refuses the advances from Potiphar’s wife, but he later marries an Egyptian, even more, the daughter of a priest. Joseph becomes absorbed in Egyptian culture.

C. A student read a note from her study Bible that said that seven years of famine, one on top of another, would have crumbled the Egyptian empire, had God not intervened.

D. The pastor said that he does not believe that God caused the famine but foreknew it and prepared the Egyptians (and the world) for it; God does not cause evil but brings good out of it. We got some into theodicy. Calvin elevated God’s sovereignty, whereas Luther saw divine mercy as more important: God’s sovereignty informs and shapes his sovereignty. Whereas Calvin believed that God somehow caused Adam and Eve to sin, Luther held that Adam and Eve sinned by their own free will, but God foresaw their sin and thus planned to send Christ. A student asked if God knows we will sin but hopes we will not. The pastor replied that God sees the whole movie in advance but his heart still breaks over human sin.

I asked about Genesis 41:25, 28, and 32, which appear to suggest that God indeed did cause the famine. The pastor referred to Luther’s idea of three kingdoms. The Kingdom of Power includes God’s jurisdiction over nature. The Kingdom of Grace is God dealing with us according to God’s promises. The Kingdom of Glory is heaven. How the pastor addressed my question may need to be unpacked, a bit. The pastor seemed to suggest that God rules nature but often allows nature to unfold itself. The pastor may have been implying that, when Joseph says that the famine is something that God is about to do, he means that God, in his rule over nature, is permitting the famine to take place. The pastor also said that the New Testament focuses on God’s mercy more than God’s power, whereas God’s power was stressed in the Old Testament. Yet, the pastor noted exceptions, such as the deaths of Ananias and Sapphira and the Book of Revelation, commenting that, just when you think you have God figured out, something in the Bible trips you up.

Church Write-Up: Planted by Streams

Here are some items from the LCMS service and Sunday School class:

A. The visiting pastor preached about Luke 6:17-26, which are the beatitudes in Luke’s Gospel. Jesus promises blessing to those who are poor, hungry, weeping, and hated on account of their belief in Jesus, and woe to those who are rich, full, laughing, and popular. The latter, according to the pastor, are people who gloat in their power and wealth and see themselves as self-sufficient, without need of God.

B. The Sunday School class that I attended was about the lectionary.

I will go through the presentation. Some of what was said may be speculative or debatable, but I am preserving this for future reference rather than fact-checking.

The use of lectionaries in churches began in the first century. Christians inherited the practice from the synagogues, which read from the Torah and the prophets and had a homily on the reading. Christians met on Sunday rather than Saturday since the first Easter, and they supplemented the Old Testament readings with readings from the writings of the apostles. But the specific readings for each week differed from church to church, as there was not a standard lectionary.

Starting in the fourth century, the church’s calendar, with the readings that accompanied it, was developing. There were readings for the time from Advent to Pentecost. In the twelfth century, there emerged the celebration of the Trinity. The Reformation was divided on what to do with the church calendar. Many Reformers chose to abandon it and to do their own thing, but Luther kept it because it neither taught false doctrine nor altered what the church knows about Christ.

The LCMS has a choice between a one year calendar and a three year calendar. The one year calendar uses fewer passages, they are repeated from year to year, and it is good for memory, since people will hear the same texts every year. The three year calendar uses more passages. The three year calendar started as late as 1969, with Vatican II. The Lutheran Church in America began using it in 1973. The three year series has three options: A, B, and C. A uses Matthew for the Gospel reading, B uses Mark, and C uses Luke. The church that I attend is currently in C, and it will continue the three year series until the first Sunday in Lent, then it will diverge from that for a while.

The Old Testament lessons are selected according to how they relate to the Gospel lesson. One of the teachers said he was unsure how the epistle readings are chosen, and the visiting pastor then shared that the church often chooses to continue through an epistle even if it does not tie directly into the Old Testament and Gospel lessons. For example, the New Testament reading over the last several weeks has been from I Corinthians.

We then dived into the passages for today (Sunday, as I write this). The Old Testament reading was from Jeremiah 17:5-8: it curses those who rely on their flesh for strength and whose hearts are turned away from the LORD, while blessing those who trust in the LORD. The former are like shrubs in the desert, whereas the latter are like trees planted by water, which bear fruit even during drought. The Epistle reading was from I Corinthians 15:12, 16-20: if affirms that, if Christ has not risen, then our faith is futile, we are still in our sins, and those who have died in Christ have perished, without hope of resurrection. The Gospel reading, of course, is Luke 6:17-26: Luke’s beatitudes and woes.

One student drew a contrast between Jeremiah 17:5-8 and Luke 6:17-26. Jeremiah says what to do to improve your circumstance, namely, trust in God. Jesus, however, offers a different way to look at one’s circumstances: to remember that God will make the circumstances better. It is about what Jesus does. If it is about what you do—through accumulating, exulting, and trusting in wealth, power, and comfort—then you will get your reward.

The teacher said that, apart from God, we have no expectation that good will come, nothing to which we can hold on. The plant’s fruit in Jeremiah 17:5-8 is not from what it has done but from the living water that comes from God. Through heat and drought, Christ sustains and nurtures us. Psalm 1, which is also part of the lectionary for today (but which we did not read), also has the theme of a plant being beside waters. Rich people may feel inclined to trust in themselves and that they did everything right. The problem with trusting in the strength of human beings is that, with age, strength fades. In the Gospel reading, people come for miles to touch Jesus’s garment so that Jesus’s life can flow from him to them. In the Old Testament reading, Jeremiah predicts ugly things that will happen and wants the Israelites to make sure that they are planted in the right place. The Epistle reading from I Corinthians explains why we can trust in God: Christ’s resurrection is why we can trust God to be the living water for us.

Church Write-Up (Sort Of): It’s Personal, by Andy Stanley

The LCMS church that I attend has two Sunday School options for the next four weeks. One option is Andy Stanley’s series, “It’s Personal.” The other option is a discussion of the lectionary. The Andy Stanley option intrigued me because it addresses the issue of doubt and the barriers—both intellectual and personal—that people cite as inhibitors to their acceptance of the Christian faith. I decided to listen to the Andy Stanley series at home, and I will attend the lectionary Bible study at church. The LCMS church did not have its Wednesday Bible study this week, so I will use the time and space that I ordinarily devote to my mid-week Church Write-Up to a write-up about the Andy Stanley series.

Let’s start with a rough summary. Stanley acknowledges that people have legitimate, or at least understandable, reasons not to become Christians. They may wonder how the dinosaurs got onto the Ark. They may look at Christians and wonder why anyone would want to be like them, or they may have had bad experiences in churches. They may compare themselves with Christians and conclude that they live better lives than Christians do. Some may just be indifferent. “Why don’t I want to be a Christian? I don’t know—why don’t I want to stand on one foot all day? I just don’t want to be one.”

Stanley was encouraging people to desire to know and love God for himself, not to get their questions answered. Is that not the way many of us are: we want to be loved for us, not accepted after we answer people’s questions about us? We are that way because we are made in God’s image. Stanley said that most people who become Christians do so, not because their questions were answered, but because they had an experience in which they met and fell in love with God. One can have all one’s questions answered and still not be close to God.

Stanley drew a comparison with marriage. Single people may have a bunch of objections to getting married. Perhaps they struggle to support themselves financially, so how would they support both themselves and a spouse? What if they get married and then develop a connection with someone else, who could have been “the one”? But when they meet and fall in love with a person, those questions fall into the background. Sure, they will meet other people, but none of them will be that person. Before, they were looking at marriage as an issue, the way that many non-believers look at Christianity as an issue. After they meet the right person, they love that specific person, as believers are enraptured with Christ.

Throughout the series, Stanley referred to Scriptural examples. Abram did not have all of his questions answered when he believed in God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness (Genesis 15). He did not know how God would address his lack of offspring, and God did not tell him then and there. Nathaniel in John 1 was skeptical that Jesus was the Messiah because what good could come from Nazareth? Then Jesus revealed a personal detail that Jesus knew about him, and Nathaniel believed, even though that whole Nazareth question was not resolved. Saul of Tarsus encountered Jesus on the road to Damascus; he may have still had his religious questions about whether Jesus biblically qualified as the Messiah, but he could not deny the truth when he appeared to him. The Jewish leaders in John 9 had their reasons not to accept Jesus as the Messiah, yet there standing before him was a man who had been blind but now could see, due to Jesus.

Stanley expressed doubt that we would want a God who would be so undignified as to answer all of our questions before we accepted him. Stanley also referred to people’s experiences of God in Christ throughout the world, treating that as an unavoidable fact. Another point that Stanley made was that unbelievers may win a debate with their believing friend or spouse, but, after winning, there is still something that nags in their heart: the realization that God so loved the world.

A lot of what Stanley said hit close to home. I have some issues with the claim that one should just accept God, whether his or her questions are answered or not. Those questions are not just about curiosities. They pertain to whether the God of the Bible is real, and if that God is just, kind, and good (especially on such issues as hell and the biblical Conquest). In addition, not everyone, including not every Christian, has had a powerful experience of God.

Book Write-Up: George MacDonald in the Age of Miracles

Timothy Larsen. George MacDonald in the Age of Miracles: Incarnation, Doubt, and Reenchantment. IVP Academic, 2018. See here to purchase the book.

George MacDonald was a nineteenth century Scottish preacher, whose works had a profound influence on C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkein, G.K. Chesterton, and Madeleine L’Engle. This book is a collection of lectures about aspects of MacDonald’s life and thought. Timothy Larsen is the author of most of them, but James Edward Beitler III, Richard Hughes Gibson, and Jill Palaez Baumgaertner. All of them are scholars at Wheaton College.

The back cover of this book states: “Larsen explores how, throughout his life and writings, MacDonald sought to counteract skepticism and to herald instead the reality of the miraculous.” Well, not entirely, at least not according to my impression. The book is excellent, but, if you are expecting MacDonald to be presented as a classical Christian apologist, you may be disappointed. MacDonald celebrated doubt as a possible path to authentic faith, in an age when people were starting to become more publicly honest about their doubts concerning the Christian faith. MacDonald was also a romantic, who believed that nature could inspire the worship of God, but who shied away from arguments for the existence of God that appealed to nature. At the same time, in one passage in this book, it is speculated that MacDonald may have regarded one of his character’s gullibility regarding fairy stories as preferable to wholesale doubt, as the former view is more enchanting.

I have read some of the works with which the book interacts, in Michael Phillips’s edited versions. Still, this book taught me a lot that I did not know before. Larsen talks about how the celebration of Christmas changed throughout history, and how MacDonald’s thought interacted with that. MacDonald’s surly personality is a prominent point of discussion in this book, as one of the essays argues that MacDonald’s failure as a pastor was due, not to his unorthodox beliefs, as that did not stop conservative churches from inviting him to speak. Rather, he was simply a bad pastor, who really wanted to be a poet. Imagine Sheldon Cooper in the pulpit, only with the desire to be a poet. Although MacDonald repudiated Calvinism, he still had a robust view of divine providence, viewing afflictions (even his own) as purifying agents from the hand of God. But he also had the idea that a person’s doctrinal beliefs could somehow influence his or her physical health, which reminded me of “Word of Faith” teachings.

When the book discussed topics that I had encountered before, it did so in an edifying and insightful manner. This includes MacDonald’s belief in postmortem cleansing and his preference for the Gospels over other books of the Bible, even though he did not reject the other biblical books. The book does not agree with MacDonald’s universalism. Larsen cites MacDonald’s view that God will utterly purify people in the afterlife before letting them into heaven and remarks that one need not be a universalist to appreciate the value of holiness. Maybe, but how many will become perfect for heaven in this life? Baumgaertner then offers her own Lutheran perspective, saying that “we cannot pursue” “holiness and sanctification” but “can accept it as it is freely given to us through Christ and respond in gratitude with good works” (page 132).

The book perhaps could have gone into a little more detail about how MacDonald thought nature pointed to God, by giving examples. Still, this is an informative and edifying book.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher. My review is honest.