I visit the blog of a local (non-Orthodox) young adults pastor occasionally, and today I noticed he had a wish list. When I opened it, I found it contained a listing of 44 books that presumably he would like to have. Now, I don't know when he'd find time to read them all if he got them—that would be little less than a book a week. Looking at the list, I was surprised both by some of the titles and the topics. I wondered also why a Christian pastor would want to read some of these books. One of them is a book on building a successful company; my boss has a copy on his desk! Some others also had titles that just left me incredulous. In the list there might be one or two that I thought could be helpful reading. The rest seemed like a lot of seminarians publishing the papers that got them their degrees, so somebody had better read them.As in the days leading up to the Reformation, the Church seems to be pickling its clergy in the brine of bibliocracy, both when they're still in the cooker (seminary) and then when they get out. The Word of God, the Holy Scriptures, whatever you call the Book (you know which one I'm talking about), just seems like it isn't good enough… Books, books and more books! But where's the Book?
Perusing this long list of titles and contemplating the state of mind of the young pastor who unashamedly proclaims them on his wish list, I felt a twinge of sorrow—it seems like our shepherds have now gone back to farming, trying to get a bigger, better yield.
Abel is slain, and Cain offers vegetables to God while crying, "Am I my brother's keeper?"
Businessman have to keep up with the latest trends, they have to stay in the fast lane or lose their position, and who knows? maybe they'd never get back in. But for ministers of the Gospel to abandon that God-breathed, all-sufficient living scripture, to join in the paper chase! As holy prophet Jeremiah wrote, "They have bartered their glory for shame." And as Martin Luther wrote in his Open Letter to the Christian Nobility of the German Nation, "Whoever is not ceaselessly busy with the Word of God must become corrupt."
Here's the list of books I referred to above. I admit I'm ignorant of the contents of all of them, and I don't want to be acquainted with any of them. I know this makes me a hopeless cop-out in today's "Christian" world. I don't condemn these books or their authors; perhaps many are great saints and their writings venerable. Who knows?
I confess, I am just an ignorant Orthodox village muzhik.
After looking over the list of books, pray for Romanós the sinner, and an ignorant one at that!
"All I want to know is Christ and the power of His resurrection…" (Philippians 3:10 Jerusalem Bible).
1. The Last Word and the Word after That: A Tale of Faith, Doubt, and a New Kind of Christianity (Brian D. McLaren)
2. The Modern Preacher and the Ancient Text: Interpreting and Preaching Biblical Literature (Sidney Greidanus)
3. The Revolution: A Field Manual for Changing Your World (Jim Wallis, et al.)
4. On Beauty and Being Just (Elaine Scarry)
5. Organic Church: Growing Faith Where Life Happens (Neil Cole)
6. The Hidden Power of Electronic Culture: How Media Shapes Faith, the Gospel, and Church (Shane Hipps, Brian McLaren)
7. Treasure in Clay Jars: Patterns in Missional (Lois Y. Barrett)
8. Heaven Is Not My Home: Learning to Live in God's Creation (Paul A. Marshall, Lela Hamner Gilbert)
9. For All God's Worth: True Worship and the Calling of the Church (N. T. Wright)
10. Kingdom of God Is a Party (Tony Campolo)
11. Sacred Rhythms: Arranging Our Lives for Spiritual Transformation (Ruth Haley Barton)
12. Reflecting the Glory: Meditations for Living Christ's Life in the World (N. T. Wright)
13. The Rising: Living the Mysteries of Lent, Easter, and Pentecost (Wendy M. Wright)
14. Eastertide: Prayers for Lent Through Easter from The Divine Hours (Phyllis Tickle)
15. The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity (Philip Jenkins)
16. Ancient-Future Time: Forming Spirituality through the Christian Year (Robert E. Webber)
17. Transforming Mission: Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission (David Jacobus Bosch)
18. The Gospel in a Pluralist Society (Lesslie Newbigin)
19. The Continuing Conversion of the Church (Darrell L. Guder)
20. Missional Church: A Vision for the Sending of the Church in North America (Darrell L. Guder, Lois Barrett)
21. To Own a Dragon: Reflections On Growing Up Without A Father (Donald Miller, John MacMurray)
22. Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places: A Conversation in Spiritual Theology (Eugene H. Peterson)
23. Desire of the Everlasting Hills: The World Before and After Jesus (Thomas Cahill)
24. The Bible As It Was (James L. Kugel)
25. Excavating Jesus: Beneath the Stones, Behind the Texts: Revised and Updated (John Dominic Crossan, Jonathan L. Reed)
26. Engaging God's World: A Christian Vision of Faith, Learning, and Living (Cornelius Plantinga)
27. Creating Community: Five Keys to Building a Small Group Culture (Andy Stanley, Bill Willits)
28. Return of the Prodigal Son (Henri Nouwen)
29. Paul: In Fresh Perspective (N. T. Wright)
30. Following Jesus: Biblical Reflections on Discipleship (N. T. Wright)
31. Through Painted Deserts: Light, God, and Beauty on the Open Road (Donald Miller)
32. Connecting (Larry Crabb)
33. Reaching for the Invisible God (Philip Yancey)
34. Not the Way It's Supposed to Be : A Breviary of Sin (Cornelius Plantinga)
35. Now, Discover Your Strengths (Marcus Buckingham, Donald O. Clifton)
36. First, Break All the Rules: What the World's Greatest Managers Do Differently (Marcus Buckingham, Curt Coffman)
37. The Contrarian's Guide to Leadership (Steven B. Sample)
38. Adventures in Missing the Point: How the Culture Controlled Church Neutered the Gospel (Brian D. McLaren, Tony Campolo)
39. Where Do We Go from Here?: A Guidebook for the Cell Group Church (Ralph W. Neighbor)
40. Prepare Your Church for the Future (Carl F. George)
41. The Next Generation Leader: Five Essentials for Those Who Will Shape the Future (Andy Stanley)
42. Sacred Pathways (Gary L. Thomas)
43. Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap... and Others Don't (Jim Collins)
44. Can We Do That: Innovative Practices That Will Change the Way You Do Church (Andy Stanley, Ed Young)
3 comments:
Romanos,
If you would, just pray for me... My most current blog explains it, and roughly it's in regard to 9/11 five years later.
It still hurts, especially when someone I knew was on the first plane.
Thank you.
[n][v]
I have not read any of the books on this list: in fact, I have never even heard of them. There are a lot of books I want to read, and I do not think I can add these to my personal list. I want to go back and read the Fathers, the lives of the saints, and....the Bible! It has been a long time since I have really read the Old Testament. Now that I am familiar with blogs, I spend even less time reading because I find great nourishment and a sense of relationship in certain blogs.
Modern Churchianity has a form of godliness in a new guise: reading and writing Christian books. Myself, I read the bible daily, and over the course of a life time, perhaps two dozen Christian classics, what I would call the Fathers (and Mothers) of the Church. Just as my human friends are very few, so are my spiritual books. Yes, I have hundreds of books in my house, and I have read most of them at one time or another, and many are reference books, but I am talking about books like Imitation of Christ, The Desert Fathers, Cost of Discipleship, Luther's Three Treatises, C. S. Lewis' many books — Mere Christianity, Miracles, The problem of Pain, The Pilgrim's Regress, The Great Divorce, yes, all of them.
Blogging, well, yes, I write something in my blog everyday, but so do I think everyday, so do I pray every day, even every hour. As to reading blogs, well, relatively few on a regular basis. For me at 60 years, every moment is worth ten times what it was worth when I was 24. So I must pick and choose, and so pass by much that is very good. But I trust the Lord to guide my steps, and receive gratefully what He puts, whom He puts, before me and into my hands.
I am still an implacable biblioclast, though, and before and above every book I raise the Book, in my room, in my speech and thoughts, in my life. I think that classical sola scriptura doesn't go far enough, and in some ways it goes too far. For the enemy is not human tradition per se, but the setting aside of the Word of God.
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