More and More Reviews

In our continuing effort to catch up on book reviews, here are some more this week! (We should catch up next week.)

Also, during this time frame, I finished reading the Bible in the New King James Version. Here’s my review: The Bible is the greatest book ever written!!!

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Living with Confidence in a Chaotic World

Dr. David Jeremiah

Thomas Nelson, 2009 (253 pages)

I reviewed this book for Booksneeze.com. You can read that review by clicking here.

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Mosaic

Dayna Zoll Cookson

self published, 2010 (85 pages)

I don’t read poetry books very often, but when you found out that the author went to high school with you, you make an exception!

Dayna and I both went to high school in Dexter, Missouri, and have reconnected via Facebook with several of our classmates. Her book of poetry, Mosaic, is a collection of poems that are designed to show her journey from a life of rebellion to one lived for the Lord. Because some of the poems show an earlier life of rebellion (including drug use and an abortion), several of the poems are quite dark and gritty. However, the honesty portrayed in the stanzas is truly eye-opening.

The book is basically divided in half, with the first half being poems of rebellion and fighting against the world, and the second half being poems directed toward God and a life of trying to seek Him. The transition is remarkable, and is worth the read in and of itself.

If you like deeply personal poetry, you will find this collection of verses to be a good read. I have already marked a couple of these poems to file away for use in future sermons.

The book is available on Amazon here. (There is also a Kindle version.)

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The Epistles of John

James Montgomery Boice

Baker Books (2004, originally published in 1979) 192 pages

I used Boice’s “expositional commentary” on these three letters from John as the major resource for a class I just finished teaching on those books. While I used many other sources, I used Boice’s outlines and tried to follow his flow through the books.

This is the first commentary by Boice that I have used, and I found it to be extremely helpful. While there was some Calvinism found in the work, the overall flow of the book was helpful for me, and kept my “on track” as I taught the class.

To me, the best positive of this type of commentary is that Boice gives different viewpoints on certain passages, but does so in a very concise way. You, as the student, can go to other works to study these controversies more deeply, but you will find Boice’s treatment to be fair and clear.

The weakness (other than Calvinistic thought) of this work to me was the treatment of Third John. I know it is very brief, but the book seemed to “run out of steam” when it got to that powerful book. While we looked at it briefly in my class, as well, I found myself using very little of Boice’s material for that class. Other than that, I think this is a worthy commentary to add to your shelf on these powerful little books.

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Jesus Came Preaching

George Buttrick

Baker Books, 1970 (239 pages)

This book contains transcripts from Buttrick’s Yale Lectures on Preaching. The focus, obviously, is on the very simple fact that Jesus was a preacher. However, as I read the book, it seemed that Buttrick tried to cover far more ground, and lost sight of the theme. The book was still helpful, and contained many good reminders for preachers (especially younger preachers), but it seemed to go off the major thrust of the lectures.

My major problem with this book was that it was extremely “academic.” That may seem like a stretch for a criticism, since the lectures were delivered at Yale, but at times it seemed as though Buttrick was trying too hard to sound academic. I like that he did that sometimes, but it seems as though a vast majority of his sentences were crafted to have that tone to them.

Overall, though, the book was a very good read on preaching. I gained much from it, and was reinvigorated in my work by it. If you preach, this might be a good little volume for you to add to your library.