Here is an example: cold-climate cultures are task driven while warm-climate cultures are relationship driven. We in the West tend to think about getting something done and getting it done on time. Those in warm climate cultures consider the entire event.

• In some places it is offensive to arrive to dinner on time (because it makes it seem like you are only arriving for the task and not the relationship).
• In other places it is offensive to arrive to dinner late (because it makes you seem like you are not respecting the other person’s time.)

Lanier also shows how the type of communication differs from culture to culture. After all, in a hot-climate culture, communication takes place indirectly. It seeks to maintain the atmosphere of friendship, whatever the cost.

The only weakness of Foreign to Familiar is also its strength. The strength of the book is its brevity and immediate accessibility. But in the interest of brevity, Laner makes major generalizations, and therein lies its only weakness.

Still, as an introduction to understanding the differences between different kinds of culture, Foreign to Familiar is terrific. Pick it up and start learning how to navigate the murky waters of contextualization!

- first published in October 2008

Nate was in town recently, and we had a conversation about books, beauty, and bestsellers. Naturally, we talked about The Hunger Games. His take on it was too good to keep to myself, so I asked if I could share it here.

Why Hunger Games is Flawed to Its Core
N.D. Wilson

Almost everywhere I go, I’m asked about The Hunger Games (book, not film). The questions used to fly about Twilight and Potter, but Katniss and dystopic death-matches have taken over.

First, I completely understand why The Hunger Games took off. Suzanne Collins knows how to suck readers into a page-turning frenzy. The pace of the book grabs like gorilla glue and the kill-or-be-killed tension keeps fingernails nibbled short. She knows her craft, and I have to say that I’m grateful to her for expanding our mutual marketplace (in the same way that Rowling did). That said, Collins stumbles badly in her understanding of some pretty fundamental elements of human story, and the whole thing is flawed to its core as a result.

The best authors are students of humanity, both as individuals and grouped in societies (big and small).

• C.S. Lewis’ profound insight into human motivation and relationships is on display in Narnia, and even more intricately in his Space Trilogy. He paints honest and accurate portraits, leading readers through darkness toward wisdom.
• Think about Mark Twain’s ability to see and image the motivations of boys, and the entire society in which those boys lived.
• Tom Wolfe’s sharp clear vision is on display in both his essays and his fiction. He sees into the hearts and minds of men; he sees which of their choices and follies will set fire to the world around them, and how exactly that fire will progress and grow. (And, like the greatest writers, he manages to maintain an affection and sympathy for his characters and for humanity in general despite this insight.)

When an author profoundly misunderstands human societies, arbitrarily forcing a group or a character into decisions and actions that they would never choose for themselves given the preceding narrative, it drives me bonkers. I once threw The Fountainhead across the room for exactly that crime, and I’ve never read anything by Rand since. And Collins bundles clumsy offenses like this in Costco bulk…

Quick Switch 1

Katniss volunteers to take her sister’s place in the Hunger Games. Yay. Self-sacrifice. Christian themes, yadda, yadda. So far so good. But that walnut shell slides away immediately and a moment of self-sacrifice is replaced with sustained, radical, murderous self-interest.

In the Christian ethos, laying down one’s life for another is glorious. In the Darwinian world, self-preservation is the ultimate shiny good. Readers bite the lure of sacrifice, and then blissfully go along with survive-at-the-expense-of-murdered-innocents. Katniss becomes evil–she’s even relieved at one point that someone else murdered her innocent little friend, because she knew that she would have to do it herself eventually. And we still give her credit for being sacrificial…

(Sacrificial Sidenote: Many people point to Peeta as the truly noble and sacrificial character. I don’t mind him as a character, but a picture of heroic sacrifice he ain’t. In Hunger Games, he’s fundamentally passive and submissive. He’s that guy who is happy to ‘just be friends’ with the cute girl. Or a lot more than friends (but only if she initiates). He’s just the puppy at her heels. “Sure, kill me Katniss. Oh, you’d rather we both killed ourselves? Yes, Katniss. Whatever you say, Katniss.” Really? There are plenty of guys in the world just like Peeta, and kudos to Collins for using the type, especially since nice second-fiddle fellas like that confuse and conflict girls tremendously. But worldview readers are gaming themselves into seeing something that just isn’t there.)

Quick Switch 2

The self-defense defense. Katniss is a victim, but so is every other innocent person thrust into these games. She should be rising above the game and defending herself (and everyone else) from the Hunger Games. Instead, she kills her fellow victims. Sure, if someone is in the act of trying to murder you, shoot them through the throat. But dropping tracker jackers on sleeping kids? Negativo. Why is she playing this game by the rules at all? The Hunger Games are the real enemy.

If Collins wanted her protagonist to be the kind of rebel who would start a revolution (and she does want that), she should have had Katniss cutting her locator out of her arm on night one instead of participating in and perpetuating the evil. But readers are a little numb to killing, and this particular switch wasn’t hard to pull on us.

Here’s a thought experiment to help us see clearly. What if Collins had thrown her character into this arena and the rules had been different? Last one raped wins. Rape or be raped. Obviously, a real hero wouldn’t play the game. Explode the game. (Sidenote: rape is awful, but at least the other kids would have survived.)

Faux-revolution

File this under misunderstanding humanity, which is just another way of saying that The Hunger Games misunderstands courage, inspiration, oppression, and nobility as they relate to people in a collective herd. If you want to see an accurate picture of how one enslaved victim can threaten a regime, watch Gladiator. Twenty thousand people (and the emperor) are commanding one slave to kill another. (Kill!Kill!Kill!) But instead, he throws his sword in the dirt and turns his back on the emperor. And…the people he just defied now adore him. He inspires. His courage is unlike anything they’ve seen, and he is now officially a political problem.

Walk through what Collins has Katniss do while playing in the Hunger Games. First, she does and says exactly what she’s told to do and say (trying to manipulate the mob with false sentimentality). Second, she plays the vile despotic game, and by the immoral rules.  Finally, she threatens to kill herself (and talks her faux-boyfriend into doing it with her). This, allegedly, panics the establishment and is the spark that will start a revolution.

But the world doesn’t work that way. Men and women are not inspired to risk their lives in insurrection and defiance by someone reaching for poisonous berries. Revolutions are not started by teen girls suicide-pacting with cute baker boys. Oppressive regimes are not threatened by people who do what they are told.

Put yourself in the author’s well-worn desk chair. If you really wanted your Katniss to threaten this tyrannical system like many great men and women have threatened many tyrants throughout the ages, what would you have her do? She needs to be a lot more punk rock (in the best possible way). She needs to stop giving a rip about her own survival (the most dangerous men and women always forget themselves). She needs to refuse to be a piece in the game. Imagine millions of people watching her disarm some boy who was trying to murder her, and then cutting out his locator, hiding him, and keeping him alive. Every time she defied the order to kill, she would earn the true loyalty of the spared kid’s district. And she would start being a legitimate political threat. (Even Tom Wolfe asked me about The Hunger Games, having apparently heard it had some revolutionary insight. I hit him with the primary plot beats and watched him blink in confusion.)

There is more to say, but I’ve said enough. Well, almost. One final thought: never read or watch a story like a passive recipient, enjoying something in a visceral way and then retroactively trying to project deeper value or meaning onto the story you’ve already ingested. Such projections have been making authors and directors seem more intelligent than they are for decades. As you watch, as you read, shoulder your way into the creator’s chair. Don’t take the final product for granted, analyze the creator’s choices and cheerfully push them in new and different directions. As we do this, the clarity of our criticism will grow immensely. Which is to say, we’ll be suckered far less often than we currently are.

Lastly, Suzanne Collins can really write. It’s just that we can’t really read.

That’s a good word. But I don’t want to wait for the next generation to criticize this book. I want to take a stab at it right now! So even though I agree with much of Merritt’s negative assessment of politicized Christianity, I can’t go along with his solution because, frankly, I don’t know what it is.

“Politics itself is not the problem. Foolish participation in politics is what gets the church into trouble. It divides a community for which God desires unity and forces us to lose sight of the reason we live and move and breathe.” (5-6)

So far so good. But when we get into the nitty gritty of what wise political engagement looks like, we’re left with vague generalities, such as:

I agree that the posture of many Christians can be problematic. We war not against flesh and blood but against powers and principalities. Political opponents are not our enemies. I’m nodding my head.

He decries Christian leaders who oppose anti-gay bullying legislation, but he says nothing about the militant homosexual activists who bully restaurants (Chick-fil-A, for example, for partnering with a family organization) or adoption agencies who have been shut down rather than violate their consciences. His one-sided treatment of this issue reminds me of pastors on Piers Morgan or in other interview settings who are always asked about homosexuality, only then to be asked, “Why are you so focused on this?” when the host is the one to bring it up.

Ultimately, Merritt’s proposal for cultural engagement is short-sighted. He wants us to accept whatever we can from the culture, but he has no suggestions about how to deal with issues important to Christians that broader culture rejects.

Conclusion

Overall, I suggest you read A Faith of Our Own if you want a glimpse into the thinking of many 20 and 30somethings in the United States today. This book will undoubtedly resonate with a lot of people my age. Unfortunately, I don’t think Merritt has offered a substantive way forward in political involvement. I wish his perceptiveness regarding the solution matched his perceptiveness regarding the problem.

Beauty Will Save the World: Rediscovering the Allure and Mystery of Christianity. 

If you have been reading this blog for any length of time, you’ve probably seen me harping on the need for Christians to consider the inherent beauty of truthand how that beauty shapes the way we present Christian teaching. Brian Zahnd, author of Beauty Will Save the World, is saying something similar:

Zahnd sees beauty as inherently “cruciform.” Reorienting ourselves around the self-giving love at the center of our faith exposes the dangers that lurk behind Christian partnerships with the powerful and the implementation of worldly strategies to effect change:

But Zahnd is not clear on how we move forward when the world condemns as “ugly” what we know is inherently “beautiful” and celebrates as “beautiful” what Scripture would say is ugly.

Beauty is objective, yes, since beauty is an attribute of God. This means that true beauty is not just in the eye of the beholder. But it would help to know how to present the beauty of Christianity in a world where many subjective “beholders” remain implacably opposed to Christianity no matter how beautiful and cruciform our display is. We need to keep thinking on this…

I want to be careful not to focus the majority of my reading on the latest, greatest thing. Better to mix it up. To visit saints from other centuries. To listen to the church fathers preach. To pray with the Puritans and scratch my head with the philosophers.

Occasionally, though, a book grabs my attention and won’t let go. Josh Riebock’s Heroes and Monsters: An Honest Look at the Struggle within All of Us(Baker, 2012) was that kind of book. The look and feel of Josh’s memoir intrigued me. So I started reading and then kept reading and kept reading. I finished the book after a couple of evenings, thoroughly impressed with the artistry with which he crafted the story. Like all good books (and particularly memoirs), some of it bugged me. Some of it moved me. Some of it inspired me. But none of it bored me.

The most fascinating people in the world are the people who are most fascinated by the world, and those same people are the ones who change the world. No one who’s ever influenced this planet has ever done so without being remarkably curious.

Dreams can’t live alone. Sharing our dreams with others may risk destroying them, but without sharing them, we destroy ourselves. Most dreams aren’t murdered. Most dreams commit suicide.

Disappointment knows where we hide. Pain is more reliable than Santa Claus, more determined than a starving thief. It will bang the door, jimmy the lock, crawl through a window, come down the chimney, bypass security; it will find a way in. In this life, there is no such thing as safe. Insulation is an illusion.

Laughter is the evidence that we’re still here, the proof that our tragedies will not define us forever. Laughter is the language of the survivor.

Josh lives in Austin, TX, with his wife, Kristen, and they attend Austin Stone Community Church. I asked Josh some questions about artistry, truth, and beauty.

A memoir isn’t so much the retelling of someone’s life but an interpretation of someone’s life. It’s a writer’s attempt to make sense of their own life and the things they’ve learned in order to help others know themselves and to make sense of their own lives. In some ways, the whole thing is a weird and terrifying stab at intimacy, I suppose.

And yes, I’m a young memoirist (32 actually!). So in that way, I certainly can’t offer people longevity or the wisdom that comes from walking this planet for decades on end the way other memoirs can. But I can offer my life in detail—the beauty and ugliness, the tragedies and triumphs—and do that with honesty and creativity.

As a writer, I want to have the courage to talk about what I see, to embrace the often-paradoxical nature of life rather than gloss over it in order to maintain a false sense of symmetry or tidiness. And that, I believe, is a hallmark (I wouldn’t say it’s the hallmark) of good writing—the willingness to embrace, explore, and speak truthfully about the complexities of what we see, to write in such a way that readers are compelled to do the same.

Josh Riebock: In some ways it’s made writing more difficult. As Christians, we sometimes foster a culture of fear that makes artistic expression very intimidating. Often we spend so much energy critiquing theology and culture, and in doing so we drive creativity underground. People—along with their imaginations and gifts—go into hiding in order to protect themselves rather than being set free to make beautiful things.

But recently, as I’ve been growing through some of my own insecurities and fears, I find that theology, Scripture, and the church are so much of what propels me to write. Scripture talks about God and humanity through poetry, fiction, short story, biography, song, and metaphor. It’s spectacular. It’s off the wall. It’s raw. It’s creative. The writers of Scripture didn’t just care about what they were saying but also about the elegance in how they said it. That releases me to do the same.

And therein lies the incredible challenge and opportunity of writing. I want to write about the things of God using a language and form both accessible and fresh to those who’ve grown tired of the same Christian talk and to those who struggle to engage Scripture in the ways it’s often talked about. I want people to see the artistry of God in every sentence I write.

I suppose sharpening is an attempt to help someone become who God created them to be. And meddling is an attempt to help someone become who I want them to be. One glorifies God. The other glorifies me. One contributes. The other detracts. Like I said, I’m not always sure how to do that. But I will tell you that I want guidance from people, from pastors. As an artist, and a man, I need it.

Pastors can be catalysts for healthy conversation about beauty and truth and what it might look like to do that in a way that brings God joy. That is something I cherish. That sharpens me. I suppose that sharpens all of us.

The so-called “seven deadly sins” – lust, greed, envy, sloth, pride, gluttony, wrath – are not merely things we “do” with our behavior but, as Jesus reveals, conditions of our heart. Even if we don’t act on them, we carry these desires around with us every day. How does the gospel address the needs at the root of these sins and empower us to break patterns of bondage to them? Seven Daily Sins reveals from Scripture how Christians can stop managing their sin and start experiencing freedom in Christ. As Tim Keller tells us, “We are more wicked than we dared believe.” But also, “We are more loved than we dared hope.” There is good news for Christians struggling with these appetites – for that’s what they are, deep down – and it comes by and from the redemptive power of the gospel of Jesus.

Trevin Wax: It’s got to be hard to put together a Bible study resource that is so focused on sin. What were the challenges in writing about these particular (and prevalent) sins?

Luther says it’s the supreme art of the Devil to turn the gospel into law, so even as I was attempting to apply the gospel to these “big sins,” by focusing on them, the shift into law-giving happened so imperceptibly. And the law is helpful and good for what it’s designed to do, so it’s not like there’s no practical instructions or application of the imperatives in the book. I just had to make sure that by leading readers into focusing on their sin, I found a way to stand beside them, to write as humbly as I could as a brother who shares these sins and similar struggles myself.

Another challenge, of course, is writing honestly and candidly and substantively about sin without indulging prurient interests. The chapter on lust was probably most dangerous in that regard. The aim of the book is not to indulge fascination with sin but to face it head on, sober-mindedly, and really not play around on the surface of the behavior.

Jared Wilson: Well, I don’t have a formulaic way of making these connections. I “read” a lot of the entertainment I take in on an illustrative basis. I think a lot of preachers do this, actually; as a preacher and a writer, I’m sure you do too.

I think people can go way overboard in making religious connections in everything they see, but good art resonates with me in ways I can’t really explain, so it’s a practically instinctive thing to see when Ben Stiller at the end of “Along Came Polly,” just as one example, says to Jennifer Aniston that he’s never been more afraid in his life than when he’s with her but wants to be with her forever anyway, to see this as a picture of the appeal and the danger of the call to discipleship. That’s just a silly little note, but these can be helpful for listeners and readers when you don’t make them about the movie but instead about the moment in the movie.

But for me personally, the other so-called “deadly sins” that I most apply my pride to are gluttony and lust, but more so gluttony these days. I’m not an obese guy, and that’s one way I have been tempted to avoid it, because there are not many physical repercussions. More than when I was younger, with a faster metabolism, and was more active, of course, but still not too many. But I love to medicate with food when I’ve had a rough day or week. I like food too much.

By God’s grace I do not struggle with lust nearly as much as I used to. This is purely a God thing, not a me thing, because I used to be a struggling pornography user. God broke me of that through some serious consequences, and I’ve been repentant and “clean” for almost 8 years now.

Jared Wilson: I think the church struggles in general most with greed and envy. This comes out in a million different ways, as the message of Christianity gets corrupted by the idolatrous parts of the American dream and even as whole churches succumb to competition with each other or a “shameful gain” of numbers, be it budgetary or attendance.

Jared Wilson: If we don’t continually center on the gospel of grace, we either leave people feeling the burden of condemnation or the deceptive burden of moralistic self-improvement. The latter may delay the felt experience of the former, but it goes there eventually anyway, as people tend to burn out or wonder why they can’t get beyond certain sinful habits or thoughts. The gospel is the only thing the Bible calls power to save.

Trevin Wax: Why are Christians tempted toward sin-management instead of sin-killing? What’s the difference?

Jared Wilson: Sin-killing is more painful and requires more self-honesty. Any schmuck can change his behavior. The Pharisees did. Buddhists do. The unsaved working the program in addiction recovery can do that. But it’s the desire, something much more elusive, much deeper, more rooted in our interior life and worship-wiring, that has to be fixed.

It’s the difference between mowing over weeds and actually uprooting them. And it’s a pain to pull weeds; we’d all just rather mow them down. Over and over and over again. It takes some grit to manage our sin — and then we can feel proud of ourselves — but it takes grace to kill sin.

It really is like messing with DNA. One of the premises of the book is that we don’t just do sin, we are sin. So sin-killing involves the dying to self that Jesus talked about, that taking up of our cross. But there is astounding power in knowing that He who knew no sin became (our) sin that we might become His righteousness.

Trevin Wax: Thanks, Jared. The study is an excellent resource, and I commend it to others.

• The truth of God’s absolute centrality is a wrecking ball to humanity’s constant desire to make ourselves the measure of all things. It dismantles the facade and proclaims the Godhood of God. It reminds us all of what we know deep down inside: We are creatures; we are not gods. We are not ultimate. God is God.

• Men naturally minimize sin insofar as it relates to God. If they could, they would make the concept disappear. But the truth about sin puts sin back where it belongs: directly between the God of the Bible and our guilty selves. Sin is defined by God and embraced by us to our own ruin.

• The world strives manfully to find fulfillment here and now. But the truth tells the world that it cannot itself bring meaning, and it cannot fulfill. For real meaning and eternal purpose and lasting joy, we must look away from the world and beyond the world.

• The world defines “healthy” as “normal.” It defines “normal” by statistics, polls, and studies of what people do. “Is” equals “should.” But the Bible teaches that the world is marred by sin. Normal human behavior is broken human behavior, abnormal behavior, when judged by the standards of God’s original intent and stated norms. God’s unchanging, transcendent moral and spiritual absolutes shatter the world’s echo chamber of self-serving back-patting.

• The world has tried to do all sorts of things with Jesus. It has tried hard to ignore Him. It has repeatedly tried to mash Him into its image for its own endeavors. But the world needs to hear the truth about the Jesus Christ who won’t be ignored, tamed, lassoed, or co-opted. If Jesus is real, all the world’s values and plans and tidy little sandcastles are doomed.

• The world is all about pulling itself up by its bootstraps. If that doesn’t work, it just redefines “up” down and doesn’t move. But the truth is that no program or set of rules will perfect man or even improve him. This truth points to the treasure trove that can only be found in the perfect Man, Christ Jesus, in whom all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden away and in whom alone we can be filled full.

#9. The Vast Bounty of God’s Provisions for Us in Christ Enables and Obliges Us to Get on with It to His Glory

• The world is opposed to Christians getting on with it. To the degree that we walk with Jesus, we reflect His light, which the world finds repulsive. But in the name of God, we need to get on with it: take that gospel – that mighty, robust, saving, whole-Bible gospel – bust barriers, and turn the world upside down again.

You ought to read this book: Keep Your Head Up: America’s New Black Christian Leaders, Social Consciousness, and the Cosby Conversation (Crossway, 2012).

Anthony Bradley: Cosby and Poussaint catalyzed a needed conversation within the black community between those of the civil-rights generation and those of us born after 1970. For those who suffered under Jim Crow era discrimination, fought through the civil-rights movement, suffered to become the first generation of African Americans to hold many positions in this country, and so on, it has been very painful to look back at the pathologies of many black communities and ask, “Where did we go wrong?” or “What happened?”

Today, many blacks are now asking, “Where’s the church in all this?” That is, “Is the black church dead, and what is her response to these new realities?” This is one reason we wrote the book. We are making the case that as long as God’s church has a presence in broken communities, there is hope because the church is where people discover the gospel.

Anthony Bradley: Since slavery, the black church has served as a primary place for moral and social formation in the black community. The black church provided a refuge from suffering and a place to hear the hope of God’s plan to redeem all things because of what was finalized at the cross. We believe that her role is still important as the Scriptures teach us about the cosmic scope of redemption (Rom. 8; Col. 1).

If we want black families restored, virtues developed, and so on, that comes through the preaching and teaching of the work and person of Christ and the applications of redemption accomplished on the cross in our communities as God’s people seek first the Kingdom. This is what union with Christ is all about.

God intends to use His people, formed by the means of grace in His church, to be His agents of doing His will in the world wherever the curse is found (Matt. 5:13-20). As Reformed theologians, like Abraham Kuyper, remind us, the church is to continue preaching against sin in the lives of individuals and the errors in social institutions that do not reflect God’s intention for human life.

Anthony Bradley: Sadly, the prosperity gospel has taken the already individualistic, consumeristic American understanding of what it means to follow Christ to a new destructive level. This is why we included a chapter on this movement. Its theologically poisonous tentacles have found their way into many black churches, and it is now a major force in the black expression of Christianity in America, Latin America, and Africa.

Black pastors who are faithful to the Bible’s theology and faithful to the gospel of Christ are burdened to regularly preach against the prosperity gospel because of its presence in so many black churches as well as its emergence in contemporary gospel music. Prosperity theology is so bad that even black liberation theologians attack it.

Trevin Wax: Is gangsta rap a reflection of problematic issues within the black community or a cause of many social ills?

Anthony Bradley: It’s actually both. I am no fan of behavioral determinism because people who listen to gangsta rap still make their own moral choices. Gangsta rap is a complicated medium because it is primarily purchased by white suburban pre-teens and teens. The market drives so much of the content these days that some rappers are told what to rap about by producers because of what is known to sell. If there were a causal relationship between the music and moral action, middle-class culture would have similar outward pathologies in multiple areas.

In fact, gangsta rap serves as a signal and an enabler. You can think of gangsta rap as a reflection of the ways in which some people reflect on the narratives they encounter in their lived experiences. It serves as a signal to alert those in ministry to discern the “why” behind the music and to apply the gospel to it. It also serves to enable the mal-formed morals of those who already have certain presuppositions about the nature of the world.

The root cause of social ills in the black community is not gangsta rap but that men and women suffer from loving the wrong things in the wrong way. The music reflects that reality and, in some cases, encourages disordered love. This is why preachers need to preach the gospel to those who love gangsta rap because those men and women need to be transformed and liberated to love God and love neighbor (Matt. 22:36-40). This is what the gospel does—it frees us to love in the way God created people to love.

Sadly, the market will respond to the demands of consumers. When consumers are loving as God desires, it will be reflected in the music people want to hear—for those in the suburbs and inner-cities alike. As long as people are not loving the things that God loves, we will have music that does not reflect virtue (Phil. 4:8).

Anthony Bradley: The best way for a white church to serve alongside black pastors is to first think of themselves in a subordinate role—to first listen to what black pastors say the needs are and then to submit to black pastoral leadership. Far too often white churches approach black pastors assuming they know what is best for communities in which they do not live and for people they do not know. It is the same posture that is needed in international missions: Americans go to other countries and follow the lead of people who are there on the ground. Cross-cultural relationships in America are not different. This posture of humility will yield amazing dividends for the Kingdom.

Second, one of the reasons I wanted to do this book with Crossway was to give resources to white evangelicals, for them to use the book as a point of contact with black churches with whom they would like to serve and partner in order to say, “Here’s a book we picked up and would like to discuss with you all for the purposes of you telling us how we can help further the cause of Christ with your church in your community.”

Keep Your Head Up is a wonderful opportunity for white churches to begin new relationships with black churches to begin a fruitful dialogue. Sometimes in new relationships, you don’t know what to talk about. We want this book to serve as a national conversation starter not only within the black community but among white and urban pastors. We simply wanted to provide content for needed conversations. The truth is that we are all in this together as God’s people, and seeking the Kingdom calls for greater unity and solidarity. We wrote the book to help bridge the gap between the urban and the suburban (John 17).

EQUIPPING PASTORS TO RESPOND TO THE PROSPERITY GOSPEL

David Jones and Russell Woodbridge teach at Southeastern Seminary and are the authors of Health, Wealth & Happiness: Has the Prosperity Gospel Overshadowed the Gospel of Christ? They admit their surprise at the pervasiveness of prosperity theology, even among conservative Southern Baptists. They write in the preface, “The prosperity gospel has tremendous appeal, and it is growing both in the United States and internationally. Millions of people follow famous prosperity teachers, and their souls are at stake” (10).

It would be easy for young, theologically minded pastors to think of prosperity teaching as so obviously misguided that we don’t consider it worthy of attention. This would be a terrible mistake. As pastors and church leaders, we have an obligation to preach the biblical gospel in a way that takes into consideration our current context, a setting that unfortunately is heavily influenced by the idea that God’s blessing is financial and deserved.

Prosperity teaching is the antithesis of grace. Preachers and teachers of the gospel should be able and willing to point out the flaws in the prosperity gospel and equip others to do the same. Health, Wealth & Happiness is designed to aid pastors in that pursuit. “We want to inform you about the prosperity gospel movement and equip you to help those who have let the prosperity gospel replace the gospel of Christ” (20).

A SURVEY, CRITIQUE, AND RESPONSE TO THE PROSPERITY GOSPEL

The book begins with a survey of the historical foundations and growth of the movement. Following this, the authors point out the doctrinal errors of prosperity teaching. And the final third of the book lays out a biblical theology of some of the key themes that are denied or neglected in prosperity teaching.

Along the way, the authors take care to show how prosperity teaching is essentially gospel-less. They write: “This new gospel is perplexing—it omits Jesus and neglects the cross. Instead of promising Christ…this new gospel claims that God desires and even promises that believers will live a healthy and financially prosperous life” (14-15). Then, after laying out the biblical gospel, they show how woefully deficient is the preaching that takes place in prosperity churches:

Advocates of the prosperity gospel marginalize key components of the biblical gospel, such as Jesus, the cross, God’s judgment, and the sinful estate of humanity. If Jesus is left out of the gospel, then there is no gospel. If the cross is left out of the gospel, then there is no gospel. If God’s judgment against sin is left out of the gospel, then there is no gospel. If humanity’s sin is left out of the gospel, then there is no gospel. (86)

TWO ESPECIALLY BENEFICIAL SECTIONS

Two sections of this book are especially beneficial for pastors.

Historical Survey

The first is the historical survey that traces the roots of prosperity teaching back to “New Thought philosophy” and its advocates Emanuel Swedenborg, Phineas Quimby, and Ralph Waldo Trine. Though the authors are unable to establish a firm line of descent from “New Thought” to the origins of prosperity teaching in the mid-20^th century, they show striking similarities between these two movements.

Biblical Theology of Suffering, Possessions, and Giving

The second particularly helpful section is the constructive turn the book takes in the final chapters. Instead of merely exposing and condemning prosperity teaching, the authors offer a robust biblical theology of suffering, possessions, and giving, three themes that are especially mangled by prosperity teaching.

A SUCCESSFUL CRITIQUE OF AND COUNTER TO PROSPERITY TEACHING

Overall, pastors will find Health, Wealth & Happiness to be a worthy addition to their library. It succeeds at exposing the foundational errors of prosperity teaching as well as offering insight into how prosperity teaching can be countered by having a firm grasp on the only gospel that saves. Pastors will want to have not merely one copy on their bookshelf, but multiple copies to hand out to church members.

- This review was first published as part of the 9Marks eJournal, Jan-Feb 2012

The Generous Soul: An Introduction to Missional Giving 

Marty Duren: Thanks for the invite, Trevin. Many years ago, I was blessed to hear some really solid preaching by a number of evangelists on the biblical attitude toward possessions. Early in our marriage, Sonya and I committed to give from what God had entrusted to us, so over the years, we supported numerous missionaries, ministries, and whatever local church we attended. We really wanted to lay up treasures not on this earth.

During the past few years as the conversation around missional church, missional living, missional Christianity, etc. expanded, it seemed that the direct relationship to possessions was being overlooked, if not completely, then in a big way. If missional has to do with the believer’s partnership in the missio dei, then there is simply no way around the fact that this must impact our relationship to money and possessions.

Trevin Wax: I like the phrase you introduce in the book: “missional giving.” What do you mean by that?

Marty Duren: Missional giving is the idea that our relationship to money and possessions is subordinate to the mission of God, that all money we have under our control is under the control of God. We cannot say that we are on mission with God if our stuff is actively impeding that mission. To be a missional giver is to live in such a way that financial support of kingdom work is a planned priority. The thesis of the book is stated this way:

Marty Duren: Possibly the most important thing to come out of the missional conversation is the truth that all believers are missionaries in their country, culture, and context. This has contributed mightily to our exploration of cross-cultural mission work within our own cities and communities, leading us to embrace cultural distinctives rather than judging them. More and more, Christ’s followers see themselves, accurately, as missionaries.

When missionaries are sent into international contexts, there are expectations, both spoken and unspoken, that their lives will be sacrificial: lesser goods, lesser money, one car, less emphasis on possessions, and smaller houses. One well-known mission agency allows their missionaries to live only in homes up to 1,600 square feet in size. In virtually every instance, if a missionary demanded a U.S. sized home, multiple cars, a large yard, i.e., almost everything we as Americans expect, we would demand they either repent or come back home.

Why do we place expectations on missionaries we send to other countries but do not live according to the same expectations even though we are missionaries sent by God as well? How does the fact that we are in our home culture change the fact that we have the same gospel responsibility to our host culture as someone who travels to a new culture? It does not.

Marty Duren: Anyone raised in America is familiar with the concept of the American dream—the idea that anyone who works hard and is self-sufficient can be successful. Though it has been under some attack in the last 2-3 years, it stands as the concept of each generation doing better than the generation preceding it. The problem for American believers is that “doing better” refers, almost solely, to having more stuff. The American Dream too easily slides into a life of materialism.

This has nowhere been more clearly demonstrated than when the economy became mired in the Great Recession. Out-of-control debt—the result of buying, buying, and more buying—was a curse on followers of Christ as well as those making no claim to salvation. Mortgage foreclosures hit believers and churches alike. Our credit card debt, as a whole, was also enslaving.

It is not just the questionable theology of the prosperity gospel that is the issue or the followers of certain “health and wealth” preachers. It is the blindness to our own idol worship. It is so engrained that we do not see it as sin and are loathe to admit it if confronted. When we get a raise or a bonus, it is rare for the first response to be “I wonder if God has a purpose for this extra money He has sent my way…” Most of the time, the money is gone before it ever hits our checking account: new toys, new trinkets, bigger car, and the like.

Marty Duren: Because money is more tangible and it is easier to trust. When God says, “Wait,” but First National says, “No closing costs!” and MasterCard says, “Priceless!” we often reach for what we can touch rather than waiting for Him who is invisible. Even though God has promised to meet all our needs, our lack of patience leads us to the immediate gratification money provides. There are many ways that mammon is the exact opposite of God: God is power; money provides power. God requires faith; money replaces faith. God teaches patience; money provides immediacy—and so on.

Mammon is an idol that directly affects our lives every single day. Mammon is not like Baal or Molech—stone images to whom some sacrifice is made—instead, it affects virtually every decision we make: clothing, electricity, gasoline, size of house, style of car, vacation destination, sports, and hobbies. Literally, the list could go on and on. Part of what makes mammon so endearing is that it is interactive.

If we are not careful, we will make all of our financial decisions not on the basis of what God would have us do but simply on whether or not we can afford it. At that point, mammon is in control.

Marty Duren: Practical theology, yes. But this is not a book on balancing your budget or getting out of debt. It is not a how-to book. It is a “what is the truth and what does that require” kind of book. It is not an investment book, unless you count investing in the kingdom of God. Dave Ramsey and Ron Blue are safe.

Marty Duren: I would like to say it’s because I’m such a generous person, but that might not be accurate. It is actually two-fold: first, due to shifts in the publishing industry, my publisher is going out of business. Consequently, my book will be out of print until I either get another publisher or decide to self-publish it. Second, I really do believe the content is important enough to put into everyone’s hands, even if I don’t always make money.

To accomplish this, I’m making the book available in serial form on my blog. Each Thursday, beginning tomorrow, March 22, a new chapter will be available to read. It won’t be downloadable, but quotes for reviews or use in teaching will be allowed. It will stay up indefinitely unless an unexpected book deal were to require it to be removed. It will remain available in both the Kindle Store and the iBookstore at very discounted rates.