Books Books Books

At the Together for the Gospel Blog, Albert Mohler posted some of his thoughts on reading books and while I try to keep everything here somewhat original I had to refer you on to read his post, Some Thoughts on the Reading of Books. I love books and I love to read so for me one of the saddest and most disturbing trends within among modern evangelicals and within America, as a whole, is a lack of reading. I think it is safe to say that the majority of reading that does occur is of the superficial fictional type that fails to stimulate deep thought. This is largely due to our incessant desire to be stimulated by the onslaught of vivid images provided by television and video games. I mainly read books on theology but I also enjoy reading books about WWII and Scotland; I find books on war particularly interesting because they remind me of what the Christian life is, a war for eternal freedom, and what this war requires, great sacrifice. On this theme, Erwin Raphael McManus said the following, “God’s Kingdom is a Kingdom of war. Not where we kill but where we are willing to let others kill us. Not where we hate but we are willing to embrace the hate of others. Not where we are violent but where we take the violence of the world upon ourselves and allow the love of God to prevail. I wonder how many of us actually believe God can prevail if we love the worst of sinners; if we extend our lives into the most dangerous situation in the world?”