Wednesday Book Reviews for 5-9-18
This week’s Wednesday book reviews center on what is the Gospel?
Here We Stand – A Call from Confessing Evangelicals For A Modern Reformation
Edited by James Montgomery Boice and Benjamin E. Sasse
The church in sixteenth-century Europe needed a reformation. Martin Luther precipitated what we call the Reformation with his famous declaration, “Here I stand!” Is the evangelical church of today equally in need of a reformation? Yes, proclaim eight evangelical leaders:
-David Wells
-R. Albert Mohler
-James Montgomery Boice
-Gene Edward Veith
-Michael Horton
-W. Robert Godfrey
-Sinclair Ferguson
-Ervin Duggan
“Because of our love of Christ, his gospel, and his church,” they affirm in a document called the Cambridge Declaration, “we endeavor to assert anew our commitment to the central truths of the Reformation and of historic evangelicalism.”
Evangelicals “have abandoned the truths of the Bible and the historic theology of the church, which expresses those truths,” writes co-editor Boice. “We are trying to do the work of God by means of the world’s ‘theology,’ wisdom, methods, and agenda instead.” Here We Stand! calls churches to return to the authority of the Bible and to apply it faithfully in their worship, ministry, policies, life, and evangelism.
Ashamed of The Gospel 3rd Edition
By John MacArthur
In the third edition of this top-selling book, John MacArthur challenges the seeker-sensitive, user-friendly, entertainment-oriented pragmatism that permeates the church today.
In the late 1800s, Charles Spurgeon warned that the church was drifting away from the purity of the gospel, candy-coating God’s Word rather than boldly proclaiming the truths of Scripture. As a result, Christianity’s influence in nineteenth-century England was severely weakened. One hundred years later, John MacArthur, troubled by the seeker-sensitive movement and an emphasis on pragmatism within the church, sounded the same alarm with the first edition of Ashamed of the Gospel.
In this newly revised and expanded edition, MacArthur gives an overview of developments in the seeker-sensitive movement since his book was first published in 1993. New material traces the line of pragmatic philosophy from the seeker-sensitive movement through the Emergent phenomenon, explaining why the latter is a philosophical heir of the former-and an even greater danger; chronicles the failure of pragmatic approaches to church growth; and emphasizes the importance of evangelicals solidly committed to biblical doctrine rising to positions of leadership.
Hard To Believe, The Hard Cost and Infinite Value of Following Jesus
By John MacArthur
Jesus Christ did not die on the cross so you and I could have a nice day.
Ministers and teachers who water down the gospel of Christ in order to make it more popular and appealing may be leading their fun-loving audiences down the road to eternal punishment.
This book is John MacArthur’s unflinching, unapologetic treatise on the modern tendency to alter the true message of Christianity in order to meet the whims and desires of a culture hoping for nonconfrontational messages, easy answers, and superficial commitments.
Too many people just want a Madison Avenue Jesus to make them well, make them happy, and make them prosperous. But Jesus Christ isn’t a personal genie. He is the Savior. He died in agony to satisfy the wrath of a holy God and to forgive the sins of humankind. Faith in Him demands a willingness to make any sacrifice He asks. The hard truth about Christianity is that the cost is high, but the rewards are priceless: abundant and eternal life that comes only from faithfully following Christ.