Books I Like: The Jesus Storybook Bible

Here's a book I'm loving at the moment. OK, so it's probably never going to appear on the UCCF study programme, but Tim Keller did recommend it as a book for preachers at a conference a couple of years ago.

It's called the Jesus Storybook Bible: Every Story Whispers His Name (emphasis more on Storybook and less on Bible). Sally Lloyd-Jones has taken lots of well known stories from the Bible, and a few lesser-known ones, and has written them in a child-friendly, colourful way. And some great illustrations make it really engaging. But she doesn't just retell the stories - in each story, right from the beginning of creation, she points to Jesus. Again and again, she shows how Jesus is at the heart of God's story from beginning to end. It's a heartwarming book, and I'm loving it. It's a refreshing way to look again at some familiar parts of the Bible, with the challenge of looking for Jesus in everything that happens. I love it and heartily recommend it, no matter how old you are!

Total Spirituality

OK, following on from a previous post, here is the first (although these aren't in any kind of order) of many things I got out of the book Total Church.

There are a couple of things which have nagged me (by which I mean, I've felt there was something wrong, but couldn't definitely put my finger on it) as I have thought about 'spirituality' over the past few years. One is that, as evangelical Christians, we don't seem to be very good at spirituality. And so I've been encouraged lots to venture outside of my own theological tradition to 'be spiritual.' Prayers, icons, candles, whatever. I don't necessarily have a problem with learning from others, but it bothers me when I don't have a gospel-centred alternative to compare things to.

The other thing which has nagged me is the individualism that seems to be a big part of being spiritual. We tend to focus a lot on personal and private prayer and Bible study. Again, not necessarily bad things, but I think it's part of the reason why we can be very personal and private about our faith in general. So that when we get together, we're just a collection of individuals who happen to all be worshipping God in the same place. I went to a CU meeting once (I won't say where) which was mostly silence. I think we were meant to listen to God. I lasted about 30 seconds and started thinking about something else.

Chapter 9 of TC is about Spirituality, and it addresses both of these things. The authors point out that God's Word should be central to our spirituality. We don't need to just sit quietly until God pops something into our heads - he's already spoken through the Bible! Our spirituality should be marked by passionate engagement in the world and in prayer. And it will happen in the context of community.

A really helpul way the TC boys look at the role of coummunity in spirituality is to look at the Bible story emphasising first the individual, then the community. Both stories are true, but the individualistic version misses out a huge part of the picture. And they explain how this should work in practice. We should prioritise prayer together over prayer on our own. We shouldn't separate our relationship to God from our relationship to those around us, as one affects the other. And we need the constant exhortation and encouragement that comes from being together as a community.

When we make spirituality about certain practices, we set up what TC calls a 'spirituality of achievement' - you're more spiritual the more/better you do. The goal is often union with Christ. But that is upside down. Union with Christ is not the goal of spirituality, but its foundation. Basically, the gospel is all we need. Paul makes a big deal about that in Colossians. It reminded me of something pretty mind-boggling that Andy Shudall said at a Relay conference. We can fall into the trap of thinking of the gospel as the door we walk through to become a Christian, which we then leave behind. But that's rubbish. The gospel is the car we drive, the petrol in the engine, the map we use to find our way... you get the idea.

Should I feel guilty that I don't find candles and chanting particularly helpful? Does that make me immature? No. And it's good and healthy to be spiritual by spending time with God's people, marvelling at the gospel together.

My boss once asked me a question which was something like, "what do you think is the key to maintaining the spiritual life?" My answer what that we maintain the spiritual life by holding tight to the gospel. We don't need to move on to other things - in fact, that will lead to disaster. What we need is to have our heart and mind opened more and more to the transforming, reconciling, humbling power of the gospel.

More on Total Church

Thanks to Wendy who left a comment on my last post pointing me to a couple of articles in The Briefing on Total Church. I'm too tight to buy things like that, but I found it on the wonderful internet. The link below will take you to a series of emails exchanged between Steve Timmis (co-author of TC), Tony Payne (Editor of The Briefing) and Simon Flinders (an Assistant Minister in Sydney).

Talking about Total Church, part 1
Talking about Total Church, part 2
Talking about Total Church, part 3

The australians spend a lot of time on some quite specific definitions, which I have a feeling might say more about the bees in their bonnets rather than failures of Total Church. But Steve Timmis's responses are great. It's worth a read.

Total Church

Have you ever read one of those books where it's as if someone has taken lots of things you were thinking about and written the book you wanted someone to write about them? For me, Total Church is one of those books. And Steve Timmis and Tim Chester have definitely stretched my brain.

I know it's been out for a while, but I had a book token (thanks Cumbria CU!) so I invested in it. It was worth every penny (in fact, I woul dhappily have spent the full £10 on it - I should've saved the book token for something else...). I can't actually express how much I love this book! And so there will probably be a few posts on this as I try to. The book is based on a simple idea - the church should be a community centred on the gospel, with a focus on mission. Having set that out (very clearly and persuasively), the boys head off into all sorts of different aspects of church life to find out what it means. The results are seriously mind-boggling. Once we've taken it on board, it will affect how we think about church and about it's place in the world.

As I said, it came along at just the right time, when I was thinking about some of this already. But Total Church made it really clear that I have a lot more thinking to do. In a lot of ways I was quite reassured by the book, because I'm possibly not as random as I thought I was. At a certain job interview recently, I said a couple of things off-the-cuff which I later thought sounded really stupid, and were probably wrong. But, to my surprise, Tim and Steve said them too! (I won't say what they were here, but I might mention them in future posts...)

If you're a Christian you should read this book, either to encourage you or (more likely) to challenge and unsettle you. Pastors should read it, but so should the people they're pastoring - it's all about community, which will only work if the 'leaders' and the 'led' are on board. I love this book. And if you bear with me, I'll tell you some of the reasons why...