On April 1, 2024, I wrote on this blog a review of Becoming A Woman of Excellence by this same author.  In it I mentioned that she has other books in this series.  This is one of those.  This one, I think, might be more helpful.  Many of us live our lives worried about our past, about what others think about us, unable to forgive and too busy with things of this world.  Those are just a few of the lessons in this book, as the author seeks to show us how to free ourselves of extraneous, unhelpful, or even sinful things, and "run the race" as Jesus would have us do.

Please reread that first book review.  Everything in it, except the subject, applies here—the way the lessons are laid out, what to watch out for (very little), and how to go about studying and/or teaching them.  And speaking of freedom, do feel free to ignore anything that is not grounded in scripture or smacks a little of Calvinism or any other –ism that is not Biblical.

As with the other book, this one is published by NavPress.

Dene Ward

For anyone who just happens upon this review:  if you are a scholar of Biblical Studies, you want to just skip this.  I am no such thing.  I just enjoy reading, especially books that will build my own knowledge and understanding of God's Word.  That means that sometimes I get hold of a book that is a little beyond me, but that's who I am writing for on my own personal blog—people who are not necessarily erudite but who want to challenge themselves with something that is far above the fluff one usually gets at the supermarket bookshelf or even the chain bookstores.

 I am glad I read it after I read the same author's Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels rather than before.  This one, the Letters of Paul, actually came out before the other.  In it he carefully describes what he is doing and how he goes about it.  You would think that would make this one easier to digest, but that was not the case for me.  If I had read this one first, I would never have picked up the second one on the Gospels, which I enjoyed and will probably make use of in future Bible classes.  This one was so much more difficult that I could barely manage 10-12 pages at a sitting and even halfway understand what I was reading.  I looked up the same words again and again and still cannot be absolutely sure that I remember what they mean!  Words like adumbrate, metalepsis, kerygma, heuristic, etc.—I have reached the point that if I see them in a sentence I can figure them out, but all alone and out of context?  No more than a couple.

 If you do want to give it a try, you absolutely must understand that the word "Scripture" has a narrow meaning in the context of this book; here it refers to the Old Testament scriptures only.

 Once the author gets into the actual letters of Paul and begins to go back and forth between them and the Old Testament passages they "echo," you really can learn a lot.  Most of the things he pointed to I already knew, but he takes it much deeper and sees more than I ever have before.  You and I already know and believe what he is trying to prove in most cases.  The author is just showing you how you got there, and adding a few details you might have missed.

At the end he seems to be arguing about whether we can take the same "liberties" Paul did in interpreting scripture.  Let's face it:  you and I are much more simplistic.  We believe that the Holy Spirit inspired Paul to see these things whereas Jewish rabbis before him did not.  That answers the question for us.  But a few things like that do not mean you cannot learn things from this book if you want to try.  You had just better be ready to go at it with a figurative pickaxe to mine the gold in it. 

 Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul is published by Yale University Press.

Dene Ward

After you read this book you will realize that even though you think you have read the gospels, you have never really read them at all.

 As one can easily see from even a quick reading, the Old Testament appears in one way or the other on practically every page of the New Testament.  Hays shows us not only those obvious citations but also allusions and something he calls "echoes," things that can only be seen by a reader well-versed in the Old Testament.  Just think of passages like these:

For if you believed Moses, you would believe me; for he wrote of me, John5:46.

And he said unto them, These are my words which I spoke unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must needs be fulfilled, which are written in the law of Moses, and the prophets, and the psalms, concerning me. Then opened he their mind, that they might understand the scriptures, Luke24: 44,45.

And those two are only a tiny piece of the wealth the author presents.  Already in my own studies I had come across Isaiah's vineyard parable (Isaiah 5) and its relationship to Jesus' own vineyard parable (Mark 12), but that is still nothing more than a thin veneer compared to the depths this author plumbs.

 Hays patiently takes us through each gospel, not only showing the use of the Old Testament in each, but also analyzing the methods that each writer employs and why he does so.  It will become painfully obvious that anyone who insists on using only a fourfold gospel approach to the life of Christ misses far more than half of what each writer was trying to show us because he is too focused on chronology and details to see the more complex allusions and echoes—that one will be stuck with clear citations only.  It also thoroughly scolds anyone who insists on ignoring the Old Testament as "no longer relevant."

 My readers, who I know are above average intelligence, must still realize that this is a scholarly treatise.  Occasionally, Hays writes in Greek, but probably 95% of the time he translates it somewhere else in the paragraph.  It would do you well to keep a dictionary handy, not because you aren't smart but because theology and exegesis are not your bailiwick.  I learned several new words after looking them up, not once but several times.  You can too.  Do not be discouraged by the page count either.  My copy contained about 150 pages of notes and indices in the back.

 Did I agree with everything in the book?  No, I did not, but would it impress you to know that premillenialists don't like the way he presents Christ's kingdom as existing now?  Funny what you can teach yourself out of with an intense study.

 Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels is published by Baylor University Press.

Dene Ward

I read Yancey's The Jesus I Never Knew about 20 years ago and loved it.  Keith read both that and Disappointment with God and was so happy with the latter that the church soon after had a class based upon it.  So I came into this book expecting wonderful things.  Unfortunately, this one doesn't match up, at least for me.

 When you study the history of the Israelites as they leave Egypt, led by Moses, it takes only a little thought to realize why they had so much trouble.  For 400 years or more they had no direct contact with God.  In Egypt they saw a culture with tangible gods (idols, often of calves) every day.  That is what they grew up with and so, expected from their own God.  No one had taught them otherwise, except perhaps a few whose families kept the old stories of the patriarchs alive, like Amram and Jochebed who successfully taught their own children.  But by and large, when Aaron fashioned the golden calf and told them that this was the god who brought them out of Egypt, that was far easier for them to understand than a God who only showed Himself in frightening thunder and lightning, and cloudy or fiery pillars.  They had to be taught that God was not a tangible being, and that was the reason for the second commandment, "You shall have no graven images before me."

 And so today, we Christians will often fall into the same trap.  "I can't see God in my life, so He must not be there."  Nonsense.  One just has to learn how to see Him, just like those ancient people had to, and sometimes we fail as miserably as they did.  So I expected this to be a book that helped with doubt primarily, and spiritual vision as an answer to it.  That is not what I got.  This book seemed like a group of people sitting around nursing their mocha lattes while discussing personal experiences and interesting questions, with no real practical help given at all.  It barely hung together, and that like a patchwork quilt without even a color scheme.  It was repetitive and somewhat boring.  Frankly, Os Guinness's God in the Dark was much more helpful to me.  After 100 pages in Yancey's book, I gave up and put it back on the shelf.

 If you still want to give it a try, Reaching for the Invisible God is available all over the internet.

Dene Ward

 Based upon my experience of the past 7 decades, this book is sorely needed.  Not only has a generation arisen that does not know their Bible like they should, they do not know God like they should, and that knowledge should mean a recognition of His authority and the fact that He expects us to honor that authority.  We have a group that wants to ridicule Nadab and Abihu and gopher wood along with Naaman and his seven dips into the Jordan.  Meanwhile, they live by someone's authority every day and think nothing of it.  They drive on highways by the authority of the state that issued them a driver's license, and obey laws they don't agree with just to stay out of jail or not pay a fine or whatever else that "authority" tells them they must do.  In their own hypocritical way they spout, "No one can tell me what to do," and then do what they are told to do every day of their lives. 

 If anyone has authority in our lives it is our Creator.  This book helps us see in a logical way how to please God in terms we have heard before, and explains them with scripture after scripture, step by step.  The first half of the book contains 13 lessons and accompanying questions which is suitable for high school, college, or adult class—perhaps a new converts class as well.  The last half includes 11 essays on relative topics like instrumental music, institutionalism, names of the church, and creeds, among others.

 Doy Moyer has always been a deep and clear thinker.  I think you will find this book more of the same.

 Mind Your King is printed by Moyer Press.

Dene Ward

When I sat down to write this review was the first time I actually saw the sub-title for this book, "A Call to a Spiritual Reformation."  Maybe that explains why it made me feel like a ping-pong ball going back and forth from one chapter to another, and sometimes within a chapter.  At one point, about halfway through a chapter, the author wrote, "And what does this have to do with prayer?" and I uttered a not very quiet "Amen."  So let this be a warning before you pick this one up:  don't expect a guidebook to learning how to pray.  This is about much more than that, and sometimes the author cannot seem to decide if it's a book for scholars or a book for us ordinary folks who just want a better prayer life.

     The author does discuss eight, if I counted right, prayers of Paul.  And no, my prayers are not much like his.  Only occasionally have I reached the sort of profundity that his do.  This read did teach me how better to think about and thus word prayers like Paul's.  I wish Carson had spent much more time helping me be able to do that instead of just asking again and again, "Do your prayers sound like this?"  Perhaps I am just too practical, even too formulaic in my thinking, but certainly there are many others who just want a little more "how" discussion instead of just "what." 

     The most helpful chapters to me were the first where he does indeed give us a list of helpful hints and then the seventh—excuses given for not praying.  Be careful of your toes in that one.  I also found comfort and relief in the twelfth chapter in which he discusses the times that it seems our prayers are not answered, at least not in the way we would like them to be.  

     I found myself in other chapters wading through things I never expected due to the title of this book, and that left me aggravated more than helped.  Sometimes it seems like Carson cannot decide whether to write about theology or practicality.  Part of the problem is that his Calvinism, modern though it may be, creates paradoxes that non-Calvinists do not wrestle with, at least quite so much.  Yes, I believe in the sovereignty of God, but my God—and the God I believe the Bible shows us—is so powerful He can give us freewill in its greatest sense and still make His will come to pass.  So I pray, even trying to change His mind occasionally, because I believe my prayers will make a difference—HE said they would.  Carson stops every so often to wrestle with things like that and it gave me motion sickness, going back and forth from subject to subject.

     This writer has a reputation for scholarship and good writing and he certainly deserves it.  I will probably use quotes from this book on my blog's "Thirty Second Devo" entries.  But if you pick this one up, you have my permission to skip ahead every so often to find what truly helps you.

     Praying with Paul by D. A. Carson is published by Baker Academic.

Dene Ward

Yes, it's another book by those Ward people, our son Nathan, in this case.  This has become one of his most acclaimed books yet.

            So what's it about?  He does the rather remarkable thing, it seems,  of studying prayers by faithful servants of God in order to teach us how better to pray.  Even scholarly people, perhaps especially scholarly people, seem amazed at the concept.  But we who attempt to be First Century Christians in all our words and deeds are used to this.  If you want to know how to pray, look for approved examples in the Scriptures themselves.  If you want to know how to do anything, look in those same Scriptures!

            And what will you find out?  Some pretty comforting things actually.  Things like God will listen to our prayers no matter how poorly worded or awkward they are as long as they are humble, especially, and sincere.  That if we study the prayers of these saints our own prayers will change for the better.  That if we base our prayers upon the promises of God, we needn't worry they will not be heard.  That God expects our complaints and laments because they show our faith in Him to hear, care, and answer.  That if we begin with the physical and superficial in our prayers, it will help us move on to more spiritual concepts in our prayers.  That not all prayers need be all-encompassing; some can be quite specific and even short.  That faith always comes with action.  That what we pray for should first be viewed in how it will affect God's glory.  And on and on and on.

            I have read this book three times now, if you count the editing.  It grows more and more profound as I do.  Do yourself a favor and read it once through, then the second time go through more slowly, one chapter every other day, perhaps, so you have some meditating time in between, writing down notes short enough but specific enough to jog your memory for each chapter.  Then when you have a particular need, you can skim through them and find the chapter you might need to read again at that time.  Your prayers will be glad you did! 

And for those who always ask me, "Is this something I can really understand, or is it very scholarly?" Yes, you can understand it, and it will help you in one of the most important aspects of your life as a servant of God.

            Our Eyes Are on You is published by DeWard Publishing Company.

Dene Ward

Don't run away because of the title of this book.  The authors do believe that Jesus existed and was the Son of God.  The aim of authors Eddy and Boyd is to carefully study and ultimately call into question those who do not believe Jesus was the Son of God, or that he even existed. In order to do so, they very carefully distance themselves from their faith most of the way through the book in order to make their treatise as academic as possible.  Be aware that this is a scholarly treatise.  It is not easy to read, but if you are reasonably intelligent, as I believe my readers are, you can understand it and come away more assured about your own faith.

               The first chapter is nearly interminable.  Don't run away from that either.  Just read a section or two at a time, keeping a dictionary handy.  The authors are setting forth not only what they are investigating, but also how they plan to do it.  That part does get a little tedious, but I am not sure you will understand what you are reading if you skip it.  Once you are past that, it goes much more quickly.  In fact, the last half of the book is a breeze after that.

               The scholars the authors are speaking about say they are using the "historical-critical" method, which includes a naturalistic (no miracles allowed) approach to everything.  Eddy and Boyd show how this method is nothing more than post-Gutenberg Western Academia blowing their own horn as the only ones who are doing it right.  They are charged with chronocentrism, ethnocentrism and circular reasoning.  "When nothing is allowed to count as evidence against a presupposition, and when nothing is allowed to call into question one's metaphysical commitments, the commitment to the presupposition is, for all intents and purposes, a religious commitment to a dogma…This hardly seems consistent with a discipline that calls itself 'critical' and strives to be…objective and unbiased…in its assessment of evidence."  The authors then advocate an "open" historical-critical method, which they believe is much more fair and includes the humility to recognize that they are not the only intelligent ones out there.  More than once, Western Academia is scolded for its arrogance.  Some of the arguments made by these people to "prove" that the Gospels are no more than myth even I can answer.  The fact that Jesus' sermons on the same topic are often "different" in each gospel?  I am married to a preacher.  He often preaches the same sermons again and again, but he does not use exactly the same words.  It depends upon the audience for one thing, and anyone telling the same story more than once will use different words with each telling.  It is not a rote performance. 

               The authors answer every objection these scholars make in their own very scholarly way.  At the end, they don their theological hats for a final brief moment and say, "the Holy Spirit, personal commitment, and covenant trust must carry one the rest of the way.  If this work has, to any extent helped to clarify the solid historical grounds for this faith response, it has served its purpose."  I think it does exactly that.

               The Jesus Legend is published by Baker Academics and is also available on Kindle.

Dene Ward