Chapter 38: Books

   I love reading. Everywhere I go I have books with me. They are in my office. They are in my car. They are on the coffee table. They are by my bed. I carry them in my hands, backpack, coat pockets and even my socks if they are small enough. I’m usually reading about forty or fifty books at a time. Novels, history, theology, biography, sociology and on it goes. I find most everything interesting and love seeing how different fields of study intersect.

   In the midst of this pile of authors there are a few who stand out in their impact on my life. Historically, the reformers Martin Luther and John Calvin have done that for me. In the contemporary world I think of Eugene Peterson and Roger Olson. One group I seem to identify with best are those British evangelical Anglicans; John Stott, Alister McGrath, N.T. Wright, John Newton and C.S. Lewis, to name a few.

   I encourage every Christian to find mentors in books, both among the living and the dead. Don’t just dabble with their material. Immerse yourself in them so that you can see, feel and think as they do. This saves you from getting stuck within the narrowness of your own thoughts. You’ll also need to expand the perspectives of your mentors. Recently I have been reading more from Africans, Asians and women, as I recognize a lack of their influence in my thinking. This doesn’t mean you’ll agree with everything your mentors will say. There are a number of things I disagree with John Calvin on, and yet he has deeply impacted me. 

   There is so much that can be said in this chapter about different writers who have influenced me that I will limit myself to four: Francis Schaeffer, C.S. Lewis, John Newton and Charles Spurgeon. 

Francis Schaeffer 

   The fall of 1996 was my first year as a seminary student. For the last couple of years I had been struggling with my faith. It was then that I came across a little book entitled Pollution and the Death of Man (1970), by Francis Schaeffer. I had a theology assignment on creation due and the book title made me think it might help.  So I started reading, not realizing the profound effect this book was going to have on my understanding of Jesus and his message. After reading it my obsessive compulsiveness took over and I spent the next two years reading through the works of Francis Schaeffer. 

   Schaffer taught me the importance of preaching the physical message of the gospel.

   I’d grown up in a Christian home. I’d gone through four years of Bible College. I’d been a youth pastor for two years. But it wasn’t until I was 22 that I started to “get” the holistic message of Jesus, and I’ve been learning and preaching it ever since. 

   As a brief synopsis, the following words from Pollution and the Death of Man ended up establishing the foundation of how I see life and my purpose in the world.

   While we should not romanticize the tree, we must realize that God made it and it deserves respect because he made it a tree…. The Christian has reason for dealing with each created thing with a high level of respect…. We certainly cannot think the material low when we realize that God created it…. To think of them as low is really to insult the God who made them….
   (Also) the resurrection and ascension prove there is no reason to make a false dichotomy between the spiritual and the material. That is a totally non-biblical concept…. Christ’s body really was raised from the dead. It could be touched, and he could eat…. This body was not just an apparition or a ghost….
   The fact that our bodies are going to be raised also speaks of this…. Why should I say my body is lower than my soul when God made both my body and soul?

   The implications in understanding this are huge. 

   As Paul wrote to Timothy, “Since everything God created is good, we should not reject any of it but receive it with thanks. For we know it is made acceptable by the word of God and prayer. If you explain these things to the brothers and sisters, Timothy, you will be a worthy servant of Christ Jesus, one who is nourished by the message of faith and the good teaching you have followed.“ (1 Timothy 4:4-6, NLT). 

   I went from being a spiritual (gnostic) Christian, only concerned about saving “souls” to no longer believing in “souls” (in the Platonic sense of having a ghostly part living in our body). I came to understand that Christianity is a physical faith. In fact, it is the one faith that truly upholds God’s creation and humanity to their rightful and dignified place. From this, Schaeffer went on to teach me an appreciation for art and science and the place of the social gospel. Biblical (gospel) preaching intersects all of these areas. Schaeffer informed my preaching and prayer life to understand the words in the Lord’s Prayer that say, “May it be on earth as it is in heaven.”  

   Christianity doesn’t allow you to escape real life. Instead it is about blood, dirt, ashes, semen, menstrual-cycles, gravel and saliva. It’s why the church practices rituals that involve water, wine and bread. Jesus gave us things that we can taste, see, smell, feel and hear to remember him by. A Christianity that is only spiritual, and not engaged with physical life, is not true Christianity.

C.S. Lewis

   Lewis is by far the most delightful author I have ever read. I have read most of his Christian stuff more than once and I am now beginning to read though his books on English literature. C.S. Lewis has taught me the importance of using one’s imagination and to think with pictures and stories. I can pull any one of Lewis’ books off my shelf, open it at random, and find ideas expressed so well that you cannot help quoting them out of sheer delight at his images, wit and ability with words. Just listen as he challenges us to live in light of the resurrection: 

   Who will trust me with a spiritual body if I cannot even control an earthly body? These small and perishable bodies we now have were given to us as ponies are given to schoolboys. We must learn to manage: not that we may someday be free of horses altogether but that someday we may ride bare-back, confident and rejoicing, those greater mounts, those winged, shining and world-shaking horses which perhaps even now expect us with impatience, pawing and snorting in the Kings stables. (Miracles).

   What is it about this beer drinking, chain smoking, Anglican teacher who believed in purgatory and evolution, that has made him so popular among evangelicals? Lewis could write works of philosophy like the Abolition of Man, apologetics like Mere Christianity and Miracles, while at the same time write some of the greatest children’s literature of the 20th century in the Tales of Narnia. In the same way the Bible has the logic of Proverbs, the stories of Genesis, the poetry of the Psalms, the hyperboles of Jesus, the metaphors of Paul and the visions, dreams and creatures of fantasy of Revelation. Without an imagination you are going to have a difficult time interpreting large chunks of scripture. Lewis even tells us to stop feeding on only milk and grow-up and become children! As he writes in his dedication in The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe to Lucy Barfield: 

   I wrote this story for you, but when I began it I had not realized that girls grow quicker than books. As a result you are already too old for fairly-tales, and by the time it is printed and bound you will be older still. But some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again. You can then take it down from some upper shelf, dust it, and tell me what you think of it. I shall probably be too deaf to hear, and too old to understand a word you say, but I will still be your affectionate godfather, C.S. Lewis. 

   In other words, Lewis taught me how to read and, in turn, taught me how to read the Bible. Lewis was a man who allowed God to use his imagination, his questions, and even his scepticism to become one of the greatest influencers of Christianity in the 20th century. God is making all things new and I cannot think of a better individual to read who, in describing this, sends shivers down my spine by engaging my mind, emotions and whole being. I want these last words from The Last Battle to be read at my funeral: 

   “There was a real railway accident,” said Aslan softly. “Your father and mother and all of you are – as you used to call it in the Shadowlands – dead. The term is over: the holidays have begun. The dream is ended: this is the morning.”
   And as he spoke he no longer looked to them like a lion; but the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot write them. And for us this is the end of all stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on forever: in which every chapter is better than the one before. 

John Newton

   Early in my ministry at Greenfield I bought a little book at a second-hand bookstore for $2 called Letters of John Newton. This book sat on my shelf for about seven years when, looking for somebody to accompany my devotions, I picked it off my shelf and began reading it.  

   I felt like these letters were written to me. How did Newton know to send these letters to me at precisely the time I was discouraged in my pastoral work and needed the encouragement of another pastor? After reading this book I was ecstatic to find out that he had written over 500 other letters, and so I ordered them and have since read all his letters, books, sermons and hymns that are available.  

   Many know John Newton through the hymn "Amazing Grace." Fewer know John’s story of a once arrogant, licentious, African slave trader who turned himself over to Christ. Fewer still know of the impact this slave-trader, turned Christian, turned pastor, had through his letter writing. Many of Newton’s letters were written to pastors and he became something of a pastor to pastors in his lifetime. And that is what he became to me. He has become to me what Paul was to Timothy. 

John Newton taught me that preaching comes out of the everyday life of being a pastor. One of Newton’s great themes to pastors was the development of their character. 

   Ministers cannot be too earnest in the discharge of their office; it behoves them to use all diligence to find out acceptable words, and to proclaim the whole counsel of God. Yet when they have done all, they have done nothing, unless their word is accompanied to the heart by the power and demonstration of the Spirit.

   Newton’s words to this hot blooded Italian pastor need to be continually remembered and reread when facing opposition. 

   Don’t embitter your spirit against those who oppose you and speak back in anger and set them at defiance. Don’t retaliate upon them in their own way. By doing this you only bring guilt upon your conscience, increase your difficulties, and impede your usefulness. Be patient in well-doing. A consistency in character, and an attention to return kindness for hard treatment, will, in a course of time, greatly soften the spirit of opposition.

   Newton counsels me about my fans as well. Writing to one minister he says:

   With these advantages, I expect to see you a popular preacher. The more you are so, the greater will be your field of usefulness, but, alas! You cannot yet know to what it will expose you. It is like walking on ice. If opposition has hurt many, popularity has wounded more. 

   Newton spoke to pastors of the value of their temptations: 

   Though the Lord does not desire to hurt you, he has permitted Satan to sift, tempt, and shoot his fiery arrows at you. Without some of this discipline, you would have been very unfit for that part of your office which consists in speaking a word in season to weary and heavy-laden souls.

   And Newton’s continual reminder to pastors:

   We cannot hope to be useful to our people, unless we give them reason to believe that we love them, and have their interest at heart.

   Newton’s pastoral letters are filled with advice on preaching, visitation, study, evangelism, discipline and the list goes on. His letters are a seminary to the pastor who takes the time to read them. They are written by one who was in the trenches of ministry. 

   There is also something that caused Newton to be misunderstood by many. He remained in the Church of England, yet had a difficult time obtaining ordination from them because many found his beliefs to be too evangelical. Yet, when his non-conformist friends offered him positions in independent churches they were confused by his desire to remain an Anglican. He made the conservative establishment and Calvinist non-conformists uncomfortable because he supported the open air revival preaching of John Wesley. At the same time he did not accept Wesley’s Arminianism and remained a Calvinist. Living in a day where much of the church was bitterly divided into numerous parties, Newton was a voice of reason. He brought pastors and leaders together from across denominations as part of his Eclectic Society, where they would, in a spirit of love, discuss current issues and pray for one another. 

   I will quote Newton at length with themes I’ve always desired to champion. 

   Whether a minister wears a black gown or a stole, whether he be ordained by the laying on or the holding up of hands; whether water-baptism should be administered by a spoon-full, tub-full, or in a river, are to me points of no great importance. I will go further – though a man does not agree with my views of election, yet if he gives me good evidence that he is called of God, he is my brother.
If he loves Jesus, I will love him, whatever name he may be called by, and whatever incidental mistakes I may think he holds. His differing from me will not always prove him to be wrong, unless I am infallible myself.
   I preach my own sentiments plainly, but peaceably, and directly oppose no one. Accordingly, Churchmen and Dissenters, Calvinists and Arminians, Methodists and Moravians, now and then I believe, Catholics and Quakers, sit quietly to hear me.

   Newton understood that virtues like tolerance, acceptance and diversity can be good qualities in the church and he often stood his ground preaching this. It was anything but a watered down faith that caused Newton to take this stand. Instead, it was his commitment to Christ.

   Moderation is a Christian grace; it differs much from that tame, unfeeling neutrality between truth and error, which is so prevalent in the present day.

   Newton’s pastoral character, wisdom, and teaching are what I want to grow up to emulate in my preaching and pastoral ministry. For me he has become the model pastor. He was committed to Christ, committed to preaching the gospel, committed to the unity of the church and committed to people as individuals. He was committed to any pastor, of any denomination, who had a love for Christ.

Charles Spurgeon

   Little do we realize how much we owe Spurgeon for the development of today’s preaching. Spurgeon has been named the “prince of preachers” and so it would seem that we should want to find out a bit about him if we are preachers ourselves.

   Charles Spurgeon taught me the importance of relevance in preaching. I try to find common ground with everyone, doing everything I can to save some (1 Cor. 9:22), could be a theme verse for him. Spurgeon believed that if people couldn’t understand the preacher it was the preacher’s fault. As you’ll read, like Lewis, Spurgeon too was a master of word pictures.

   An average hearer who is unable to follow the course of thought of the preacher ought not to worry himself, but to blame the preacher, whose business it is to make the matter plain. If you look down a well, if it be empty it will appear to be very deep, but if there be water in it you will see brightness. I believe that many “deep” preachers are simply so because they are like dry wells with nothing whatever in them, except decaying leaves, a few stones, and perhaps a dead cat or two. If there be living water in your preaching it may be very deep, but the light of truth will give clearness to it. It is not enough to be so plain that you can be understood; you must speak so they you cannot be misunderstood. 

   Spurgeon made room for humor in his preaching.

   I’m not sure if smiling is a sin, and, at any rate, I think it less a crime to cause momentary laughter than half-an-hour of profound slumber. Nothing will avail if you go to sleep yourself while preaching. 

   Charles Spurgeon understood the importance of reading for a life of preaching. 

   As the apostle says to Timothy, so also he says to everyone, “Give yourself to reading.” He who will not use the thoughts of other men’s brains proves that he has no brains of his own. You need to read. Spare neither labour in the study, prayer in the closet, nor zeal in the pulpit. 

   On the other hand, Spurgeon understood the limits of study. 

   If we degenerate into bookworms it will be to the old serpent’s delight, and to our own misery.
You cannot gain certain knowledge from books; you must have personal acquaintance with men if you are to help them in their varied spiritual experience.

   Charles Spurgeon understood the importance of passion in preaching. 

   If you preach the truth in a dull, monotonous style, God may bless it, but in all probability he will not; at any rate the tendency of such a style is not to promote attention, but to hinder it. It is not often that sinners are awakened by ministers who are themselves asleep.
   A great deal of sermonizing may be defined as saying nothing at extreme length; but out-of-door, verbosity is not admired: you must say something more, or your hearers will let you know. In the street, a man must keep himself alive, and use many illustrations and anecdotes, and sprinkle a quaint remark here and there. 

   Charles Spurgeon understood the importance of personal pain and about being open about it in preaching. Throughout his ministry Spurgeon struggled with depression and gout and talked about it in his sermons and writing. At times he was even out of his pulpit for up to six months because of his illnesses. One of his talks in Lectures to my Students is entitled “The Minister’s Fainting Fits”. It is not a chapter on stage fright, but on depression in the preaching ministry. This chapter has been a lifesaver to me through some of my struggles. It has been a piece I’ve gone over many times. In fact, his self-study (done in the 1870s) is a brilliant piece of work and right up to date regarding many of the causes and cures of depression that have been discovered through modern psychology. Spurgeon believed that God uses pain as part of the process of developing the preacher and the preacher’s message. That insight alone can revolutionize how we embrace the pain and suffering we go through. 

   Is not this the reason why God’s servants are made to pass through so many trials, that they may really learn many truths not otherwise apprehended? Do we learn much in sunny weather? Do we not profit most in story times? Have you not found it so – that your sick bed – your bereavement – your depression of spirit, has instructed you in many matters which tranquillity and delight have never whispered to you?
   I often feel very grateful to God that I have undergone fearful depression of spirits. I know the borders of despair, and the horrible brink of that gulf of darkness into which my feet have almost gone; but hundreds of times I have been able to give a helpful grip to my brothers and sisters who have come into that same condition, which I could never have given if I had not known their deep despondency. I believe that the darkest and most dreadful experience of a child of God will help him to be a fisher of men if he will follow Christ. 

   Early on in my ministry at Bethany I was going through a particularly difficult time. I was even questioning whether or not I had the strength to carry on. One particular morning I left under a dark cloud while my wife was doing her devotions. Later that day she sent me this email. Once again, the Lord encouraged me through Spurgeon (through my wife).

Stef,  

   I love you. I believe in you. I am proud of you. I do not doubt for a minute that you are called to be here, at this time, at this church. I just read some encouraging words from Charles Spurgeon:

The lesson of wisdom is, be not dismayed by soul-trouble. Should the power of depression be more than ordinary, think not that all is over with your usefulness. Cast not away your confidence. Live by the day, by the hour. Come fair or foul, the pulpit is out watchtower, and the ministry our warfare; be it ours, when we cannot see the face of God, to trust under the shadow of his wings.

Nancy

   Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up. And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us. (Hebrews 12:1, NLT).

   I not only read a lot, but I write a lot. If I were to add up all the sermons, papers, articles and books I’ve written, the pages would be in the thousands. I want to conclude this chapter by mentioning four self-published books I’ve completed through Guardian Press. 

   My first three are somewhat of a series based on the catechism you find in many mainline churches. The catechism is an introduction to the Christian faith and usually includes sections on the Apostle’s Creed, Ten Commandments, Lord’s Prayer and Baptism and Communion. I wrote these books from sermons I preached covering these same areas to try and better educate people in their faith. The books are meant as an introduction to thinking and living as a follower of Jesus. My book on the Apostle’s Creed is called, All Roads Lead Somewhere. My book on the Ten Commandments is called, This is Love. And my book on the Lord’s Prayer (which is my favorite title of the three) is called, Walking on your Knees. 

   I self-published one other book after completing my doctoral work on “Preaching and Depression”. Taking the material there and rewriting it for a broader audience, I put it out as a book called, Do You Have a Black Dog: A Biblical Perspective on Depression. Both Greenfield and Bethany have been a great support in my writing and publishing endeavors by giving me the time to write as well as the funds for these projects (which I pay back as the books sell).  I find writing an imperative tool to help me sort out my thinking, which I can then present as a tool to others. 

Discuss: What is your favourite book and why?