Review: The Naked Gospel by Andrew Farley

I don't routinely review books but this one is part of Pomotheo's theOoze commitment so I though I'd give it a go. "The Naked Gospel. The truth you may never hear in church." Sounds edgy but it wasn't.

Maybe I'm not the target audience. Actually, I know I'm not. This is for a reader squarely planted in the middle of Christendom who takes in a conservative brand of Christianity weekly. To that person this book is certainly to geared to offend, (as most conservatives are quite easily offended it doesn't take much to receive such a response).

Farley began the book with great promise, the questions he posed caught my attention in his mini introductory exam. Continue reading

Simply to Surprised to After You Believe – NT Wright

after you believe Part of our commitment to theOoze is to review books they send us. This time I jumped at the opportunity to review NT Wright's latest installment in his series of 3 called 'After You Believe'. But before I could read this one I made a point to finish the first two (to try to get a perspective of Wright's progression of ideas).

After You Believe is preceded by Surprised by Hope, an exceptional work that challenges the conservative Christian perspective of heaven (that we say a prayer and go to heaven by eternity.) It's not only a challenge but quite simply a return to orthodoxy. I found Surprised by Hope to be an exceptional contemporary work that should hit everyone's must read list. Continue reading

Ehrman ‘Jesus Interrupted’ Arrives in Paperback

Bart Ehrman's popular 'Jesus Interrupted' is now coming out on paper back and I'm letting you know cause of some ulterior motives. You can read my original review here. You can also pick up a copy of Ehrman's book here. The real reason I'm bringing up this release is because I'll get my hands on another Ehrman book called 'God's Problem' which discusses the issue of theodicy (problem of good v. evil). Why is this important? Continue reading

The Justice Project is a Must Have in Social Justice Reading

The Justice Project, Edited by Brian McLaren, Elisa Padilla, & Ashley Bunting Seeber, is a must have in the conversation of social justice for today's Christian audience. Thus far, this has been by far the most engaging and relevant book in theOoze viral blogger library, and certainly the one worth glowing reviews.

Enter the Justice League. The book is a collection of essays from a wide spectrum of writers and thinkers in the contemporary Christian ‘justice conversation,’ including voices from evangelical, mainline, and emerging contexts:

* Rene Padilla
* Peggy Campolo
* Will and Lisa Samson
* Sylvia Keesmaat
* Bart Campolo
* Lynne Hybels
* Tony Jones
* Richard Twiss
* many others

Continue reading

Many Questions on ‘A Prayer to Our Father’ – Book Review

Part of my commitment with theOoze is to review the books I sign up for and they send me! They are nice enough to give the option but I choose to generally review the ones I request. Kind of like an all you can eat buffet.... Anyways, I was going to skip the review for this book but it was short enough that when I found time I cracked it open and took a read.

A Prayer to Our Father. Hebrew Origins of the Lord’s Prayer by Nehemia Gordon and Keith Johnson is a 171 page large print narrative adventure about an African American pastor and Jewish academic combining to investigate the Hebrew origins of the Lord's Prayer.

What I enjoyed about this book was the concept of investigating the 'original' text of Matthew which is purported to be a Hebrew text, not Greek. The con of the book is the fact only 1/2 of the pages were devoted to the investigation of the actual prayer component. The other issue I have is the lack of corroborating evidence for the conclusions they make. It is dangerous to make claims implicitly or explicitly and passing them on to t he masses as fact (or not framing them as mere ideas so that people won't treat them by default as 'fact' because they show up in a printed book). Continue reading

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