Facebook Page

Just wanted to remind our readers to follow us on Facebook. Often we post links to interesting articles and ebooks that do not make it on to Bring the Books. Following us is simple, you can click this link here or click the Facebook icon in the toolbar to the left. Then "Like" our Facebook page. Once you do this, all of the content will show up in your Facebook news feed. Enjoy!

Blog Tour: A Hitchhiker's Guide to Jesus

I have been invited by the fine folk from Baker Academic to participate in a blog tour for one of their new titles, A Hitchhiker's Guide to Jesus by Bruce N. Fisk. Let me say out the outset that this is a very clever book. The presentation of the material is done in a new and fresh way.

At its core, this volume is an introduction to the Gospels and the so-called "search for the historical Jesus." The book is laid out as the journal of a recent college graduate named Norm Adams, as he makes a journal through the Holy Land. The book is full of dialogue, pictures and even email correspondence will Norm's former Bible professor, as Norm moves through the places Jesus is said to have been. Along the journey Norm interacts with many notable New Testament scholars, such as James Dunn, Scott McKnight, and John Dominic Crossan. This book deals with some of the questions college students would be dealing with as they are introduced to many of the forms of Higher Criticism. Because of that, this book would seem to be a good text book for a college introduction class on the Gospels. The format and style would seem to appeal to to most students, even those who are being forced to take your course. The way that the author interweaves details of the Holy Land makes you feel, at times, like you are there. One thing is for sure, after reading this book any Bible student wants to visit the places described in these pages. The readers of this blog would like to know that Fisk takes a more historical/critical approach to the study of the Gospels, rather than a canonical approach. If this is kept in mind, most of the material in this guide to Jesus is solid.

Chesterton! You Read Like a Blogger!

That's right; I said it. G.K. Chesterton reads like a blogger. He is the most brilliant meanderer in the history of literature. He's great to quote, and he's fun as can be, but here's how he reads in a cut-down, butchered, un-witty form:

Hey, all. I'm going to talk to you today about Saint Francis. Boy, those Greeks sure were ignorant. Speaking of ignorant, historians today seem to write more like journalists. And did I tell you about my nephew? He's five, and he loves eggplant! And so you see, nobody gives St. Francis a fair shake because they don't understand the world he comes from, and that's why I wrote this book.

Now, just pretend that was well-written, flowery, and that every sentence was worth posting to your facebook profile, and BAM! you have G.K. Chesterton.

I love you, Chesterton; even if you are a Roman Catholic and think that the war against the Albigenses was justified and that the crusades weren't half as bad as the rest of us believe them to be. In case you can't tell, I'm reading Chesterton's Saint Francis of Assisi which I found at a used book store for $2. If you want, you can read almost everything he's written for free on the web.

Reflections on 45 days of Continuous Blogging

I've spent over a month posting literally every day here at Bring the Books, and often two or three times a day. At first, this started by accident because I was doing the series on Craig Koester's Revelation commentary, but after awhile, I felt like I was being sharpened by writing here every single day. About two weeks into it, I decided to make it a challenge to myself to write every day, and to see if I could write quality stuff each time.

Looking over the last month and a half, I'm quite happy with what I see, but I can sense the end of my "personal challenge" drawing near. Our readership has grown by almost 40% in the last two months; we are now drawing between 2000-3000 visitors a month (RSS feeds make it hard to know for sure), which is really unexpected and incredible. It's an exciting feeling to sense that you may be really contributing something to the Reformed online community, and at the same time knowing that I am able to keep myself sharpened in the faith while doing it is very rewarding. Fighting for constant forward momentum is one of those disciplines that I've developed by pushing myself in this way here at BTB.

So why am I writing this introspective pause? Mainly because I need to take the pressure off which I've now put on myself. Blogging every day only takes a few minutes if you're a good, quick writer. But my biggest challenge is that I don't want to write if it doesn't come passionately from my heart, and so I need to just make a promise to our readers. (I seriously have no idea how Tim Challies does it.)

I promise never to write something which I don't feel deep in my bones, and not to write simply for the sake of taking up space or fulfilling obligation. Josh and I started Bring the Books because we believed we had unique voices to share in the Reformed community. Now, whether that is true or not is inconsequential, but the point is, we write because we love to write. And we write specifically for the Reformed community because we love Jesus Christ and His Church, and we want to see the church built up. The presence of orthodox, Reformed, culturally aware, plugged in fellow Calvinists should be edifying, and that's what we hope comes out of BTB.

I'm in the middle of reading a lot of great biographies, works of theology, and I was thinking of reading some more Sherlock Holmes short stories. In order to do that, I just need to turn the pressure valve and tell myself that it's okay if I don't post here literally every single day. In the long run, it's much healthier for the quality of the posts and the overall integrity of the site.

Psalm 139, The Sovereignty of God, and Worship

Having conversations with more people now than ever about the sovereignty of God and the doctrines of grace has perked my ears up when I see God's sovereignty exalted and exulted in throughout scripture. So when Arryn and I got to our reading in the Psalms for the day, I had to share what I had seen in the text.

The Psalmist starts off by marveling that God is completely aware of what is going on in his heart.

"Oh LORD you have searched me and known me...and are acquainted with all my ways" (v. 1)

Then the Psalmist thinks of something even more marvelous...

"Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O LORD, you know it altogether" (v 4).

The Psalmist is blown away that God exhaustively knows all our future acts, even the words which come out of our mouths. He is thinking about freedom and God's perfect foreknowledge of the future. We know this because of the next verse:

"You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me."

The Psalmist is not saying that God has placed an invisible barrier around him which follows him from place to place. He is talking about our past being set and unchangeable, just as our future is. He is saying, "God, you know everything I'm about to do before I even do it. My whole life was determined from before the foundation of the world, and every day of the rest of my life is already written in your book," and now he's about to marvel in it:

"Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high; I cannot attain it."

This is the response of most who start to really dig into the subject of divine sovereignty, foreknowledge, and human freedom. And justifiably so, for we cannot completely attain knowledge of God's foreknowledge and human responsibility outside of what the Bible has given us to know.

The Psalmist then goes on to talk about how intricately God created him, and praising Him for how he was "fearfully and wonderfully made" (v. 14). And then he returns to the theme of sovereignty:

"In your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them" (v. 16).

Again, one act of worship on the Psalmist's part is the thought that all his days of his life were predestined before the Psalmist even existed! This is a worshipful thought to the Psalmist. To many in the church today, the idea that our whole life is predestined is scary, upsetting, counter-intuitive, and in many ways offensive. It militates against our entire human-centered view of the universe to think that all our lives are subject to the will and knowledge of someone other than ourselves.

And yet the Psalmist is blown away by the thoughts and uses them in his worship:

"How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! If I would count them, they are more than the sand" (17-18).

Band of Bloggers

DeYoung, Missions, Wright and Flying Monkeys

Kevin DeYoung has two interesting, and unrelated, posts that I wanted to point out.

The first post has "Questions for Your Missions Budget." In this post DeYoung puts forth four helpful questions to think about when giving money for missions.

The second post is DeYoung's concluding post in a series of questions to N.T. Wright titled, "Flying Monkeys and the New Perspective." His third question gets to the heart of the whole New Perspective controversy, "On what basis are we declared to be in the right before God?"

The Deals Abound!

This week the great folks at Ligonier Ministries are ofering daily specials in honor of Calvin's 500th birthday. Today only the special offer is a black leather Reformation Study Bible for a donation of any amount. That is right, a leather Study Bible for a gift of any amount. That is almost insane, almost! To find out all the details on this amazing offer head to their website.

Sermons by Jonathan Goundry

As many of you know, Jonathan Goundry is one of the bloggers here at Bring the Books. But what you might not know is that Jonathan is also an elder at Great Oak Baptist Church. His sermons preached there (and elsewhere I presume) can be found here. I would recommend giving them a listen. Jonathan is a great communicator and solid in his understanding of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Well worth the time spent!

Twitter, Bring the Books and You

Bring the Books has added a new feature to our tool bar. On the left hand said of the blog you will notice a new link that enables you to follow us on Twitter. By clicking the link and following our Twitter you will be updated every time a new blog is posted (plus unique Twitter content). This is just another way that we are helping our readers to stay connected to the staff of Bring the Books.

*UPDATE* Thanks to Roger at The A-Team Blog for the cool Twitter button he made for us. You ROCK!!!!

Add Bring the Books to Your RSS Reader

The staff of Bring the Books have made it easier to add our site to your favorite RSS reader. On the left hand side of the blog, about half way down, you will notice a new widget called "Subscribe to Bring the Books." Simple use the drop down menus to select your favorite RSS reader and subscribe to our blog or our comments. Once you are subscribed all our new blog posts and/or comments will be automatically delivered to you RSS reader. This way you will never miss a post for the staff of Bring the Books. This is just one more way that our staff is helping you!

Gospel Coalition 2009 Audio

The video and audio are now available here for the 2009 Gospel Coalition. The conference was great. The speakers were excellent. I would make sure to listen to Bryan Chapell and Ligon Duncan. Keep in mind, when listening to Chapell, he had no notes with him, amazing!

I was able to have dinner with Ligon Duncan. That was great. We talk about everything from PCA polity to Ph.D. programs. I was also about to steal about 30 minutes of Phil Ryken's time. Thanks to fellow staff member Mike Lynch, I was able to tour the IPV warehouse. That was pretty neat to see how that all work. Also, Mike and I had lunch at a haunted restaurant, the Country House. We sat at table 13, the one that is said to be haunted (but I do not buy it). I was able to get tons of free books (thank you Steve from P&R). Free books are always cool. As you can tell, I had a blast. I would highly recommend attending the Gospel Coalition next time.

A Deadly Serious Milestone

With typical aplomb, I am choosing to write my first blog post in nearly a month (has it been over a month, yet?) on something of crucial importance: our own popularity. Now, since we're just a bunch of small-potatoes wannabe theologians, any visits feel like a great honor. We, however, have had 10,000 different visitors to our sight, and well... it feels like kind of a big deal. If only Adam could get his groove back, we'd get some satire again. Yeah!

Greek Help!

I have a blog that I am ready to post (it is a good one too), but I cannot seem to get the Greek font to work right. Does anyone know how I can get the Greek fonts to post?

One More Can't Hurt, Can it?

It is my great pleasure to announce that the staff of Bring the Books has gained a new member. Michael Lynch. I had the privilege of meeting Michael and his wonderful wife Kelly when they came to visit RTS last month. Let me tell you a bit about Michael so you can get to know him. He grew up in the huge state of Texas. Currently, he is finishing up at Moody Bible Institute (B.A. in Historical Theology) and he wants to attend Seminary in the fall. He loves to read theology and play with his chocolate labrador Luther (what a cool name for a dog!). He also enjoys playing Tetris (I just made that one up). His interests are particularly in the areas of church history, theology (union and justification, really all things Gaffin), and hermeneutics. He is a member of Covenant OPC in Orland Park, IL and is under care in the OPC. After a hard day at school, he enjoys drinking a nice cold beer and smoking a pipe while talking theology with his friends (that is true). He will be a great addition to the staff. Now remember to play nice with him!

RSS Readers and You

Re-Post
A very helpful blog has been posted on the Desiring God site. This post, by Abraham Piper, explains, in a very easy to understand way, what an "RSS" reader is and why you should use it. Go read the post and then add us to your list of blogs. No really, go now, get started!

Once you are ready you can use the address below to add us or click the icon in the address bar:

http://bringthebooks.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default

Just in Time for the Holidays

Anyone who visits Bring the Books on a regular basis will surely notice the new look. The face lift is my gift to the readers and staff of Bring the Books. Many thanks to the the staff at Tekeme for the hard work and the great design they gave us.

Why Blog?

I am often asked why I blog. Although I am not a professor, Fred Sanders attempts to answer this question as it realities to those in the academy. His article can be found here.

Adam Watches Too Many Movies

Our very own Adam Parker is featured over on Reformation 21. This is the second time that Adam has been featured on Reformation 21 and I am sure it will not be his last. His most recent article, "Watching Movies to the Glory of God," can be found here. I highly recommend this article to anyone who would like to understand how their Christian worldview impacts the way they watch movies. Adam has a great gift in this area and offers some solid practical insights.

New Edition

The staff of Bring the Books is proud to announce that a new member has joined the ranks of our staff, Jonathan Goundry. Jonathan was born and raised in England, County Durham to Christian parents. His father has been a pastor and missionary since Jonathan was a young child. Consequently Jonathan grew up around the church and the ministry. His parents proved to be a great Christian influence in his life and when Jonathan was fifteen, having recognized his desperate need for salvation in Christ, he was converted.

Jonathan arrived in the US when he was eighteen with his family; his father at that time began pastoring in Boca Raton, Florida. At that time Jonathan enrolled at an Assemblies God bible school and graduated after two years. This became a catalyst to a vigorous study in the Scriptures and Church History, which eventually brought Jonathan to a Calvinistic understanding of God's Word. With this being the case, Jonathan relinquished his credentials with Assemblies of God and transferred to the Southern Baptist Convention, allowing him to minister without an immediate conflict of conscience and doctrine. Following this Jonathan relocated to Temecula, Southern California to be Elder at Great Oak Church. Currently, Jonathan is the co-host on the webcast the Narrow Mind.

I would like to the first to welcome Jonathan to the staff and I for one look forward to his posts.