The Life You've Always Wanted

Author: John Ortberg
ISBN: 0-310-21214-6
Publisher: Zondervan
Review:
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I picked up this book looking for a light read, but I was pleasantly surprised at the insight it contained. The subject of the book is spiritual disciplines and Ortberg adroitly navigates this potentially dangerous ground by focusing on the purpose of the disciplines, namely, spiritual transformation. He uses the word "morph" to illustrate the concept of transformation through its use in New Testament. We start our human lives as transformed souls. Sin has transformed us into ugly, misshapen caricatures of what we were intended to be. God has, in His infinite wisdom and mercy, chosen to enter our world so that we can be "morphed" or restored to a new and, I would venture, better state.

But how many of us fail miserably in achieving that state? We seem resigned to marginal change. Instead of true virtue we settle for "boundary markers" to help us identify those within the church and those without. Boundary markers are acceptable as long they themselves are biblically sound. Indeed the chief marker could be considered love. "By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another." Ortberg is challenging us to re-examine this condition in which we find ourselves and realize that it is possible, and even expected, for a Christ-nature to be found in us.

Training is Ortberg's recommended overarching strategy to overcoming the flesh and ensuring that change is inevitable. We have a choice to make. We can allow ourselves to become submerged in the details of life so that our life is all about getting stuff done. However, Olympic athletes train with a specific goal and all other competing interests are subordinated to that goal. Are we not running a race? We must choose to run with the intention to win, and therefore all competing interests, although not intrinsically evil, must be taken captive for the purpose of winning the race.

I won't go into all the details, but Ortberg focuses on the following disciplines: celebration, slowing down, servanthood, confession, Spirit guidance, secret works, meditation, developing a rule of life and last of all suffering. One theme that I will touch on which is repeated many times is the concept of the well ordered heart. Ortberg quotes Augustine to define a well ordered heart in terms of loving the right thing, to the right degree, in the right way with the right kind of love. Indeed that is a lofty goal, that when we love, we love in those ways. It would eliminate many falsehoods in our lives. Is a well-ordered heart realistic? Well, I would view that goal as a destination, and as long as we are making daily progress towards that destination we can have hope that it will one day be a constant reality in our lives. But we must make the choice to pursue, single-mindedly, such a worthy destination. Without that decisive choice and the ordering of our lives around it then it will forever remain just a hope.

What Saint Paul Really Said

Author: Tom Wright
ISBN: 0-8028-4445-6
Publisher: Forward Movement
Review:
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In what appears to be a shot across the bow to traditional Pauline interpretation, Dr. Wright offers in this book some fresh theories concerning the apostle Paul which will be later detailed in his anticipated work on Paul. Paul, having written a significant portion of the New Testament and particularly with regards to the fleshing out of Christian doctrine, has both provoked both admiration and bewilderment on the part of scholars from the time of his ministry to the present day. Dr. Wright offers to us, albiet in abbreviated form, an alternative which he believes harmonizes the Pauline texts where other approaches have failed.

In the first and last chapters of the book, Wright addresses some modern scholarship on Paul, notably that of A.N. Wilson. Again, his points are brief, but he conveys the sense that at times modern scholarship has probed close to the right approach but in the end falls short. It will indeed be interesting, especially in light of the main points of the discussion, how Pauline scholars respond to this challenge.

The essence of Wright's approach might be summed up as follows, if one should dare to do so. Saul, a very Jewish Pharisee of the kind who zealously demanded the freedom of Israel, was converted by God in an unorthodox manner, and from then on as Paul sought to declare the very confrontational proclamation that Jesus was Lord which formed the core of Paul's gospel. He did this, not from a Hellenistic perspective, but from a very Jewish worldview. He saw how the one true God of Israel had actually won freedom for Israel and according to Israel's true vocation, for the entire world. He did not invent a trinary God system, rather he reinterpreted the face of God as Jesus Christ, and he did not invent a timeless Christ divorced from the reality of Christ's ministry, rather he maintained the course of being a faithful interpreter of Christ. Last, but not least, justification from a Jewish perspective and thus from Paul's does not function as a method of obtaining salvation, i.e. the imputation of righteousness, rather it is the badge that identifies a believer as belonging to Christ and as having received a righteous status from God based on the work of Christ.

I have already read some initial negative reaction to Dr. Wright's work, and as I suspect, this work is destined for controversy. In fact, most of the major points Wright advances are definitely contested. I do not personally have any opinions on this work at this time, other than to say they are thought-provoking. Dr. Wright is very clever in exposing some of these arguments in a preliminary form. It gives him a chance to weigh the responses and answer them accordingly in his full thesis. I am very, very cautious at entertaining visitors who offer seriously divergent views from traditional interpretations of Scripture. Nevertheless, I fear that we have elevated Reformation interpretations to the level of Scripture. Judgment must always begin at the house of God and we must diligently search the Scriptures to see if these things are so. Dr. Wright's thesis must be held up to the light of Scripture, but in the same way, we must hold up Reformation thinking, and indeed I would submit all of the doctrines of the so called "church fathers." Is this to say that nothing is sure? Unequivocally no. Scripture is sure. Paul is sure. Peter is sure. Luke is sure. Everyone else has their own opinion, and it behooves us to opine together so that together with the Spirit we may reach understanding.