| Book Review: The Reason for God (part 1) |

Buy The Reason for God by Tim Keller at amazon.com!

this is my long (pick one: -awaited; -promised but never delivered; and boring; way from home) review of Tim Keller’s recent book, The Reason for God. at this moment, i’m sitting at the national Christian cheerleaders of America finals in concord, nc, in between activities in which my middle daughter, rebecca, is participating. we’ve been here since thursday – it’s saturday today – and we’re heading back to atlanta tomorrow.

the hotels, meals, admission fees, concessions, etc., have cost us an arm and a leg (i’m not sure what part of ‘Christianity’ this group is affiliated with…), and we STILL have to pay $2 each day to park. i asked the guy taking my money, “so, was there public transportation i could take here?”; he said, “i don’t believe there is any.” i said, “and y’all built this center eight miles from where the nearest hotels are?”; he said, “yeah, i guess they did.” i said, “so there was really no way i could get here without a car, was there?”; he said, “$2, please.” i said, “so, do i have to pay a fee for the clothes i’m wearing into the event?”; he just motioned me forward to the parking spaces.

but this is a review of Keller’s book, not a review of every group with “Christian” in the name whose favorite verse no doubt has something to do with muzzling oxen treading out grain… of course, i’m just the ass in the next stall for buying (literally) into all this, i suppose.

anyway… on to The Reason for God.

when i bought the book, i knew it was going to be an important book for me to read. i must confess, when i read a book, i take one of two mindsets as i read: (a) i either come to it with a take-no-prisoners, ready-to-argue-at-every-phrase-turn animosity, or (b) i sway like a reed to whatever wind is blowing the author’s sails. i honestly approached this book with an objective a view as possible – for me, anyways. i wanted to hear some valid reasoning to, what? i don’t know – restore my faith? that’s too strong. re-ground my faith? probably closer. re-gird my loins? maybe, but those books usually have more pictures than Keller’s… i just wanted to find peace again with a Christianity in which i could believe, and perhaps get back the baby (Jesus) that i threw out with the bathwater when i decided the God of my childhood, and the God of those whom i constantly argue with around the web, was more fiction than fact, simply because of how He had worked in my life.

and, in part, because of how it seemed He was(n’t) working in the lives of all the Pharisees at Triablogue, Pyromaniacs, the challies.com comments section, etc.

sorry, had to get that little jab in. didn’t want you all to think i’d been entirely sanctified or something…

Keller pastors a church in manhattan, where he has been ministering to abrasive, think-they-know-it-all new yorkers for twenty years. if you can go into that lion’s den of iniquity, and present legitimate arguments for some of the basic tenets of a pragmatic Christianity – belief in God, likelihood of Jesus’ life and death and resurrection, believability of the Bible, etc. – then you have my respect (which, along with $3, might get you a coffee at starbucks…; remember when we used to say, “…and a quarter…”? that was back before “Christian” cheerleading, i’m almost certain…). further, i, too, want to hear what you have to say.

Keller’s book is divided into two parts: ‘The Leap of Doubt,’ wherein he responds to common objections he’s heard over the years from people in an educated, 21st century America; and, ‘The Reasons for Faith,’ wherein he goes a step further and makes arguments in favor of these beliefs, i.e., he steps out of refuting objections into presenting favorable views that should make one consider Christianity not only as possibly valid for others, but valid for themselves as well. the tone throughout the book is very even-tempered, presenting objections as legitimate questions, and never responding with overly-opinionated, down-in-the-noise text-egisis or the typical “well, God will just have to explain that in heaven” responses hidden behind by blinder-wearing Christians in most churches today.

sorry, had to get that little jab in. didn’t want you all to think i’d been entirely sanctified or something…

(is there an echo in here?)

questions are good; questions are necessary. ‘don’t ask so many questions’ needs to be changed to, ‘why aren’t you asking any questions?’.

and well-thought out answers not based entirely on the testimony of the witness (i.e., the Bible) make a stonger case, at least from my perspective.

i guess i’ll attack it – sorry, uh, offer thoughts on the book’s contents – chapter by chapter. and, in the interest of full disclosure, i found the book to be very good, one that we should encourage people in churches to read.