Classic Books: Ordering Your Private World

Ordering Your Private World has sold over 1 million copies since it was first printed way back in 1984. Many testify that besides the Bible, it is their favourite book, to be read again and again as one attempts to soak up all its practical wisdom and spiritual depth. It is for this reason that Ordering Your Private World qualifies as this week’s classic book review. Author Gordon MacDonald points the way forward in bringing shape and order to our inner worlds as we invite God to take control over every segment of our lives. The basic premise of the book is that the inner world of the spiritual must govern the outer world of activity if we are to grow into the kind of people God created us to be.

If you struggle with an addiction to busyness or with an unhealthy drivenness then this is the book for you. Or at the other end of the scale if you struggle to become motivated or to find purpose, then Ordering Your Private World will help you sort through the turmoil of your inner world. Essentially, this book promotes a tremendous sense of balanced lifestyle founded upon Godly principles that will enable you to live in a way that honours God, family, friends, and other important commitments. MacDonald points out how many public implosions happen (examples of how individuals, corporations and even countries have 'fallen' from grace) because the importance of maintaining and developing your inner world is not taken seriously enough.

Each chapter manages to put its finger on a common symptom of the over-busy and over-committed society we live in, and then gives advice that is both deeply spiritual and immensely practical. I especially enjoyed the chapters on ‘Drivenness versus being called,’ and ‘McDonald’s Laws of Unseized Time.’ McDonald’s thoughts on keeping the Sabbath were also poignant. In fact, the general helpfulness of this book is such, that I go along with those who recommend reading it more than once. I re-read it every few years because I need to be continually reminded of some of the more important principles it espouses. Some of the later prints include an updated version as well as study guides at the back. The study guide version is an excellent resource to read in a bible class or study group.

Ordering Your Private World is not the sort of book to buy and leave on your bookshelf. Instead scribble in it liberally and underline important parts. This is because interacting with the content will surely help you apply its core message as you order your inner world in a way that will bring greater meaning and purpose to life.

Stuff Christians Like

Any book with a ‘how to pull off a successful side hug’ on the cover is worth further investigation in my opinion. Jonathan Acuff begins his humorously satirical take on Christian behaviour with the words, "If you buy this book, God will make you rich," and doesn’t look back from there. Acuff is a pastor’s kid, long-time church attendee and popular blogger making him the perfect person to explore the funnier side of faith. Or at least prompt Christians to begin to see the funnier side of some of the stranger things we do.

In a collection of over 100 short essays (and several rather amusing illustrations), Acuff pokes an irreverent toe into the waters of issues like holding hands in church, prayer circle etiquette, side-hug techniques and those four famous fob-off words - “I’ll pray for you.” Acuff is not trying to be disrespectful in his keen-sighted observations, but rather attempts to get Christians to lighten up a little before challenging accepted religious behaviour that may lack authenticity.

Some may be offended by Acuff’s more barbed comments, but I found most of what he had to say genuinely amusing even when my own blind-spots were roasted. Acuff favours no one with his essay “Judging Fundamentalists For Being Judgemental” coming quite close to the bone. Acuff lampoons the competitive tendencies of churches in “Feeling Sad for Churches That Aren’t Mega,” while “Not Knowing How To Hold Hands” also cracked me up just because it was so close to my own awkward experiences.

While Acuff’s commentary is directed to the American church, there will be definite points of contact for most South Africans despite the difference in culture. The success of “Stuff Christians Like” is not only that it is funny, but that there is wisdom and insight behind the humour. The author’s satirical edge is founded not on cynicism but rather on a deep belief in the love God has for the church. Acuff desires to see Christians living more authentically within the context of that love. This is why "Stuff Christians Like" tries to declutter faith a little, revealing the wondrously graceful God working within it all. This book will probably challenge you and almost definitely make you laugh, but hey, at the very least it promises to make you rich!

Review: Evolving in Monkey Town

Dayton, Tennessee may not be a town that is automatically familiar with you, but it famously became synonymous with Christian fundamentalism during the Scopes Monkey Trial of 1925. John T. Scopes was a science teacher based in Dayton who was prosecuted for violating a state law prohibiting the teaching of evolution in schools. The trial generated world-wide attention.

In ‘Evolving in Monkey Town - How a Girl Who Knew All the Answers Learned to Ask the Questions,’ young author Rachel Held Evans writes about her experiences of growing up in this town. Held Evans was brought up in a conservative Christian family and by her own admission was a shining example as a child, winning 'Best Christian Attitude Award' in her school four consecutive years. Held Evans says that she learned abortion was wrong before she knew where babies came from, and cried when she learned that her grandfather voted for Bill Clinton, thinking he would now be sent to hell when he died. Even more amusingly, as a youngster she used to move the wisemen away from the holiday manger scenes since the Magi didn't really arrive until Jesus was a toddler and she wanted to make the scene more biblically accurate.

Yet, when she left school Held Evans became increasingly dissatisfied with the carefully defined and apologetically orientated faith she had always embraced. As she describes it, her Dayton-based faith came under its own trial. Through a series of faith-shaking events, Held Evans began to question the foundation of everything she was always taught, and indeed, had taught others about.

Held Evans shares that she especially struggled with the question of how people could be sent to hell just because they were never given an opportunity to meet Jesus. Was God running some sort of "game of chance," a kind of "cosmic lottery" for people's souls? Held Evans notes that these struggles and questions brought her into an ‘evolution’ of faith. Her faith actually deepened through her struggles, and she realised belief is not just about agreeing to a creed or particular theology, but instead ‘evolves’ as one asks questions and truly seeks to know who Jesus really was. "There is one thing I know for sure," she writes, "it's that serious doubt--the kind that leads to despair--begins not when we start asking God questions but when, out of fear, we stop,"

Rachel Held Evans testifies how she learnt that authentic faith is always open to serious questions and that honest doubt about certain beliefs and cherished traditions can lead one closer to God, not further away. She asserts that a healthy faith is one where ‘we live in the questions’ while committing ourselves to following Jesus in impacting the world around us.

Rachel Held Evans has the soul of a poet and writes beautifully, although not consistently so. Her honest intelligence and flare for well-crafted sentences allows her to communicate her journey in a compelling manner. Although many South Africans may never have heard of the ‘Monkey Trial,’ her journey through doubt is one that almost everyone can relate to. The true value of this book is the freedom it offers to struggle through your own honest doubts, and the encouragement given that these doubts need not be feared as the end of faith, but rather the beginning of something even healthier and stronger.

Sex God!

Rob Bell's latest book 'Love Win's generated so much conversation and controversy that sometimes it is forgotten he wrote two other books before this. In Bell’s first book, ‘Velvet Elvis,’ he looked at wider issues of faith and life, while in his second, 'Sex God,' Bell narrowed that focus down to the topic of sexuality and its connection with human spirituality. 'Sex God' is our review book for this week.

In ‘Sex God,’ Bell laments that the church doesn't often proactively talk about sex, despite the fact sexuality and spirituality are fundamentally connected in Scripture. Bell argues that you cannot talk about sex properly without talking about God. Similar to his preaching style, Rob Bell writes in a conversational manner, with short, punchy paragraphs, He also uses provocative chapter titles guaranteed to draw your attention such as “God wears lipstick,” “Sexy on the inside,” and “Leather, whips and fruit” – well, they certainly managed to gained my attention!

Throughout this book, Bell attempts to peel back the layers of why we act the way we do, while connecting spirituality with everyday life, and everyday life to God. Bell repeatedly makes the point that ‘sex’ is not an act within itself, but points to something much larger and more spiritual about human beings and reality.

The first part of the book argues that “our sexuality is our awareness of how profoundly we’re severed and cut off and disconnected.” Bell adds that our sexuality is “all of the ways we go about trying to reconnect.” (Both quotes from p. 40). He deconstructs some of the more damaging myths about sexuality that society propagates (excuse the pun), and outlines how these myths damage our intrinsic God-given identity. Bell's definition of freedom is especially profound as he states freedom isn’t about being able to have what we crave, but rather it is being able to go without what we crave and be fine with it.

In the second half of ‘Sex God,’ Bell deals with the concept of marriage and says that, “The point of marriage isn’t marriage. It’s a picture.” Bell points to the deeper context of sex and marriage as mission. Dealing with words like submission, headship and sacrifice, Bell details the redemptive beauty of the wedding gospel found in Ephesians 5. The vulnerability of marriage can be a little scary - “Being naked is terrifying,” Bell writes, but our desire for someone to accept us no matter what speaks to a deeper need, a need for the unconditional love of God; a love that’s worth the risk. In these chapters Bell gets to grips with the hoary question of “submission in marriage,” and the book is worth reading for his thoughts on this alone.

This is not a book aimed only at married couples, however. Instead, Bell details the full scope of sexuality as an expression of human hunger for intimacy with ‘something more and someone else.’ ‘Sex God’ is a thoroughly enjoyable primer on sex, marriage, and God, and is written in a charmingly simple manner. I might disagree with a few points here and there, but on the whole it is an excellent read.