Thomas Nelson is releasing a new book called Jesus Manifesto: Restoring the Supremacy and Sovereignty of Jesus Christ
You can learn more by going to www.theJesusManifesto.com.
Endorsements by Rowan Williams, Matt Chandler, Calvin Miller, Ed Young, Jack Hayford, Shane Claiborne, Ed Stetzer, Reggie McNeal, Mark Batterson, Gregory Boyd, David Fitch, Steve Brown, Dan Kimball, Margaret Feinberg, Mark Chironna, Francis Frangipane, Todd Hunter, Alan Hirsch, Chris Seay, Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove, Anne Jackson, Craig Keener, Ken Ulmer, Tommy Barnett, Sally Morgenthaler, and others.
I was contacted a few months ago to read and review a pre-release copy. Things have been so crazy that I couldn’t make the deadline for an official review, but will do so shortly. By in large I really liked this book. I am no the biggest fan of Viola’s stuff, but this particular book gripped my attention and my heart, especially in light of my previous frustrations with certain contemporary veins of Christianity as evidenced in my last set of posts.
In short, the book is a call for the Church, especially her leaders, to return to the centrality of Christ. It is a passionate, emboldened call for the 21st century American Church to peal away the American crap we’ve attached to the Cross and also return the vital elements of belief in Christ that we’ve taken away. While a fairly short, quick read, it offers a vision any pastor, church leader and Christian needs considering much of the hanky-panky coming out of evangelicalism.
I received this book free from Thomas Nelson Publishers as part of their book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 : “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”
Popularity: 1% [?]
Post Series
0: Intro
1: Narrative Question
2: Authority Question
3: God Question
4: Jesus Question
5: Gospel Question
Theological Foundation Recap
6: Church Question
7: Sex Question
8: Future Question
9: Pluralism Question
10: What-Do-We-Do-Now Question
11: Final Thoughts
After setting down his alternative theological foundation, Brian launches into an exploration of “be-ology”—what it means to be as a Christian and human. (160) A natural first question after such a jarring experience with the first 5 questions is this: “What do we do about the Church?” Or more specifically: What is the Church?
Interestingly, up until this point Brian has not used the word church. I found this incredibly odd and disconcerting in a book that is supposedly exploring a new kind of Christianity. Odd that he would not use the very word Jesus Himself used to describe the group of people who are his followers, i.e. Christians; disturbing that his new theology and faith is not specifically for the Church. For someone who describes himself as “a lifelong churchgoer and a veteran pastor,” I wondered why in 160 pages (and beyond this chapter) he never utters the word. I think the reason becomes clear when we explore the answers Brian provides to his question.
He begins this section, and rightly so, describing the fear and antipathy modern culture has toward the church. The sentiments he describes reflect one which someone exclaimed in a conversation I describe in my book I had with a fellow Starbucks barista: “The church is fucked up!”1 As Brian describes the current crisis, “When enough church leaders wake up and smell the Ben-Gay, when they realize that their faith communities are shrinking and wrinkling and stiffening, they start to ask the church questions very urgently: What are we going to do about the church?” (162)
He says that we should stop worrying about what forms the church takes (thanks you!) and start seeing “ourselves as servants of one grander mission, apostles of one greater message, seekers on one ultimate quest…What would that one mission, message, and quest be? Around what one grand endeavor can we rally? What one great danger do people need to be saved from and, more positively, what one great purpose do they need to be saved for?” (164)
In other words: Why does the church exist? According to Brian, “to form Christlike people, people of Christlike love…the formation of Christlike people of love naturally becomes the grand unifying preoccupation and mission of our churches.” (164, 165)
At one level this seems fine, but does the church in any way exist to save people as the earliest church themselves existed? Yes. According to Brian, the church exists to save people “from the great danger of wasting their lives, becoming something less than and other than they were intended to be, gaining the world but losing their soul.” (emphasis mine. 164)
In answering question 6, then, the Church must totally rethink the Her core mission and identify that mission along these terms. (165) That mission, then, is “forming people of Christlike love” (171) and “save them from…wasting their lives” (164)
That’s it folks.
It’s funny, because I thought the Church was a community of redeemed and rescued people sent on mission to reconcile the world to God through Christ.
Does not Paul explicitly explain the mission of the Church in 2 Cor. 5:11-21 when he explains the God gave “us” the community of believers the “mission of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them”? Are we not Christ’s ambassadors who have been committed the message of reconciliation: “Be reconciled to God”? Is not God making His appeal through the Church to be reconciled to Him through Jesus Christ? And is not the basis of that reconciliation that “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God”?
While I am with Brian at one level, that the mission of individual church communities is to form Christlike people. Christlike formation, however, is part of sanctification! In other words, forming Christlike people who follow the way of love happens only after that have been made new through individual “transformation moments.” What is that transformation moment? When a person choses to be “in Christ” (that incredibly key, distinctive theological rallying point for Paul throughout his letters) and the old person goes a ways and the new person begins.
For Paul humans are born “in Adam” and live out of the flesh, their sinful nature (Rom 5:12-20). They are alienated from God and His enemies and by nature people of His wrath (Col 1:21; Eph. 2:3). But “in Christ” Paul also makes clear that this condition is a past condition. “Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior.” (Col. 1:21) “Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath.”
These and other pieces of the Holy Scripture make plain that there was an old condition and a new condition; a moment when someone is not a believer/follower and when someone is. Even more important there is a time when someone is not reconciled to God and a moment when a person is through Christ. To put it in more exclusionary terms: a person is part of God’s community or they are not, part of the Church or not. Brian cannot voice this, however.
All of this is incredibly important to Brian’s definition and mission of the Church, which misses a vital, necessary piece: faith in Christ. The church is NOT simply a group of people who act like Christ and follow the way of love (though this is an important, vital part of having a real, genuine faith in Christ) and saved from wasting their lives. This is the Kiwanis, a great group of people who’s current motto is “serving the children of the world.” Service and love is not distinctive to the Church nor to Jesus. You could say the same thing for the PeaceCorp, though such Imperial comparisons might draw a lightning bolt or two from Brian.
No, the Church is the community of people who have been rescued from death through the forgiveness of their sins by faithing in the final sacrificial death of Jesus Christ, who by His own blood entered the Most Holy Place once and for all, thus obtaining eternal rescue and life for those who faith in Him. Consequently, those who are saved and believe in Jesus act as the continuing presence of Christ to spread His Kingdom Reign on earth.
That’s the Church, Brian McLaren.
As Paul writes in Ephesians 2: “Because of His great love for us, God, who is rich and mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions— it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with Him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages He might show the incomparable riches of His grace, expressed in His kindness to us in Christ Jesus.”
The word “us” is used 4 times along side with/in Christ 4 times. Paul is speaking to the Church, the redeemed and the rescued and the reconciled in Christ. This is the message and banner of the Church: BE RECONCILED TO GOD IN CHRIST!
This is the very message of the earliest of the Church in Acts. They didn’t preach “live like Jesus” but “believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved.” (Acts 16) In the face of Jewish persecution and Roman imprisonment they didn’t proclaim “don’t waste your life” but “Repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins.” (Acts 2) God raised Jesus from the dead, and the forgiveness of sins and freedom from sins in Christ was the consistent message of the Church, stemming from Her mission to go into all the world and make disciples of Jesus Christ. (Acts 13 and Matthew 28).
In reality, Brian’s church is not church at all, but a social club devoid of any power because it is disconnected from Jesus Christ as exclusive Lord and Messiah.
This Holy Friday I am reminded how important it is for the Church to boldly, confidently shout from roof-top to roof-tops that Christ has died, Christ has risen, Christ will come again! Through the Church God is dispensing His grace and forgiveness and reconciliation and rescue from sin and death, because it is through Jesus Christ and Him alone that all of this is accomplished. The power for forgiveness and reconciliation and life transformation and individual rescue from evil, sin and death is through death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, both of which are mysteriously missing from the mission and message of Brian’s church.
Popularity: 1% [?]
- the (un)offensive gospel of Jesus, 37. [↩]
Post Series
0: Intro
1: Narrative Question
2: Authority Question
3: God Question
4: Jesus Question
5: Gospel Question
Theological Foundation Recap
6: Church Question
7: Sex Question
8: Future Question
9: Pluralism Question
10: What-Do-We-Do-Now Question
11: Final Thoughts
Brian’s shift in perspective on the gospel happened during a lunch conversation with a “well-known evangelical theologian” who challenged Brian’s assumptions regarding the gospel by asking the question “What we the gospel according to Jesus?” The theologian replied, “For Jesus, the gospel was very clear: The Kingdom of God is at hand.” He later urged Brian to read Paul in light of Jesus, instead of the other way around. (138)
Before this moment, Brian approached the gospel in a typical evangelical manner, one with which I am all to familiar. As he puts it, “I had always assumed the ‘kingdom of God’ meant ‘kingdom of heaven,’ which meant ‘going to heaven after you die,’ which required believing the message of Paul’s Letter of the Romans, which I understood to teach a theory of atonement called ‘penal substitution,’ which was the basis for a formula for forgiveness of original sin called ‘justification by grace through faith.’” (138)
Instead, “[an] increasing number of us, when freed from the constraints of the six-line Greco Roman narrative and the associated constitutional reading of the Bible, gain courage to speak what has become joyfully clear to us in this fresh reading of the gospels: Jesus didn’t come to start a new religion to replace first Judaism and then all other religions, whether by pen, the pulpit, the sword, or the apocalypse…Instead, he came to announce a new Kingdom, a new way of life, a new way of peace that carried good news to all people of every religion.” (139)
On the point about Jesus coming to inaugurate God’s Kingdom presence, Brian is correct: Repent for “the Kingdom of Heaven has drawn near,” is the opening salvo that launched the teaching ministry of Jesus of Nazareth. “The term ‘Kingdom of God/Heaven’ signified God’s sovereign, dynamic and eschatological rule,”1 both now and in a future epoch. Throughout three years of preaching, the message Jesus bore was eschatological in orientation; Jesus both established and anticipated the Kingdom of God. Through debates, discourses, and parables, this Nazarene teacher testified to the dawning eschatological reign of God and anticipated the eschatological “age to come” where that reign would be exhaustive and permanent.
I. Howard Marshall affirms that the Gospel writers regarded the Kingdom of Heaven as being central to the teachings of Jesus.2 Through these teachings, Jesus declared that the Kingdom would come in the future, yet was also present in someway. Jesus never relegated God’s Kingdom reign simply to the future but instead explicitly announced its presence, while expecting its future; the Kingdom is present and future.3 This “already and not yet” descriptor is now a common place of scholarship, being described as “realized” and “future” eschatology.4
For Jesus—as well as the other disciples. including Paul—the euangelian, “good news,” gospel was intimately linked to the concept of the Kingdom of God/Heaven5. In fact, I much more prefer the term Reign of God, because the Greek basillea can be rendered Kingdom or Reign. What Jesus makes clear, and what Paul further develops, is that through Jesus Christ God’s sovereign, dynamic and eschatological rule was breaking into earth’s reality. It was happening “at hand,” in that moment, in our moments. The term Kingdom or Reign of God referred primarily to the sovereign activity of God as ruler and king, and only secondarily to the ream over which God ruled.6
David Flusser, in his book The Sage from Galilee, presents a convincing case that Jesus absolutely believed the Kingdom had come and was amongst the world. In fact, this idea would have been a fixture of rabbinical Judaism. “There should be no doubt that both for rabbinical Judaism and for Jesus the Kingdom of Heaven is a present reality.”7 Jesus’ main task was to be the center of a movement which realized God’s Kingdom reign among mankind, right now in this present age.8 “Consequently, when we talk about the [Kingdom of Heaven] we are talking about something that is actually happening here and now.”9 God’s Kingdom, the exercise of His kingship, and the manifestation of His sovereignty has dawn near.10 While its entire consummation awaits His return, Christ inaugurated the Kingdom of Heaven during his lifetime.11 The parables themselves make this clear, beginning with an emphasis on the presence of the Kingdom and its explosive growth.
So in as much as he seeks to shift the gospel to center around God’s inbreaking rule through the Kingdom of Heaven, Brian is OK. The problem is when he divorces that kingdom and rule from Jesus Christ and Him alone. He audaciously asserts that Jesus came to announce a kingdom to all people of every religion, a kingdom that has “room for many religious traditions within it.” (139) While seemingly out of the ordinary, Brian is being incredibly consistent with his re-imagined Christian faith, on that is no longer about Jesus Christ as exclusive Lord and Messiah, but simply about God, a generic pan-deity that is in no way wholly rooted in Jesus Christ. As Brian recentered the gospel around the Kingdom—a task I actually applaud at that level—he fails to root that Kingdom in Jesus Christ and exalt him as the catalyst for the Kingdom in the first place.
For Brian, the Kingdom is “about God’s will being done on earth as in heave for all people…God’s faithful solidarity with all humanity in our suffering, oppression, and evil…God’s compassion and call to be reconciled with God and with one another—before death…a summons to rethink everything and enter a life of retraining as disciples or learners of a new way of life, citizens of a new kingdom.” (139) Elsewhere he writes that Paul himself “preaches the Kingdom of God,” that Paul still carried “the same gospel message he received from Jesus Christ in a vision, the gospel of the Kingdom of God. Whether in person or by letter, he calls people everywhere to be reconciled in the Kingdom of God—reconciled to God by grace through faith, reconciled within themselves, reconciled with others whatever their class, ethnic, cultural, or religious background…This is the gospel of Jesus Christ and of his servant/apostle Paul: the Kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe the good news. Be reconciled.” (157)
While I agree with all of this on the surface, here is my problem: Brian has successfully divorced the Kingdom of God from Jesus Christ! The reconciliation of which Paul proclaims happens ONLY though Jesus Christ. No one else. We are not simply called to “be reconciled.” Every person is called to be reconciled to God through Jesus Christ. Paul explicitly teaches this in 2 Cor. 5. Romans 8 makes clear that there is no more condemnation for those who are “in Christ.” The righteousness that we all require, the righteousness of God displayed in his reign and kingdom, is given through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe in Him. (Rom. 3)
No Brian, the Kingdom does NOT make room for all faiths, because all other faiths outside of faith in Jesus Christ are false. The Holy Scriptures make clear that God’s Kingdom was inaugurated through Jesus Christ and is available to all because of His life, death, resurrection, and ascension. Peter himself makes this plain in Acts 2 when he roots the eschatological expectations of the Hebrew people in Jesus Christ, declaring that all who call on His name will be saved. Peter does not say, “Repent and believe in the Kingdom of God.” Not at all! He implores his fellow Jews to “Repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins.” (Acts 2) In fact, he proclaims that, “God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah.” (Acts 2) He is the one in whom salvation is found, “for there is no other name given under heaven by which we must be saved.” (Acts 4)
As I have maintained in my assessment all along, for Brian it’s not really all about Jesus Christ, it’s about God, a pluralized God that accommodates to all faiths and religious systems. Not only is this incredibly clear in this section as he never roots the Kingdom in Christ alone, it is also clear in his horrible exegesis of the book of Romans. On the one hand, Brian’s methodology throughout this book is pitiful and nonsensical, because he rarely quotes primary sources to establish his claims, leading to absurd conclusions, like claiming the primary audience were fellow Jews (Most modern scholarship is unified in agreement that most of the audience are Gentiles, in addition to some Jewish converts)12 On the other hand, his conclusions are reckless, dangerous to the Christian faith, and devastating to the gospel itself.
His conclusions are crystalized in his continued pluralization of God and Christianity itself in his analysis of Romans 3 and 5. First, Brian argues that Paul is announcing a new way forward for all: the way of faith. (148) This is mystifying because Paul actually maintains the exact opposite: faith has ALWAYS been the means through which one is made right with God! This is the entire point of chapter 4 and the example of Abraham. Ethnicity, food laws, and nationalism in no way bring salvation. Faith does and always has from the beginning. Brian seems to think otherwise because he writes, “Paul now points both Jews and Gentiles toward the way out: not a new doctrine, not a new religion, and not trying harder at the old religion either, but faith. Religious laws and practices are inherently exclusive; you’re either circumcised or not, and either you keep kosher or you don’t. But faith—having reverent confidence or dependence on God—is an option available to everyone.” (emphasis mine. 148)
But faith in what? Or better whom? This is where Brian’s color’s shine: God. For Brian Faith is the point. And actually faith in God, as a generic pan-deity. Brian completely ignores the clear teachings of Romans 3 which root that faith in Jesus Christ. Brian completely refuses to exclusivity embrace Jesus as Lord and Messiah. Furthermore, Brian implies that all of our at least the religious systems of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are, in the end, actually unified under Jesus Abraham. After butchering Romans 3, he bludgeons Romans 5. (I realize these words are dramatic, but they are appropriate for the manner in which Brian handles the Text)
Without giving any sources, Brian clams that Paul, in his discussion on Adam, implies “Our diverse religious systems…have many points of departure that separate us, but if we follow any path back to its source to the genesis of our common humanity, we come to the creation story of Adam, where we are united. After unifying us in the story of our common ancestor Adam, Paul presents Jesus as a new Adam, a second Adam, the last Adam…Adam brought death and condemnation to all humanity; Jesus now brings life and justification to all humanity. So we’re all part o the story of the original Adam, and now, of the new Adam, Jesus.”
At this point in the reading I almost put the book down and walked away. Brian’s assertion that all of our religious systems are somehow united in Adam is far from any sound, sane, serious biblical exegesis. I wrote elsewhere on Romans 5:12-21 and will summarize those thoughts here:
Interestingly, the phrase from Romans 5 that is of interest “through one man” is the first time it appears in biblical literature. In classical literature, this idea that someone suffers something because of another (for instance, “I have suffered injustices by a single wicked person…”)((Dinarchus In Demosthenem, 49:4; see also Hippocrates Epistulae)) does appear, but Paul now uses it in accordance with Adam.13 Like much of these intertestamental examples, Paul believes that death came as a result of Adam’s sin and now our nature is affected in the way Adam was.
Clearly during the time of Paul, there are signs influential Jewish literature and the 1st century Jewish tradition viewed Adam as a “head” of humanity and that humanity participates in the sin of Adam, enduring the same consequences: death. Paul’s notions in Romans 5:18 that Adam’s trespass results in the condemnation for all people and in v. 19 that all are made sinners through his disobedience are not entirely unique and mirror the same Jewish perspective of his day.
Regardless, though, our Christian understanding of human nature and sin flows from Jesus Christ’s and Paul’s teachings. The historical background must only enhance our understanding of the two without dictating it. Romans 5:18, 19 in particular make clear that “in Adam” we are condemned (vs. “in Christ” we receive justification and life); “in Adam” we are made sinners (vs. “in Christ” we are made righteous).
Adam acts as humanity’s representative not in a religious sense, but a rebellious one. And in the broader context which must include 5:1-11, Paul is explaining how BELIEVERS now have peace and hope with God, because of their faith in Christ blood, death, and life. This is not a passage universalism, which Brian attempts to argue. It is clear that those who “reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ” are “those who receive God’s abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness.” (Rom. 5) In other words, those who “declare with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord’ and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead,” (Rom. 10) those who are “saved” and “in Christ” (Rom 10 and 
And in regards to the seemingly universalistic “all” in v. 18 Jewett reveals:
In the context of Romans the concern is not so much whether salvation is universal in a theoretical sense…but whether all believers stand within its scope. This verse strong suggests that Adamic damnation has been overturned by Christ’s righteous act and that the scope of righteousness in Christ includes all believers without exception, both now and at the parousia.14
In the end, Brian continues his journey away from Jesus Christ as exclusive Lord and Messiah toward a pluralized, pan-deity God. Like his friend Samir Selmanovic, Brian clearly describes the kingdom of God in terms that are utterly disconnected from Jesus Christ alone. Further, he has also joined with Samir by selecting the feature of the kingdom of God as a revelatory ground of “divine immanence,” instead of Jesus Christ alone. Selmanovic affirms this devastating indictment by claiming the Kingdom is not exclusively limited to Jesus Christ:
Many Christians believe that the Kingdom of God that Jesus spoke about is inseparable from knowing the person of Jesus. If so, the question begs to be asked: Is the Kingdom of God present in all of life, among all people, throughout history, or is the Kingdom of God limited to the historical person of Jesus and thus absent from most of life, most people, and most history? The answer to this question depends greatly on whether Christians are willing to make their religion take a backseat to something larger than itself. (It’s Really All About God. 76-77)
Like Samir, Brian believes that God is reveal to the world outside of Jesus Christ and that the gospel itself is more than Jesus. In closing this question, Brian claims that “Paul is a ‘Jesus and the Kingdom of God’ guy from first to last.” Here Brian is preaching the Kingdom of God along side Jesus, rather than Jesus Christ alone. Brian, you are wrong to do this; there is a massive difference between the Kingdom of God and Jesus vs. the Kingdom of God through Jesus.
Karl Barth makes it clear such people as Brian are “oblivious of the fact that [divine] immanence both as a whole and in its parts has Christian truth and reality only in so far as it is founded in Jesus Christ and summed up in Him, so that if, as a whole and in its parts, it is affirmed, preached and believed as a centre in itself and alongside Christ, the Church will inevitably be led back into heathendom and its worship of the elements.” (CD II,1:319). More importantly, he goes on to say that God’s Kingdom is not known at all apart from Jesus Christ, and doing otherwise establishes a Christian heresy. As he warns, “Christian heresies spring from the fact that man does not take seriously the known ground of divine immanence in Jesus Christ, so that from its revelation, instead of apprehending Jesus Christ and the totality in Him, he arbitrarily selects this or that feature and sets it up as a subordinate centre: perhaps the idea of creation…or even the kingdom of God.” (CD II,1:319)
Paul was not about Jesus and the Kingdom of God, but Jesus Christ and Him alone who inaugurated God’s reign through His life, death, resurrection, and ascension. This is clear from his words in Philippians 3:10-11:
I want to know Christ—yes to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection of the dead.
This was the prayer and cry of Paul the apostle: Jesus Christ and the forgiveness, salvation, and resurrection provided through Him. Why is this also not the prayer and cry of Brian, too? At this point, it is clear they are not. How sad, indeed.
Popularity: 1% [?]
- Caragounis, “Eschatology,” Dictionary on Jesus and the Gospels, 417. [↩]
- I. Howard Marshall, Jesus the Saviour. Studies in New Testament Theology (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1990), 213. [↩]
- McKnight, “Gospel of Matthew,” Dictionary on Jesus and the Gospels, 535. [↩]
- Allison, “Eschatology,” Dictionary on Jesus and the Gospels, 206. [↩]
- Matthew favors Kingdom of Heaven language, while Luke/Mark favor Kingdom of God [↩]
- Marshall, Jesus the Saviour, 231. [↩]
- Flusser, Sage from Galilee, 87. [↩]
- Flusser, Sage from Galilee, 88. [↩]
- Marshall, Jesus the Saviour, 231. [↩]
- James Dunn, Jesus Remembered, 408. [↩]
- Craig Blomberg, Interpreting the Parables, 297. [↩]
- Jewett, Romans, 70. [↩]
- Jewett, Romans, 373 [↩]
- Jewett, Romans, 385. [↩]
In the interest of full disclosure my wife works for Zondervan Bibles and was the lead manager for this Bible. I did hear about a new blogger program for this important new study Bible from her and I jumped on board to sign up. I am NOT being compensated for this giveaway, other than being married to greatest gal on the planet! The contest giveaway is after the review towards the bottom of the post.
The Review
I have to admit straight away that when my wife told me that she was working on a Bible with Lee Strobel I was skeptical. While I have appreciated Lee’s contribution to the Church and greater community for a while, I wondered why we needed yet another Bible product, especially one centered around a Christian celebrity. I thought, “There are Bible’s for moms, teens, dads, grandmothers, environmentalists, NASCAR fans, patriots, and even for horse lovers, why on earth do we need yet another one?”
As husbands often are (so I’m learning 6 months into marriage!), I was wrong: this is a sweet, needed Bible, which is why I wanted to write this review for The Case for Christ Study Bible!
Lee has written a much needed companion for the spiritual journeyperson. This is a Bible for both Christians seeking to better understand and investigate their faith AND seekers/skeptics who are trying to better understand Christianity and searching for answers to their spiritual questions. In a manner only he can pull off, Lee consistently presents his case along side the biblical text for the reality of God, reliability of Scripture, rescue brought through Christ, and reasons for putting our hope and faith in Him alone. I can see this Bible being given by a Christian to a seeking friend as much as Christian parents to their maturing teenager; those wondering about Christianity will pick up this Bible at their local Barnes and Noble as will the longtime Christian who needs better apologetical equipping.
Here are some of the questions this Bible seeks to help answer: How can there be a God if there is so much suffering in the world? Did Jesus claim to be the Son of God? Can we trust the New Testament? Does science point to a Creator? Why was Zerubbabel a significant ancestor of Jesus? When was Daniel written? Why did Jesus associate with the lowest people of society?Was Jesus sinless? Did Jesus intentionally fulfill the messianic prophecies? What’s the truth behind the debate regarding the number of differing Greek manuscripts? Who is the rider on the white horse in Revelation? Is Jesus the only way?
He also tackles such topics as: The Creator of Earth’s perfect location; Worshiping the Creator; Care for the needy; The accuracy of Ezekiel’s prophecies; Messianic prophecies and the integrity of the gospels; The plausibility of a virgin birth; Problems with the Jesus Seminar; Paul and Old Testament prophecies; The Bible and the truth about God.
These and other questions and topics are addressed and answered with the precision, accuracy, and care only a journalist like Lee Strobel could provide. Using new articles and material culled from his other works, Lee gets to the heart of the inquiries from the faithful and skeptics alike using 5 insightful features: The Case for the Bible; The Case for Christ; The Case for a Creator; The Case for Faith; The Verdict. As the information from the CFC Study Bible describes these features:
- The Case for the Bible: The Bible is an extraordinary record of human history and these articles demonstrate the accuracy of this record. They explore the character of the Bible and the extrabiblical evidence that corroborates Scripture. They also tackle many tough questions and offer explanations for apparent contradictions within the Scriptural Text.
- The Case for Christ: These articles provide an in-depth exploration of Jesus’ claims, deity, and resurrection. They also show how Christ can be found throughout the Old Testament. Included in these notes are Old Testament prophecies that point to Jesus as Messiah.
- The Case for a Creator: If you look closely, it is easy to find evidence that the world was specifically designed. These articles highlight the many wonders of creation and provide specific examples from nature and science to illustrate how the scientific evidence points to one supreme Creator.
- The Case for Faith: For most people faith is a complicated and personal subject. These articles attempt to address some of the most popular questions asked by skeptics and believers alike, such as “How can there be a God if there is so much suffering in the world?” and other critical questions about faith.
- The Verdict: Through testimonies from well-known scholars and other Christians who have examined the evidence, discovered the reality of Jesus and put their faith in him, these articles provide the real and personal examples of true faith. They will challenge you to examine the evidence for yourself so that you can make your own verdict.
Here is what I like about The Case for Christ Study Bible:
- Uses the NIV text and includes the study notes from the main NIV Study Bible.
- Each book opens with a short information sheet, including: Major themes, Author, Audience, Date of writing, and setting.
- Lee tackles serious questions about serious issues of faith.
- The responses are well researched and reasoned, skipping the typical cheap platitudes and bobbing and weaving all too often associated with other so-called Christian apologetic resources.
- For a bible studies and theology student like me, Lee tackles subjects like inerrancy, OT prophecies, the Jesus Seminar/Historical Jesus studies, and even Q. Right on!
- With pastoral sensitivity, he even addresses hard-hitting subjects, like the personal pain of loosing his own child.
- The back includes really helpful charts I have not seen in other Study Bibles, such as: The Creeds and Hymns of the early church; Divine actions of Jesus; OT prophecies fulfilled by Jesus; Jesus’ claims about Himself; and Resurrection appearances of Jesus.
- Finally, the interior layout is nice and crisp, unobtrusively inserting the articles in such away that they don’t get in the way of the biblical text, but rather supplement it, which to me is an important “user-interface” feature.
All in all, this is one of the only Study Bibles I would give to a spiritually seeking friend or fellow believer who is interested in strengthening their faith. While I have always appreciated Lee’s writings and perspective, I am pleased with his latest efforts to see people encounter our risen Savior Jesus Christ. This Bible is a great tool for Christians and non-Christians alike who want to better understand and investigate the claims of Scripture for themselves.
You can purchase this bible for $23.09 at amazon, here.
The Giveaway
Contest is closed.
Popularity: 1% [?]
Post Series
0: Intro
1: Narrative Question
2: Authority Question
3: God Question
4: Jesus Question
5: Gospel Question
Theological Foundation Recap
6: Church Question
7: Sex Question
8: Future Question
9: Pluralism Question
10: What-Do-We-Do-Now Question
11: Final Thoughts
It is becoming clear that for Brian, the Christian faith should not really be about Jesus Christ, but God. As one commenter said: “it really does look like [Brian] is trying to move away from a Christocentric understanding of God towards a more open/inclusive concept…When Brian speaks of ‘God,’ he isn’t speaking about the Triune God of the Bible, but some generic pan-deity. Its the least common denominator of God.”
Unfortunately, Nathan is dead on.
For Brian the biblical narrative does not climax in the redemption of humanity through Jesus Christ alone; the Text itself does not pivot around the revelation of God exclusively in Jesus Christ; the Bible does not actually reveal God to the world, but merely human conversations about their understanding of God; and Jesus Himself is not God, but is simply “the highest, deepest, and most mature view of the character of God.”
At this point, just three questions in, Brian’s theology is no where near orthodox, no where near Christian. This becomes increasingly clear when we examine his understanding of Jesus Himself. In the Jesus question, Brian asks: Who is Jesus and why is He important?
Brian begins by characterizing—or rather caricaturing—the Jesus of conservative evangelicals. He quotes one of his most “loyal and dedicated critics,” Mark Driscoll—though I really do not understand why he leaves him unnamed and unsourced. After arguing, and rightly so, that “many different saviors can be smuggled in under the name ‘Jesus’” he quotes Driscoll’s characterization, which apparently is built on the Greco-Roman six-line narrative, a constitutional reading of the Bible, and an interpretation of God based on these two sources (120):
In Revelation, Jesus is a prize-fighter with a tattoo down His leg, a sword in His hand and the commitment to make someone bleed. That is the guy I can worship. I cannot worship the hippie, diaper, halo Christ because I cannot worship a guy I can beat up.
On this point Brian and I agree: this characterization of Jesus is just stupid.
While this question is almost like watching Jim Carey’s and Jeff Daniels’ characters in the movie Dumb and Dumber—like the movie, by the end you have a hard time deciding who is dumber; in the end both portrayals of Jesus are unsatisfying and unpalatable—I do grant Brian’s points that we are guilty of “letting Jesus be re-imaged according to contemporary tastes” (121). Unfortunately, although he cites the white Supremacist Jesus, the prosperity-gospel get-rich-quick Jesus, colonial Jesus, male-chauvinist Jesus, and homophobic Jesus, Brian’s own biases blind him to the ways in which he and his like make Jesus in his image, such as: the Oprah Winfrie Jesus, Depok Choprah Jesus, Al Gore Jesus, and Sojo Jesus.
I would also argue that the view espoused by Driscoll is in no way mainstream and is used, yet again, by Brian as a rhetorical Straw Man. He pulls such an extreme example in order to attempt to gain easy trust from his readers that the “other sides” view of Jesus really is utterly detestable and unbelievable. This simply is not the case, however. While I am certainly no Driscoll apologist, Driscoll is being his typical over-the-top, polemical self. For Brian to trumpet his view as representative of all conservative evangelicalism is pitifully weak.
In order to refute said Straw Man, Brian launches into an explaination of the text from which he claims such a view of Jesus comes: Revelation 19:11-16. It reads as follows:
Then I saw heaven opened, and there was a white horse! Its rider is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he judges and makes war. His eyes are like a flame of fire, and on his head are many diadems; and he has a name inscribed that no one knows but himself. He is clothed in a robe dipped in blood, and his name is called The Word of God. And the armies of heaven, wearing fine linen, white and pure, were following him on white horses. From his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron; he will tread the wine press of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty. On his robe and on his thigh he has a name inscribed, “King of kings and Lord of lords.”
Over against the Driscoll and other conservative evangelical types, McLaren interprets the passage as follows (bear in mind, however, that Brian continues to remain consistent with his pet rule: “thou shalt not cite any authoritative primary or secondary sources other than my own!”) (124-124):
this image of Jesus as a conqueror reassures believers that the peaceful Jesus who entered Jerusalem on a donkey that day wasn’t actually weak and defeated; he was in fact every bit as powerful as a Caesar on a steed. His message of forgiveness and reconciliation—conveyed as a sword out of his mouth (not in his hand, as my loyal critic asserted–quite an important detail)—will in the end prove far more powerful than Caesar’s handheld sword and spears. And the blood on his robe—that’s not the blood of his enemies. It’s his own blood, because the battle hasn’t even begun yet, and Revelation has already shown us Jesus “as the lamb standing as if it had been slaughtered” (5:6). And it may also recall the blood of the peaceful martyrs (6:9-11), since in attacking them, violent forces were also attacking Jesus, the Prince of Peace, who taught them the way of peace.
In fact, rather than being violent, “Revelation actually tells us, that the humble man of peace is Lord. It confesses, in the midst of persecution and martyrdom, that the poor unarmed Galilean riding on the donkey, hailed by the poor and hopeful, is the one to trust. It invites us to pledge allegiance to the one who rules by his own example of service and suffering rather than by making examples of others.” And in response to the suffering servant’s name, “every knee will gladly bow.” (emphasis mine. 126)
While all of this sounds lovely and convincing, there is one slight problem: he is simply wrong; Brian is no exegete and he twists the text to conform to his agenda.
If Driscoll portrays Jesus as another incarnation of The Rock, McLaren portrays him as Ghandi, perfectly peaceful without a care for judgment. In so denying judgment (a theme which we will address in more detail in chapters 9 and 9), he twists and contorts the Revelation passage to mean everything else but a portrait of Judge Jesus.
In this passage we have “the most expanded description of Christ’s defeat and judgment of the ungodly forces at the end of history.”1 The defeat of the beast, the false prophets, and their followers (who are all the ungodly) is portrayed in the climax verses in 17-21. Christ’s word of truth imaged in the sword coming out of his mouth is His weapon of judgment2 Christ rides in on a while horse in promise of judging “the wicked in order to vindicate his name and his followers, and he will be ‘faithful and true’ in fulfilling his promise.”3 His eyes are “a flame of fire,” evoking His role as divine judge as is clear from 14-21 and 2:18-23.4 “In Ch 2. the point was that Jesus as ‘Son of Man’ always knows the spiritual condition of the ungodly who claim to be members of the covenant community, which results in their judgment…The link with the same phrase in chs. 1-2 suggests the apostate are among those judged in the present scene.”5 The symbolic meaning of the “unknown name” is that while Christ has not yet thoroughly revealed his promise of salvation and judgment, when he comes to carry out his vindication of his followers all His character of grace and justice will be revealed; “only his people will experience the full revelation of his grace, whereas his opponents will experience the full expression of his justice.”6
The final expression of his judgment is the image of Jesus’ “robe dipped in blood.” Contrary to Brian’s assertions that this blood is his or his followers who’ve been martyred, it is the blood of his enemies and those he has judged. Here John is clearly referencing Is. 63:1-3: “…your garments are red, like those of one treading the winepress…I have trodden the winepress alone; from the nations no one was with me. I trampled them in my anger and trod them down in my wrath; their blood spattered my garments, and I stained all my clothes.” John is affirming “Isaiah’s prophecy of God as a warrior and identifies Christ as that divine warrior. In Isaiah the warrior judges to achieve ‘vengeance’ and ‘redemption’ on behalf of his people…the stained garments symbolize God’s attributes of justice, which he will exercise in the coming judgment.”7 Here in the Revelation passage in vs. 11-16, the blood symbolizes attributes that Christ Himself will exercise judgement over the wicked; it is through the judgment that they are exercised and demonstrated. In the Apocalypse “blood” can refer to the suffering of the judged or to judgment itself, the most decisive use is in 14:18-20, where “blood” is used with winepress metaphors and clearly refers to the judgment of unbelievers.8
I realize this was a data-dump of sorts, but the information was given to expose the lie that Brian insists Jesus will not come as judge. At the end of chapter 14 he says, “In response to the crucified one’s name—not Caesar’s or any other violent human’s—every knee will gladly bow. (emphasis mine. 126). Gladly? If only that were true! Brian falsely inserts this word in order to give the appearance that in the end all will be saved, that Jesus will not judge because everyone will gleefully bow before Jesus Christ as King and Lord. As Peter T. O’Brien states, however9:
It ought not to be assumed that the bending of the knee by all will be glad acknowledgement of Jesus’ lordship. Since the following words of 10c, which explain the meaning of ‘every knee’, include both good and evil beings who acknowledge Jesus’ rule rather than voluntarily confess or praise him, one ought to understand the bowing of the knee as an act of submission to one whose power they cannot resist.
Phil 2:10-11 come from Is. 45:23-24, which is also quoted in Rom. 14:11, a passage that endorses the idea that ‘we will all stand before God’s judgment seat.’10 The context of Is. 45 precisely fits the notion that all beings and powers (righteous and wicked) will bow before Jesus Christ’s authority in submission, rather than all finding salvation in the end in that bowing, which Brian suggests is the case. The verses are christological, not eschatological.11
It is clear that Brian (along with many others within the emerging church conversation) cannot handle the idea of judgment, let alone a Judging Jesus. I agree that Jesus Christ did not come “merely to ‘save souls from hell’…he came to launch a new Genesis, to lead a new Exodus, and to announce, embody, and inaugurate a new kingdom of as the Prince of Peace (Isa. 9:6).” (135) This is not the full story, however. While Brian tries to assert the “day of the Lord” will bring liberation for the oppressed and accountability for the oppressors (135), it’s far more (and really different) than that.
“The Day of the Lord” is “the time of the decisive visitation of Yahweh, when he intervenes to punish the wicked, deliver and exalt the faithful remnant who worship him, and establish his own rule. Both judgment and salvation are especially prominent aspects.”12 In the NT it is identified with the return of Jesus Christ who, as the Creeds assert, “comes to judge the living and the dead.” Because Jesus Christ is Lord and Messiah, and is Himself YHWH, He is the one who will intervene “to punish the wicked, deliver and exalt the faithful remnant who worship him, and establish his own rule.”
Brian cannot say this, however. He refuses. On the one hand, “Jesus serves as the Word-made-flesh revelation of God’s character,” which means He Himself is not God/YHWH. (128) (Which, again, serves his agenda to pluralize God and minimize Jesus Christ as exclusive Lord and Messiah) On the other hand, “So many are like my loyal ciritic; they have so utterly bought into the six-line, black-and-white, soul-sorting heaven-or-hell Greco-Roman narrative that it has become the precritical lens through which they see everything…” (136) Part of that so-called “six-line narrative” is the reality of judgment, the reality that Jesus Christ will come as judge. While the good news of Jesus does include “a new Genesis, a new Exodus, and a new Kingdom come,” there is also separation and judgment.
But Brian, if Jesus and the gospel bring salvation to everyone who believes (Rm. 1:16), from what are people saved and what about the people who do not believe. Does not Jesus Himself explicitly explain what He Himself will do with those who stand in defiant opposition to Him and His Kingdom?
In my book, (un)offensive gospel of Jesus, I wrote about the tension of telling a better, more compelling Story that explores how Jesus and His gospel are inherently, good, and reassuring, while also being honest about “That Other Place.” Here is a portion of what I wrote:
While I think the prospect of a universal re-creation is possible, I find it hard to reconcile that idea with all the different teachings of Jesus which show a separation of people who choose belief from those who choose unbelief. Jesus Himself seems to insist that there is a separation between those who choose to entrust their stories and lives to Jesus in total commitment and those who hold onto the Way of Self while actively vandalizing shalom and rebelling against God and His Rhythm of Life.
I asked my friend Andy about his own struggle with judgment and hell. Like many of us, myself included, he has struggled with the idea that people will be judged and punished forever because of sin. The idea the some will receive eternal heavenly bliss, while others sit in hell has been a struggle for Andy. Recently, though, he’s begun to understand why judgment seems to make sense. “For the longest time both judgment and hell made me shudder, leading to a rejection of their existence. But in doing that I rejected the reality of our world. The reality is that there are consequences to our rebellion, which I think is hell. Now it makes sense that there is a hell and judgment because of that reality.”
In trying to tell a more compelling Story, Brian completely neglects and ignores the reality of judgment, which in the end decimates the gospel and changes it completely. We will explore how he does this in more detail with the next question: the gospel question.
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- Beale, Revelation (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999), 948. [↩]
- Beale, Revelation, 949. [↩]
- Beale, Revelation, 950. [↩]
- Beale, Revelation, 951. [↩]
- Beale, Revelation, 951. [↩]
- Beale, Revelation, 956. [↩]
- Beale, Revelation, 957. [↩]
- Beale, Revelation, 959. [↩]
- O’Brien, Philippeans (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing, 1991), 243. [↩]
- O’Brien, Philippeans, 243. [↩]
- O’Brien, Philippeans, 243. [↩]
- “The Day of the Lord,” Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing, 2000), 324. [↩]
