Death By Love

Death By Love

By Mark Driscoll and Gerry Breshears

The cross is the most crucial part of Christianity. If Jesus did not die on the cross and rise back to life 3 days later, then Christianity is a joke. There is so much happening on the first Easter weekend. So many things are being resolved. Things about Jesus’ nature and character. About sin. About death. About our righteousness before God. About our eternal life. About so much more.

There is so much going on when it comes to the cross. And yet at times, when I’m teaching and preaching this most wonderful of events, I find it hard to not get all intellectual about it. I struggle not to turn it into a thinking exercise. To reduce what Jesus did on the cross into head knowledge and nothing else. That’s why I’m so thankful for Mark Driscoll’s and Gerry Breshears’ Death by Love.

Driscoll, aided by Breshears, takes his years of pastoral ministry and applies the various doctrines of the cross to his experiences. Each chapter is a letter written to someone he has interacted with in the past. The letter addresses their pastoral needs by explaining and applying one of those doctrines. Some of the chapters are: “My dad used to beat me” - Jesus is Bill’s propitiation; “I hate my brother” - Jesus is Kurt’s reconciliation; or “I want to know God” - Jesus is Susan’s revelation.

The key to this book is that it takes something that is often dry and impersonal - doctrine - and makes it relevant and personal. I can see how these doctrines can be used to help someone who is hurting. How they can be used to reassure someone who is doubting. And how they can be used to rebuke someone who is sinning. This is a book written with great love and tenderness. Yet it is firm and masculine at the same time. I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to gain a greater understanding of what Jesus did on the cross. I would recommend this book to anyone who is in a position of Christian teaching and pastoring. I would recommend this book to anyone who knows the love of Jesus or wants to know the love of Jesus. This is a great book and deserves to be widely read.

I got my copy at Moore Books.

Crazy Circus Train, Aka Water for Elephants

Welcome to the first episode of “Books in my Durtbagz”, the Durtbagz online book club and review. Boo. Yeah.

Each week, I’ll read a book and then talk about it. The End.

Well, there’s a little more to it than that. Sometimes I like to rename the books I read, like I did this one. Sometimes I don’t  read the most recent books. However, none of that matters.

I want to hear from you. I want to know if you have read these books and what you thought. And by “what you thought”, I mean, do you agree with me on my thoughts and if not, I hope you know you are stupid.

Yes, there is something in it for you. I will occasionally give away a book on here to a lucky person. You enter by leaving a comment. And when I say I’ll give something away for free, to someone, at some point, I usually do it. Just ask the Durtbagz on my Facebook Fanpage.

Okay, without further prolonging, Episode 1, “Crazy Circus Train, aka Water for Elephants” by Sara Gruen.

Talk to me, Durtbagz. Yes, I’m talking to the other five of you that I know can also read.

William D. Cohan: House of Cards

Here is another interesting link to FORA.tv. They interviewed William D. Cohan, about his book House of Cards: A Tale of Hubris and Wretched Excess on Wall Street.

Synopsis: On March 5, 2008, at 10:15 A.M., a hedge fund manager in Florida wrote a post on his investing advice Web site that included a startling statement about Bear Stearns & Co., the nation’s fifth-largest investment bank: “In my book, they are insolvent.”

This seemed a bold and risky statement. Bear Stearns was about to announce profits of $115 million for the first quarter of 2008, had $17.3 billion in cash on hand, and, as the company incessantly boasted, had been a colossally profitable enterprise in the eighty-five years since its founding.

Ten days later, Bear Stearns no longer existed, and the calamitous financial meltdown of 2008 had begun.

How this happened – and why – is the subject of William D. Cohan’s superb and shocking narrative that chronicles the fall of Bear Stearns and the end of the Second Gilded Age on Wall Street…

Please click here to view the video.

What is interesting about the interview is that, as opposed to a classical book review, Cohan talks through his views and comments freely on the whole situation adding some interesting perspectives and additional context.

For those of you who are intereted in our review of his previous book on Lazard, please click here.

Ironside: A Modern Tale of Faerie

OMG. And just when I think Holly Black can’t get any better than the amazing story she told in Tithe, I find myself yet again amazed! I love the different relationships involvedi n this story. And the eventual close relationship that Val eventually has with Luis (one of my favorite characters in fiction to date).

Holly pulls no punches. This is an in-your-face novel, and if you’re squicky about faerie violence, Holly’s Modern Faerie tales ares not for you.

I can only expect even better, as I sadly journey into the final book in the Modern Faerie Tale series. i guess I’ll have to settle for reading the Spiderwick novels. At least then, I’d still be in the same universe, at least.

So. to sum up this review: Dramatic, Violent, Moving. All things Holly Black has come to represent for me, and I look forward to reading much more from this amazing writer.

(I am sorry this is late, but I just realized I never posted it!)

Wendy Alec's "Chronicles of Brothers"

Wendy Alec is a founder of GOD TV alongside her husband Rory Alec. Recently, the second book of her trilogy “The Chronicles of Brothers” came out, called “The First Judgement- Messiah”.

Alec takes an interesting perspective on the events of the Bible by telling the story of humanity from the viewpoint of the three Arch-angels Gabriel, Michael and the fallen Lucifer. The first books tells of Lucifer’s fall, the second of Calvary, the third- I am guessing- will focus on Armageddon.

I have to say it was the first book I read without putting it down in three years. Alec manages to give her characters more credible depth than most who authors hit the best-selling lists. Her style is permeated with colour and impressionistic descriptions of her fantasy worlds and its creatures. She knows how to keep her story from becoming boring, and particularly the psychology of Lucifer is an original read.

Though I  disagree with some of the theological points she brings across, I doubt that her readers take her fiction literally, and the Jesus she portrays is not unlike the person I know him to be. The book is enjoyable and definitely not a waste of time. I give it 4/5 for her vivid descriptions and bright, empathic language.

High hopes

I have very high hopes for this weekend, none of which includes sleep because I plan on being insanely busy and productive.   I want to do some more spring cleaning - i’m hardly ever home and when I am, I’m so tired that I just don’t clean the house as much as I should.  I want to vacuum and at least make sure that stuff is in the right rooms.

I also have big plans for today - Izzy’s birthday.  I got him a few things and I think we may try to head to the city for a little outing with Nate that includes seeing the ducklings in Boston’s Public Gardens. Today is supposed to be beautiful. The problem is that I really have no desire to go to Boston seeing that their baseball team defeated my baseball team in extra innings last night. ::sigh::  And they’re playing again today.  It’s like being in enemy territory. Thankfully, our Constitution protects minority citizens so I should be ok, although I may not come out completely unscathed.

I also have high hopes about finally getting up to speed completely on a really interesting and important case that I’m working on, but I will probably do that tomorrow. I plan on doing that at the office.

Oh and I just finished reading this book:

The review can be found here. Enjoy!

Achieving Desires

Paulo Coelho, has managed to get my attention once again. One of his most famous and most inspirational works is The Alchemist, and although it was not the first book by him that I read, a quote from it guided my life for quite some time.

“When you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.”

This line has kept me going at times when I believed failure was awaiting me and it has helped me make some big decisions in life. Although it guided my life for a while, I lost it somewhere while running this crazy rat race. In fact, this quote and “signs” helped me be certain of my decision to study in USA…

I had entirely forgotten about this quote and my thoughts were leading my life in a strange direction. But, something that happened today brought it all back on track and helped my mind reconcile in that quote’s truth.

It is my twenty-first birthday tomorrow and I was supposed to write a Physics exam tomorrow. I was sitting here dreading the exam and solving some problems for practice. I’ve been hoping and wishing that this exam was canceled and it was just a stupid desire of a child who hasn’t grown up. The child in me still wanted to celebrate a birthday without having to deal with real life. Well, guess what? My wish came true and I don’t have to face real life because a classmate messaged me on Facebook to ask if I saw Dr. Dave’s last email. Somehow, I had managed to overlook it and would have kept studying if he hadn’t mentioned it.

The universe, which includes circumstances, turned to my side and the e-mail stated that the exam tomorrow is now optional. Considering my average for the first three tests is 98%, there is absolutely no need for me to take this exam. Afterall, the universe did help me achieve what I wanted…

I know it’s a very minor incident according to most of us, but it is special to me because it brought that quote back to me and returned to me the hope that I lived with… the hope that helped me believe and succeed. It is the little things in life that are miraculous and while one waits for the big ones to happen, one loses the most precious ones….

To end it in Paulo Coelho’s words:

“It is the possibility of having dreams come true that makes life interesting”

… and it has just made mine a little more brighter