Skip to main content

Clear Winter Nights





Clear Winter Nights by Trevin Wax
http://www.amazon.com/Clear-Winter-Nights-Journey-Truth/dp/1601424949

Clear Winter Nights is a provocative story that drawn together themes of doubt, faith, the truthfulness of Christianity and family relationships.  Seen through the lens of Chris Walker’s, the book’s main protagonist, the story develops through the characters including his fiancĂ©e Ashley, his Grampa Gil and a few other characters.  This novel or story is rather unusual in that it carries with it more signs of what it means to struggle with the Christian faith and opposing viewpoints than developing a riveting storyline.  Chris is in the midst of college in which his faith is being tested through the stimulating teaching of a professor who doesn’t seem to inhabit the kind of evangelical Christianity Christ is involved with.  Chris ends up confiding in his grandpa about these struggles and finds not only a sparring partner theologically and spiritually, but a man who has weathered the storms himself.

After digging up some old history about his grandpa, Chris is amazed at how many challenging times his gramps had as a pastor.  The point that we don’t really know a person until we dig deeply and ask the tough questions is goes a long way in the story.  In the end, we find out that his Grandpa had been a faithful servant of Christ through divisive times and had entertained some of the same doubts that Chris was going through in the present.  His grandfather says a penetrating word to him at one point, “Chris, make sure you don’t use scholarship as a way of masking your doubts, of defending yourself against the Bible, or distancing yourself from God’s claim on your life” (50).  Basing Christianity as an ethical system ultimately fails because it’s much more than ethics, but ‘about dead people coming to life…God seeking man” (50).  Often, scholarship is used as a vehicle to mask the penetrating questions of faith, in turn, we end up having more confidence in the academic tools and methods more than we do the revealed truth we are given.

Overall, I enjoyed this book as a fictional account of some very real and contemporary situations that people face concerning larger questions of life and faith.  I don’t think this book was an amazingly developed story but a rather in depth struggle many people face going through college, looking for a trusted guide to help them. 


Thanks to Waterbrook/Multnomah Blogging for Books program for the copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Saving Casper

Saving Casper: A Christian and an Atheist Talk about Why We Need to Change the Conversion Conversation by Jim Henderson and Matt Casper http://www.amazon.com/Saving-Casper-Christian-Conversion-Conversation/dp/1414364881 Many readers will quickly know the authors of this book from their previous release Jim and Casper Go to Church.  Jim and Matt’s new book entitled Saving Casper focuses on the way we talk about conversion in the church and the devastating ways we have pushed away atheists and other non-believers by our posture.  Both Jim and Matt traversed the national landscape, meeting in churches and asking hard questions about faith, conversion, and life. The basic premise of the book and travel is laid out here in their words, “Part of what Casper and I are trying to achieve when we speak to a group of Christians is to help people move a little bit on their “judgment meter.”  This capacity, while intellectually and often theologically uncomfortable,...
Post a Comment
Read more

Essential Christian Doctrine

  Essential Christian Doctrine , General Editor John MacArthur Pastor John MacArthur has for years been teaching the Word of God in both pulpit ministry, books, and conferences with an aim to displaying God’s revelation to his listeners in a winsome and foundational manner.  This new book, Essential Christian Doctrine takes an entire life of teaching and preaching and encapsulates the main contours of the Christian faith for its readers.  John in a systematic way highlights the most necessary teachings from Scripture including God’s Word, the Trinity, while also including sections on Man and the Future. One of the most helpful ways the authors bring to light biblical truth and theology is the way in which they group together particular themes.  In the section on the Holy Spirit, instead of a complex discussion of personhood, word pictures of the Holy Spirit are introduced in a discernible and profitable manner.  The metaphors for the Holy Spirit include fir...
Post a Comment
Read more

Wisdom for All

Interpreting the Wisdom Books: An Exegetical Handbook by Edward Custis Among the many wonderful books on the OT wisdom literature, this fine new book helps the reader interpret, exegete, and apply God’s Word to his people in succinct and helpful way.  The book is laid out nicely with bolded words that emphasize necessary themes in the study of the wisdom books and short chapters that get to the point of the biblical books.  This series of exegetical handbooks is a great treasure for students and pastors because it synthesizes much of the academic work on a biblical book into digestable portions helpful  for preaching and teaching. The opening chapter on the wisdom books brings out a helpful grid for understanding wisdom literature.  Custis writes, “Biblical wisdom, in contrast to Israel’s neighbors, reflects “Yahwistic theology” through its regular use of terms like “fear of the Lord,” its affirmation of God’s providence, and its recognition th...
Post a Comment
Read more