For All It's Worth

Gifted Mind: The Dr. Raymond Damadian Story by Jeff Kinley with Dr. Raymond Damadian The story of Dr. Raymond Damadian, Inventor of the MRI is a story of great ingenuity and belief.  From the beginning, Ray was a brilliant student and excelled in music and in scientific endeavors.  The first chapter of the book, rather than being an introduction to this life is more of an apologetic for the Christian life.  Damadian states, “Similarly, I attribute the invention of the MRI entirely  to the Lord’s hand in revealing it to me.  I credit His specific intervention to accomplish it reduction to practice (15).”    Dr. Ray in the first chapter seeks to explain that to believe in a closed system in which God never intervenes is to lose our access to His truth.  Dr. Ray tells his early childhood story in the second chapter and particularly illuminating was the part about his violin.  He started playing at the young age of five and...

Ready to Return: Bringing Back the Church’s Lost Generation by Ken Ham with Jeff Kinley, research by Britt Beemer The church is in trouble in the West and this is no lie, for there has been for many years a growing secularism that is eating away at the livelihood of the historic church.  Ken Ham and Jeff Kinley decry this global diminishing of the church in their new book, Ready to Return.  They look at the spiritual departure from churches in Europe as a sign of both a unhealthy belief system but also a church that has weak in its proclamation and stance on the real issues of the day (9).  What is the way forward for the church to regain its footing? The authors posit that the real issue at hand is the nature of biblical authority (58).  The questions to begin this discussion are: Did God really make you? and Is He really the Creator?  These questions point back to the origins of humanity and the divine work in the beginning.  Man was ...

The Story of Everything: How You, Your Pets, and the Swiss Alps Fit into God’s Plan for the World by Jared C. Wilson The title alone begs one to dive straight headlong into this book.  For those of you familiar with Jared C. Wilson, The Storytelling God and The Prodigal Church are some of my favorite books of his.  His passion for seeing God’s glory shower over all creation and central focus on Jesus Christ is admirable in many ways.  In this new book, The Story of Everything, Jared takes a wider angle lens and looks at the most significant events in the Scripture as providing a solid paradigm for a robust biblical theology.  The book is accessible, winsome and chalk full of good news for every believer. One of the important points that Jared makes in his book concerns Genesis 1-2 and creation.  Often we see this story of beginnings as relevant to the beginning of the story and the end of the story, but fail to see how Genesis 1-2 is con...

Mark (Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament) Vol. 2 by Mark L. Strauss This newer commentary set put out by Zondervan is an excellent series, and this volume on Mark by Mark L. Strauss is no different.  Many of you will no doubt recognize Strauss, as he has labored in the field of NT studies for many years, producing substantial works on the gospels, choosing a translation of the bible, and his newest work is on paradoxes in the Bible.  This work, coming in at the hefty weight of 784 pages, leaves no stone unturned as Strauss covers introductory matters, textual issues, commentary, and theology.  The helpful layout of the book made for easy reading in that you could looking at the Scripture and Mark’s commentary alongside each other, comparing notes and engaging the original text in an accessible manner.  What I particularly enjoyed about this commentary was its judicious balance of weighing the importance of Mark’s narrative alongsi...