Author: Rob Bell & Don Golden
Rating: ***½
This book will not allow me to read the Bible the same again, ever. I think I’ve always read it with a bent toward God’s favor and blessing on me and my country. The authors write a lot about empire in this book. About how Israel was delivered from the hands of the oppressive Egyptian empire.
Then they became one.
My America is an empire. So I am now reading the Bible from the perspective of the oppressor.
And that changes everything.
I love and appreciate the United States. I am grateful for clean water, abundant food, the right to vote and a relatively safe life. I am grateful to the men and women who serve and die for this. But maybe my lifestyle, my consumption, my empire is perpetuating the suffering of millions. Think about this: one billion people in the world (roughly 1/6th of the population) do not have access to clean drinking water while today I used between 100 and 150 gallons of it.
Ouch. Maybe Jesus came to set people free……………..from me.
Favorite quote from the book: “At the height of their power, Israel misconstrued God’s blessings as favoritism and entitlement.”
Hmmm……….
Saturday, February 14, 2009
"Jesus Wants To Save Christians"
Posted by Rick at 4:39 PM
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1 comments:
Glad you got a chance to give this a read Rick. Was having a recent conversation with a friend who came into a lot of money after college through a business he started. As he was talking, he spoke of how this season of the Lord's blessing was also the darkest of his life spiritually speaking. He had never even stopped to think that often, propserity and affluence is the gift not of God, but of Satan to keep our focus off of what is really important. Bell and Golden, I thought, did a good job of helping folks to see through some of the ways in which our domiannt expression of Christianity has sucumbed to American paradigms and ideologioes. Lots of places to go from there.
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