Links: Interviews and Reviews

This week I've stumbled upon several interesting reviews and interviews:

The Hole in our Holiness

The first, a review of Kevin DeYoung's The Hole in our Holiness.  I haven't yet read the book, but have read several other by this author, and am looking forward to DeYoung's new title.    Christianity Today is publishing a four part series of reviews.  Mark Labberton composed the second of these reviews, saying,

"DeYoung examines various facets of the biblical call to holiness and considers some of the strongest voices for holy living within his own Reformed tradition. He writes with theological conviction and passion, laying out a case for the recovery of faithful character and piety as one of the highest priorities of Christian pastors, leaders, and laity alike. Surely DeYoung is right about how needed holy living is among God's people, because it is both our calling (it's intrinsic to identification with our holy God) and our mission (it's essential as an authentication of our new life in Christ)."

Read the rest of the review here.

The Creedal Imperative

Also in Christianity Today is a review of Carl Trueman's book The Credal Imperative.  Fred Sanders reviews the book, pointing out Trueman's advocacy of creed's as a counter-cultural expression of faith.


"Trueman builds up this biblical case for creeds, layers over it the historical case from both the patristic church and confessional Protestantism, and puts the burden of proof on what he calls the "'No Creed but the Bible!' brigade." Given this biblical and historical trajectory of churches using creeds, "the question is not so much 'Should we use them?' as 'Why would we not use them?'"

Trueman acknowledges that there is a case to be made against creedalism, but he thinks that case is spurious because it is entirely cultural: The spirit of our age ignores history, distrusts institutions, values emotions more than words, and hankers after novelty. For moderns, the loftiest goal is to be authentic, to speak spontaneously from the heart, giving voice to unique insights from our own points of view. For this mindset, the idea of reciting a set of ancient words in public agreement with a group is, if the word be allowed, anathema.

As a result, anti-creedal evangelicalism is, ironically, "not countercultural, but culturally enslaved." Trueman is passionate and eloquent about how creeds enable churches to dig in their heels and stand with the great tradition, pushing against the modern temperament."

Read the rest of the review here.

Why You Should Read Chesterton

Trevin Wax has included several interesting author interviews on his blog in recent weeks.  Most recently, he interviewed Kevin Belmonte.  Belmonte compiled the book  A Year with G. K. Chesterton: 365 Days of Wisdom, Wit, and Wonder (Thomas Nelson, 2012).  I have only read one of Chesterton's books, Orthodoxy, and the post introduced me to several other titles.

In the post, Belmonte shares a number of insights from Chesterton's life, as well as key quotations from his work.  He writes of Chesterton,

"When he most greatly needed to make sense of life, that shard of truth returned to Chesterton. A scene from a much-loved children story rallied to his aid. It gave him courage to believe. He began to see the world, once more, like a great tapestry woven by the Master Story-teller. He followed the thread of thanks he re-discovered to back the light—to faith."

Read the full post here.