What are the biggest problems in the world?What do the life and teachings of Jesus have to say about the most critical problems in our world today?
Brian McLaren seeks to address these central questions in his new book Everything Must Change: Jesus, Global Crises, and a Revolution of Hope. He systematically examines humankind’s great challenges, using the image of a giant “suicide machine” to describe our global addiction to violence, domination, and unrestricted consumption. He concludes that our planet is on a self-destructive trajectory and that the Christian religion has often failed to provide an alternative to “the dominant framing story that currently drives human society.”
McLaren critiques the “incredible shrinking gospel” of popular Western Christianity which promises peace, forgiveness, and eternal bliss for the individual, but fails to also address our most pressing global and societal problems. He believes that Jesus offers a revolutionary message of hope…
…a vibrant form of Christian faith that is holistic, integral, and balanced - one that offers good news for both the living and the dying, that speaks of God’s grace at work both in this life and the life to come, that speaks both to individuals and to societies and to the planet as whole.
He challenges us to recover the radical belief that God’s will truly CAN be done here on earth as it is in heaven and urges us to join God in his mission of healing and reconciliation. McLaren’s book left me feeling inspired and hopeful and gave me a renewed vision for the work of the Kingdom.
Visit Conversation at the Edge for Helen Mildenhall’s review
10-21-2007 |
1 Comment »Peter Walker recently wrote a review for what sounds like a really fascinating book, and has kindly given us permission to repost here. Thankyou Peter!
To be honest, when I initially picked up Dr. Stephen Post’s Why Good Things Happen to Good People, I was expecting another thinly-veiled prosperity read in the grand tradition of Osteen and Amway.
I’ve been down that road before: back in the ‘90s my brother jumped on the pyramid-bandwagon, distributing soap samples and copies of God Wants You To Be Rich to everyone he knew. When his finances flopped, so did his faith.
Call me a cynic, but that’s why I tend to be cautious about literature touting enlightened paths to success or affluence: Jesus said to die to myself and take up my cross. The Gospel is peace, transcendence, and total self-effacement; no mention of that six-car garage.
09-06-2007 |
1 Comment »“The book of Ecclesiastes is one of the extraordinary pieces of ancient wisdom literature. The author beautifully expressed the desperation of the powerless: ‘I saw all the oppressions that are practiced under the sun. Look, the tears of the oppressed - with no one to comfort them! On the side of their oppressors there was power’ (Eccles. 4:1).“In our world today, 27 million individuals live as slaves. Frankly, power is on the side of the oppressors at the moment, but a wave of abolitionists is on the rise. They will wipe away the tears of the oppressed and deliver justice to the oppressors.”
To learn more about modern day slavery, I recently read David Batstone’s excellent new book Not for Sale: The Return of the Global Slave Trade - and How We Can Fight It. David Batstone is a professor of ethics and an award-winning journalist who traveled all over the world preparing to write this book. I found this well-researched and passionately written book to be both heartbreaking and inspiring.
In it Batstone gives both statistical and policy information, as well as first hand accounts. He outlines the massive scope of this global crisis; there are an estimated 27 million slaves in the world today, more than in the four centuries of the transatlantic slave trade combined. He explains the main types of modern slavery - sex trafficking/forced prostitution, bonded labor, and captive child soldiers. And he details actions that are being undertaken and need to be undertaken by governments and institutions to fight against this scourge.
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05-15-2007 |
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