Global Andy

The Gospel According to Lost by Chris Seay is not a cheesy/playing off popular culture/with little circles in the back type of book.   Rather is a a fun book written by a pastor who obviously is a fan of the show, Lost.  He takes the main characters of the well-written story of ‘Lost’ relating them to the well written story of God and how we are lost.

Seay brings insight as a fan into characters like Jack, Kate, Sawyer, Ben, Locke, Hurley, Faraday, Desmond and the like.  Then he shows how their flaws and pains are parallel to those we face as humans. Seay does a good job weaving in stories from the bible without it coming across as a cheap gimmick.

As a fan of the show, I enjoyed the book.  It might be a little hard to follow if you are not aware of ‘Lost’.  (Of course you can just go watch episodes on hulu or read insights on lostpedia and get caught up.) But any fan of the show,whether a seeker of truth or a follower of Christ, would enjoy this book.

I think the only weakness is when he talks about Jacob as Seay has to speculate more on his character as we really got most of what we know about him during the final two episodes of season 5.  (Seay has to go a lot by what Ben has told us and who can trust him?).  Also it feels a little pre-mature since we have a season still to go before the story ends but I guess the publishers realized the appeal might be stronger now.   Unfortunately some of what Seay writes about may be out of date come February.  Perhaps he will update the book for a 2nd release in the Spring/Summer.

By the way, the best part of the book to me is in the last chapter when Seay relates the conclusion of a sermon a friend was supposed to preach until he had a tragic death. Seay’s friend’s thoughts on accepting life as a gift are poetic and powerful.  …Sort of like ‘Lost’.

Vernon M Whatley, who is the Director of the Center for Worship for Liberty Univeristy has written a very thorough book on worship:  Called to Worship.

Here’s all you need to know….  I received my copy of Called to Worship back to review back in the early part of the summer.   I started it but set it aside as I got bored and keep trying go back if only so i could review it and get another book to review.  It’s not that it was bad.  In fact i enjoyed his first chapter on Creation and intial call to worship.  But after a while it felt like I was sitting in a Sunday school class in the South.

I stopped at the lessons from Saul when Whatley started to preach:

“Yet people try constantly. ‘Oh I’m a Christian,’ they say. Every weekend, they’re in God’s house, singing enthusiastically  along with the worship leader, perhaps raising their hands, or shouting hallelujah.  Like Saul, they are making a show of worship.  But then these same ‘worshippers’ go home and worship at the feet of internet pornography or sex-filled romance novels.  their TV viewing is uncensored; the movies they watch, abhorrent. Their speech is laced with profanity – and gossip. Alchol hides in their cupboards; lust and evil lurk in their hearts. They are worshippers, all right but of whom/ Themselves.  They are certainly not worshipping God, because they are endeavoring to worship above the law, and that’s idolatry.”

Perhaps he should have added…  “Lord I thank you I am not like those sinners.”

So the book is not bad.  I am sure Dr. Whatley is well meaning and many will benefit from this biblical overview.  Just not what I enjoy or what draws me into worship.  I tend to be drawn to God by authors who are vulnerable and put themselves in the place of one seeking and not having all the answers.

Save your money.

My buddy Matt has published a book that will be released next Spring. It’s called “Imaginary Jesus” . He let me take a sneak peak.

I read the entire book on Saturday. It’s awesome! I will try not to copy the Amazon editorial review verbatim. But it really is like no other book you have ever read. It’s a work of art that is bizarre (I mean that in a good way too), laugh-out-loud-funny, entertaining, profound, and convicting all wrapped up in one. Not sure what category it would fall under. You really can’t say its a novel or or a theological book or completely auto-biographical.  Though its written from a very personal pov as Matt himself is the main caratcher on the quest to renounce his misconceptions and discover the real Jesus.

While I found myself rolling on the floor at times, I also found myself being convicted.   Matt took me as a reader to similar places of truth and discover as when I read the profound theolgical works on Christ: ReJesus and The Jesus Way: A Conversation on the Ways That Jesus Is the Way.  All three made me want to renounce the imaginary Jesus I have chosen to follow and discover the true one. But even though I really like Alan Hirsch and Eugene Peterson, they can’t hold a candle to Matt’s sense of humor.

Maybe it helps that I know Matt personally and that even some of his personal life adventures were familiar to me.  But I have to think most when they read his book would agree.  I believe it’s the kind of book that anyone would enjoy whether they consider themselves a follower of Jesus or not.  Everyone will be able to identify with crazy views they have of Jesus and be compelled to search for the true Messiah.

Awesome book!  Pre-order yours today!

The idea behind 100 Bible Stories 100 Bible Songs is to combine Bible stories with songs.  Every story has a song sung by kids on one of two CDs.   One quick play of the songs and my boys really didn’t like them.  Most are old school like “Noah’s Arky Arky”, “Do Lord” and “Father Abraham”.   Even if your kids do like these songs, honestly, which parent can stand 100 straight 1970′s/1980′s praise songs sung in kid’s choral style?    Okay some of you might like that. My boys – almost 7, 4 and 4 – perfer to listen to Fernando Ortega or Autumn Film for some other adult praise music.

The stories are okay I guess.   They are rather short often one paragraph.  Stephen Elkins is the author and the cover page says that he is president and owner of Wonder Workshop which is the third largest independent children’s music company in the world.   I had never heard of Wonder Workshop but will take his word on that.  Sometimes as I read the stories, my wonder workshop is if the author was thinking, “As president and owner of the third largest independent children’s music company in the world, what story can I write to go with this song?”   You have to like his chutzpah  since how many Children’s Story Bibles tell the story of Ezekiel’s wheel, Job’s boils or Balaam and the Talking Donkey?    How many combine a story on heaven with that classic “You Can’t Get to Heaven on Roller Skates” or a story of Father Abraham with.. well you can guess.

Personally, I have to say that I would pass on this book.  If you want a good children’s story bible, I suggest buying The Big Picture Story Bible.

Last night I finished, “No Place Left to Bury the Dead: Denial, Despair and Hope in the African AIDS Pandemic” by Nicole Itano.

Incredible book.  Itano, an American journalist, focuses on the issue of AIDS in Africa not by just being a distant reporter of facts.  Instead she lived among people suffering from the disease and thereby weaves facts, history and personal accounts to tell the story.

The book is divided into three sections.  ’Denial’ is centered around a lady and her son living in Lesotho.  ’Despair’ focuses on a family of AIDS orphans being raised by the grandparents in rural South Africa and ‘Hope’ takes us to Botswana again to a single mom and a child living with AIDS.    I have to say I experienced more  ’despair’  as I read this book. (Maybe why it took me so long to finish it.)  There is hope in terms of Botswana providing antiviral drugs free to her citizens but the lives of these people living in extreme poverty and facing certain a life of despair seems hopeless nonetheless.

I personally liked how Itano would set aside her journalistic approach at times and get involved in the lives of these people.  It showed the author was truly human as she cared.  It invites the reader to do the same.

This is a book we should all read.  Itano brings home the need for the world community to act on behalf of Africa.  Compassion should drive us to care for these people facing a life of hopelessness.   Justice should drive us to look for ways to stem the tide of death.

One of the best books I have read in the last few years is being offered free on Christianbooknotes.com: Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places by Eugene Peterson: Free Audio Download

Tell all the Truth but tell it slant—
Success in Cirrcuit lies
Too bright for our infirm Delight
The Truth’s superb surprise
As Lightening to the Children eased
With explanation kind
The Truth must dazzle gradually
Or every man be blind-–  Emily Dickinson

In occupied Europe, 75-80% of the Jewish population during World War II was executed.  And, yet what if I told you that in one country, approximately 75-80% of the Jewish population in that same period survived.  What if I told you that number may not include thousands of more foreign Jews living in that nation?  What I then told you that this nation where so many Jews was one that was Hitler’s prime ally?

Of course you read the title of the post so you know by now it happened in Italy - fascist Italy.  But if you were didn’t know all this you were like me and most students of history and you were like the author.

What does God expect of me?

Dave Gibbons begins the Monkey and the Fish: Liquid Leadership for a Third-Culture Church with an eastern parable.  A well-meaning monkey sees a fish struggling in the water after a typhoon.  Having a kind heart, the monkey with considerable risk to himself reaches down precariously from a limb of a tree to save the fish snatching him up from the water.  The monkey lies the fish on dry land.  For a few minutes the fish showed excitement but soon it settled into a peaceful sleep.