Here are 50 books J.I. Packer thinks you should read. It’s funny to have come across this today, considering me post earlier.
I’m saddened to report that I have not read any of these (I won’t count the ESV Study Bible). Even worse, I have only four or five on my list of books to read (though, none on my 2016 Challenge List). Many of the books, though I am familiar with their general category, I’ve never heard of. So many books, so little time.
I read a lot of books. Somewhere between 20-30 a year, even more when I can figure out how the Kindle Owner’s Lending Library works. Everyone in my family reads like this (more or less) also. My dad will put down a whole novel in a night. Even my grandparents read for most of their leisure time; which is actually kind of hilarious because we set my 91 year old graddad up with a Kindle, he has to max out the font, but he loves it.
Apparently reading challenges are a thing, that’s why I made one. However, when I tell people this, they seem somewhat shocked, as if it were some insurmountable number. I think it is because so many people don’t want to put the effort in of one book after the other, or if they pick up a big book, they hate the idea of try to slog through it. My wife does this. That’s why I think people should read multiple books at once. I’m currently reading an 800 page book on the 20th century American presidents. I’m not going to come home and read that every night. Just like TV or music or movies, sometimes you want something a little different.
That’s why I’m always(ish) reading at least five books. I have them broken down into five different categories, with some overlap. So, it’s not that I read all five every day, but in a given week or so, I do. My guess would be that I get through them faster than reading five books, one after the other, which actually wouldn’t work for my first category anyway.
On Friday, I noted that Andy Stanley thinks you’re selfish for not attending a mega church such as his. He was since apologized. I give him credit for admitting the mistake and realizing people have differing views, not only on the type of church someone may want to attend, but how certain churches want to run their programs. So, 10 points to him for stepping up and apologizing.
18 For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit, 19 in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison, 20 because they formerly did not obey, when God’s patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through water. 21 Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
This is a really weird passage right? You are reading along in 18 and it’s typical stuff. Christ died as propitiation for our sins, the one sacrificial lamb, he died and was raised again…wait in the spirit? His spirit, is that the Holy Spirit, or does Christ also have a spirit? Three in one (trinity) would mean it’s also the Holy Spirit’s spirit. Then you hit verse 19 and all hell breaks lose.
He spoke to spirits (like his spirit?) in a prison, then all of sudden we are talking about Noah and a few, well eight (sounds like a response to how many drinks you’v had) were saved and then something about water and as we leave and go into 21 we are talking about baptism. By this point, you get confused and kind of skip ahead to chapter 4, because that’s a nice round number.
Don’t worry, Karen Jobe helps us catch our breath with four questions the think about:
I’m not going to say much, because it is summed up so well here, but this seems sad and desperate. It shows all that is wrong with the corporate model of church. I don’t even know what to say about his focus on segmentation, that is, getting the group so large that you can cut it up into as small a piece as possible. This completely separates believers from each other (separating the different parts of the body). I’m in a Bible study now with four guys who are much older than I; one of them is a grandfather. Even though this is meant to be more of a ‘Bible’ group than a ‘group’ group, I’ve learned a lot about being a father and husband, just by interacting with guys who have more experience in it.
Has returned.
We’ve been going through John at church. This past Sunday part of the verse was John 18:11 – So Jesus said to Peter, “Put your sword into its sheath; shall I not drink the cup that the Father has given me?”
Listen to the lyrics here – “He drank it up, the Cup of God’s Wrath”
I had Tom Standage’s book, A History of the World in 6 Glasses
First of all, it isn’t a history of each individual beverage, though there is plenty of that, but a history of the world (as the title indicates) viewed through the lens of what (and why) people were drinking at the time. The drinks and the times they represent are:
Beer – probably the oldest known drink, popular in Mesopotamia and Egypt. Likely made/discovered by accident, at some unknown time far in the distant past. One of the main benefits it had on society was that you must boil water to make it. This had the affect of water purification and a decrease in waterborne illness. Interesting notes about how it was used as currency and given as rations to soldiers and slaves.
Wine – Our next step in history (Western, at least) is to move north to Greece and then Rome. Wine was viewed as the sophisticated drink and being a wine civilized, educated and wealthy (the more things change…). The sections about the drinking parties are fascinating, with all the ritual and impact on democracy they had. Tangentially related, I grew up in a church that served grape juice for the Lord’s Supper. People would argue that we should have wine, as Jesus turned water into wine, etc. but the common retort was well, wine was weaker then. Turns out, this is actually kind of true. It was made the same as today, but watered down. It was considered crass to drink wine straight. Who knew? I assumed they were just pulling something out of their asses, on the other hand, they could have just watered it down, but I digress.
Spirits- specifically whisky and rum, my personal favorites, though there is also gin and brandy that play a major role. This is the era of exploration and colonization. Beer & wine were expensive to ship and didn’t always keep on the voyage across the Atlantic. Distilled spirits would, and quickly replaced beer as the rations for soldiers. Incidentally, to flavor the harsh drinks, they’d add lime juice, which would help prevent scurvy. He also goes into detail about the triangle of slave trade where slaves would be taken to the islands where they’d be traded for sugar, sugar was then taken to Boston to produce rum, the rum was then traded to Africans for more slaves. And of course, the Whisky Rebellion – the first major attempt to raises taxes in America and one of the first violent threat from within, all due to homemade whisky.
Coffee – The age of reason and the enlightenment. This was definitely my favorite chapter. If you are not familiar with the impact that coffee had on the move to the industrial revolution, the book is worth the cost for this chapter alone. Basically, we’d all walk around half drunk all day. People often had beer (weak, but still) for breakfast because it was safer than water. Your precision in operating machinery or your output at a factory is greatly diminished when you’ve been drinking. Once you are caffeinated, however, then you are alert, focused, and ready to go. Also, the interesting impact on enlightenment and revolutions, as discussion moved from pubs and taverns to coffee houses.
Tea – Mostly focused on the British empire, there is still a cool history behind tea in the East that he dives in to. Some of the more interesting things to come out of this history is the impact of people working out of Tea Shops. People would often use the place for meetings and have mail sent there. Because the shops were located near places of work, there would often be a certain industry focus. Proprietors would put shipping information or stock prices on boards. Manuscripts were circulated and critiqued. Lloyd’s of London and the London Stock Exchange both started as or at tea shops. Twining’s, The Wife’s favorite, started almost 400 years ago and may be the oldest official logo still in use. Speaking of women, unlike coffee shops, they were allowed in tea shops which had some interesting impacts, such as the little boxes, sometimes with locks, that teas are still kept in today.
Coco-Cola – or Coke here in the South. This chapter follows the rise of America and The American Century; also ‘Murica, to a lesser extent. The history is kind of crazy, to think about the number of people running around selling random drinks that are dangerous for you, even though they make wild health benefit claims. Then again, this is still happening, and is completely unregulated,(so, again, the more things change…). Overall fairly interesting, but probably more known by most people (at least Americans) but some great and funny anecdotes. Such as the Russian general who couldn’t been seen drinking Coke, even though he loved it, because it was associated with capitalism. So, Coke hooks him up and make clear Coke, puts it in a different bottle to look like vodka and sends it to him. Interesting stuff about Coke embodying capitalist ideals to many communist countries.
Overall, definitely worth picking up somewhere. Very well written and interesting book, especially if you are a big history nerd.
An odd thing happens when you tell people you are having a girl. When I would tell people that my wife is pregnant, naturally one of the first questions is, ‘boy or girl?’ I don’t remember exactly, but somewhere between 1/3 and as much as half of the responses after my answer (a girl) were something along the lines of, ‘how are you doing?’ or ‘are you okay with that?’ Sometimes it was worded more subtly, and I didn’t quit understand what they were referring to. Was I happy with a kid? Absolutely, we’d been married for six years and had been trying for months to get pregnant.
Being asked this over and over, and often much more bluntly, I finally realized what the major issue was that people were so concerned with: how disappointment was I, a man, with have a daughter. More often than not, it was women who asked me, especially older ones, who would make a sad and concerned face while asking. It makes me sad to think of how they must have felt growing up.
To be fair, if I could have had my perfect situation, I’d have a son first then a daughter. Partly because I don’t understand babies/children or women, but I do understand boys, so I felt the transition would help prepare me as a parent. But then there is also some idealistic about have the other son helping to protect and look out for their little sister.
Either way, one of each was generally the ‘plan’ as much as random occurrences can be planned. It just seems so anachronistic to be disappointed with a daughter. I won’t be burdened with her until I can marry her off. I am not part of the titled gentry, where I risk losing my land rights for future heirs if I don’t have a Sir Monday Morning Theologian the Second the carry on my name.
It is also just sad thinking how common this feeling must be (or hopefully, must have been) that so many people felt the need to express sympathy for me. I can’t imagine how some little girls must have felt and how that impacted them later on in life.
A good friend of mine and his wife were also pregnant in some overlapping time. He was having a boy. I was at talking with people after service one Sunday, and the group included the wife and an older couple, who, upon finding out that they were expecting a son said, “He must be excited.” She noted that many people ask her some form of that question. When I asked him about it, he confirmed that he quite often received a congratulatory type response from people, as if he had no interest in a daughter. It truly is a sad state for this to be such a common thing in our society today.
It sounds cliche, but when it happens, it is actually true: you really do not care what comes up on the ultrasound, as long as it is healthy. Even if you have some lingering sadness/disappointment/whatever else there is, it should dissipate quickly after holder her and looking at her little potato face. It certainly should be gone by the time she can smile at you. Look, you really need to talk to Jesus and spend some time reflecting, if, when you go pick her up from day care, and she comes running to you, smiling, with her hands out, and you still care what’s under her diaper.
I haven’t been active on this site for a quite awhile, about a year and a half. actually. I’ve been writing elsewhere and doing other things. This week, I’ve decided to consolidate the other writings and move everything here.
So, there’ll be a bit of a post dump, but then I should be getting into some new content.
I’ve been away for quite some time, but I’ve decided to try to pick this up again. Anyway, we’ll see how that goes.
Over the past year or so, I’ve gotten interested in the “Great Books” or “Harvard Classics” or any number of groups of books people think you should read. I’ve looked at collections from different publishers as well as book list from different websites/blogs and authors I like.
On top of that, I found out that things called something along the lines of “2016 Reading Challenge” exist. So, this is my reading challenge for 2016. My goal is to read 31 books. I probably read about 20 something last year, but never really paid attention. I know I was ordering a kindle book every month from the lending library thing and I’m guessing I read between 10-15 additional books.
Why 31? Well, 30 would be 2.5 books a month, which I felt was quite doable. That is also a number that works based on the title of this blog. I was in the middle of reading two different books, so I tacked an extra one to the list.
I haven’t really completed the list yet, but have ideas of types of books that I’ve shamelessly ripped off of other lists. The first two, I have already read, the next seven I am currently reading, but it is a little more nuanced than that. The List:
So, there it is. Updates to follow.
Monday Morning Theologian 