Archive for category: book reviews

Man, this took me ages to get to, but it was well worth it!

Martin has written a blinder of a book for lads.

Unlike most ‘how to be a godly man’ style books, The Man You’re Made* To Be has taken the spotlight off of us and put it back onto God as the one who made us. He starts off with this,

‘I should probably get this out of the way now because otherwise it’s just going to get awkward. I believe that you didn’t happen by accident. I believe that you were made. Handmade actually, on purpose, by a Creator. A God who made you as his child, whom he loves just like a really great father loves his son or daughter. Except much better than that.’ (xv)

The focus, therefore, isn’t ‘11 ways to do man-stuff properly’, but 11 ways to grow into all that God has designed you to be. Fantastic!

Because Martin keeps going back to this God as our creator, everything just feels more grounded. When he talks about role models, for instance, he doesn’t just find a few godly men to point to. Instead he goes right back to the source and points to Jesus himself (chapter 3). In this chapter, Martin draws out the Jesus of justice, strength, conviction, forgiveness, and compassion, and rather than just saying ‘be like Him’ (which he does do), Martin encourages us to know Him. Frankly, I’d be very happy to stick this into a non-Christian’s hand.

I’m going to highlight briefly a couple of juicy areas that I think Martin tackles particularly well:

Fatherhood

As you can imagine in a book like this, fatherhood comes up a fair few times, as it should. But for many people fatherhood is a toxic issue that triggers so many ill, confused feelings. Martin doesn’t shy away from talking about the immenseness of having a Father in heaven, but treats that with the sensitivity it needs. He says,

‘If you are a man who doesn’t know or have contact with his father then I’m sorry. I’m also aware that all this talk of God as a father who lives you can feel a bit uncomfortable or even painful. I believe, though, that God’s version of fatherhood is so many times better than ours that it is barely recognisable even from the closest and kindest father-son relationship. And whatever yours is like, I promise that the offer to know and root your identity in him is cast-iron. He will never let you down, even if your real father has.’ (34).

Sex

I thoroughly enjoyed Martin’s chapter on sex (go figure). He manages to bluntly talk about hormones, pornography, and the pervasive sexualisation of culture, without going unnecessarily OTT, or awkwardly dancing around the issues either. In a straight-forward, frank, and realistic tone, Martin opens dark taboos up in a helpful and wise way. He exposes, for example, the most insidious lie of pornography which tells us ‘this is what sex should be like’, and contrasts it against God’s design,

‘The truth is that sex is incredibly meaningful, and I believe that the biggest reason why is that it’s holy. It’s not just a physical action but it’s also a spiritual experience, designed by God as a gift to us.’ (80)

Women

Unlike a lot of books of this kind, Martin doesn’t use women as a functional tool for us to work out our manhood in conflict with. Women are far too easily objectified in Christian culture as dangerous distractions that a godly man must constantly fight off with spears and axes. However, for Martin, women are clearly created equal by God. They are our sisters in Christ and our partners on our journeys of faith.

Martin tracks the West’s history of male dominance and looks at ways we can crawl out of that context into something so much better. He helps us to consider the attitudes of our hearts towards women and realign our lifestyles to treat them with genuine respect. He says,

‘It’s one thing to agree intellectually with the idea that men aren’t better than women. It’s quite another to put that into practice. There are so many subtle ways that gender imbalance has wormed its way into our culture; disarming all those bombs means having our eyes wide open to every form of them’ (145)

So why read it?

Here’s a few reasons…

• It tracks a form of manhood that lives in the Bible and can exist today.
• It’s funny, poignant, easy to read, and packs a punch – right to the gut of what so many lads are dealing with.
• It isn’t afraid to challenge accepted ideas of what everyone says is ok – but does so without being preachy or legalistic.
• It looks honestly at things like mental health, self-harm, and suicide.
• It also considers things like screen time and cyber bullying.
• It has more pop-culture references than you can swing a Kardashian at.
• It points back to spiritual disciplines like prayer.
• It isn’t scared to tell us to exercise our self-control muscle.
• It encourages us to connect up with others and build supportive relationships.
• It gives us some solid titles and content for a teaching series: purpose, identity, Jesus, emotions, sex, temptation, friendship, technology, women, and materialism. I want the workbook next, Martin.
• It uses the word ‘bants’.
• It makes a HUGE deal of Jesus.
• it keeps bringing us back to God our creator.
• It ends with ‘I love you, man.’

Masculinity has become so toxic and confused, that even broaching this topic is brave, but Martin – somehow – has tracked a path through a healthy version of manhood which doesn’t just flat out reject the unique aspects of what being a man means.

It’s not a deep systematic theological treatise – but it’s not meant to be. It absolutely hits the target it’s aiming at and will be a helpful resource for my young people. Frankly, it was helpful for me too!

The Man You’re Made* To Be is the book I’ve been waiting to give to lads for years. I was sent a free copy (thanks), but I’m buying a bunch for my youth club.

Cheers Martin – you’re a legend.

Here’s a quick first snap of doing a whoollllle Youthwork Magazine Review.

Youthwork Mag did something amazing this month – they wrote their magazine for young people rather than about them – and loads of it is written by young people too. The result is pretty cool!

There’s the obvious, yet nevertheless helpful summer article on ‘how to survive festivals’ – brilliant tidbits considering how easy it is by day 2 to have no tent, no dry clothes and a full-on tummy bug. I particularly enjoyed the correlation between a sweaty onesie and no friends! Something – albeit perhaps too parent-esque to make it onto the list – that would have been a good addition is to hydrate, hydrate, hydrate! The number of people keeling over from heat stroke this year is crazy – drink a shed load of water every day. If you sweat it out – you need to put it back in.

There are some fun, simple reviews too. It would have been good to see more books (only 3, yet 5 CDs), but again helpful and good comments. Great CD’s, particularly Rend Collective’s ‘Art of Celebration’ and Guvna B’s ‘Scrapbook II’ – although I guess all the buzz now will be Beth Croft’s new release that didn’t make it onto the list (probably because it wasn’t out in time). It’s worth saying that nothing makes less than 4 stars – which is probably the Christian way of being nice to our mini-Celebs – but that does make the reviews slightly difficult to trust totally. Can’t comment on the books as I’ve not read any of them – although I bet Rachel Gardner in ‘The Dating Dilema’ is fab! A few good wee interviews/Q&A’s thrown in too by Rend, Guvna and Beth.

What I loved about this edition was the short testimony articles. There are two particularly powerful stories – one from Katie, a girl who moves to Russia to work with trafficking victims, and a second from Yasmin, who ran from her Muslim home to become a Christian. In the same vein there are also convicting challenges from a bunch of young people to get them more implemented into the life of Church through service, including real-life examples of young people who have set up websites and school groups to great effect. Bekah says “In 20 years time I would hope to see the divide between the young and old diminished. I would love to see the youth take on bigger roles within the church, leading services, being part of the worship band, or offering to pray with people.” Right on girl – bring it on Church! And let’s add being co-opted onto Eldership boards and PCCs too!

One of the best and surely most useful parts of this issue is #AWKS – awkward questions about life, the world, and particularly relationships, answered form a Christian perspective. The amazing thing about the answers are how totally grace-centered they are. They are not prescriptive, black-and-white or legalistic in any way. I am totally proud of the authors for this! Only crit I’d really make is perhaps a couple of answers are too grey or lax. A teenager wanting to go further than they should might be able to interpret some of the grace as license – so throwing in a few more solids for anchors of holiness might have been a good call too.

Nudge presents an interesting conundrum for me. The thrust of the article is an encouraging look at how Christians in every aspect of the world can survive, thrive and make a massive difference – so this really makes the piece invaluable! It starts with quite a cool little set of quotes from ‘Christians’ in the celebrity world. In one sense that’s awesome; it’s a great encouragement for young people to know some of their fav celebs are following Jesus! That said, I’ve got two big issues with this: 1st When a celeb looses their faith publicly – which happens surprisingly often – shaken young peeps who were in their wake can come crashing down with them. 2nd when ‘Christian’ celebs – like Katy Perry (who features) spend half their public time getting almost naked and singing about kissing girls – it does tend to water down the importance of walking the walk as well as talking the talk. Generally though – a good stab at an important topic!

The Bible Reading Notes is a really welcome section as always. A week of Bible-driven challenges that’s easily accessible to a wide range of young people with a strong thrust on application is simply brilliant – well done YWM! There’s an amazing mix of passages that really gets you bobbing around your whole Bible which is massively important, and the simple approach makes them poignant, pertinent and easy to digest. Fab! The only slightly awkward thing about these (which is unfortunately the case with most youth Bible reading notes) is they model a sound-bite-with-explanation Bible reading habit that doesn’t teach how to actually engage with the Bible itself. Context, exegesis, word analysis and structure are all sadly lost – and if we don’t teach these things then our young peeps will always be dependent on spoon-feeding, constantly needing more ‘extra stuff’ with their Bibles – making us the same as any other religion. Let’s make a pact shall we? Let’s learn and teach how to let God’s word speak, come alive and burn within us for itself. It’s hard – and lots of us don’t know how to do it ourselves – but it’s well worth it!!!

Finally, the comic at the end is a brilliant, inventive and very funny opening-up of Jesus’ epic relational and conversational skills, both with the religious brainiacs of His day and those from ours. It’s actually a masterful way of teaching Bible stories – and with the distinctive ‘thought’ and ‘speech’ bubbles you get a whole world of subtext and commentary in the timeline which is wonderfully instructive. This follows a huge spectrum of apologetics and ethics and packs a great punch. Absolutely brilliant!

Thank you Youthwork mag. A great gamble well worth it! Again maybe? Perhaps room for just one more regular publication Premier?

Joshua Harris has bravely asked for feedback and stories to aid his understanding of the difficulty some have had with his first book ‘I Kissed Dating Goodbye’ which was a best seller when he was 21 years old. You can add to this yourself here.
Here is the story / feedback I left.

I’d first like to say that I’m humbled and impressed by the bravery, teachability and vulnerability expressed here. Thank you. I’ve been a youthworker for over ten years, and I’ve always wanted to sit down with 18 year-old Joshua Harris in my youth group. I’ve wanted to talk with him about dating and the beauty of grace that I feel was sadly missing from his worldview.

I first read IKDG when I was in my first year of Bible College. I was young and very impressionable, and as such was impacted by its message and found easy applications in its method. It effectively gave me a way of approaching dating that didn’t require the mess or organic growth. I could skip those steps. In their place it gave me measurable checks and balances. Just what a lonely, hormonal and legalistically-bent young theology student needed!

The book also gave me license to be ‘in control’ of my godliness, in a way that totally disregarded the responsibilities and mutual partnerships of those around me, especially women. It also subtly took my dependence away from the mercies of God and placed purity back into my hands: The worst possible play for it.

As a result of reading this book (in two short sittings), and immediately after reading the sequel ‘Boy Meets Girl’ and the now renamed ‘Not Even A Hint’, I split up with my long time girlfriend. This was a bad breakup. Unexpected, and incredibly hurtful for her – while feeling uncomfortably victorious and proud for me.

These books made me feel – in equal measure – hopeful about a magical and yet strangely attainable wife; and dirty and sinful in a way that could not be saved by grace, but would need to be tamed by hard work and determination.

In the year following my breakup (which wasn’t handled well), I effectively withdrew from all my female friendships. I wouldn’t talk to girls on the phone, email them individually, add them as Facebook friends, or spend any time alone with them anywhere. As someone who naturally gets on better with girls, I became increasingly dis-balanced as a person and isolated. I was moody and lonely.

At the end of the year I watched a movie with a female exchange student and went on a walk with her. Nothing romantic, but really friendly. That was the last evening before she – and her classmates – would get on a plane and leave. I remember the piercing feeling of lament at how stupid I had been and the painful sense of what I had lost that year.

Re-reading the book again years later it was easier for me to notice the simple theological errors which leave the reader with legalism. It was also easier for me to see the power of suggestion sewn into it’s stories.

IKDG is not necessarily a legalistic book. Not intentionally. It’s a story book written as teaching material from someone who did not have the experience or responsible burden of a teacher. It subtly suggests legalism in the fallacious and simplistic ways it compares the dating and non-dating worldviews. Neither of which are properly explored, or put into clear Biblically relevant context.

It’s so close to the truth! So close. It made me long to be like Jesus – but it did not make me long for Jesus.

I recognise young Joshua Harris’ heart in those pages, however. A beautiful and stunning longing for purity from a wise young lad. But it unfortunately clutches at simplicity rather than relational grace. With some guidance and mentoring, it could have been stunning! It could have been a story of life and triumph – rather than a pseudo self-help book that left me seeking some form of Christ-likeness rather than seeking Jesus.

And therein lies its fatal flaw.

I remember a few years later listening to a Joshua Harris talk on good deeds as the assurance of salvation – which was unpacked in a very Jonathan Edwards like way. Brilliant and well communicated, but with the same misdirected theology. Just like Edwards, Harris had misunderstood the purpose of good works, and was using them as demonstrations of salvation almost to the point of creating it. This theology litters the pages of IKDG.

I would not recommend the book IKDG to any of my students or young people. However, I would commend the purity and passion of Joshua’s heart and wisdom to everybody.

In love.

Tim Gough
youthworkhacks.com