The sad testimony of Christian believers in today's world is that they have forgotten how to love good theology books.
Any kind of interest in reading at all has been replaced with fast paced electronic entertainment. Folks would much
rather sit in front of a TV for a few hours, than spend an equal amount of time reading a book on historical theology.
Any Christian who actually spares a few moments reading, usually does so with some of the most deplorable books ever
written. These books are the so-called popular, "on the top ten best seller's list" of Christian books, and inspite of
their wide readership among believers, they are for the most part spiritually vacuous and devoid of any true, theological
substance.
In addition to dumbed down Christian literature, believers only hear pastors preach equally dumbed down sermons that are
meant to be versions of a 22 minute television program. Rare are those pastors who take the time to study a passage,
discover its meaning and accurately exposit its contents to their congregations, and rarer still are those pastors who
preach beyond 30 minutes. As the result of a vacancy of sound doctrine and sound preaching, Christians are increasingly
growing ignorant of their faith and biblical doctrine. They absolutely have no ability to understand and study their
Bibles, which in turn leaves them open to victimization by false teaching. Believers have no ability to discern and
pastors lack the ability to preach God's word, because cultivating both of those abilities takes concentrated periods
of study, and that involves the reading and comprehension of good books and commentaries.
I want to stir up a passion in the lives of Christians for reading good theological books. I think many believers are
discouraged from even attempting to read good theology for a couple of reasons. First, they have been incorrectly told
that theology and doctrinal matters are irrelvant. But in response to such nonsense, the apostle Paul warns Christians of
being tossed to and fro by false doctrine, because they are not stablized in the sound doctrine. Then second, believers
have heard over and over that reading these heavy theology books are boring and cannot be understood by modern Christians.
These are books only meant to be read by pastors and seminary students, and so they never make the attempt to take them
up and study.
In order to dispel these kind of myths, and to accomplish my task of igniting a passion for good books, I put together a
list of ones that have been helpful in my own Christian walk, and that have challenged and shaped my thinking about God
and His word. I pray these recommended picks will first extinguish misinformation about "heavy" theology being irrelevant
and boring, but also exhort those who perhaps have never read good theology to make it their habit.
 Recommend Commentaries
Recommend Reading
|
