Skip to main content

Sacrilege


2012 is starting out really well as far as my book choices. Last week I reviewed Dug Down Deep by Joshua Harris. I thought this was a good place to start a year because it laid a foundation of truth.

Then I jumped right into Sacrilege by Hugh Halter. I must admit, the title had me scared a bit for what I would find inside. But you know what they say about judging a book by its cover. So I jumped in anyways.

And...

I say jump in with both feet, my friends. What Hugh basically does is to break down the Beatitudes and explain how deviant these words would have sounded to the original audience.

Hugh writes in a very easy to follow manner. He explains in the introduction that he is writing as if to his daughters in a letter, so they may know the real Jesus. Also near the beginning he defines how he is using the term sacrilege. It comes don to tipping holy cows. That sounds mean, but these cows had it coming. Really.

What we need to understand is that people did not sit through Jesus' teaching like we do through a sermon. Instead of obedient silence and perhaps a smattering of 'Amens', there would have been shock and awe. Imagine gasping, scoffing and disbelief and I think we get a bit closer to the reactions Jesus would have become accustomed to.

Hugh weaves the Beatitudes together and shares some very clear implications for how we follow Jesus, from the sharing of communion to the sharing of our resources to how we spend our Sabbaths. He even returns our focus to how we respond to people.

In the end, nothing is too sacred to be questioned and yet Hugh finds the true character of Jesus to be uber-sacred. Yes, uber.

I highly recommend this book for anyone who is new to the faith and needs to start out right, before getting comfy with the holy cows. Oh, and for the rest of us, this would be a great opportunity for a  refocusing.

I received this book for free from my good friends at SpeakEasy. They ask me to say something but don't tell me what to say. They're cool like that.
 
Hugh Halter is a church planter, pastor, consultant, and missionary to the US. He is the national director of Missio and is the lead architect of Adullam, a congregational network of missional communities in Denver, Colorado.You can vist him at his blog if you'd like; http://hughhalter.com

#SpeakeasySacrilege
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Accountable

I recently officiated a wedding. The ceremony was simple, lovely, and ended with another couple professing to keep the covenant of marriage. But it all started with a clarification...from me. At our first premarital counseling session, as I have done with every couple I have agreed to marry, I clarified a couple of matters. First, I officiate Christian weddings, where both spouses-to-be are professing Christians. I firmly believe that marriage is difficult enough, without adding disagreements about God into the mix. Second, as a minister of Jesus Christ, I believe the pastor’s role in a wedding is to represent the blessing of God on that union. So we have several sessions of premarital counseling where we discuss married life. It’s not that I have this imaginary card in my head, with a picture of me on the front and my stats on the back. (You know, like a baseball card.) Ok, I do picture cards. Pastor cards! And being a competitive guy, I want my stats to look good. The number of coupl
Post a Comment
Read more

Patience

I am more than halfway through the last year of dropping one of my children off at school. It's my eighth grade daughter, for anyone keeping track of my family.  See, next year she will be at the high school, and her brother will drive her. He says that it's not cool for seniors to drive their freshman sister to school, but I bet it's cooler than being dropped off by your mom in a minivan.  So rather than groan about this daily responsibility, I've been reminiscing about what the drop-off line used to look like, way back in elementary school. Once our children were about halfway through their elementary years, the drop-off line became a test of patience.  Do you know which group you do not want to get caught behind in the parent drop-off line at an elementary school? The kindergartners. These little ones are barely able to walk, but now we put them in the high-pressure situation of trying to unbuckle their seat-belt, grab their backpack (which might be as tall as they a
Post a Comment
Read more

Jury Duty

I was recently summoned to jury duty. I know, groan. Except I didn't. I had never experienced it before and was curious to see what it was like.   When the day to report arrives, they separate you into groups, asking various questions to decide if you will be selected to serve. Do you know the accused? Do you have conflicts that would keep you from serving? Can you stay focused?  I wanted to answer well, if only because my kids kept wishing me luck the day before, telling me they hoped I made the team. After all, who wants to be rejected? It occurred to me that there are things you probably shouldn’t say right away if you’re wanting to serve on a jury. I know, I know, people don’t typically want to serve on a jury. But that list didn’t seem nearly as humorous to me. Here are the things you probably shouldn’t say if you want to be selected for jury. I hold myself in contempt. You can’t handle the truth. We find the defendant guilty. I believe the judge looks pretty in his robe. I’d
Post a Comment
Read more