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

The Facebook Maybe

Granted, I'm a pastor. I have Type-A tendencies. Ok, my tendencies border on freakish OCD behavior patterns, but... Few things bother me more than the Facebook 'maybe'. I suppose I could go on and on about the grey areas of our society and the refusal of people to accept absolute standards. I could discuss the great need of people to accept that what is wrong for one person is likely wrong for everyone. I should certainly be concerned about mentioning that someone might have sin in their life. But I don't believe the Facebook 'maybe' is quite sin. Perhaps if I were coming up with new sins, I would add this to the list. But alas... Some might think the Facebook 'maybe' did not exist prior to the Internet, but they would be wrong. When I was in high school and asked a girl out on a date, I would normally be told that if they had no other plans, if nobody else called them, if there was nothing good on television and their hair did not need washing, then per...
5 comments
Read more

But I Wanted It

As I've said before , I'm looking for a new place to do youth ministry. Job searching in itself can be a full time task. Unfortunately, no one is paying me to look for a job. And when you haven't had to find a job in 15 years, the whole experience can feel brand new. And nerve-wracking. And quiet. So very, very quiet. I may spend a few hours here and there sending out my resumes and writing cover letters. But the churches I'm sending my information to have their own timeline. And sometimes that timeline does not involve acknowledging my presence. Which is fine, especially if one of the churches I've applied to is reading this right now. I understand those looking for youth pastors will have their own agenda and their own timeline. But it leaves me sitting here with a deafening quiet around me. I am choosing to walk by faith through these days, picturing God working behind the scenes (always behind the scenes) and holding His voice very still, until He is re...
2 comments
Read more