Skip to main content

Real Life

If James Choung ever reads this, I'm going to be honest. Real Life was in a stack of books for me to read. I had to choose between it and another book. This one had short chapters which, for me, meant I would find good stopping points.

I had no idea, however, what I was getting into. I had no idea that I would stumble upon a book that organized my own thoughts into a system that felt natural as well as effective.

James is a part of InterVaristy and so he takes what he calls the Real Life Continuum, a well thought outs system for understanding discipleship and evangelism. The beauty of this technique, if it can be called that, is that it takes the conversations we should be having and helps us to focus on helping people move along each stage of developing a deep and impacting relationship with God.

In order to relay this system, James weaves us a tale of a guy with a job who is both mentor and mentee. The story format makes it interesting, effectively showing how the conversational technique can feel.

After wrapping up the story, James pulls back the curtains and answers a few lingering questions. He does not mean for this to become a technique that becomes labeling and limiting. In fact, he says quite the opposite. Though there is a progression, he admits not everybody goes through in the same order and some will go back and forth through certain stages.

Overall, this is a book that should be explored by leaders in ministry as a strategy that removes the tension between focusing on evangelism or discipleship. In this case, we can have both.

I received this book for free from my friends at Likewise Books, a division of IVP. I told them how much I loved them, so they sent me a couple of books. They didn't even ask me to review it. But this is what friends do.

Comments

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

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

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