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The Call, Evolution, and Christian Music At the Crossroads

Os Guinness' new book, The Call: Finding and Fulfilling the Central Purpose of Your Life (Word), is must reading for every Christian serious about serving God in the most fulfilling ways. It does more to illustrate the total claim God has on our lives than any book since Elton Trueblood's now out-of-print, The Company of the Committed.

The Call is particularly insightful, suggesting that we raise things that we might otherwise see as "ordinary" to levels of glorious service to God: "Drudgery done for ourselves of for other human audiences will always be drudgery," says Guinness, "but drudgery done for God is lifted and changed." When God calls us to something, even if others might see it as lowly, it is invested with what Os calls "the splendor of the ordinary."

No level of society deserves to hear the gospel any more than any other—and no level deserves it less. Our brilliant Christian thinkers take the gospel to the very needy intellectual elite in this country, invading Ivy League campuses, learned journals, and publishing books for the mainstream. Phillip Johnson—who occupies a prestigious endowed chair at the University of California at Berkeley law school—continues to do great work critiquing Darwin's theory of evolution. His Darwin on Trial (InterVarsity Press) is a classic.

J. Budziezewski has published two very helpful new books, Written on the Heart: The Case for Natural Law (InterVarsity Press) and How to Stay a Christian in College: An Interactive Guide to Keeping the Faith (NavPress), a reader-friendly book. Mark Noll's The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind (Eerdmans) encourages Christians to become more involved in intellectual pursuits in order to be better representatives of Christ.

(On that note, the 100 or so Christian liberal arts colleges in this country graduate approximately 30,000 seniors each year. That's not a small number. What happens to this sizeable army? Shouldn't we see a bigger impact for God's kingdom than we do?)

The Brooklyn Tabernacle limped along with about seven families until pastor Jim Cymbala committed the church to an emphasis on prayer. Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire: What Happens When God's Spirit Invades the Heart of His People (Zondervan) tells the story of how a Tuesday evening prayer service grew to where literally thousands now come to pray each week. (Also, the church's five Sunday services attract several thousand people.)

Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire is something of a publishing phenomenon: It was sort of tossed to bookstores with no fanfare, advertising, or promotion. But through word of mouth and, I think, the work of the Holy Spirit, more readers were attracted to it. This document of the power of prayer has been on the best-seller list for months.

Jacques Ellul was the rarest of the rare—a Protestant living in the south of France and a brilliant engineer. He wrote quite a few technical books, but the late author may have more to say to American Christians than many of us trying to write today. His most compelling book for believers is Presence of the Kingdom (Helmers & Howard). Ellul's most famous quote—particularly germane for our day—is, "Every time the church has gotten into the political game, it has been drawn into betrayal and apostasy. Politics is the church's worst problem. It is her constant temptation, the occasion of her greatest disasters, the trap continually set for her by the Prince of this world."

Music has been important to people of faith since biblical times, and it's been one of Christianity's richest blessings. It has inspired the church, instructed, provided a vehicle for worship in most meaningful ways, and has been one of its most effective tools for reaching the lost. Strangely (and perversely), music has now become the most divisive subject among many Christians since the early debates over biblical inerrancy. Amazingly (and sadly), it seems more churches have split in the '90s over music and worship differences than for any other reason.

But Charlie Peacock's new book—At the Crossroads: An Insider's Look at the Past, Present, and Future of Contemporary Christian Music (Broadman & Holman)—brings music back to the church in a theologically sound and biblically cogent way. At the same time, Charlie uses his wonderful instruction about music to teach universal truths. The "old rocker" is at least as adept with words as he is with music! At the Crossroads is destined to become a classic.

Of all the speaking assignments I had in 1998, the most challenging and fulfilling was for the Florida Library Association. Tony Campolo and I took spots occupied the previous year by shock jock Howard Stern and an ACLU spokesperson!

The title of my talk was "The Management Methods of Jesus." There was a massive crowd in front of me, and I knew I was in unfriendly territory. The woman who introduced me did a wonderful job, but I was greeted with only a smattering of applause.

When I finished, the applause was thunderous (certainly not because of my ability as a speaker), and I was almost late for my plane with all the people who had questions and comments afterward.

The gist of the most consistent comments? "I never thought Jesus could be relevant to anything I was doing or thinking."

Christians must do better at mastering the English language if we are to communicate the truth of the gospel to every level of American society. Just as there are no excuses for bad manners, there should be no excuses for bad English! A book that can help is Patricia T. O'Conner's Woe Is I: The Grammarphobe's Guide to Better English in Plain English (Riverhead Books).

Chuck Colson is such a great resource for the Body of Christ—smart, articulate, and fearless. I am so thankful for him. I believe his book, The Body: Being Light In Darkness (Word), is his seminal work. In it he calls for Christians to return to the public square with a commitment to excellence.

If you don't want to be convicted, don't read Hugh Hewitt's The Embarrassed Believer: Reviving Christian Witness in an Age of Unbelief (Word). Hewitt is a lawyer, the host of a PBS show, and television producer. His principal point in this book is that the gospel is intellectually sound, of great practical good, and entirely relevant to today's world—but most American Christians are in some way embarrassed by it and reluctant to proclaim it to anyone but other believers! Hewitt points out very forcefully how ludicrous this is.

Some might say the Mars Hill Tapes (now known as the Mars Hill Audio Journal) put the cookies pretty high on the shelf. But this resource makes reaching for dessert very worthwhile. The bimonthly audio "magazine" tackles a wide breadth of subjects—sociology, sports, science, music, history, philosophy, and more—from a Christian perspective. The sound quality is excellent, too, with music setting up and underscoring the authoritative voice of host Ken Myers. You cannot help but be impressed with the erudition. A first-class creation! (For more information, call 800/331-6407.)

Editor's note: Bob Briner died on Friday, June 18, 1999, after a lengthy battle with cancer. We at Youthworker are privileged to have worked with him and blessed to have known him. Though Bob will be missed, his radical love for God and desire to see him lifted up in mainstream culture will continue to be an inspiration to us and many others.

A leading figure in professional sports management, an Emmy Award-winning television producer, and president of ProServ Television, Bob Briner is also a prolific writer. Among his works are Roaring Lambs and Lambs Among Wolves (Zondervan), The Management Methods of Jesus (Thomas Nelson), and The Leadership Lessons of Jesus and More Leadership Lessons of Jesus (Broadman & Holman). He's also penned articles for the New York Times and Sports Illustrated.