Tried With Fire

What is a Girl Worth? My Story of Breaking the Silence and Exposing the Truth About Larry Nassar and USA Gymnastics - Rachael Denhollander, Tyndale Momentum, 2019, 352 pages. I stayed up later than I intended last night and finished What is a Girl Worth? . I had followed the Nassar case after connecting with Jacob Denhollander on Twitter. He shared his wife’s story in the Indy Star article – a victim/survivor who had come forward to stop an evil man who had been abusing children for decades. As I read the articles and watched the news coverage, Rachael came across as so brave, strong, and capable. Her training as an attorney was evident in the clarity and power of her carefully chosen words. But her book reveals what was going on behind the scenes – Would anyone believe her and take this seriously? Was it too late to report?  The internal turmoil and re-traumatization of having to retell her abuse.  Turning her private journals over to Nassar’s defense team knowi...

Beyond Authority and Submission: Women and Men in Marriage, Church, and Society - Rachel Green Miller, P&R Publishing Company, 2019, 273 pages. Newton's third law of motion states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. This is true in science, and unfortunately, this is true in theology. Attempts to correct a problem can create an equal and opposite problem by reacting in fear, and I've seen this take place in the gender wars. But what if it's time to get off the pendulum, stop reacting, and see what the Word of God says? This is why Beyond Authority and Submission is such an important book.  Rachel Miller first examines what the Bible says regarding authority and submission. Spoiler alert: submission is rooted in our humanity, not in a particular chromosome pair. God has sole power and authority to whom all of creation is subject, including all of mankind. Any human authority is derivative and temporal. Thus the Bible admonishes chil...

"It shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not My people, there it shall be said unto them, Ye are the sons of the living God" (Hosea 1:10). Sovereign grace can make strangers into sons, and the LORD here declares His purpose to deal thus with rebels and make them know what He has done. Beloved reader, the LORD has done this in my case; has He done the like for you? Then let us join hands and hearts in praising His adorable name. Some of us were so decidedly ungodly that the LORD's Word most truly said to our conscience and heart, "Ye are not my people." In the house of God and in our own homes, when we read the Bible, this was the voice of God's Spirit in our soul, "Ye are not my people." Truly a sad, condemning voice it was. But now, in the same places, from the same ministry and Scripture, we hear a voice, which saith, "Ye are the sons of the living God." Can we be grateful enough for this? Is it ...

My review of Not Forsaken is at Out of the Ordinary today. " Not Forsaken by Jennifer Michelle Greenberg began as series of letters to her husband to try to explain the trauma and emotional, mental, and physical aftermath of her child abuse. She also wrote those letters for her own understanding of herself and to try to make sense in the scriptures of what she endured. Those letters became this book, and I am so glad she wrote it for the rest of us..." Read the review here .

I have been nearsighted for most of my life. In fact, I can't even remember what it is like to wake up in the morning, open my eyes, and see anything in focus. Because of this condition, I wear glasses to correct my vision. In Forbearance: A Theological Ethic for a Disagreeable Church, James Calvin Davis writes about other kinds of myopia, ways in which our view of ourselves, others, and the world are out of focus. Informational: Our brains and memories are limited. Our exposure to the world around is limited as well thus limiting our knowledge. Consequently "there is a limit to what any one person can know." But this isn't only just true for individuals. It "can also be true of communities especially monolithic ones." Temporal: We live in a particular time and culture and are products of those temporal boundaries. Therefore, "we often fail to appreciate the effect that historical location (including our own) has on a person's understanding...

You've probably heard these exact words before. You might have even said it about a friend or sibling. But all it takes is a couple kids playing together. One grabs the other's toy or gets a little too close for personal space. A little pushing, a little shoving, A few snarky words are said. The volume rises, and then Mom or Dad asks what the problem is. The aggrieved response is: "He did it first!" Oftentimes the parent will tell the children that they need to work it out, not tattle on each other, and shake hands. The handshaking is all about timing because you don't want to be the first to make a move toward concession. So on cue, hands meet, apologies are mumbled, and the kids start playing again maybe a little awkwardly at first. We may be more sophisticated than a couple kids, but our relationships have their share of tension. We've also had many more years to build up our store of biases and opinions about the way things should be. We disagree. Wo...

"BUT THE WORD OF THE LORD ABIDES FOREVER." And this is the word which was preached to you" (1 Peter 1:25). All human teaching and, indeed, all human beings shall pass away as the grass of the meadow; but we are here assured that the Word of the LORD is of a very different character, for it shall endure forever.  We have here a divine gospel; for what word can endure forever but that which is spoken by the eternal God?  We have here an ever-living gospel, as full of vitality as when it first came from the lips of God; as strong to convince and convert, to regenerate and console, to sustain and sanctify as ever it was in its first days of wonder-working.  We have an unchanging gospel which is not today green grass and tomorrow dry hay but always the abiding truth of the immutable Jehovah. Opinions alter, but truth certified by God can no more change than the God who uttered it.  Here, then, we have a gospel to rejoice in, a word of the LORD upon wh...