Reading Days (More Like Lame Days!)

For those of you who don’t know, I go to The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, KY. We don’t get a Spring Break here. Well that is and is not true. We get what the administration here calls ‘Spring Reading Days.’ I think it is their hope that we will use the break to read and catch up on class work and so forth. Well, I would love to be able to tell you that I rebelled against THE MAN and went and did something adventurous and fun during ‘Spring Reading Days,’ but I guess I am not as cool as I thought, and yes, pretty much all I have done over the break is read and write papers!

So Tony Kummer, that cool cat over at Said at Southern, is asking SBTS bloggers to share what they are reading over the break (e.g. what we would like to read over the break, what we aren’t reading over the break, etc., etc.). Then you are supposed to tag some other people to tell you what they are reading. In order to rebel against the system just a little, I have decided to comply to Mr. Kummer’s requests in my own unique way!

I should also mention that I was tagged by Rich Clark at Christ and Pop Culture. If you haven’t checked out this blog yet, do it now. It is excellent! I was also tagged by good ole Southern gospel-lovin’, Brother Hank. Hank’s blog is a must-read for those of you who are interested in Christian ethics!

OK, so here is my very own Spring Reading Days List!

1. What I am reading?: I have been reading an interesting book on preaching the cross called Cross Talk by Sally A. Brown. Dr. Brown is a professor of Theology at Princeton Theological Seminary and has produced one doosy of a heretical book on preaching! Basically she claims that we should stop preaching theories of the atonement (none of which she claims is carried throughout the entire NT) and preach the metaphors of the cross as we see them in Scripture. Her hope is that such preaching will help to relieve much of the suffering that the preaching of penal substitutionary atonement has caused. Actually there are many metaphors that she is unwilling to preach–like the one where Christ is scourged for our iniquities and wounded for our transgressions and the one where Christ drinks the cup of God’s wrath on our behalf. Needless to say I disagree on many many levels with Dr. Brown, which has made this an interesting read.
2. I am also reading lots of commentaries on Philippians for my exegesis paper on Phil. 3:1-11. Peter T. O’Brien’s commentary is by far the best I have found but its quite heavy, especially if you are relatively new to NT study and haven’t studied Greek. If that is you, I highly recommend Moises Silva’s commentary–it is lighter but the content is good.
3. What I wish I was reading . . . : I really wanted to read Young, Restless, Reformed: A Journalists Journey With the New Calvinists by Colin Hansen, this is a book that likely resonates with many young evangelicals who, I think, in many ways could potentially do much good for the kingdom through commitment to a high view of God, clear teaching on conversion, and commitment to expository preaching. The book is essentially about how many young evangelicals today are turning to reformed theology. There is an entire chapter about my school, so I hope to get to this one soon!
4. What I am listening to during ‘The Reading Days’?: If you haven’t checked out Pandora.com, you really should. It’s this really cool website where you can set up free internet radio stations based on artists or songs you like. For instance, I have been listening to a “Explosions in the Sky” station this week while working on my papers and reading, so Pandora plays songs by Explosions in the Sky as well as songs by artists with similar tonality or musical style etc. as Explosions! I have also set up a Thomas Newman station that I have been enjoying (Newman wrote the music for some really great films such as The Shawshank Redemption and The Road to Perdition).
5. I have also been listening to several sermons on 1 Thessalonians by Nate MagLoughlin. Nate is the pastor of my former church back in Texas, a church that Kevin and I have both served at. I wanted to point out a particular sermon on 1 Thessalonians 1:9-10, titled Repentance, Reorientation, and Nature of Conversion, because Nate articulates the nature of true conversion well and does an excellent job of emphasizing repentance in gospel preaching. Since I have been blogging on these issues, I thought this would be a good time to highlight some good gospel preaching that properly emphasizes repentance and the nature of true conversion.
6. An interesting tidbit on divorce and remarriage: Since this is something I have been blogging about as of late, I thought I would pass on to you an interesting tid-bit about the issue. Did you know that the early church fathers almost categorically did not understand the Scriptures to allow for remarriage after divorce? That doesn’t seal the deal on this controversial issue, but its worth noting, because the early church fathers got a lot of things right and were much closer grammatically and historically to the writers of the NT than you and I. There is much much more to be said here, just wanted to throw out that interesting tidbit!
7. Why am I blogging while I should be reading? Well if it isn’t obvious to you already, it is so I can tell you about awesome things like Pandora and Thomas Newman! In all honesty, I think I speak for all here at EE when I say that I hope to point people to Christ in all his glory in the way that I blog here. We live in a world that is all about the internet. So I simply hope to do my best to make much of Christ and the good news on the blogosphere and the wider world wide web!

So many people have already been tagged! But here goes-I tag: Danny, Brandon, Paul Cable, Paul Roberts, and R. Albert Mohler Jr.. Yes that is right . . . I tag President of Southern Seminary. If I tagged you, obviously I won’t be disappointed if you don’t tell me what you are reading, you should be spending your time reading rather than telling people what you are reading anyway!

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