One recent Sunday morning I met a man visiting our church. His wife Jane had stayed home while he and his boys attended worship. When I asked him about Jane, he said, “She wasn’t raised in any faith. That’s why she’s not here.”
Two hours later I rejoiced with Orion’s mother as Orion was baptized into Christ. A seventh grader from a strong Christian household, Orion nonetheless had much to learn about God. His new life was just beginning.
Before leaving the church building I received a note from Albert. A seventy-something widower, Albert has attended every class offered by our congregation. But in his note, Albert remarked that there’s still so much he’s trying to grasp about the Bible.
D. A. Carson’s latest book was written for Jane, Orion and Albert. Carson is a research professor of New Testament at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and the author of over 45 books. This book, entitled The God Who is There: Finding Your Place in God’s Story is Carson’s attempt to summarize the narrative of Scripture for non-believers, new believers, and seasoned believers.
As one who has written about postmodernity, Carson is uniquely qualified to write a synopsis of the Bible that speaks to the issues most critical for contemporary readers. And as a New Testament scholar, Carson is exceptionally competent in getting to the heart of each portion of Scripture.
Carson’s goal is to help readers see God. Each chapter focuses on one fundamental aspect of God. The book thus moves from “The God Who Made Everything” (Genesis) to “The God Who Triumphs” (Revelation). This is one of the book’s strengths—keeping readers’ eyes upon God with each page.
Perhaps unintentionally, Carson employs one method for summarizing the Old Testament and another for the New Testament. Carson utilizes “biblical theology” to explore the Old Testament. That is, he moves from one Old Testament book to the next, reflecting on what each book reveals about God. Readers are thus exposed to most books in the Old Testament and their theology.
Carson, however, utilizes “systematic theology” to explore the New Testament. For an unknown reason, Carson does not continue a book-by-book technique (e.g., here’s what the Gospels teach about God, and here’s what Acts teaches about God, etc.). Instead, he chooses qualities about God and shows systematically how the New Testament informs us about each quality.
This makes Carson’s Old Testament portion far superior to the New Testament portion for those seeking to understand each book in the Bible. Still, even the New Testament portion skillfully abridges the most central teachings of Scripture. In addition, Carson offers a remarkable analysis of how themes raised in the Old Testament find fulfillment in the New. Readers walk away with a firm understanding of how the two Testaments fit together.
Carson ultimately produces a readable piece capable of introducing people like Jane to Christianity for the first time, enabling people like Orion to take their first steps as new Christians, and assisting people like Albert in deepening their knowledge of Scripture and of God.
Carson has blessed me through many of his writings; Spiritual Reformation, the KJV Debate, and challenged by many more. he is a dyed in the wool modernist though. how does this work compare with, say, Bartholomew and goheen’s the drama of scripture or wright’s the last word? or on a more substantial level the scripture and hermeneutics series edited by Bartholomew and company?
Bobby,
You are right about Carson’s modernistic outlook, though he is very conversant with postmodernity. One disappointing aspect of this book is that it deals almost exclusively with the “vertical” problem of sin (me and God) and neglects almost all facets of the horizontal problem of sin (me and others, me and the planet), etc. In addition, his presentation of the significance of the cross deals only with substitutionary atonement, not with any other classic or postmodern perspectives on the cross. I like Bartholomew and Goheen a lot. Wright is very good but I have a hard time seeing a non-believer or new-believer picking up his work and slogging through it–it can be quite challening reading.
Chris
Chris, thanks for the Book Review. I am going to take a look at his book and see if there are portions I can use in my work.
If you were to change any aspects of Carson’s book, what would you choose? How could you reapply some of his material for unbelievers?
Daniel,
I was hoping this book would be ideal for unbelievers. However, it’s quite long and in-depth, probably more than the typical unbeliever will be willing to wade through. For the truly hungry, however, it may hit the spot.
I have enjoyed Carson’s little booklet “Radical” which is a collection of about 4 speeches he gave about the cross. It’s filled with good illustrations and would work well with unbelievers.
Chris
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