BOOK REVIEWS
Bandy, Thomas. Moving off the Map: A Field Guide to Changing the Congregation.
Daw, Carl P. Jr., and Kevin R. Hackett. A Hymntune Psalter.
Keck, Leander. Who Is Jesus?: History in Perfect Tense.
Keel, Othmar and Christoph Uehlinger. Gods, Goddesses, and Images of God in Ancient Israel.
Vincent, Mark. A Christian View of Money.
Wimberly, Edward P. Moving from Shame to Self-Worth: Preaching and Pastoral Care.
Bandy, Thomas G. Moving Off the Map: A Field Guide to Changing the Congregation. Nashville: Abingdon, 1998. 278 pp.
Reviewed by Sara Gallant
One wouldn’t expect a book to be worthwhile reading that compares highly professional, dedicated clergy to stool pigeons. But do you actually know how the term "stool pigeon" originated? We must read this book, not only to clarify the simile but to find out why the author uses the extinction of this friendly, monogamous bird, steeped in family values, as a warning call to America’s churches – and seminaries.
"The time required for the passenger pigeon to transition from being one of the most abundant species in North America to virtual extinction was only about 50 years. . . . Christendom has been sick unto death for well over 100 years. We began to recognize this clearly during the past 50 years. Yet the actual death of congregations is happening suddenly, quickly, and with an odd sense of surprise on the part of church leadership. . . . not because they had not been warned but because they never really believed God would let it happen to them." (p. 18)
Surprisingly, some of the symptoms of impending death would be identified as successes by many congregations who have achieved them: for instance, family-orientation, freedom from debt, a proud heritage, professional church management and pastoring by clergy while volunteers staff church events, a Sunday School which is the cornerstone of Christian education. What can possibly be wrong with this picture? In short, the author contends that these comfortable congregations are not prepared to withstand the stresses of the present and near future, or to attract the unchurched among the populace who yearn for spiritual solutions to their problems.
"This is not a theoretical death of Christendom. . . . It is the immediate future . . . unless the Christian congregations of North America change. . . . into a new species of Christian community" (p. 20).
These changes, the author explains, must deeply alter the nature of the church. Congregations must make the changes by themselves, for themselves. They must jettison beliefs, practices, and traditions that do not fulfill the New Testament purpose of the church. The key question for determining how to change is: What is it about our experience with Jesus that this community cannot live without?
The transformation process presented in the book is an enormous undertaking for clergy and congregation, and the author gives a detailed sequence of activities that can guide a congregation through to success. Readers already jaded about the utility of focus groups and mission statements should suspend this disbelief while evaluating the book. By whatever route, the churches must rethink their own understanding of their identity and usefulness.
"Everybody wants to be touched by the healing power of God." "What matters most of all is how people feel following the church service." "Small groups are the cornerstone of Christian education – groups in any configuration, meeting during the week in homes, promote Christian growth." Throughout, prayer and a direct connection with God – however hard-won – direct the transformation.
The text regularly refers to earlier works by the author: Kicking Habits: Welcome Relief for Addicted Churches and (co-authored with William Easum) Growing Spiritual Redwoods, both of which are also available in BTS libraries.
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Daw, Carl P. Jr., and Kevin R. Hackett, A Hymntune Psalter. Book one: Gradual Psalms: Advent through the Day of Pentecost. 135 pp. Book two: Gradual Psalms: The Season after Pentecost. 126 pp. New York: Church Publishing Inc., 1998.
Reviewed by Sara Gallant
These books offer psalm settings in styles readily accessible for congregational singing. They draw together various traditions of psalmody by preserving the refrain/verse pattern of Israel’s worship (the responsorial form); by using a hybrid form of the chant (simplified Anglican chant, itself a hybrid of plainsong); and most significantly, by basing its refrains on hymn tunes (many of which carried the texts of early metrical psalms) likely to be already known by most Episcopalians. The antiphon melodies are either in unison or 4-part settings and may be reprinted. The psalm verses may be sung by a cantor or the choir. Book One includes all the psalms appointed in Lectionary A, B, and C from Advent through the Day of Pentecost. Book Two continues from Trinity Sunday through the season after Pentecost.
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Keck, Leander E. Who Is Jesus?: History in Perfect Tense. Columbia, S.C.: University of South Carolina Press, 2000. 182 pp.
Reviewed by Sara Gallant
As would be expected from the pen of a professor emeritus at Yale Divinity School, who is also senior New Testament editor for The New Interpreter’s Bible, this is a thoroughly documented, scholarly book. It will not likely be fully grasped in one reading. The footnotes are there to be read.
Keck studies Jesus from two perspectives at once. He sifts through the last two centuries’ search for the historical Jesus, as attempts to find "the Jesus who was," or Jesus in past tense. He holds the findings of scholars up to the gospel records with a goal of determining what Jesus can be to seekers today: Jesus in perfect tense. He focuses on "four facets: that he was a Jew, that his mission was energized by his grasp of the kingdom of God, that he was executed without any visible or audible validation from the God he trusted, and that he is the central figure in the moral life of his followers" (p. 9).
Although Keck disclaims creating a comparative overview of all the Jesus literature, he nevertheless accomplishes just that. In the process, he unseats many of the conclusions proposed by others. Such an overview of what the "quest" has or has not accomplished, such as the evolution of the "Q" hypothesis or the activity of the Jesus Seminar, this reviewer found to be useful.
Keck notes that: "Inevitably Jesus is portrayed in the idiom and perspectives that reflect the values and convictions that the historian, and his or her social location, finds congenial. . . . the transitoriousness of all historical reconstruction must be acknowledged and all pretentious claims made on its behalf – such as Now we really know what he said and what he was up to! – must not be taken seriously. . . . Whoever wants to understand the historicity of Jesus (his conditionedness by time and circumstance) must reckon with his or her own historicity as well, perhaps more so" (pp. 8 and 9). He extends that warning to cover his own essays as well.
So, do we give up reading "Jesus books"? One might think so; but in flagging ideas in this book that I wanted to return to and ponder, I wound up with a forest of post-it note tabs. As examples:
In debunking the long-held conviction that Jesus founded the Christian church, modern scholars often propose a "Jesus movement." Keck points out that there is no evidence of such, "either as a spontaneous result of his activities or by design" (p. 48). Jesus’ commands to "follow me" were not broadcast, but specific to individuals. He called few to vocation, but all to accept and live by his teaching.
In a discussion of Jesus’ exorcisms, especially in relation to similar work done by others: "the exorcisms do not authenticate Jesus’ message and mission but express it" (p. 85) -- a point that bears emphasis and may, indeed, be the most important line in the book. Similarly, regarding the healing and exorcism stories, Keck says: "For Jesus, these activities flowed from the message, not the reverse; he was not a healer who found he had something to say but a teacher who found it necessary to heal" (p. 83).
"When the Old Testament is taken seriously as a whole instead of being perused for usable passages (as if its being the ‘Old’ Testament means that, like an old car, it still has salvageable parts), it becomes evident that the living God-Reality so persists in being itself in its own way against sundry human expectations, illusions, and wickedness that again and again something unexpected occurs portending the time when God’s kingdom on earth will be as real as it is ‘in heaven’ " (p. 133).
I found Keck’s chapter five, "The Authorizing Judge: Beyond Jesus’ Ethics," to contain the most material new to me. Keck says that ethics is "a mischievous word for Jesus’ teaching about behavior" (p. 158). Contrary to an ethics instructor, Jesus consistently shifted the focus from the deed to the doer, nor did he teach how to make difficult choices between sometimes conflicting goods or between unavoidable evils. He painted no shades of gray. Rather than posit "Jesus’ ethics," Keck writes about the "Jesus ethic."
"Not only must one acquire true familiarity with the gospels, but one must also be left alone with them in order to ponder the figure they portray. Internalizing Jesus requires steady exposure . . . . The internalized Jesus does not only settle questions; repeatedly he also unsettles answers" (p. 167). And on Keck goes, with well-reasoned, thoughtful statements based on the texts. This is one of the most useful "Jesus books" I’ve read, outside the gospels themselves.
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Keel, Othmar and Christoph Uehlinger. Thomas H. Trapp, translator. Gods, Goddesses, and Images of God in Ancient Israel. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1998. 466 pp.
Reviewed by Sara Gallant
The authors contend that the culture and religion of ancient Canaan and Palestine/Israel cannot be adequately described, much less interpreted, solely from texts (biblical and otherwise), including inscriptions; but that the large and growing body of physical artifacts must be "read" as well. Their particular quest is to try to determine to what extent the ancient cultures were monotheistic – perhaps to pinpoint when and where monotheism began – and whether there’s any substance to the textual hints that Yahweh had a consort goddess. Their conclusions will not be revealed here.
The book claims to be directed not only at scholars, but at a larger public – people with serious interest in religion, theology, or feminism. For all its scholarly detail (and a few terms not found in the American Heritage Dictionary), I found the book readable and highly informative in this area which is indeed not covered in the average Bible class. A helpful tool for the reader is that the artifacts are shown in bold sketches rather than in photographs, thus making it easier to read the images. The book had several German editions before the English edition under review, and more German editions followed as new information came to light through archaeology. The first chapter indicates that modern (1990s) German scholarship tends to regard pre-exilic Palestine as polytheistic. Supporting texts are said to be Psalms 82 and 89, and Deut. 32:8f. The authors seem predisposed to this view.
The authors, however, seem not to know of the linguistic and geographical discoveries of modern Near Eastern scholarship indicating that the texts of the First Testament may describe events that took place elsewhere than the territory of today’s "Holy Land" (cf., The Historicity of Biblical Israel by Kamal Salibi. London: NABU Publications, 1998). Hence, they are bound by the ages-old need to harmonize what is dug up from the ground with what is dug out of the texts. However, whether or not the Biblical texts apply, the authors’ analysis of artifacts still remains a fascinating study of the culture and religion of whatever peoples lived on that land in ancient times.
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Vincent, Mark. A Christian View of Money: Celebrating God’s Generosity. Scottdale, Pa.: Herald Press, 1997. 136 pp.
Reviewed by Sara Gallant
This work documents The Giving Project, developed within the Mennonite Church in response to its own financial needs. That experience is now a plan of action they teach other congregations. The goal is to help congregations and individual members "keep mammon as a servant role instead of a master, and to foster generosity as an integral part of Christian character." The book takes the reader through much of what would be presented in a seminar, and there is a companion volume (not owned by the Seminary) on methodology, called Teaching a Christian View of Money.
The author begins by examining the power of money, how it attains a godlike position in our personal and church lives. Each chapter then examines one of what the author finds to be core Christian beliefs about money, illustrating the origins of the belief within Bible passages and scenes from Christian history. The chapters continue with anecdotes, usually ethical dilemmas, that call for reflection on the principles under discussion, and conclude with suggestions of concrete actions and imaginative exercises congregations can undertake to improve their dominion over mammon. The focus is on wealth of sharing, rather than accumulating.
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Wimberly, Edward P. Moving from Shame to Self-Worth: Preaching and Pastoral Care. Nashville: Abingdon, 1999. 133 pp.
Reviewed by Sara Gallant
Rev. Wimberly believes that learning to think with the mind of Christ, which includes obeying what one learns within that mind, will bring us and those we help into living the world to come in present time. Through this process Jesus’ ministry becomes, in a degree, our ministry. In each chapter, the author looks at an event in Jesus’ career (his own experiences, his healings, or his parables), retells the story from an eye-witness’ point of view, explores the meaning and how we can imitate the Master, then tells a contemporary story from his pastoral counseling that makes the same point. One theme throughout is that Jesus operated within a shame-based culture which he was constantly dismantling, and that we have the same opportunity today. Wimberly’s language is largely that of human psychology, and there’s lots of repetition; but it’s worthwhile reading on to find out what is meant by this concept of following Jesus.