Tag Archives: Books

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Book Review – Invitation To Philippians by Donald R. Sunukjian

Invitation To Philippians As a minister, I am always on the lookout for great preaching resources. Sometimes I find some incredible tools and helpful books that enable me to improve my preaching abilities. Other times, the books I find are not all that great. This book lands somewhere in the middle of that spectrum.

Invitation To Philippians, by Donald R. Sunukjian, is a part of the Biblical Preaching For The Contemporary Church series. This is a series that provides resources for the church of today, and for ministers as they strive to be relevant.

The struggle to be relevant has always been a difficult one. If you become to culturally relevant, you run the risk of compromising the message. Or you miss the chance to relevant entirely. That was my feeling as I read this book. Really, each chapter is a sermon, and it covers the entire letter of Paul to the Philippians. But in my opinion, they are bland. They lack something that would give them the power needed to be great sermons.

As I read through this book, I decided that this is much more useful in a illustrative role, rather than as sermons, or even as commentary on the passages.

Don’t get me wrong. There are some useful gems hidden in these pages. But as a preaching resource, this is mediocre, at best. I’m sure that the author is much more engaging in person, since he is a professor of preaching. However, this resource leaves something to be desired.

There are better resources out there.

Question: If you preach, what passages are your favorites to preach on? Is Philippians one of them? You can leave a comment by clicking here.

If you are interested in reading Invitation To Philippians, from the Biblical Preaching For The Contemporary Church, by Donald R. Sunukjian, you can purchase it at Amazon.com in print or for Kindle.

I received this book free from Cross Focused Media as part of their Cross Focused Reviews blogger review program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.

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Book Review – Persuasive Preaching by R. Larry Overstreet

Persuasive PreachingAbout a year and a half ago, I entered the preaching ministry full time. The previous two decades, and more, were spent in youth ministry, primarily to teens. In that capacity, I taught a lot. But I really didn’t have much of an opportunity to preach frequently. In all, I only filled the pulpit to preach a handful of times each year.

All that changed when I accepted the position as lead minister at my current church. In this new role, part of my primary priorities include preaching on a weekly basis. I was a bit nervous about making that change, since this isn’t something I was all that familiar with. But the change has been just what was needed, and it was obviously God’s leading for this change in ministry to occur.

However, I immediately realized my need to study more on the subject of preaching. It has been years since my homiletics courses in Bible college, and though I was adept at teaching teenagers, preaching to the whole church seemed to be a whole new league of its own. I immediately pulled out many of my old preaching books from those college courses and brushed up on style, preparation, and delivery, knowing that much of the content in these books, while helpful, was dated. So I began looking for other, newer material.

And I had a hard time finding anything really good, until I picked up a copy of Persuasive Preaching by R. Larry Overstreet. Persuasive Preaching was the shot in the arm that I needed to read to help me focus my attention on the areas of preaching that are the priority.

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Book Review – The Woman Who Would Be King by Kara Cooney

The Woman Who Would Be KingI don’t know all that much about Egyptian history. The subject has always intrigued me, since much of the Bible’s early history is affected by Egypt. I even went so far as to purchase a few DVD courses a few years ago on Egyptian history, but haven’t studied them completely. It has always been an interest of mine, but never a passion.

That may have just changed.

Over the weekend, I read The Woman Who Would Be King, by Egyptologist Kara Cooney. I was hooked and couldn’t put the book down.

Written in an almost biographical format, The Woman Who Would Be King is about Hatshepsut and her reign as king of Egypt during the Eighteenth Dynasty.

Against all odds, and against early civilization’s strictures against women in power, Hatshepsut took firm control of the leadership of Egypt when her dynastic line was in trouble. Her powerful father, Thutmose I was dead, leaving a sickly heir, her husband and brother, Thutmose II. Shortly after this, he died as well, and the new heir to the throne was a young child.

Hatshepsut quickly stepped in as regent and co-ruler, taking the reigns of the nation in hand and leading firmly. As she consolidated her power, she built a legacy that few other kings could match. She expanded trade with several new regions in Africa and around the Mediterranean, and even into Asia. She pushed her military strength south into Africa, bringing home much wealth from Nubia. And she instituted a building frenzy of temples, obelisks, and other Egyptian structures that is unparalleled in much of Egypt’s history.

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The Value Of Reading Biographies For A Leader

As a leader, I find some of the most incredible resources in some of the most unlikely places. Most of the time, I find encouragement and new ideas in a variety of the usual ways: conferences, books on leadership, discussions with other leaders. But over the past several months, I’ve discovered a whole new treasure trove of leadership resources.

Reading Biographies

Biographies.

That’s right. The stories of other people and their lives. I am amassing quite a collection of biographical resources in my personal library.

Several years ago, one of the ministers at a church I worked with in Indiana encouraged me to read biographies. He specifically encouraged me to take a look at a certain biography of Thomas Jefferson. I can’t remember which one, or who it was by. I shrugged off his suggestion, wondering what I could possibly learn by reading about the life of someone else, other than a new perspective on history.

I wish I had paid a little more attention to his suggestion. I would be ahead by several years.

Since I stumbled into reading biographies a few years ago, my pace has picked up, and I read a half a dozen a year now, easily. I could probably state that biographies are quickly becoming my favorite genre of book to read as a leader.

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Book Review – Noah by Mark Lundy

NoahI’m not really all that excited about graphic novels. The right story can make one great, and I’ve read a few that I enjoy, but I would much rather sit down with a good comic book instead, preferably Superman or other members of the Justice League, although I have been known to read a few Marvel comics from time to time.

So when I received a copy of Noah, which is subtitled “A Wordless Picture Book,” I wasn’t expecting to be overly impressed. I expected either a collection of drawings loosely connected, or a graphic novel without words, of which I really didn’t get the point.

However, I was surprised. In reality, Noah is both of those things: a graphic novel without the words, and a collection of art, but it is well designed and the art is exceptional.

On the positive side, the illustrations are well done, and evocative. Although they are slightly graphic novel-ish, they communicate the scenarios depicted quite well. And the sequence of the illustrations follows closely along with the biblical narrative of Noah and the Flood. In fact, there are a couple of illustrations that my kids may find a bit disturbing, including one man who is drowning. It’s a touch too graphic.

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Book Review – Playing Saint by Zachary Bartels

Playing SaintI have to admit, I wasn’t too interested in reading Playing Saint. Zachary Bartels is a new author, and this is his first book as far as I know. I’m usually skeptical of such books, simply because the author doesn’t have any track record, and first books are often a bit… well, cheesy.

I was totally surprised when I started reading Playing Saint. This book is well written, and captures the attention very quickly. And then it holds it until the very end.

Here is a brief synopsis. Parker Saint is a successful televangelist, serving at a megachurch that is exploding with growth. On top of all of that, he is close to launching his first book. Saint’s star is on the rise.

But when he becomes embroiled in helping the police solve a string of murders with religious symbols found at the scenes, his life turns upside down. He starts to slip, and soon discovers that he is in over his head. Between helping the police, being drawn into a search for an ancient relic with several mysterious Jesuits, and his own personal struggles, Parker Saint discovers that there really is a spiritual battle going on. And he finds that he is in the cross hairs of the killer.

Playing Saint is an exceptionally well written book, with a plot that twists and turns and leaves you completely surprised. It’s intense, and difficult to put down. Very few authors can create such an exceptional novel right off the bat, but Bartels has done it, and done it well. Along with Ted Dekker, Bartels will be an author to watch. I will be looking intently for his next novel.

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Book Review – A Spy Among Friends by Ben Macintyre

A Spy Among FriendsOne of my favorite authors of all time is Tom Clancy. The author of The Hunt For Red October, Patriot Games, The Sum Of All Fears and many more, Clancy can weave a web of intrigue in a novel that will keep you turning pages long into the night.

His novels center around the CIA and the intelligence community, and many of the best of his stories are from the era of the Cold War.

Though his novels are fictional, they are based somewhat on reality, albeit loosely. However, the underpinning of many of his novels could very well happen. And it did.

In the 1930s, the Soviet Union recruited an agent in the British government. And they had no idea just how far this spy would go. Kim Philby flirted with communism while at university. Unknown to his closest friends, he never discarded the ideals of the communist philosophy. He just buried them, and lived the outward life of a loyal patriot.

A patriot who just happened to be in the upper echelons of the British intelligence services, MI5 and MI6. Philby fooled everyone, from his own countrymen and colleagues, to his friends in other intelligence services. And he did so for more than thirty years.

Though much of his story is conjecture, and is either buried in the archives of the British intelligence files, or has been deliberately destroyed, Philby caused massive damage to British and American efforts to subvert communism throughout the Cold War. His betrayal gave operation and political advantages to the Soviets, and caused an unknown number of deaths.