Lady Jane Grey

by Simonetta Carr
Reformation Heritage Books, 2012, 60 pages

Four hundred and sixty years ago, Lady Jane Grey was made Queen of England, but she lasted in that position for less than two weeks. She never wanted the job, but was pressed into the service of her country after the Protestant King Edward died, leaving his Roman Catholic older stepsister, princess Mary, as the only other potential successor. So Jane accepted the crown. But only days afterward Mary seized power and imprisoned Jane. A little over six months later Jane was executed, but not before gaining fame for her unwavering faith and love for the Lord. Though she reigned just days, her example of faithfulness has impacted generations.

Simonetta Carr has authored a half dozen “Christian Biographies for Young Readers” so far and I’ve found each of the 4 I’ve read to be of an impressively high quality, from pictures, to production values, to prose. They are intended for kids, probably Grade 3 and up, but adults will enjoy them too. That said, Lady Jane Grey was slower paced than the others, probably because there is a lot less action in her life and short reign, so if you have the other titles this will make a great addition, but if you are only going to buy one or two start with Augustine or John Calvin instead.

John S. Goodall - a wordless wonder!

John Goodall's books are unique, unlike any other wordless books I've seen. Most wordless or near wordless books seem to be intended for the pre-reading set. My two-year-old daughter was quite thrilled the very first time she came across one of these books, T. T. Khing's Where is the Cake?, and could "read" a story to her dad!

But Goodall's books seemed to be aimed at an older age groups with most of his wordless books (he has written quite a few). He has a series of The Story of... titles that tackle "an English Village," "the Seashore" and "a Castle," and in each the lack of words leaves readers, or rather viewers lingering over each picture. So it isn't wordless to make it accessible to the very young - its wordless to bring the focus to the pictures, and the impressions left by them.

For exampled, In The Story of a English Village Goodall starts us with a picture of 13th century castle under construction on a large hill, and then in the following two-page spread he shows us this same setting in one hundred year leaps, until we arrive near our modern day. These are picture to linger over, then flip back to, to compare the next century with the last.Goodall also makes creative use of single half page stuck between each two page spread. This is a bit hard to describe, and apparently was unique to Goodall - he may have invented this technique - so let me try to explain a little better: image a book with a picture spanning both pages, and right in the middle there is a half page - it spans the height of the book, but is only half as wide as the other pages - and when this page is flipped from the left side of the page to the right, we get an entirely look version of events in the middle of the spread. If you didn't follow that let's just say, it is pretty cool, and you should track down one of these books in your local library to check it out.

Though the books have 40-50 pages, they are very short reads, so even though they are brilliant they aren't books to return to again and again. That makes them less than ideal for home libraries, but very good choices to get out of your local library, or to purchase for a school library. The four titles shown here would be great for any teacher involved in English history.

Most of Goodall's books seem worth checking out, the exception being his "Naughty Nancy" series about a an obnoxious little girl mouse. It was his attempt at making a wordless book for the very young, but Nancy is more nasty than naughty, and I have no idea why a parent would want to introduce this character to their children.

Prodigal God

by Timothy Keller

176 pages, 2011

My pastor recently concluded a series of sermons on a single 21-verse passage of Scripture. I was delighted to discover just how much God has to tell us in the Parable of the Prodigal Son.

I felt that same delight while reading Tim Keller’s Prodigal God, which is also on Luke 15:11-32. Keller begins by explaining why he doesn’t call this passage the Parable of the Prodigal Son. He notes that the word “prodigal” means “recklessly spendthrift” and the term is “therefore as appropriate for describing the father in the story as his younger son” since the father “was literally reckless because he refused to ‘reckon’ or count his [son’s] sin against him or demand repayment.” Thus Keller arrives at his book’s title, Prodigal God.

But that is still not what he calls the parable. He calls it the parable of “The Two Lost Sons.” Two lost sons? Wasn’t there just one? After all, the older brother never left home! 

But as Keller explains, the older son was just as lost as the younger. The younger son’s rebellion was more obvious, but the older son shows that he isn’t interested in his father’s happiness either. If he had been, he would have rejoiced when his father rejoiced. Instead it becomes clear that he has only been obedient with the expectation of reward, so when that reward doesn’t come to him like he expected, he gets bitter. 

Keller argues there are a lot of older brothers in the Church. We all know we are sinners, but because we don’t fully understand how all we receive is a matter of grace, we still find ourselves looking down on “younger brothers” caught up in “big sins” like homosexuality or prostitution (we may be sinners, but at least we don’t sin like that!). This is rebellion of a more subtle kind – it is a form of works righteousness, because even as we acknowledge we aren’t sinless, our gracelessness to those caught in “big sins” shows we think ourselves in some way deserving of the goodness God has showered on us. 

Prodigal God is very engaging and quick read. I believe it is a very relevant and challenging book for our churches and would recommend it to anyone 16 and up. The only caution I would note is an echo of my brother’s (see his review of Counterfeit Gods): the care, rigor and reverence with which Keller plumbs the depths of Luke 15 here is absent in his treatment elsewhere of Genesis 1 and 2. So I would recommend this book without reservation but not its author.

Polycarp of Smyrna

by Sinclair B. Ferguson

Sinclair Ferguson wants to point young people to heroes, rather than idols. As the back cover asks, “what’s the difference?” Well, our idols are people we admire and want to be like because of their looks, their money, their power, or their abilities, but heroes – true heroes – are people who pursue the Lord with everything they have, willing to live and die for Him.

Polycarp was just such a hero. He lived during the time of the Roman Empire, and had been taught by the Apostle John himself. As an old man he was presented with a choice: deny the Lord, or be burned to death. His accusers didn’t really want to burn him, and they pleaded with him to renounce his faith. But Polycarp would have none of it, declaring: “For 86 years I have served Christ. He has done me no harm! How can I deny Jesus who is my Savior?” He was burned but his courage and steadfastness encouraged the believers who saw him die.

Colorful illustrations are sprinkled throughout, with only the strange, seemingly random, enlargement of the first letter of the first word of one third of the paragraphs distracting me a bit, but causing no problems for children. Overall evaluation: a superior church history title for children. It would make a good gift for those in Grade two and up.

The barber who wanted to pray

by R.C. Sproul
2012
33 pages, Hardcover

R.C. Sproul has written a half dozen picture books to date, all of them great instructional tools, and all of them decidedly average stories. This time round Sproul is using a picture book to teach both children and their parents and packaged a great lesson on prayer in a pretty good historical tale. The 

Barber Who Wanted to Pray is based on something that really happened. In 1535 Martin Luther was asked by his friend, Master Peter the barber, how to pray more effectively. Luther wrote a 20-page answer which became the booklet A Simple Way to Pray (... for Master Peter).

Artwork is first-rate - we feel like we’re right there in a 16th century German barbershop. And the lesson Luther and Sproul pass along here is sure to help readers of all ages with their prayers. To get a better account of what Luther was suggesting, please do find a copy of this book, or look up Luther’s booklet Simple Way to Pray online. But, in brief, what Luther suggested was that we memorize the Lord’s Prayer, the Apostle’s Creed and the Ten Commandments, and then, each time we pray, use a single line or clause from one of these as the focus of our prayer. So, for example, we might focus on the Apostle’s Creed’s first line: “I believe in God, the Father Almighty, the Maker of heaven and earth” and then in our prayer think on and recall some of the wonders God has made on the earth, and in the heavens above.

It’s a wonderful, very helpful lesson. I originally got Barber Who Wanted to Pray thinking it might be a good way to teach my three-year-old how to do more than 3 or 4 line repetitive prayers. But what was a bit much for her was still helpful for her daddy. The simple lesson Luther taught his barber 500 years ago is just as useful to young and old today.

Cry, the Beloved Country

by Alan Paton
Collier Books, 1987, originally published 1948
283 pages, paperback

Last month, I started reviewing some "really good reads" that are studied in our school. I mentioned that one way to tell that Harper Lee To Kill a Mockingbird is such a really good read that it made a really good movie. In the case of Cry, the Beloved Country, the most recent movie is not as beautifully faithful to the themes of the novel; however, as with Lee's novel, when the movie version of Paton's novel is successful, it is when it trusts its source, using meditative and descriptive passages from the novel (read by James Earl Jones) to deepen our understanding of crucial scenes.

So why does the movie quote the book as often as it does? The reason is that Cry, the Beloved Country is possibly the most poetic novel in the English language. Here is the passage that opens the book, part of which also is read in the recent movie:

THERE is a lovely road that runs from Ixopo into the hills. These hills are grass-covered and lovely beyond any singing of it. The road climbs seven miles into them, to Carisbrooke; and from there, if there is no mist, you look down one of the fairest valleys of Africa. About you there is grass and bracken and you may hear the crying of the titihoya, one of the birds of the veld....

A Promise Kept

by Robertson McQuilkin 
1998, 96 pages, Hardcover

A Promise Kept is the true story of a man putting his wife's needs and wants ahead of his own. That's what husbands are called to do (Eph. 5:25) but to consistently, repeatedly love our wives as Christ loves his Church is a struggle, so when a man is doing it it is awesome to see. We can't help but see God in it; we can't help but praise God for enabling a man to love his wife like that.

A Promise Kept is about the decision Robertson McQuilkin made in 1990 to step away from his prestigious and influential role as a Bible college president so he could stay home and care for his wife Muriel. She had, years earlier, started showing signs of Alzheimer's and as the disease progressed it became clear she would need full-time care. It was suggested she be put in a home, but, as Robertson noted in his resignation speech, when he was near her, she was calm, and when he was not, she would get anxious and scared. In the same speech he noted it was an easy decision to make: he had promised to care for Muriel until "death do us part" and he considered it an honor to care for her.

This a very short book – just 90 pages – but profoundly beautiful.

Commentary on John

by R.C. Sproul
409 pages, 2009

In Acts 8 an Ethiopian studying God’s Word asks a question that will sound familiar to most of us: “How can I [understand it] unless someone explains it to me?” While the Bible is generally clear, there are sentences and even chapters that defy the average lay person’s understanding.

That’s why I’m always on the look out for a great commentary - a really good one can be like a teacher coming alongside to offer personal instruction. And I’ve found nothing better than RC Sproul’s commentary on John. I’ve never before read a commentary front to back. I’ve never before found a commentary that so completely answered my every question. And I’ve never before been midway through a commentary and felt the urge to skip to the back of the book to get a sneak peek at how it all turns out! It seems so odd to say a commentary knocked my socks off, but this one did.

Sproul has helpfully integrated the entire text of John into his commentary, which meant I could walk around with it, reading snatches whenever and wherever. The book started as a series of sermons, which gives it a very different feel than other, more detailed, and verse by verse, clause by clause, word by word commentaries. Sproul was addressing themes, and narratives, and not analyzing each word. That said, any time there was a phrase or word that might be conjuring up some controversy, Sproul was sure to address it. So it was a commentary that had the flow of a story, never getting bogged down into too much details. And yet it was thorough. Yes, there are some commentaries that may be even more thorough, but Sproul dives deep – I felt like I was learning something new every page.

I would recommend it to everyone: this was an edifying, educational, joy-filled encounter with the book of John and I can't wait to check out other titles in this series.

The secret thoughts of an unlikely convert

by Rosaria Champagne Butterfield
2012, 150 pages, Paperback

13 words: Post-modern, lesbian activist, university English professor becomes Reformed Christian homeschooling pastor's wife.

Intrigued yet? There is so much to love and so much to learn from this book. One of the biggest lessons is in how God got the attention of this professor. After she wrote an article in the local paper critiquing Promise Keepers she "received so many letters... I kept empty Xerox paper boxes on both sides of my desk, one for hate mail, and one for fan mail." But one of the letters she received wasn't so easy to categorize. It was from a Reformed pastor, and instead of commending or condemning her, it was "a kind, inquiring letter." The pastor wanted to know "how did you arrive at your interpretation? How do you know you are right? Do you believe in God?" The letter concluded by inviting "me to call its author to discuss these ideas more fully." After a week of repeatedly throwing out the letter and then digging it back out of the recycling that's what she did.

As you might expect from an English professor the writing is delightful. She is also no quiet convert, and her pointed questions uncover wonderful Christian truths but also unmask the shallowness and hypocrisy that is such a prevalent part of the Church.

One caution: In the course of her conversion the author is confronted with, and takes on so many different theological issues (adoption, homeschooling, the Regulative Principle, etc.) it's likely readers will find some point on which they disagree. But for a discerning adult, that is a minor issue. And to them this book is highly recommended.

To Kill a Mockingbird

by Harper Lee
Harper Collins, originally published 1960
336 pages, paperback

Over the next few months, I'll be reviewing some of the novels that are studied in our school. Obviously, any book that is studied in my classroom is, by definition, a "really good read" (though such novels do require the discussion that they receive in a school classroom). For instance, To Kill a Mockingbird is such a really good read that it made a really good movie, which is really unusual. Often, Hollywood ruins a great story; however, the 1962 version starring Gregory Peck is successful, largely because it trusts its source, featuring frequent narration from the novel to set up crucial scenes.

So... why is the novel a great story? To Kill a Mockingbird is what is called by teachers and other academic sorts a bildungsoman. It's not as pretentious as it sounds. Bildung is German for growing, and roman refers to a novel. So, like Old Yeller or Anne of Green Gables, Harper Lee's novel is a novel of growing up. And what a childhood the story's narrator, Scout Finch, has!

As the novel opens in the summer holidays, Scout is a six-year-old growing up during the Depression in the sleepy Alabama town of Maycomb County, with her ten-year-old brother Jem, and their friend Dill, who is small but a little older than Scout, and meets them while he is visiting his aunt for the summer. The three of them do what kids of that age would do when their widowed father Atticus is at work - get in trouble. Mostly, they spend time trying to spy on the neighborhood recluse Boo Radley, but they also incur the anger of their neighbour Mrs. Dubose when Atticus, a lawyer, takes on the case of a black man accused of rape.

God gave wine

by Kenneth L. Gentry Jr.
148 pages, 2000

"Do not suppose that abuses are eliminated by destroying the object which is abused. Men can go wrong with wine and women. Should we then prohibit and abolish women?" - Martin Luther (from the back cover)

Ken Gentry dismantles the notion, common in some Christians denominations, that alcohol use is a sin. He also tackles a second, more compelling, anti-alcohol stance that says partaking isn’t sinful, just unwise. Since the Bible condemns drunkenness, it’s argued it would be best for Christians to abstain entirely.

But does this logic hold? As Gentry notes, the Bible also condemns gluttony; should Christians then abstain from food? And God condemns prostitution; should we respond by taking vows of celibacy? Clearly we go too far when we discourage proper use just because something can be abused. God has placed boundaries within which all these things can be enjoyed to His glory; God has not called us to abstinence, but instead to self-control and moderation.

Gentry works through the New Testament and Old to methodically rebut every anti-alcohol argument - his book is the best on this topic, and the one to buy if you, or someone you know, frowns at the idea of Christians drinking.

But interestingly, Gentry's point can be applied more broadly. For example, a similarly argued book might be titled God Gave Dance. Our young people are taking up dancing, and the gyrating they do gives God no glory. However, the Bible is clear that dancing can be godly (Eccl 3:4). So, rather than take an “anti-dancing” stance (and, in doing so, going further than God does!) shouldn’t we respond to this abuse by teaching our young people dancing’s proper godly use?

Now, I don't exactly know what it might mean to dance to God's glory, but I do know it would be a pretty interesting discussion to have over a couple of cold ones!

Unbroken: A World War II story of survival, resilience, and redemption

by Laura Hillenbrand
2010, 497 pages

One of the least amazing things about Louis Zamperini is that he took up skateboarding in his eighties. But it shows the determination that had him competing as a 5,000-meter runner at the 1936 Berlin Olympics. It also reveals the attitude that led the young Louis to steal a Nazi banner when the Games concluded.

These two qualities would be vital to him when, during World War II, his plane crashed and Louis found himself on a tiny raft in the middle of the vast Pacific Ocean. His chances of being found by searchers were remote, but if the small craft continued to drift west there was a chance it might make it to land – islands occupied by brutal Japanese forces.

The redemption mentioned in the subtitle is true redemption. Louis starts the story as a thief and a punk. As an airman in World War II he bunks in a cabin plastered with pornography. Many of the Japanese soldiers he meets are sadistic and perverse. So we see evidence of the Fall in this book (described with restraint). But the most amazing thing Louis is able to do is something he knows comes from completely outside his own abilities. God enables Louis to repent and forgive.