Elliot Ritzema

Category: Book Reviews

  • Book Review: Same Kind of Different as Me

    This is the story of the friendship between a poor black man and a rich white man. It's about reconciliation, about the courage to step outside your comfort zone and trust another person, and about not judging people by appearances. It's also about perseverance, and coming to terms with death and the presence of evil in the world. It's a fascinating story, and one that you should read for yourself. I'm not going to give any more of it away than I already have.

    It is an autobiography of sorts. The two men alternate chapters in telling the story of how they grew up, lived their lives in separate worlds – one an international art dealer and the other a homeless man – and eventually met. That aspect of the book makes it very hard to review, for me. I don't find it difficult to evaluate (and even criticize) people's arguments or writing styles when I write a review, but criticizing this book – in which both men shared deeply about themselves – would feel as if I were judging these men. I don't want to do that. Sure, there were times in the book where I thought, "I would have handled that situation differently," but in the end, who am I to judge? I didn't live these men's lives. I haven't gone through what they've gone through. After all, one of the main messages of this book is to not judge people by appearances. I can only say, in the end: thank you, Ron and Denver, for sharing yourselves with us, warts and all. It was touching, and it was better than fiction.

  • June 2010: Books Read

    1. Letters and Papers from Prison by Dietrich Bonhoeffer. I’d had this book on my shelf for a while, and after reading Eric Metaxas’ excellent biography last month, I decided to stay in the mental world of Bonhoeffer for a little longer by reading this book. As the title indicates, this is a collection of letters and papers that Bonhoeffer wrote beginning in the spring of 1943, when he was arrested and held in Tegel Prison in Berlin. He was a prisoner until his death two years later.

    For the first several months, he was only allowed to write to his family members, and each letter was read by a censor. In the fall of 1943, however, he was able to write smuggled letters to his friend Eberhard Bethge, who was with the German army in Italy for much of this time. It is his letters to Bethge that really make this book a worthwhile read. In them, we find Bonhoeffer’s speculations on what “religionless Christianity” would look like, as well as his poems, the most famous being “Who am I?”

    I found this book particularly interesting after having the background filled in by the Metaxas biography. I was already familiar with most of the names mentioned in the letters. If anything, the tragic end of Bonhoeffer’s life was made even more poignant in this book than in the biography. In the biography, how Bonhoeffer’s death came about was reconstructed. This book, however, ends with three letters from Bonhoeffer’s parents which were never answered. In fact, they did not find out that he had been killed until three months afterward.

    2. Just How Married Do You Want to Be? by Jim and Sarah Sumner. This is a marriage book that I read out loud to my wife over several months. It is unique among marriage books mostly because of the couple who wrote it: she has a PhD in theology from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, and he is a former stripper who was only a Christian for a few years when they met. They have had a lot of struggles in learning how to relate to one another, and they share what they have learned in this book. It is well worth reading because of her insights into biblical passages that deal with marriage, as well as their honesty about their struggles and the wisdom they have gleaned from working out their differences in community with others.

    3. Mind Your Own Mortgage by Robert Bernabe. Reviewed earlier here.

    4. Peace Like a River by Leif Enger. I’d been hearing good things about this novel for a long time, and I finally picked it up for $1 at a library book sale this spring. I usually don’t read many recently published novels, but the buzz about this one was so consistent that I decided to give it a read.

    I was not disappointed. It is told from the perspective of an 11-year-old boy who lives in rural Minnesota with his father, an older brother and a younger sister. The father is a devout Christian man who works miracles at times, the older brother (Davy) is a 16-year-old who is strikingly independent and behaves like an adult, the narrator struggles with asthma, and the younger sister is a poet with an active imagination and an obsession with the Old West. The story is set in the early ’60s.

    It is a literary novel, with rich (but not too florid) prose – and a plot(!) which mainly involves revenge (on the part of Davy) and love and forgiveness (exhibited by the father, and learned throughout the book by the narrator). Because of the miraculous elements, some might be tempted to label this a magic realist novel. However, in Christianity (and in the book), miracles are not magical, nor can they be manipulated. They are sheer gift, and part of the narrator’s journey is learning how to notice and accept them.

  • May 2010: Books Read

    1. Colossians Remixed: Subverting the Empire by Sylvia Keesmaat and Brian Walsh. This is an unusual book. It is about the letter of Paul to the Colossians, but it is not a commentary in the usual sense of the word. In fact, the authors in the Preface call it an “anti-commentary.” Rather than digging into the technical details that commentaries usually deal with, their main goal is to read Colossians in such a way as to make it relevant to our current postmodern and globalized context.

    I really enjoyed this book. It is creative, and it did a lot to convince me that Colossians can in fact address contemporary concerns. I’m always skittish when the word “empire” gets thrown around, though. To their credit, at least Walsh and Keesmaat specify what they are talking about when they use the word. Empires, for them, are “(1) built on systemic centralizations of power, (2) secured by structures of socioeconomic and military control, (3) religiously legitimated by powerful myths, and (4) sustained by a proliferation of imperial images that captivate the imaginations of the population” (58). In parts of the book, it seems that when Walsh and Keesmaat talk about empire, they are talking about globalization. In other parts (like on pages 62 and 187), they attach the word to the United States. I think that the United States can be empire-ish in some of the things that it does, but making a one-to-one correlation between the United States and ancient empires is overstating the case. It’s bombastic, but ultimately unhelpful, in my opinion.

    That is my main gripe about the book. Aside from that, I think this is a creative book that challenges Christians to think of ways to live more faithfully (if less comfortably) in our present context. For that, Walsh and Keesmaat should be commended.

    2. Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy by Eric Metaxas. Reviewed earlier here.

  • Book Review: Mind Your Own Mortgage

    Mind Your Own Mortgage is a tract for the times. It was written in light of the recent financial meltdown, and seeks to get the U.S. economy in better shape by encouraging people to get their home economies in better shape.

    The book comes in three main sections: Get a Grip on It (your mortgage), Shop for It and Manage It. The first section gives the lay of the land, talking about how the mortgage market works and how so many people have managed to ruin their finances. The second section is all about the mortgage shopping process, and encourages you to select a mortgage using the Mind Your Own Mortgage shopping system which uses forms from an accompanying Web site (be warned: full access to the Web site requires a paid membership). The third section talks about how to pay down a mortgage efficiently and when to refinance.

    I am relatively young and have never owned a home, so this book was eye-opening for me. It taught me more about the mortgage business than I had ever known before. My head was spinning at points because of all the new information, especially while reading the second section. At the end of the book, I took away a few main principles, which Bernabe mentioned so frequently that I wasn’t allowed to forget: get a fixed-rate mortgage, not an adjustable-rate one. Shopping for a mortgage is about price (rate, points and fees), not about monthly payment. Don’t give in to the culture of consumption, but prioritize your spending so as to leave room for what’s important: relationships.

    Some of the details discussed in this book may well be out of date in a few years, but it seems to me that the principles Bernabe emphasizes will stand the test of time. I’d recommend this book to anyone looking to buy a home, especially if they feel intimidated by the mortgage business or that they are living beyond their means.

  • Stuff Christians Like

    Mary and I went to Lake Chelan over Memorial Day weekend, and on the drive we listened to the audiobook of Stuff Christians Like by Jonathan Acuff. It is a book spun off of the Web site of the same name, which in turn is a Christian version of Stuff White People Like, a Web site (and book) by Christian Lander. I first heard about the Web site almost two years ago from my friend Tony, who told me about #124: The kid that makes out with girls from other youth groups. When I saw that the book was a free download from christianaudio.com (sadly, this has now expired, though they have a new free download each month), I got it right away.

    Mary and I both loved it. For one thing, this is what an audiobook ought to be: it is read by the author, and includes explanatory (and often humorous) asides that are not included in the print version. Acuff is a pastor’s kid/copywriter who lives in Atlanta and understands the North American evangelical subculture. For example, he understands how ironic it is that one thing that Christians like – making their own version of something that is popular in wider culture – is the very thing that he is doing.

    Wander over to the site and check it out. If you are taking a road trip with me in the future, we can listen to the book. Otherwise, you can buy the audiobook or print version (which I’m told has neat diagrams).

    Before I go, I wanted to direct you to one of my favorites: #269: Understanding how metrosexual your worship leader is (a handy guide).

  • April 2010: Books Read

    1. The Hole in Our Gospel: What Does God Expect of Us? by Richard Stearns. April was a busy month for me, with starting a new full-time job as well as continuing with my internship obligations at church. That’s why the only book I finished this month was The Hole in Our Gospel by the president of World Vision US, Rich Stearns (Here is an interview with him in Christianity Today).

    This was a challenging book for me. Not because it was hard to read, but because it was hard to not become numb to the many statistics that Stearns cited, showing just how poor so many people are. The “hole” of the title is that many Christians in the United States have decided that the gospel is nothing more than a transaction, in which God forgives them of their sins and they get to go to heaven when they die. The real gospel is not less than this, but it is so much more, according to Stearns. One thing in particular that it involves (and which is the focus of this book) is serving the poor in a self-sacrificial way. The most compelling part of this book, for me, was Stearns telling his own story of how he went from being the president of Lenox, a fine tableware company, to being the president of World Vision. His story of how God grabbed him and drove him to care more about the poor gave me hope that God can grab more Christians and show them their obligation to assist those in need.

    I don’t know whether this book will change the American church or not. We can pat ourselves on the back for being generous, but in fact the percentage that so many of us give is far below the level of sacrificial giving that we read about in the Bible (specifically in 2 Corinthians 8-9). I hear a lot of complaining these days about how the government is taxing too much, and I wonder sometimes if we aren’t being judged for doing little with our money besides feathering our own nests. I hear people say that Jesus said “The poor you will always have with you” (Mark 14:7), thinking that this excuses them for being selfish. Far from letting people off the hook, though, Jesus was alluding to Deuteronomy 15:11: “Since there will never cease to be some in need on the earth, I therefore command you, ‘Open your hand to the poor and needy neighbor in your land.’”

    You will always have the poor among you. Therefore, open your hand. Not out of guilt (and despite the ranting of the previous paragraph, I really don’t think that trying to induce guilt is the best way to get people to be generous), but because God has blessed you.

  • Book Review of Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy


    Eric Metaxas, who is already familiar to aficionados of Christian biography through Amazing Grace, his biography of William Wilberforce, has written a fast-paced and informative portrait of Bonhoeffer, the German pastor and theologian who resisted the Nazis even unto his death in a concentration camp in April 1945. This book, while not nearly as long as Eberhard Bethge’s 1000-plus page authoritative biography, is still a substantial 542 pages, not including endnotes.

    While Metaxas relies heavily on Bonhoeffer’s own words to tell his story, one way in which he keeps the pace fast is that he does not enter into a detailed discussion of Bonhoeffer’s written work, which one can get elsewhere. It seems that Metaxas is far more interested in showing the real-life consequences of Bonhoeffer’s theology, instead of giving a lengthy exposition of it.

    This is a wonderful book, and a real page-turner, but there were a few problems that might have gone away with more vigilant editing. For example, it mentions that Bonhoeffer’s brother Karl-Friedrich studied with Alfred Einstein and Max Planck in the 1920s. Karl-Friedrich was a physical chemist. Alfred Einstein was a musicologist. I can only assume that Metaxas meant Albert, the more famous Einstein? Also, there is a quote from Matthew 10 that says it is from the Sermon on the Mount – but Matthew 10, while part of Jesus’ teaching, is not part of the Sermon on the Mount. These are minor errors, and didn’t seriously impede my enjoyment of the book.

    This book will not replace Bethge’s biography; after all, it is hard to get closer to Bonhoeffer than his best friend. But what Metaxas does is introduce Bonhoeffer to a new generation that will greatly benefit from knowing that such a man existed – a man who was obedient to God (not merely to a set of principles), even when that obedience brought him into deadly conflict with his church and his country.

  • March 2010: Books Read

    1. Pudd’nhead Wilson by Mark Twain. I’m a big fan of Mark Twain. As a fan of Twain’s, I have already read his most well-known works, like Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. I have also read Roughing It, Life on the MIssissippi and an awful lot of his essays. It was about time, then, that I got around to reading Puddn’head Wilson.

    It was not bad, but clearly there is a reason why this is not among his most-read stuff. It is about two children who were switched as infants, with one being raised as the scion of a wealthy family and the other being raised as a slave. The plot was interesting enough, but for a “mystery,” the ending was not at all surprising. The characters were not as compelling as in some of his better work. And this book was written in the 1890s, when Twain was becoming more and more of a cynic – as can easily be seen in the epigraphs at the beginning of every chapter. Though he was still talented, his later work is, with some exceptions, just not as entertaining to read.

    2. Jane Austen (Christian Encounters Series) by Peter Leithart. Reviewed earlier here.

    3. Being Consumed: Economics and Christian Desire by William T. Cavanaugh. This is an excellent, short work on the interaction between Christianity and economics. It is made up of four essays, and is only 103 pages long. Cavanaugh is Catholic, and draws mainly on Catholic theologians, but his theology is not so distinctly Catholic that other Christians can’t benefit from his insights.

    Cavanaugh critiques the definition of economic freedom as only “freedom from” and proposes instead that economic freedom ought to be “freedom for” participation in community and realizing our humanity more fully. He also critiques consumerism, globalization and the economics of scarcity. It is simultaneously a quick read and a dense read, and unfortunately I read it over a month ago and can’t describe its arguments with the nuance they deserve. It is a book well worth picking up, though.

    4. The Glory of Preaching: Participating in God’s Transformation of the World by Darrell W. Johnson. I studied preaching under Johnson at Regent College, so it was no surprise that I found much to agree with in this book. He honed the material for this book in his preaching classes, so a lot of it was not new.

    What is unusual about this book, as over against most other books about preaching, is Johnson’s confidence in the biblical text. That is not to say that other books on preaching are not confident in the Bible to change people’s lives. It is unusual, though, for a writer to say, as Johnson does, that when the living God speaks, something ALWAYS happens. Another unique thing about this book is that Johnson thinks preachers are not responsible for applying the text to people’s lives. I remember, when I was in preaching class, that some students pushed back on this. Johnson was adamant, though. Preachers can imply what the text means – they can state the truth that the text leads us to. But applying – that is, telling people what particular things they ought to do – is the job of the Holy Spirit.

    This is a wonderful book, and one that I will return to over the years.

    5. The Cross of Christ by John R. W. Stott. I decided that during Lent this year, in addition to fasting from something, I would read something that led me to focus on Jesus. I’ve had this book on my shelf since my time at Regent, and it is as good a book as any to accomplish that goal.

    There isn’t a lot that I could say about this book, aside from saying that it is a classic work on what Jesus’ death meant and means. If you are interested in learning more about what Jesus’ death accomplished, this is the first place to turn.

  • Book Review: Jane Austen by Peter Leithart

    I have never read a Jane Austen book. I love to read, and I’m sure I would enjoy her novels, but I have just never gotten around to it – though she is one of my wife’s favorite authors.

    So when I had the chance to read a short biography of her, I jumped at the chance. I saw it as a way to “prime the pump,” as it were. This book by Peter Leithart, in the Christian Encounters series from Thomas Nelson, did not disappoint. Though Austen did not live an outwardly eventful life, Leithart does a good job of mining her correspondence and the reminiscences of friends and family members to paint a picture of a woman who had a gift for observation and storytelling, a strong sense of humor with a satirical bent, and a sincere (though reserved) Anglican faith. I especially appreciated Leithart’s pointing out that Austen intended for her works to be instructive without being overtly moralistic. Throughout the book, and especially in the first chapter, the reader can get bogged down trying to keep straight the names of many of Austen’s relations and friends. However, the publisher has taken pity on the hapless reader by including an appendix of names in the back.

    In all, this book made me more interested in reading Austen, so that I can more fully understand the fascination that she has exerted over readers for two centuries.

    (Thanks to Thomas Nelson for a review copy.)

  • February 2010: Books Read

    1. East of Eden by John Steinbeck. I’ve heard from various places (not least the cover of the edition I read) that this is Steinbeck’s masterpiece, and it was certainly a very good book. It’s an epic story that follows the Trask and Hamilton families through three generations, from the Civil War to World War I. It could even be termed a semi-autobiographical novel, since Steinbeck’s mother is from the Hamilton family and young John himself makes a cameo appearance in the book.

    What stuck out the most to me about the novel were the descriptions of the Salinas Valley in California, and the relationship between Adam and Cathy Trask. It is clear that Steinbeck loved the Salinas Valley and sought to convey that love in writing this book. Cathy is one of the more monstrous villains I have encountered in any novel I have read, and Steinbeck describes her (and Adam’s love for her) in a riveting way. There are many rambling asides in the book which slow down the pace of the narrative, but that comes with the territory in an epic. They were never so distracting that I skipped through them or wanted to put down the book.

    2. The Liturgical Year by Joan Chittister. Reviewed earlier here.

    3. Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH by Robert C. O’Brien. This is one of my wife’s favorite books from her childhood. After we watched the animated movie version of this book (The Secret of NIMH), she insisted that I read it because it is so much better.

    And it is. It is the story of Mrs. Frisby, a widowed mouse and mother of four children, who needs to move her family out of a farmer’s garden. She is unable to do that, however, because of her youngest son’s pneumonia. She eventually enlists help from the mysterious, super-intelligent rats who live under a nearby rosebush. In doing so, she finds out the story of how they came to be who and where they are. She also finds out that they are planning on moving to a remote valley to being a civilization of their own. They help her move her house, and she helps them in important ways as well.

    This is an entertaining children’s book (I particularly enjoyed reading the story of how the rats came to be), and it is also a tract for the “back to the land” movement of the ’60s and ’70s. The rats feel that depending on a farmer for electricity, or continuing to use tools they find, is dishonorable. A few rats disagree and leave, but these rats are cast in a negative light in the book. The noblest ones (O’Brien strongly hints in the narrative) are the ones who want to set out on their own, start afresh, raise their own crops, construct their own homes.

    3. Slaves, Women and Homosexuals: Exploring the Hermeneutics of Cultural Analysis by William J. Webb. I heard about this book during my first semester at Regent in 2004, but never got around to reading it because it wasn’t required for any class. Now that I’m finished with school, I finally got around to picking it up, and I’m glad I did.

    This book deals with hermeneutics, which is the discipline of determining how to interpret the Bible. Webb’s argument is that when it comes to slavery and patriarchy in the Bible, there is a “redemptive movement” at work. That is, the Bible never explicitly condemns either, but the broad ethical strokes, especially in the New Testament, lead inevitably to the abolishing of both. The Christian church has collectively decided that slavery is in fact against biblical teaching, and Webb argues that the same conclusion should be reached regarding patriarchy.

    Webb contrasts slavery and patriarchy with homosexuality, on which he argues there is no redemptive movement. It is condemned from start to finish, and so those who attempt to make a biblical case for homosexuality are using a faulty hermeneutic.

    A lot more could be said about this book. It is probable that no one will agree with everything Webb says, simply because of the sheer number of arguments that he advances. I also should point out that this is not an easy read, as the arguments can get technical in places. But it is a rewarding book, and one that I recommend to anyone who wants to put in the effort to learn more about hermeneutics.

    4. When the Game is Over, It All Goes Back in the Box by John Ortberg. Ortberg is pastor at Menlo Park Presbyterian Church in CA. I have listened to a few of his sermon podcasts, and I heard him speak in person at the Covenant Midwinter Conference in Denver this year, but this is the first of his books that I have read. I read this book in particular because my church is doing a video series based on this book together during Lent.

    Ortberg uses games as a launching point for talking about materialism and mortality. The object of the game of life is to be rich toward God, and Ortberg makes this point winsomely, using stories and humor. I like his writing style, and this is a popular-level book on the Christian life that I would readily recommend to others.

    5. Incarnate Leadership: 5 Leadership Lessons from the Life of Jesus by Bill Robinson. My first response to the title of this book was a snarky comment: “Incarnate leadership – as opposed to the other kind?” As I read it, though, it began to grow on me. Robinson is the president of Whitworth University in Spokane, WA, and he has an informal, engaging style of writing. He bases this short book on Jesus’ example of leadership, in particular John 1:14: “The Word became flesh, and made his dwelling among us.”

    The five leadership lessons from the title are Minding the Gap (closing the chasm between the positions we occupy and the needs of those we lead), Leading Openly, Bending the Light (remembering that leadership is not about us, but that we need to be mirrors reflecting God’s glory), Living in Grace and Truth (understanding the need for, and the time for, both) and Sacrificing. This was a short book, but a challenging book on how to lead like Jesus.