by Eugene Peterson
published in 1983 and in 2009 by Intervartisty Press
Summary: Eugene Peterson, the translator of The Message, has been writing books for decades and this is a reprint of a classic of his on its 25th anniversary. Peterson has a driving theme in many of his books, if not most, of how we need to slow down on all of frenetic doing to spend some time just being with God to give Him time to transform us. This book captures that very idea. Using the story of Jeremiah the prophet Eugene paints a picture of how we can live our life to the fullest for God. Long before The Purpose Driven Life or Your Best Life Now Peterson was deliberately using scripture to paint a picture for us of how we can live for God. The title is derived from God's chastisement of Jeremiah when he is complaining that he is tired of dealing with men. God tells him that if you can't run a footrace with men, how then do you expect to run with horses? If you get worn out by the little stuff, then how do you ever expect to do the big stuff for me? That is the drive of the book, how to live in a way to prepare ourselves to be able to run with the horses when God calls us to exactly that.
Review: This is classic Peterson. It richly and properly uses the narrative of scripture to inform us as to how we should live our lives. Using Jeremiah as our example he writes in a manner which makes theology practical. He makes strong observations from the text of both Jeremiah and Lamentations that he then communicates in a way that is not only eash for us to understand but also for us to apply to our lives. Peterson is a reader, a writer, an artist and a poet and all of those influences work together to create a book that is a wonderful, inspiring read.
Reading Reccomendation: YES, whether it is the orignal copy or the reprint. One thing to note with the reprint is that he has chosen to use The Message for all of his scripture quotations, which makes it even easier to read.
No comments:
Post a Comment