Let me tell you about an excellent book I have just finished reading.
The Jesus Manifesto by Leonard Sweet and Frank Viola is a great primer on the supremacy and sovereignty of Christ. Frank sent me a copy a few weeks ago and I read it through quite quickly and enthusiastically. It used to be people had a difficult time seeing the humanity of Christ, but it's just the opposite today--even among those who consider themselves "religious." The average person has lost sight of the deity of Jesus and the incredible implications of not hearing and obeying Him. Jesus is the ultimate expression of divine truth, the incarnate God Himself, and
The Jesus Manifesto reminds us that our belief in the person of Christ is what true Christianity is all about.
For just a short time the book can be purchased at a 45% discount on
Amazon.com. Currently the book is #6 in terms of sales out of the 7 million advertized on Amazon. The book lends itself for small group discussion, both among new Christians and established believers. With a very readable style, and a content worthy of multiple rereads, it is a can't miss for your library.
6 comments:
Read back through several church worship bulletins. The name of the Owner of the church seldom appears there, it seems.
Hmmm. The "average person" outside of the church, perhaps, but in my limited exposure to the PCA, recognition of the deity of Jesus and the concept of obeying him are alive and well.
His humanity, however, in terms of his setting the example for all humans to follow, seems missing. Worship him, yes. He's born, he's on the cross, he's resurrected...What? You mean something happened between the time he was born and when he was placed on the cross? I find we talk hardly at all about the life Jesus lived while he was on Earth: the example he set for us.
I imagine that this is in part because it would be a little awkward to teach him as the example for all of us and to continue teaching gender roles as divinely mandated...
Hello Chai,
I am wondering how any extremist fundamentalist Christian can possibly treat people as badly as they do. The only thing I can see that gives them an idea that they are 'justified' is that they claim that right by certain isolated Bible verses out of context in St. Paul's letters,
AND by saying that Christ did NOT actually mean what He said in the Gospels.
The CONTRAST between Lord Christ's example and the example of a mean-spirited, hate-filled 'christian' fundamentalist is SO GREAT that I have to assume that these fundamentalists have some deep-seated problems that interferes with any sort of compassionate discernment of the teachings of Christ.
"It certainly has captured the attention of disparate groups of people."
Deception always does especially when it is disguised as the truth.
"I have to take serious issue with the theology of this book. In the introduction Sweet and Viola say:
The historic Christian creeds are an expression of the need to answer Jesus’ “Who do you say I am?” question. But that “you say” is contextual. Each new generation, in every culture, is given a “you say.”
This is just a flat out lie. When Jesus asked the “Who do you say I am?” question, the answer given by Peter was NOT contextual, it was eternal. Said Peter, “You are the Christ the Son of living God.” Jesus praised Peter and told him that answer was revealed to him by the Father. Then Jesus said, “on this rock I will build my church.” Jesus’ church is built on the eternal truth that Jesus is the Christ the son of the living God.
Who Jesus is, is not contextually determined by any culture or community. The creeds themselves confess eternal and transcendent truths about Christ NOT contextualized truths that were true for the cultures of the 4th and 5th centuries. This is a SERIOUS and Dangerous false teaching on the part of Sweet and Viola." - Chris Rosebrough
What exactly, then, is “heresy?” Irenaeus states, “Error, indeed, is never set forth in its naked deformity, lest, being thus exposed, it should at once be detected. But it is craftily decked out in an attractive dress, so as, by its outward form, to make it appear to the inexperienced (ridiculous as the expression may seem) more true than truth itself.” - The Devil's Merchandise Heresy in the Church
I hope this helps the unwary.
Wade,
to write a book with the title; "Jesus Manifesto: Restoring the Supremacy and Sovereignty of Jesus Christ," tells me something is drastically wrong, not only with the book but with the authors that put it together. I have read enough reviews now as well to put me off that book forever. Those men did a whole public relations exercise before the book even went on sale to get heaps of folks on their side, using lots of flattery, sales gimmicks, so on and so forth and they have deluded many, including unsuspecting, undiscerning "reformed" Christians. The whole thing went viral, I think that was planned on purpose.
The LORD Jesus Christ, "I AM," God, Yahweh, does NOT need his SUPREMACY and SOVEREIGNTY restored because He has "NEVER EVER" lost it. In the past, in the present or in the future, Jesus Christ always reigns supreme and sovereign, in and through HIS Church and in all of HIS creation.
To even suggest that the LORD Jesus Christ's "Supremacy and Sovereignty" needs "RESTORING" is sinful. The two men that wrote that book need to repent, renounce what they have written, retract it and pay back the money to all the people that spent their hard earned money on buying it. They then need to take same serious time aside, months, years maybe, and study, study, study and even more study of SOUND doctrine instead of the "emergent mysticism" they are fostering upon unsuspecting Christians.
Review: “Jesus Manifesto”
by Mike Duran
This man writes far mote graciously than me, I hope you can hear what he has to say.
Wade,
did I give you these two reviews:
Believing in a “Third Way” Between the Religious Right and Left Is like Believing TV Wrestling is Real
Review: “Jesus Manifesto”
by Mike Duran
I think they are very important and Chris Rosebroughs' review of the book will be on going.
Post a Comment