Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A must read for all emerging church leaders, 13 Oct 2006
This is perhaps the most original and philosophical of books to come out of the `emerging church' in the last few years. Brian McLaren arguably the Father figure of the movement writing about it states:
`Reading it did good for my mind and for my soul. It helped me understand my own spiritual journey more clearly, and gave me a context for the work I'm involved with. In fact,I would say this is one of the two or three most rewarding books on theology I have read in ten years.'
Dr Rollins' `How (not) to Speak of God' certainly challenges those who read scripture with a `modern' mindset. This he does with both compassion and understanding having been previously an evangelist with a charismatic church for some years.
His original stories and parables, as well as his playing around with words adds to its charm. Nevertheless this is not a light read and is well worth rereading at least once.
The second part of the book entitled `Towards orthopraxis: Bringing theory to the church' consists of a series of services that were held by the `Church' Ikon that he founded some years back. Again these will challenge our preconceived ideas of God ,the Church and the world and hopefully cause us to reflect and become at least a little more humble when it comes to our belief that we hold the Truth and nothing but the Truth.This book I recommend for everyone involved in the `Emerging Church' Conversation and for those who wish to understand the philosophy behind it.
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16 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
a new poet/prophet is born, 27 May 2006
this is an important and beautiful book. we are living in a fractured time. we do not yet know what we are let alone where we are going other than (in rollins' words) "away-from-here." we are defined by what we are not (postmodern) and by the fact that we are moving, or emerging, but not yet by what we are or by any final destination. it's easy to lose hope in this generation. all the enlightenment promises of certainty, provability and universal Truth now look jaded in the cold and often terrifying light of postmodern philosophical thought.
if you've heard rollins speak you'll know how passionate he is about these issues. if you have heard him on more than one occasion, then to be honest there will be little new here for you. but that is a long way from saying that the book is not worth buying and reading. i read my copy in one sitting and will no doubt return to it again and again. as i do with every book i read this with a pen and a yellow highlighter in hand so as to be able to remember the important bits and note where i disagreed or was provoked to think about something. it's now with some sense of dismay that i flick through a book where practically every page has a radioactive glow to it!
one of rollins' chief gifts is in analogy and parable. how sad it is that jesus' parables no longer take our breath away. truly great parables always have the audience nodding their heads as the story starts, thinking they know the ending right from the get-go only to be slapped in the face and completely offended by the shocking twist-in-the-tale. rollins stories are clever, poignant, offensive and often very moving. this is not a book of dull theology. this is a book of poetry.
rollins' concern is that people often ask him what he believes but never how he believes. in his view belief should always be transformative
"the reversal from `right belief' to `believing in the right way' is in no way a move to some binary opposite of the first (for the opposite of right belief is simply wrong belief); rather, it is a way of transcending the binary altogether. thus orthodoxy is no longer (mis)understood as the opposite of heresy but rather is understood as a term that signals a way of being in the world rather than a means of believing things about the world... it is an approach which emphasises the priority of love: not as something which stands opposed to the knowledge of god, but, more radically still, as knowledge of god... orthodoxy, as believing in the right way, as bringing love to the world around us and within us ... that will cost us everything. for to live by that sword, as we all know, is to die by it." (pg 3.)
if you find yourself agreeing with everything rollins says here, he'd probably say himself that you're not reading carefully enough. this is a book to rock our comfortable boat, to provoke thought, to engage and begin a conversation with the reader. don't read this if your theology is rock-solid and water-tight, this book will either shatter that faith completely or make you want to crucify the author as a heretic!
i guess my only criticism of this book is that it's left me hungry for more. i wish it had been two books rather than one. the first half of the book is the argument/discussion/theory; the second a series of ten liturgies, used by the ikon community in belfast to attempt to outwork the implications of living for christ today. liturgy needs to be experienced/said/shared to be truly effective. i want more of the thought-provoking insight contained in the first half. roll on book number two.
i'm concerned that this review doesn't do justice to the book. rollins is a much better communicator than i am. his words are much more poetic than mine. if i've made it sound dull, philosophical and high-brow i've misled you. if you think this is another book of wishy-washy new-age theology again that's probably my fault, for nothing could be further from the truth. read this book and if you ever get the opportunity, go and listen to this humble pilgrim. it sounds like i'm on his payroll. to be honest i struggle with much of rollin's insight and thought. as paul tillich points out, "most human beings of course are not able to stand the message of the shaking of the foundations. they reject and attack the prophetic minds, not because they really disagree with them, but because they sense the truth of their words and cannot receive it." i may disagree with his thinking at times (though I fear he is right more than i like to admit) but his commitment to and love for god are never in question. this book is a call to love god and love people.
sit up church. the voice of one calling "in the desert prepare the way of the lord." there is a transformative message here for those who have ears to hear.
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6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
a thought provoking contribution, 24 Oct 2006
Here's an interesting book. Rollins is a philosophy lecturer and founder of the experimental worship community Ikon in Belfast, and this reads like a manual for doing theology in a postmodern world, although I don't think Rollins uses that term anywhere. It may be the first Christian book I've read that takes a postmodern context as given, which is refreshing.
Rollins is concerned with finding ways of presenting God within and through a climate of relativism and deconstructionism, rather than fighting it. He explores how we have considered orthodoxy to be right beliefs, rather than believing rightly. He talks about God as being subjective, not objective, and raises any number of other issues and paradoxes of faith that the church has traditionally been uncomfortable with, but that the emerging church welcomes and celebrates.
However, as with so many of these books, the practical outworking seems incomplete. The second half of the book is ten descriptions of services at Ikon, which are meant to demonstrate the theology in action. Intriguing perhaps, and highly creative, but I found this bit less useful, mainly because I can't imagine the model being useful outside of Ikon. Rollins also seems to be courting controversy a little on issues that the book isn't really about, and it seems a shame to forfeit the real debate by losing readers over details (See Steve Chalke and the `cosmic child abuse' debacle). I'd have valued some real discussion on the practical elements instead, which in my mind makes this a thought-provoking contribution, rather than a milestone, in this important debate.
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