Book Reviews

When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor . . . and Yourself

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When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor . . . and Yourself Summary: A very helpful book, when used rightly.

When Helping Hurts is a book that has really changed the way that many have looked at Christian social ministry and short term missions. But I have been reluctant to read it. Not because I thought it would be a bad book but because I feared how it misused. However, since christianaudio has it as the free book for February 2014, I thought it would be a good time to read and review it.

First a bit of background on me and how I am reading it. I have a Masters in Social Service Administration (like an MSW, but administratively focused.) I have been a consultant for small church based non-profits since 1997. Initially working for a denominational office, I spun off my work into an independent organization when the denominational office ran out of funding for my position.  My wife was also a short term volunteer coordinator for almost a year before we were married at the same denominational office.

So I do not come at this book ignorant of how Christians have approached social ministry or short term missions nor the current best practices for Christian ministry. I can tell you that this book (and several similar like Toxic Charity by Robert Lupton) have made a difference. Many funders and staff at non-profits have read these and really want to focus on doing the best work for the kingdom of Christ.

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Navigating the Interior Life: Spiritual Direction and the Journey to God by Daniel Burke

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Navigating the Interior Life: Spiritual Direction and the Journey to GodSummary: A Catholic understanding of the role of spiritual direction.

One of the most important reasons to regularly read outside your stream of Christianity is that the same words or concepts are treated differently because of the experience of the different stream of faith.  That difference can often spark new understanding, or at least fresh perspective on your own stream.

So I have read several books about spiritual direction, but none previous to this from a particularly Catholic perspective.  Regular readers of this blog may know that I started seeing a spiritual director early last fall.  I am still trying to work through my role in (and the full purpose of) spiritual direction.

Because this book is written particularly to Catholics (as opposed to for Christians but by a Catholic) there are some differences in perspective (no Protestant book on spiritual direction would include a section on Mary as the exemplary pathway to Jesus).  But overwhelmingly this book is helpful to both Protestant and Catholics that are interested in spiritual direction if you read it generously.

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Cronkite by Douglas Brinkley

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Cronkite by Douglas BrinkleySummary: A mediocre biography of a formative figure in the history of journalism.

I have been keeping my New Year’s resolution of not buying more than one book a month to try and whittle down my list of books that I have already purchased but not read.  But I have also been working through library audiobooks that I have had on my radar but had not listened to yet.

The first problem with Cronkite is that it is an abridged audiobook.  Had I realized that, I would have probably not checked it out in the first place.  It felt like an abridgement long before I realized that it was.

Also it felt like a repetition of events more than an insightful biography.  Maybe this is about a bad abridgement, but I did not feel like I really understood Cronkite, although I heard a lot about him.  It also felt like a quote fest.  I am not opposed to accurately quoting sources.  But too often the quotes feel forced into the content and not naturally supporting the flow of the book.

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The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate by John Walton

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The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate

Takeaway: Professional biblical scholars bring important understanding to texts. We need to spend more time being taught, not just by pastors, but by the academic theologians and biblical scholars throughout the church.

Over the past year I have been increasingly convinced (and convicted) that the church needs to take scripture seriously.  Not just reading it or finding biblical principles to live by, but seriously studying scripture and allowing scripture to change us.

I have been hearing about the Lost World of Genesis One for a while, but only started reading it as part of a book discussion.  John Walton, a formerly at Moody Bible Institute and currently an Old Testament professor at Wheaton College, makes a clearly presented case that the first chapter of Genesis is not about the material creation of the earth, but a functional creation of the earth as his temple.

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Through the Door by Jodi McIsaac

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Reposting this review from last summer because Through the Door and the sequel Into the Fire are on sale for $1.99 (audiobooks are only $0.99 with purchase of the kindle book) as part of the Kindle Daily Deal for Feb 16th only.  The third book in the series is available as a pre-order for only $4.99.

Through the Door (The Thin Veil)Summary: Modern fantasy using Celtic lore as a basis for the storyline.

Book discovery is the biggest problems for authors in a world that has an over abundance of free or cheap ebooks. No reader has to ever pay for a book again if they choose. Every day there are literally hundreds of free books available through Amazon or other ebook providers. This is in addition to the thousands of public domain books and library books available.

This is why being chosen for Amazon’s Kindle Daily Deals is so important. Almost every Kindle Daily Deal book breaks into the top 100 for at least the day of the deal and often for several days after.

I rarely buy books from the Kindle Daily Deals, not because they are not great deals but because I have have hundreds of books already purchased and unread already on my kindle.

But for some reason I picked up Through the Door when it was a Kindle Daily Deals and also picked up the accompanying audiobook (so kindle book and audiobook were $3.98 total).

Through the Door is another modern fantasy using the Irish fairy tales as the jumping off point. Neil Gaiman, Rick Riordan, Michael Scott, Orson Scott Card and many other authors have already used the ancient stories to mine ideas for new books. While the ideas are not completely original, the execution is pretty good.

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