{"id":11121,"date":"2017-11-15T18:03:38","date_gmt":"2017-11-15T23:03:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/?p=11121"},"modified":"2017-11-15T18:03:38","modified_gmt":"2017-11-15T23:03:38","slug":"book-review-the-good-news-we-almost-forgot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/?p=11121","title":{"rendered":"Book Review: The Good News We Almost Forgot"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The Good News We Almost Forgot<\/em><\/a> by Kevin DeYoung is an awesome look at the Heidelberg Catechism from the 16th century.\u00a0 I’m grateful for the opportunity to dig into God’s word and really wrestle with my own theology.\u00a0 I think this is a valuable exercise on a regular basis to keep my heart and mind focused on the main thing.\u00a0 Our culture is full of noise and shifting tides, but the gospel remains our steady anchor.\u00a0 If you are up for it, grab a copy of this book and engage the questions…really wrestle with them and ask the Lord to speak to your heart on these major issues.<\/p>\n

I highlighted several things while reading and have posted my notes below…<\/p>\n

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  • The only thing more difficult than finding the truth is not losing it. \u00a0What starts out as new and precious becomes plain and old. \u00a0What begins a thrilling discovery becomes a rote exercise. \u00a0What provokes one generation to sacrifice and passion becomes in the next generation a cause for rebellion and apathy. \u00a0Why is it that denominations and church movements almost always drift from their theological moorings? \u00a0Why is it that people who grew up in the church are often less articulate about their faith than the new Christian who converted at forty-five? Why is it that those who grow up with creeds and confessions are usually the ones who hate them most? p. 13<\/li>\n
  • The gospel summarized in the Heidelberg Catechism is glorious, its Christ gracious, its comfort rich, its Spirit strong, its God sovereign, and its truth timeless. \u00a0You can meet Christ here, if you will simply come and see. \u00a0p. 18<\/li>\n
  • Question 1 of the Catechism shapes our whole existence. \u00a0The first thing we need to know as a Christian is the we belong to Jesus and not ourselves. p. 22<\/li>\n
  • Belonging to Jesus and not ourselves means knowing three things: guilt, grace, and gratitude. \u00a0The rest of the Catechism will follow this threefold outline. \u00a0First, we understand our sin. \u00a0Then we understand salvation. \u00a0And finally we understand how we are sanctified to serve. p. 23<\/li>\n
  • The first thing we need in order to experience the comfort of the gospel is to be made uncomfortable with our sin. p. 25<\/li>\n
  • Divine love without divine wrath is meaningless. \u00a0When we minimize God\u2019s justice, we do not exalt His mercy, we undermine it. \u00a0God\u2019s mercy exhibits its full power and sweetness when we see it not merely as a general goodwill to all people, but as the means by which God\u2019s people are rescued, in Christ, from their just wrath and condemnation. p. 35<\/li>\n
  • There is nothing more important in Christian theology than our theology of the cross. \u00a0We must speak clearly the the heart of the gospel is the good news of divine self-satisfaction through divine self-substitution. \u00a0Never compromise on the cross. \u00a0Never dilute the message of the cross. \u00a0And never stop glorying in the cross where Christ accepted the penalties that should belong to us so that we can claim the blessings that would otherwise belong only to Him. p. 43<\/li>\n
  • Question 27: What do you understand by the providence of God? \u00a0Providence is the almighty and ever present power of God by which He upholds, as with His hand, heaven and earth and all creatures, and so rules them that leaf and blade, rain and drought, fruitful and lean years, food and drink, health and sickness, prosperity and poverty\u2014all things, in fact, come to us not by chance but from his fatherly hand. p. 58<\/li>\n
  • If we truly believe in providence, we will view success and prosperity not as products of good upbringing, good looks, or good intelligence but ultimately as the unmerited favor of a good God. p. 61<\/li>\n
  • The work of Christ and the life of a Christian can be summed up in three words: prophet, priest, and king. p. 69<\/li>\n
  • The Sonship of Jesus Christ, then, is different from ours in that we became children of God, whereas Jesus Christ has always been God\u2019s Son. p. 71<\/li>\n
  • The resurrection means the death of Jesus was enough\u2014enough to atone for sin, enough to reconcile us to God, enough to present us holy in God\u2019s presence. \u00a0Christ won; sin, death, and the Devil lost\u2014that\u2019s the good news of the empty tomb. \u00a0The resurrection means Christ proved Himself righteous to the Father, so that through faith we now can share in His righteousness. p. 93<\/li>\n
  • Communion is for the weak, but it is not for the hypocrite. p. 145<\/li>\n
  • \u201cI will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loosen earth shall be loosed in heaven.\u201d Matthew 16:19 p. 151<\/li>\n
  • The Word of God must be our standard of goodness, not nice thoughts, not pleasant smiles, nor the usefulness of charity. \u00a0We can be thankful for kindness instead of meanness, but true goodness goes deeper in to the heart and higher up to God than mere mortalism. p. 161<\/li>\n
  • We cannot capitulate to the contemporary ethos that laments short attention spans and linear thinking. \u00a0We must resist the urge to get with the spirit fo the age and feed our people with more than a steady diet of video clips and sermonettes. p. 169<\/li>\n
  • If we truly love our neighbors as ourselves, we will do whatever we can to protect his name. p. 205<\/li>\n
  • Get down deep into the Scripture, God\u2019s holy Word, and your prayers will start to fly. \u00a0We pray best when we ask God for everything He already wants to give us. p. 213<\/li>\n
  • An \u201calready and not yet\u201d understanding of the kingdom gives us hope for improvement in the world, tempered by a realism that acknowledges the continuing presence of sin, enmity, and rebellion. p. 225<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      The Good News We Almost Forgot by Kevin DeYoung is an awesome look at the Heidelberg Catechism from the 16th century.\u00a0 I’m grateful for the opportunity to dig into God’s word and really wrestle with my own theology.\u00a0 I think this is a valuable exercise on a regular basis to keep my heart and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,14,28,17,34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11121","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bible-study","category-book-review","category-integrity","category-leadership","category-truth"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11121","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11121"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11121\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11121"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11121"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11121"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}