Recent reading

I've read a few good books lately having had a holiday, and also hitting a stream of inspiring reads.

I read Sex God by Rob Bell, and found it a really helpful book. Both as a pastor and as a frail human this book helped me reflect on a good number of relationships from the past and present. His analysis that we are meant to be human, not angels nor animals is wonderful, worth reading the book just for that insight.

I also read Revolution by George Barna, a very good analysis of the growing phenomenon of faith outside church in the US. I wonder if it translates to other cultures well, It didn't fit the UK but could see some useful stuff in it.

On holiday i read Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow by Peter Hoeg, a really great, twisty, windy thought provoking and moving murder mystery. This was set in Denmark and Greenland, and being rooted in a culture other than the ones i guess i tend to read about (UK, US, Aus) added a whole other level of involvement.

I finished Steve Taylor's book The Out of Bounds Church, a sweeping look at the emerging church in the UK, US, NZ & Aus. really inspiring, and very good at application as it uses a number of discussion partners, and suggestions for other artistic material to use alongside reading it.

Really enjoyed the joint effort of Tony Campolo and Brian Mclaren on Adventures in missing the point perhaps the first, or most wide ranging, attempt to ennunciate a moral theology of the emerging church?

And, I have just started reading a recent find The Man in White by Johnny Cash - a novel of the life of Paul, that is surprisingly good.

If you're heading off soon, then happy hols, and I pray you'll return refreshed for all God has in store in the new term.

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