2 Books About The Church & The Jews

Well, it’s been a while since the last book of the month. The reason for that is that it took a while to work my way through Jen Rosner’s book, which has lots of footnotes. So, to make up for it, here’s a two-for-one deal!

Jen Rosner is a Messianic Jew and a professor at Fuller Seminary. In Healing the Schism, Jen has written an important book that provides a century-long overview of theological approaches to the difficult but important topic of the relationship between the Church and Israel.

We learned of the importance of this topic during the Wittenberg 2017 initiative. We were surprised when we approached German pastors with the idea of Wittenberg 2017, and kept getting the same response - “This is a God idea - but, where are the Jews?”

Why was this? Jen offers us a clue in a quotation from Thomas Torrance: “Schism between Christians and Jews is the deepest schism and the root cause of all other schism in the one People of God.” Thus movements to heal this schism, also lead to the healing of other schisms. We experienced this directly during the Wittenberg 2017 initiative, where the involvement of Messianic Jews was one of the key graces God gave us — ultimately resulting in the Shabbat celebration that in so many ways capped the 2017 gathering.

Jen frames her entire book around a question posed by Bruce D. Marshall: “Marshall seeks an affirmation of both the universal, ecclesially mediated saving mission of Christ and the irrevocable election of Israel, which necessarily includes the ongoing practice of Judaism.” Wow! So much of life is simply finding the right question.

In Chapter 1, Jen holds up to the light of this question the work of German theologian Karl Barth; in Chapter 2, the Jewish mystic Franz Rosenzweig; in Chapter 3, a series of post-Holocaust writers including Torrance, Soulen, and Wyschogrod; and in Chapter 4, Messianic Jewish theologian (and friend of CTR!) Mark Kinzer.

Each chapter is framed by looking through three lenses: Christology; the Election of Israel; and ecclesiology. Throughout, Jen evaluates the ways in which each theologian does, and does not, meet the original criteria posed by Marshall.

Jen’s conclusion is that the progress made towards “Healing the Schism” has been substantial in the last century - praise the Lord! And yet, there is still much work to be done, both theologically and on the ground. Some of this work is being done here at CTR, and Jen’s book is an encouragement to press on … for which we should be grateful!

In the Introduction to her book, Jen Rosner has a quote about opening up “the possibility of Christians learning things from Jews about how to be Christians.” There is no better summary of Bob O’Dell’s new book, and his Root Source project, than this sentence.

As related as Bob’s book is to Jen’s, it is completely different in style! If you’re looking for a book with fewer footnotes - well, choose Five Years With Orthodox Jews. The book is organized as a series of 40 vignettes, each one short and (for the most part) self-contained … such that you could just pick and choose chapters to read that sound interesting. And all of them do, since Bob has a gift for enticing titles, such as “The Greatest Love Story You’ve Never Heard” and “Does God ever Bait-and-Switch?”

Chapter 35 is “A View Too Small: First Steps” … and those of us who have been engaged with AHOP and CTR for a while will find ourselves reading a familiar story, from an unfamiliar perspective. Bob recounts his view on the J.J. Seabrook narrative that AHOP, and of course the Seabrook Center, played an important role in. It is wonderful to revisit this God event, and learn new aspects of how the Almighty wove together a tapestry that nobody expected.

One remarkable aspect of Bob’s book is the “with Gidon Ariel” on the title page. Gidon Ariel is an Orthodox Jew, and you learn about him and how Bob met him in the early part of the book. Bob asked Gidon to respond to each chapter, so at the end of each chapter written by an Evangelical Protestant Texan, there are a series of questions to which an Orthodox Jew in Israel writes his short, witty, and often surprisingly orthogonal answers. It’s like being a fly on the wall as Bob and Gidon converse at a corner café in Jerusalem.

In fact, reading the book is very much like having a conversation with Bob. This dear friend of CTR has held nothing back as he opened up his experiences, thoughts, and musings from the past five years. Get to know him better … get to know our Jewish friend better … by reading this book!

Tear Down These Walls

In both the title and content of Tear Down These Walls, John Armstrong has penned a clarion call for unity in the body of Christ. He has spent the last several decades promoting and working for what he calls missional-ecumenism - by which he means an approach to reconciliation and unity that focuses on Christ’s mission of salvation for the world. John rightly points out that Jesus links the two in his prayer in John 17 - “May they be brought to complete unity, so that the world may know …” Here is a good distillation of his approach:

… I am persuaded this resurgence of interest in the imperative of our unity will lose its momentum if it is not vitally linked with Christ’s mission. This link can be found in missional-ecumenism, a model that brings mission and unity back together.

Tear Down These Walls began as a revision of John’s previous book Your Church is Too Small, but quickly became a new work - in many ways, a summary of his life’s work and thought. As such, it contains many stories of his journey from an up-and-coming Reformed theologian … to being confronted one day in church with his easy recitation of “one holy catholic church” … to walking away from growing fame into rejection and an uncertain career path … to finding his voice as a leading advocate in the US for missional-ecumenism.

These stories weave in and out of a careful presentation of his essential approach:

  • The importance of relationship first (against previous emphases on theology first)

  • The anchor we have in the Creeds, particularly the Nicene Creed

  • The problem of schismatic sectariarianism (as illustrated by the 44th-funniest joke of all time!)

  • The hope for a truly beautiful church to impact the world

  • The importance of a love for each other that is costly - “A theology of ecumenism is helpful, but love alone is indispensable”

Thomas met John Armstrong in Chicago in 2013, at the first Lasaunne Catholic-Evangelical Dialogue.

Thomas met John Armstrong in Chicago in 2013, at the first Lasaunne Catholic-Evangelical Dialogue.

We at Christ the Reconciler should be encouraged, inspired and challenged as we read Tear Down These Walls. His practicality and emphasis on mission is a good balance to our more mystical approach that focuses on satisfying Jesus’ desire and preparing the way for the return of the Lord in glory. We have much to learn from John. I am grateful for this new expression of his life. Tear Down These Walls … Amen!

Unity - On Earth As In Heaven

I was very honored to receive this book in the mail from Dan Almeter, a long-time leader in the Alleluia Community in Georgia. In the note he attached he comments that Fr. Peter Hocken wrote the foreword. Oftentimes when Fr. Peter came to visit us at AHOP / CTR, he would be coming from the Alleluia Community, which he always tried to visit on his trips to the States.  It is wonderful to have this connection with them, a shared love for (and from) Fr. Peter.

This is an important book for us at Christ the Reconciler, and very timely for our current focus on “community.”  Let’s study it together, and be both challenged and encouraged!

Unity – On Earth As It Is In Heaven tells the story of the Alleluia Community, which was founded in February 1973 in Augusta, Georgia.  That weekend, a historic snow of 15 inches fell on Augusta, shutting the entire area down.  Twelve Catholics who had been recently filled with the Holy Spirit were trapped together in a large house.  As they worshipped and prayed, surrounded by the snowstorm, they began to put into action the idea they had been discussing together for a year or so – intentional community.  They wrote a covenant of life together and adopted it, forming the first nucleus of the Alleluia Community.

Their community has grown to more than 700, but they still have the same covenant that the original snow-bound dozen crafted almost fifty years ago.

Unity - Covenant.jpg

Though the Alleluia Community began with only Catholics, they immediately sought the Lord as to whether they should also include Protestants.  They heard an immediate “Yes!” from the Holy Spirit.  Today about 10% of the community is Protestant, and they have also been joined by Orthodox believers and Messianic Jews.

Dan Almeter’s book is a wonderful recounting of this journey.  He mixes stories from their decades of community life with a clarion call to living out John 17 (though they don’t use that same phrase, which we have adopted here at CTR).  As such, Unity includes both inspiration for us, and practical understandings of the nitty-gritty of life in an intentional community.  For example:

We know that in a Christian marriage each spouse is meant to help the other grow in holiness and mutual love.  They learn to do this by dying to themselves through sacrificial love.  Imagine having hundreds of opportunities every day to interact with a multitude of brothers and sisters of different backgrounds, different Christian traditions, different races, different personalities, different cultures – there’s no end to our differences.  If we can grow in holiness and charity within our nuclear family, then we can grow exponentially in community, where we must die to ourselves and live in charity with hundreds of other Christians on a daily basis.  This has, in fact, been our experience in community.  After 40 years of living covenant life with one another, holiness and love have grown to a level where mutual communion is very real and palpable.  A deep conversion to the Gospel has occurred within our midst.

 What a gift!  As we craft our own community commitment, we can learn from what the Holy Spirit has been doing in Alleluia.  Hopefully we can avoid some of their mistakes – while no doubt making new ones of our own!  The leaders of Alleluia Community have expressed a willingness to walk alongside us, without trying to make us “just like them.”  Oh, the beauty of the body of Messiah!

If you are interested in going deeper than the Statement of Personal Devotion and considering the Community Commitment here at CTR, it is important for you to get a copy of this book from Amazon and read it. 

Here is the link:

Imagine Heaven

I never before realized that the Prodigal Son is one of Jesus’ parables about money. Why do I say this? Immediately after the parable, Luke 16 begins with this:

Then Jesus said to the disciples, “There was a rich man who had a manager, and charges were brought to him that this man was squandering his property …”

Squandering property … sound familiar? Just a few verses earlier:

“But when this son of yours who has squandered your property with prostitutes comes home, you kill the fattened calf for him!”

The older son is focused on money and possessions. The father doesn’t seem to regard the lost family wealth as important at all.

“…we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.”

Jesus crystalizes the difference between these two outlooks with a single piercing phrase later in Luke 16:

“What people value highly is detestable in God’s sight.”

When I was making these discoveries in Luke’s gospel, I was also reading John Burke’s book Imagine Heaven, which catalogues and analyzes thousands of near-death experiences that have been studied by scientists and confirmed as legitimate in various ways. (For example, a blind person who was able to describe in detail the operating room that his body was laying in.)

A consistent theme from these “NDEs” (near-death experiences) stood out to me, in light of my readings in Luke. During the “life review” portion common to most NDEs, as God was presenting the person’s life to them so they could review the decisions that they had made, their actions that accumulated wealth, prestige, fame, and fortune counted for nothing. “What people value highly is detestable in God’s sight.” But their actions in service of others whom God brought them into relationship with, counted for everything. This is what God values highly.

Here is an example passage from the book, from an art professor who had a heart attack while leading students on a tour of Paris.

In my life review, I had to turn away numerous times when I saw myself treating my children in unloving ways. … The most disturbing behaviors I witnessed in my life review were the times when I cared more about my career as an artist and college professor than about their need to be loved. The emotional abandonment of my children was devastating to review. … I begged them to stop it because I was so ashamed of my failure to live lovingly and because of the grief I caused God, Jesus, and the heavenly beings. The only reason I could bear to proceed was because of their love for me. No matter what we watched me do in life, they communicated their love for me, even as they expressed their disapproval of the things I did.

And another, from a young Australian who was in a surfing accident:

Every detail of twenty years of living was there to be looked at. The good, the bad, the high points, the run-of-the-mill. And with this all-inclusive view came a question. It was implicit in every scene and, like the scenes themselves, seemed to proceed from the living Light beside me.

What did you do with your life?

This made a profound impression on me. Where have I neglected relational love and service for others? How can I live differently?

I can recommend Imagine Heaven just for the impact of this message. But the entire book Imagine Heaven is fascinating. Who doesn’t want to read about other people’s glimpses into the afterlife. John Burke’s approach comes from his background as an engineer, so he carefully presents various points of view, but explains how the evidence points to the biblical narrative as the best explanation for what is commonly experienced during NDEs.

Another very interesting conclusion he reaches is about the Biblical theophanies (when the heavenly realms are revealed, such as in Isaiah 6 or Revelation 4). He had always interpreted them figuratively. But as NDE after NDE reported seeing a heavenly city, gates made of pearl, streets of transparent gold … well, he began to wonder if these theophanies are not much more literal than he had realized. This should encourage us to gaze on “the Beauty Realm” in ever more fervent hope.

Read Imagine Heaven! Then pass it on to some friends, especially those who have doubts, are discouraged, or are afraid of death.

2 Novels

This year it’s been my pleasure to read two novels. One was very Catholic - Fr. Elijah. The other was, I would say, from a Protestant point of view - Charis Colony: The Landing. But they were connected in a certain way, because each had a unique perspective on the second coming of Our Lord. That makes them very appropriate Advent reads … and also wonderful Christmas gifts!

Charis Colony: The Landing was written by a member of the CTR Community, John Martin - his first novel. Set on another world but very much inheriting the problems of ours, Charis Colony charts Raj and Shirin’s whirlwind romance, and its consequences for each them. From the moment Shirin’s machete whistles a half-inch from Raj’s chest, I was hooked. As the fantastic story unfolded, I must admit I kept wondering, “Where is the Christian part of Christian SciFi?” And then … the end!

Enough said … buy this book and read it for yourself.

Fr. Elijah: An Apocalypse is one of a series by Michael D. O’Brien. I was first introduced to this series more than a decade ago, with Eclipse of the Sun, and was astonished to find that Catholics wrote about the end times! Who knew?

Fr. Elijah traces the path of a Catholic priest who is a Jew. He is called to the Vatican and sent on a perilous mission. The novel follows him into danger, out again, and into worse danger as the Vatican confronts evil outside, and evil within. Like Charis Colony, the book is well written and gripping. Don’t pick it up until you have a few days of holiday relaxation on the schedule!

Because of Winn-Dixie

This year our Reconciliation Bridge Prayer includes this collect:

Dear God, thank you for warm summer nights and candlelight and good food.  But thank you most of all for friends.  We appreciate the complicated and wonderful gifts you give us in each other.  And we appreciate the task you put down before us, of loving each other the best we can, even as you love us.  We pray in Christ's name, Amen.

- "The Preacher" from Because of Winn-Dixie

This resulted in an email from one community member - What is Because of Winn-Dixie?

This book review is my lengthy answer to that short question! Because … Because of Winn-Dixie is a delightful and profound children’s book.

It tells the story of a 10-year-old girl named India Opal who has just moved to a small town in Florida with her father, who has taken a job as pastor of a small church that meets in an abandoned convenience store.

India’s mother left when she was a small child, and her father is wrapped up in shame and sadness - but he can’t share it with his daughter. It is locked up inside of him, and he “pulls his head into his shell, like a turtle.”

As a result, India calls him “The Preacher” instead of “Daddy” - for most of the book. But the story tells how grief is unlocked - for him, for India, and for other members of their small town. Everyone has their own private grief - and learning to make it public is “both sweet and sad”, like the famous Litmus Lozenge candies that the town used to produce. And of course Winn-Dixie, the dog that India finds, plays an important role as well.

Learning to grieve is such an important part of reconciliation. This book communicates powerfully to children and adults alike.

The book has also been made into a wonderful movie of the same name, which stars AnnaSophia Robb as India Opal and Jeff Daniels as “The Preacher.” Both the book and the movie are highly recommended!

BecauseOfWinnDixie-Movie.jpg

A Man Called Mr. Pentecost

When Fr. Peter first visited our community (then called AHOP) in 2010, part of the discussion with him was about our library. He asked about how we chose the books in our library, and recommended that we change from “everyone’s discarded books that they drop by the prayer room” approach, to a more curated library of books we can enthusiastically recommend. Felipe asked him for books that he would specifically recommend, and one author he mentioned was David du Plessis.

A Man Called Mr. Pentecost is the wonderful and easy-to-read autobiography of this important man. David du Plessis was born into a Pentecostal missionary family in South Africa in 1905. Chapter 1 begins with a prophecy given to David du Plessis by Smith Wigglesworth in his early 30’s, that David would see the Pentecostal movement spread into the established churches (mainline Protestant & Catholic) … which was unthinkable at the time.

The first half of the book then traces his childhood, conversion, baptism in the Holy Spirit, and early ministry and leadership experiences. The chapters are short and filled with a combination of the excitement of the Holy Spirit’s activity and the disappointment of immaturity in himself and other Pentecostal leaders.

Everything turns in Chapter 18 - Revolution. God does a serious work in David’s life, that prepares him to begin to work with the mainline churches. The remainder of the book is a remarkable account of the doors that open to him in church after church, as the Holy Spirit blows through the windows of the established churches in the 60s and 70s. One highlight is the invitation from the Roman Catholic leadership to be an official observer at Vatican II.

I highly recommend A Man Called Mr. Pentecost for our community. It is important to understand the Pentecostal movement, and the history of David du Plessis is a wonderful on-ramp to this important topic, that will be highly accessible for Protestants and Catholics alike. (Note that is seems to be out of print, so you will need to search around for a used copy to purchase, or come to CTR to read the one that is in our library!)

A Garland for Ashes (new Audio book)

The book of the month for April 2020 is Hanna Miley’s new audio book! Her powerful memoir, A Garland for Ashes, has just been released as an audio book.

Here is the publisher’s summary of the book:

Torn from her homeland...her parents murdered.... How could she cope? 

When little Hannelore (Hanna) Zack left Cologne, Germany, on a train bound for London as a seven-year-old mädchen (young girl) on July 24, 1939, she had no way of knowing that she was part of the Kindertransport, an epic rescue effort that would save 10,000 Jewish children from Hitler's Nazi regime by granting them safe passage to England. In the coming years, Hanna would learn the painful truth: After being stripped of their business, forced from their Zuhause (home), and deported to endure six months of inhumane conditions in the Lodz Ghetto, her parents were gassed in a brutally efficient killing operation in a remote, forested area near Chelmno, Poland, on May 3, 1942. 

Written over a four-year period beginning when Hanna was about 75 years old, A Garland for Ashes is both a gripping detective story recounting the heartbreaking process of discovering her family's fate and a poignant account of her journey from vengeful hatred to forgiveness and release from bitterness.

Here is the review I posted on Audible:

Stories from the Holocaust are so important, so as to not forget what happened, and what could happen again. But this story ... this story should be next on your list.

Why? It offers a beautiful example of how to respond when terrible events happen in our lives. Heaven forbid we have to deal with something on the level of the Holocaust again - but all of us have ways in which we have suffered loss, betrayal, and hidden darkness. A Garland For Ashes not only recounts the history in a precise and powerful manner, but lays out the process of forgiveness and reconciliation that Hanna went through as she wrestled with these memories and the powerful emotions that they evoked in her soul.

In terms of production, I haven't listened to too many audio books (I generally prefer to read visually), but this one is really good. The narrator outstanding (apparently her father also escaped the Holocaust). The violin music in the opening was like a musical interpretation of Hanna's story.

Highly recommended!