Out of the Question (Book)

interior_head_01Len Sweet is ripening with age. His latest book, Out of the Question . . Into the Mystery is a far cry from the number-crunching “Soul Tsunami” and more subtle than the poppy “Carpe Manana”. Its a grey-blue minor-key book that finds its power in the pure simplicity of the discipled life, rather than catchy titles and ambitious prophecies. Thats why I liked it. Of course i liked his other books also.
Len is one of the few guys I know who has crossed the river of complexity and can write a simple book from the other side. Simplicity after complexity is widely informed and never insulting. Out of the Question is a simple book on following Jesus, being church, throwing parties (sounds like me?) celebrating the elements of new life, building a devotional life and more. Its an attractive book that anyone could give without cringing to a brand new believer. In fact, thats what I plan to do with mine.
Buy it? You may not need it, but some of your friends do. Wait for the paperback and buy a dozen.

Andrew

Andrew Jones launched his first internet space in 1997 and has been teaching on related issues for the past 20 years. He travels all the time but lives between Wellington, San Francisco and a hobbit home in Prague.

7 Comments

  • Don says:

    Glad you liked it Kiwi!
    More to come from this fine writer in the years ahead.

  • Darryl says:

    I think that’s the best book recommendation I’ve ever read.

  • maryellen says:

    read a preview and liked it! hope to see the paperback version

  • Edward Pillar says:

    Hi and thank you for the review – right up my soul’s high street. It is – at this very moment – being sent to me by that most honourable servant of the Kingdom – amazon.co.uk.
    I look forward to reading it v.much.

  • eoqan says:

    ijonrveq

    whhwedg

  • I just finished this book, and arrived here via next-wave’s link to your review.
    I thought the book started strong and raised good questions, but should have had about half the content it did. The early chapters raised really good points, but I felt that the second half was padding designed to make it feel long enough to be a book.
    I don’t know if the book is intended to be evangelistic or not, but if it is, I think it may give the impression of being more universalistic and “radically indeterminate” (to borrow Michael Horton’s phrase from Church in Emerging Culture: Five Perspectives, which Sweet edited) about the Christian faith’s particulars than Sweet intended. So I didn’t assume that it was evangelistic.
    I assumed the book was for those of us from conservative branches of the church who are starting to see a bigger world and starting to appreciate the mystery of many corners of creation and faith. In that light, I thought it would do a little less than is necessary to convince people firmly committed to an Enlightenment foundationalism, but still made its points well. Sweet can speak the language of both the modern and the postmodern culture well, which makes him so helpful to many denominations (even my own tribe, the Churches of Christ) as a consultant.

  • a reader and scholar says:

    this book clearly is a disgrace to all christian texts. this man mis-quotes scripture and assumes a non-biblical approach to most of life. all that aside he had a few good points; but none that were not overshadowed by his grave errors.

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