I am still not sure – as is so often the case with these type of questions, the answer is really all of the above. But this e-book only work by novelist Lars Walker is a captivating read and one that pulls you into its characters and settings – making you feel like you are reading about a real place and real people; that you are reading history in a sense not literature or not just literature.

More thoughts below …

Here is a blurb from the author/publisher:

Chris Anderson has everything. He’s the son of the richest family in town. He lives in a beautiful, loving home. He even has a fairy godmother.

Chris Anderson also has nothing. He was born with a deformed arm, and when he gets angry he sees visions that terrify him.

At the turn of the Twentieth Century, in a nation wrestling with faith and science, tradition and change, Chris will be forced to confront his own nature, and learn the meanings of freedom, love, and the grace of God.

The set up seems to hint at historical fiction: you have the introduction in modern times with flashbacks for the history. The basic plot follows Chris as he grows up; moving from farm to town and dealing with his complex Norwegian family and community.  The drama comes from conflict within the family – his old school grandfather and his progressive teetotaler mother for example – and from his deformed arm which looms large in his own mind and life.

But always on the edge of the story is the “underworld” – the world of fairies and magic.  He has his own real live fairy godmother in fact, who reminds him  that the magic side is often dark and dangerous and who desperately wants to be baptized.  Chris himself has a strong connection to this world.  When he is angry or feels threatened he sees little men with red hats who seem capable of great violence.  He has dreams and visions.

All this complexity leads to dysfunction and struggle – despite the wealth and success of the Andersons.  One by one the men are driven away. His Norwegian immigrant grandfather is driven out by his domineering mother and her progressive causes.  His brother rebels and heads west to escape.  And soon his father joins the path west.

Chris tries to stay rooted.  He takes a position in the family firm and seems committed to what normalcy he can find. But his deformed arm and his love for Sophie – an adopted girl who is in some ways like a sister but who he loves with desperation – prevent him from peace or stability.  He can’t accept himself as he is and thus can’t accept love from Sophie and this brews deep and ugly bitterness inside him.  When this emotion surfaces it drives him out west to find his father and brother.

He connects with them but out of fear of ending up lonely and alone heads back to his hometown to make a life for himself.  His awkward and often ugly attempts to do this make up the rising climax of the book and highlights the truly changing nature of the community he returns to.

What struck me about the style and content of Troll Valley is how, at bottom, what makes it worthwhile is the simple storytelling.  Walker creates such believable and entertaining characters that the reader is sucked in and soon begins to care about these complex characters.  This is what storytelling is all about: the ability to see the world through someone else’s eyes; to experience and explore new things without having to go anywhere. Walker gives us this chance to visit Minnesota around the turn of the century and see what a Norwegian immigrant community might look like and how its inhabitants might live and interact.

But there is also an element that is almost post-modern or a unique mix of pre and post-modern – unmodern if you will.  With a magical realism influenced by classical Christianity and Nordic myth; with genres blended and intertwined and big ideas wrestled with and unpacked.

In some ways this makes it messy. The plot isn’t particularly tight and it isn’t clear what exactly the device of the modern-day relative drug-addict and his Native American helper brings to the story.  But it works because it is full of interesting characters, settings and language – because it touches on powerful emotions that grow out of conflicts we still wrestle with today.  It touches on faith and family – on community and relationships.  It feels like history, literature, theology and psychology all rolled up in a story.

Who knows what you call it.  But it is engaging, entertaining, often thought-provoking and for $3 a real steal.  If you have a Kindle or a Nook I encourage you to download Troll Valley and experience this unique journey.

One such example is The Gospel According to Tim by Joseph Bottum – a Kindle Single that I read a week or so back.

Here is blurb:

What’s there left to say about Tim Tebow? He’s brilliant and appalling, inspiring and annoying–a straightforward young man who somehow played and prayed his way into being the most enigmatic figure in American sports.

In the essay-length Kindle Single “The Gospel According to Tim,” Joseph Bottum argues that Tebow strikes a nerve because he has slipped beyond all the usual categories of our wink-and-nudge culture of irony. And he’s done that mostly by being simply who he is: not a football-playing theologian but, in essence, a mystic:

“Isn’t that what everyone who has met Tebow does? Believe in him, I mean: believe that he’s for real. The young man is drunk on charity, in the same way he’s drunk on the endorphins that race through his body during his strenuous daily workouts. In the same way he’s drunk on the excitement of winning and losing football games before roaring crowds. In the same way he’s drunk on what the medieval mystics used to call “the gift of tears,” weeping easily and often. In the same way he’s drunk on his constant conversation with the Lord, referring all his victories and all his losses up to heaven.

“Tim Tebow isn’t a Christian theologian. He’s a Christian mystic — intoxicated, as all mystics are, with God. He’s King David, dancing in the joy of his youth before the Ark of the Covenant.”

This is one of those blurbs that really captures the entire book in a few paragraphs. Bottum basically argues that Tebow did not force his faith on the country but rather the country created its own obsession.  And Tebow is a polarizing figure because he is a true believer who is sincere and lacking in guile and hipster irony you expect from a celebrity not matter their faith.

Bottum is a great writer and it is a fascinating subject.  Plus, for a dollar the risk is so low as to be non-existent.  If you have an interest in the intersection of popular culture and faith this is an essay worth reading; a balanced and useful corrective to much of the hyperventilating about Tim Tebow.

Related articles

• Dakota Christmas (Kindle Single) by Joseph Bottum (collectedmiscellany.com)

Scott McKnight is a very engaging writer and blogger.  He tackles some serious subjects but does so in a very engaging and relatable style.  So when I saw he had a Kindle essay available on an interesting subject, I one-clicked my way to reading it.  The essay/book is Junia Is Not Alone.  What is that subject?

In this fierce essay, leading Bible scholar Scot McKnight tells the story of Junia, a female apostle honored by Paul in his Letter to the Romans—and then silenced and forgotten for most of church history. But Junia’s tragedy is not hers alone. She’s joined by fellow women in the Bible whose stories of bold leadership have been overlooked. She’s in the company of visionary women of God throughout the centuries whose names we’ve forgotten, whose stories go untold, and whose witness we neglect to celebrate.

But Junia is also joined by women today—women who are no longer silent and who are experiencing a re-voicing as they respond to God’s call to lead us into all truth.

McKnight, the author of over 30 books and the blogger and curator of the blog “Jesus Creed,” is a trusted, authoritative, and accessible voice on the Bible and theology. Junia Is Not Alone is a must-read for longtime followers, a valuable introduction for new readers, and a necessary call to awareness and action for the entire church.

I found it to be a passionate and informed argument about the subject of Junia and the role of women in the church.  More below.

What McKnight offers is an impassioned plea for the church to recognize its past errors and celebrate the women past, present and future who play such a critical role in the furthering of the Gospel.

The historical case of the erasing of Junia from the Bible is really just a jumping off point in this essay turned e-book. But it is a story I was unaware of and I am sure a great many others are ignorant of the episode and its implications as well.

Given my lack of knowledge in this area, and my lack of study to rectify such lack of knowledge, I will fully admit that I am not well suited to judge whether McKnight exaggerates the history or pushes the limits of the impact of this particular episode in the history of the church.  A quick Google search will give you lots of reviews to read and ponder.

I certainly lean much more in the egalitarian direction than the complimentarian but I think this book would be challenging and enlightening no matter where you fall on that spectrum.

A quirky story in many ways but an important subject and McKnight brings passion and knowledge to it.

Evangelical Christians are too “Modern.”

They fail to see the intellectual baggage modernity brings with it and they falsely assume that pre and post-modern thought somehow rejects the concept of truth or absolutes.

Post-modern thinking is more than just relativism and Christians should not fear it but wrestle with it and use it to think more clearly about their world and their faith.

The concerns were thankfully unwarranted, as Jared has written a wonderfully engaging and challenging book on the gospel and its place in our lives.  With wisdom, compassion and humor he outlines what it means to be alive to the gospel in your life and have it infiltrate every area of that life.

Do you ever feel like your desire for God is waning? Are you numb to the routine of church? What does it mean to be truly awakened to the wonder of the gospel?

Jared Wilson contends that we must be regularly engaged and engaging others with the good news of the sacrificing, dying, rising, exalted person of Jesus Christ. Wilson reminds us of the death-proof, fail-proof King of kings who is before all things and in all things and holding all things together, and of the Spirit’s power to quicken our hearts and captivate our imaginations. The message of Gospel Wakefulness will make numbness the exception (rather than the norm) and reawaken us to the multifaceted brilliance of the gospel.

But it is another one of those deep and meaty spiritual books that I am simply not going to have the time or focus to review properly.  But if you are seeking a deeper and sustained faith and looking for a book that will both inspire and challenge you, then I recommend you read this book.

A book of this sort can easily come off and as a tired combination of verses and platitudes – the same old, same old dressed up as a revolutionary way to understand orthodox theology.  Or seemingly profound spirituality that quickly wilts under sustained examination.

But Wilson avoids that for two reasons.  He has lived it and it shows; and he keeps it simple.  Not simple in terms of ease but simple because he doesn’t over think it.

Because Wilson has lived this out and struggled with his own demons and doubts his writing has an authenticity that is refreshing and encouraging.  He also has a passion that comes off the page; a powerful sense that he believes in the power of the gospel and he is not just writing to prove how clever he is.

I made dozens of notes throughout the book, but here is a section that should give you sense of the book:

One of the marks of gospel wakefulness is the failure of anything else to thrill the soul like the gospel.  When the heart treasures Christ and savours his power, sin grows bitter.  Even good gifts that God made delicious recede to their proper flavors.  Good things we have made “god things” don’t cease to be good; in fact, they continue to provide pleasures and satisfactions, but they keep their proper functions and blessings, in service to the common grace the God of Glory ascribed to them.

Gospel wakefulness doesn’t lead to asceticism.  it does not lead to a withdrawal from society and simple pleasures into a monastic religious regimen.  Rather, gospel wakefulness is foremost about orienting your spiritual system around the sun.  When the sun is at the center of the system, the planets and moon don’t cease to exist.  in fact, they exist more securely, more beautifully, in their proper positions and proportions.  With God at the center of your universe of worship, with gospel at the center of your life, all other good gifts – people and pleasures, thoughts and things – take their proper place and proportion in our lives.

After outlining and unpacking the term gospel wakefulness, Wilson then moves on to discuss the impact this has on things like worship, spirituality, depression and church and results in a new approach to sanctification and increased confidence for the believer.

Along the way Wilson adds in stories from friends about how this has played out in their lives.  Many of these are compelling and some quite powerful.  The confession of someone who dealt with depression and struggled with Easter week was one of the more powerful expressions I have read in some time.

At its most basic this book is about not taking your eyes off what is truly important; not thinking that seemingly simple things are not deep enough to sustain the deepest of faiths.

Jesus is big enough to fit into infinity. He is the true light of the world.  He is the risen King, the exalted Lord.  He is before all things and in him all things come together.  All things were made through him and for him, that he might be preeminent to them and supreme over them.  He is the radiance of God;s glory.  One day we won’t need the sun, because he will be the lamp of the new heavens and the new earth.

Why in the world do we fix our eyes on anything but him?

If you find your eyes and mind easily distracted, Gospel Wakefulness will get you back on target.

Image via Wikipedia

Yesterday’s edition of Coffee & Markets featured Jordan Ballor discussing Wisdom & Wonder: Common Grace in Science & Art a collection of the writings of the theologian Abraham Kuyper.  Pejman Yousefzadeh and I spoke with Jordan about Kuyper’s unique life, his ideas and the challenges of cultural and political engagement for people of faith today.

Listen Here.

I mention this because I have been avoiding posting on The King Jesus Gospel: The Original Good News Revisited for this reason for quite some time. I am not sure I can do it justice or engage the real meaty issues it touches on. But the good folks at Net Galley and Zondervan didn’t send me a review copy so I could fret about my self-esteem … So. Some thoguhts below.

First, what is this all about anyway? Publisher synopsis:

Contemporary evangelicals have built a ‘salvation culture’ but not a ‘gospel culture.’ Evangelicals have reduced the gospel to the message of personal salvation. This book makes a plea for us to recover the old gospel as that which is still new and still fresh. The book stands on four arguments: that the gospel is defined by the apostles in 1 Corinthians 15 as the completion of the Story of Israel in the saving Story of Jesus; that the gospel is found in the Four Gospels; that the gospel was preached by Jesus; and that the sermons in the Book of Acts are the best example of gospeling in the New Testament. The King Jesus Gospel ends with practical suggestions about evangelism and about building a gospel culture.

This is a powerful examination of what it means to speak of the Gospel and how our understanding of it impacts our “Gospeling” or evangelism. McKnight argues forcefully that to present a plan of salvation, or soterian, gospel is to miss the larger picture of scripture and God’s plan for the universe.

As noted, there is a lot packed in there and a lot you can, and should, debate.  But for now, a few thoughts …

I think the aspect that McKnight is absolutely right on is the plan of salvation focus on current evangelicalism.  This is exactly the environment I grew up in: one focused on making a decision about personal salvation.  Not that there wasn’t an attempt to connect the Old and New Testament, or that spiritual growth beyond salvation wasn’t discussed, but that the gospel was very much seen as personal salvation and the lens through which we saw everything else.  It felt like to me that this was the point.  McKnight calls this focus soterian from the Greek word soteria which we use for salvation.

For McKnight the Gospel is the story of Israel being completed in the story of Jesus who is the Messiah King. This is the Apostolic Gospel and the Gospel Jesus preached. If we lose our focus on this larger story and the context it provides we end up with an individualistic “get saved to avoid hell” type gospel not one focused on the larger Kingdom of God; of how God is writing our story even now.

McKnight presents this very well and uses stories from students and the perspectives of some pastors to highlight how this view has come to dominate. He then outlines how 1 Corinthians 15 is the Apostolic Gospel and the earliest form of the Gospel in the church.  From this start he outlines what this means and how we lost our way.  He then goes on to explore whether Jesus preached the Gospel. Peter’s perspective on the Gospel and how we approach evangelicalism and the Gospel today.

I really feel like I need to read this again to get a strong grasp on the argument and the deeper issues involved.  But the one thing that I absolutely agree with McKnight about and belive deserves to be highlighted is how the big story of the Gospel is so often lost today – the way the plan of salvation approach leaves out the wider lens of God’s action and plan for all of creation – and how the content and style that results from this mindset fails to develop disciples and build communities.

Scott McKnight has down us a valuable service looking at a central aspect of our faith, clearing away the cultural, theological and historical ruble and forcing us to think in a fresh way about what we mean when we talk about the Gospel.

The King Jesus Gospel is a challenging but necessary and, in many ways, refreshing book.

For most who live,
hell is never knowing
who they are.
The Singer knew and
knowing was his torment.

Recalling the popularity of  The Singer: A Classic Retelling of Cosmic Conflict by Calvin Miller when I was younger, and having a vaguely positive recollection of reading and enjoying it as a teenager, when I saw it for a dollar at a library sale I snatched it up.  Seeing it as a quick and potentially inspirational read, I read it read it that same week

It is a rather unique book (the first of a trilogy), a sort of poetic narrative – some poetry, prose – that re-imagines the Gospel in the form of a classical myth or fairy tale of a troubadour compelled to sing the song that points man back to their creator.  His opponent is the World Hater who seeks to keep mankind enslaved and unaware of the song.

And even after all these years, it stands up very well. A little forced in places and certainly “artsy” in a sense but with beautiful and evocative language that re-imagines this timeless story in a way that knocks the dust off and allows us to see it fresh.

What struck me most was the way the story could help explore both the universal and simple nature of the Gospel in terms of love and redemption but also how the aphorisms at the start of each chapter were thought provoking and somehow fragile – if you thought about them too much or for too long they fell apart, but if you glanced at them they seemed quite profound.

I also really enjoyed the way the relationships played out.  The emotions involved in how the Singer interacted with God, his mother and the people he encountered really seemed to capture the Christ of the Gospels in a fresh and insightful way. This simple prose poem somehow cleared away the clutter and allows you to see the arc of history and Christ’s sacrificial love as the touchstone of that arc.

To give you a taste, here is an aphorism or poem that introduces a chapter:

Oftentimes Love is
so poorly packaged
that when we have
sold everything to
buy it, we cry in
finding all our
substance gone and
nothing in the tin-
sel and the ribbon.

Hate dresses well
to please a buyer

As noted above, I find this introductions very interesting. There is a sense of the profound about many of them and yet they are hard to nail down and unpack. They sort of hit you on an almost subconscious level.  They give the larger story a philosophical and spiritual weight.

I am sure there are many who might find the poetry to heavy handed or the allegory too thin; a work such as this has a lot to do with taste and style.  I am no expert on poetry or poetic narratives but I found it thought provoking and at times powerful.  Something different and daring even if it doesn’t always succeed.

If you enjoy poetic language and storytelling this is a Christian Classic worth revisiting.

Publisher’s blurb:

What does a transformed life actually look like?

In his follow-up to the critically acclaimed Imaginary Jesus, Matt Mikalatos tackles this question in an entertaining and thought-provoking way—with MONSTERS!!! While Christians claim to experience Christ’s resurrection power, we sometimes act like werewolves who can’t control our base desires. Or zombies, experiencing a resurrection that is 90 percent shambling death and 10 percent life. Or vampires, satiating ourselves at the expense of others. But through it all we long to stop being monsters and become truly human—the way Christ intended. We just can’t seem to figure out how.

Night of the Living Dead Christian is the story of Luther, a werewolf on the run, whose inner beast has driven him dangerously close to losing everything that matters. Desperate to conquer his dark side, Luther joins forces with Matt to find someone who can help. Yet their time is running out. A powerful and mysterious man is on their trail, determined to kill the wolf at all costs . . .

By turns hilarious and heartbreaking, Night of the Living Dead Christian is a spiritual allegory that boldly explores the monstrous underpinnings of our nature and tackles head-on the question of how we can ever hope to become truly transformed.

The challenge Matt faces is trying to use the unique fictional element (the story and his own role within it) to both entertain and offer insight; to make it a story that works while making the points he wants to make.  In Imaginary Jesus I thought it largely came together without any one aspect dominating and toppling over the balance. This time the balance was off and it came out as the foundation of a good story (Luther Martin) surrounded by a lot of silly distractions and ending with mostly preaching.  The hook of viewing Christian living through the lens of monsters is interesting but in the end it felt like too many ingredients forced into a style and structure that didn’t quite fit.

The strongest element of the story is Luther Martin, a werewolf struggling to hold his marriage together.  Estranged from his father the pastor, and disillusioned by Christianity, Luther is desperately seeking answers to his condition before he loses everything.  Luther’s anger and violence is pushing the people he loves most, his wife and daughter away, but he can’t seem to get control.

Luther’s voice and back-story are revealed in interludes in between chapters and are the most compelling parts of the book.  It is a strong voice of cynicism and doubt; a forceful rejection of easy answers and cheap grace.  And the events surrounding Luther’s confrontation with his father that is the climax and the highlight of the book. Some of the sections are moving and deeply sad.

The problem is that Mikalatos’s voice is silly, self-deprecating and self-referential. He sets up comedic situations and throw in jokes and word play.  But instead of comic relief the first half of the book just seems like fluff and disconnected from the very serious issues of the second half which focus on abuse and real pain.  The book then ends by throwing off all pretense of fiction and just has Matt preach the Gospel (and Luther relating his baptism reinforces this sermon like quality).

Don’t get me wrong, I agree with much of what Mikalatos “preaches” but why not just write a non-fiction book that uses the concept of monsters to explore the ideas of sin and transformation (perhaps the Luther interludes as illustrations)?  I give him credit for trying to pull off a creative and challenging book but I don’t think he quite succeeded.  Outside of Luther, and to some degree Lara, the characters are thin.  The plot meanders and really struggles to develop.  The spiritual side is far from subtle and mostly just preaching with the characters as obvious illustrations.

The other problem is that that the various monsters don’t work together thematically. The idea of Christians as zombies is barely developed and is very different from Christians who struggle with sin in such a serious way (vampires and werewolves).

Mikalatos has a light and witty style and the book is an easy read; even the preaching isn’t particularly heavy.  And as noted above, the Luther Martin element is well done and quite compelling in parts. But the rest of the story feels distracting and thrown together.  The zombie aspect feels like a side joke rather than a real part of the story.

With this in mind, I think reader expectations will play a big role in reactions to this book.  If you are expecting a strong story with allegorical aspects I think you will be disappointed. If you are expecting “fiction” more as sermon illustration then I think you will enjoy it; if you can appreciate the various pieces and parts without demanding them come together all that much.

For me, Night of the Living Dead Christian was an interesting experiment, with some promising elements, that just didn’t work as a whole.

Watch the video trailer and don’t forget I am giving away a free copy so you can form your own conclusions.

I received this book as part of the Tyndale Blog Network program.

Related articles

• Review of Matt Mikalatos’ Night of the Living Dead Christian (1manandhisbooks.wordpress.com)
• Review: Night of the Living Dead Christian by Matt Mikalatos (jenniferajanes.com)
• The Big Idea: Matt Mikalatos (whatever.scalzi.com)

What book? you ask.  God Is Red: The Secret Story of How Christianity Survived and Flourished in Communist China

When journalist Liao Yiwu first stumbled upon a vibrant Christian community in the officially secular China, he knew little about Christianity. In fact, he’d been taught that religion was evil, and that those who believed in it were deluded, cultists, or imperialist spies. But as a writer whose work has been banned in China and has even landed him in jail, Liao felt a kinship with Chinese Christians in their unwavering commitment to the freedom of expression and to finding meaning in a tumultuous society.

Unwilling to let his nation lose memory of its past or deny its present, Liao set out to document the untold stories of brave believers whose totalitarian government could not break their faith in God, including:

• The over-100-year-old nun who persevered in spite of beatings, famine, and decades of physical labor, and still fights for the rightful return of church land seized by the government
• The surgeon who gave up a lucrative Communist hospital administrator position to treat villagers for free in the remote, mountainous regions of southwestern China
• The Protestant minister, now memorialized in London’s Westminster Abbey, who was executed during the Cultural Revolution as “an incorrigible counterrevolutionary”

This ultimately triumphant tale of a vibrant church thriving against all odds serves as both a powerful conversation about politics and spirituality and a moving tribute to China’s valiant shepherds of faith, who prove that a totalitarian government cannot control what is in people’s hearts.

Liao Yiwu mostly lets the people he interviews speak for themselves (but offering some rather poetic introductions and descriptions along the way) in this fascinating look at the people who gave everything they had to help grow the Christian church in China.  As a result, he book reads more like a journal or series of vignettes than a stand alone book – it really is a collection of interviews – but because the underlying stories are so powerful this style and structure is easily overcome.  And it’s simplicity and straightforward witness adds to its power. Yiwu focuses mostly on rural areas and the villages that embraced the Christian faith in the early part of the Twentieth Century only to have the horrors of communism and the Cultural Revolution bring suffering and persecution in ways that are almost impossible for Westerners to imagine.
These amazing people held on to their faith despite decades of hardship and persecution. The state took everything they had – their homes, their churches, their freedom, their health – and yet they persevered to see the faith grow and flourish. The tragic irony is that they were punished as foreign spies and imperialist lackeys even as they sought to provide care and meaning to the poorest of poor in the rural areas.

Imagine being forced to kneel on tile and broken pottery in the freezing rain for days without food; dragged to public condemnations and beaten whenever you pray or refuse to renounce your faith; thrown in prison for thirty years for nothing more than preaching the gospel and bringing aid to the poor and helpless; having everything you have worked for taken away by capricious bureaucrats and your own neighbors.

And then as the political winds change you are forced to choose between state run churches with at least the appearance of peace and the ability to worship freely or continuing to fight for true freedom of religion and the ability to worship as you choose.

What a challenge to people of faith today!

Of course, even if you are just interested in the history of Christianity or human rights or China you will find this book (written by a non-Christian) fascinating – a glimpse of history from the participants.

Christianity Today sums it up well

If you want to read one book that sums up the glory of the Christian witness under persecution and the tragic 20th-century story of China’s Christians, read God Is Red. Brilliant and immensely moving, it will, if anything can, inject new backbone into your own Christian life.

Related articles

• Hammer and Sickle and Cross (online.wsj.com)
• God is Red (geneveith.com)