Library

Our library continues to grow and as it does some fine books are being added. Some of them are old and well-worn, but don't let the cover or the age fool you. Many of those books are still around because of the quality of their content. Others are new, but new doesn't always mean novel and many of them are very good as well.

The Jesus I Never Knew, by Philip Yancey

Zondervan, 1995

The Jesus I Never Knew should really be a must read for us all, but especially those of us who grew up in church. Often, as we learn about the things Jesus did we fail to see the radical nature of what he did and said in light of his own day. In turn we often fail to see how radical he would be in our own day as well. Philip Yancey shakes the old flannelgraph Jesus out of our heads and gives us keen insight into who he really was and is and what he said and did.

Professor Lewis B. Smedes, Senior Professor at Fuller Theological Seminary in California says of this book: "This is the best book about Jesus I have ever read, probably the best book about Jesus in the whole century. Yancey gently took away my blinders and blazed the trail through my own doubting fears, pious know-it-all, and critical balderdash until I saw the Savior anew and thought I heard him ask me, 'Now who do you say that I am?' and I understood the question as I never had before."

From the inside cover: "The Jesus I Never Knew uncovers a Jesus who is brilliant, creative, challenging, fearless, compassionate, unpredictable, and ultimately satisfying. This honest book will help you discover a different Jesus from the flannelgraph Sunday school figure, the sweetly smiling Victorian Savior, and all the cultural clichés that have tamed Jesus and kept him in comfortable religious boxes."

From the Table of Contents:

Part One

Who He Was

The Jesus I Thought I Knew
Birth: The Visited Planet
Background: Jewish Roots and Soil
Temptation: Showdown in the Desert
Profile: What Would I Have Noticed?

Part Two

Why He Came

Beatitudes: Lucky Are the Unlucky
Message: A Sermon of Offense
Mission: A Revolution of Grace
Miracles: Snapshots of the Supernatural
Death: The Final Week
Resurrection: A Morning Beyond Belief

Part Three

What He Left Behind

Ascension: A Blank Blue Sky
Kingdom: Wheat Among the Weeds
The Difference He Makes

I cannot recommend this book more highly and I hope you will take the time to read it and let it soak in. There are two copies in the church library including a large print edition. This book won the 1996 Gold Medallion Christian Book of the Year Award. Billy Graham said of the author Philip Yancey: "There is no writer in the evangelical world that I admire and appreciate more."

Be sure and check it out.