JY: Welcome to GearTalk, a podcast on Biblical theology. Today, Jason and Tom talk about reading books of theology. What’s the right strategy for reading books like this? Should we read them like we read any other books? The podcast ends with Jason and Tom talking about books of theology that have particularly influenced them.

TK: Welcome to GearTalk, Tom and Jason together and we have a pretty fun topic today.

JD: We do. How to read a theology book. At least that’s where we’re going to start.

TK: Do you ever do that, Jason? Do you ever read a theology book?

JD: I have read a few of them.

TK: Maybe it’s about time you should read one.

JD: Maybe I should start. Yes, but I will say that probably 15, maybe even 20 years ago, my wife said you need to read other kinds of books too. And so I started reading, for example, historical nonfiction, and I’ve loved it. There have been so many adventures that have taken place in real time that I’ve been able to track through the years. But the books that I read most are definitely ones related to who God is and who he made us to be. So that’s where we’re focused today on these books of theology that are especially designed to help us understand the scriptures rightly, to understand what God has spoken and who Jesus is and what God’s purposes are in this world from beginning to end.

TK: And just to maybe set this category aside real quickly, Jason, maybe go back there, but you talked about non-theology books. I think something that both of us would say is that we both use different strategies when reading that sort of book from the kind of books we’re talking about today. Would you agree with that?

JD: Oh, absolutely. I am constantly reading a book out loud to my kids and all different types of adventures. Right now we are reading a missionary biography along with some children’s Alfred Hitchcock mysteries, and while I do read them, I approach the reading of the rest of the story so differently than I approach reading a theology book. I just start at the beginning and begin moving through. But as we’re going to see, that’s not at all how I approach a book of theology.

TK: Well, you just kind of gave away part of it right there—clearly it sounds like you don’t necessarily start at the beginning with the theology book.

JD: That’s right. So sitting in front of me right now is a book I am reading for a course to work with my students, it’s actually a course you’ve already taken Tom with me, My Servants the Prophets by Edward J. Young. And I see the title and that’s where I start. And I actually had a whole stack of books related to the prophets, because I was teaching an Old Testament prophets course and I start with the title and then I look at the back cover and see who else has already read this book and what they’ve had to say about it. Those are called the endorsements. I look at the description of the book. This is before I ever start reading.

TK: So why would you—what are you looking for, Jason, in the endorsements?

JD: I’m looking for specific people that I trust and specific people that I may already have flags for. You know, flags that are saying warning, warning this man or woman’s theology is not in line with what I truly believe Scripture is teaching. So that’s what I’m looking for. I’m looking at do they have scholars on the page? Do they have pastors who are endorsing the book? It helps give clarity about where the book is heading, what the book is, the audience that the book is intended to reach, and so taking the time to read the cover of a book and knowing who the author is and where this author, for example, if it’s a teacher—where’s his church? What’s his denominational background? Where does he teach if he’s a professor? What role does this woman play in various ministry contexts? That’s the kind of things that I’m looking for in order to associate. And certainly that doesn’t clarify everything in the book, but it does clarify a lot. The more we understand what God is doing in the world present or past, the better we’ll understand the context from which books are written.

TK: So let me ask you a question. This just relates almost to handing a book to somebody and saying, hey, I think you should read this because you just said it. I took a class with you where you told us it wasn’t a choice for us. You just said this is one of our required texts. So what were you hoping that we would get out of this book, for instance?

JD: Oh, this particular book by Ed Young. I knew that he—I’ve read a number of books by him. He’s a conservative Presbyterian and this book actually was written in 1945. So there’s been many, many books that have been written to introduce the Old Testament prophets since he penned this volume. But his work had a particular influence on an entire generation of conservative scholars, and alongside of this I had you read a work by a German liberal scholar named Gerhard von Rad and his work had a massive influence on a generation of scholars. And they were both right around from the same time period. So I wanted you to see an evangelical gospel loving voice up alongside of a liberal and see how they were thinking differently, how their worldview was informing their words and I mean, at times we read books that we know going in are going to have a different perspective on reality because they don’t view scripture as God’s Word. And yet that doesn’t mean that book would have no benefit for us. It can caution thoughts that we have, critique thoughts that we have and also nurture deeper conviction. It can give us a greater perspective on the scope of how different people are thinking in the world and help us build biblical responses that are faithful to the Christian Scripture and that are actually effective at confronting even false teaching.

TK: So that’s—and maybe we need to from here we’ll back up a little bit, but that’s a good example of almost surrounding an issue and saying I don’t want you to only read books that I’d say I more agree with. This in certain contexts, but there are times certainly where you’d say a pastor with his elders, I want you all to read this book because it does align with what we’re thinking. And you’re not—you’re not handing them an opposite view, for instance.

JD: A big, important element of book reading is either being able to evaluate fairly and rightly and faithfully the claims that are being made, or having the resources, say, another book or a theological mentor who can help guide you in rightly, critically evaluating. That is not criticizing, but faithfully considering the truth claims that another is making and be able to evaluate in a way that would honor God, that is faithful to the biblical text. All throughout my own process of study I have been very blessed to be able to stand on the shoulders of many who have gone before me, who know the data, whatever those are, as well as anyone else does, and retain their conservative biblical conviction that rightly sees God as the God over all things, his word as faithful in all it declares, Jesus as the only savior for a needy world. Men and women who have been faithful and yet, who have studied well. I’ve been able to stand on their shoulders to learn from them in contexts where left to myself, I may not have been able to evaluate fairly because I just didn’t know all the data and I didn’t even know the implications of—if I follow the path of this author, here’s where it will lead. I couldn’t see far ahead enough. Yet others who are, you know, a decade ahead of me have been able to see where it would lead and been able to faithfully evaluate the claims that are made and give caution where necessary, pause where necessary and affirmation where justified.

TK: So let’s start at the beginning, Jason. You have a book in your hand and let’s—so pick something that you—you get a book. How do you—a book of theology—how does Jason DeRouchie read this thing?

JD: Sure. Well, I just picked up another book and it says 5 Views of Christ in the Old Testament. I read the title and it’s intriguing. “Five views” suggest alternative proposals. I read the various contributors and I know all their names. Then I go to the back cover and I read the description of the book and it offers a short summary of each approach of seeing Christ in the Old Testament. This is drawing me in. It’s giving me a clear picture of what I’m going to find in this book and the type of dialogue that’s going to be happening in the book as I look at these five different approaches. This particular book doesn’t have any endorsers. But many books do, and so I’d be looking at those endorsements. But that’s only stage one. Stage two of my reading a book is to first read the table of contents from start to finish. Every main chapter heading, every chapter title, all the various headings and subheadings in each chapter. I actually take the time to read that so that I have a sense for the flow of thought and the types of topics that are going to be addressed in this book. This kind of book of theology is not like a mystery novel where we want to hold off until the very end to, you know, to let the author actually lead us through the mystery and discover at the pace that he wants us to discover. That’s not what these kind of books are about. No, we need to know from the beginning where the author is leading us so that we can rightly understand what he’s declaring and faithfully evaluate his message.

TK: In this book, I’m arguing for these three specific things. Here’s how I’m going to prove it.

JD: That’s right. So my first step is after I look at the outside, I start to look at the inside, but I don’t just open to Page 1 and begin to read. I look at the table of contents and overview the whole book. Then I will—many books have a foreword. That’s not FORWARD, I’m moving forward, but rather a word that comes before. It’s a foreword and other books have an afterword. So FOREWORD, and it’s usually written by someone other than the author, but it gives a synthesis for where this book is going and why this book is important.

TK: I’m looking at—so Brian Verrett, for instance, he’s been doing our series on Samuel. You wrote his foreword because not because you just wanted to write this, you actually had something to say about this volume.

JD: That’s right. I think it’s an excellent volume and he asked me to write that foreword on his behalf. That book started, before it was significantly updated, that book started as a graduate thesis for his Master of Theology degree and I oversaw that thesis, so I had just been involved in that project from beginning to end and I wanted his discoveries to get out to the broader world. So I wrote this foreword that introduces to the reader where this book is going, the perspective from which it’s written and what the goals are as I saw them. Then Brian himself would have written—most likely I don’t even remember if he did in this book, but many books begin with a preface, which is a word from the author that actually sets the stage for what follows. So I’ll read that preface. Then I’ll consider, does this book have an introduction and does this book have an actual conclusion? If it does, I will begin by perusing the introduction. Seeing if he actually summarizes the whole book, or how he gets into it, but usually I’ll start my book reading with the conclusion. I’ll jump to the back of the book and I will read the entire conclusion if the book ends that way, and most books do.

TK: This would help your reading of mystery books to your children to just start reading them…

JD: We know where it’s heading. No, I would not. I don’t do it that way for mystery novels, but it’s exactly how I do it for every book that I read. Honestly, I just start at the end. I look and see what conclusions is this author drawing from their entire study? And once I have that conclusion, I’m going to read it again by the time I get there. But then I will go back and after I’ve read the conclusion, I will then go back to the introduction and I will begin at the beginning and I’ll read the entire introduction through, but often that’s not where I end. I will look to see are there sections like Part One of this book and then there’s three chapters, Part Two of this book, then there’s another three chapters and after I read that introduction and have a sense for where the author wants me to be thinking, I’ll go through and I will read each of the major section introductions. So for example, a new book that I have just completed—it’s not out yet—it’s called Delighting in the Old Testament. It has four different parts, and each part I take a page and I introduce where the next three to four chapters are going to go. As a reader, I would read just those introductions in each unit. Then after I do that, I would find out, are there actual chapter summaries? Many books in theology actually have at the end a conclusion or summary for every single chapter. And so before I read—after I’ve done the introduction, after I’ve overviewed each of the major sections, before I just start reading the rest of the book, in Chapter One, I will actually read each chapter summary so that then in, you know, a paragraph to four paragraphs, however it is at the end of each chapter, gives me an idea for where this entire chapter is going and I get a snapshot for the entire book. In, you know, within an hour I can have an overview of where this entire book in theology is going.

One of the books I got to participate on was called 40 Questions About Biblical Theology. One of the neat elements and, someone who goes to read that book might miss it unless they read the preface and that is in the preface, we say you don’t have to read this book from start to finish to benefit from it. In fact, each chapter is answering a single question. And each chapter ends with a summary of all that we’ve said, so you could, for example, read each question. It’s just a single statement question at the beginning of each chapter, and then just read the summary at the end of every chapter and really get a good idea for what we’re arguing in the entire book. Or you could just focus on, “Oh, that question’s interesting,” jump to the end of that chapter, read the summary, and then go back and start at the beginning of that chapter and read the five pages that we used to answer that question that we summarize at the end.

TK: I think for those of us who have maybe a sense of guilt if we don’t read like the book in order or skip around, or if we do things like that, really it’s learning—no, the intention of these books is they don’t look like that mystery novel you’re talking about. They’re intended to be used how you’re describing it.

JD: That’s right. I as an author am writing the book recognizing that many people will not just open up this book and read it cover to cover. Rather they’re—I mean, for example, a woman’s Bible study teacher: every week she’s preparing her Bible study lesson for this woman’s Bible study. She wants to see if in a book I’ve written, if I have anything to say about, you know, her particular topic and the theme of the book is generally related to what the theme is of that week. But she doesn’t have time to read the whole book, right? How could she actually benefit from this book? And I’m giving—I’m giving keys. Another element to keep in mind as a reader of books is often there are subject indexes, Scripture indexes at the back, and so you can actually find everywhere in this book where the passage you’re studying this week is actually mentioned. And so you dive in and you find those pages and you could just, you know, dip into that volume and actually benefit from the volume, even though you haven’t read the entire book.

After I’ve read all chapter introductions and summaries, then I just start systematically walking from the beginning to end. I might reread the introduction, you know, start at page one and then just go all the way to the very end of the conclusion. But at every moment through that systematic page by page, paragraph by paragraph reading, I already have a very good macro understanding of what the entire book is about. That’s how I read almost every theology book. Rarely, rarely would I ever just pick up a book and start reading it. I want to know what is this book about so that I can then rightly evaluate knowing where this author is coming from, and where this author is leading me.

TK: Do you read Jason with a highlighter or a pencil in your hand? Anything like that?

JD: I do. I am reading always with a highlighter. I know you really like to read on your iPad and…

TK: At certain things, but certain things I don’t.

JD: OK.

TK: And I use—I use a mechanical pencil pretty much in—similarly not in, not in a book that I would read like the kind you would read to your kids or like you said, historical fiction or nonfiction or something like that. But theology books I read with a pencil always.

JD: So I—I’m not afraid to mess up my books. I put—I highlight, I use a pen, I make it—it’s permanent. It’s in that book. All of my notes, the same thing. Right now I’m reading, for example, a biography, an autobiography written by John Paton, who was a missionary to the New Hebrides Islands in the South Pacific, just off of Australia in the early 1800s, and he was ministering among cannibals. In 20 years after his initial landing, he wrote down from all of his journals his life experiences. I’m reading that whole book with a highlighter. It’s just how I do it, but all of my theology books, yeah, I’m underlining. I’m writing notes in the margins. Sometimes I’m collecting my notes and putting them at the back of the book so that I can—like when there’s—I’m noticing I’m tracing certain themes or motifs through the book itself. I’m making collections of collections of page numbers at the back of the book. I’m reading trying to read this book thoughtfully with a real mind toward evaluation. So that I can in turn if ever I want to go back or use this book, I could go back and find what stood out to me rapidly because I’ve made those notes.

TK: What do you write when you bump into something which clearly you would—that you’d say wow, I feel like this is a weak argument and it’s going somewhere that I am questioning already? Let’s say—do you—how do you notate something like that?

JD: So I’ll put a highlight whether through a bracket, put a box, underline, but then I will put a star in my margin and I will write a response. Often I have to turn the book sideways so that you know I can use the entire side of the page and add the margin. I’m putting in Scripture references that counter the claims that are being made. I’m noting “He doesn’t address this issue” or “She fails to mention this element”. If I recall another book that’s actually responding directly to the claims that are being made, I’ll say, you know, “See Dempster, Dominion and Dynasty.” And then I may even go pick Dempster’s Dominion and Dynasty off the shelf and find what page number it’s on, because I had already marked up that book and I could find it easily. And then I add that to the new book. Those are the kind of comments that I’m making as I work through a volume. And then sometimes I just write “Praise the Lord”, you know, I’ll just—when something stirs my soul, when an author helps me see the beauty of God, celebrate the glories of Christ’s saving work, revel in the power of the Holy Spirit. I may make a comment like that or I alter my highlighting from just being an underline to actually going over all the words and it notes that it’s a distinct element on the page.

TK: And this is something I’m going to want to come back to sometime. Something like that. That’s really good. Do you mind taking a second—and what I—I’d just be curious, what are a few books that you’d say this shaped Jason DeRouchie, whether it was at a particular time in your spiritual growth or, you know, more recent—whenever. But like, wow, this book really impacted me.

JD: Yeah, you prepared me for that question and I have a host of books. Going through them really will give some clarity to my own interpretive development as I have gone through scripture. Writing them down made me just celebrate the journey that I’ve been on. I divided these into books on doctrine, books on studying the Scripture like how-to, and then books specifically related to theological method and how the whole Bible progresses and integrates and climaxes in Jesus. So feel free Tom to jump in on any of these.

TK: Well, let’s start with—and clearly there’s a category too of like more devotional books as well, which both of us have found joy and delight in and even like a missions biography would probably find itself in that sort of category. But let’s start with the books of doctrine that you were talking about.

JD: Well, the books of doctrine include the ones that you were just talking about, those that have stirred my soul to see God bigger and I just honestly—for me, in my own personal development, in my own theological journey, the author that God’s used to stir my soul in the greatest way to see the beauties of Christ and the greatness of God is Pastor John Piper. So it’s a living author. But his big three volumes on Desiring God, The Pleasures of God, and faith in Future Grace—those 3 volumes changed how I think about reality. God used them along with his specific preaching to shape my understanding of marriage and ministry and parenting and missions and work. So much of what he’s written has been captured in a smaller book called Brothers, We Are Not Professionals, and it’s written for those who are in full-time vocational ministry. And if you’ve never had the chance to study doctrine with John Piper, that might be a place I would start. These are five-page essays and I don’t know how many there are—maybe 30 of them in this little book. That really gives a worldview for life about thinking about ministry, thinking about who God is, what Christ has done, the different doctrines of the church, the place of missions, the reason we should expect suffering and all the while hoping in God.

There were actually—and I’ve mixed these in a few times—sometimes I don’t just have books, but two of the most foundational essays that shaped my early understanding of God and the world and have completely shaped my vision of ministry and theology of suffering: In the back of Desiring God, Piper has an appendix called “The Goal of God in Redemptive History.” And it just shows that everything God does is ultimately for his glory. And that is right, and that is necessary, and that is loving. And then second of all, is “Is God Less Glorious Because He Ordained That Evil Be?” That’s big God theology and Piper, I think very effectively building off the theology of Jonathan Edwards, shows that God is not less glorious, but indeed we are able to celebrate him as more glorious because he’s that big.

And then you mentioned missionary biographies. I’ve read many, many but I’ve been significantly blessed, especially through the audio versions of what have now been captured into a book 27 Servants of Sovereign Joy. It’s biographies that Piper gave on great men of the faith at 27 different Bethlehem Pastors conferences that have been packaged now into this book and it just stirs my heart for God’s work among the nations and the beauty of God, the faithfulness of Christ, the power of the Spirit. So much of my reveling in Christ has been nurtured through the ministry, the teaching ministry and writing ministry of John Piper. So that’s where I would start for doctrine, just biographically. How about you, Tom? Do you have any significant doctrine books that stand out to you as shaping your vision of God and love for Christ?

TK: Yeah. And what’s interesting is—so I’m actually staring at the Brothers, We’re Not Professionals. I remember this season in life reading it and the Lord just working on my heart in so many directions. Just my view of God growing and changing and I would say I love the books that I have found the most joy in as a believer are the books where the author is able to write not just as a scholar, but as a worshipper at the same time. And that’s probably a mark of Piper’s books. That is what gives you so much joy.

JD: I think so. When I find an author who’s able to worship while he writes and lead me to worship while he writes, I want to keep reading because God is the greatest joy that can stir a soul. And when we find an author who’s able to do that for us, keep reading.

TK: Right. Right. I think, Jason, you do that and it’s one of the things that I have loved in your books is that you celebrate—you celebrate Christ and faith. And I think to do less than that is really not treating our subject, which is the greatest subject in the world, as it deserves to be treated. I think of certain authors that have really impacted me—some—a book I actually first heard about from you and you actually mentioned it a little bit ago. Steven Dempster’s Dominion and Dynasty: A Theology of the Hebrew Bible in many ways shaped categories for me that I didn’t—I didn’t have those categories before.

JD: That’s so good. He—his book is on my list for how does the Bible progress and integrate and climax in Christ? It really—his book is a treasure.

TK: Mmm.

JD: For just unpacking the Old Testament storyline step by step working through Jesus’s Bible and showing us how from beginning to end—dominion, that is land, and dynasty, that is offspring—how those two themes are working together and interwoven all throughout the entire Old Testament, and culminate in the person of Christ as king over a universal realm.

TK: So what starts bumping together—all of it—you mentioned biblical theology. The idea of how the Bible is progressing, integrating, climaxing in Christ. Certainly that book is feeding that. For me, I think an author that really helped me get going—I and we worked as a church together—Australian author Graham Goldsworthy. Just reading his works was really significant for me because I realized a lot of the things he described as kind of the “don’t do this”—I thought, oh, that’s what I do. Everything you describe as don’t do—that’s as a lover of God, as a lover of his word. My approach to it was almost in his not category. You know in like how to tell a Bible story or things like that and…

JD: And it’s so helpful to gain perspective, yes. And so here you have a book that actually your practice disagreed with through and through, and yet God used it to put you on a new trajectory of biblical interpretation.

TK: Absolutely. Absolutely. And I, you know, you’re reading and struggling as you’re working through certain things because in some ways my life is fighting against what I’m reading because he’s pushing against things that practices of mine, but it almost feels like how the Lord has worked in my life. Different books, different authors—they’re pulling almost pins out or pegs, nails that are holding up practices or something that maybe don’t quite match up with what you read in God’s Word or whatever, and that’s a reason I would say for me at least, books have been able to—if somebody would say to me “I only read the Bible”—that sounds really healthy, except I’m not interacting with other people who also have been led by the Holy Spirit and thought very hard about the very same book. And I’m not acknowledging then I probably need to be pushed and prodded and moved. And so I would say he was one author, Graham Goldsworthy, that really pushed and shaped me in a really helpful direction.

JD: I think just building off what you just said—I think of Hebrews 13:7: “Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the Word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith.” That is a verse that justifies the reading of Christian biography. But it’s also a verse that justifies the reading of Christian theology to expand the number of leaders who have both through verbal and written word guided us and led us to Christ in order that we might in turn imitate their faith.

TK: And it, you know, for pastors who are listening, who work with people, I would just be encouraging people to be reading widely. It’s so good for your soul. So those—all of us have either been this person or bumped into these people. “I only read the Bible.” But it really is denying—I mean that the Holy Spirit has been working with people just like you just read Jason, for the church 2000 years and so saying no, I won’t hear from anybody else—he the Lord has to speak it to me directly for it to be relevant to me. We’re just cutting ourselves off.

JD: Yes, yes we are. I think it would serve readers—for our listeners for us to just go through our list and we certainly can’t comment on it like we have been. But how about I just go through quickly what’s here and listeners may want to pause and you know, go back, write down each of these books if you want, you know, a reading list for your summer. Or for many summers, these books that have influenced me, and then I’ll let you give your list and close us out for the day. How does that sound, Tom?

TK: I love it, love it.

JD: All right, so I can’t say that I agree with everything in this theological journey. What I’m about to lay out—I don’t agree with everything in these books, but all of these books have had massive influence either earlier in my theological development or later in my theological development. First on studying Scripture, John Sailhamer’s Introduction to Old Testament Theology, just thinking about method, thinking about the nature of scripture. It shaped me. Tom Schreiner’s Interpreting the Pauline Epistles—he was the first to put in print a pattern of what’s called arching, which is a process of thinking about the interrelationship of every clause in a passage and considering the significance of those relationships—purpose, result, reason, trying to understand the details of a passage and understand that flow of thought. Douglas Stuart’s Old Testament Exegesis—it was the first textbook I used to move me into the Old Testament, and it just raises all kinds of helpful questions for interpreting Scripture. And then for me it’s a very technical volume, but it was Steve Dempster’s doctoral dissertation that first opened up categories for me in how to read the Old Testament Hebrew text in order to understand the flow of thought. So that was books on studying scripture. Dempster’s dissertation was called Linguistic Features of Hebrew Narrative. That sounds pretty technical, but it was so helpful and very influential in, even today, how I approach scripture. With respect to theological method and biblical theology—early, early on, highly influential player was Meredith G. Kline. His books Kingdom Prologue, Structure of Biblical Authority, By Oath Consigned—they had a shaping view. He was the first one who, in writing, I was reading, who was taking me from Genesis to Revelation at every stage as I was reading the Old Testament. Next, and he’s a Presbyterian. He’s a classic covenant theologian. I am neither of those. And yet his work—he’s reading the Bible for the glory of Christ and reading in light of the complete context, and I’ve learned a lot from him.

Greg Beale—this is not a book, but an essay: “Did Jesus and his Followers Preach the Right Doctrine from the Wrong Texts?” And that’s in a book of collected essays, The Right Doctrine from the Wrong Texts that Greg Beale edited—highly influential in helping me think about how did the New Testament authors interpret the Old.

Scott J. Hafemann’s The God of Promise in the Life of Faith. Scott is a writer who stirs me to celebrate the greatness of God, the beauty of Jesus and God’s purposes from Genesis to Revelation. I disagree with a number of things that Scott says, and yet he was massively influential in helping me treasure the glory of Christ, the beauty of complementarity and the centrality of Jesus in the Bible storyline, and also in making me a Baptist who loves the covenants.

Douglas Moo’s “The Law of Christ as the Fulfillment of the Law of Moses” in the book Five Views on Law and Gospel. It’s extremely technical and very long, but massively influential in my own development.

Stephen Wellum’s essay “Baptism in the Relation Between the Covenants” in a book called Believers Baptism, edited by Tom Schreiner and Wright. It just walks through the whole story of Scripture and when I read it, I’m like, that’s what I believe. It was just at that point in my development, here’s a Baptist loving the progress of the covenants from Genesis to Revelation, and I was able to say he just captured in writing what I am growing to believe is true.

You already mentioned Steve Dempster’s Dominion and Dynasty. And then lastly for me, Peter Gentry and Stephen Wellum’s Kingdom Through Covenant or their more popular God’s Kingdom Through God’s Covenants—two very helpful volumes that I think perhaps better than any other texts help summarize the overarching storyline of Scripture that has Jesus at the center.

That was my list that I came up with in preparation. How about you, Tom?

TK: Oh, that’s a great list. Well, the same—I have books in front of me, Kingdom Through Covenant, Gentry and Wellum. I’m looking at it right now. Stunning picture on the cover of the Tower of Babel being destroyed. But that was a shaping work for me. Let’s see. So I’m just going to pick through a list here and authors that you would mention, but G.K. Beale has A New Testament Biblical Theology. It’s a very thick—most people would not like—you just talked about it isn’t a read from cover-to-cover sort of book. I’m just even looking how much this is—

JD: Although you read it from cover to cover.

TK: I did and that’s not because I like wow, that’s so excellent. It—the book is so great. As a—

JD: I totally agree.

TK: It—I remember and—I was just as we talked about this podcast thinking about, for instance, how he works through Daniel 7—there’s so many things you’d say that was worth the book right there. His comments in that section and have and continue to shape how I think about certain things. So his New Testament Biblical Theology and then he has a shorter work Handbook on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament, which is kind of like a how-to.

JD: It’s so, so exceptional in just bringing together so much of what he’s written through the years and showing his methodology. That would be the go-to book I would give people in considering how to think about Scripture’s use of Scripture.

TK: Right, right. You mentioned Tom Schreiner. He has a biblical theology of the Old and New Testaments called The King in his Beauty, which I find is written at a level that makes it very accessible for anyone and even the way he titled it—he writes as a worshipper.

JD: He does. He’s tasted and seen that God is good and he helps us do the same. So much of what Tom writes is exactly that way and I celebrate him as a brother.

TK: The Messianic Hope—and I don’t even know how to pronounce his last name. Is it Rydelnik?

JD: Yeah, I don’t know if it’s Rydelnik or Rydelnik, but an exceptional book.

TK: “Is the Hebrew Bible Really Messianic?” and he just goes—so arguments about the New Testament authors—it goes back to what you said earlier about did the New Testament authors misuse the Old Testament? And he’s arguing from the standpoint of no, they’re just properly interpreting what was already there. This is such a helpful volume, and it’s in a series where a number of the books in this series have been a real help, but this one in particular—I’ve given it to numbers of people.

JD: That’s right. So good.

TK: I’ve really liked it. Let’s see. I grabbed one that was more of a—I don’t think it’s a like normally a category I read a lot of books on, but there’s a book on that just shapes a way you think about a whole category that I didn’t have a category for. A book on heresy by Alister McGrath was super helpful for me. And even just his definitions, he just—I don’t know what prompted him, but went down a certain road and it was so helpful for me in thinking about heresy and how we define it. And I think the reason for me that I was thinking about it is we were just dealing with some things church-wise that I just had to think about some things that I hadn’t thought about a lot and I just found this very helpful. I’m just going to read something here and this would be an example though—I have like I can quickly open this and see. Yep, I wrote some notes right here. “The essential feature of a heresy is that it is not unbelief, rejection of the core beliefs of a worldview such as Christianity in the strict sense of the term, but a form of that faith that is held ultimately to be subversive or destructive and thus indirectly leads to such unbelief. Unbelief is the outcome, but not the form of heresy.” And then he goes on and he just says that heresy really is something that ultimately destabilizes our faith, but I just found this would be an example of a work that you pick up that shapes you in a way that in a surprising way, and maybe I just didn’t have even categories for it.

JD: That’s really helpful.

TK: Oh, really. And you might—I don’t know if you know him, Jason. I might pronounce his name wrong, but a newer work that I just read that was deeply moving to me—Gathercole. Do you know him?

JD: Yes, Simon Gathercole.

TK: The Pre-existent Son: Recovering the Christologies of Matthew, Mark and Luke. I found this work deeply moving. In fact, the group of churches I work with led a conference using just things that he had really driven, but his point was Matthew, Mark and Luke are seeing things and writing about the pre-existence of the Son of God. These are not later inventions of the church. I found this book deeply moving.

JD: Yeah, to have a whole book focused on who Christ is should move our souls, yeah.

TK: I have found books on language super helpful—aside from like Greek and Hebrew—but I’m looking at a book right now by D. Brent Sandy called Plowshares and Pruning Hooks: Rethinking the Language of Biblical Prophecy and Apocalyptic. That book for me was really helpful in helping me think about what does certain type of language in apocalyptic literature, what’s it intended to do? And then a book by Robert Alter, professor of Hebrew and comparative literature at the University of California at Berkeley, his Art of Biblical Poetry would be an example of someone not written from a Christian perspective, but just theology-wise, really helping me understand how does biblical poetry work? What are the mechanics of it?

JD: So there is an example—you’re benefiting from someone who’s a non-believer in Jesus and yet gaining aid in how to read the Old Testament in beneficial ways.

TK: Right. And he’s written a number of works that I think in that way, and you said it earlier about different scholars who are Christian ones even, but like where you go—no, I probably am going to disagree a lot about a lot of things. But I’ve also found him deeply helpful.

JD: Non-believers can be close readers of the biblical text.

TK: For believers, there is a category I think of books too, that are easy quick read books that are great to give away. I’m looking at one—speaking of John Piper from earlier, his little book Risk is Right is the sort of one that would be a great one to give to a church for instance, over summer and just say this is something we would like you to work through this summer. That would be an example of something that encouraging all your people to read, something like that.

JD: When you have a God that you can be absolutely confident is in charge of all things, no purpose of his can be thwarted and he, through Jesus, is 100% for you, then be bold and take risk because you have nothing to worry about. You have a God who’s in charge of all and is on your side. I totally agree.

TK: Well, Jason, this has been super fun. There’s a whole category of books—commentaries—we didn’t talk about at all.

JD: That’s very true. Maybe next time.

TK: All right. We’ll see you then. OK bye.

JY: Thank you for listening to GearTalk. Please join us next week for a discussion about using Bible introductions, study Bibles and commentaries.