If you've done the math in the title of this update, you will already know we are posting five reviews this week. I will also mention a notable external book review of a runaway bestseller, so you'd best keep on reading.
Tipping the hat to Discerning Reader's friend and partner in the gospel Steve Burlew at Banner of Truth, we have posted three reviews of Banner books...and booklets. One of these days I'm going to have to post on the benefit of booklets, especially in light of Banner's brand new series of booklets called "Pocket Puritans", currently featuring four titles. Next week is Banner's stateside Minister's Conference, which Tim Challies will be attending and liveblogging.
Jacob Hantla, whose wife just gave birth to their firstborn, exists online at hantla.com and joins Discerning Reader as our newest reviewer. We nicked a review of Iain Murray's booklet about the atonement entitled The Cross: The Pulpit of God's Love while Jacob was at the hospital. We're glad to have him on board.
I (Mark Tubbs) have reviewed two fairly recent Banner efforts. I went to town on John Benton's book Evangelistic Calvinism: Why the Doctrines of Grace are Good News, which applies the Reformation acronym of TULIP to evangelism, and was very affected by a compilation of puritan Samuel Rutherford excerpts published under the title The Loveliness of Christ. As I note in my review, these excerpts help equip the reader to take ten looks at Christ for every look at themselves.
Leslie Wiggins offers the first of two reviews of brand new On-the-Go Devotionals for women from Crossway Books and written by Lydia Brownback. The first is entitled Trust: A Godly Woman's Adornment. Leslie, who is usually wary of feel-good, content-challenged women's devotionals, admires both the content and the format of this devotional. Come back next week, ladies, to find out the topic of Lydia's other On-the-Go Devotional - and one that I will be buying for myself.
Tim Challies has posted his review of Bishop V. Gene Robinson's semi-autobiographical book In the Eye of the Storm: Swept to the Center by God. Tim points out the various traps the book falls into but locates the epicenter of the problem in Robinson's liberal brand of hermeneutics.
Please also take time to check out Tim's expanded and reformatted theological critique of William P. Young's bestselling novel The Shack, another book that purports to reveal new truth about God outside the divinely set boundaries of Scripture. Tim has produced an attractively designed, downloadable review of The Shack ideal for printing off and passing on to friends, family, and coworkers who may come across this little book that does more harm than it does good.
And that's a wrap for this week. We're bound to have at least one or two more reviews of Banner books to mark the kickoff of the Minister's Conference next Tuesday, and other reviews besides.
