Book reviews for Winter 2023
Retiring Well / Changed into His Likeness / What Is the Church’s Mission?
Retiring Well: Strategies for Finding Balance, Setting Priorities, and Glorifying God
John Dunlop, MD (Crossway, 2022) 179 pp.
Dunlop specialized in the care of seniors for some 50 years and writes from his own retirement experience. He shares what he has learned from his study of the Bible (God’s values and priorities), from watching many of his patients retire, from his reading, and from his own failures. The book is practical, and each of the ten chapters is organized around a specific strategy to implement: Determine your priorities, retire at the right time, retire in the right place, take care of yourself, love God, make good friends, enjoy and strengthen your family, avoid destructive pitfalls, get busy, and be flexible, adaptable, and resilient. Each chapter ends with questions to ponder and a prayer.
He includes recommended reading and other resources, including Christian financial advice for retirement. The three-page Scripture index shows how the book is informed by biblical wisdom. In the chapter on loving God (the longest chapter), Dunlop encourages us to focus on spiritual disciplines to grow in our love for God as we retire. Retirement may have its surprises and challenges, but Dunlop reminds us that “the end of retirement for those who have retired well will be to stand in the presence of Jesus and experience his glory . . . Let us long for—and live for—that day. That’s the final strategy for a joyful, fulfilling retirement that brings glory to God” (p. 167). Highly recommended for all ages!
Reviewer rating is 5 of 5 stars ★★★★★
Changed into His Likeness: A biblical theology of personal transformation
J. Gary Millar (InterVarsity Press, 2021) 271 pp.
Millar, principal of Queensland Theological College in Australia and Old Testament scholar, explores the nature of gospel-shaped change. He exposes the dangers of both promising too much (a suffering-free, resource-rich life) and expecting too little (minimizing what God can do through his Spirit in us). He has a fascinating chapter on the Old Testament and concludes that a careful reading of the OT “suggests that change or transformation is both necessary and deeply desirable, but remains elusive until the new covenant (i.e., the dramatic intervention of God promised in multiple places . . .) is set up by the coming Messiah” (p. 122). His concluding chapter argues that transformation is a New Testament reality. God changes us through the gospel. Millar says that writing this book made him “gasp all over again at the extent of his love for us, the extravagance of his work in us and the relentlessness of his commitment to us” (p. x). This book calls us to embrace the challenges and delights of a lifetime “of being changed by God into the likeness of Christ. It is a call to be both realistic and optimistic. It is a reminder that yes, the Christian life is hard, but we have been changed, are being changed and will be changed into his likeness” (p. 243).
Reviewer rating is 5 of 5 stars ★★★★★
What Is the Church’s Mission?
Jonathan Leeman (Crossway, 2022) 64 pp.
This short booklet does not take long to read, but it is packed full of wisdom. What does Jesus call the church to do? Leeman, editorial director for 9Marks, argues that the mission of a local church is to (acting together) go and make disciples (the whole family job). And our mission as an individual church member is to be a disciple by observing everything Jesus commands (the individual family member job). Leeman says that “making disciples plays a central role in being a disciple” (p. 23). He helpfully distinguishes between “root problems” and “fruit problems” as he looks at a gospel solution to humanity’s biggest problem. God is the solution, and “directing people’s hearts and minds to God is the most important thing a church can do and the singular activity around which everything else revolves” (p. 47). This is clear, biblical teaching on the mission of the church.