Two of the first books I ever reviewed dealt with the topic of sexual purity. One of these books, Every Man’s Battle by Steve Arterburn, stands out in my mind and the review I wrote continues to generate emails even several years later. The main teaching of his book is the concept of “bouncing” the eyes. What this means is that when a man sees something that is sexually tempting he is to immediately divert his eyes. The authors state that most men, after six weeks of doing this, will make it a habit and will no longer struggle with lust the way they once did. Their eyes will naturally bounce away from objects they once found alluring. When men stop filling their minds with lustful images, they can then learn to control their thoughts and stop the cycle of sexual fantasy. This is exactly the kind of solution people love to find in a book of this nature. It is a simple plan and one that depends largely on the willpower of the individual.

In the Introduction to her book Total Truth, Nancy Pearcey discusses the burgeoning Christian interest in the topic of worldview. “Just a few years ago, when I began work on that earlier volume [How Now Shall We Live?], using the term worldview was not on anyone’s list of good conversation openers. To tell people that you were writing a book on worldview was to risk glazes stares and a quick change in subject. But today as I travel around the country, I sense an eagerness among evangelicals to move beyond a purely privatized faith, applying biblical principles to areas like work, business, and politics. Flip open any number of Christian publications and you’re likely to find half a dozen advertisements for worldview conferences, worldviewinstitutes, and worldviewprograms. Clearly the term itself has strong marketing cachet these days, which signals a deep hunger among Christians for an overarching framework to bring unity to their lives.”

I used to be an avid computer gamer. From the time computers became widely available, I was using them to play games. I played them for long enough to know that they don’t make them like they used to. Modern-day games have not risen above the standards set by such classics as X-Com, Railroad Tycoon, Civilization, SimCity and so on. When these games were made, computers were primitive enough that a game had to stand on the merits of its gameplay. Graphics were not exciting enough to be able to hide a bad game within pretty graphics. With recent advancements in technology, games have undergone a radical transformation. Today’s games are rapidly becoming almost photo-realistic. This raises new issues about the morality of portraying acts of violence and sexuality that were mostly unknown even a few short years ago.

John Eldredge’s Wild at Heart is a runaway bestseller. Though it debuted in 2001, it still remains near the top of the list of Christian bestsellers and has sold over three million copies, no small feat for a title marketed primarily to Christians. Unfortunately, sales figures do not indicate which books are most faithful to Scripture (indeed, one could probably make an argument that sales figures are inversely proportional to theological faithfulness) and a large number of reviewers, myself included, have pointed out some troubling flaws with the book. In Fools Gold, edited by John MacArthur, Daniel Gillespie examined the book and nicely summarized the foremost problems with the book, suggesting it has: an insufficient view of Scripture; an inadequate picture of God; an incomplete portrait of Christ; and an inaccurate portrait of man. In short, the book was deeply flawed.

I don’t envy the man who writes a book on prayer, for I can’t think of too many topics that have been written about more extensively than this. There are many spiritual classics dealing with the topic and surely an author must wonder if anything he writes can contribute to the discussion. New to the fray is Prayer: Does It Make Any Difference by Philip Yancey. A guaranteed bestseller, this book, by virtue of the topic and the author, is sure to sell tens or hundreds of thousands of copies. And so it was with some interest that I read this book, interested in learning what so many people would learn from Yancey.

It was an interesting experience reading Suffering and the Sovereignty of God (edited by John Piper and Justin Taylor), for only a year before its release I had been present at the Desiring God National Conference where the contents of the book were first presented as keynote addresses. With only a couple of exceptions, each chapter of this book is drawn from one of those speeches (those exceptions being Dustin Shramek’s chapter and an appendix entitled “Don’t Waste Your Cancer” which was initially written by John Piper when he learned of his prostate cancer and was subsequently added to by David Powlison when he was diagnosed with the same disease). I had, then, some familiarity with the material before I began to read it. I knew which authors would provide a theological framework for suffering and which would focus instead on their first-hand experiences of suffering. I even knew what most of the authors would say. Still, I enjoyed reading the chapters as much as I enjoyed hearing the speeches one year ago. I am sure I learned as much from them the second time around.

On one of John Ensor’s web sites, “Heartbeat of Miami,” is a most sobering map. Showing the locations of each Miami’s abortion facilities in red and ultrasound-equipped pregnancy help centers in blue, the red dots outnumber of the blue by a margin of fifteen to one. As leader of “Heartbeat of Miami,” Ensor hopes within the next two years to increase the number of adequately equipped pregnancy help centers to at least 4. From his work directing this organization that constantly sees people at their most broken comes Ensor’s third book, The Great Work of the Gospel.

In an uncertain world, there are at least six things we can always count on. These six are the focus of J.D. Wetterling’s new book, No One…. Quoting Jesus’ words from the book of John we know that:

• No One can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again.
• No One can come to me unless the Father Who sent me draws him.
• No One comes to the Father except through me.
• No One takes it [life] from me, but I lay it down of my own accord.
• No One can snatch them [true Christians] out of my hand.
• No One will take away your joy.

These six “no one” statements form the framework for the book. Each one receives thorough, Gospel-centered treatment. Each chapter concludes with the promise that “these are unshakable certainties in an uncertain world.”

There are many things in life that are easy to do poorly but are much more difficult to do with excellence. It did not take me long as a parent to discover that it would not be difficult to raise children, but that it would be exceedingly difficult to do it with excellence. In the six years since my eldest child was born I have looked often for help and advice in becoming an excellent parent. Unfortunately my wife and I have received little mentorship in this area. Thankfully, there are many books written about this topic so we have often looked to these resources to provide the wisdom and training we know we need.

There are some sins that torment only some of us, while there are others that are universal. Pride is a universal sin. So is anger. And, unfortunately, I’m good at both of these. I do love to be angry. It feels good to be angry at times, and especially when the anger is righteous, or is perceived to be righteous. But, if anger feels good during the moment, it can sure feel embarrassing and shameful when reason has been restored. Because it is so often sinful, anger needs to be overcome.