Ask Pastor John: 750 Bible Answers to Life’s Most Important Questions by Tony Reinke. Crossway. 712 pages. 2024
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One of my favorite podcasts is Ask Pastor John, in which the host Tony Reinke reads questions from listeners to Pastor John Piper for him to answer. At the time of the writing of this book, 1,881 episodes of the podcast had been released, which have been played over 230 million times, or about 125,000 times each. Currently, Reinke and Piper release two episodes of the podcast each week – on Mondays and Thursdays.
Reinke tells us that to understand the podcast’s success, you need to understand one part of John Piper’s life, the part about why he thinks asking good questions is essential to succeeding in life. He states that over time, Piper came to discover that Christian learning is the process of heart convictions gained by asking great questions and finding convincing answers in the Bible. A quote from Piper included in the book was “All learning is the fruit of question-asking and answer-seeking”.
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BOOK REVIEWS ~ More of this review…
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BOOK CLUB ~ Truths We Confess by R.C. Sproul
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The author tells us that the purpose of the podcast is to disciple Christians into mentors who can better serve the people around them. The podcast doesn’t subvert local churches, instead it fortifies them.
This book is a guided tour, a narrated synthesis of the 750 most popular episodes of the podcast, mostly on situational ethics, over the course of its first decade (from January 11, 2013 to December 30, 2022). The book version of the podcast episodes is intentionally brief, blunt, and to the point. The audio recordings are fuller, warmer, and more pastoral. Reinke encourages us to use them in tandem. There are two appendices included – one that covers the author’s favorite six podcasts, and one is a full index of episodes featuring Piper from 2013-2022.
This is not like a normal book where you have to read from beginning to end, although that is what I did. I read this book like I would a daily devotional, reading one or two episodes/questions a day. You could do the same, or you could first go to the subject areas that most interest you.
The subjects range from Bible reading, to politics, calling, money, dating, sex, marriage, exercise, food, alcohol, social media, television, porn, Satan, sorrow, depression, leaving a church, retirement, suicide and much more. Some episodes will interest you more than others. You may disagree with some of Piper’s answers, and that’s OK. It’s good to engage with such a variety of important topics.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book, my favorite of 2024.
If you are not already listening to the podcast, I would encourage you to subscribe at https://www.desiringgod.org/podcasts
- Must You Read at Least One Spurgeon Biography? Tim Challies writes “I am not aware of a verse in the Bible that says every Christian must read at least one biography of Charles Spurgeon. Or every Calvinist, at least. But I also wouldn’t be completely shocked if it’s there somewhere and I’ve just missed it.”
- Study, Savor and Share Scripture: Becoming What We Behold. My wife Tammy has published a book about HOW to study the Bible. The book is available on Amazon in both a Kindle and paperback edition. She writes “Maybe you have read the Bible but want to dig deeper and know God and know yourself better. Throughout the book I use the analogy of making a quilt to show how the Bible is telling one big story about what God is doing in the world through Christ. Quilting takes much patience and precision, just like studying the Bible, but the end result is well worth it.”
We are reading through Truths We Confess: A Systematic Exposition of the Westminster Confession of Faith by R.C. Sproul. From the Ligonier description:
In Truths We Confess, Dr. Sproul introduces readers to this remarkable confession, explaining its insights and applying them to modern life. In his signature easy-to-understand style and with his conviction that everyone’s a theologian, he provides valuable commentary that will serve churches and individual Christians as they strive to better understand the eternal truths of Scripture. As he walks through the confession line by line, Dr. Sproul shows how the doctrines of the Bible—from creation to covenant, sin to salvation—fit together to the glory of God. This accessible volume is designed to help you deepen your knowledge of God’s Word and answer the question, What do you believe?”
This week we look at WCF 24: Of Marriage and Divorce. Here are a few helpful quotes from the chapter:
- Any sexual relationship between two men or between two women is clearly prohibited by the Word of God.
- The most basic, foundational unit of society is the family, and it is that very unit that is under such fierce attack in our culture today.
- There is a mandate from the Apostolic word that Christians are not allowed to marry unbelievers.
- Those churches that seek to be confessional and biblical in the matter of divorce generally reduce the legitimate grounds for divorce to two: adultery and desertion.
