It also includes essays on a range of homiletical challenges that textual preaching raises for the contemporary preacher, including genre, preaching without notes, inhabiting the text, and preaching without platitudes. Or maybe a figure of speech saying she was not pleasant to look at.

Does this seem like a familiar story? Only Christ is my life. Abraham was the example studied Go had promised and then given him a son.

The gods of moralistic religions favor the successful and the overachievers. New York: Riverhead Books. In Counterfeit Gods, Timothy Keller shows how a proper understanding of the Bible reveals the unvarnished truth about societal ideals and our own hearts. Counterfeit Gods: The Empty Promises of Money, Sex, and Power, and the Only Hope that Matters (p. 27). Abraham believed God was both holy and gracious. I underlined so much in this book, it is full of helpful insights. He's at his best in identifying these idols and illustrating them in the lives of different biblical characters (Jonah, Jacob, Leah and Rachel, and others). There is growing peer pressure to engage in sex and not get too emotionally involved... Once we get over our lingering Puritanism, the argument goes, sex will be no big deal. Keller starts talking about sin as a concept, how to notice you are idolatrous, then how to deal with it. Sessions include: Isn’t the Bible a Myth? What’s the moral? "Keller's work belongs on the bookshelf of every serious Bible student." It means also that some “errors” or side issues seem smoothed over to please the middle ground rather than Keller taking a stand(for instance of the political matters), not that it matters in the whole. The first chapter alone is worth twice what I paid for the book. It was sometimes used by one of my favorite authors, Allen Wheelis MD. But when we get that truck - we become disappointed. Potentially more than any other author I’ve read, Tim Keller has a knack for communicating how every aspect of the Biblical story subtly shows Jesus as “the better.” Chapter after chapter in Counterfeit Gods, Keller delves into scripture in a way that blows my mind, taking familiar stories and painting them in such a way that they feel new and more profound than I knew before. This six-session small group Bible study (DVD/digital video sold separately) captures live and unscripted conversations between Tim Keller and a group of people to address their doubts and objections to Christianity. Jobes treats three major themes of the letters under the larger rubric of who has the authority to interpret the true significance of Jesus, an issue that is pressing in our religiously pluralistic society today with its many voices claiming truth about God. I wanted to be free.”, Your life is hidden with Christ in God … and when Christ who is your life appears, you will appear with him in glory. Having sons, especially in those days, was the best way to do that; but it was not working. Idols drive almost every action I take, and I have just begun the lifelong battle of uprooting them and replacing them with the only One who is truly worth idolizing. This book is not completely perfect, the majority of it focuses on identifying idols, so much so that the last chapter on replacing idols can seem like an afterthought, but I would still highly recommend it to others. Hear God speak, not self help or opinions, The context that scripture and prayer are effective, Not just socializing - ministering the gospel to each other, The topic is identifying and dealing with idols, It is good, but not required to read through the chapter and make notes and questions, But not required - I am not quizzing anyone and it will all be covered, Starting applications - but Keller is layering in lessons that apply to all idols, Dream come true can be the worst thing that can ever happen to us -. Tim Keller does an excellent job of exposing the idols of money, sex and power and the many various forms that they take today. She approaches the three letters of John as part of the corpus that includes John’s gospel, while rejecting an elaborate redactional history of that gospel that implicates the letters. Counterfeit Gods Study Guide 4 All You’ve Ever Wanted Read Chapter 1 of Counterfeit Gods.

Locating Christ at the center of what God's image means, Kilner charts a constructive way forward and reflects on the tremendously liberating impact that a sound understanding of the image of God can have in the world today. The end of each chapter also does an awesome job of relating each of those idols to Jesus, showing how He is always the thing we need in those unique spaces in our hearts. Jesus. I found it very challenging - in a good way - as it really helped to highlight some of my idols, without piling on the guilt! Goodreads helps you keep track of books you want to read. I would have liked Keller to have a chapter on entertainment/Hollywood as I feel. Use this devotional guide to learn all you can about Him. The question of why there is pain and suffering in the world has confounded every generation; yet there has not been a major book from a Christian perspective exploring why they exist for many years. “beautiful in her figure and beautiful in her appearance” - the total package. She had come to look to men for the kind of deep affirmation and acceptance that only God can provide. Jacob was lovesick - Rachel became the only important thing to him, He is willing to work for seven years for Rachel, which was 4 times the going rate.

Can any more be said? "World When the people of Judah were taken captive by the Babylonians, their world was drastically changed. New York: Riverhead Books. How do you think This blocked Laban from profiting off of Rachel’s attractiveness. Isaac marries and his wife Rebekah has twins.

Keller has also a keen eye on where to do the approach and how to drive the point home, and manages to add new insight into things that have been explored by many before him. This is one of the books I'd categorize as a must read. Have you ever heard someone exclaim, “BUT GOD!” and then wonder what they meant? There was a defiance in that claim.

But he was called to sacrifice him. There’s hardly a chapter that goes by without clearly laying out the gospel, and yet it’s fresh every time. A helpful, biblically-based book which encourages us to see where we are valuing certain things too highly and living with them as more important to us than God. There is only one God who can wholly satisfy our cravings—and now is the perfect time to meet Him again, or for the first time. Rather, it comprises a single story, telling us how the human race got into its present condition, and how God through Jesus Christ has come and will come to put things right. Timothy Keller: Encounters With Jesus, Counterfeit Gods and Walking with God through Pain and Suffering, Walking with God through Pain and Suffering. 2. However, their God had been traumatized by their behavior and also grieved with them.