1st Quarter Reading
Here are my entries from my reading in the first quarter of
the year. One of my goals this year is to read 36 books. I'm well on my way
because I have been reading 50-55 pages per day.
862. Smart Baseball, Keith Law. 1/1/22 * * * * (A book about
baseball and analytics. He explains how old stats like RBI are unhelpful or
wrong, He describes what new statistics are and how they work. This is awesome.
He's a good writer. The emphasis on data and programming makes this a book
about the modern world and how statistics and analysis are changing
everything.)
863. Comfort the Grieving, Paul Tautges. 1/5/22 * * (I love
this series, but this book was not very good. The book Visit the Sick was much
more helpful on the grieving process and Conduct Gospel-Centered Funerals was
much better. This was lot of tone-deaf pastoring advice along with a long
checklist of work to do with those who grieve.)
864. The Disappearing Spoon, Sam Kean. 1/27/22 * * * * (I
liked this book on the stories behind the elements on the periodic table of
elements. Kean is an engaging writer and explains things really well. I don’t
have much knowledge of chemistry, and I could follow his explanations. It made
me curious about chemistry. Audiobook.)
865. Empire of Pain, Patrick Radden Keefe. 1/28/22 * * * *
(The story of Oxycontin and the Sackler family is one of the most important
stories of our time. This book is great. It looks at the family behind Purdue
Pharma. I checked the endnotes regularly because the story felt made-up. I
couldn’t believe people would do these things and then do those things again
and again.)
866. The Life of Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Iain H. Murray. 1/29/22
* * * * (I admire and resonate so much with what I knew of MLJ that I thought I
should learn more about the man. I loved this book. This is a shortened version
of the two volume one Murray did first; he said that he mainly removed a lot of
extended quotations. This was still over 400 pages. This book encouraged me a
lot because living through World War One as a young man and then pastoring
through World War Two has a lot of similarities to living in and pastoring in
these times. Our current challenges within the church--and as a local church
pastor-- and in our culture are very similar to the challenges he lived
through.)
867. The Cubs Way, Tom Verducci. 2/4/22 * * * (I wanted to
understand how Theo Epstein built the Chicago Cubs with advanced statistics to
win the World Series. This book didn’t address that much and felt like a
hurried look mostly at the manager, Joe Maddon. In the final paragraph of the
acknowledgements, Verducci says he wrote it inthe two months after the Cubs’ win. That lack of
perspective shows.)
868. The Plan, David Kaplan. 2/11/22 * * * (I liked this
book on the Cub’s 2016 build and championship better than the one by Tom
Verducci.)
869. All Creatures Great and Small, James Herriot. 2/15/22 *
* * * * (This is so excellent--perfect for bedtime reading. It is a warm memoir
of being a vet in the early part of the 20th Century in the North of England.
The best thing is that it made me see and feel the places. It is hilariously funny too! I ignored this book growing up
because it seemed sappy and boring. It is anything but boring or sappy.)
870. The Pastor: A Memior, Eugene H. Peterson. 2/23/22 * * *
* (I reread this. This is a memoir of Peterson’s life as a pastor. I read this
years ago before I became a real pastor. Our theologies are quite different,
but I appreciate that we see the world and the problem of the church in similar
ways. Our remedies are different, but he helps me see some of the
shortcominings of the American church and culture.)
871. The Good Who Goes Before You, Michael S. Wilder and
Timothy Paul Jones. 2/23/22 * * * (This reads like the lecture notes from a
class on pastoral leadership. As I read leadership books, this is the best on
pastoral leadership from a biblical perspective. Their main point is that
pastoral leadership means following Jesus and being a brother and shepherd to
the church that God leads. Most leadership books that I’ve read are not about
following Jesus but about getting things done. This grounds pastoring in the
identity of a shepherd, and it gives me confidence and patience. It is hard to
read though; it isn’t well-written and has too many charts and diagrams to be
easy to read.. I had to move from reading line-by-line to x-raying sections to
find the main points. Then I restated the point of the passage.. That is why I
say it reads like lecture notes. I traveled in Indonesia for a couple of
classes with Dr. Wilder when I was in seminary.)
872. Area 51, Annie Jacobson. 2/24/22 * * * (Audiobook. This
was a lot more measured than I thought it might be. I didn't want a conspiracy
theory book and have read Jacobson before. She didn't disappoint, and it was a
mostly a military technology book.)
873. Total Power, Kyle Mills. 2/24/22 * * (I like Mill’s
plots and writing, but Mitch Rapp is quite cruel in this book. I don’t remember
him being so cruel. That reminds me why I like Daniel Silver more. This is like
the book equivalent of junk food--military/spy fantasy.)
874. Enemy at the Gates, Kyle Mills. 3/6/22 * * (The book is
fun, and I enjoy the series. I didn’t care for this installment in Vince
Flynn’s Mitch Rapp series. The main plot conflict didn’t reveal itself until
late in the book, and I didn’t care for the way the book finished.)
875. Northanger Abbey, Jane Austen. 3/8/22 * * * (I enjoyed
this and found it suspenseful. It’s not as good as Austen’s other more famous
novels, though.)
876. The Perfect Weapon: War, Sabotage, and Fear in the
Cyber Age, David Sanger. 3/13/22 * * * (Audiobook. This was an interesting look
at cyberwarfare, warfare, and hacking. It was odd because so much of it
referenced Russia and Ukraine in a different context than the current war. It
shows that the current war is a continuation of conflict between them.)
877. Irresistable, Andy Stanley. 3/17/22 * * (This is an
expansion of Deep and Wide. I read it to understand the current controversies
around Stanley and his teaching. I think he is being more shock-jock than
serious with his language. He is basically arguing two things: there is much
discontinuity between Israel and the church and thus the Old Covenant and the
New Covenant, and there is a lot of bad hermeneutics in the church that
interprets the Bible badly and drives people from the faith. Then he uses those
two arguments against the New Atheists, people leaving Christianity, or people
never considering Christianity in the first place. He argues for a certain way
of speaking about the Old and New Testaments--covenants--to persuade people to
consider and then follow Jesus based on the resurrection of Jesus. The problem
I see is that his shock-jock language about Scripture undercuts the church and
what he is trying to do to persuade people to consider Jesus’ claims. His
context in Georgia is what he is speaking to and since I grew up in Georgia, I
understand a bit of what he faces. I think his language creates more room and
gives more permission for people to leave the faith than it does to open wide
the invitation of Jesus. I prefer Tim Keller’s use of apologetics and the resurrection than Stanley’s.)
878. Power Ball, Rob Neyer. 3/20/22 * * * * (This was the baseball book that I wanted to read. It
was a book examining all the modern baseball trends by looking at one game.
Neyer calls it Postmodern Baseball, and describes all the ways that it has
changed, is changing, and needs to change. This was the fourth baseball book I
read this year, and it along with Smart Baseball are the books to read.)
879. My Name is Asher Lev, Chaim Potok. 3/27/22 * * * * (I
loved this in college and wanted to return to it and see if it has grown with
me. I enjoyed it and see more depth in it, but I don’t know why I loved it as
one of my favorite books. That sounds like I am down on it, but I’m not. I
enjoyed it so much; just not as much as I did the first time.)
880. The Doctrine of God, John Frame. 3/31/22 * * * (I liked
this less than I expected. The order of the book was jumbled, and I didn’t care
for it. The length also allowed him to ramble and interact with theologians
that I didn’t care about or see relevant. I prefer his Systematic Theology
because he was required to be briefer. The first 200 pages are still the best
part of this book.)