Eugene Peterson, Eat This Book: The Art of Spiritual Reading (2006).

Eugene Peterson was pastor of Christ Our King Presbyterian Church in Bel 
Air, Maryland, until he retired in 1991 to work on his 'magnum opus' - 
his translation of the Bible into modern American English ('The Message').

In 'Eat This Book', Peterson is passionate about three things:

1. God's Word being in the language of everyperson - as was most of the 
Bible when it was originally written...

2. Peterson wants us to read the Bible for our spiritual formation - 
shaping us into our true being - rather than for information. ('To know 
much and taste nothing - of what use is that?' asks Bonaventure). He 
rues the modern tendency - even among Christians - for the 'authority of 
the self' to replace the authority of Scripture. 'The three-personal 
Father, Son and Holy Spirit is replaced by a very individualized 
personal Trinity of My Holy Wants, my Holy Needs, and my Holy Feelings'. 
Following his mentor Karl Barth, Eugene Peterson encourages us to 
approach the Bible 'as a book like no other book', which 'reveals the 
sovereign God in being and action'...

3. And Peterson wants us to know that the 'contemporary unbiblical 
preference... for information over story' leads us to organize biblical 
knowledge theologically, so that we can take charge of our own lives 
rather than submit to the message of the biblical narrative/s. It's what 
others have called our modern tendency to be 'over' the Word as its 
critic, rather than 'under' the Word in an attitude of submission and 
obedience.

More... http://tinyurl.com/7k8tn9

Rowland Croucher

January 1, 2009
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Shalom/Salaam/Pax!                         Rowland Croucher

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