Extended Summary: Rick McKinley is the Lead Pastor at the Imago Dei church in Portland, OR [the church attended by best-selling author Donald Miller]. Pastor Rick writes this book in an effort to help us recognize the importance of seeing God's Kingdom as realized both in heaven and on earth. There is a real, perfect place awaiting us beyond this life, but Jesus says that the Kingdom is present here as well.
The book is easy to read, yet full of deep, challenging questions and ideas. I felt that it started a bit slow, but it got better as it went on [which I suppose is better than a book that gets worse as you read it].
Here's a great paragraph about the problem of many Christians today :
We take the "Jesus is our Savior" message home like a really good story, but Jesus as King has no place in our lives. Kings are for fairy tales and burger commercials. Kings wear clothes and funny hats. We don't need a king. What we need, we think, is a little more defense in our doctrines and a little more time to tidy up our messes. That's all we need; then our world will get better.
Except it doesn't. (pg. 31)
and later he answers this problem with the reality of the Kingdom:
The kingdom of Jesus is alive and growing, but not because we make it grow. We plant seeds of life. We water and weed. We sweat and hope and pray. But the dynamic of life in the garden is the kingdom at work. It is the life of God springing up around us. (pg. 65)
Any books I should read next?
2 comments:
I'm sure this is a good book, but I don't read anymore. I just listen to podcasts. :-) I like mckinkley. This is his best sermon where, in his words, "he ruins christmas". You can download it here http://www.sermoncloud.com/imago-dei/advent/
BTW, we are having a boy.
I also enjoyed the book very much. I am always intrigued by our challenge to "stretch the borders" of heaven by how we live!
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