Review of Primal by Mark Batterson

Is this book for the complacent? Nope. But if you are hungry for change and ready to move from your state of spiritual sleepwalking into an intimate relationship with your Christ, then Primal by Mark Batterson should be your first read in 2010.

Batterson, author of Wild Goose Chase and In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day, will lead you on a journey of primal proportions. This book is not a "feel good" book with a simple message; Primal will challenge you to "go underground, below your actions to your motivations." Mr. Batterson forces you to answer uncomfortable questions, and he dares you to move back to your first love.

Mr. Batterson digs deep into each of these cornerstones of the Great Commandment - love, intimacy, knowledge and power. His brutal honesty about his trek into the catacombs of his soul can be used to guide you into a deeper walk with Christ.

Do you remember your primal feelings when you first came to know you were loved by Christ? Mr. Batterson knows how easily lost you can become in the busyness of today's Christian culture. He describes himself as a "paid professional Christian" before his primal awakening. In Primal, he gives excellent advice, issues life-changing challenges, and demonstrates God-given insight with one goal - "to take you back to that primal place - the place where loving God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength is all that matters."

If "growing deeper with Christ" is on your New Year's resolution list, then Primal by Mark Batterson needs to be on your shopping list for tomorrow!

PRIMAL is here!!!!!!

I'm very honored to be selected to review the book Primal by Mark Batterson before its upcoming release on December 22nd! I received my book and I am eagerly devouring it. Please watch for my review THIS WEEK!

Those who have been regular readers of my blog will be interested in the connection between PRIMAL and my thoughts on God's love for us.

The author states in the forward, " My aim in this book is to take you to new places intellectually and spiritually so that you discover new way of loving God. But I also hope this book takes you back to a primal place where God loved you and you loved God. And that's all that mattered."

WOW! I CAN'T WAIT TO FINISH THIS BOOK AND SHARE IT WITH YOU! Put it on your Christmas list now so you can make it the first book you read in 2010! You will not regret it!

Heaven Can't Wait, Part Two

So meanwhile you say, "Let's not worry or think about it.
Turn on the record player, and fill the room with jazz.
Live for today, do what comes naturally...
This doesn't take thought, or hard work, or being different.
"Heaven can wait."
But will young people, by postponing serious thoughts and refusing to think of spiritual things, eventually stumble upon some satisfying beliefs?
Will you one day - without thinking about it - find a satisfying experience with God?

Will you manage to find the happiness you seek by drifting along, day by day, "gathering rosebuds while you may"? Is it true that "Heaven can wait"?

Does Heaven wait?

Will Heaven wait?

Youth is the period of the most important decisions of life for which the Lord's guidance is particularly needed.
It is in youth that we form our basic ideals and philosophies...
It is in youth that we come to crossroads where decisions are made between right and wrong:
To do homework - or to sneak out the sexy magazine...
To take a low grade - or cheat...
And when caught doing something wrong to tell the truth fearlessly - or lie cravenly -
perhaps even shifting the blame to someone else.

These are the crossroads...
Here is where greatness begins its journey or weakness and evil take over.

Habits are begun in youth that solidify like concrete:
Putting off assignments until it is too late...
Telling little lies that grow into bigger lies that trap, enmesh, entwine, imprison...
Giving away a priceless treasure a little at a time until it is all gone, and you are soiled, distraught, bitter, and desperately disillusioned that love can turn so dirty...
Choosing friends that help lift your thinking, or lower it by feeding your ego, tempting you to do the things that deep inside you know are wrong.

It is in youth that we decide upon a life work.
Either we just drift into something as the only thing we could get, or we carefully prepare at home and in school for that niche in life which we feel is specifically ours.
But whether we drift or whether we steer a direct course, we achieve that place we choose in youth.

It is usually in youth that we select a life partner. And in this, the most important decision of our whole life, we need the help and guidance of a Wisdom greater than our own.

The prophet promised that it was the young who would see visions...the old who would dream their dreams.

Joan of Arc was only seventeen when she was riding at the head of the army that liberated France from the English.

John Calvin was twenty-six when he published his Institutes.
John Keats died at twenty-six...
Shelley was thirty when he was drowned, leaving English literature his undying Odes...

Sir Isaac Newton had largely discovered the workings of the law of gravitation when he was twenty-three...
Henry Clay was sent to the United States Senate at twenty-nine, and was Speaker of the House of Representatives at thirty-four...

Raphael painted his most important pictures between twenty-five and thirty - he died at thirty-seven.
Van Dyck had done his best work before he was thirty.

Jesus Christ was not quite thirty-three when He died.
For the most part, His followers were young men.

Those who gathered at Pentecost were young people...
The movement that started when the winds of the Holy Spirit blew through the streets of old Jerusalem was essentially a youth movement.

It is for all these reasons, you see, that Heaven can't wait.
The visions that are to be granted are given to youth.
But voices that are unheeded have a way of being heard no more.
And visions that shine through the fogs and above the mists have a way of fading and disappearing as time goes oozing out.

"Well," you may say, "it sounds fine. I do want to be happy with a lasting kind of happiness.
I do want to get the most out of life.
I want to be successful.
I would like to feel that there is a God who is interested in me and my life.
Of course, I don't want to make any big mistakes that will mar my life - that will mess it all up."

"I would like to believe that it is not simply a lot of sentimental pious nonsense to say that God cares whom I marry... that marriages are still made in heaven, that somewhere there is a particular person for me, that I can feel close to God in my daily life but - let's be practical."

"Suppose I am ready to call your bluff!
Suppose I am willing to give it a trial.
How does God become real to me?
What do I do?"

(Today's blog is copied in its entirety from a sermon preached by Peter J. Marshall; Heaven Can't Wait by Peter J. Marshall, 1963, p. 38. Part Three will be published soon.)

Heaven Can't Wait, Part One

Each one of you has a philosophy of life.
You may not realize it...
You may not even know it, but you have one nevertheless.

It may be sound - or it may be false.
It may be positive - or it may be negative.
It may be Christian - or it may be pagan.
Perhaps you could not expound it in so many words, but you have one just the same.

It lies back of every decision you make...
It colors every opinion you hold...
It suggests every action you take...
and it shows itself in a hundred different ways:
The type of amusement you seek...
The kind of pictures you prefer...
The magazines and newspapers you read...
The television programs you watch...
The slang you use...
Your favorite songs...

All these things are indicative of the tenor of your thinking and are clues to your philosophy of life.

Such a clue, I believe, is the title of a song of some years ago, "Heaven Can Wait."
It is indicative of a prevailing idea to which a great many of us subscribe...
"This is paradise enough" is a philosophy which says,
"We're only young once, let us have our fun while we can.
There's plenty of time for responsibility and serious thoughts.
We're not ready to settle down yet...
We're out for a good time, so don't be a wet blanket by asking us to be serious.
This is the time to be happy - so come along, let's dance.
Have another drink...you're only young once."

This idea is not new, nor is it modern.
You and your parents and your grandparents have been saying it down through the ages.
Always there have been young people who have fallen victims to this pagan philosophy and have expressed it in many different ways.

It was this idea that Robert Herrick expressed in the seventeenth century when he said:
"Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old Time is still a-flying:
And this same flower that smiles to-day,
To-morrow will be dying."

You see, there is nothing new about the idea of sloughing off of responsibilities or duties or thoughts of a future life.
There is nothing new here - but there is also nothing good about it.

I wonder why it is that so many young people are afraid of that which is high - afraid of high ideals, of high thoughts, of high morality.

Is it because so may grew up in homes saturated with cynicism and helplessness and defeatism?

Some of you grew up in an age when not only big sisters and brothers - but fathers and mothers took to drinking and staying out nights...
When young girls were trained to sever liquor in barrooms no better than the old saloon...
When American women were persuaded by brilliant advertising that it was fashionable to drink...
When Hollywood and Freudian psychology were making us sex-conscious as never before.

It is not surprising, therefore, that so many of you young people have lost your moorings...are confused and bewildered...And have the feeling that no one - not even God - cares about you.

Yet behind the "so what" indifference - the cynicism, the boredom, all of you want challenges and jobs.
All of you want to make your own way in life...unless you have been softened and spoiled by parental indulgence.

Most of you want to get married - and deeply and sincerely desire your marriage to be a success...
You want to have a home and a family and you want to see some light ahead for your children.

You would like to give yourself to something worthwhile, perhaps a hospital project...work with children...the church.
Inside are the stirrings and longings and a hunger for the real meaning of life.
You are in search of happiness but don't know where to find it, or even how to look.

(Today's blog is copied in its entirety from a sermon preached by Peter J. Marshall; Heaven Can't Wait by Peter J. Marshall, 1963, p. 38. Part Two will be published tomorrow.)