'25 SUMMER READING LIST, #15 - "THE PILGRIM'S PROGRESS" BY JOHN BUNYAN

This is the oldest book on my list, and the first one I've become familiar with. I heard an excerpt when I was in children's church in 6th grade. In the 80's, I saw two movies based on the book (one live action, the latter animated) and read an article based on the portrait of a pastor from this book.

I finally read it in the '90's. I wasn't aware until then that Bunyan wrote two parts of the story. The above mentioned movies were based on the first one, and I thought it was stronger than Christiana's journey. 

In "The book of Lists" I saw in the mid '70's, "The Pilgrim's Progress" was on top of "The Most Boring Classics." At first, I thought it might be anti-Christian bias on the compilers part, but after reading it, I can see why. There are a lot of discourses in the book, and it's easy to picture a non-believer to lose interest. Still, it belongs on my "Must Read" list.

By the way, this is the second of the two books that are on both my list and the Renovare list. 

 

'25 SUMMER READING LIST, #14 - "MERE CHRISTIANITY" BY C.S. LEWIS

 

I mentioned at the beginning the book "25 Books Every Christian Should Read." Only two of my 25 are on that list, and Lewis' classic "Mere Christianity" is the first. (The second is tomorrow). Now, to be honest, there are classics in the book's list that I haven't taken time to read (e.g. Augustine's Confession and Calvin's Institutes).

Who knows why I didn't finish this book when I first started reading it in '84, but I finally read it more recently and studied it with my pastor at that time (Richard Walton). While I don't agree with everything Lewis says, this book definitely is an effective defense of the faith. It originally was a radio program in England during World War II where Lewis was able to define what a Christian was.

While it didn't make my list, I also read "C.S. Lewis & Francis Schaeffer: Lessons for a New Century from the Most Influential Apologists of our Time" by Scott R. Burson and Jerry L. Walls. It helped me become more familiar with these authors. I found it interesting that the two authors seemed to identify more with Lewis (both did a lot of research on Lewis), but I finished the book being more of a Schaeffer fan instead.

'25 SUMMER READING LIST, #13 - "LOVE YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR MIND" BY J.P. MORELAND

I was in a meeting with church leadership training, and the group leader shared the chapter of "Love Your God With All Your Mind: The Role of Reason in the Live of the Soul" that dealt with how this focus translated into the local church. That chapter hooked me, and I thus read this book. Twice.

But which of the editions did I read? Both. The second edition  (which is what the cover is for) adds material to the first chapter, and rewrites the third of four parts of the book. To be honest, while both editions are good, the original fit the purpose of the book, examining the role of the Christian mind in evangelism, apologetic reasoning, worship, and fellowship. The second edition instead gives a strategy on how to reason - again, useful, but I missed the deleted information.
 

'25 SUMMER READING LIST, #12 - "LIVING THE CROSS CENTERED LIFE" BY C. J. MAHANEY

This is a book I've read twice, and need to read again. My wife and I were given C.J. Mahaney's "Living the Cross Cenetered Life: Keeping the Gospel the Main Thing" by our friend Steve Sering, and it is an excellent read. 

We know we're supposed to live in the power of the resurrection (Phil. 3:10), but the context also says we're to live in the fellowship of Christ's suffering and be conformed to the likeness of His death. This book helps us learn what those latter points looks like. Not the easiest book, and not one that makes us view ourselves as the wonderful people we aren't, but that's necessary in growing in Christ.

 

'25 SUMMER READING LIST, #11 - "THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE HOLY" BY A.W. TOZER

 I started this series off with a review "25 Books Every Christian Should Read" by Renovare, an organization that focuses on Christian mysticism and spiritual foundation. Considering that A.W. Tozer is considered a Christian mysticism, it should be a slam dunk that this (or another) book would be included. But it isn't.

I also have mentioned the differences between Biblical and Systematic theology. This book is an example of the latter. Tozer looks at nineteen  attributes of God. 

This is a challenging read. Me and some other men went through this book recently. But this book is rightly considered a classic.

MEMORIES OF MY FATHER ON FATHER'S DAY

Dad, foreground, at a birthday party for Becky, 2017. And yes, unless he used Grecian Formula without my knowledge, that was my Dad's hair color a month from his 84th birthday.
Photo courtesy of Pam Hall

A question just popped into my mind a few minutes ago: Did any of the classic horror actors (Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi, Lon Chaney Sr. or Jr., Vincent Price) ever get an Oscar nomination? And what does this question have to do with anything? I'll get to that.

I should have started with wishing you all a Happy Father's Day. And I'd like to take the opportunity to remember my Dad, who passed away September 23, 2019, at age 86.

I grew up in Fullerton, CA for the first 9 years of my life. Then, he seemed to disappear. A month later, Mom sent me to stay with his parents in Skull Valley, AZ (a lot smaller than Fullerton), who took care of foster children at that time, meaning I went from being an only child to second oldest of a half-dozen, three of those Native American. (By the way, I never knew my maternal grandparents.) 

Dad moved to Skull Valley around Easter time, and after landing a job as a radio announcer/DJ, he worked at different radio stations, mostly at KVIO in Cottonwood. He did leave that station for Needles, CA, followed by Kingman, AZ (2.5 months total between those stations) and then returned to Cottonwood. (The person who took his place at KVIO didn't stay, so Dad returned there after a 6 months absense). One memory I had was riding with him as we moved back to Cottonwood, and he told me that I had nothing to do with his and mom's divorce (which had never crossed my mind, but I might be in the minority of how most kids deal with a divorce). 

Those who knew my dad late in his life knew he showed movies at the Senior apartments he stayed in from '07 to '18. That was part of our lives. While in Fullerton, Dad and I saw movies together from those more in my interest (e.g. "Hey There, It's Yogi Bear" and "Yellow Submarine") to those more his type (such as "Fantastic  Voyage" and "The Day The Earth Stood Still." This continued through till Becky and I moved from California in '84. The radio station employees had a pass to Cottonwood's movie theater/drive-in. While he was married to my step-mom, we went to movies a lot, but he would take the older of my two younger stepsisters to John Wayne movies since she was a John Wayne fan, and he was excited when "Cinderella" came to the drive-in so he could take my youngest stepsister. (BTW, my step-mom had four daughters with a 12 year gap between the second and third, and I fit right in the middle of that gap.) One year, Dad got me a book with all the movies of Boris Karloff (and a John Wayne book for my step-sister). Since then, I've seen several movies of Boris Karloff. Which is where the question I asked came about. I did once ask him who was the better actor between Karloff, Lugosi, and Chaney Jr. (and Dad's answer was in that order).

One thing I remember is he was encouraging me to do what interested me. There was only exception: When I got home after armed-services day my senior year at high school interested in the military, Dad did his best to nip that in the bud fast. (I know my grandfather on Dad's side was too young for WWI and too old for WWII; Dad would have been the age for the Korean War, and I don't know why he wasn't drafted, unless it was an educational deferrment.)

I remember Dad telling me how the movie version of a couple of Agatha Christie Stories ("And Then There Was None" and "Witness For the Prosecution") varied from the original stories. A couple of years ago, I read her "Mousetrap and Other Plays," where the introduction said she didn't like some of the renditions of her stories because... they stayed too close to the original. In that 8 play collection, three were based on Poirot mysteries except Poroit wasn't in any of those plays. I came to the conclusion that it was Christie who changed the endings of those plays. I wish I had the chance to ask Dad about his opinion on that.
 

Don't remember the year, but I think it was in winter!

'25 SUMMER READING LIST, #10 - "KILLING CALVINISM" BY GREG DUTCHER

If you think this book is written by Arminians (or other non-Calvinists) to refute "the doctrines of grace," you not only haven't read the book; you haven't even carefully read the full title of Greg Dutcher's book: "Killing Calvinism: How to Destroy a Perfectly Good Theology."

This is a book written by a Calvinist to Calvinists pointing out how Calvinists fuel the fire of the oppositon and how to prevent it. However, I'm including this because some of these errors some Calvinists fall into (all of which are practical rather than theological) are ones that other theologies can imitate and equally need to avoid.