One of my favorite statements from Jesus is found in Matthew 11:28-30, where He said Come to Me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light. There is so much beauty in those verses.

December’s book of the month, Dane Ortland’s Gentle and Lowly: The Heart of Christ for Sinners and Sufferers is based on that text. This book helped me as a follower of Jesus Christ, and it taught me how to better pastor people who are hurting or mired in sin.

Many Christians who get mired in sin believe that God is displeased with them. They have fallen out of favor. Perhaps God is even waiting for a chance to make them pay for their weaknesses. Sufferng can raise similar thoughts. Maybe their hardship is God’s punishment for some past sin. Because they feel guilt, shame, or despair about life, they think that God must feel the same way about them.

This book paints a very different picture. Christ is not an aloof Monarch. He is a gentle Savior who is drawn to us in our weaknesses. He does not deal harshly with a weak lamb. He is tender, stooping down into their muck so He can lift them out of it. He is the shepherd who leaves the 99 sheep to find the single stray. When He finds it, He lifts it gently to His shoulders and carries it home. Once it is safely back into the fold, He rejoices over its restoration. 

I do not know of a book that better captures the heart of Christ towards the weak, weary, or hurting. Ortland understands God’s grace in a profound way, and he has the skill to communicate its depths in understandable ways. To the self-righteous person who thinks God accepts them because of their performance, this book will have little effect. But to the person who is wearied by the struggles of this life, tired of their sin, and ready to move from guilt to freedom, this book will be a comfort and a teacher. Freedom from sin and strength in suffering comes from drawing near to the Savior whose gentle and lowly heart compelled Him to deal with our sin on the cross. This is the heart of the Savior who said, “Come to Me all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”

In 2016, I attended a pastors’ conference with a theme on holiness. One of the speakers commented that helping people understand the relationship between Law and Grace is one of the hardest things a pastor must do. By Law, he meant God’s standards of righteousness communicated throughout the entire Bible, but especially in the books of the Law. Grace points to God’s undeserved favor expressed by forgiving those who have transgressed His righteousness. Although this truth is also found throughout the Bible, it is seen most clearly in the person and work of Jesus Christ described in the gospels and explained in the epistles of the New Testament.

If we are not careful, we wrongly divorce Law and Grace from one another. We do this with statements like God is a of justice in the Old Testament but a God of grace in the New Testament. We almost act as if there are two gods in the Bible, the wrathful God of the Old Testament and the loving God of the New Testament.

This polarization often shows up in our approach to the Christian life. On one hand, there is the antinomian. This is a fancy word that describes those who say God does not care how someone lives after salvation. His grace places no demands upon us. He is just happy we looked to Christ for salvation.

On the other hand, there is the legalist. They prefer the Law of God. They create checklists of rules, then gauge their own godliness and everyone else’s based upon their capacity to keep the rules. In this system, it is common for people to think that God favors the rule followers over those who struggle with sin.

Both the antinomian and the legalist misunderstand the relationship between law and grace. One says it doesn’t matter how I live; God’s grace covers it all. The other says I must make myself acceptable to God through my actions. Most of us have a propensity in one direction or the other. Churches also tend to lean in one direction or the other.

But there is a third, biblical approach to the Christian life. It is a way that does not see law and grace as opponents, but as partners. God’s grace is sufficient for all our sin. We do not earn our standing before God; we receive it through the mediation of Christ. Yet God cares how His people live. He commands us to be holy because He, our God is holy. Therefore, His grace remains operative in us after salvation, enabling us to live a life of holiness. Learning to cooperate with God’s ongoing work of grace in our life is key to spiritual growth. 

This is why I am recommending Kevin DeYoung’s book The Hole in our Holiness: Filling the Gap between Gospel Passion and the Pursuit of Godliness as November’s book of the month. DeYoung is a skillful writer who has the ability to make big concepts understandable. This book is easy to read, practical, and most importantly, saturated with Scripture.  It captures well the tension found in Philippians 2:12-13, where we are commanded to work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. But we do so with the knowledge that it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.

October’s book of the month is Newton on the Christian Life: To Live is Christ by Tony Reinke. Crossway has published a series of books focused on various historically significant pastors’ and theologians’ approach to growing into faithful followers of Christ. I have read and benefited from several of them, but this book is uniquely good.

Who was John Newton?

Most Christians have a vague idea of who John Newton was because of the enduring popularity of his hymn Amazing Grace. Most people know that he was captain of a slave trade ship who converted to Christianity and eventually wrote the famous hymn. What most people do not know is that Newton was a pastor, prolific hymn writer, publisher of books and hymnals, and spiritual mentor to pastors and laymen alike. He was one of the most influential Christians in England for much of his life. It was not until after his death that Amazing Grace became popular. 

What this book is

This book is not a biography of Newton’s life. If you would like to read a biography, I would recommend Jonathan Aitken’s book John Newton: From Disgrace to Amazing Grace. Instead, it is a book that seeks to capture the heart of Newton’s pastoral ministry. The hope is that we learn from a skilled soul physician how to live the abundant life Christ redeemed us to have. Newton was a skilled letter writer. These letters serve as the primary source for the book’s explanation of how we live the Christian life.

Why I love the book

There are a lot of concepts thrown around in Christian circles that we can get very familiar with without truly experiencing them in our daily lives. Terms like born again, grace, abiding in Christ and walking by the Spirit are things we can define yet not know the transforming power of God in the experience of them. Talking about them is not the same thing as internalizing them.

I picked this book up in a season when I was weary and my relationship with God was not as intimate as it could have been. It was an instrument of God’s grace to me at the time. Newton helped me understand God’s grace better. He strengthened my walk and taught me more about what it means to abide in Christ. The book introduced me to a pastor who thought of himself as a physician for sick souls. His gentle yet courageous way of speaking truth into struggling people’s lives was instructive to me as a pastor.

I try to be a discipled and consistent reader. It is rare for me to read a book more than once, and it is even less rare for me to say that a book has made my list of top five books to affect me most. Yet I have read this book three times. Each time it has ministered to my soul. I have recommended it to others who gave similar reports. It is definitely in my list of top five books. I trust you will be blessed by it too if you choose to read it.

1 Kings 21 describes Solomon’s great wealth. It tells the story of his trading ships which went all over the Mediterranean trading goods. Once every three years they returned to Jerusalem with various kinds of wealth, including apes and peacocks. These were exotic animals not native to Israel. They were novelties that only the wealthy could afford to enjoy. It is like a wealthy person owning a tiger or some other exotic pet today. It is a sign of wealth and privilege. The many zoos across America filled with animals from other continents point to a similar wealth among us.

This question reminds us how important it is to learn the times and cultures of the Bible. The most recent parts of the Bible were written almost 2000 years ago. The events in 1 Kings 10 took place nearly 3000 years ago. They lived in a very different time and place. Many things they thought, did, and prioritized seem strange to us. If we are to properly understand the Bible, we must become familiar with their culture and times.

One of the principles of sound bible interpretation is asking what did this mean to the original audience? To answer this question, we must know their times, setting, and culture. Only after we understand what the text meant to the original audience can we ask how does this apply to our times, setting, and culture?

This is why the ongoing study of the Bible is important. It takes time to build a catalogue of knowledge about Bible times and cultures. Through intentional study, we gain a working knowledge of these things that greatly aid our understanding of the text. Questions like the one above are healthy because they recognize that something is happening here that I do not understand, but I want to know why! 

Context is king in Bible interpretation. Understanding the culture is vital to understanding the context. The Bible begins to yield its greatest treasures to us when we read it carefully, ask good questions of the text, and then find answers to those questions.