Reading “The Good God”

I announced in my previous post that March is Trinity month and that the Theology Network ran a competition to win a copy of Michael Reeves’ new book, “The Good God: Enjoying Father, Son and Spirit.”

Well, in God’s providence I was a winner of the book and it arrived this last Friday. I have started reading it already, although I have only finished the ten pages of the introduction so far.

March, being Trinity month, I started and finished Fred Sanders’ book “The Deep things of God: how the Trinity changes everything.” I also went back to James White’s book, “The Forgotten Trinity: Recovering the heart of Christian belief” and had a look at some of the things in the book that I highlighted. Out of these two books, I appreciated White’s book more because he shows exegetically how he got to his belief in the Trinity, and not so much philosophical talk (not that I am against philosophy, but as Christians, our belief is based first on the Bible’s declarations). I am also not saying that Sanders did not go to Scripture either. I just found that White’s exegesis was more thorough. White’s book is more a why-we-believe-in-the-Trinity book, whereas Sanders’ book shows how the belief in the Trinity touches our lives as Christians.

I will finish “The Good God” as soon as possible, and then I will tackle Alister McGrath’s book, “Understanding the Trinity.”

Here are a few good quotes from “The Good God”:

“[T]he truth is that God is love because God is a Trinity.” p vii

“Christianity is not primarily about lifestyle change; it is about knowing God.” p vii

“’... it would be madness to settle for any presupposed idea of God. Without being specific about which God is God, which God will we worship? Which God will we ever call others to worship? Given all the different preconceptions people have about ‘God’, it simply will not do for us to speak abstractly about some general ‘God’. And where would doing so leave us? If we content ourselves with being mere monotheists, and speak of God only in terms so vague they could apply to Allah as much as the Trinity, then we will never enjoy or share what is so fundamentally and delightfully different about Christianity.” pp xv-xvi