Simply Christian by N.T. Wright

Last week, while browsing the religion section at our local library, I came across Simply Christian: Why Christianity Makes Sense by N.T. Wright.  Though I’m generally skeptical of people who use initials instead of names, I put that bias aside and started thumbing through the book.  I’ve heard other people reference N.T. Wright’s writings and the title intrigued me.

I’m glad I did.  I ended up checking out the book and have loved it.  Here are a few of the take-aways at the two-thirds point:

• “Laughter and tears are a good index of being human.”
• “The skepticism that we’ve been taught for the last two hundred years has paved our world with concrete, making people ashamed to admit that they have had profound and powerful ‘religious’ experiences.”
• “We must begin to talk about God.  Which is like saying that we must learn to stare at the sun.”
• “Watching Richter play the piano or Tiger Woods hit a golf ball doesn’t inspire me to go out and copy them.  It makes me realize that I can’t come close and never will.”
• “Many of the questions we ask God can’t be answered directly, not because God doesn’t know the answers but because our questions don’t make sense.”
• “The Spirit is given to begin the work of making God’s future real in the present.”
• “God doesn’t give people the Holy Spirit in order to let them enjoy the spiritual equivalent of a day at Disneyland.”

That last line, by the way, is my favorite … so far.