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Brian’s Books

1. William Willimon, Remember Who You Are: Baptism and the Christian Life (Upper Room, 1998) & Sunday Dinner: The Lord’s Supper and the Christian Life (Upper Room, 1983).

When I first made the move to the CREC about 20 years ago, my pastor handed me several books to help as I thought through issues like baptism, the Lord's Supper, and Corporate Worship. Funny enough, one of the authors who had a profound impact on my understanding of the Reformed view of the Sacraments was a pastor who was not reformed... but Wesleyan. William Willimon's books on the sacraments are wonderful resources because they eschew academic language for earthy, practical anecdotes and storytelling. It's like learning theology from your grandpa while the two of you are out fishing for the morning. 

This past year I revisited two of his books - one for each sacrament. Remember Who You Are is on baptism, but is less a book about the doctrine of baptism than it is about the identity of the baptized. It was this book that first introduced me to the concept of baptism as the moment when God bestows a new name upon His child and brings them into the covenant community—the church. I was raised believing that my sin was a reason to doubt my faith—if I can't stop sinning, doesn't it mean that I'm not really saved? But this book changed my perspective; it helped me see that my identity in Christ is not contingent on my subjective feelings but on the objective declaration of my Heavenly Father. When I sin, my duty is to not doubt my sincerity but to "Remember Who I Am" and act accordingly.

Willimon writes, “‘You were washed,’ Paul reminds the contentious Corinthians, thereby ‘you were sanctified, you were justified (1 Corinthians 6:11)... Baptism sets our feet on a different path, gives us our true vocation, lets us see our true nature which our sin has obscured. We fall out of the ranks of the enslaved and start marching to the beat of a different drummer.’” (pg. 57)

This is a powerful statement, whether one is a credo-baptist or a paedo-baptist. The implications are huge for parents trying to obediently raise their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord—rather than teach our children to doubt when they sin, reminding them of their baptisms grounds them in their identity in Christ and reinforces their position in the family: They are a beloved child of God, and the Lord disciplines those whom He loves. 

The other book I read was Sunday Dinner, which is on The Lord's Supper and is very similar in tone to Remember Who You Are. Much like that book, Sunday Dinner had a profound impact on how I viewed the sacrament of communion—not because of its academic arguments, but because it connected doctrine to everyday, ordinary life. The primary idea in this book is that The Lord's Supper ought to be viewed as a family meal because the church is a family and our Heavenly Father invites His beloved to His table. Rather than reducing the Lord's Supper as a time of introspection and discernment, Willimon emphasizes that the invitation to the table is not "Take, and understand," but "Take and eat."

Willimon writes, "How interesting that Paul's test for the validity of our worship is not the qualifications of the celebrant, correct formulae, proper rubrics, or other liturgical tests we often apply! The test is in the quality of the community's life together. Many people see Sunday morning as primarily a private time for 'me and Jesus' individualism and subjectivism... Private, personal meetings with God have their time and place. But church on Sunday is not the time or the place. Sunday is a family day. It is a joyous day to get together, to reform and re-form the body, to meet one another, and to meet God. We are called forth from our rugged individualism and yoked to the Body. Unlikely, separated individuals are converted into family. We come to the table as virtual strangers; we rise and go forth as kinfolk." (pg. 105)

Since Willimon is a Methodist, there are some things I quibble with. Willimon is not always favorable toward Calvinists (though he does quote Calvin favorably). But on the whole, both of these books are filled with wonderful stories and eye-opening metaphors that help the reader understand the Sacraments as gifts from a gracious Father to His beloved children. 

2. Wallace Stegner, Crossing to Safety (Modern Library, 2007).

Over the last 10-15 years I have grown to love the communal novels of authors like Wendell Berry, Marilynne Robinson, and Annie Dillard—novels that tell family stories spread over long periods, often with agrarian themes, and mixed with moments of humor and sorrow, trial and triumph. Because of this, Wallace Stegner was recommended to me and I very much enjoyed reading it. Stegner is a superb storyteller and reminds me of a "northern-minded" Wendell Berry. The story focuses on two couples and their life-long friendship. There are moments of devastation, moments of laugh-out-loud comedy, and moments of keen insight:

 Stegner writes, "Ambition is a path, not a destination, and it is essentially the same path for everybody. No matter what the goal is, the path leads through Pilgrim's Progress regions of motivation, hard work, persistence, stubbornness, and resilience under disappointment. Unconsidered, merely indulged, ambition becomes a vice; it can turn a man into a machine that knows nothing but how to run. Considered, it can be something else - pathway to the stars, maybe. I suspect that what makes hedonists so angry when they think about overachievers is that the overachievers, without benefit of drugs or orgies, have more fun."

I still prefer the novels of Berry and Robinson, not least because - at the end of the day - their Christian worldviews can't help but shine through their stories. I am not sure if Stegner is a believer... and that makes me a little sad because these are the kinds of characters I want to meet in heaven... Charity Lang, in particular, is one of the great literary figures. That said, I will still carve out time for another one of his novels - likely Angle of Repose, which is considered his best.