Hello faithful readers! I managed to sign myself up for free
books in exchange for book reviews through the website The Speakeasy and the writer
Mike Morrell, who, if you’re interested to know more, helped write a book by
Richard Rohr on the Trinity. I’m hoping to get some new and exciting reads out
of it. More information here.
I was at church the other day, talking to a friend about
how, in the progressive wing of the mainline church, it’s easy for us to say
what we’re against: exclusion, judgement, taking the Bible literally, etc. But
it’s harder to say what we’re FOR. This book, A Resurrection Shaped Life: Dyingand Rising on Planet Earth by Jake Owensby, is an exploration of what
resurrection could mean in a progressive church context.
An image that I love that opens the book is of a Japanese
practice of taking broken pottery and gluing it back together with a material
that has gold in it. The cracks become beautiful and sparkling – the beauty of
the re-formed bowl is its imperfection, the crack it has survived is highlighted.
Resurrection in our everyday lives is like this – what have we survived, what
are the scars that have been healed, what has marked us deeply and made us who
we are in our lives made new?
I appreciated that Owensby expands the meaning of
resurrection out from the standard sin and redemption trope that is so common.
The ways that God is saving us through Jesus move far beyond this into freeing
us from shame and moving us into acceptance, freeing us from a life where we
are always looking for someone else to blame into one where we live out of
compassion for ourselves and one another. Resurrection is also about how we
heal from our deep losses and griefs. And finally a life of compassion can lead
us into seeing the connectedness of all beings and working toward a just world
for all. Owensby closes by sharing that he believes in a life beyond this one,
that resurrection is not simply a metaphor.
Reading the book, I appreciated the personal stories and
concrete examples to ground the theology, and I liked and resonated with the ideas.
I didn’t necessarily feel like I was having an amazing new groundbreaking
theological experience. But on the other hand, I’ve been working on this
project of finding an alternative to substitutionary atonement for a while. The
book has discussion questions at the end of each of the six chapters, and it is
nice and short, clocking in at 106 pages before the acknowledgements. So I
think it would be excellent for book groups made up of busy people and for
folks who are new to the idea that there are more possibilities for what
salvation means than simply “Jesus died on the cross for my sins.” As it turns
out, God is saving us in all kinds of ways and transforming us again and again
through any number of resurrections.
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the author and/or publisher through the Speakeasy blogging book review network. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.
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