Join The Underlines // The Best Of What I Read
A batch of the best highlights from what Joshua's read, .
The first word, psychikos, does not in any case mean anything like “physical” in our sense. For Greek speakers of Paul’s day, the psychē, from which the word derives, means the soul, not the body. But the deeper, underlying point is that adjectives of this type, Greek adjectives ending in-ikos, describe not the material out of which things are made but the power or energy that animates them. It is the difference between asking, on the one hand, “Is this a wooden ship or an iron ship?” (the material from which it is made) and asking, on the other, “Is this a steamship or a sailing ship?” (the energy that powers it). Paul is talking about the present body, which is animated by the normal human psychē (the life force we all possess here and now, which gets us through the present life but is ultimately powerless against illness, injury, decay, and death), and the future body, which is animated by God’s pneuma, God’s breath of new life, the energizing power of God’s new creation.
Surprised by Hope
N. T. Wright
The core claim of this book is that liturgies[8]—whether “sacred” or “secular”—shape and constitute our identities by forming our most fundamental desires and our most basic attunement to the world. In short, liturgies make us certain kinds of people, and what defines us is what we love. They do this because we are the sorts of animals whose orientation to the world is shaped from the body up more than from the head down. Liturgies aim our love to different ends precisely by training our hearts through our bodies.
Desiring the Kingdom
James K. A. Smith
The contemporary church model thrived in American soil. Americans’ staggeringly high appetite for church attendance, standardization, and franchising, accompanied by a significant reservoir of latent Christians who were only an invite away from re-engaging with the church, ensured that the model, if done right, could succeed. However, in other parts of the West, namely the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, and Western Europe, the model struggled to work as they found themselves further down the road of secularization.
Disappearing Church
Mark Sayers
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