What I am perusing, reading, loving right now:
This year, David has led us into the New Testament to study/read together the Sermon the Mount. To help with this we are reading D. Martyn Lloyd Jones' 'Studies in the Sermon on the Mount.'
The first two chapters are intro stuff and already I am challenged, amazed, and expectant of the good ways the Father will use this study to grow me. To be any kind of follower of Jesus, Jones says, you have 'to face the Sermon on the Mount'. He dismisses those whose theology says you can't actually live it, and prods: 'It is a very terrible sermon, this Sermon on the Mount. Be very careful as you read it, and especially as you talk about it. If you criticize this Sermon at any point you are really saying a great deal about yourself. Let, us, therefore, in the words of James, 'be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath'.
These words, this teaching of Jesus, this Sermon is the living out of the Christian life...Jones: "Here is the life to which we are called, and I maintain again that if only every Christian in Church today were living the Sermon on the Mount, the great revival for which we are praying and longing would have already started. Amazing and astounding things would happen; the world would be shocked, and men and women would be drawn to our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ."
Before we decided to read the above, I picked up THIS book from David's table and laughed out loud. I had already read 'The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment' by Puritan Jeremiah Burroughs about ten years ago. My notes were all over the pages. I laughed because I knew I didn't have it, the contentment he was talking about. And to prove it I flipped the page and read his summary out loud to David: 'Christian contentment is that sweet, inward, quiet, gracious frame of spirit, which freely submits to and delights in God's wise and fatherly disposal in every condition.' The first four adjectives just did me in from the beginning. I knew I would read this book this year and I am very slowly gathering the nuggets. It may take me the whole year to actually digest and read it. And I am hopeful: 'the mingling of joy and sorrow' the 'mystery' of the contentment while a 'rare jewel' is not so elusive, it is a real thing, able to be had in Jesus, and Jeremiah Burroughs is going to propel me into the depths of my heart to see it all more clearly. It will be a 'work out' for sure, I will get 'beat up' and feel sore quite a bit, but it will be worth it!
Fun Read: The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics
This is a long book, but it is so well written. It really makes me want to go run or work out or get stronger (like after watching a Rocky movie). And more than truly analyzing the sport of crew, it details one man's life and the various tragedies and triumphs that pull him along with 'crew' at the center. I am thoroughly enjoying it and am only about 40% done!
The one other thing I am reading this year is Keller's little devo on psalms, it is short and gets me intentionally prayerful at the beginning of my devotions.
Read Aloud with kiddos: We just finished 'The Sign of the Beaver' (with all). I just finished with Tobin (who listens to both) Mother West Wind's Children and started Winnie-the-Pooh. Up next for all is Johnny Tremain, I think. David is into 'My Side of the Mountain' for their night time reads.
