Recommending books without ruining souls
Mar. 20 2007
A few weeks ago there was some discussion about a book we recommended. The book was by an author we love and respect but someone pointed out that he holds a position we don’t think is scriptural. Can we still recommend the book if we don’t believe everything the author believes?
Of course, this is a bigger issue than just one book or one author. How much and what kind of error can a book contain before we just can’t recommend it to anyone anymore? What does practicing a humble orthodoxy look here?
In short: How can we recommend books to our friends without turning them into heretics and ruining their souls?
We spent some time talking about it and asked a very smart theologically minded friend of ours (most of this is stolen shamelessly from him). Scripture says to, “Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers” (1 Tim 4:16 NIV). Here are a few ways to watch your doctrine closely in this area…
You’re not going to find a list of “good” and “bad” authors here. Instead we’ve come up with a few principles we believe are helpful when dealing with these issues.
First, you can commend different books to different people for different reasons. This seems pretty obvious when we’re not talking theology. Homer is read for his literary merits and historical significance, but not as a guide to ethics.
Sometimes certain books cannot be recommended to certain people at all, because they presently lack the discernment to benefit from it, though later in life they might profitably read it. Hemingway may have a lot to offer but we should take his books out of the hands of our chronically depressed friends.
The same principle applies to the theology we read. No non-biblical writer is infallible. We’ll often need to temper our recommendations to the person we’re talking to. For young Christians and people still growing in discernment, we have to be extra cautious in what we recommend.
But the reality is that it’s difficult to read very much Christian literature without coming across some degree of error, and in these cases, readers should be warned. There are no “safe” authors or preachers, outside of Scripture, whom we may read or recommend uncritically. On the other hand, there are a great many authors who are mostly wrong but who we can still learn from, if we read them critically.
When we recommend books we try to make the necessary qualifications and warn people about potential weaknesses. Why? Because when a person reads a book about God, the health of their soul is at stake. Loving our brothers and sisters in Christ means we caution them about errors they may encounter in books we recommend.
But we can recommend one book wholeheartedly while not agreeing with everything an author believes. For example, my church’s pastoral team has benefited recently from reading Mark Dever’s book “The Deliberate Church.” Even though some of what Dever talks about applies only to Baptists, they have benefited from many other things he had to say because his counsel was rooted in scripture.
So how does humble orthodoxy fit into this? Well orthodoxy looks like holding onto truth even when it’s not “hip” or “relevant.” We have to take a hard look at the content of what we read and determine whether it lines up with scripture. We want to be like the Jews in Berea that scripture says, “received the word with all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so” (Acts 17:11 NIV). We’re going to talk about discernment at Na 2007, and the reality is that it’s tough.
Hebrews 5:14 says, “But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil. (Heb 5:14 ESV) Discernment takes work. It takes constant practice. It’s hard. But it’s necessary every time we open a book.
At the same time humble orthodoxy looks like holding onto truth, not loosely, but humbly. We hold on humbly because we are all sinners and only God’s word is infallible.
Humble orthodoxy also looks like avoiding disagreements for the sake of disagreeing. In 1 Timothy Paul criticizes those who “devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies. These promote controversies rather than God’s work—which is by faith” (1:4). Pointing out an author’s flaws should be done clearly, but done humbly because on our best days we are all sinners with flawed understandings of theology. And we are just as fallible as any author. It is only by God’s grace that we are able to be discerning in the doctrine we hold.
Last, keep the main thing the main thing. Keep the author’s treatment of the gospel at the forefront of your mind. If an author has the gospel right then we have a brother in Christ. We love the example of C.J. Mahaney, Al Mohler, Ligon Duncan, and Mark Dever with their work on Together for the Gospel. Four men holding diverse views about the secondary truths of scripture can all partner together on the essentials. They can still hold to what they believe scripture says—and disagree at times about what scripture says—but be postured to humbly learn from each other. That, I think, is humble orthodoxy.