Best Books of 2022

Many books that cross my desk are aimed at students or laypeople, rather than biblical scholars. I read and enjoy many of them in order to be able to recommend them to students and others interested in biblical studies. I leave at least a brief review of all the books I read on GoodReads. Of the 40 books I read this year, I'm limiting my "best books" list to those that were game-changers for me personally. 

Each of the following six books is not only beautifully written and impeccably researched, but opened up new vistas in how I think about God, Scripture, and the life of faith. I'm so grateful for the hard work that went into writing each one and to all those who were involved in releasing these to the world.

Women and the Gender of God, by Amy Beverage Peeler

This is a daring book. Amy Peeler tackles a controversial issue: the gender of God and its implications for women. For some, to raise these questions at all is objectionable. For others, Peeler's high view of Scripture will suggest that she herself is captive to patriarchy. However, readers who take the time to engage her argument will find that neither critique has merit.

Like it or not, many people today reject the Christian faith because of their perception that the Bible portrays God as masculine/male. Is the Bible even good for women? Peeler patiently shows why these questions are worth asking and how the Bible itself offers a robust response that both affirms women and glorifies God, without making God male. Part of her answer is to help Protestants recover the biblical portrait of Mary.

Peeler's grasp of the secondary literature is impressive. Her arguments are sophisticated and theologically astute. She is attentive to nuance in Scripture, and her faithful reading yields an illuminating vision of a good God who invites women to be full participants in God's work in the world. I'm so grateful for her work. I expect it will be an essential resource for years to come. 

Cursing with God: The Imprecatory Psalms and the Ethics of Christian Prayer, by Trevor Laurence

A remarkable work--lyrically inspiring and imaginatively compelling. For many, it will represent a paradigm shift. Laurence not only rehabilitates the imprecatory psalms for use by the church, but he demonstrates their compatibility with Jesus' call to love our enemies. This is more than a treatise on imprecation; Laurence offers a profound work of biblical theology in service of the church. He draws our attention to imprecation hiding in plain sight in the New Testament, and he charts a path for churches who are ready to recover this neglected aspect of the whole counsel of God. In a world plagued by injustice, this book is a gift we urgently need.

One of my favorite things about this book is the sample liturgy in the appendix. Although this is the published version of Laurence's dissertation, he offers such practical help for church leaders who want to shepherd their congregations in praying the imprecatory psalms.

Paul and Gender: Reclaiming the Apostle's Vision for Men and Women in Christ, by Cindy Westfall

In the stuffy room marked "Paul's Views on Women," where a weary debate has been at an impasse for centuries, Westfall raises the blinds and throws open the windows, letting in light and fresh air.
With my three degrees in theology and four-and-a-half decades in the church, I thought I had heard it all. But just ask my husband (at home) if he's ever seen me gasp so many times while reading in bed, and if I've ever interrupted him so many times to read him a sentence or a paragraph.

Westfall's conclusions are carefully researched and well argued. She has a way of turning things inside out to help readers see what was right there in the Bible all along. Her book simultaneously delighted and depressed me. If she's right -- and I think she is -- then some corners of the church have unnecessarily missed out on hearing the Spirit-empowered voices of women for a very long time.

Church leaders, I beg you to read this book. You can't afford not to.

Abuelita Faith: What Women on the Margins Teach Us about Wisdom, Persistence, and Strength, by Kat Armas 

Magnificent!

Kat's exegesis is impeccable and her stories are captivating. She weaves personal and international stories with stories of women in the Bible. The result is a compelling invitation to reconsider what counts as theology and to (re)discover the voices of those hiding in plain sight. An absolute must read. I devoured it in one day!

Disability and the Way of Jesus: Holistic Healing in the Gospels and in the Church, by Bethany McKinney Fox

Fox's book is such a gift to the church. The opening chapter was worth the price of the book! It shifted the way I think about disability. Each chapter addressed Jesus' healing ministry from a different angle--first century context, medical perspective, disabled persons' perspective, and pastors' perspective--followed by chapters on the seven marks of healing in the way of Jesus and the seven ways this can be lived out in the church. 

Although the first six chapters focus primarily on physical disabilities, the final chapter offers many ideas on how to include people with intellectual disabilities in the church. One of Fox's big ideas is that inclusion of people with disabilities is not simply an act of compassion modeled after Jesus, but that people with disabilities have so much to offer the church. She advocates for full inclusion of people with disabilities in the decision-making and ministries of the church and challenges us to re-think our services so that they are less reliant on verbal proclamation and more holistic and multi-sensory. I'm grateful for her careful thinking and clear vision. It's usefulness goes beyond the church -- this book has given me much to think about with regard to college classroom instruction and campus life. It was well worth the read!

Jesus and the Forces of Death: The Gospels' Portrayal of Ritual Impurity within First-Century Judaism, by Matthew Thiessen

An excellent reexamination of Jesus' healing narratives, demonstrating that Jesus did not disregard Jewish law. Several of his healings focused on those suffering from ritual impurity caused by lepra (a skin disease sometimes erroneously translated "leprosy"), genital discharges, and death. Rather than set aside the ritual purity system, Jesus removed the sources of ritual impurity, showing that his power was even greater than the temple.

Theissen includes a chapter on exorcisms and on Jesus' Sabbath "violations" as well as an appendix on dietary laws. These contribute to the overall picture that Jesus upheld Jewish law. 

So much of what Thiessen points out is evident to those reading closely, but somehow with all my years reading and studying the Bible I had missed it. An illuminating book!

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What's the best book you read this year? I'd love to hear about it in the comments below!

Lament's Crucial Role in the Ministry of the Church

In my last post, I discussed three misconceptions about lament. Now I'd like to highlight four reasons why lament is essential to the ministry of the church. I'll be drawing on the excellent work of a Ugandan author, Emmanuel Katongole, catholic priest and professor at Notre Dame. His book, Born from Lament: The Theology and Politics of Hope in Africa, is one of the best on this topic.

Did you know that laments outnumber any other type of psalm in the Bible? This may come as a surprise because most of us rarely hear lament psalms in church. The truth is, they make up 40% of the book of Psalms! (See Katongole, 104)

Not only that. By my count almost 25% of the psalms include "imprecatory" language, which is when the psalmist prays for God to bring harm on his enemies. For reasons I'll share below, I believe that these psalms are for Christians, too. Why can we not get along well without lament? Here are four reasons:

1. God's character is the basis of lament.

As Emmanuel Katongole reminds us, 

"At the heart of Israel's social, political, and religious life is the central conviction and experience of Yahweh as a saving God. Yahweh is not only the creator of the world and sovereign ruler of nations; Israel is God's chosen nation, which, through a covenant relationship, enjoys God's special favor and protection. For biblical Israel, therefore, safety and security are found not in military strength or wealth or technological advantage, but in the covenant relationship with Yahweh. Thus in the moment of crisis, because they believed that God can, should--and indeed, would--do something to save them, they complained, mourned, wept, chanted dirges, and cursed." (Born from Lament, 103-104)

This point is especially true of imprecatory psalms (the ugly, violent-sounding ones). If we cut out the violent parts of the psalms, we deny part of God’s essential character. YHWH’s self-description in Exodus 34:6-7 highlights divine mercy, but it also says of God: “forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, yet by no means clearing the guilty, but visiting the iniquity of the parents upon the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation” (NRSV). The God of the Old Testament is YHWH, the covenant-making and redeeming God who rescues and saves, who demonstrates love and who takes sin seriously.

Would we prefer it otherwise? Would we prefer a world where rampant evil goes unchecked? Where corrupt despots get rich by oppressing others? Would we prefer for people to be allowed to destroy each other’s lives and reputations by spreading false rumors about them with impunity? Or are we grateful that God wields his power in loving ways by putting a stop to injustice? 

If we believe that God takes sin seriously, then we can accept the Bible's invitation to pray that he will act to bring the unrepentant to justice. 

2. Jesus modeled lament.

The book of Hebrews tells us that even Jesus lamented. "During the days of Jesus' life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with fervent cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission." (Hebrews 5:7)

Jesus' tearful prayers did not disqualify him. He was still "without sin." And here the author of Hebrews says that his lament was evidence of "reverent submission." Remember that on the cross Jesus prayed Psalm 22:1: "My God! My God! Why have you forsaken me?" This, too, was a faithful way to pray in the midst of his darkest hour. If Jesus is our model, then lament is an indispensable part of faithful discipleship.

3. Without lament, our worship spaces are less safe.

We live in a world full of brokenness at every level ranging from international to intensely personal. The people walking through our doors (or tuning in) on a Sunday morning are the same people who are enduring hardship throughout their week. If our church services are mostly a pep rally or an exhortation to "trust more," and fail to reckon honestly with brokenness, we essentially send people elsewhere to find solutions to their problems. Introducing lament in corporate worship creates space to be real -- to bring our pain to God and cry out for healing.

When we don't acknowledge pain in church, we get less of God and less of each other. As my friend Amy Oden recently put it, "I find more of God when I am most angry with him." Expressing our true emotions in his presence opens us up to meet him in deeper ways. It also opens us to each other.

Why would we deny this opportunity to our congregations? I can think of one reason why: FEAR. We fear that if we create space for lament, people will be offended or discouraged. But in reality, the opposite happens. By restricting our prayers to praise, we deny people access to the full message of Scripture. We lose people who think that their lives and emotions are too complex for the church. If your congregation is likely to be offended by lament, then they have not embraced the whole counsel of Scripture. Teach them what the Bible says about it. Cultivate a space where people can pray how they feel and in so doing discover that they are not alone.

4. Lament is the foundation of social justice.

The consequences of neglecting lament go beyond our local congregation. Not only will individuals not feel that the church is a safe place to bring their whole selves, but the church will lose its ability to impact the wider culture by addressing societal brokenness. 

Katongole explains, "In the end, the loss of lament signals of loss of passion for social justice. A church that has lost its nerve to lament before God will likely lack the nerve to confront oppression and be prone to support the status quo. But that is also the reason why an attempt to recover the language of lament is about solidarity with those who suffer" (183).

The historic failure of white evangelicals to lament racial injustice unveils the root of our problem--we see racial discrimination as something happening to somebody else and being done by somebody else. By identifying with neither the perpetrators nor the victims, we maintain distance. As long as we are distant we cannot be part of the solution. Unless we see crimes against people of color as crimes against our fellow humans, we excuse ourselves from taking action.  

If we cannot corporately bring to God those problems that overwhelm us, where will we bring them? If we are not comfortable creating space for our brothers and sisters to pray and weep, how can we even begin to work with them to find solutions? If their grief does not become our own, on what basis will we build unity? Where else will we find the resources to address whatever threatens to undo us? The first step in imagining a different kind of future is to grieve together and to grieve deeply over what has been done and what is being done.

If we want to (1) know God, (2) follow Christ, (3) minister to broken people, and (4) make a difference in a broken world, then lament is essential. On its own, lament is not enough. It is not the whole answer. But without it, we lose our grip on the resilient hope of the gospel.

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For more on lament, see my interview with Remnant Radio. 

For more on imprecatory prayer, see my blog post for the Political Theology Network.

My Favorite Books of 2019

I entitled this blog Chastened Intuitions as a way of recognizing that our gut feelings about something need reshaping in light of research and exposure to other perspectives. Reading is a powerful way to pursue that kind of learning. I read 40 books in 2019. The five listed below made the most significant contribution to my own growth, chastening my intuition in important ways.

Surprised by Jesus Again: Reading the Bible in Communion with the Saints by Jason Byassee

I encountered this book as a skeptic, but I was quickly disarmed, even charmed. I did not find every reading persuasive, but I was won over by his central thesis. Byassee winsomely, playfully invites Christian readers of Scripture to delight in its mysteries and to participate in God's passionate quest to lavish his love an on ever-widening circle of faithful followers. He is right to chide biblical scholars for our lack of imagination. Reading this book has reignited my passion for a pedagogy that ushers fellow readers of Scripture into a place of wonder. A finalist in the Christianity Today 2019 Book Awards, this book is well worth reading.

The Liturgy of Creation by Michael LeFebvre

Given LeFebvre's brilliant doctoral work on Old Testament law, I expected this book to be carefully researched and lucidly written. I was not disappointed. LeFebvre skillfully brings into focus the parts of the Pentateuch readers are most likely to skip, showing how the purpose of each calendar notation in the Torah, including its opening chapter, is liturgical―to order the work and worship of the covenant people. His reassessment of Genesis 1 moves beyond the stalemate in the creation debates without recourse to extrabiblical or scientific arguments. His thesis grows organically from a close reading of the biblical text. LeFebvre shows himself to be a master teacher with pastoral sensitivity, able to patiently explain what he has so carefully studied. This book will change the way I teach the Torah. I can't wait to share it with my students!

Blood Brothers by Elias Chacour

A powerful and enlightening story of a Palestinian Christian living in the aftermath of WWII. His story unveils the dark side of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, its origins outside the land of Palestine, and the way both sides have been caught in the crossfire between nations whose complex interests are not above board. Chacour's hope is that Arabs and Jews can learn to live together as neighbors. He has devoted his entire life to this aim: PEACE. Such an eye-opening and hope-filled book!

Hope for the Oppressor by Patrick Oden

Hope for the Oppressor is a brave undertaking. Patrick Oden suggests that efforts to liberate the oppressed will never be successful until oppressors experience liberation, too. Without true liberation of all parties, new cycles of coercion result. But there's hope. He locates that hope in Christian community, where our notion of selfhood can be reconceived and our fractured selves healed in light of God's holy love. Oden's thesis is grounded in theologically rich readings of biblical texts and skillful engagement with historical and systematic theology. His book issues a life-giving invitation for all of us — those with privilege and those without — to participate in a different kind of kingdom. His book has the potential to fuel a revolution for those who dare to reexamine their lives in light of his claims.

Phoebe by Paula Gooder

How does a woman with a slave name end up delivering Paul's letter to the Romans? How does she have the means to undertake such a journey? How was she educated to the point that Paul chooses her to explain his letter? What did she think of the church in Rome? Gooder answers all these questions in a compelling way. She kept my attention from beginning to end. Friends who are not biblical scholars have enjoyed the book, too. Together with Holly Beers' A Week in the Life of a Greco-Roman Woman and Ben Witherington III's Priscilla, 2019 was my year to discover what is was like for women of the Roman Empire in the first century.