What I've been reading (continued)

I love a hard-boiled detective story, and while The Corruptible by Mark Mynheir doesn’t rise to the top of the genre, it still provided a satisfying summer read.

Ray Quinn, private eye, used to be an Orlando homicide detective, but was forced to retire when he was shot, permanently damaging one of his legs. But he’s still got lots of friends on the force, and unlike most fictional private eyes, he prefers to work with the police instead of against them. When he is hired to find a computer hard drive that contains valuable information belonging to a rich client, it seems like he’s hit the jackpot. That is, until the guy who apparently stole the goods, an ex-cop and former friend of Ray’s, ends up murdered.

Ray, his apprentice Crevis (like a split in a rock), and former client and friend Pam, rapidly find their own lives in danger as they try to unravel a complicated plot of revenge, greed, and murder. In the first half of the book, tends to overdo the descriptive language typical of this genre: “He had a brown flattop haircut as tight as a boot brush and a chin cleft deep enough to hide a TV remote.”

And, although this is marketed as Christian fiction, the religious elements were integrated into the story fairly smoothly. I say “fairly” because there were a few times when the realities of writing about hardened underworld characters clashed with the author’s choice of language. For instance, at one point the head of a criminal motorcycle gang says, “That snitch put me in federal custody and stole twelve years of my life. He got almost everyone in this room some time in prison. I don’t think ‘miffed’ quite covers what I feel for that traitorous, no-good, filthy, lowlife narc cop piece of sewage.” Now, I applaud Mynheir’s decision not to use profanity in this book. But it would have been better to skip it than substitute this silly and unbelievable tirade.

Like all good detective stories, you probably won’t figure out “who done it” until moments before (or after) Ray Quinn solves the case. Then you’ll slap your forehead, because all the clues were there – you just missed them. The story was just good enough to keep me reading, but not so engaging that couldn’t put it down. And it did leave me wanting to find out happens next. All in all, a good read.

The publisher, Thomas Nelson, provided me with a complimentary copy of this book.

Finally, “Christian” fiction with a bite!

I’ll admit it up front. Although I’m a pastor, I have never been much of a fan of “Christian Fiction.” All too often the characters are two-dimensional, the plot is linear and predictable, and the message is spiritually simplistic and heavy handed. Far too many authors feel that for it to be a Christian book, the gospel must be overtly explained and every moral question must be black and white. So, it was with some reluctance that I sat down to read Life Support by Robert Whitlow. Well, I’m happy to tell you that I was pleasantly surprised.

Life Support is a legal mystery that will grab your attention and keep you up most of the night. The question isn’t “Who done it?” We learn that in the first chapter. The question is, “Will she get away with it? And what will she do next?” But it’s even more complicated than that.

The heroine is Alexia “Alex” Lindale, a bright young divorce attorney with her eyes on a partnership at her law firm in the southern town of Santee. But soon the law becomes a matter of life and death as one man clings to life in intensive care, while his wife and father battle over who will decide whether, or when to remove life support. Greed, insanity, guilt, and fear drive Alex into an ever deepening web of deceit.

Meanwhile, Alex starts to fall in love with a local pastor who shares her love of classical music. The romance is realistic, tentative, and satisfying. Whitlow manages to write the pastor character as a real human being instead of the typical caricature of a saint, a buffoon, or a hypocrite found in so many other stories.

While there are clear Christian themes throughout the novel, Whitlow succeeds in weaving the spiritual with the temporal in a way that feels as natural as breathing. What pleased me most was Whitlow’s comfort with moral ambiguity. This isn’t to say that there’s no sense of right and wrong. It’s just that, as in the real world, we sometimes have to make judgments between shades of gray. Because Alex is such a well-written and sympathetic character, you can’t help rooting for her even when she is (unknowingly) working on behalf of a client who is up to no good – even murder!

Go ahead! Take the plunge! Life Support is a satisfying journey that will leave you asking, “I wonder if that could happen to me?”  Check it out yourself on Christianbook.com.

The publisher, Thomas Nelson, provided me with a complimentary copy of this book.

Multicultural

For the next few weeks I'll be writing some thoughts about our church's vision statement in our Sunday bulletin. I'll also share them here!

A Few Words about our Vision Statement:

It is our vision to be “A multicultural family, growing in faith, connecting people with Christ.”

“Multicultural.” On the surface, you might think this is about the fact that our church worships in two languages, Spanish and English. But culture is about much more than language.

Among our English speaking members, some hail from England, Italy, the Caribbean, and countries around the world. Our Spanish speaking members come from Guatemala, Colombia, Argentina, Puerto Rico, Cuba, and more, and these individual countries differ as much as the many countries of Europe. Not only that, we have cultural differences based on our age, race, economics, and upbringing. Each of us brings unique gifts (and challenges) to the body.

It’s significant that God waited until a day when people from all over the world, with a cornucopia of languages, were in Jerusalem before he gave birth to the church with the gift of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:5-11).

Being intentionally multicultural requires much shared sacrifice. It would certainly be easier to be in a church where everyone is “like us.” But, in God’s opinion, it’s our differences, woven together into one tapestry, that make His church beautiful. 

A Cure for What Ails You

Book Recommendation: Enemies of the Heart.

Reading Enemies of the Heart: Breaking Free from the Four Emotions That Control You, by Andy Stanley, is like sitting down and having a candid conversation with a long-time friend who knows all your secrets and is willing to tell you the truth. His conversational, self-effacing style of writing breaks down your defenses, while his keen insight into human nature and deep knowledge of the Bible provide answers to most of your questions before you even ask them.

Stanley’s premise is that most of us spend too much time worrying about how to change our behavior, while investing too little effort into changing the source of that behavior – our heart. When we find ourselves saying or doing something contrary to our beliefs, we might ask “Where did that come from? That’s not like me.” The answer, Stanley says, is that it’s exactly like you – the you that you usually keep bottled up inside. It comes from your heart.

Four emotions form the “heart” of his diagnosis, and surprisingly, they are all about debt. Guilt is the heart crying out “I owe you.” Anger is the heart accusing “You owe me.” Greed, which is endemic in our Western culture, says pompously “I owe me.” And finally, jealousy shakes its fist at the heavens and says “God owes me.”

In our sex-soaked culture I expected lust to be among the four key emotions. Anticipating this, Stanley explains that lust, at least lust for someone other than our spouse, is actually a manifestation of one of the other four problems. “Simply put, guilt, anger, greed, and jealousy weaken our resolve against sexual temptation.”

Of course, diagnosis is only half of a cure. Stanley goes on to describe spiritual habits he calls “Habits of happiness,” that each of us can develop that serve to disarm the power and begin the life-long process of healing our wayward hearts.

Andy Stanley is fast becoming one of my favorite authors when it comes to practical, Christian living. This book is remarkably practical, and easily accessible, while being spot-on theologically. I highly recommend it to anyone who has ever wondered why they do the things they do – and how to break those habits that control us.

The publisher, Waterbrook Multnomah Publishing Group, provided me with a complimentary copy of this book. Learn more about the book at Christianbook.com by clicking HERE.