Get Connected
September 30, 2012
''Connected - Living in the Light of the Trinity'' by Sam Allberry is an excellent introduction to the practical outworkings of the Trinity with regard to humanity, gender, the church, prayer and worship. I found myself underlining and making notes to use this material with different people. As with Sam's previous book 'Lifted' it is very readable. The first section starts dealing with the doctrine and then seemlessly moves to the implications. It's an excellent companion to Mike Reeves ''The Good God/ Delighting in the Trinity''.
My favourite chapter was the chapter on prayer; non guilt enducing encouragement! Sam writes 'God is interested, God is there. He made us and cares deeply about us. He is not just theoretically around, like the friend who says you can call them at any time but never actually answers the phone. We have access to God. Jesus has secured it'
What I like about the way Sam writes is that, although the book began as sermons, it doesn't feel like sermons. There's a turn of phrase which is like a hand grenade. At first you read a sentence normally and then 10 lines later the grenade goes off and suddenly you find yourself going back and getting excited.
On commenting on Romans 8 and our sonship he writes...
'He is not the unknowable 'other', still less just a finger wagging authority figure, but our Father, 'By him we cry 'Abba, Father.'' The Spirit himself testifies with our Spirit that we are God's children' (Romans 8:15,16).
Two things are mentioned here
* The Spirit moves us to call out to God as our Father.
* The Spirit bears witness to us that we are God's children.
I suspect this is one activity, not two. As we call God Father, the Spirit testifies to our inner being that we are indeed God's children. The act of praying reminds us that we are on praying terms with God our Father.
If this is right, then prayer itself is a means of assurance. As we avail ourselves of the privielge of addressing God as Father, we are beocming more deeply conscious of the utter apporpriateness of doing so as his adopted children. Prayer is essentially evangelical: as we pray we are re-enacting the gospel to ourselves.' (page 141)
Read that last paragraph again and buy Connected (It's due out in the US from P&R shortly)
My favourite chapter was the chapter on prayer; non guilt enducing encouragement! Sam writes 'God is interested, God is there. He made us and cares deeply about us. He is not just theoretically around, like the friend who says you can call them at any time but never actually answers the phone. We have access to God. Jesus has secured it'
What I like about the way Sam writes is that, although the book began as sermons, it doesn't feel like sermons. There's a turn of phrase which is like a hand grenade. At first you read a sentence normally and then 10 lines later the grenade goes off and suddenly you find yourself going back and getting excited.
On commenting on Romans 8 and our sonship he writes...
Two things are mentioned here
* The Spirit bears witness to us that we are God's children.
If this is right, then prayer itself is a means of assurance. As we avail ourselves of the privielge of addressing God as Father, we are beocming more deeply conscious of the utter apporpriateness of doing so as his adopted children. Prayer is essentially evangelical: as we pray we are re-enacting the gospel to ourselves.'
Read that last paragraph again and buy Connected (It's due out in the US from P&R shortly)
