Customer Reviews

Larry Crabb's Gospel

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I personally think it's sad when a book is written that leads people closer to God and it has other books written about it in criticism. If not for Crabb I likely would not have made it as a Christian. Reading the Bobgans book was discouraging in that they clearly did not see the way God's Word was brought to life by Crabbs refreshing insights. For instance, Crabb was accused of using psychological tactics like sharing from his own personal experiences to trick people into buying his teachings. What if Crabb was being honest, which I have every reason to believe from the way his thoughts have changed my life????? I would stake my faith on the fact that Crabb's words are closer to God's heart than Bobgans.

What is so sad about this book is that it is reflective of EVERY book that the Bobgan's write. As a conservative Christian woman who is also a medical professional, I find that the Bobgan's beliefs concerning psychology are profoundly flawed on many levels. Although I believe strongly that the Bible calls us to "test and discern" and assure that the counsel that we receive in ALL areas of our life are congruent with Biblical teaching, their beliefs about psychology and psychiatry are more in line with the Christian Scientist and are frankly outrageous. Like their other books, they exhaustively research and trash upstanding professional Christians who are honestly and wholeheartedly committed to helping other Christians understand and cope with the suffering that is inherent in life with in a Biblical framework. Although I do not espouse agreement in every area that Larry Crabb's speaks of, having read Mr. Crabb's book I was moved by his sincerity in helping the body of Christ and helping Christians to gain insight and understanding on the coping and management of life here on earth. On the contrary, like all their other books, the Bodgan's are not interested in edifying or building up the body of Christ nor do ANY of their books offer answers beyond prayer and Biblical reading. As important as those concepts are, Jesus's ministry was all about relationship and connection not only to Jesus and God the Father but to each other. The Bobgan's beliefs are cultish in that they isolate and alienate and they "blame" the Christian who is suffering psychologically with actual biological illness, poor coping skills, addiction or emotional pain but passively saying that if they only read their Bible enough and prayed enough that it would be sufficient to "heal them". Hence my remark, they are the "Christian Scientist of the Mind" , therefore a cult and thus dangerous...steer clear of these two!

What I think the writers of this book have missed, as well as the two previous reviews, is the powerful art of integration. Integration of all areas of one's life: professional, personal, spiritual, etc. is no easy task. The writers fail to realize that yes, Larry Crabb's books are about psychology...from a Christian perspective.

While the Bible is the guiding and final word on all matters, the Bible alone is not sufficient to guide a professional practice in psychology. Just as the Bible can not be a text book for a carpenter, or a medical doctor. The Bible relays TRUTH, but God also uses other areas to reveal general truths. The Bible has no way to guide an examination of neurotransmitters in the brain or how to treat schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. The Bible gives the ground work for the human condition. However, we live in a fallen world, simply meaning that things are not the way they are supposed to be. Therefore, humans are not the way we are supposed to be...and things are generally messed up.

It is of some concern to me that one reviewer I read bet his/her faith on the writing of Larry Crabb as opposed to the Bobgans as being closer to the "heart" of God. This, I think, is indicative of the non-sensical approach to faith, life, and practice taken by "evangelicals" and the like who desperately avail themselves of every anemic concept of sanctification or promise of "secret knowledge" that comes to the rack of the local bookstore. This is the crusade of the Bobgans in this classic polemic. The most important thesis of the book, perhaps, is that Scripture is a complete and sufficient rule of faith, life and practice, by its own admission. When it comes to the sanctification of human lives, a Biblical anthropology is totally incompatible with a doctrine of man which looks to meet the "legitimate needs of the heart" in God and community. The New Covenant in Ezek. 36 makes it perfectly clear that true religion in the covenant is not about us. It is about the glory of God. It leads us to self-loathing, not in search of a god who will meet our needs. In this context, the Church has a duty to her purity by the right exercise of discipline (which begins with the proclamation of the Word). James writes:

"Therefore, putting aside all filthiness and all that remains of wickedness, in humility receive the word implanted, which is able to save your souls. But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was. But one who looks at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man will be blessed in what he does." (James 1:21-25)

And so we see that it is not the psychological method by which we see the truth of ourselves, but in the reflection of the law. The duty of the Church is to discipline according to our Lord's prescription and to make right use of the word.

"Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord, according as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us

to glory and virtue: Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust." (II Pet. 1:2-4)

"All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works." (2 Timothy 3:16-17)

Doesn't sound like an invitation to a Freudian theory of unconscious as the key to relationships in the church, does it? And yet, as the Bobgans thoroughly point out, this is precisely the mission of Larry Crabb and his ilk (see also The Safest Place on Earth by Crabb). Thank you, Bobgans, for the insider's look. I encourage any interested in this work to do a little study into the Bobgan's own journey of repentance, having been practitioners of this kind of psychological theory within the church.

This book can be eye-opening to many of us who truly are hopeful that Crabb is moving toward a more biblical approach to counseling (and in understanding man and his vertical relationship with God and his horizontal relationship with his fellow man). If you have been impacted by Crabbs' books, this is a must read. It will give you a very discerning look at how Crabb, many times, still sees the world through the eyes of secular psychology. I do believe that a few times the authors were more sarcastic rather than the more loving exhortation for a brother (1 Cor 2:3-9) we're called to in God's Word. However, overall, we need to be warned: Psychology is at war with God's Word and let us be discerning in these last days.