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35 of 41 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Relationships: A Mess Worth Making, May 26, 2007
This review is from: Relationships: A Mess Worth Making (Paperback)
Last week I finished this new book from Resources for Changing Lives-Relationships: A Mess Worth Making. Tim Lane, together with Paul Tripp (author of one of my favorite books, War of Words) tackle the deeper issues involved in relationships in the lives of believers.
Written with a gentle, we're-right-there-with-you tone but also grounded in the authority of Scripture this proved to be a helpful read considering my relationships and the specific ways I need to embrace the power and sufficiency of God's grace to redeem, restore and deepen the quality and purpose of relationships in my own life.
The structure of the book is a little awkward because even though it has two authors they write as one. I was somewhat distracted by this especially when they would tell a personal illustration but not say who's story it was. I was surprised that at the beginning of each chapter they had a lengthy excerpt form a secular song. And I was concerned at the couple of quotes they positively sited from Donald Miller of the Emergent Church movement. The one other hang-up I had was due to the multiple Scripture references quoted from The Message translation.
Overall this was a beneficial read. Perhaps a better book addressing the heart of godly relationships would be Jerry Bridges book The Crisis of Caring: Recovering the Meaning of True Fellowship. However I would still recommend Relationships: A Mess Worth Making and here are some excerpts from my two favorite chapters:
Chapter 5-Agendas
p. 43
The default question we ought to bring to every area of life should be, "What is God's purpose and design? What was his reason for creating this?" When you apply these questions to relationships you begin to see how different his agenda is from your own. We would easily settle for our own definition of personal happiness when God's purpose is nothing short of conforming us to the image of Christ! Whether we are conscious of it or not, we all have dreams for our relationships, and we are always working to realize those dreams. How close is your dream to God's purpose?
Chapter 9-Forgiveness
p. 95
The metaphor of debt cancellation (Matthew 18:21-35) clearly defines the nature of forgiveness. The merciful king absorbed $100, 000 debt that was owed him. When you forgive someone, you also cancel a debt. But, more specifically, you make a conscious choice to absorb the cost yourself. You choose not to make the offender pay for the offense. By forfeiting....you make at least three promises.You promise that you will not bring up the debt to use it as leverage. You promise that you will not bring up the offense to others and slander the person who sinned against you....You promise not to dwell on the offense yourself.
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9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Don't Judge This Book by it's Cover, May 17, 2009
This review is from: Relationships: A Mess Worth Making (Paperback)
On the top of the back cover it reads, "Hope for messy, conflict-ridden relationships": unless you are prideful, blind, or live in a cave that sentence will appeal to you. Tripp and Lane once again deliver an impressive book. Relationships are messy but through 15 chapters the authors show us that they are indeed a mess worth making. Inside this excellent work you will find advice for conversations, apologies, forgiveness, mercy, how to use your time and money, and much more. But more importantly each chapter is gospel-saturated. This book does not only define the problem it offers the only biblical solution--Christ and Him crucified.
This seems like such a petty thing to say...but...the cover really turns me off to the book. It makes it look like a book for high school students. Either that or something that a grandmother made and she just had to get all of her grandkids on the cover. UPDATE: Thankfully since this review was first published they changed the cover! Great decision.
Inside, one thing concerns me and that is the use of The Message for many Scripture passages. While I find that paraphrase helpful at times, I think a fair amount of people are turned off to it. I sincerely hope that it does not distract from the beautiful message of this book. One other, minor disappointment that I hope gets corrected in the second edition (if there is one), is that the authors refer to the wrong James as the author of the Epistle of James. Easy mistake, but again I hope it does not hurt their credibility. These dislikes are minor and the overall tenor of this book is phenomenal.
If every member of our churches followed the biblical guidelines outlined in this book then our churches would be much healthier places. Once again Tripp and Lane bring us to the foot of the Cross and therein points us to healing in our relationships.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Book Worth Reading, May 18, 2007
This review is from: Relationships: A Mess Worth Making (Paperback)
This is one of the best books written on the subject from a distinctly Christian viewpoint but valuable for non-Christians as well.
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