What Bothers Me Most about Christianity: Honest Reflections from an Open-Minded Christ Follower [Paperback]

Ed Gungor (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 2, 2009

New York Times bestselling author ed Gungor offers a provocative look at the questions that bother not only opponents of Christianity but dedicated believers as well. with candor and good will, Gungor joins the discussion generated by the multitude of atheistic books currently in the market and offers a thoughtful, reasonable response.

In What Bothers Me Most about Christianity, Pastor Ed Gungor owns up to the valid criticism that affronts Christianity. With his trademark sense of humor and unabashed honesty, Gungor explores the ten most troublesome aspects of Christianity, addressing questions such as:Why does a loving God allow evil to exist in His world? If the Christian church is so good, then why have so many horrible acts been committed in its name? Why was God so harsh to His children in the Old Testament?

Maintaining that having faith is not intellectual suicide and that mystery is an essential quality of the Christian belief, What Bothers Me Most about Christianity opens up the forum for amicable discussion between thinking people on both sides of the debate, from aggressive atheists to unswerving Christian believers. Gungor maintains that balancing faith and reason is indeed possible and that devoted Christ followers need not shy away from asking the tough questions. As he guides readers through these fundamental issues, they will find that their honest wrestling will actually bring them to a deeper, more mature understanding of faith.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"When I first heard the title, What Bothers Me Most About Christianity, I was a bit leery, because quite frankly, I am most grateful to be a Christian! But I was delighted to discover that Ed Gungor upholds Christianity while honestly addressing many of the misconceptions about the Christian faith. In a way that speaks to our post-modern culture, Ed Gungor takes these misconceptions, one by one, and systematically addresses them from a Christian perspective." -- Jerry Newcombe, D. Min. - TV Producer / Author

"I love this book! It's a lot easier to give pat answers to questions people aren't asking than to wrestle honestly with the questions they are asking. Thank you, Ed, for wrestling with honest questions. I highly recommend it for people who wrestle and think!" -- Bob Roberts, Author, Glocalization: How Followers of Jesus Engage a Flat World

About the Author

Ed Gungor is a veteran pastor—currently pasturing the Sanctuary Church in Tulsa, Oklahoma--who has been deeply involved in the spiritual formation of others for over thirty-five years. He is the author of several books, including The Vow, Religiously Transmitted Diseases, and There Is More to the Secret, which landed on the New York Times bestsellers list. He is also a member of Springtime for Faith, a lay-driven initiative supported by the Vatican, and he travels around the U.S. and abroad speaking in churches, universities, and seminars. Ed and his wife Gail have been married thirty years.  They have four children and live in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Howard Books; Original edition (June 2, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1416592555
• ISBN-13: 978-1416592556
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.4 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #625,400 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars What bothers me is ducking the questions, July 24, 2010

By 

Just wondering - See all my reviews

This review is from: What Bothers Me Most about Christianity: Honest Reflections from an Open-Minded Christ Follower (Paperback)

Ed Gungor is a lead pastor of a church in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The book seems to be written on the junior-senior high school student level; there are lots of pop culture references and on one occasion Gungor even address the reader as Dude. He also mentions several times how "cool" faith is.

He begins with the reason God intentionally hides. "Maybe this conspiracy of hiddenness is like the hide-and-seek game children play." He then compares God to Goldilocks, leaving clues to his presence. He goes on to say that all famous atheists had difficult relationships with their fathers or their fathers abandoned them or died when they were young. Gungor then tells us that believing in God is similar to believing that the British graffiti artist Banksky exists.

As to the question of why there is evil in the world, there is no answer. You must simply trust that everything will work out according to plan. We are then told that the gospel is a "kind of decoder ring" to help people understand. He suggests that "the job of Jesus followers would be to hunt for the activity of God in the lives of others (that would add some mystery and suspense to faith -- like being spies for God!)."

As for the faith vs. science problem: "people saw no conflict between faith and science, at least not until the second half of the nineteenth century." "Science is a subversive activity. Scientists must go into the lab with an open mind." And it was the professional scientists who created the conflict as they struggled for social acceptance.

Gungor explains why the God of the Old Testament seems so war-like. He was fighting evil "toe-to-toe in the boxing ring". This also explains why God destroyed so many people in the Old Testament (even though he didn't want to): he had to destroy the people who were committing evil in order to destroy the evil. (During the Vietnam war there was a saying: we had to destroy the village in order to save the village.)

Misinterpretations of the Bible are likened to the distortions you experience when wearing BluBlocker sunglasses and Christian life is like Bilbo Baggins' quest.

I really cannot recommend this book as a serious discussion of the difficult questions that may bother believers or those who hold other beliefs.

5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Lacks Real Depth, January 19, 2010

By 

Carl Crain (Sacramento, CA, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: What Bothers Me Most about Christianity: Honest Reflections from an Open-Minded Christ Follower (Paperback)

This book was very disappointing. The author's positions and arguments lack real depth, and in some cases seem to be based on nothing more than personal opinion. At times, his opinions (I quote Gungor's words below) reflect the arrogance of some Christians that he speaks against:

"Their stories (religions other than Christian) reinterpret real God events into false stories. Hence, the true God remains unknown to them." (p84)

"The gods of other religions are not gods at all - they are worthless idols." (p93)

I followed up on some of Gungor's chapter end notes. I randomly checked a few non-biblical references from Chapter 4. Notes 5, 6, and 7 reference specific websites that, when checked, indicate "page not found".

After reading books by Christian authors such as Marcus Borg and John Shelby Spong, I find Gungor's writing to be simple-minded rather than "open-minded" as his subtitle suggests.

3 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Thought-Provoking and Life Changing Read, May 25, 2009

By 

Stacey (Las Vegas, NV USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: What Bothers Me Most about Christianity: Honest Reflections from an Open-Minded Christ Follower (Paperback)

Ed Gungor's "What Bothers Me Most About Christianity" is a bold and thought-provoking response to 9 specific "issues" that the author has with Christianity and Christians. Some of these topics are probably things that you have allowed to rub you raw as well. Still, the answers are well thought out and documented with tact. I am thrilled to have this book in my resource library!

Some of the ideas tackled in this tome are: the thinking that God hides from us, the frustration that logical thinking doesn't readily lead to faith, the existence of evil, the fact that Jesus is the only way to heaven (this has never "bothered" me), the incompatibility of science and faith, Christians giving Christianity a bad name (Oh, yeah! A serious pet peeve of mine - especially when it's me giving Christians a bad name!), the appearance of God as a bully in the OT (I don't really think so - but it's taken my years of Bible study to get to this point), Christians misquoting scripture, the fact that there is a hell. You may not agree with what the author says, but this is certainly a thought-provoking read.