Today’s post comes from one of newest contributors, Natalie, who is delighted to come out from behind the scenes at More to Be and share her thoughts in our weekly Feature It column. Please give her a warm welcome!
It changed my life.
Enough said. I know that is a very cliché sentence, and that there are plenty of other great Christian books out there that are changing lives. I have read several of them, and somehow none of them have hit me in a way that Radical did.
In this book Radical: Taking Back Your Faith from the American Dream
“Its easy for American Christians to forget how Jesus said his followers would actually live, what their new lifestyle would actually look like. They would abandon everything for the gospel. They would take up their crosses daily… But who do you know who lives like that? Do you?”
The way he writes is just so unbelievably convicting, straightforward, honest, and biblical, in such a way that it was exactly what I needed.
And exactly what I think many of us need.
David Platt talks about someone worth losing everything for,and he explains why and what that means. He talks about discovering the truth of the gospel and who God really is, who we really are, and what we really need. He then talks about Gods global purpose from the beginning till today and that’s where it got me.
Like a big wake up call.
Christians need to wake up, trade in false values rooted in the American Dream, and embrace the notion that each of us is blessed by God for a global purpose – to make Christ’s glory known to all the nations! He has created each of us to take the gospel to the ends of the earth (Matt. 28:19, Mark 16:15), and that really is our sole purpose in life.
Platt argues the questions of ‘What if I’m not called to missions? That’s for other people, for missionaries, but not for me. What about the needs here?’ An all too common defense against the global purpose God has for our lives.
“We are ignorant of our own cultural captivity and indifferent to the needs of the poor and the plight of lost. We have manipulated the gospel to fit our cultural preferences.”
Now, I am very aware that this all sounds very harsh and makes all American Christians sound fake and not good enough, so to say. But David Platt is aware of this too, so that’s why he addresses this issue in Radical: Taking Back Your Faith from the American Dream as well. Seriously, he pretty much answered most of my questions, even as new questions came up while I was reading, he would answer them in the next page.
David Platt’s good friend, Kevin DeYoung (Senior Pastor at University Reformed Church in East Lansing, Michigan), says of David’s work,
“I am grateful he never shies away from the hard edges of God’s sovereignty and God’s wrath. I especially appreciated Chapter Seven (“There is No Plan B”) where David walks through the book of Romans and makes a strong case for why non-Christians must hear the gospel and put conscious faith in Christ in order to be saved and why Christians must make it a priority to reach those who have never heard.”
I took a year off after graduating high school, and before starting at college, because I really had no idea what to do with my life, what to study, what to pursue, what I feel called to do, etc. And I don’t think I could have read this book with better timing. I have a month left before I go back to live in the ‘American Dream’ and start school again.
But now, I feel equipped.
I no longer question what i’m supposed to do with my life, because God has made it very very clear to me through the words expressed in Radical: Taking Back Your Faith from the American Dream.
This is a must read!
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Yes! I loved this book. Loved it. 🙂 And think I need to go reread it. 🙂