Encounters With Jesus: Unexpected Answers to Life’s Biggest Questions by Timothy Keller
What it’s about
Tim Keller shares a series of talks originally given to Oxford students about Jesus, using encounters in John’s gospel to illustrate Jesus’ character and significance, with non-believers and skeptics in mind. After this, the author adds more thoughts about what people can know about Jesus from other stories in the Bible and links this to how we might address problems in life today.
Why it’s interesting to me
I’m preparing a series of experiences for groups to share on the same theme – meeting and getting to know Jesus through encounters he had with people in the Bible. (I’m not yet sure if “Encounters with Jesus” is a safe title to use, given this book!)
I’m very respectful of Tim Keller’s scholarship and thoughtfulness in his approach to understanding and sharing about Jesus. He was more conservative, perhaps, than I think I am theologically, and his descriptions of “the gospel” seem to me to bear the hallmarks of a particular evangelical approach which reduces its glorious richness to an unfortunate, distorting focus on Jesus dying to fulfil some legal obligation on our behalf. (That’s a topic big enough to merit books more discussion…)
I would love to glean insights into how people like Tim Keller find that presenting Jesus in this “encounter” type of way proves to be interesting to people who don’t yet have faith in God.
How I’m getting on
I’ve finished. There were some really helpful bits I’ll come back and write more about, including what might be the best possible explanation for the logic behind the argument for Jesus’s death as legally watertight reason for us to escape punishment for our sins. (I know this is in the Bible! I’m just keen to point out to other people that it’s not the only explanation in the Bible for Jesus dying on the cross, and it’s not necessarily the best one to pick to bring people close enough to Jesus to start being interested in following him, as I think most of the New Testament illustrates!)
Lots to consider before writing this up properly, so I’ll finish this later.