God graciously redirected and rejuvenated my heart on this in 2014. Here are five books that he has used to help strengthen my confidence in the Scriptures.
1. Truth Matters by Kostenberger and Bock. This little book was used by God to help me see that it is not foolish for me to have a confident faith.
2. Taking God At His Word by Kevin DeYoung. DeYoung is one of my favorite writers, and though there wasn’t really any new information for me in this book it served as a helpful reminder that confidence in Christ cannot be separated from confidence in God’s Word.
3. Tactics by Greg Koukl. This book helped me reason with the my own doubts and battles with skepticism. Koukl poked holes through some silly thinking that was lingering around in my mind.
4. The Greatest Fight in the World by Charles Spurgeon. This is a short little book made up of talks by Spurgeon during the Downgrade controversy. God used this to help me see that confidence in God’s Word is not only not stupid it is something that I must have as a minister of the gospel.
5. The Bible. Nothing strengthens your faith more than actually engaging with God’s Word. Reading what God wrote on God’s terms considering genre and everything else continues to give me confidence that this is God’s Word. It is, as DeYoung said, Christ’s unbreakable Bible.
In addition to the Bible, which has a way of convincing the individual, I have found Gaussen’s Theopneustia, Packer’s Fundamentalism and The Word of God, Young’s Thy Word is True, Oswald T. Allis, The Five Books of Moses, Pink’s The Inspiration of Scripture, plus about 20-30 other volumes that I had in my library on the subject along with many works by scholars of other denominations which I have quoted. I think of John Warwick Montgomery, and the Preuses (I think they are brothers), and Book lived by my grandfather after he was converted. I have a picture of him… Read more »
Good article.
Three books I’d recommend:
“I Don’t Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist” by Norman Geisler & Frank Turek.
“A Coffer of Jewels” compiled by John R. Rice; 1963.
“Apologetics Study Bible,” Holman
And, of course, there are many others.
David R. Brumbelow
I especially like one mentioned: the one that is a light unto my path and a lamp unto my feet.
Hey Parsons Mike: drop me a note as I cannot locate your email address. I think you have mine through SBC Open Forum.
James:
bygrace4012@yahoo.com
Mike,
Good recommendations.
I’ve read 4 out of 5. I have not read “Tactics”.
Radical by David Platt helped me focus on what our mission is.
Studies in the Sermon on the Mount by D. Martyn Lloyd Jones, is helping me focus on God not on myself.