This latest mini-series is bound to be about as occasional as all the others but as my readers you are subject to my every whim. Unless of course you stop reading. It is my unfortunate lot in life to frequently come up with ideas for books (mostly Christian/theological) which I have neither the time, ability or inclination to write, so I have decided to at least turn these ideas into something, namely a blog post. They are probably not very good ideas, still less original, but they are still ideas. If you have more time, inclination and ability than me then feel free to steal the ideas, but make sure you include glowing testimonials in the Preface about what an inspiration I was to you, and include my blog address so that thousands of wisdom-hungry souls will flock to my pages. I apologise for all the titles being boring and utterly banal, but at least the books would be like a can of Ronseal (let the reader understand).
Most of these books have probably been written already. In which case, if you know of them please email me and tell me what they are called, because I would like to read them (which is why I want someone else to write them, of course). Also, if you know anyone who you think should write any given book, tell them - or tell me.
- "A Systematic Biblical Spirituality" - an exploration of prayer, worship and the like which proceeds by analysing the biblical conception of the Christian life first in an expository way, e.g. "Encountering God in Genesis" or "Worship in Revelation" and then in an systematic way, e.g. "Worshipping God the Trinity", "Intercessory Prayer", "Biblical Fasting" etc.
- "Biblical Ministry" - instead of bringing our ideas of what ministry is about to the Bible and letting it speak to them, we must let God set the whole agenda for pastoral practice and leadership. What is essential is not the best and latest practical technique but a vision for ministry from God which sets his priorities as central and follows the practices and models of Jesus, Moses, Paul and co (whilst recognising appropriate differences). (It is possible that Ajith Fernando, Jesus Driven Ministry is about this but I haven't read it yet. If anyone has a copy they'd like to lend me please pass it on.)
- An ethical commentary on the New Testament/Bible. Nice, small little ideas I have you know.
- Joy as a moral duty. Sounds contradictory? Yet God commands us to be happy.
- The Communicator: an analysis and exploration of how Jesus taught and communicated his message and trained his followers, and a consideration of its relevance both for general theories of education and for training for Christian ministry in particular. [Stop press: after drafting this post I discovered that something like this has already been written by Sylvia Collinson, entitled Making Disciples - which shows either what good ideas I have or how unoriginal I am.]
- There are lots of little books on "The Christology of the New Testament" yada yada yada which covers each NT author's view of Jesus. Well, how about "The Soteriology of the NT" (including atonement) and "The Eschatology of the NT".
Sorry it's all a bit theology-heavy. I could also entertain you with some of my ideas for novels of detective fiction too, but then you would all email me to tell me that Agatha Christie wrote one like that already.
