Last week, I was in the mood for a quick, easy read as a break from some heavier reading. This fun, historically-based novel did the trick. The author got much of her material from letters the Mozart family wrote and cataloged over roughly two decades of travel and performing.

As a young child, I was greatly influenced by the love for classical music held by my great-grandfather, grandfather, and mother. When I got my first stereo in 4th grade, I listened to tapes of classical giants, like Mozart and Chopin, as well as contemporary geniuses, like New Kids on the Block, Boys II Men, and Mariah Carey. For all of my learning and interest, I never realized that Mozart had a sister…or that he was a self-absorbed jerk. The renown of some tends to separate them in the public eye beyond the bounds of average human life: having a family, having a childhood, being a jerk, and so on.

Even in a book told from the point of view of his sister, Nannerl Mozart, little Wolfie (Wolfgang Amadeus) overshadows her. As a precocious five-year-old, Wolfie is tender-hearted, a little outspoken, and leaps into the laps of royalty for hugs after his performances. As he grew in age, he grew in talent–sadly, he did not grow as much in maturity. For years, his well-meaning and extremely proud father, Leopold, told Wolfie he was “God’s gift to music.” One can only go so long hearing such things before believing it, internalizing, and living it out in one’s actions and words.

Nannerl was Wolfie’s elder by six years, and though believed to be equal in talent to Mozart, was not regarded or groomed as such by her father. It seems her talents were not considered as impressive because she was older and because she was a girl. Rather than being encouraged to compose like her brother, she was told that she needed to spend her time practicing. Her practice, however, was not always rewarded with opportunities to showcase her talents at concerts. As children, she and Wolfie would perform duets, but as adolescents, Nannerl was left at home while her brother and father toured. The excuse was that it was too costly for the family of four to travel.

Much of the Mozart story revolves around money–or the lack of it. Leopold was forever preoccupied with sharing his son’s musical genius with the world, providing for his family, and securing a permanent, paid position for Wolfie. He sacrificed much, was indefatigable, and burned some important bridges along the way. Nannerl and her mother were also expected to sacrifice much. Wolfie seemed very unaware of what sacrifices were made on his account and went into adulthood unwilling to make any sacrifices in return. Perhaps the saddest part of the story was when Nannerl, the aging woman with few prospects of marrying, was denied the opportunity to become the wife of a man she truly loved because Wolfie pissed off her fiancees boss. It would be challenging to forgive a brother who did something like that.

If you’re looking for something more meaningful than a romance novel but not super challenging intellectually, give this book a shot. Be prepared for whatever good impressions you had of Mozart to be ruined with reality.

**Sorry there’s no book image…I tried ten times and it’s just not working.

Share on Facebook

“There are only three kinds of Christians when it comes to world missions: zealous goers, zealous senders, and disobedient.”

I think I’ve found the perfect Piper combination. A lot of his books go way over my head and are challenging to digest. I dig his sermons, but his voice is so distracting that I can’t concentrate on what I’m hearing. A Holy Ambition hits the mark, as it’s a collection of Piper’s sermons on the topic of frontier missions–preaching Christ to unreached people groups worldwide as modeled by the Apostle Paul. I am only about half way through his book, Let The Nations Be Glad, on the supremacy of Christ in missions, so I won’t try to compare them here.

The book is divided into three topical sections (see below) and is bookended by two intro sermons, one concluding sermon, and two very helpful sermons in the appendix. I highlighted a great deal in the final sermon in the appendix on the “Driving Convictions Behind Cross-Cultural Missions”…my guess is Piper knew it needed to be included, but didn’t have a good place to fit it. While reading, I found some overlap here and there, but it’s to be expected in sermons that span from a few months before I was born (June 1983) all the way to 2008. Each chapter was roughly 10-15 pages long, so it’s a great book to read if you can only do so intermittently.

-A Biblical Theology of Gospel-Centered Missions

“…if we want our heart for the nations to rest upon God’s heart for the nations, it should rest upon the basis of God’s heart for the nations, namely, God’s heart for his own glory.”

-The Mandate of World Missions

“God is not done with the work of missions. He said go make disciples of all nations. And then he said, ‘I will be with you to the end of the age.’ The promise is good till Jesus comes, because the commission is binding till Jesus comes. Therefore, you and I face the question individually what our role is in obeying the great commission to reach all the unreached peoples of the world with the gospel of the riches of Christ.”

-The Costs and Blessings of Mission

“I get very tired of people coming to look at staff positions in my church, which is in downtown Minneapolis. We all live in the inner city, and one of the first questions they ask is, ‘Will my children be safe?’ And I want to say, ‘Would you please ask that question tenth and not first?’ I’m just tired of hearing that. I’m tired of American priorities. Whoever said that your children will be safe in the call of God?”

As Jim and I consider our future, quite possibly in world missions, I dogeared two different sections that I think will help us on our journey. The first is a list of questions at the end of Chapter 8 “The Aroma of Christ Among the Nations.” The questions are derived from 2 Corinthians 2:17 and include five tests from the Apostle Paul as to whether or not someone is fit to be a missionary. I appreciate that Piper follows it up by saying that there are no perfect missionaries, and we will all miss the mark in some way or another, but our desire should be a resounding “Yes!” in response to all of the questions posed.

The second section that would be an especially helpful resource for anyone considering world missions or in the midst of it is found in Chapter 10 “I Am Sending You Out As Sheep In The Midst of Wolves.” Here, Piper does an excellent job of succinctly describing the six costs and ten blessings of frontier missions. I think the ten blessings would be an awesome thing to commit to memory or to have readily accessible in times of discouragement.

All in all, this was a great book and an easy read. I highly recommend it!

Share on Facebook

This work of historical fiction landed a spot on Oprah’s book club list several years ago. I picked it up cheap at a used bookstore when I was in college. I wasn’t Christian at the time, and I distinctly remember putting the book down and thinking “If that’s what mission work and loving Jesus is all about, then I don’t want any of it.”  I also recall crushing the dreams of a classmate who had shared with me that her lifelong passion was to be a missionary to Africa. I told her missions were a sham and that she should read this book. My, oh my, how things have changed since then.

The book hasn’t changed, but I have–dramatically–and any good change in me I attribute solely to Christ. Now it’s my dream to be a missionary in a distant land. I love reading missionary biographies and encourage friends to read them as well. I decided to pick this book up again and to read it with new eyes, a new mind, and a new heart. I learned a great deal more the second time around.

If I had to briefly sum up this book, I’d call it the “How NOT to do Missions Handbook.” It follows the journey of the Price family, a Southern bunch that venture to the Congo in response to the Great Commission (Matt 28:18-20). The book is told from the point of view of Orleanna Price and her four daughters, Rachel, Leah, Adah, and Ruth May.

At the head of the family is Nathan Price, a zealous, strong-willed, ill-tempered man who is dead set on baptizing each and every person he meets in the Congo…never mind the crocodiles lying in wait in the river that would snatch up children in an instant. Nathan is resistant to anything that exists outside of his tunnel vision and takes criticism as an affront to his goals. Despite being rejected by the Baptist Missions Society to go to the Congo, he starts raising funds anyway.

The Price’s receive no pre-field training in language or culture, and it shows the day they arrive in Kilanga. Within hours of their arrival, they manage to insult the entire village, who just sacrificed an exorbitant amount of food to celebrate and welcome the Price family. Nathan loves to preach about the preciousness of Jesus, but his mispronunciation of the tonal Kikongo language means that he often speaks of Jesus and the Bible as “poisonous.” “Come to Jesus, everyone! He wants to give you pussy boils and pain! My, he is a good Jesus! He wants you to feed your children to the crocodiles!” No wonder no one trusted this Jesus.

Orleanna carries the burden of feeding their large family three meals a day with a garden that won’t produce anything, a husband who doesn’t know (and isn’t interested in learning) how to hunt for meat, and a small stipend from the mission society that basically says, “We didn’t want you here in the first place, but we don’t want you to die of starvation.” Orleanna loses her precious house helper and cook extraordinaire, Mama Tataba, to Nathan’s relentless push to get children into the crocodile infested river for baptisms. Mama Tataba gives him a piece of her mind and then leaves–her compassion is all dried up for this stubborn man who doesn’t want to hear what anyone has to say or learn anything from anybody.

In reading the daughters’ accounts, as well as those of Orleanna, I realized that none of them truly had a firm grip on the Gospel: that we are justified and saved by grace alone, through faith alone, in the work of Jesus Christ. Orleanna went to a tent revival when she was a teen because it was the “cool” thing to do, and you’d be more attractive to handsome Christian men if you looked like you really meant it when they did an altar call. Nathan Price believed with all his might that he earned God’s favor. Going to the Congo was a good thing, so God had to bless it and take care of them and give them oodles of converts. God just had to. Even when political upheaval forces the missions society to evacuate all its members, Nathan Price refuses to leave or send his family home. No Price would leave the Congo until his work was done, regardless of the dangers it posed to have zero means of support. Even his wife falling into a severe depression and one of his daughters dying didn’t make him budge on his convictions. Eventually, enough was enough for Orleanna and the surviving girls, and they left without so much as a goodbye.

The latter 1/3 of the story is about their departure and the way each woman carried that year-long experience in Kilanga into their future. One daughter found love, while the eldest found found a string of husbands/lovers. Another daughter found a voice and a passion for medicine and contributed greatly to work in infectious diseases. Pretty ironic considering her father is a total misogynist:

‘Sending a girl to college is like pouring water into your shoes,’ he still loves to say, as often as possible. ‘It’s hard to say which is worse, seeing it run out and waste the water, or seeing it hold in and wreck the shoes.’

Orleanna lived on in Georgia, never remarrying because one husband was about enough to kill her, and beating herself up over the loss of one of her girls. I was surprised that the book continued on as it did giving glimpses here and their of how the girls lives had morphed over about 30 years. It could have easily ended with their escape from Kilanga, but it was interesting to see how their lives were forever impacted by Africa and what they experienced there.

Share on Facebook

It’s hard to keep momentum going for three books straight, and this was unfortunately my least favorite of the Larsson trilogy. If I had to point to one thing to blame, it would be the focus on unearthing the extremely secret conspiracy going on behind the scenes in the Swedish equivalent of the CIA. It grew tiresome watching secret service agents, the journalists at Millenium, and the police talk themselves in circles speculating on the group behind the Zalachenko cover up. It may be interesting to watch on the big screen, but reading it is slow going for 500+ pages.

The final book in Larsson’s trilogy opens with Lisbeth Salander receiving medical care for the life-threatening wounds she received at the end of book two. Amazingly, her brilliant mind is unaffected by the bullet and bone fragments that burrowed into her brain. Her father, the infamous Zalachenko manages to survive an axe to the face and is recovering in the hospital room two doors from the daughter he tried to murder. An overzealous prosecutor is determined to burn Salander for aggravated assault and attempted murder and she is confined to prison after several weeks of recovery in the hospital. For a person who is banned from receiving visitors and has no contact with the outside world, Salander is able to accomplish a great deal. Not only does she compile a cut-and-dry autobiography that sinks the prosecution’s case, but she also pin points a source of harassment at one of the largest newspapers in Sweden, thus saving the reputation and career of the former head of Millenium  magazine, Erika Berger.

I was disappointed that the majority of the story revolved around Mikael Blomkvist, the man who sleeps with pretty much every woman he meets. I much prefer following Salander’s character, who is as cunning as her old man, but with a better moral compass. But Blomkvist is dogged and successful in his mission to exonerate Salander from all the evil that has been said of her and to expose the real criminals within the government–for that, I have to tip my hat to him.

To say much more might ruin it, so I’ll close by once again offering up a strong recommendation for this trilogy.

Share on Facebook

Oh man, I’m hooked. My dream came true in the second book of this series–the secrets of Lisbeth Salander’s past have unfolded. I don’t want to give too much a way for those who haven’t read it yet, so I’ll stick to generalizations and thematic observances in this review.

If your a fan of “Law & Order SVU,” you’d love this book, but let me warn you that it’s significantly more graphic in terms of (homo)sexual encounters, vulgar language, and the like. Sometimes I have to turn that show off because the subject matter kills a little bit of my soul, yet, I also want to cheer at the end when all the searching is done and the bad guy is caught. That’s what I love about Larsson’s series. He’s written up the strangest heroin I’ve ever heard of, and yet I find myself cheering for this 90 pound wildcat every step of the way. This is perhaps the most succinct and accurate description of Lisbeth Salander:

Salandar was the woman who hated men who hate women.

It truly sums up her mission in life, which we learn is born out of a history of being a victim and observer of abuse against women. You have to get through about 80% of the second book before you get the full picture of “All the Evil” that occurred during the mysterious gap in Salander’s early teen years that earned her a bed equipped with restraining belts in a padded room in a psychiatric ward for children.  Not only does Salander not want to share that part of her life with anyone, but the Swedish government also goes to great lengths to keep it hush hush. Anyone else smell a conspiracy?

While the first book was about Salander helping track down a murderer/rapist, the tables turn in this book and Salander is the one being hunted. She’s wanted in connection to a triple homicide and manages to not only evade the multitudes who are searching for her, but to also be successful in her own man hunt for the person truly responsible. In the process of searching for Salander, the police and the press hang all of Salander’s dirty laundry out there for the nation to see. They make sport her “mental incompetence,” her bisexual relationships, and her violent streak. My big question for the next series in the book is how does Salander go on with life in a place where everyone now knows every secret she had been trying to bury deep.

Bring it, Larsson. I’m ready for book three.

Share on Facebook

The first 74 pages of this book were a bit ho-hum and I wasn’t quite sure where it was headed. Then on page 75, the author serves up the most delicious looking carrot that keeps you chasing for answers right up until the end.

The three main characters are Mikael Blomkvist, Henrik Vanger, and Lisbeth Salander. Blomkvist is an investigative reporter who suffers a major blow to his writing career and magazine company. Vanger is the elderly head of a centuries-old family corporation. Despite his age, he’s still as sharp as a tack and is eager to have the biggest mystery of his life examined by the unemployed Blomkvist in hopes of securing some answers before he dies. Forty years prior, Vanger’s niece, Harriet, vanished from the family estate without a trace, and Vanger suspected foul play within the family.

Salander’s character deserves a paragraph all her own. She’s a teeny, tiny, anorexic looking 25 year-old in the body of a 14 year-old boy. She also sports a punker look, with jet black hair, oodles of tattoos, and a fair number of piercings. You can tell right off the bat that she’s a deeply scarred and extremely guarded individual. While we never get too much information about the experiences she went through as a child, we do learn that she has been declared mentally incompetent by the state, a verdict handed down not because of her lack of mental aptitude, but because she refused to cooperate with any psychiatric evaluations. In fact, she’s the most gifted computer hacker in Sweden, has a photographic memory, and can process an insane amount of information in a very short amount of time in her job as a free-lance private investigator. As Blomkvist’s investigation begins to intensify, he and Salander team up to nail both the Vanger family fiend and the business mogul who trashed Blomkvist’s reputation. They are quite the dynamic duo.

At the beginning of each section, Larsson offers a statistic on sexual abuse against women in Sweden. It wasn’t until I got 3/4 of the way through the book that I realized the significance of those statistics. Not only is Salander  attacked, but Blomkvist’s investigation of the Vanger family leads to some seriously, seriously, disturbing secrets that have been perpetuated for 40+ years.

What threw me for a loop, though, was the double-message the author seemed to give. On one hand, he seemed to glorify–if not deify–sex and promiscuity among the characters in the story; yet, on the other hand, makes a huge statement about abuse against women. I challenging to explain why it bugged me, but it did.

Off to read the next book in the series…I’m hoping it’ll shed some more light on Salander’s past!

Share on Facebook

Ever since I read Heaven by Randy Alcorn, questions have been rolling around in my head about hell. After purchasing Erasing Hell, I discovered that is was written in response to Rob Bell’s book, Love Wins. While I haven’t read that book, I still found this one helpful and easy to follow, despite the frequent references to Bell’s assertions.

The biggest question I’ve wrestled with is whether hell is a place of eternal punishment or if it’s a place of annihilation. Either way you slice it, hell is hell, but in my heart, non-existance is a more palatable punishment than experiencing pain and suffering for all of eternity. While this book didn’t answer my question, it did spend quality time on verses relating to this topic and reminded me that regardless of the outcome, I should be deeply concerned for the fate of others and, as a result, be moved to action.

I really liked the way Chan and Sprinkle (what a fun name!) structured the book. It made sense and flowed well. The first four chapters are spent examining the facts of Scripture and extra-Biblical evidence to show what 1st Century Jews believed about hell, what Jesus taught about it, and what Jesus’ followers went on to teach about hell. The final three chapters of the book challenge the reader to look inward at what their own beliefs about hell, what those believes indicate what they believe about God, and how they relate to Him. These chapters also serve as a challenge to really feel the weight of the severity of hell, rather than living a life content in our own “fire insurance.”

I don’t think I could’ve handled a super heady book on hell. As I was reading, I didn’t feel like anything was over my head, but I didn’t sense that the authors watered it down either. Perhaps now I’ll pick up Love Wins and see what the fuss was all about.

Share on Facebook

“What we believe about God determines the quality of our marriage.”

Most couples, after three months of dating, are still getting to know one another. Jim and I, in contrast, said “I do.” A brief engagement meant a condensed version of pre-marital counseling, but what was instilled in us at that time was a perspective of sanctification–of continuing to grow in our understanding of what marriage is supposed to look like and how God wants the gospel to permeate every aspect of how we relate as husband and wife. I don’t think I really understood the importance of that perspective and what it meant until sin made an attempt at pushing Jim and I apart.

What I appreciate about this book is that it focuses on the fact that we are sinners, plain and simple. It’s not about love languages or meeting each others needs; it’s about loving each other by combating sin together. I’m not a perfect being, placed in this marriage for the sake of fixing all the things that are wrong with my husband. I’m a sinner, and unless I recognize the impact my sin has on our relationship and take responsibility for it, I will end up being my husband’s enemy instead of the helper God designed me to be (Gen 2:18). Likewise, if I’m not willing to offer grace and forgiveness when my man messes up, we’ll grow stagnant and bitter instead of moving forward and deeper in our relationship.

Recently, I’ve come to realize that I was leaving the gospel out of our marriage almost entirely. I was operating out of fear instead of love and basing my value in works, thinking that if I did everything right, I would earn my husband’s love. The flip side of that is if I did anything wrong, I felt I forfeited my right to my husband’s love. If that sounds pretty jacked up to you, it’s because it is!

The author, Dave Harvey, does a great job of relating Christ’s work on the cross back to marriage. He talks about sin, grace, forbearance, forgiveness, and the like, weaving together the gospel and sound theology in with helpful stories, examples, and profound excerpts from other Christian scholars. I don’t know about you, but I have to preach the gospel to myself every day, and I STILL forget how repentance, grace, and forgiveness can impact my marriage. If you have similar struggles, than this book is well worth the time and money (it’s about 1/2 price on Kindle).

Share on Facebook

I have to give the Bronte sisters a round of applause for having much more substance, mystery, and strange twists to their stories than Jane Austen. If Austen’s books are “Days of Our Lives,” then Wuthering Heights is “Jerry Springer.” It is dysfunction to an unbelievable degree. It’s filled with abuse (physical and verbal), revenge, family infighting, broken marriages, unrequited love, and more. I had to plow through 90% of this book before the dreariness and churning hatred began to lighten up.

The story is told from the point of view of the head maid, Mrs. Ellen Dean. She recounts the story of the inhabitants at Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange for the new tenant of her master, Mr. Heathcliff. There are so many characters and names that overlap, that it would be confusing for me to comment on too many aside from Mr. Heathcliff. They all, however, seem unfortunately drawn and bound to him like mice to a trap.

Heathcliff is rescued as a boy on the streets of Liverpool by Mr. Earnshaw, the patriarch of Wuthering Heights. Heathcliff is brought home, taught English, and enjoys a childhood equal to the Earnshaw children. He is especially close with Catherine, whom he loves, but is considered unworthy to marry because of the mystery behind his extended family and his darker features (his country of origin is never mentioned, but Mrs. Dean suspects he may be Spanish). All spirals out of control within the family once Mr. Earnshaw dies and his eldest son turns on Heathcliff.

If there’s one word I had to choose to describe the majority of the characters, it is venomous. The Earnshaws are infamous for their raging tempers, complete lack of manners, and insolence. It broke my heart to see characters with so much potential for goodness sucked into the swirling vortex of animosity. In spite of his love for Catherine, Heathcliff’s final plot is to break the spirit of her daughter. In doing so, he is able to exact revenge on a number of parties and secure for himself the wealth of two separate families. He is a man of deep anguish until the end, when it is suggested that he is visited by the ghost of the love from his youth. His death is unremarkable, but marks a sigh of deef relief for the handful of characters that survived his tyrannical rule.

It’s an intense, but riveting read. I highly recommend it!

Share on Facebook

This is my second Jane Austen book of 2012. While Mansfield Park had the same soap opera feel of young people battling for each others affections as Emma, it brought up two interesting themes that endeared me to this book more so than the other. The first is of blessings that flow from opening one’s home to a child in need. The second theme seeks to answer the question: what does a morally upright woman look like?

Lady Bertram is the wealthiest of three sisters as the result of an extremely advantageous marriage. Her sister, Mrs. Norris, married a clergyman, but quickly became a widow. Her other sister, Mrs. Price, married a drunkard who is apparently a frisky fellow, as they have heaps of children. Desperate and pregnant with her umpteenth child, Mrs. Price writes to her sisters entreating them for assistance. Mrs. Norris, a wretched woman with a knack for getting everyone to do everything for her (but taking all the credit for it) manages to trick the Bertrams into taking in one of her sister’s kids to offer some relief to the ever growing Price family. What got Mrs. Norris on my bad side right off the bat was how snotty she was and how she looked down so harshly on her niece, Fanny, whom she claimed to love too much to ignore. Make me vomit, Aunt Norris…you are NOT genuine, and you are NOT nice. Sir Thomas Bertram, also had a slight case of my-poop-doesn’t-stink syndrome at the beginning of the story:

‘There will be some difficulty in our way, Mrs. Norris,’ observed Sir Thomas, ‘as to the distinction proper to be made between the girls as they grow up: how to preserve in the minds of my daughters the consciousness of what they are, without making them think too lowly of their cousin; and how, without depressing her spirits too far, to make her [Fanny] remember that she is not a Miss Bertram. I should wish to see them very good friends, and would, on no account, authorize in my girls the smallest degree of arrogance towards their relation; but still they cannot be equals. Their rank, fortune, rights, and expectations will always be different. It is a point of great delicacy, and you must assist us in our endeavors to choose exactly the right line of conduct.’

My, how Mrs. Norris took that last request to heart. I’m sure Sir Thomas regretted the day he ever asked Mrs. Norris to be his conscience. For years, she berated, belittled, and criticized her niece for anything and everything, real or imaginary. Ugh, by the end of the book I really hated her character, and it became evident that her relatives also found her insufferable. I think she’s horrid, with a capital H-O-R-R-I-D.

Fanny, the eldest daughter of the Price brood, becomes the youngest among the Bertram children (two boys, two girls) by several years. I would liken her personality to a frightened little bird. Scared to open her mouth, scared to disappoint, and scared to appear ungrateful, Fanny tries to fade into the background of life at Mansfield Park, the expansive mansion her generous relatives call home. Her cousin, Edmund, an observant and compassionate young man, recognizes the deep sadness she feels over being suddenly removed from her family and becomes her friend and confidant. It is Edmund’s kindness, above all, that fuels Fanny’s heart throughout the book.

Fanny Price as the ultimate under dog. She’s convinced of her own inferiority and so humble that she struggles to ever exert herself. Though considered quite ignorant and lacking manners upon her arrival at Mansfield, Fanny grows into a beautiful young woman in appearance and in spirit. She is patient,virtuous, considerate, and sacrificial. She becomes an indispensable companion to Lady Bertram and her relatives (minus Aunt Norris) begin to take notice of her character and actions, both of which are beyond reproach. Everyone pats themselves on the back for their part in bringing her up and giving her the environment that would produce such happy manners, but using that same logic, one wonders how the three eldest Bertram children fell so short of the propriety and humility demonstrated by Edmund and Fanny. The girl that nobody wanted is a true gem compared to her elder female cousins.

To say much more would kill the drama and suspense of the story. I will finish by saying that Lady Bertram and Sir Thomas wind up loving Fanny like their own daughter and don’t regret the day they brought her home to live with them.

Share on Facebook