Dan J. Brennan

Review: The Meaning of Marriage Pt. 2

Knowing something of Timothy Keller's ministry through online and books, when I heard that he and his wife Kathy wrote a book on marriage I anticipated something like The Meaning of Marriage. It's vintage Keller. It is filled with rich insight. It is anchored in 37 years of passionate experience in marriage. He seeks to portray a "surprising goodness" in marriage. As someone who has been married 30 years, I can attest to much of what the Kellers write about. 

While the Kellers read the Bible through a Neo-Reformed lens,  their book is much richer and deeper than the Driscoll's Real Marriage. But what does that look like? Part one in this series is here. 

Let me state where I am coming from with seven statements:

Review: The Meaning of Marriage Pt. 1

With eager anticipation, I looked forward to reading Timothy and Kathy Keller's book, The Meaning of Marriage. Tim is situated in the Neo-Reformed camp and yet, he has a distinctive voice which sets him apart from many in that community. Kathy and Tim have been married for 37 years.

Their book has such a different spirit and depth to it than Mark and Grace Driscoll's Real Marriage. 

An essential focus both books share (beyond a Neo-Reformed reading of marriage) is their vision of marriage-as-friendship. As I observed in my review of the Driscoll's book, this is progress!    

The Christian community (especially evangelicals) has not devoted much energy integrating friendship and marriage. The Driscolls claim they have read 187 books on marriage and "not one of those books had one chapter or major section on marital friendship." I wonder how many Catholic books on marriage they read! And, they certainly didn't read my book! But they also go on to claim that they could only find "one significant book written on the theology of friendship." 

Now I do wonder about the accuracy of their claims but speaking from personal experience, the Driscolls are not exaggerating. This is an extraordinary weakness in the evangelical community. There is a significant silence amongst evangelicals integrating sexuality, friendship, and marriage. 

 

My Reflections on Wild Goose East 2012

To be honest, I was looking forward to Wild Goose East with eager anticipation accompanied with a small dose of nervousness. My small dosage was due in part to that fact that I'm a white male who has written a book on heterosexual love within marriage and beyond, between the sexes, Sacred Unions, Sacred Passions. 

I don't neatly fit into any conservative, moderate, or progressive paradigms. Progressives would probably call me too conservative while conservatives would call me too progressive. My book is one of those subjects though, that reaches out to all three paradigms for different reasons so I find myself talking to people situated in all three. 

What is more important to me than being shoe-horned into one of the paradigms is Jesus' call to love. To love others who challenge me, who are different than me, who see the world different than I do. I may do it imperfectly; I may express it inadequately, but I am more convinced than ever that love is what God's reign looks like on earth.