The God Who is There is a theological book written by D.A. Carson. I first purchased this book shortly after graduating from college in 2013 and it collected dust on a shelf. Some years back, I picked it up and read the first 5 chapters and loved it, but put it down and let it collect more dust. Part of my goal for this year is to complete a reading challenge. I set out to read 24 books this year. So far, I’m doing well and am actually ahead of schedule. It has been an amazing time for me to sit down and learn.
I’m gonna be honest with you, I picked this book up because the couple books I read prior to this one were duds. They weren’t bad books per se, but they certainly weren’t page turners for me. So I picked this book up thinking it was a sure thing. Thankfully, it was a very encouraging and challenging book for me to read. The tagline for the book is “Finding your place in God’s story.” This is important. God has written a fantastic story for our world. Where do we fit into it? What role do we play? These are themes and questions he answers throughout.
Carson starts off the book by trying to explain how he will be writing the book in simple terms so that any Christian can easily pick up what he is talking about. I would say that is a noble task and one that from time to time he does do a good job at. Thankfully though, he drops that line of thinking for the most part. This book is academic-light. It could be looked at as a textbook, but is more a deeper level theological resource for anyone doing study on the redemptive story of Scripture.
The rhythm of the book is that he has a topic to discuss, he reads a passage of Scripture that explains the topic, and then he does a deep dive into the Scripture and what we can learn from it. It’s a simple structure for a book, but it works. For me, one of the highlight chapters in the book is chapter 3, The God Who Writes His Own Agreements. In it, he discusses the Abrahamic Covenant and how God essentially wrote the contract up with Abraham and how he is the guarantee of that contract coming to fruition.
Another highlight would be chapter 8, The God Who Grants New Birth. This chapter is a thorough study of the story of Nicodemus coming to Jesus and the discussion that those two had on what being born again is. It’s a common enough story in Scripture that I believe we miss what is going on here. Nicodemus was a highly religious man that should have understood what Jesus was talking about with him, but he missed the boat. Thankfully, Jesus takes the time with him to correct him and show him a proper view of what he had come to do.
In conclusion, I believe this book was very well written and challenged my thinking in spots and was a tremendous resource to read through and study. I will say that as I was reading, there were times in the middle of the book where it felt like a slog. I think that is to be expected sometimes though. All in all, it was a great book and one that I know I can confidently put back on my bookshelf and pull off whenever I have a question that I know the book touches on. I like that in a book and I’m thankful to have one more I can refer back to again and again.
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