The Corruptible

I will have to admit that I am a sucker for a good mystery book.  I found "The Corruptible: A Ray Quinn Mystery" to be just that, a good mystery book.  It wasn't great, but it wasn't bad either.  I didn't get bored with this book, but it did move at a fairly slow pace for a mystery book.  Part of that may be due to my love for TV shows of the same genre that move quickly and take several episodes or seasons to develop their characters.  This is the second book in a series, and I have not read the first one, so there may be some background information that I am missing.

The basic premise of the book is centered around an ex-cop, Ray Quinn, who was injured in the line of duty and now is working as a Private Investigator.  His carrer as a PI was helped by a previous case that he helped to solve and now afforded him certain perks as a consultant with the police force.  His partner is a wanna be cop by the name of Crevis, who is good hearted but cannot seem to pass the written cop exam.  Ray is hired to recover some stolen materials by a very wealthy investment firm that is run by Armon Mayer.  Ray is told that he was hired because the suspect was a dirty ex-cop, Logan, who had been working as a security guard for Mayer.  As Quinn begins his search Logan is found dead with the stolen goods no where to be found.  Quinn finds himself working alongside the police force in both the murder investigation as well as his own investigation into the stolen goods.  The case seems to go round and round while running into many dead ends but Quinn does end up solving the case in the end, which as it turns out was an inside job for the theft and a revenge of sorts for the murder.

With this being a "Christian" mystery novel there is a hint of evangelism  on the part of one of the characters who desires to help Ray.  In the end Ray does finally start listening to her and begins a journey toward sobriety that the author leads open for subsequent books.

All in all this was a good read.  There were a few things that seemed unbelievable from time to time, but I chalk that up to a work of fiction.

I received this book for free from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group for this review.

The Nature of Love: A Theology

In The Nature of Love: A Theology, Thomas Jay Oord sets out to construct a theology that features love at its center.   While this doesn't seem like an incredibly novel idea, I think that as one digs deeper into this stream of thought they will begin to understand that too many of our theologies put love as one of the many attributes of God.  But for Oord this is the essential understanding that we should have of God.  One of the first problems that arises from this line of thinking is how do we define love, especially in light of how our culture has distorted the meaning of this word.  The working definition that Oord uses is as follows, "to love is to act intentionally, in sympathetic/empathetic response to God and others, to promote overall well-being."

With this working definition in hand Oord turns to the biblical witness of love and reframed my understanding of the three Greek words that we translate into love: agape, philia, and eros.  I had always thought that agape (self-sacrificial love for the good of the other) was the best understanding of biblical and Godly love.  But Oord redefines agape as "loving responses to evil" and notes other instances where the biblical writers not only use the terms philia and eros but also use agape to express the concepts of philia and eros.  Not being someone who has studied Greek I will take Oord at what he says here and have to rethink and study up on these concepts and uses of love in the New Testament.  Beyond my own discovery in this area I really loved the landing point of Oord on understanding the full meaning of saying that God is love.  "Not only should contemporary Christians embrace agape, eros, and philia as legitimate forms of love for creature to express, but they should also accept the biblical witness that God expresses these forms of love.  Rather than one-dimensional, God's love is full-orbed" (52).  This opens us up to understanding God in terms of relationship and also how we as creatures are able to act in ways that are loving.

This in turn leads Oord to make the case that a theology of love affirms open theism.  This is due to the picture of a relational God that open theism paints in contrast to the 'totally other' God of classical theism.    I appreciate the emphasis on relationship that open theism paints between God and creation but I will admit that I got a tad lost in the discussion on theodicy.  I understand the basic assumption that open theism helps to explain away the culpability of God in view of the freedom that God has given to creation but Oord's assertion that creation ex nihilo is both unbiblical and wrong still has me thinking.  I can totally see where it is an idea that is not fully supported by the biblical witness, but I am struggling with this idea that something existed apart from God in the beginning and how God will redeem that something without being at least a little coercive.  Any help here would be appreciated.

Oord finishes the book with a fleshing out of what he calls Essential Kenosis which means that it is essential in God's nature to come near to creation in love (well being).  This was modeled by Jesus and is pointed to in the New Testament writings.  Ultimately the picture of essential kenosis is one of hope that God, and love, will win in the end.  I appreciate the full picture of love, God and eschatology that essential kenosis presents to us but I still feel like I've been drinking from a fire hydrant as I process this idea.

All in all I enjoyed this book and would recommend it.  I understand that not all will receive this view well but I feel that there are very good thinking points made by Oord in this book.

I read and reviewed this book as a member of the Speak Easy bloggers program.