This collection contains the majority of sermons preached by John Piper between 1980 and mid-2009 (the blurb cites 1,125, whereas, at my count, the collection actually includes 1,174 sermons). In terms of his theology, Piper, heavily influenced by Jonathan Edwards, is at the forefront of what has been described as New Calvinism. He is perhaps best known for his involvement with the Passion movement and as the writer of the influential and best selling Desiring God. The sheer size of this collection is impressive and, given that Piper preaches from a manuscript, the sermons have been written and formatted with care. As a result, this collection is a pleasure to browse and to read. Anyone familiar with Piper’s expository style of preaching will be unsurprised with regards to the scope and depth of the content. Indeed, this collection contains the entire sermon series which underpin Desiring God, The Pleasures of God, Future Grace and, with the recent update, Spectacular Sins and their Global Purpose in the Glory of Christ. Moreover, this series covers 1 Peter, 1 John, the first 13 chapters of Acts, Malachi and Romans in its entirety. The recent update includes Piper’s sermons on the first four chapters of the Gospel of John. Notwithstanding this, it should be noted that all of this content is available online for free. The question, then, is what value is added by having access to these resources within Logos? The answer to this question will depend on the degree of one’s interest in Piper and the intended use of the resource. Logos 4 does enable navigation by sermon date (via the table of contents), but this is also possible when accessing the resources online. Disappointingly, however, I cannot see anyway (in Logos 4) of easily navigating the resource by series (this is possible online and in Libronix, the predecessor to Logos 4). The strength of accessing this resource via Logos 4 is, therefore, twofold. Firstly, it is incredibly convenient to be able to access resources from the same software platform. The value of this cannot be underestimated given the improvements in the mobile apps. It is hugely valuable to be able to read, highlight and annotate this collection on the desktop programme and from the iOS app. Secondly, the search capabilities offered by Logos 4 add incredible value. For example, as suggested in the blurb above, one can assemble a dynamic collection containing Piper’s sermons and then add this to My Passage Guide. My Passage Guide will then pull up any sermons relevant to the passage of interest. Consequently, in Logos 4, this collection attains something of the value of a homiletic commentary. In summary, therefore, this collection is immensely valuable to those interested in Piper, Calvinism, New Calvinism or wanting to supplement their library with a strong sermon collection.

This book is structured as a dialogue between N.T. Wright and Marcus Borg (characterised, respectively, as representing the conservative and liberal streams of Christianity). Both Wright and Borg profess to be confessional Christians.

 The dialogue between Wright and Borg circles around the person and work of Jesus with the final chapters being given over to implications for Christian living.

 Essentially, Borg approaches Scripture from a critical standpoint (he sets forth his methodology in Chapter 1), arguing for a distinction between history remembered and history metaphorised. In Borg's formulation, history remembered refers to those passages of Scripture which he considers to be reliable and factual historical accounts. Contrariwise, history metaphorised refers to those passages of Scripture which Borg considers to be historically unreliable and which are, in Borg's estimation, metaphors recorded by the early Christian community to account for who Jesus had become to them. This distinction then enables Borg to assert that those passages which are not, in his view, historically reliable are, in a deeper sense, 'true'. As such, 

Borg draws a distinction between the pre-Easter (Jesus of Nazareth) and post- Easter Jesus. Borg presents the pre-Easter Jesus as a Spirit-prophet, but argues against any sense of a Messaianic self-awareness. Wright, however, adopts a conservative socio-historical approach to the same subject. In my evaluation, much of Wright's response is summarised from the brilliant Origins series (available elsewhere on this site). Wright argues, persuasively, in my view, that, on balance, the gospel accounts are historically reliable (including the resurrection, virgin conception and miracles). Wright takes this as a foundation and constructs a compelling account of a self-aware Christ self-consciously engaged in his Messianic mission. Wright argues that this Christ is aware that his mission entailed actions which only God himself could undertake and would necessitate his own death.

 In conclusion, the dialogue is interesting in as far as it goes. My reservation, reflected in the rating, is that this book is unlikely to either convince or satisfy either those of a conservative or liberal persuasion. Neither writer is afforded space to unpack their positions to a degree which would satisfy a reader informed in respect of this debate. Moreover, I am unsure as to whether the 'dialogue' format advances the debate. One would perhaps be better served by instead reading Wright's Origin series or Borg's Jesus: A New Vision.