A Place for Weakness

One of the things I appreciate about Michael Horton is that he writes both for the academy and also the congregation. It’s a mark of a good theologian to do both well. Horton is a professor of apologetics and theology at Westminster Seminary California. Some of his outstanding titles include Putting Amazing Back Into Grace, People and Place, We Believe, and A Better Way. He is also the publisher of the indispensible monthly journal Modern Reformation and host of the White Horse Inn radio program.

This relatively slim volume was originally published with the title Too Good to Be True: Finding Hope in a World of Hype, which I rather liked. Zondervan has released it with a new title and a new cover, and I am glad that new attention is being given to this outstanding book.

A Place for Weakness is driven along by an unrelenting but refreshing realism. There are no false promises here. There are no clichés or newly discovered secrets for “living in victory.” Horton helps us understand suffering as unromantic but deeply purposeful. In other words, we do not have to pretend that suffering does not hurt and cause dismay. At the same time, we are confidently pointed to the mysterious comfort that everything that comes our way passes through the hands of our good and sovereign God. “The unity of God’s sovereignty and goodness that will be finally disclosed on the last day has already dawned decisively in the work of Christ” (45).    Keep Reading...

Horton defines “the bottom line of this book” in this way:

The gospel is good news for losers, that in fact we are all losers if we measure ourselves by God’s interpretation of reality rather than our own. The demand for glory, power, comfort, autonomy, health, and wealth creates a vicious cycle of craving and disillusionment. It even creates its own industry of therapists and exercise, style, and self-esteem gurus—and churches—to massage the egos wounded by this hedonism. When crisis hits, the soul is too effete to respond appropriately. We become prisoners of our own felt needs, which were inculcated in us in the first place by the very marketplace that promises a “fix.” We become victims of our own shallow hopes. We are too easily disappointed because we are too easily persuaded that the marketplace always has something that can make us happy (26).