Timothy's Thoughts

C hip MacGregor has announced that he’s calling an end to his blogging. To paraphrase his reason, he has said all that’s worth saying. It goes without saying that this comes as a disappointment to his 250 daily readers, including myself. I think Chip’s blog is the first literary agent’s blog I followed and it is one of the few that I continue to follow. I understand the feeling that one has said all that’s worth saying. I had those feelings myself and I’ve wondered if some of the time I’ve spent writing posts would’ve been better spent doing something else, but I’m not sure it’s even possible to say all that’s worth saying. To quote from Michael Hyatt’s comment to Chip’s announcement, “You may think you are repeating yourself, but you are not. You are getting first-hand experience building a platform—something that is invaluable in terms of passing it on to your clients.” Michael Hyatt is only partly right. Yes, there’s much more that can be said, but a blog is more like a face to f...

F or today’s post I want to review Whosoever Will . I try to make it my policy to review only those books that I think people should read. This book is no exception. In fact, I would suggest that you don’t bother reading the rest of this review and go ahead and buy the book. I don’t think you’ll be disappointed. If you are, something is wrong with you. Whosoever Will is a written as a critique of five-point Calvinism from by a group of non-Calvinists. I think it’s important to use the term non-Calvinist rather than another term because no other term seems to fit, unless we simply say they are Baptists. Often in the discussion of Calvinism there is an assumption that a person is either a Calvinist or and Arminian . The authors of the book don’t fit well in either camp. If you read nothing other than chapters 1, 10 and 11 then you will have gotten your money’s worth. Chapter one is a sermon on John 3:16 by Jerry Vines. In recent years it seems like we’ve seen a lot of people talking...

I n my spare time, I’ve been reading Whosoever Will from B&H Publishing. I was enjoying it immensely until I reached the chapter on limited atonement by David L. Allen. In many ways I agree with what he says, but I have struggled with the chapter because of how he defined atonement and sufficiency. His claim is that Christ’s death is sufficient to cover the sins of all men, therefore atonement is general, rather than limited. He makes the claim that if we accept a limited atonement then we cannot make the claim that all men can be saved. Here’s the problem I have with that. First, this is the only place where I’ve seen the word sufficient used in this way. If a hostess asks if she has sufficient dip for all of the guests, she isn’t asking if she has enough as long as we tell people they can’t have any. Neither is she assuming that every guest will choose to get dip. Sufficient doesn’t mean that dip will be on the plate of every guest. Likewise, just because Jesus’ death is suff...

B rad Whittington has an interesting take on how publishers view books. He says that it bothered him that publishers would show enough interest in a book to publish it, but they wouldn’t spend the time and money needed to market it. That is until he realized that publishers offer contracts much like a Wall Street investor purchases stock. The investor wants a diverse portfolio. Most of that portfolio will consist of blue chip stock, the sure thing, but the more risky stock have a greater potential for fast growth, so the investor grabs some of those, just in case one of them really takes off. Publishers will put most of their money in well established authors, but they’ll make a risk investment in some of the unknown authors, just so they have a chance of already having the next bestseller under contract when it takes off. [ 1 ] I’m sure there are ways in which this analogy breaks down, but I think Brad Whittington’s idea is mostly correct. This model may give us some insight into und...

F eel good doctrine can come from many different places. As I was listening to the radio the other day I heard Chuck Swindoll talking about a song he learned in his youth. The verses of the song talk about being satisfied with just, but Chuck Swindoll says that the refrain is unscriptural because it asks the question “is Jesus satisfied with me?” He then went on to say that of course Jesus is satisfied with us. He made the claim that we talk about grace but we focus on works. I know we would all like to think that God is satisfied with us, so it is tempting to think that since we are now under grace he is satisfied with us no matter how we might mess up. Chuck Swindoll has a bigger following than me, so rather than just saying that I disagree with Chuck Swindoll, let’s see if we can see what the Bible has to say about this subject. If Chuck Swindoll is correct, then it must be the case that there is never a case in the Bible that God is never dissatisfied with one of his elect. We co...

O n Barry Creamer’s show the other day there was a caller who made an unexpected comment. The topic of the day had to do with why young people aren’t staying active in church once they move away from home and part of the discussion centered around church authority and the local church. What made the caller’s statement interesting was the concept she had of the “local church.” As she described it, she had made the decision not to attend a local church. When Dr. Creamer questioned her, it became clear that what she was actually saying is that she didn’t attend a church near her, but instead traveled some distance to go to church. It was clear that she was not pleased with Dr. Creamer saying that she should be part of a “local church.” So often we use terms and assume that other people are using them the same way, but if other people don’t know what we mean when we use these words we may be communicating something different than what we’re saying. The fact is that the caller was correct ...

I came across this video by way of Michelle Argyle. Much like with Hardware Wars , you don’t really need a full length novel to get the point, the video is enough. I’m not sure if picking on the work of Jane Austin is a good thing or a bad thing. I think, perhaps, that what the author is attempting to point out is the recent trend to blow everything out of proportion in a story just to get people to read it. I’m fascinated by how many authors think they have to begin their stories with something major, like a murder or some such thing. Instead of realism we have sensationalism.