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A review by essentiallynovel
Women of the Word: How to Study the Bible with Both Our Hearts and Our Minds by Jen Wilkin
3.0
This book was written as a resource (really both men and women can read this regardless of the title) to help us become those who study Scripture with both our heart and mind. Loving God should include loving His Word.
In this small book Jen Wilkin provides us with tools of how we should study Scripture and what we need to be wary of while doing so: Bible studies are great but they shouldn't replace the Bible, understanding the passages in their truest context and not based off of our own interpretation or someone else's, etc.
Spending time in the Word in crucial to the Christian believer's life, and as Wilkin quotes Paul Bloom, it has been "...found that pleasure results from gaining knowledge about the object of our pleasure, not, as we might assume, from merely experiencing it over and over. Specifically, our pleasure increases in something when we learn its history, origin, and deeper nature."
The only two things that bothered me about this book was 1) a sentence she says early on, and 2) her complete lack of capitalizing pronouns when referring to God and Christ. I don't agree with her statement saying, "Yes, it is sinful to acquire knowledge for knowledge's sake..." and I assume that she means that acquiring Biblical knowledge just for Biblical knowledge's sake, but I am troubled by her statement of saying acquiring knowledge is sinful. We are wired to want to understand things; our brains made to develop understanding, to gain and hold onto knowledge. However, the rest of the sentence says "...but, acquiring knowledge about the One we love, for the sake of loving him more deeply, will always be for our transformation." Whether she's saying this just in reference to Scripture or in general, I don't agree at all with her saying that acquiring knowledge is sinful. Also, notice that she capitalizes One when referring to God and Christ, but does not for the pronouns that also refer to them. Not capitalizing pronouns (He, His, Him) is consistent throughout the whole book.
I think reading that statement within the first chapter or so of the book and the utter lack of reverence by not capitalizing pronouns tainted the rest for me. She writes about loving God but isn’t revering Him by capitalizing the pronouns, an issue I see way too often with Christian authors.
I agree with many other things she writes, but for a resource to help believers begin the journey of being more intentional with their time in God's Word, I personally wasn't all that hyped about this one. Others may find it useful but perhaps since I have heard just about everything in this book growing up in a Bible believing home, gaining degrees at a Christian college, and during my short time in youth ministry, there was nothing in this book that was new to me.
In this small book Jen Wilkin provides us with tools of how we should study Scripture and what we need to be wary of while doing so: Bible studies are great but they shouldn't replace the Bible, understanding the passages in their truest context and not based off of our own interpretation or someone else's, etc.
Spending time in the Word in crucial to the Christian believer's life, and as Wilkin quotes Paul Bloom, it has been "...found that pleasure results from gaining knowledge about the object of our pleasure, not, as we might assume, from merely experiencing it over and over. Specifically, our pleasure increases in something when we learn its history, origin, and deeper nature."
The only two things that bothered me about this book was 1) a sentence she says early on, and 2) her complete lack of capitalizing pronouns when referring to God and Christ. I don't agree with her statement saying, "Yes, it is sinful to acquire knowledge for knowledge's sake..." and I assume that she means that acquiring Biblical knowledge just for Biblical knowledge's sake, but I am troubled by her statement of saying acquiring knowledge is sinful. We are wired to want to understand things; our brains made to develop understanding, to gain and hold onto knowledge. However, the rest of the sentence says "...but, acquiring knowledge about the One we love, for the sake of loving him more deeply, will always be for our transformation." Whether she's saying this just in reference to Scripture or in general, I don't agree at all with her saying that acquiring knowledge is sinful. Also, notice that she capitalizes One when referring to God and Christ, but does not for the pronouns that also refer to them. Not capitalizing pronouns (He, His, Him) is consistent throughout the whole book.
I think reading that statement within the first chapter or so of the book and the utter lack of reverence by not capitalizing pronouns tainted the rest for me. She writes about loving God but isn’t revering Him by capitalizing the pronouns, an issue I see way too often with Christian authors.
I agree with many other things she writes, but for a resource to help believers begin the journey of being more intentional with their time in God's Word, I personally wasn't all that hyped about this one. Others may find it useful but perhaps since I have heard just about everything in this book growing up in a Bible believing home, gaining degrees at a Christian college, and during my short time in youth ministry, there was nothing in this book that was new to me.