Highly Recommended

The disease of postmodernism has had its own peculiarly damaging effects on the Christian church. In this mammoth volume, D. A. Carson takes up the gauntlet where the initial challenge of The Death of Truth leaves off as he takes a long, hard look at the results of pluralism.

Be forewarned that The Gagging of God is no casual read to place on your nightstand. This is a serious, detailed --- and in a few places, I regret to say, tedious --- examination of how pluralism has done harm to our society, especially the church, which in some places is falling prey to the infection quite directly (for example, with the watering-down doctrines of universalism and annihilation, which Carson takes some pains to examine and refute -- he is not afraid of taking on the toughest nuts to crack).

We see the disease at large, Carson tells us, in something as banal as the recognition of daily talk show hosts as arbiters of public morality, sometimes given the credence that ministers once held; furthermore, the bane of Biblical illiteracy has made its way into the world at large. (Carson reports a horrifying anecdote: Of 33 non-Christians he spoke to, only 2 were aware that the Bible had two testaments!) Are these not the bills that a historically neglectful church must pay?

The challenge is there for us, and can be met: The early church, too, confronted pluralism in the Roman empire, and Carson justly asks whether we can not meet the challenge just as well. Though it has touched many fields, as he describes, he encourages us with this volume not to give up the fight.