Picturing the Gospel

Tapping the Power of the Bible's Imagery

By Neil Livingstone
Foreword by Brian McLaren

(paperback)

Product Details

Line: IVP Books
Length: 183 pages
Size: 5 1/2 x 8 1/4 inches
Binding: paperback
Published: February 2007

ISBN-10: 0-8308-3370-6
ISBN-13: 978-0-8308-3370-2
IVP Order Code: 3370

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Bible Study Resources

"The gospel is never less; it's always more. By expanding the metaphors and rationalities with which we understand and explain the gospel, Neil Livingstone does the church (and the world) a great service. Without disparaging propositional truth, he adds a layer of aesthetic truth, and in so doing, exhibits the beauty of the good news."

"Since the early church first began to present the gospel as an apologetic that corresponded to the philosophical categories of Greek thought, we have tried to reduce biblical truths to constructs. Our earliest creeds necessarily followed this approach. But such constructs do not always capture the heart or move us deeper into the journey of faith. Though this approach was not entirely wrong we missed a whole range of biblical meanings that corresponded more closely with the imagery actually employed by the biblical writers themselves. Neil Livingstone gives us a thrilling book that shows us practically how to expand the way we present the gospel, first to ourselves and then to outsiders. This is an inspiring and fruitful book that will foster a needed rethinking of how we share Christ. I heartily commend it."

"Too often we limit the gospel to one aspect of life. Neil Livingstone walks us through a number of the Bible's powerful portraits of God's work in a way that enriches our life and witness."

"How can the lives of Christ's followers become gospel tapestries? Neil Livingstone weaves the life-struggles of contemporary Americans together with biblical images of salvation in order to exemplify what it means to incarnate the good news. Readers will be challenged not only to know about the life-transforming power of the gospel but genuinely to embody it."

I'm particularly impressed with how Livingstone is able to tie these images and themes together throughout the Bible rather than simply list verses. At the same time he is exploring the imagery, he is mining the Biblical resources and making application to real persons. . . . Above all, Livingstone never loses sight of another set of images: people who need the Gospel in different ways.

Livingstone uses narrative to enliven afresh those biblical word pictures that repetition has sucked day.

Livingstone's aim is to open up the true nature of the Gospel to us so that it can change the way we do Christianity. Yet his vision of the Gospel is 3-dimensional and only an aesthetic journey into the intersection of heaven and earth can help us begin to grasp its contours.