Product Description

The End of Faith. The God Delusion. God Is Not Great. Letter to a Christian Nation. Bestseller lists are filled with doubters. But what happens when you actually doubt your doubts?

Although a vocal minority continues to attack the Christian faith, for most Americans, faith is a large part of their lives: 86 percent of Americans refer to themselves as religious, and 75 percent of all Americans consider themselves Christians. So how should they respond to these passionate, learned, and persuasive books that promote science and secularism over religion and faith? For years, Tim Keller has compiled a list of the most frequently voiced “doubts” skeptics bring to his Manhattan church. And in The Reason for God, he single-handedly dismantles each of them. Written with atheists, agnostics, and skeptics in mind, Keller also provides an intelligent platform on which true believers can stand their ground when bombarded by the backlash. The Reason for God challenges such ideology at its core and points to the true path and purpose of Christianity.

Why is there suffering in the world? How could a loving God send people to Hell? Why isn’t Christianity more inclusive? Shouldn’t the Christian God be a god of love? How can one religion be “right” and the rest “wrong”? Why have so many wars been fought in the name of God? These are just a few of the questions even ardent believers wrestle with today. In this book, Tim Keller uses literature, philosophy, real-life conversations and reasoning, and even pop culture to explain how faith in a Christian God is a soundly rational belief, held by thoughtful people of intellectual integrity with a deep compassion for those who truly want to know the truth.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #249 in Books
• Published on: 2008-02-14
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 293 pages

From Publishers Weekly
In this apologia for Christian faith, Keller mines material from literary classics, philosophy, anthropology and a multitude of other disciplines to make an intellectually compelling case for God. Written for skeptics and the believers who love them, the book draws on the author's encounters as founding pastor of New York's booming Redeemer Presbyterian Church. One of Keller's most provocative arguments is that all doubts, however skeptical and cynical they may seem, are really a set of alternate beliefs. Drawing on sources as diverse as 19th-century author Robert Louis Stevenson and contemporary New Testament theologian N.T. Wright, Keller attempts to deconstruct everyone he finds in his way, from the evolutionary psychologist Richard Dawkins to popular author Dan Brown. The first, shorter part of the book looks at popular arguments against God's existence, while the second builds on general arguments for God to culminate in a sharp focus on the redemptive work of God in Christ. Keller's condensed summaries of arguments for and against theism make the scope of the book overwhelming at times. Nonetheless, it should serve both as testimony to the author's encyclopedic learning and as a compelling overview of the current debate on faith for those who doubt and for those who want to re-evaluate what they believe, and why. (Feb. 14)
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Review
“In a flood of bestsellers by skeptics and atheists...Timothy Keller stands out as an effective counterpoint and a defender of the faith. The Reason for God makes a tight, accessible case for reasoned religious belief.”
—Washington Post

“It’s a provocative premise, in pursuit of which Keller...takes on nonbelievers from evolutionary biologists to the recent rash of atheist authors.”
—The Boston Globe

“Reverend Tim Keller [is] a Manhattan institution, one of those open urban secrets, like your favorite dim sum place, with a following so ardent and so fast-growing that he has never thought to advertise.”
—Newsweek

“The most successful Christian Evangelist in [New York City]...with intellectual, brimstone-free sermons that manage to cite Woody Allen alongside Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.”
—New York Magazine

“An intellectually compelling case for God.”
—Publishers Weekly

“I thank God for him.”
—Billy Graham

About the Author
As the founding pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City, Tim Keller started his congregation with a few dozen people. It now draws over five thousand weekly attendees who meet in three Manhattan locations. Redeemer has since spawned a movement of churches across America and throughout major world cities. Many pastors model their churches on Redeemer and Tim’s thoughtful style of preaching.

Customer Reviews

Concise, Clear Arguments
It starts strongly with the almost paradoxical problem that the special grace offered by God through Jesus requires substantial reflection and justification when compared to the acts-based grace of other religions. I wrote paradoxical because in Judaism, acts matter, what you believe is secondary, nice, but not damning by absence. Jews think of this as superior to Christianity, but it allows very sloppy thinking, which the carefulness of Keller shows.

The highlight of the book is really on pages 58-62. These words would and will turn many thoughtful non-Christians into acolytes.

If I could add one thing to the early text, it would be a reference to Gödel's Incompleteness theorem. Most people think it means that nothing humans conjure contains the all truth or all causes. In effect, everything is faulty: so your belief is just as valid as my belief - another argument for relativity or nihilism. However, what Incompleteness really implies is that there is a reality out there, outside our closed thoughts, and that reality may just be god: a wonderful belief that rests on extremely solid, non-religious ground: a real proof no different than vertical angles are congruent in plane geometry.

Reasonable
At last, here is a crisp intellectual reply to the challenges raised by secular, humanist and atheistic thinkers against Christian doctrine and belief. Tim Keller addresses their most common and pointed questions in an eloquent, firm and thoughtful way. Best of all, he does so without the rancor, sarcasm and arrogance that have typified so many of the challengers themselves. He invites people to seek the truth, and offers solid, sensible supporting points for each argument.

He readily admits the profound harm and mistakes that have been made by those claiming to be Christians who act contrary to the teachings of Jesus and the early church. By drawing a distinction to clarify the true message and beliefs of the faith, he dispels multiple misinterpretations and misconceptions about Christianity. His moderate voice of love and tolerance towards others has already led so many people to think through the profound implications of their belief systems in Manhattan. This book reflects his decades of street-level experience in New York.

Mr. Keller's reasoned approach contrasts sharply with the shrill and emotional outbursts so common in our "progressive" post-modern age. His work is a welcome and worthy successor to that of his proclaimed predecessor, C.S. Lewis.

you better be willing to use your brain
I was a little disappointed in this book, probably because I have listened to a lot of Tim Keller's messages and I guess I was hoping for new ideas in this book. I didn't find many points that I hadn't already heard him speak about but that doesn't mean his points aren't intelligent and helpful because they are. I was hoping to give this book to some friends, but after reading it, I think it's too intellectual for them to want to read it. It's a well written, clear, helpful book . . .expectations are a bummer.