Epic, by John Eldredge - A Review

Editor’s Note: This book review was originally published in the Summer 2006 issue of the International Journal of Frontier Missions.

From the author of Wild At Heart comes this Epic: The Story God is Telling, a small book, which, like Brian McLaren’s [The Secret Message of Jesus], is very logically structured. In addition to the important Prologue and Epilogue it tells the story, the epic, of the entire universe in four “Acts.”

In the 16-page Prologue he insists that we must see the overall story, “the larger story,” if we want to understand the sub-plots.

Act One is where all is good and beautiful.

Act Two is the entrance of evil in the form of fallen angels. (Which, my guess is, at the moment in history when predatory life first appeared in the Cambrian era.)

Something happened before our moment on the stage. Before mankind came the angels. . . . This universe is inhabited by other beings . . . Most people do not live as though the Story has a Villain, and that makes life very confusing . . . I am staggered by the level of naiveté that most people live with regarding evil. (pp. 30, 39)

He now quotes a famous passage from C. S. Lewis,

One of the things that surprised me when I first read the New Testament seriously was that it talked so much about a Dark Power in the universe—a mighty evil spirit who was held to be the Power behind death, disease, and sin . . . Christianity thinks this Dark Power was created by God, and was good when he was created, and went wrong. Christianity agrees . . . this is a universe at war. (p. 40)

Act Three is where, he says, the Biblical story begins in Genesis 1:1, after angelic powers went wrong.

This act begins in “darkness . . . is still under way, and we are caught up in it. A love story, set in the midst of a life-and- death battle.” (p. 72)

Act Four gestures toward the final future in a brilliant, eloquent, imaginative flight of fancy which frowns on all human guesses of the grandeur of the future. He says playfully:

I’ve heard innumerable times that “we shall worship God forever.” That “we shall sing one glorious hymn after another, forever and ever, amen” It sounds like hell to me. (p. 80)

The Epilogue is a significant part of the book. He says,

First, things are not what they seem. . . . the unseen world (the rest of reality) is more weighty and more real and more dangerous than the part of reality we can see.

Second, we are at war. . . . We must take this battle seriously. This is no child’s game. This is war . . . a battle for the human heart.

Third, you have a crucial role to play. . . . We must find our courage and rise up to recover our hearts and fight for the hearts of others. (p. 102)

Here we see talk of war. But, strangely, it does not speak of a war against a Dark Power and his works, but a rescue operation for human hearts. That is certainly a basic part of it, but to liberate the French from the Nazi yoke the dark evil of Hitler had to be eliminated first.

““Most people don’t live as though the Story has a Villain, and that makes life very confusing.” ”

Here is a thought: theoretically if every soul on earth were finally born again we would still face a ravaged creation, riddled with violence (in nature) and disease. And God would continue to be blamed for all this evil—unless Christians were finally identifying it with Satan. However, that is precisely why this “thought” is purely theoretical: we CAN’T win everyone without destroying the works of the Devil in that very process. As long as hundreds of millions of mission-field Christians have eyes running with pus and incipient blindness, as long as such horrors are blamed on God (for the lack of a Satan), WE ARE NOT GOING TO WIN MANY MORE PEOPLE. And, all those hundreds of millions of rural people and uneducated people we have recently won are eventually going to lose their faith just as they have in Europe and much of America. We are not winning very many educated people.

We must, it seems to me, accept it as our true mission to fight these horrors in the name of Christ. That is essential if we are to glorify God in all the earth, and that glorification is the basis on which we invite people to accept God as their Father in Heaven—and recruit them to help fight this war.

Both of these two books [Epic and The Secret Message of Jesus] brilliantly describe the restless pew. One of them actually speaks of war, not so much against evil as a rescue operation of humanity.

Thousands of writers and pastors are puzzling over the essential question of what a believer does as a Christian besides being religious and decent and active in (small) good deeds.

Is there something wrong with the DNA of American Evangelical congregations? Many leaders today are suggesting that we need new church pioneers with ideas so different that the very word “church” may not be ideal.

Both authors here are discontent with “normal” church life in America and in one way or another are groping toward something vitally different.

These two book writers, plus myself, plus a whole host of other restless, relentlessly inquiring Christian leaders today are aware that Evangelicals have never in any country of the world grown as prominent in national affairs, have never more closely approximated the culture of those outside of the church, and have never generated in reaction such a profound phobia of religious people taking over the country (witness the avid attention given to the Da Vinci Code book and movie which so skillfully throws doubt on the validity of the entire Christian tradition).

Here we see an outcry for something more, something different, something more serious. I believe what is lacking is a clearer idea of evil and what to do about it. 

When God Doesn’t Make Sense

Flickr/West Midlands Police

In this essay, Ralph D. Winter poses a chilling scenario: A couple comes home late one night. All their lights are on, the doors stand open, police search the premises.

"Terrible things have happened," he writes. "The drawers are pulled out, cupboards are emptied, dishes smashed, even carpets pulled up. The whole place is an incredible mess. And the police turn angrily to the returning couple. 'We got a 911 call that something was wrong in your house. We have been here a half hour and we are overcome with puzzlement and fury. We have never seen a house so poorly kept.' They turn to the wife, 'What kind of a housekeeper are you anyway?'"

It seems preposterous. But Winter says this is exactly what we do when we attribute to God the works of Satan. "It seems ominously clear that the Adversary has greatly succeeded in not only concealing his own existence but in persuading us to think God is the author of all evil."

God has Given us the Means to Fight Cancer

By Beth Snodderly

HPV/LSIL On Pap Smear - Normal squamous cells on left; HPV-infected cells with mild dysplasia (LSIL) on right.

Ralph Winter’s call to the evangelical world to include fighting disease as an aspect of mission (Frontiers in Mission: page 180) echoes biblical themes that have their origin in Genesis 1:2. In this, Winter is also echoing Edwin Lewis who said in his book, The Creator and the Adversary, in 1948 (pages 149-50): "...a speaker who called upon the American people to cease believing in God because seventeen million persons now living would die of cancer would have made a much better and a much wiser use of his time had he called upon the American people to join with God in the fight against cancer [emphasis added] by the use of the very means which God is seeking to put into their hands for this purpose, because the only way in which God can use the means is through human minds and human hands. 'We are laborers together with God.'" 

Remembering Dr. Winter on his birthday - December 8

An interview with Barbara Winter

By Brian Lowther

Ralph and Barbara Winter at the Ribbon-cutting ceremony officially opening the Ralph D. Winter Library at Olivet University in San Francisco. Used with Permisson.

In honor of Dr. Winter’s birthday today, (he would have been 88), and as a way to keep his memory alive, I interviewed his widow Barbara Winter. Barbara and her first husband, Dr. George Scotchmer, who died in 1993, knew and supported the Winters for many years prior to Roberta’s death in 2001. Barbara married Dr. Winter in July of 2002 and remained his constant companion through the last seven years of his life. She brought him much joy and facilitated his continuing ministry, helping him to remain highly productive even as his health declined. Barbara carries on his legacy today as a member of the Frontier Ventures, the chair of the Roberta Winter Institute’s Advisory Board, and by archiving over 800 boxes of his personal files.

Brian Lowther: Name three books that influenced Dr. Winter’s RWI thinking.

Barbara Winter:

1. Greg Boyd’s God at War, The Bible and Spiritual Conflict. Downers Grove: Intervarsity Press, 1997
2. Lesslie Newbigin’s Foolishness to the Greeks: The gospel and western culture. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1986
3. Edwin Lewis’ The Creator and the Adversary. New York: Abingdon-Cokesbury, 1948.

Brian Lowther: What was the hardest thing Dr. Winter had to give up for health reasons?

Barbara Winter: Working more hours per day. He had to rest a couple hours every afternoon; also speaking more frequently. Before we were married (2002) he had given up soccer following his stroke. Later on he gave up distance walking due to weakness from Lyme disease and multiple myeloma.

Brian Lowther: Which of his qualities did you appreciate most?  

Barbara Winter:  His solid faith that began in his youth and endured his entire life. He continued to gain new insights from the Bible until the end; his loving commitment to me as his wife and to the rest of his family; his steadiness in the face of pressures; his sense of humor.

Getting folks on board to work at actually eradicating disease, a major work of Satan, thereby enhancing God’s reputation; not just treating disease with more medications.

Brian Lowther: Name one thing the Roberta Winter Institute could do that would have made Dr. Winter intensely proud.

Barbara Winter: Getting folks on board to work at actually eradicating disease, a major work of Satan, thereby enhancing God’s reputation; not just treating disease with more medications.

Brian Lowther: Did Dr. Winter ever grow out a full beard?

Barbara Winter:  No, he didn’t even like to have a day’s growth so he shaved even on Saturdays and holidays. He liked modest sideburns, but that’s all.

Brian Lowther: Name a theological idea that Dr. Winter continued to defend until his dying day.

Barbara Winter: Satan is and has been alive and active since before Genesis 1; also the absolute authority and truth of the Bible, God’s word.

Brian Lowther: Describe Dr. Winter’s interest level in sporting events. 

Barbara Winter: Very limited since he said that either one team would win or the other!! He enjoyed playing soccer for 30 minutes a day simply for exercise purposes. When in Guatemala he enjoyed watching a neighborhood soccer game occasionally. Watching games on TV he considered a waste of precious time.

Brian Lowther: Is there a skill Dr. Winter wished he had?

Barbara Winter: Being able to sing later in life. As a young man he was forced to sing tenor, which ruined his vocal chords. Other skills he would teach himself if he needed to such as carpentry, electronics, photography, computer programming.

Brian Lowther: What was Dr. Winter’s favorite food?

Barbara Winter: Tamale pie, apple pie; also split pea soup and sardines; root beer float whenever he could get one!

Brian Lowther: What impact did he want to leave on the world?

Barbara Winter: Getting the gospel to all the peoples of the world, not just more missionaries where there were already some serving, do what others either can’t or won’t do.

Brian Lowther: Did he have any quirks?

Barbara Winter: He liked to redesign filing and accounting systems, always finding a better way to do something. We had many clocks because he wanted to be able to see one no matter where he was sitting in our house. He wouldn’t wear shoes or neckties that he had to tie because both were a waste of time. He chewed on his pencil or his right thumbnail when deep in thought. He didn’t like to arrive early at a dinner or meeting because he didn’t like small talk. He loved fixing things with his hot glue gun and also taking time-delayed photos so he could run and get in the picture.

Brian Lowther: How would he finish this sentence?: Life is too short to tolerate ________.

Barbara Winter:  Chit chat; computer games, puzzles, TV (except for “60 minutes” which he determined from the opening summaries whether he would watch or not), inefficiency. 

Could your Definition of Disease be Too Narrow?

By Brian Lowther

When defining disease, many people naturally think of a microbiological explanation, such as: an abnormal condition affecting the body of an organism. But the concept of disease is broader than the microscopic world. Disease can also be social (cultural injustice); it can be structural (political oppression); it can be personal (relational breakdown); it can be spiritual (demonic activity). A response to disease can be specifically microbiological. But that response might be greatly augmented if it grew out of a larger frame of understanding. Perhaps the best way to define disease is to define its opposite: health.

The World Health Organization (WHO) defines health in their constitution as: “a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.” Their definition is a good one, given the WHO’s secular constraints. But perhaps something could be added to acknowledge the spiritual dimension of our existence. Dr. Dan Fountain may have said it best in his book From Health, the Bible and the Church (Wheaton, IL, EMIS/Billy Graham Center 1989):

In the Bible, health signifies a functional wholeness which includes the person, the full spectrum of social relationships involving the person, and how the person relates to God and to the physical environment. The goal of healing is to restore strength and function to all dimensions of this wholeness.