Nearly every home in America owns a Bible. However, surveys and statistics from various sources show biblical illiteracy is present in our culture and even in our churches. In other words, people may have Bibles laying around at home but those Bibles are not being opened in their hands. What biblical illiteracy leads to is a group of people Deron Spoo, pastor and author, calls ignostic, “someone who is ignorant about the subject of God” (Spoo 15). This is one of the reasons for which Deron Spoo set forth to write a resource to teach people the message of the Bible. The result is The Good Book: 40 Chapters That Reveal the Bible’s Biggest Ideas.
In The Good Book, Pastor Spoo lays out 40 chapters broken into eight sections, with each section containing five different selections of Scripture. In such a brief work, he makes it clear from the beginning, “we’ll focus on the best-known passages of Scripture that form the basis of the faith” (Spoo 17). While he refers to the book as a guidebook to the Bible, he admits the depths are too deep to be explored in such a concise volume. Nevertheless, Deron Spoo serves the reader as a guide, leading them through the story of the Bible.
The Good Book by Deron Spoo is ideal for Bible beginners who are looking to understand the Bible in perspective and its passages in context. While the more experienced Bible reader may benefit (Spoo 18), the primary audience for this book is for those who do not have a great amount of knowledge of God’s Word. The book is easy-to-read, featuring concise and compact chapters, making it a fit for devotional time. Each chapter does impress upon the reader the need to apply the passage they are studying. I would greatly encourage the reader to follow the practice Pastor Spoo describes, “read the Bible selections first. Each chapter will take about five minutes to read. Then, after reading the entire Bible passage, read my brief exploration of that passage. Finally, I encourage you to reread the Bible chapter with the benefit of knowing more about the context and content” (Spoo 19).
The book does not come without critique, though. Two in particular are worth mentioning. The first concerns the point of the book. The subtitle to The Good Book states the book contains 40 chapters that reveal the Bible’s biggest ideas. While it is certainly true many of the Bible’s biggest ideas are expounded upon in the volume, his choice of a passage like Judges 16 reveals his philosophy. To be fair, he does state the focus of the book will be “on the best-known passages of Scripture” (Spoo 17) and his choice of Bible portions are more art than science (Spoo 18). The issue is the subtitle could have been rephrased to fit the book’s philosophy. Something like 40 Chapters that Put the Bible’s Best-Known Passages in Context (or Perspective) may have worked just as well.
The first critique is a minor detail. The second critique is a matter of understanding God’s Word. Deron Spoo wants to point the reader to the Bible’s biggest ideas and even says himself, “The Bible, from the first word to the last, points to the person of Jesus” (Spoo 21). What he says in theory, he fails to do consistently in practice. He teaches on Genesis 3 but makes no comment on the promise of Genesis 3:15. In 1 Samuel 17, he mentions the importance of David in the Bible, but he fails to mention how this event points to the greater David, Jesus Christ. Although the author does not describe how the passage points to Christ in those instances, in other places (Genesis 22, for instance) he does briefly draw the connection to Christ. If all of Scripture points to Jesus, wouldn’t it make sense to see how each chapter’s big idea leads us to the biggest idea of all, Jesus Christ?
Even with these critiques, The Good Book by Deron Spoo is a good resource to put into the hands of Bible beginners who are seeking to grow in their understanding of the Word of God.
I received a complimentary copy of this book from David C Cook via Litfuse Publicity Group for this review. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own and are my honest review of the book.
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