The Hole in Our Gospel

What Does God Expect of Us?

By: Richard Stearns

Narrated by: Tommy Cresswell

Length: 10 hrs and 27 mins

Publisher's summary

The answer that changed a life and might just change the world....

It's 1998 and Richard Stearns' heart is breaking as he sits in a mud hut and listens to the story of an orphaned child in Rakai, Uganda.

His journey to this place took more than a long flight from the United States to Africa. It took answering God's call on his life, a call that hurtled him out of his presidential corner office at Lenox - America's finest tableware company - to this humble corner of Uganda.

This is a story of how a corporate CEO faced his own struggle to obey God whatever the cost, and his passionate call for Christians to change the world by actively living out their faith. Using his own journey as an example, Stearns explores the hole that exists in our understanding of the Gospel.

Two thousand years ago, 12 people changed the world. Stearns believes it can happen again.

©2009 Thomas Nelson (P)2009 Thomas Nelson

All hole and no doughnut

I listened to this book as one of many books, in preparation for my first short term mission trip to an impoverished nation. I'm not sure that I would have finished it without that motivation. Here's why.

First, the narrator has a deep, rich voice and reads smoothly with appropriate intonation. He represents well the persona that any high powered executive would want to portray. It was a solid four star performance.

Richard Stearns spends the bulk of the book explaining how he was recruited by World Vision and how far he came down in pay grade to accept his position with them, the extent of the pain and suffering in the majority world, how pathetic North American Christians are at alleviating worldwide suffering and how we should be doing more, like sponsoring children, etc.. He of course quotes Francis of Assisi, "Preach the gospel at all times and when absolutely necessary, use words." This constitutes "the hole."

I believe that the gospel (i.e. God loves us so He sent His son, Jesus, to die for our sins so that we can be forgiven and know him personally) is the most critical bit of information any human being can be presented with and that apart from being born again through hearing and accepting the good news that God personally made a way for forgiven sinners to enter Heaven, this life is as good as it gets whether you live in the USA or Malawi. No amount of "being nice" to suffering people will matter without that relationship beginning through a new birth into Jesus Christ. The gospel of Mr. Stearns and World Vision seems to be that we should make people as comfortable as possible on the bus to Hell, unless they happen to ask if they're on the right bus.

The Bible teaches that after the new birth in response to hearing the gospel, there must come growth in a Christian's ability to live a life of active love. I agree with the author, that Christ followers should invest their lives intentionally and sacrificially to ease suffering, care for widows, orphans and the oppressed and work to make this world as good a place as possible in which to live. I don't agree that this work should be done without proclaiming salvation through faith in Jesus Christ alone and that this must be done with words. If, for some strange reason, you really don't care for Jesus but choose to listen to this book, you may want to skip the last 12 - 15 minutes. The author does eventually use words to preach, but it comes off as an afterthought.

Just as a hole without a doughnut surrounding it is worthless, so is just being nice without the story of God's love for us through Jesus. I gave the author three stars but I was "being nice."