There are three ways to read a good and growing number of the classics of the Christian faith. The first is to read the original work. This is usually the most rewarding option, but it can pose difficulties when the author’s language is either foreign or antiquated. The second is to read a modernized version in which a contemporary author has generally maintained the content and flow of the book, but rewritten it in modern English. The third is to read a modern adaptation of the work in which a contemporary author writes his own version or adaptation that conveys the same ideas as the original, but with fresh language, illustrations, and so on. As time goes on, many classic works are available in all three formats.

The most recent to receive this treatment is John Owen’s Communion with God. Already available in Communion with the Triune God, a slightly modernized version edited by Justin Taylor and Kelly Kapic, we now have a fully adapted version in Mike McKinley’s Friendship with God: A Path to Deeper Fellowship with the Father, Son, and Spirit.
There is little I need to say about the original text except that it is for good reason that it has stood the test of time. First printed in the 1650s, it continues to be the preeminent work on the subject of the Christian’s communion with the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—realities that Owen understood to be not only crucial to the Christian life, but actually the heart and soul of it.
In this adaptation, McKinley chooses to speak of “friendship” rather than “communion.” “If you are a Christian,” he explains, “the Bible says that the eternal God—the one who made the universe and everything in it, the God who is more holy and glorious and powerful than we can even begin to understand—that God wants you to know him and be known by him. He has gone to great lengths to make it possible for you to be his friend. He delights in your company and loves to shower you with good gifts. In fact, he plans to spend eternity blessing you far beyond what you can imagine.” And, indeed, within the pages of Scripture we find the Lord referring to his people as friends, family, his body, his bride, and other terms of warmth, endearment, communion, and friendship. “That’s pretty clear, isn’t it? God intends to have a close and intimate connection with us.”
Yet we often have trouble believing this and living like it’s true—imagining that a being as great and holy and mighty as God might actually treasure a relationship with weak and broken people like us. And then even if we do believe it, we can struggle to know how to act out and foster that relationship. “I know both of those struggles in my own life and in the lives of the brothers and sisters in the church I pastor,” says McKinley. “I see it in the Christians who leave to find another church that makes them feel ‘more spiritual,’ in those who are always looking for the new conference or program that will unlock the key insight they need to feel closer to God, in those who have grown doubtful that God could really love someone like them, in those who feel like their walk with the Lord has simply stalled out, and in the people who have settled into going through the motions, hoping that something will change someday.”
And this is precisely where Owen’s book has proven so valuable to so many generations of Christians. Yet as time passes, it becomes increasingly inaccessible. “The problem (and the reason for this book) is that Owen can be difficult to read and understand. His language is outdated, the world that he was writing to is very different from ours, he never tires of listing out points and subpoints, and his writing style can seem overly complicated at times (he never seems to explain anything in ten words if he can explain it in fifty!). As a result, Communion with God just isn’t something that most twenty-first century Christians are going to pick up and read.”
Hence this modernization in which McKinley’s goal has been to “mine some of the most precious diamonds of Owen’s spiritual insights and make them available and applicable to you as you grow in your enjoyment of the friendship of the God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. I’ve tried to provide some of Owen’s most accessible and helpful quotes from the book, and if this motivates you to go read Owen on your own, you will be richly rewarded for your time and effort. It is true that some wonderful things are inevitably lost when you take a masterpiece written by a genius and let a (definite) nongenius like me shorten, rephrase, and rework it. But while some of Owen’s brilliance has certainly been lost in the process of creating this book, I do have hope that much good remains to serve you in your friendship with God.”
McKinley carries out his task well and helpfully conveys the best of Owen’s work in a way that is much easier to read and digest. If you have wanted to read a classic but have been intimidated by the original, or perhaps even incapable of understanding it, Friendship with God is just the answer. I am glad to recommend it.
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There are times when circumstances dictate that we move—that we move from one town to another, one province or state to another, or even one country or continent to another. There are other times when it is desire more than circumstance that causes us to uproot ourselves from one location and re-root ourselves in another.
It has long concerned me how many people move to a new house without giving substantial attention to a new church. They carry out an extensive job search and move only after signing on with a new company. They put great effort into choosing a town and selecting a house within it. They may visit nearby schools to ensure their children will continue to receive a good education. But they simply assume they’ll be able to find a church.
I often find myself thinking about the insight I learned from a recent book: That one of the most dangerous things a Christian can do is move. Why is it so dangerous? Because a move necessarily uproots that person or their family from their local church. And while they may intend to find a new church in their new location, they often do not. Sometimes they simply cannot find a good one and other times they break the habit of attending and never quite recover it. The key insight is that many people are “accidental deconstructionists” who abandon the faith through sloppiness or poor planning rather than conviction or malice.
I have seen this play out many times, often with former members of our church. While they were with us they appeared to be thriving and growing, joyfully attending services and faithfully serving other people. Then they announced they were moving for work or school or perhaps just for a change of scenery. We did our best to say farewell to them, pray for them, and bless them on their way.
Sometimes in our first follow-ups after the move we learned they were struggling to find a new church and in our later follow-ups we learned they had not found one at all. Soon they would stop replying to us altogether, perhaps in shame that they had now abandoned the local church and maybe even the Christian faith.
In other cases, they did not abandon the faith or even waver in it but had been forced to settle into churches that failed to properly honor the gospel or that worship in ways they disagreed with—churches that were from an entirely different tradition. While they were grateful to be able to gather with believers, they struggled with a church that denied much of what they held dear and sometimes even lamented having moved altogether.
Of course, there are circumstances in which a move is necessary—perhaps when you are in the military and are reassigned or if you are in a country that is not your own and the terms of your visa change. There are times we are forced to move involuntarily by life circumstances or divine providence. Yet far more often than not, I have seen people move for other reasons.
Might it be better to stay put and take a pay cut than to move and take a “church cut?” Wouldn’t it be better to be underemployed in a sound church than prosperous in a bad one?Share
And so I have often wondered: Might it be better to stay put and take a pay cut than to move and take a “church cut?” Wouldn’t it be better to be underemployed in a sound church than prosperous in a bad one? Wouldn’t it be better to have your kids in a slightly worse school system but in a dramatically better church? Wouldn’t it be better to forgo a bit of property size in order to have a faith that can grow and remain secure?
And if you do choose to move, let me plead with you to put more attention into your church than your job, neighborhood, home, or school. Let me plead with you to ensure—to be absolutely certain—that wherever you go, you and your family will be able to be members of a church that honors the Word, preaches truth, and faithfully worships the King. For nothing less than spiritual life and death are at stake.

May you know the Lord’s blessings as you honor and serve him this weekend.

I’m grateful to Baker Books for sponsoring the blog this week with news of a new book by Andrew Davis titled The Glory Now Revealed. Be sure to check it out!
Today’s Kindle deals include some newer and older works.
(Yesterday on the blog: Welcoming the Uncomfortable Work of God)
The Final T4G
Collin Hansen reflects on the forthcoming final T4G. “More than 15 years ago I crowded into the Galt House Hotel ballroom, just across I-64 from the Ohio River in Louisville, Kentucky, with 3,000 pastors and students. We gathered for the inaugural Together for the Gospel (T4G) conference without much idea of what we should expect. We got something we could never forget.”
Back to the Word
I’m with Andrée Seu Peterson: “I’m just about ready to give up the rational conversational approach to social intercourse and to start quoting straight Bible to people. The further we go, the more reason isn’t working anymore. In these sputtering last gasps of the Enlightenment, language itself is deconstructing before our eyes.”
James Bond Converts to Conservatism
As I read Samuel James’s analysis of the latest Bond film, I realized that I’ve never seen a Bond film. He looks at how Bond has changed over the years and what it may mean.
A Theology of Disappointment
“Oddly enough, disappointment can be an indicator you are seeing the world correctly. No one enjoys feeling disappointment. In itself, disappointment is akin to the sadness of loss, and ultimately we were not designed for it. But like all emotions, disappointment is a gauge of how a person perceives his life—what he believes about it and wants from it. When you’re living in a broken world, sometimes believing and wanting the right things means you’ll be disappointed.”
When Does Marriage Begin In God’s Eyes?
Femi Osunnyi provides an interesting answer to the question.
Jesus Spoke a Persian Word From the Cross
“One way to distinguish Central Asia as a region is to say that it is the part of the world dominated by Turkic or Persian-related languages. … These hundreds of millions of people are overwhelmingly Muslim – and they might be surprised to hear that Jesus spoke a word from their ancestral language while on the cross.”
Sin-Coddlers Are Not True Friends
Trevin Wax looks at older and newer definitions of “friend.” “True Christian friends understand the pervasiveness and pull of sin. They’re not shocked by your misstep. They don’t make you feel worse than you already feel. They don’t heap judgment and guilt upon you. But neither do they excuse or minimize your sin. They see something better in you. They know the work of Christ and trust the power of the Spirit. They call you away from sin because they’re calling you to holiness, to the Christlikeness that marks your destiny.”
Flashback: When Jesus Says Stay
He wanted to follow Jesus. He wanted to be close to Jesus. He wanted to live a life of radical obedience. But Jesus told him to stay, not to go. Do not follow me.

We must have cast our sins on Him before we can cast our cares. —F.B. Meyer