Breaking the Idols of Your Heart: How to Navigate the Temptations of Life by Dan B. AllenderMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Having had a diet of 95% non-fiction books in the recent years, this book brought me back to good old days of my childhood - when I could not stop turning the pages of an enthralling story. Dan Allender captivated and held my imagination with his narrative of Noah and Joan, so much so that I found myself trying to read Longman's commentary as quickly as I could to find out how the story would unfold.
I am astounded as to how Allender masterfully penned the vividly relatable fictional story whilst constrained with so little word counts. The extended parable served as a wonderful companion for Longman to flesh out, elaborate and reflect on the themes of idols, cast against the backdrop of the book of Ecclesiastes.
In choosing not to get mired in the source criticism, authorship or expounding various scholarly contentious theological issues, Longman probably targets the lay reader. I'd suggest that the authors did a marvellous job at engaging this target audience. However, I wished that the book was written with less brevity and more attention was given to narrate through the reflection and application segments (the authors provided reflection questions at the end of each chapter, but I'd guess the majority of readers would not journey through the book together with others and received the benefit of helpful introspection, prayer and review).
While I have given this title 4 out of 5 stars, I'm thoroughly impressed with how well Allender and Longman have put their strengths together to come up with this gem. I think that I am most definitely going to read (and maybe review) their other titles in the near future, just to appreciate this interesting format they have written so very well with.
I received this book from IVP Academic for the purposes of providing an unbiased review. All views are my own.
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