The Word of the Lord...to Democrats

Brian McLaren has long-been one of my favorite Christian authors. His book A New Kind of Christian radically altered my theological perspective and imagination and set me on a course that has taken me to a new city, a new seminary, and a new denomination. I am eternally grateful for his profound thoughtfulness and powerful writing.

His newest literary endeavor has taken him into the new and exciting world of e-books. In our current technological world, with print material taking a backseat to electronic media, e-books have begun to emerge as a creative alternative. There is no publishing needed and the promotion and marketing process can be much different, since the author does not need to deal with traditional book stores. With a presidential election on the horizon, McLaren has written three short e-books as a part of his The Word of the Lord series. One is directed to Democrats, another to Republicans, and the third to Evangelicals. He has written them all as fiction, much like his original and popular trilogy. I just finished his book directed at Democrats, a quick little read that probably only took a few hours to finish, and I look forward to reading the other two. While this was by no means a classic McLaren piece, it is well worth your time.

SPOILER ALERT: here is the money quote at the end. If you plan on reading this book soon, perhaps you will just want to skip reading this quote.

"A new day is dawning, and that new day presents a new possibility. We must leave behind the stale, standard politics of partisan candidates who seek victories for themselves and defeat for their opponents. That's yesterday, but the times are a'changing, my friends. This new day calls us to employ the creative power of movements, movements that build unexpected alliances among previously disconnected communities, movements that seek a good far more precious and far less common than victories. What is that uncommon good? It is the common good."