I recently read and really enjoyed Sidney Greidanus’s work From Chaos to Cosmos: Creation to New Creation.
Now, full disclosure, I’ve been on something of a chaos and creation kick recently. It started by binge-listening to a Bible Project podcast series on “The Chaos Dragon.” I think this was the first time I binged a podcast since the initial season of Serial nearly a decade ago.
If you don’t have 20 hours to spend listening to that, they condensed it to a five-minute video.
And that led me to an older Bible Project Series on Ancient Cosmology.
And, I’m looking into some historical views of creation for an upcoming Sunday School lesson (not even a series - 1 lesson) on Creation. (For those interested, I highly recommend Gavin Ortlund’s book on Augustine here along with his videos).
And so, this book had a lot of overlap with things I was already reading and listening to and interested in.
That said, it did offer a few other strengths.
It’s print. Audio is great for while you’re doing dishes, driving, or mowing the yard/shoveling snow (depending on the weather), but it was helpful for me to read this, to see the Biblical text quoted, and to have a print reference for when I need it.
It’s Greidanus. You can trust this guy. He’s a conservative, orthodox Bible scholar. He’s famous for teaching pastors how to preach Christ from the Old Testament. I haven’t ever studied creation, cosmology, or ancient Eastern mythology in any depth in college or seminary, so I’m not familiar with many scholars in that field. I don’t know their other views and presuppositions. But I trust Greidanus - so reading the same things I’ve heard others say was reassuring.
It’s focused - not on ancient cosmology, but on a biblical theme. He just walks through books showing the chaos theme, not necessarily arguing for anything in particular (though there are some concluding thoughts and applications). It seems his goal is simply to show the reader what is in the Bible. And I appreciate that.
All in all, it was a fun book to read. Maybe fun says more about me than the book. But it gets a Dan Stamp of Approval.
Though it seems like apples and oranges, I think A Quiet Mind to Suffer With still is the one to beat for my favorite book of the year.
Looking for more of my book recommendations? Click here.