Daniel Bush, Ph.D., has over 15 years of experience in Christian ministry--including time as a pastor, missionary professor, youth pastor, and spiritual director. In addition to 10 years of service as an officer in the US Air Force, his training was completed at Michigan Technological University (B.Sci.) and in divinity at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (M.Div. and Th.M.) and the University of Aberdeen, Scotland (Ph.D.). He is the coauthor of Embracing God as Father and Live in Liberty and is a guest blogger for Faithlife, Lexham Press, and KeyLife Network.
Reading a Daniel Bush book is always a delight! Undefended:
Discovering God When Your Guard Is Down is not the exception. This
book is incredibly refreshing and profound--and so practical. Here,
you will find real-life "hard places" and the good news that Jesus
shows. It's the kind of book one reads often to be reminded that
one doesn't need any defense but Jesus because, in his love, grace,
and acceptance, there is nothing to defend. In his presence (and
thus the presence of others) one is free to laugh and dance with
great joy and freedom. This is a book that could change your
life.
--Steve Brown, radio broadcaster and founder, Key Life Network;
professor emeritus of preaching and pastoral ministry, Reformed
Theological Seminary; author of Hidden Agendas and Three Free
Sins
Are we willing to let ourselves need God? In Undefended we are let
in behind the scenes of one man's wrestling with this question and
invited to ask it ourselves. As we do we may just find it's what
we've wanted all along.
--Mandy Smith, author of The Vulnerable Pastor
Undefended: Discovering God When Your Guard Is Down is not a book
that you will want to read cover to cover in one sitting. Instead,
this is a book that you will want to walk through chapter by
chapter, and let God speak to you in the depths of your heart,
mind, and soul. By weaving together scriptural truths with relevant
stories and illustrations that open us to see how we are not
Undefended, Daniel Bush has provided us a guide to facilitate a
release from the barriers in our lives that keep us from
experiencing the full depth and breadth of God's grace.
--James F. Kirkley, associate professor, religion and ethics, Shaw
University
Forged in the fires of dryness, discouragement, and pain, Daniel
Bush writes from experience: his defenses burned down, his soul
exposed to his own weakness and vulnerability. He writes broken by
an acute awareness of unfulfilled needs and the struggle to
surrender to his heavenly Father. Although intellectual and astute,
Undefended is no academic perusal. It's a story of spiritual
awakening, the journey from personal competency and
self-determination to broken dependency we all must make.
If you're looking for a book of principles for spiritual maturity
or steps to Christian joy, look elsewhere. Undefended stubbornly
refuses to reduce the Christian life to a set of disciplines or
propagate the notion that faith means denying the pains of this
life and donning a veneer of niceness and joy. Again and again
we're shown that Jesus came to save the sick, broken, and needy,
that he meets us in our pain, our fear, our need, our
loneliness--and even in our doubt.
Christian growth isn't a byproduct of discipline or striving, but
surrender to the inevitable reality of our own sinfulness and
dependence upon the love and grace of the Father. For those wounded
and wearied by life, here is hope that God is present in our life
and may be discovered even now if we will only seek Him. An
opportunity for a deeper acquaintance with His love is near.
--Dr. Jeffrey Pipe, licensed psychologist, Tapestry Associates,
Marietta, Georgia
Undefended strikes truth after beautiful truth at the bull's-eye of
what it means to be human. In an age when vulnerability has
arguably become glib, author Daniel Bush provides a refreshing
reminder that when we guard our hearts in the love of Christ first,
we are then freed to let down our guard to love others more fully.
Informed yet accessible, with humor and humility, Bush offers
poignant wisdom relevant to any life season, but especially to
those times in which we are laid most bare. To me, this book will
always be a timely, needed, and reorienting read. In other words,
Bush indeed gives a blood transfusion to the anemic advice: "Just
trust in God."
--Dr. Carolyn Weber, professor, speaker, and author of Surprised by
Oxford and Holy Is the Day
Weary of defending a false self that proves over and over again to
be indefensible? Ready to entertain the notion that the real you is
on offer in the person of the only "True Self" ever to have lived,
who lives even now to live in you, freeing you more and more from
"pretense, people-pleasing, playacting, pomposity, self-protection,
and phony, pharisaical righteousness"? If so, you are ready for
this beguiling read from Daniel Bush.
--The Very Rev'd. Dr. Reggie M. Kidd, dean, Cathedral Church of
Saint Luke, Orlando, Florida, and professor of New Testament
emeritus, Reformed Theological Seminary Orlando
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