It’s complicated, okay?

PARADOXOLOGY
Why Christianity was never meant to be simple
By Krish Kandiah
Hodder & Stoughton. 308 pages. £13.99
ISBN 978 1 444 745 344

Krish Kandiah’s Paradoxology addresses some of the biggest questions Christians wrestle with – questions such as God’s sovereignty and the human will, God’s transcendence and immanence, divine compassion and judgment, and his victory in defeat at the cross.

Krish argues that the very paradoxes which seem to undermine belief actually lie at the heart of a living faith in an awesome and infinitely majestic God.

In tackling such questions Krish takes the reader through the Bible’s story to meet many of the characters who grapple with similar issues. Chapters include: ‘The Moses Paradox’ – the God who is far away, yet so close; ‘The Joshua Paradox’ – the God who is terrible yet compassionate; ‘The Job Paradox’ – the God who is actively inactive; ‘The Esther Paradox’ – the God who speaks silently; ‘The Jesus Paradox’ – the God who is divinely human; ‘The Judas Paradox’ – the God who determines our free will; and ‘The Cross Paradox’ – the God who wins as he loses. In these chapters and others, with a combination of scholarly care, potent illustration and pastoral application, Krish guides the reader to a place of humble wonder at things too wonderful for us to fully grasp or understand.

This book helpfully steers away from overly neat or glib answers to the sorts of questions people really struggle with. It’s well written, accessible and deserving of a wide audience. My guess is that this might be particularly useful for students initially engaging with these sorts of questions. Cornelius Plantinga has said ‘dogmatic myopia … subvert[s] the richer understandings of life within the gospel’. This book resists such dogmatic myopia and, as such, presents a compelling vision for the deep riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God.