Abstract
In this slim, accessible but thought-provoking book, Barbara Brown Taylor explores the history of the understanding of ‘sin’ in the church, arguing that the full range of the concept needs to be recovered if ‘salvation’ is to be meaningful today.
With engaging honesty, Taylor offers personal testimony as well as a whistle-stop tour of the changing responses to sin from the Hebrew Bible to today’s spiritually global, postmodern and secular society. She notes that in today’s Church, sin is likely to be viewed either medically/psychologically, with little sense of personal responsibility; or legally, with all the fault placed on the wrong-doer. Taylor suggests that while approaches to sin may be culturally-determined to some extent, at its heart is the breakdown of the relationship between God and humanity. In order to restore that relationship in a real way, there needs to be repentance rather than simply remorse; and an acceptance of pardon followed by acts of penance. The Church is the place where such restoration may happen; and grace is the gift which points the way home, through a commitment to transformation.
The message is delivered in an engaging and persuasive way, and draws on examples which are relevant and illuminating. An argument could be made that the differences between personal and corporate sin are not always dealt with in equal depth; and that the parameters of what is to be regarded as sin are rather porous here. But as a study book for a house-group, or the basis for a preaching series, the book would be ideal.