Monday, February 05, 2007

260 - january book


"Evil is beyond the reach of no man."
"But can a man remove himself beyond the reach of evil?"

This months book to read was Thr3e by Ted Dekker. What I like about Dekker's writing is the way he can take a spiritual concept and use the story to flesh it out in a way that allows me to ponder those concepts versus being hit over the head with a sermon.

This thriller is about a seminary student who is targeted by a serial killer who works in riddles. The killer wants the protagonist to solve a riddle and confess his sin in a certain time amount and if he fails something blows up. The killer works in sequences of threes - 30, 60, 90 minutes, etc. and has a thing for opposites. The killer believes he is really no different form the seminary student - that sins of murder are equal with sins of gossip.

The themes of this book are inspired by the age old dilemma stated by Paul in Romans:
"For what I do is no the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do - this I keep on doing."

6 comments:

Achtung BB said...

The killer sounds like the Jigsaw from the "Saw" movies

f o r r e s t said...

...because he uses riddles?

gigi said...

Sounds like a cool book.

Thanks for having us over the other night at your "partay".
It was fun.

shakedust said...

I love that passage. Even Paul wasn't perfect.

windarkwingod said...

There is a schism most evident among the missionaries here: You must reach holiness in order to be useful to God, and the other you must consider yourself a failure under the law, know that you have received grace, and get on with the job I have for you. I have less tolerance for the former - I went through my record-burning fit in high school and it cost me $217 worth of AWESOME music. BTW: going to a "partay" is a sin. The "ay" on the end emphasis a familiarity with the world and a certain identification with the carnality of pleasure. Ted Dekker sounds very cool. I must put him on my list.

gigi said...

The "carnality of pleasure"... it wasn't THAT fun.