Book review: The Gospel of John: When Love Comes to Town

★★★

Not a bad book, it just wasn’t what I was expecting. Other reviews built up my hopes for a deep exegesis, but this wasn’t the focus. Metzger is more interested in encouraging us in our walk with God.

Example: The book opens, as expected, with the Logos prologue to John’s Gospel. After a short discussion, Metzger writes, “One could easily get lost in deep theological and Trinitarian reflection on the divine Word of John 1, and how the Word is with God and is God from all eternity.” Yes, please! Let’s! But we didn’t. A bit later, in the same chapter, Metzger writes off the topic: “Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so. That computes far better than e=mc2 or any mathematical formula any day, don’t you think? Now, won’t you experience?”

I purchased this book on my own (rather than it being sent to us for review), so I felt no obligation to finish. I read about a third of it, scanned the rest to see if the focus would change, and settled upon a non-rating of three stars. Certainly well-written, but not very helpful from a scholarly perspective.