Dr. Boice’s book is powerful and heart-stirring. Accurately describing the present dying culture and how it has profusely influenced the modern church culture, he spends the first couple chapters describing all the “isms” and how they fall short of the reformation we so desperately need. The world’s culture has enveloped the church, and something must be done. Boice then does the task that is the heart of the book, seeking to help us understand and grapple with the doctrines that shook the world.
What he proposes to be done is for the church to return to the five sola doctrines, which were considered as the bedrock of the reformation. If the church is ever going to have an effect and change the dying culture around it, then it must return to foundational doctrines. Giving adequate pages to each one, Dr. Boice delves into the sufficiency of Scripture, the sufficiency of Christ’s death and resurrection, as well as the sufficiency of grace alone and faith alone, all for the glory of God alone. He writes about each from the standpoint of what they meant in the reformation, but how they must be tailored to confront the modern culture. He does a good job of blending their original context and the one in which we find ourselves.
Dr. Boice’s book is a challenge to all Christians: Let us not be like the dying culture around us, being heavily influenced by it. But let us experience a modern day reformation in our hearts and lives, and ultimately in our culture. We must escape from all the “isms” of the present world’s system, and return to the sufficiency of God and His Word. It is then, when our lives and worship become reformed, that God will get the glory alone.