Journal: Southeastern Theological Review
Volume: STR 06:1 (Summer 2015)
Article: Book Reviews
Author: Anonymous

STR 6:1 (Summer 2015) p. 113

Book Reviews

Daniel I. Block. For the Glory of God: Recovering a Biblical Theology of Worship. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2014. xix + 410 pp. Hardback. ISBN 978–0801026980. $34.99 (Hardback).

Daniel Block stands among the finest evangelical Old Testament scholars in our day, and this work on worship reflects his stature, his scholarship, and his heart for the church’s faithfulness. The book’s topical arrangement makes for a somewhat abrupt read at points, with no obvious strategy for the order after the first few subjects. But all of them are full of exegetical work and reflect the author’s deep and careful reading of the Old Testament in particular. And here lies the great strength of the book: giving the OT its full weight in discussions of Christian worship.

Block begins at the outset with the most poignant (if still respectful) polemic, aimed at those who would seem to resist the authority and importance of what he calls the “First Testament”—including John Piper, David Peterson, and D.A. Carson to varying degrees. It was a relief and joy to hear him dispute the caricatures that tend to denigrate both the nature and practice of worship in the OT. And from a scholar who knows the OT as deeply and widely as Block, I hope such critique will have a lasting effect.

One cannot fault the bravery of the author. Not only do we find a wide and direct array of subjects—daily life as worship, family life and work, preaching, prayer, music, sacred space—but he takes minority positions on many subjects. He argues for an enjoyment of Sabbath rest principles for Christian treatments of Sundays; the importance and goodness of the tithe; and the importance of theological architecture. And all comes with patient and direct interaction with the whole Bible, rather than just the final quarter.

Two faults, however, cannot be entirely ignored. First is the near silence of ecclesial tradition and reflection. What role should the reflections of the church have when mounting theology of any sort—and more pointedly about something the church has been doing for a very long time? One can agree with the Bible as the “primary” source for such theology without ruling out the years of wisdom (and its opposite). Most striking here though is the suggestion that, since we find no reference to the Holy Spirit receiving

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worship in the NT, we therefore should (apparently) not do so in our own worship. Common liturgical acts like the Doxology or the Gloria Patri are thus disputed. Of course almost all Trinitarian theology moves beyond a simple repetition of NT statements, and so we would expect that to be the case for Trinitarian doxologies. An enormous amount of ...