"The Cross: The Pulpit of God's Love" by Iain H Murray

isbn #978-0-85151-974-6

This is going to be one of my shortest reviews for two reasons: 1) It was a small booklet (a total of 40 pages), and 2) it left me with no clear understanding of the author's intent in writing.

First off, while the book was edifying in many ways, I was left with a dissatisfaction overall.  The author never made clear exactly who held the position that he was addressing, was it hyper-calvinists?  I'm still not sure.  To be fair, Murray does a wonderful job of presenting the fact that we are to preach the Gospel to all men without any distinction.  But where I came away confused is in his embracing of this idea AND the idea that in presenting this Gospel we are to assure all men that Jesus died for all men.  Now I know that Murray is no emergent...on the contrary he is a sound Reformed man.  He is certainly no Arminian.  But still, while I agreed with him on many issues, I disagreed with him on others.  Mainly, I guess, it was a matter of semantics...and maybe I need to read the booklet a couple more times.  All I know is that two men I highly respect love this booklet (in fact I received this from one of them).  So I must simply say that I am not satisfied with Murray's conclusions in this booklet.  I am sorry, dear reader, that I am being so vague, but I am struggling here because I cannot say anything truly negative about the booklet, and certainly it is very valuable...but, again, I was unable to follow the logic employed by Murray here.  This could be entirely my own failing, of course.  I am sufficiently aware of my own deficiencies to acknowledge this, so if anyone reading this has any thoughts to enlighten me with I would surely welcome them.  

For now, I would say this would be a good read if you have no other theological work to get through...but it is a secondary work as far as the value of the contents.  This is my opinion and you can take it or leave it of course!  ;-)

God bless!