Doctrine: What Christians Should Believe

Doctrine: What Christians Should Believe

Mark Driscoll and Gerry Breshears

Crossway, 2010, 464 pp., $22.99, Crossway.org

Vintage Jesus co-authors Mark Driscoll and Gerry Breshears systematize their New Calvinist theology in Doctrine. Driscoll's long catechism is organized theocentrically (e.g. "Revelation: God Speaks," "Covenant: God Pursues," "Stewardship: God Gives") and defended scripturally, although this defense often consists of the pattern "The Bible clearly states X* (*footnote listing one or two verses that have kept theologians meaningfully employed for millennia)."

Material runs the gamut from concise histories of Trinitarian and Christological controversies to quotation cameos by N.T. Wright and J.I. Packer (with Harold M. Best on Worship) to diatribes on pet issues, including complementarianism, two-ism, unlimited limited atonement, and poverty and prosperity theology that are pure Driscoll. Study questions are not so leading as to hamper the spirited discussion Doctrine should generate.