Book Review of
After We Believe
By N T Wright

Submitted to
Dr. Jeffery Riley
Of
New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary

In Partial Fulfillment
Of the Requirements for the Course
ETHC 5300
Introduction to Christian Ethics

David McIlvaine
B. S., Texas Tech University
August 10, 2014
After We Believe Book Review
Introduction
N. T. Wright is the former Bishop of Durham in the Church of England (2003-2010) and one of the world's leading Bible scholars. He is now serving as the chair of New Testament and Early Christianity at the School of Divinity at the University of St. Andrews. He has been featured on ABC News, Dateline NBC, The Colbert Report, and Fresh Air, and he has taught New Testament studies at Cambridge, McGill, and Oxford universities. Wright is the award-winning author of Surprised by Hope, Simply Christian, The Last Word, The Challenge of Jesus, The Meaning of Jesus (coauthored with Marcus Borg), as well as the much heralded series Christian Origins and the Question of God.
Thesis, Purpose & Description The major underlying thesis of Wright’s book is that the pursuit of a moral ideal, or what he calls virtues, is not contradictory to a grace-driven Christian life, but demanded by it. Wright considers how people who believe that Jesus is God’s offer of redemption should respond to this belief. He writes primarily to Western Christians, steeped in the mistaken idea that Christianity is about getting into heaven after dying. He suggests replacing this belief with a question, What is Christianity for right now and does it impact life today? To understand his answer, we need to understand three words: character, virtue, and wisdom.

Major Ethical Insights Communicated

In the very first chapter of the book, Wright goes into what happens after you are saved. The story he uses is very useful in asking what happens after you are saved and how are you to act now that you are saved. You have received grace from God, but now what do you do with it. It goes back to the title of the book, After You Believe, what really happens. Wright on page 7 gives a definition of character as, “the transforming, shaping, and marking of a life and its habits- will generate the sort of behavior that rules might have pointed toward but which a “rule keeping” mentality can never achieve.” Character is defined in Webster Dictionary as, “the way someone thinks, feels and behaves.” Another way of putting it would be sculpting the habits of someone’s life. Wright also sends a lot of time talking about virtues. Webster Dictionary has this meaning for virtue, “morally good behavior or character, a good and moral quality, the good result that comes from something” This goes along with that virtue comes from having good character. If we make good decisions along our path living then we will develop a good character. Wright emphasizes both the three cardinal virtues as well as the “nine varieties of fruit” and the unity achieved through virtue.

Ideas that Changed or Challenged your Thinking One idea that Wright brings up is the responsibility of the church and social justice. He sees it as the responsibility of the whole church. He states that he thinks that Western societies have tried to separate social justice and God. This has challenged my way of thinking only because I do not believe that is it totally true. I do not see it this way at all. My main reason for this is that most of the wars that have been fought have in some form been in the name of God in some form or fashion. The Muslims have fought most of their wars because they feel that there God has told them to. Go all the way back to the crusades and we see that God has been at the forefront of most everything that we do. A lot of the book is dealing with the process of sanctification and justification. I have always had trouble with the term sanctification. It our way of thinking it is when we become saved we are sanctified with God. We are saved by the grace of God and that we will then be going to heaven when we die. There are other people that think that we enter heaven by the good works that we go on earth and it is not all about being saved. Wright writes on page 110,
“Jesus’ forthcoming death – and his own deeply scriptural understanding, which led him not only to expect it but to interpret it in advance – is in fact tightly bound up with his announcement of God’s kingdom and His invitation to His followers to start learning its language right now. So, at least, all four gospels seem to be saying….For them, there is no clear demarcation between God’s kingdom-announcement and His approaching death. The two belong closely together….”
He also writes on page 126,
“Making Jesus the supreme example of someone who lived a good life may be quite bracing to contemplate, but it is basically safe… Jesus as ‘moral example’ is a domesticated Jesus, a kind of religious mascot. We look at him approvingly and decide we’ll copy him (up to a point at least, and no doubt he’ll forgive us the rest because he’s a decent sort of chap). As if! If all we need is a good example, we can’t be in quite such a bad state as some people (including Jesus himself) have suggested.”
These two passages in the book shows me that the way into heaven is by the grace and belief that God sent Jesus to the earth so that all of our sins would be forgiven and that if we believe in him that we will enter heaven. It all still goes through the cross.

Insights that Practically Relate to Life, Ministry, the life of the Church and the Moral Life in America N. T. Wright helps individuals that are new believers come to terms with what they are to do after they believe. The book shows this new believers what they should do after they become believers as in terms with Christian character. It would help them deal with the issues of sanctification and justification. For someone who is a truly new believer and has no church experience there are sections of the book that could be hard to understand without the help of someone to disciple them on their journey. In chapter 6 of the book, Wright explains that the love of God is not a rule, but it itself is a virtue. This is important to know it that love must built up in our daily walk with God and Jesus. It is something that we must do daily in our pursuit of becoming a better Christian. It is also something that can be accomplished by the lifestyle that we live. We have to show the love of Jesus to others and this can be done by the way act and what we say on a daily basis. Others will look to us on a daily basis to see how we are acting to see if we are living the Godly Life. Another insight that this books gives us is that of Christian worship and mission. These are a type of virtue in themselves. It is necessary for us to evangelize the word of God and to spread it around the world. Mission is also an important part of evangelism. We need to bring the word of God to others and this can be done on the mission field. We are to serve and help others through our love of God.
Strengths and Weaknesses of Book One of the major weaknesses of the book would have to be that it could be hard for the new believer to understand. It is good for those that have some theological education in their background, but for someone that is a new believer it could and will be hard to understand. If the book was used in a small group of new believers where there was a pastor of someone with advanced training, I think it would be good. There would be someone there that could disciple the new believer along the path of discipleship. One of the strengths of the book would have to be the use of illustrations. Wright does a good job of using illustrations to explain the issues that he is talking about. He uses the story of Captain Sullenberger to show how some of the choices that we make can become second nature. He uses the illustration of learning a second language to show how it help in the formation of character. Using illustrations helps people relate better to what is being told to them. If we have an example of a story to go along with the facts, we are more likely to remember what we are being told. This is like pastors who use stories and illustrations to help members of the congregation remember what they are being told in a sermon.
Conclusion
I would highly recommend this book to pastors and believers alike. Even though it may be hard for some people to follow I think it would be a good resource for individuals to learn more about what is expected of them as believers in Jesus. It is also a great resource for pastors to have as well. I learned a lot from this book and will refer back to it as a resource. I have to admit that there were parts of the book that were hard for me to follow and understand, but that is the reason why I am here. I am here to learn more about the principles that were introduced and discussed in the book. There were parts that I would say I do not agree with, but that is also to be expected. We are not going to believe everything that we read in all the books that we read. We are here to form our own theology and beliefs. Not every pastors has the some views as the other pastors.

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[ 1 ]. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N._T._Wright
[ 2 ]. N. T. Wright, After We Believe: Why Christian Character Matters (New York, Harper One, 2010) 110
[ 3 ]. Wright, After We Believe, 126