A More Christlike God

The centerpiece of Christian theology is the incarnation of God in Jesus Christ. The Scriptures as a whole and the witness of Jesus himself, corroborated by those who knew him best, is unrelenting in insisting on this. So why is there so much hate, so much contentiousness, so much ill feeling among those who claim to be his followers? And especially among Evangelicals who take pride in having it “right”?

Brad Jersak has spent his life among Evangelicals as a pastor, evangelist and writer. Mostly he has immersed himself in the company of the poor, the addicted, the outsiders. He is determined to recover the essence of the “beautiful” gospel for all of us. The conspicuous mark that characterizes every page of this winsome witness is that this is a “lived theology.” He has given attentive detail to what is in the theological libraries, but is not content with that. He has worked it out on the streets and in the lives of those with whom he has chosen to share his life and Christlike God witness, a convincingly beautiful Gospel.

EUGENE H. PETERSON, PhD

Emeritus Professor of Spiritual Theology

Regent College, Vancouver, BC

This excellent and much needed book confronts with both open heart and very good mind the major obstacles that we have created for people in their journey toward God! “Why didn’t people teach us this many years ago?” so many of us are saying. I am so very grate­ful that Brad Jersak is re-opening the door that Jesus had already opened 2000 years ago. It is so terribly sad that it was ever closed.

Fr. RICHARD ROHR, O.F.M.

Center for Action and Contemplation

Albuquerque, New Mexico

With theological integrity and open-hearted compassion, Brad Jersak creates a beautiful space for Jesus to challenge our views of God. A breath of clean and clarifying air.

WILLIAM PAUL YOUNG

Author of The Shack

Brad Jersak has given us a gift of greatest value: a fresh vision of God, Christ, the cross, Scripture … and ourselves. He demonstrates the rare ability to take deep theological issues and make them under­standable to everyone. He represents a new generation of Christian theologians whose work, I believe, is both desperately needed and wonderfully liberating.

BRIAN D. McLAREN

Author of We Make the Road by Walking

Brad Jersak’s book is a much-needed corrective for those needing to hear again, or perhaps for the first time, of a God who is always for us and never against us. Written through the lens of pastor-theologian, Brad combines a deep compassion with a love of the church fathers to draw out fresh and powerful insights into the reality of the nature of God revealed as overwhelming love and mercy through the cross.

LUCY PEPPIATT

Principal of Westminster Theological Centre

Author of Women and Worship at Corinth

Cheltenham, UK

In this radical and subversive book Brad Jersak invites us to rethink our whole understanding of God in the light of the supreme divine self-revelation in Christ: if God is like Jesus then what must God be like? The results of exploring that simple question are far-reaching, surprising, and transformative. This clearly written volume with its theological sophistication and grace-infused vision of God will certainly provoke fresh perspectives, and even those who disagree with parts of it will find plenty to enrich their minds and hearts. Warmly recommended.

ROBIN A. PARRY

Author of Christian Universalist

and The Biblical Cosmos

Written with the wisdom of a pastor’s heart, familiar with the reality of people’s real trauma and grief, Brad Jersak lovingly helps us to face the pain and darkness of our suffering head on. This is no mere apologetic that attempts to explain away the problem of evil, but a theodicy of the cross that faces it head on with brutal honesty, show­ing us that it is precisely there in that brokenness that we encounter God in Christ. A deeply needed and important book.

DEREK FLOOD

Author of Healing the Gospel

and Disarming Scripture

Do yourself a favor and make this the last book besides the Gospels you read on Jesus. This is Brad Jersak’s bold attempt to save Christianity from Christians. He writes, “In the flesh and blood person of Jesus, we have the only life ever lived that perfectly reveals the true nature of God.” Jersak shows us how to restore the ruined image of God.

Bluntly, he makes belief in God a little less stupid. These days that’s say­ing a lot. Or as Jersak writes: “May we be willing to revisit and reform our assumptions about the meaning of the Cross, and thereby make fresh and beautiful discoveries about Christ’s glorious gospel.”

FRANK SCHAEFFER

Author of Why I Am an Atheist Who Believes in God

It has been said that the truth will set you free, but that it sometimes annoys you first. That’s why I so value Brad Jersak’s books. He just tells it like it is and leaves the results between the Teacher and the reader. Brad is a voice, not an echo. Honoring the centrality of Christ, he sys­tematically and lovingly but boldly brings conservative minds forward toward the more Christlike God Jesus came to reveal.

Like his other books, A More Christlike God will provoke thought and study from the reader. It will make you think and might even make you repent, but the one thing it will assuredly do is cause you to see and to love this God of grace in a greater way.

STEVE McVEY

Grace Walk Ministries

Author of Beyond an Angry God

Through a remarkable mix of compassionate pastoral sensitivity and perceptive, crisp analysis, Brad Jersak reintroduces his readers in A More Christlike God to the ancient yet living voices that have parsed a crucial theological issue: what God is like. Routinely overlooked and taken for granted—often to our peril—discerning what God is truly like among the cacophony of available theistic representations requires space for honest, unsanitized inquiry.

In his colloquial writing style, Jersak provides this space, writing a book not simply to push his views on others or listen to himself talk, but to sincerely engage a myriad of legitimate objections and misgivings over the seemingly schizophrenic deity portrayed in the Scriptures.

Befitting the moniker of “Christianity,” Jersak eventually concludes that God is like Christ—the image of the invisible God whose humanity reveals his divinity, whose self-emptying is an expression of the divine virtues of humility, patience, mercy, compassion, and love.

ANDREW P. KLAGER

Adjunct Professor of History

Trinity Western University, Langley, BC

Brad Jersak’s book A More Christlike God reveals with stunning clarity the ways that the modern Church has distorted our image of who God is and forgotten the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Jersak then calls the reader back to the heart of God and the true Good News as revealed in and proclaimed by Christ.

This timely book has the potential to fundamentally change the way we speak about God, understand the Bible, and live out our faith. It is my hope that this book will be read widely by Christians of all theologi­cal backgrounds as well as those who have been turned off to religion because of the perverse image of God that they have been exposed to.

In these pages you will encounter the true and living Christ and the extraordinary message of grace and love that he proclaimed. Prepare to be transformed.

BRANDAN ROBERTSON

Author and Founder of The Revangelical Movement

In a single volume, Brad Jersak perfectly articulates the heart-cry of a generation who longs to believe in a more compassionate God. But he doesn’t stop there: he deftly and expertly cuts away the brush—clearing every conceivable obstacle—and lays bare the path that leads to this God. A life-changing book by the most gifted of teacher-guides.

AMY HOLLINGSWORTH

Author of The Simple Faith of Mister Rogers

and Runaway Radical

In our increasingly polarized 21st century, those who believe and follow the “wrong God” are routinely condemned and castigated. Some who worship the “wrong God” are in danger of being brutalized and/or beheaded. In the midst of religiously inspired hatred, bigotry and violence in the name of God Brad Jersak carefully and compassionately answers the urgent question: “Who is God?” We don’t need more indoctrination. We don’t need more dogma written by those who insist they uniquely speak for God. Our greatest need is to see and know God as he is. Brad Jersak is a Christ-follower who opens our eyes, helping to heal our hearts, as he explains that God is exactly like Jesus. A must read.

GREG ALBRECHT

Author of A Taste of Grace:

Christianity Without the Religion