Primal: A Quest for the Lost Soul of Christianity, by Mark Batterson

First of all, let me say that I was pleased that Primal is not the book I thought it was going to be.  It is not an attempt to find some kind of pure expression of Christian worship, faith, and practice, seeking to replicate the first century church today.  Those sorts of efforts tend toward cultural ignorance and folly.  Batterson does long for a sort of early church purity; the book was at least in part inspired by a visit to the catacombs  of a church in Rome.  Batterson wants to be sure modern Christians are able to see beneath the "bells and steeples . . . creeds and canons . . . pews and pulpits, hymnals and organs, committees and liturgies" that have come to be a part of the Christian experience, to remind us of what is most basic about Christianity.

It's pretty simple.  The church is "not great at the Great Commandment.  In too many instances, we're not even good at it."  He sets out his recovery plan with four big ideas:

The heart of Christianity is primal compassion.

The soul of Christianity is primal wonder.

The mind of Christianity is primal curiosity.

And the strength of Christianity is primal energy.

Taking each of these things, he offers a couple of chapters each to flesh out the ideas.

I can't be 100% sure, but I have little doubt that this book started as a sermon series at his church.  That's not necessarily a bad thing, but the end result feels a little cobbled together.  Much of the exposition feels like filler; he came up with the basic ideas, then had to stretch them out for Sunday sermons.  And his preacher's habit of pulling in random scientific factoids to illustrate his points got a little annoying.

However, one important measure of a book like this is, Did he accomplish what he set out to do?  I would say the answer is yes.  By the time I got to the end, my level of inspiration had moved up a few notches.  I didn't read all of the discussion questions at the end, but they definitely provide good fodder for reflection.  Ultimately Batterson wants to see a new reformation.  Whereas Luther's Reformation was a reformation of creeds, marked by the rallying cry Sola fide (faith alone), the new Reformation should be marked by deeds of compassion, wonder, curiosity, and energy, with the rallying cry Amo Dei (love God).

Thanks to WaterbrookMultnomah for providing this free copy for review!