Peter Enns has 6 audiobooks on Listento.it, narrated by 7 narrators, with an average listener rating of 4.5★ across 76 ratings. The most-rated is How the Bible Actually Works.
How the Bible Actually Works
Summary
Controversial evangelical Bible scholar, popular blogger, podcast host of The Bible for Normal People, and author of The Bible Tells Me So and The Sin of Certainty explains that the Bible is not an instruction manual or rule book but a powerful learning tool that nurtures our spiritual growth by refusing to provide us with easy answers but instead forces us to acquire wisdom. For many Christians, the Bible is a how-to manual filled with literal truths about belief that must be strictly followed. But the Bible is not static, Peter Enns argues. It does not hold easy answers to the perplexing questions and issues that confront us in our daily lives. Rather, the Bible is a dynamic instrument for study that not only offers an abundance of insights but provokes us to find our own answers to spiritual questions, cultivating God’s wisdom within us. “The Bible becomes a confusing mess when we expect it to function as a rule book for faith. But when we allow the Bible to determine our expectations, we see that Wisdom, not answers, is the Bible’s true subject matter,” writes Enns. This distinction, he points out, is important because when we come to the Bible expecting it to be a textbook intended by God to give us unwavering certainty about our faith, we are actually creating problems for ourselves. The Bible, in other words, really isn’t the problem; having the wrong expectation is what interferes with our reading. Rather than considering the Bible as an ancient book weighed down with problems, flaws, and contradictions that must be defended by modern listeners, Enns offers a vision of the holy scriptures as an inspired and empowering resource to help us better understand how to live as a person of faith today. How the Bible Actually Works makes clear that there is no one right way to read or listen to the Bible. Moving us beyond the damaging idea that “being right” is the most important measure of faith, Enns’ freeing approach to Bible study helps us to instead focus on pursuing enlightenment and building our relationship with God - which is exactly what the Bible was designed to do.
©2019 Peter Enns (P)2019 HarperCollins Publishers
The Bible Tells Me So
Summary
Trained as an evangelical Bible scholar, Peter Enns loved the Scriptures and shared his devotion by teaching at Westminster Theological Seminary. But the further he studied the Bible, the more he found himself confronted by questions that could neither be answered within the rigid framework of his religious instruction nor be accepted among the conservative evangelical community. Rejecting the increasingly complicated intellectual games used by conservative Christians to "protect" the Bible, Enns was conflicted. Is this what God really requires? How could God's plan for divine inspiration mean ignoring what is really written in the Bible? These questions eventually cost Enns his job - but they also opened a new spiritual path for him to follow. The Bible Tells Me So chronicles Enns's spiritual odyssey, how he came to see beyond restrictive doctrine and learned to embrace God's Word as it is actually written. As he explores questions progressive evangelical readers of Scripture commonly face yet fear voicing, Enns reveals that they are the very questions that God wants us to consider - the essence of our spiritual study.
©2014 Peter Enns (P)2015 Tantor
The Sin of Certainty
Summary
With compelling and often humorous stories from his own life, Bible scholar Peter Enns offers a fresh look at how Christian life truly works, answering questions that cannot be addressed by the idealized traditional doctrine of "once for all delivered to the saints". Enns offers a model of vibrant faith that views skepticism not as a loss of belief but as an opportunity to deepen religious conviction with courage and confidence. This is not just an intellectual conviction, he contends, but a more profound kind of knowing that only true faith can provide. Combining Enns' reflections of his own spiritual journey with an examination of scripture, The Sin of Certainty models an acceptance of mystery and paradox that all believers can follow and why God prefers this path, because it is the only way by which we can become mature disciples who truly trust God. It gives Christians who have known only the demand for certainty permission to view faith on their own flawed, uncertain, yet heartfelt terms.
©2016 Peter Enns (P)2016 Tantor
Inspiration and Incarnation
Summary
How can an evangelical view of Scripture be reconciled with modern biblical scholarship? In this book Peter Enns, an expert in biblical interpretation, addresses Old Testament phenomena that challenge traditional evangelical perspectives on Scripture. He then suggests a way forward, proposing an incarnational model of biblical inspiration that takes seriously both the divine and the human aspects of Scripture.
©2015 Peter Enns (P)2017 Tantor
Evolution of Adam
Summary
Can Christianity and evolution coexist? Traditional Christian teaching presents Jesus as reversing the effects of the Fall of Adam. However, an evolutionary view of beginnings doesn't allow for a historical Adam, making evolution seemingly incompatible with what Genesis and the apostle Paul say about him. For Christians who accept evolution and want to take the Bible seriously, this presents a faith-shaking tension. Peter Enns, an expert in biblical interpretation, offers a way forward by explaining how this tension is caused not by the discoveries of science, but by false expectations about the biblical texts. Focusing on key biblical passages in the discussion, Enns demonstrates that the author of Genesis and the apostle Paul wrote to ask and answer ancient questions for ancient people; the fact that they both speak of Adam does not determine whether Christians can accept evolution. This thought-provoking audiobook helps listeners reconcile the teachings of the Bible with the widely held evolutionary view of beginnings and will appeal to anyone interested in the Christianity-evolution debate.
©2012 Peter Enns (P)2020 Tantor
Phoenix
Summary
From best-selling and multi-award-winning author Amanda McKinney comes a “page-turning, steamy” stand-alone romantic suspense in the Steele Shadows series. A man who cheated death. A woman hired to pick up the broken pieces. And an obsession strong enough to kill for. They told him he’d been given a second chance at life. Told him to count his lucky stars, to stop and smell the roses. Kind of hard to do when your body is bound by chains and cuffs. That’s what it felt like, anyway, when Phoenix Steele woke up from his coma to a life full of restrictions. Once known around town as the fearless, indomitable heir to the Steele fortune, the former Marine was suddenly labeled unstable, short-tempered, and loose cannon. Unwilling to accept his issues, Phoenix instantly clashes with his assertive therapist - the town’s most eligible bachelorette. No one knew overcoming the odds like Dr. Rose Floris. Determined not to be a statistic, Rose lived her life under carefully constructed routines—until a gruesome murder and a series of mysterious events reveal she’s become the center of a madman’s obsession. Suddenly, Rose’s world is turned upside down and she finds herself under the watchful eye of her new patient, a broken man she’s been warned not to trust. As the tables begin to turn on their client-patient relationship, Phoenix realizes he must battle his own demons before he can save anyone, including the woman who’s become his own obsession.... An obsession he’d kill for. Phoenix is a stand-alone romantic suspense (no cliff-hanger!).
©2020 Amanda McKinney (P)2021 Amanda McKinney