In my last post about Larry Crabb’s book Soul Talk: The Language God Longs for Us to Speak, I was probably a little bit too critical. I have continued to read in the book and this morning I was convinced that what Crabb is trying to do at a basic level is very, very important. I hope my comments in my last post don’t overshadow that. At the risk of missing the point myself, here is what I think Crabb is trying to do:

So often when we talk to one another about life, we are not actually talking about what is really going on with us at the deepest level. Sometimes that is because we ourselves are not aware of what is really going on, other times it is because we are afraid to let others in, and sometimes we are testing the water – giving a little bit of information to see how the listener will respond. And so often in life our priorities get mixed up. We put good things (family, friends, jobs, etc.) ahead of the most important thing – loving God. The idea is that we are often obsessed with ourselves when we should be obsessed with God.

I think the main point of this book is that Crabb is trying to push the reader to a realization of how deeply each and every one of us needs God. How desperately we need God. And how quickly and deceptively we can convince ourselves that we don’t. Every day there are literally thousands of things that lure us away from depending on God. Crabb does a wonderful job of illustrating this through several different stories.

So, one of the most powerful things I am getting out of this book is that it is urging us to get to the point. And that first means that we have to realize what is the point (knowing and loving God first) and what is not the point (everything else, if it is coming before knowing and loving God). Crabb believes, and I strongly agree with him, that Soul Talk or Christian conferencing is one of the primary and most powerful vehicles that God uses to help people get to the point.

While the book may not be perfect, I think it is a very important contribution to the church. I would guess that most if not all of us have room to grow in the area of talking to one another in a way that fans the flames of our desire for God.

I have continued to read Larry Crabb’s Soul Talk. This post is a bit awkward for me because I have made an effort on this blog to focus on articulating what I do believe, rather than on focusing on disagreements. But I have also made an attempt to be honest and as transparent as possible.

Having said that, I still find Crabb’s major purpose in this book to be very profound and exciting. However, over the last several chapters I have been disappointed in the direction he has been moving in. In chapters 5-8, I think the word he has used most often is “battle.” The imagery is fairly violent, talking about entering a war zone, fighting a battle, etc. I think Crabb uses this to highlight how much is at stake in the way we converse with one another. I agree completely with this premise. However, I think of my task as more subversive than one of declaring war. My hope is to shift conversations so that before people know it they are speaking out of the deepest desires of their souls, rather than the superficial things that prevent people, and God, from really getting in.

I may be reading too much into this, but I also sense more dualism than I am comfortable with. It almost feels gnostic to me at times. Again, I sense that for Crabb this is because he is writing out of some very powerful personal experiences he has had that are based in his relationship with God. So, my criticism here may be off base.

One final thing I just have to get off my chest. This is possibly the loudest, ugliest book cover I have ever seen! (I say this mostly as a joke, because I now know first hand that authors have essentially zero say in what the cover of their book looks like. But Thomas Nelson, what were you thinking? If I am blinded by the cover, I can’t see to read the book.) You can judge for yourself by looking at the currently reading list to the right.

There is still much that I am connecting with. For example, Crabb writes, “We’re beginning to realize that the journey is not about getting our act together in prayer retreats or counseling sessions or anyplace else; it’s about dropping our masks and facing the terror of living in a world without solutions to our biggest problems and then seeing that we belong in a different world. Then wholeness sneaks up on us” (64). This quote has the gnostic/dualism I already alluded to, but it also makes a good point – as he says elsewhere, we often put second things first.

Crabb writes, “Lodged deep in his soul is the basic agenda of Adam’s children: I want to do something that will make my life better.

Lodged deep in his soul is the basic agenda of God’s children: I want to experience God through whatever means he provides and keep trusting him whether life gets better of not” (74).

Again, I think Crabb helps point out the tension that we face between wanting to be in control, and wanting to know and love God. This is a major strength, Crabb refuses to allow us to settle for a superficial relationship with God. He wants us to go deeper.

I think Crabb sums up the Fall pretty well on p. 78, “He convinced creatures who were designed to enjoy free love from God and to love God and other in return that there was something better: control.” At least for me, that was a powerful reminder of how often I am wrestling control of my life away from God.

Finally, here is another great summary of what Crabb speaks to that really connects with me, “We desire to speak out of our depths into the depths of another, to speak with life-arousing power to other people” (108). Amen! I have found that to be the most meaningful, alive, intimate, and fulfilling experience I can have with another person. It is hard, but an incredible blessing.

I am hoping that Crabb is going to get a bit more concrete in the second half of the book in giving more practical advice about how to move from what he refers to as SelfTalk into SoulTalk.

“Most people go through their entire life never speaking words to another human being that come out of what is deepest within them, and most people never hear words that reach all the way into that deep place we call the soul” (13). This is the burden that Larry Crabb seeks to address in Soul Talk: The Language God Longs for Us To Speak. He argues that “Every conversation either stimulates or dampens our desire for God” (26). As a result, in Soul Talk he seeks to address the question: “How can conversations between followers of Jesus become a stage on which the supernatural power of God is unmistakably displayed” (29)?

Crabb worries that “We live in a day when the life that God has given to every Jesus follower is counterfeited, contrived, neglected, hidden, unreleased, and generally not believed in” (43). Crabb further laments that “most of us are never known by a safe friend, never explored by a curious friend, and never discovered by a hopeful friend. And that is a tragedy, as harmful to the soul as AIDS is to the body. Hearts are not changed. Or hearts that have been changed by the Spirit at conversion to Christ are not released” (56).

Later, Crabb argues that if Jesus were speaking directly to our culture today he would say that we have “a heart problem. My people want something more than they want me. And it’s ruining them… Learn to speak with power into people’s lives. Arouse their desire for me until their thirst for me consumes them” (60).

If it seems that I am just listing off a string of quotes, I guess in some ways I am. Honestly, I am trying to force myself to slow down as I read this book to work to process some of it more deeply. I think I have experienced the kind of edifying conversation that Crabb yearns for believers to experience. I have felt times where I was burdened to say something to someone when we were talking – but it wasn’t about me. I really felt that the Spirit was prompting me to speak into someone else’s life.

These kinds of experiences are hard to articulate or explain in hindsight. In some ways, rereading what I just wrote, I feel like it sounds too mystical or otherworldly. Really, it is just a feeling of being in the presence of God. Peace and joy are the two words that come to mind.

These experiences are profound and sometimes life changing. If nothing else, when our hearts connect with another believer at a deep level, we are encouraged to focus on God and what God is seeking to do in our lives. And yet, I think Crabb is largely right- I am not sure very many Christians experience this level of “watching over one another in love”. I don’t know why. It may be that some people want to, but genuinely don’t know how. Or it may be that others are afraid that if anyone else really knew them, that they would leave or reject them.

I am afraid I may be putting too much hope in this book, because I am really hoping that it will help me to lead others into this kind of conversation. From my experience, I would say that when you can really open yourself up to a brother or sister in Christ in the presence of the Holy Spirit, those are holy moments where God’s gracious, healing, and restoring presence is especially tangible. I believe what Crabb refers to as “Soul Talk” is a major way that God’s Spirit renews people in the image that they were created in and enables them to grow in holiness.

Does this arouse a passion in you? What questions, issues, or other thoughts do you have? Have you read this book or had experience with deep Christian conversation? I would love to hear your thoughts and dialogue more about this.

I recently picked up a copy of Larry Crabb’s Soul Talk: The Language God Longs for Us To Speak. On the fourth page of the first chapter Crabb unleashes this wake-up call: “Churches, by no means all but too many, have become as dangerous to the health of our soul as porn shops. People leave both superficially titillated and deeply numbed” (16).

Ouch. But is he right? I hope and pray that this description would not fit for my congregation. But I am afraid that far too often we settle for forming people to something that is far short of the kind of relationship that God wants us to have with Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, as well as with each other. Since seminary, I have found an increasing longing to be a force for renewal within the church and over the last few years I have come to sense that one of the ways the Spirit is working to spark such a revival is through helping people enter into deeper community with one another. Wesley beautifully described what I have in mind as “watching over one another in love.”

In the Introduction to Soul Talk, Crabb writes, “We can learn to talk with each other in ways that arouse our passion for God until it becomes the most powerful desire in our soul. How that can happen, and what needs to happen in you and me as we speak into each other’s lives, is what this book is all about” (9). I sense a real need for learning how to talk to each other about the things that really matter. I am definitely interested to see what Crabb has to say.