Pritchard and DeYoung Compared
Recently, a friend lent me Ray Pritchard's book Discovering God's Will for Your Life. Shortly thereafter I was given a new book by Kevin DeYoung entitled Just Do Something for my birthday, which is also about finding God's will. Funny how books like this tend to end up in the hands of a 20 year old?
Since I read them back to back, I thought it would be interesting to do a comparison of the two books here on the blog. So first I'll go through the similarities then I'll break apart there differences and then I'll give my own personal opinion about both, my fifth grade teacher would be proud.
To start with they are both books that share an emphasis on relationship with God, seeking wisdom, and prayer as the best way of making decisions or "finding God's will." Both are opposed to seeking open doors, fleecing (Which Ray Pritchard deals with in great detail), signs, or dreams. Because of this emphasis both books are extremely liberating in that they help make the decision-making process much easier. In light of this, Pritchard in a list of decision making myths lists "God wants you to know the future" as the number one myth. God did not create us with the ability to know the future, but often we act like we need to see what tomorrow holds before we act. In fact we will never and were never intended to be able to do that. In the same way Kevin DeYoung talks about how when we stress out about decisions we tend to be preoccupied with the future in an unhealthy way with decisions that are non-moral such as whether or not to move from one place to another.
To find the differences between these two books, you need to look no further than their titles. Just Do Something is an answer to a problem that seems to have risen in the Christian cultural landscape today, especially among younger people. We are so preoccupied and worried about finding God's will that that we are too slow to make decisions. DeYoung's theses is that we should repent of our anxiety and "just do something." Discovering God's Will For Your Life talks more about the process of how to make a decision with God's will in mind. That being said that's not to say that Pritchard doesn't kick his reader in the butt to just act, nor to say that DeYoung doesn't explain a biblical way of finding God's will.
When all is said and done, the two books share more similarities than differences (this was always how I liked to start my conclusion paragraphs in the fifth grade) When I step back and try to answer the question of which one I liked better, I would have to say Just Do Something. In hindsight, I think it may have been better if I hadn't read them back to back in order to give a fairer assessment. Discovering Gods Will For Your Life was helpful and I whole- heartedly recommend it. It's just that Just Do Something, in my opinion was a better written book, and smacked my indecisive-young-adult-laziness-disguised-as-spirituality right upside the head. It was a blow that I seriously needed at this time in my life.
So there you have it, my compare and contrast essay of Just Do Something and Discovering God's Will For Your Life.
See review by Derrick Jeror of Just Do Something at Amazon.
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