The Thrill of Orthodoxy Review

G. K. Chesterton once commented on the marked difference between typical images found in Christianity and those found in Buddhism: "The Buddhist saint has a sleek and harmonious body, but his eyes are heavy and sealed with sleep. The medieval saint's body is wasted to its crazy bones, but his eyes are frightfully alive." As I read this book I kept thinking of that contrast, and Trevin Wax's The Thrill of Orthodoxy is an invitation to behold this full and transcendent faith we have been confronted with the only way possible: with frightfully wide-open eyes.

Wax lists out the ancient creeds which have, based on critical Biblical texts, formed a baseline of the Faith throughout the history of Christianity. Adherence to these stunning truth claims is what is called Orthodoxy, and deviations from it, heresy. Interestingly enough, these deviations are almost always thought in their time to be more thrilling than Orthodoxy. Human nature feels what C. S. Lewis called “the horror of the same old thing.” Imagine how much better it would be if we'd only triangulate some difficult truths and have something a little more palatable, say, make Jesus a created god, or adjust the sinner's dreadful position to needing only moral improvement? Others in our day reason if Christianity could only affirm other forms of sexual expression or allow more paths to God--how much more grand it would be than it is! But contrary to popular belief, heresy always diminishes the thrilling refulgence of God's external truth which demands our conformation, replacing it only with the dull, small corner of the individual. Heresy truncates, softens, bores--and like that Buddhist statue its eyes remain sleepily shut on self, closed to the brilliance just outside.

The thrill is in the dogma, the weighty facts that stand before us: Heaven and hell, the God-man, the bloody substitutionary atonement, the resurrection from the dead. As we peer deeper into them we see the water has no bottom and we are compelled to jump headlong into its subsurface. Its depth is the furthest thing from the comfort of domesticated heresies, it breaks us of our own desires and confronts us every step of the way. Orthodoxy is wild and demanding, threatening even, but there is no thrill that can match where it leads: the meeting of the living God.

And once we taste of it we can no longer content ourselves with the essentials. No, under every rock there is beauty to be found, under every doctrine something precious that matters and needs be defended. Wax quotes Peter Kreeft who says, "Christianity is not a hypothesis, it is a proposal of marriage"; which makes doctrinal nonchalance in an age of tolerance and greater unity really a "sign of lovelessness." The thrill is in the discovery of the facts, the keeping of those facts, and the defense of those facts—for they testify about a Person. Theology is not about being right, it’s about love.

Throughout, Wax shows various ways in which we may be tempted to fall away from the faith once delivered to the saints. From the often frequented paths of accommodation or retreat, to the lowering of eternal stakes in the name of temporal good, to downplaying Christ's challenging demands--we are met always with manifold ways to fall away from the truth. It is possible even in the honest defense of orthodoxy to fall into heresies! Thankfully the Spirit of God is powerful enough to keep us, and His message is sufficient to enamor us. Wax reminds, "The best way to avoid new errors is to love old truths, to hear the story fresh again and again, and to be caught up in the process of being slain and made alive by the gospel." The good news about an old story is not something to be taken for granted, it is rather the foundation of our continuance. 

The Thrill of Orthodoxy is an excellent book and what is more is it is an example of how to reach people in a postmodern age. Once upon a time you could argue a case for truth and if the argument was sound, people would follow the argument. These days very few care to follow where the truth leads: "Who cares if it accords reality, my personal autonomy knows no such restrictions." How then do you reach people with no regard for the truth? I think you do what this book does. You tell them how wonderful the truth is, how infinitely more thrilling it is than their small counterfeits. "This grand story trumps your small story, come see for yourself!" It is able to, as G. K. Chesterton said, "smash your small cosmos, scattering the stars like spangles, and leave you in the open, free . . . to look up and down."