In Primal, Mark Batterson writes that the church’s inability to reach and connect with twenty-somethings that are leaving the church in droves, rises out of our lack of following Jesus’ own words. In Mark 12:30, Jesus gives what is now known as The Great Commandment – “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.”
The author’s conclusion is that “we’re not great at the Great Commandment. In too many instances, we’re not even good at it” (pg. 7). The book is written around the premise of rediscovering a primal compassion (heart), a primal wonder (soul), a primal curiosity (mind), and a primal energy (strength) – and in doing so, we strip away all of the religious pomp and circumstance and relearn what it truly means to love God.
I really enjoyed the overall message of this book. The author does a good job “re-imagining” how we as a generation of believers can learn to love God in its most primal form. What if a generation stepped up and read this together and committed themselves to becoming great at The Great Commandment?
What if we made this the first book we read in 2010? What might change in you?
