Book Review: Pastor Paul Dirks. Deep Discipleship for Dark Days: A Manual for Holding Fast
to What is Good. Grimsby: Ezra Press, 2023. Paperback. 198 pages. ISBN-13: 978-1989169285.
I have a book in hand by Pastor Paul Dirks entitled “Deep Discipleship for Dark Days.” Pastor
Dirks is currently pastoring in New West Community Church in New Westminster BC. His
Church is described on their website as “an intercultural church in the Sapperton area of New
Westminster, BC, dedicated to exalting the name and word of our God, the Lord Jesus Christ, in
our community and world.” Pastor Paul Dirks has led with courage in the public square in
Canada especially in matters of gender and his defense of Biblical definitions of gender.
This book is both an encouragement and a challenge to the layman, the Christian in the pew. It is
also an encouragement and a challenge to pastors and elders as they lead the church to love
godly and pure lives in a crooked and perverse generation. In chapter 3, Pastor Dirks lays out a
robust vision for the Canadian Church: “More than ever, the church of Jesus Christ must be
committed to the life of the mind, and to a robust and distinctly Christian view of philosophy,
science, arts, politics and education. Pastors need to preach to the mind, and through the mind to
wills and hearts, as seen in the approaches of John Calvin and Jonathan Edwards.”
In this book, Pastor Dirks writes in a fresh and engaging manner. He engages with various
sources from Joel Beeke to Joe Boot, from Gad Saad to Jordan Peterson, from Thomas Watson to
JRR Tolkien and GK Chesterton. The book is not limited to one tradition in modern day
Christendom. It is comprehensive in approach and brings various traditions together in defense
of the church, while standing firmly within a robust and historic Christian tradition. He engages
with the western tradition, while having a keen understanding of the needs of the present day.
The order of this book follows a number of the concerns that Pastor Dirks has with regards to the
trajectory of society. He is writing as a pastor and a public theologian. In chapter 1 he warns
about a false peace that leads to passivity among Christians when we are in fact living through a
spiritual battle. In chapter 2, he calls on Christians to lead in society rather than living a passive
life of pursuing ease and entertainment. In chapter 3, he encourages Christians to be a thinking
people who “test the spirits.” In chapter 4, he focuses reflection on the family and the need to
restore this institution to what God intended it to be. In chapter 5, he encourages Christians to
look outward and to start reforming and rebuilding and building new institutions in a time of
compromise and moral decay. In chapter 6, he seeks to expose the abominations among the
world powers that threaten the purity of the Christian and the Church. In chapter 7, he sends out
a rallying call for Christians to find and serve in faithful churches in the midst of all the ethical
compromise that has affected so much of the modern church.
Chapter 6 has important issues for the church to understand as we raise the next generation to be
faithful to Christ. Pastor Dirks warns about the culture of death, the great evil of pornography,
and the occult (idolatry). If you as a parent have children and they have access to the internet,
then they have access to all of this. It is also easy for young men and women who have
unfettered access to the internet and weak supports at home to get sucked into the occultic end of
the web. Young men (and women) need to be taught when to look away and how to fight back. If
a classmate is headed down the path of death, young people need to be backed by families who
will support them as they contend for the souls of their friends.
Chapter 7 is a warning about what happens when Christians retreat from engagement in the
public sphere and instead use their positions of power and influence to bring the latest fads and
philosophies and scientific studies and winds of doctrine into the Church. Pastor Dirks
encourages Christians to seek out, not the glitz and glamor of pop Christianity, but the scars of
suffering in their leadership.2 Are you as a pastor or an elder ready to go to prison for your
fidelity to Christ in leading the church? Are you willing to cheerfully endure the scorn of both a
compromised church and a watching world? Even imprisonment can be an opportunity to
minister to the needs of a dying world. We see this so aptly in the example of the Apostle Paul.
I recommend this book for anyone of high school age and above and possibly younger. It has
heavy material in it. The overarching spirit of this book is a cheerful optimism in the Christ who
conquers through the faithful suffering of His people. I recommend that fathers and sons read it
together or that a highschool principal assign it as reading material in the grade 11 or 12
highschool classes. A discussion group would be highly valuable in light of the content of this
book. I believe that pastors and elders would find it helpful in thinking through how to shepherd
the souls in their care through some of the issues of the modern day.
We find this description of the men of Isaachar in 1 Chronicles 12:32: “Of Issachar, men who
had understanding of the times, to know what Israel ought to do, 200 chiefs, and all their
kinsmen under their command.” The work that Pastor Paul Dirks has done in this book is in the
spirit of the men of Isaachar. We are desperately in need of more men of Issachar in the church,
who know the times and who know what to do. So I encourage you to grab this book, read it,
reflect on it, pray about it and get to work developing deep discipleship in our times.
