Chris Hodges is the founding pastor of Church of the Highlands, a multi-site church with more than two dozen locations across Alabama and Georgia. Thomas Nelson published The Daniel Dilemma: How to Stand Firm and Love Well in a Culture of Compromise in October 2017. Lysa TerKeurst wrote the foreword, a credit the previous version of this review left out.
The problem it takes on
The dilemma in the title is real and most men reading this have lived it. You hold a biblical conviction. Someone you actually care about holds the opposite. You can go quiet and keep the relationship, or say what you think and watch it cool. Neither feels like obedience.
Hodges works through Daniel because Daniel is the case study. He served a pagan government at a high level, kept his convictions on the things that mattered, and was trusted by the people he disagreed with. He did not withdraw and he did not assimilate.
The practical line Hodges draws out of it: connect with someone before you correct them. Truth without relationship is noise. That is not a new idea, but it is well applied here, and it is aimed squarely at Christians who have gotten comfortable being right on the internet.
What it does well
It is pastoral rather than combative, which is unusual for a book in this category. A lot of “standing firm” books are actually about winning, and this one keeps insisting the goal is the person, not the argument.
Hodges is also honest that both failure modes are failures. Compromising your convictions to keep the peace is one. Being harsh and calling it courage is the other. Men tend to have a strong preference for one of those two, and the book pushes on both.
Where it thins out
The book is stronger on posture than on the hard cases. “Connect before you correct” is genuinely useful right up until the moment you are at a table with someone who wants a straight answer to a specific question, and there Hodges gives you a disposition rather than a script. Some readers will find that appropriately humble. Others will close the book still not knowing what to say on Thursday.
It is also written from a very large church platform, and the examples reflect that. The dynamics of a twenty-six-location megachurch are not the dynamics of a man at a job site or a family Christmas.
The earlier version of this review claimed every chapter ends with reflection questions and action steps. I could not verify that. Check the preview before buying copies for a group.
Who should read it
A man who has either gone silent to keep the peace or become the guy nobody wants to bring anything up around. Someone with a family member or close friend on the other side of a live issue. Men’s groups working on how to engage rather than what to believe.
Skip it if you want detailed apologetics or specific answers to specific questions. This is a book about how to carry your convictions, not about what they should be.