Learning to apply the principles of Scripture to our daily lives is a matter that demands serious contemplation and commitment. We desire to be good stewards of what God has given us, including our abilities, opportunities, finances, and responsibilities. Often it can be helpful to work through the implications of biblical principles with a friend—two heads are better than one after all.
This quarter’s selection of recommended books represents many from whom we have learned these past few months. Our recommendations span the last two millennia and offer some helpful guidance in a broad range of topics. We hope you find these selections an encouragement to your own reading. Be sure to leave a comment in response to one of our selections, or tell us about some book you’ve enjoyed.
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Alex Chediak, Preparing Your Teens for College: Faith Friends, Finance, and Much More (Carol Stream: Tyndale House Publishers, 2014), 405 pages.
Books on youth and family ministry can present a broad spectrum of ministry models. Many focus extensively on pragmatic principles, encouraging parents and youth pastors to cultivate moral values within the next generation. Fewer zero in on biblical and theological concepts to guide their understanding of ministry. Thankfully, Alex Chediak has fused these two areas of ministry together.
In Preparing Your Teens for College, Chediak gives full-orbed, holistic advice in a practical, straight-forward manner. Allowing both recent statistics and age-old theology to inform his approach, Chediak presents some important ways in which parents and youth pastors alike can encourage students in character formation, faith internalization, quality relationships, financial responsibility, high academic excellence and so much more. Rarely have I seen a book for parents and youth pastors that adequately puts theology on the ground to be lived out. Chediak does an excellent job doing that in this volume.
—Recommended by Christopher Talbot
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G. K. Chesterton, The Everlasting Man (Peabody: Hendrickson Publishers, 2007 [originally published in 1925]), 262 pages.
I once read that though Chesterton’s The Everlasting Man may not be his most enjoyable book, it may be his most important. Of course C.S. Lewis fans will recognize this title as being instrumental in his conversion. And that is not without good reason!
In The Everlasting Man, Chesterton outlines a spiritual history of Western civilization, beginning with the first man of whom we have record. Designed largely as a Christian rebuttal to H. G. Wells’ The Outline of History, this book is divided into two broad parts: Part I: “On the Creature Called Man,” comprising eight chapters; and Part II: “On the Man Called Christ,” comprising six chapters.
While The Everlasting Man may not be the easiest read, or even my favorite read of the year (though I enjoyed it immensely), it is certainly one of the most influential. If for no other reason, this book has impacted me and many other persevering readers by providing helpful, mental categories. And while Chesterton can be quite abstract, dense, and difficult, he often shines with a brilliance that is difficult to find in other authors.
By way of example, Chesterton reminds us of the importance of truth and therefore theology. He writes, “If the Church had not insisted on theology, it would have melted into a mad mythology of the mystics” (213-14).
How fitting for our day and age!
—Recommended by Matthew Bracey
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Rod Dreher, The Little Way of Ruthie Leming: A Southern Girl, a Small Town, and the Secret of a Good Life (New York, NY: Grand Central Publishing, 2014), 304 pages.
I first learned of conservative columnist Rod Dreher when reading his book Crunchy Cons back in 2007. Little did I (and many other readers) know back then, but Dreher’s family story was as interesting as any of his policy proposals or practical life suggestions. In The Little Way of Ruthie Leming, Dreher narrates his past, particularly by telling the story of his sister. He presents their lifelong relationship, which is ordinary by most standards, yet extraordinary in other respects.
Dreher’s narrative is really a story about the spiritual and cultural significance of place, which involves relationships, work, service, faith, and so much more. Readers become engrossed in the specific story Dreher tells because it is emotionally moving on multiple levels. However, it is intellectually stimulating as well because readers discover that they must think about their relationship to their home—whether the home of their upbringing, or the home they are attempting to make. I wept and laughed aloud for hours.
—Recommended by W. Jackson Watts
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Sinclair B. Ferguson, The Holy Spirit (Contours of Christian Theology) (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1996), 287 pages.
If there is any area of theology that inspires polarization, it is the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. At the apex of one swing of the pendulum we have, what some might call, an over-focus on the third member of the Trinity. However, when the pendulum swings to the other side, we often see that there is little knowledge of the Holy Spirit. Often we are comfortable talking about God the Father and Jesus Christ, but discussion of the Holy Spirit can elicit mixed reactions.
For that reason, and many more, it is vitally important that we have a thoroughly biblical understanding of Who the Holy Spirit is and what He does. Sinclair Ferguson does an amazing job with this in his book. Fusing theological wisdom with a comprehensive understanding of Scripture, Ferguson gives great insight about the Holy Spirit. He discusses contentious topics (e.g. Pentecost and “sign gifts”) along with lesser emphasized areas (e.g. the Spirit and order, and the Spirit and the body). For anyone looking for a challenging read on this ever important topic, this is it.
—Recommended by Christopher Talbot
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Greg Gilbert, What Is the Gospel? (Wheaton: Crossway, 2010) 121 pages.
You would think that the answer to the question “What is the Gospel?” would be easy to answer for those professing to know Christ as their Savior. However, Greg Gilbert is concerned that “many Christians would answer with something far short of what the Bible holds out as ‘the gospel of Jesus Christ.’” Some might even say that the Gospel is nothing more than God’s love toward man and increased positivity.
Gilbert begins by showing that God has spoken to us in His Word, the Bible. This is where we must begin if we are to understand the Gospel. Two main points of the Gospel we must understand are that God is holy and righteous. Gilbert wants his readers to know that “God’s love does not cancel out his justice and righteousness.” Realizing God’s holy nature in light of our sin leaves us hopeless, silenced, and in need of rescue. This is where Gilbert remarkably unfolds the importance of Jesus’ substitutionary death for His people. By trusting in Jesus our sin is imputed to Him, and His righteousness is imputed to us. God now looks at us and sees Jesus’ righteousness, instead of our sin. What Is the Gospel? is a great read for anyone looking to disciple another believer in the faith or to understand the Gospel better themselves.
—Recommended by Zachery Maloney
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David Helm, One to One Bible Reading: A Simple Guide for Every Christian (Kingsford, Australia: Matthias Media, 2011), 103 pages.
Every pastor wishes that his congregants would read their Bibles more. David Helm’s One to One Bible Reading is a simple guide for teaching Christians not simply to read the Bible better, but how to read the Bible with others. The goal of Helm’s work is to equip Christians to be actively involved in the other believers’ sanctification, as well as the evangelization of non-Christians through intentional, methodical Bible reading.
One of the most helpful aspects of his book is the actual reading plans that Helm provides for a wide variety of settings. For example, Helm provides a reading plan through Mark’s Gospel for non-Christians, a reading plan through Colossians for new believers, and a reading plan through Romans for established Christians. However, these are just samplings of what Helm offers.
Every Christian (particularly pastors) should read this little book, and consider the ways in which they can equip themselves and other believers to encounter God through His Word with others.
—Recommended by Jesse Owens
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Charles F. Irons, The Origins of Proslavery Christianity: White and Black Evangelicals in Colonial and Antebellum Virginia (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2008), 384 pages.
Chattel slavery is a part of American history that many Americans would like to forget. In the mid-1800s, most Protestant denominations in America were split over the issue of slavery. Shock, remorse, and regret abound even today amongst those Protestants whose ancestors and denominations supported slavery. In the 21st century we often find it difficult to understand how Christians could have held proslavery views, and even more, how they could have owned slaves.
Charles Irons’ The Origins of Proslavery Christianity sheds a great deal of light on the process whereby Virginian Evangelicals embraced proslavery sentiments. Irons’ central thesis is that Virginian proslavery Christianity developed over time through a complex, and often reactionary, interracial dialogue between white and black Evangelicals.
Irons attempts to trace the development of white Evangelicals toward African Americans. He suggests that their relationship began as a paternalistic one only to end in proslavery sentiments. Furthermore, Irons demonstrates the ways in which black Christians played significant roles in the rapid growth of Evangelical Christianity in Virginia. Irons’ work is a thorough attempt at helping explain a very complex issue.
—Recommended by Jesse Owens
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Wayne Morgan, Keepers of Culture: The Art-Thought of Kenyon Cox, Royal Cortissoz, and Frank Jewett Mather, Jr. (Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 1989), 152 pages.
Like many who were raised in the last several decades of the 20th century, I found it difficult to see any purpose for art. But I have discovered that this attitude results largely from our exposure to modernist works of art, which are disconnected from real life and basic morality. In Keepers of Culture, H. Wayne Morgan demonstrates that modernist art sensibilities were never a foregone conclusion. In fact many stood against modernist art in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Men like Kenyon Cox, Royal Cortissoz, and Frank Jewett Mather Jr. hoped that classical art could continue to develop, but believed that modernists such as Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Marcel Duchamp, and Paul Gauguin had dissolved any connection with the past in their work. These artists used art forms like Dadaism, Cubism, and Surrealism to distort and destroy the human form and the natural world. In response Cox, Cortissoz, and Mather stood against these developments. Morgan’s book gives an overview of each man’s writings and thoughts on art, as well as their differing defenses of classical art forms and opposition to modernist forms.
Selected quotes from the book:
“The great artists of the past had studied humanity and nature to see continuity while expressing themselves. To be able to depict wholeness, the artist had to seek it and had to draw upon a personal tradition of broad taste before expressing one in formal art” (H. Wayne Morgan).
“I disbelieve in modernism because it seems to me to flout fundamental laws and to repudiate what I take to be the function of art, the creation of beauty. If modernism has anything legitimate to substitute for the experience of the past it is under obligation to make a convincing demonstration; the burden of proof rests with the innovators” (Royal Cortissoz).
—Recommended by Phillip Morgan
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Tom Nelson, Work Matters: Connecting Sunday Worship To Monday Work (Wheaton: Crossway, 2011) 201 pages.
One task that Christians have in this world is being intentional about living out their faith in the workplace. What makes this task so unique is that there can actually be several avenues of living out your faith in everyday life. No matter our work vocations (whether we are schoolteachers, policemen, airplane pilots, plumbers, semi-drivers—to name a very few), we all have been called to honor Christ in our unique, given environments.
In his book Work Matters, Tom Nelson sets out to help us fulfill this calling, and show how the Gospel urges us to take on a holistic approach to living out our faith in the world through our vocations in the workplace. I really appreciate how Nelson looks at the reason why we are to work. As human beings, we are more than just a body of chemicals conducting economic transactions on a daily basis. We are much more than that. Nelson writes, “We work because we bear the image of the One who works.”
As God’s image-bearers, human beings work to bring glory to the One Who first brought the universe into existence and redeems us from sin through the work of His son, Jesus. Each workplace vocation is different, and each image-bearer is gifted to faithfully live out his or her faith in that vocation for the glory of God.
—Recommended by Zachery Maloney
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Thomas C. Oden, A Change of Heart: A Personal and Theological Memoir (Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2014), 384 pages.
Thomas Oden has been perhaps the most significant contributor to evangelicalism’s rediscovery of classical Christianity. His involvement with the Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture series has had a global impact in bringing the premodern (that is, Patristic) sources to bear on contemporary exegetical and pastoral reflection. Yet it was a long, unlikely personal and theological journey through the mid-late 20th century that made these latter contributions possible.
A Change of Heart narrates this journey with depth, breadth, and humility. Readers will be instructed in the failures of modernity’s intellectual project, the significance of community, and the value of working to reform within one’s own religious tradition as opposed to abandoning it. Of all the autobiographies I have read in recent years, this has been as rewarding as any.
—Recommended by W. Jackson Watts
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Francis Schaeffer, How Should We Then Live? The Rise and Decline of Western Thought and Culture (Wheaton: Crossway, 2005 [originally published in 1976]), 288 pages.
In certain circles, Schaeffer has come under some criticism, be it for his conservative theology, cultural analysis, scholarship, or what have you. I have found this scrutiny rather curious, since I hadn’t recalled any major problems in reading him previously. Because of this, I decided to reread one of his most important books, How Should We Then Live? If anything, I have been impressed anew by Schaeffer’s importance and relevance for Christians today.
In this book, Schaeffer offers an overview of Western Civilization. He considers Ancient Rome, the Middle Ages, Renaissance, Reformation, Enlightenment, Scientific Revolution, and our present society by considering their cultural artifacts such as architecture, films, literature, music, philosophy, science, and other such topics. By understanding such an overview, we can better understand our society and our role in it. In his own words, “To understand where we are in today’s world—in our intellectual ideas and in our cultural and political lives—we must trace three lines in history, namely, the philosophic, the scientific, and the religious.”
Because this book offers a generalist overview of Western Civilization in less than 300 pages, Schaeffer isn’t able to go into as much detail over every subject he broaches as certain specialist-leaning readers would prefer. That said, for what Schaeffer is attempting to do, he is largely successful in his endeavor. I am more convinced than ever that Schaeffer deserves a spot on our shelves and a place in our conversations. For anyone interested the intersection between culture, history, and theology, I highly recommend this book.
—Recommended by Matthew Bracey
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Virgil, Aeneid trans. Robert Fitzgerald (New York: Random House, 1990 [originally published in 20 BC]), 417 pages.
In his essay, “Myth Became Fact,” C.S. Lewis writes, “In the enjoyment of a great myth we come nearest to experiencing as a concrete what can otherwise be understood only as an abstraction.” Great stories help us actualize the import of abstract concepts, and Virgil’s Aeneid is a story beyond compare.
Virgil’s hero is the Trojan prince, Aeneas, who barely escapes Ancient Greece’s sac of the city of Troy. Though his wife is separated from the group and killed, Aeneas, his father Anchises, and his son Ascanius escape with a fair contingent of Trojan refugees. Aeneid tells the mythical story of Aeneas’ journey to Italy where he is destined to found Rome. Aeneas tries his best to obey the gods and care for his aged father, while providing a good future for his son. Along the way, he narrowly escapes the feminine charms of the Molech-worshipping, Carthaginian queen Dido, fights oath-breakers in Italy, and defends honesty and honor everywhere he goes.
This is a fun read that helps us reclaim an embodied sense of the ancient abstract values of honor, religious piety, and family loyalty. I highly recommend Robert Fitzgerald’s very readable free verse translation of this Western Civilization classic.
Selected quotes:
“Even so far away
Great valor has due honor; they weep here
For how the world goes, and our life that passes
Touches their hearts.”
“[S]urely there are powers that care for goodness,
Surely somewhere justice counts.”
—Recommended by Phillip Morgan
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