Please commit to reading 3-4 of these this summer. It will change you! Scroll all the way down for Recs from a favorite Prof of min...
Books you SHOULD HAVE READ By Now:
**Knowledge of the Holy, Tozer.
All by Lewis: The Chronicles of Narnia, (Stories) C S Lewis
Mere Christianity (SEMINAL work)
The Problem of Pain
Divine Conspiracy (on Christian virtue) by Dallas Willard
***The Pleasures of God, by Piper
Holiness of God, R C Sproul
A Path Through Suffering Elisabeth Eliot,
GREAT DEAD GUYS to Read:
Jonathan Edwards **Religious Affections
Madame Guyon, Union with God
Fenelon, Seeking Heart.
New(ish) on the Scene:
Follow Me by Dave Platt
God Loves You by David Jeremiah
Apologetics:
I don't Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist , by Turek
Cold Case Christianity, Wallace
The Case for Faith, Strobel,
Don't Waste Your Life, John Piper
Biography:
***Bonhoeffer, by Eric Metaxas (mesmerizing & important)
**C S Lewis, by Alister McGrath (Prize-winning)
** Edwards, A Life, by George Marsden (run, don't walk, to get this one!)
Through Gates of Splendor (Jim Elliot)
Marriage & Family/Sexuality
Love & Respect by Dr Eggerichs
*****The Meaning of Marriage by Tim Keller (anything by him is Super,but this especially )
The Naked truth about Chastity (Lauren Winner, great!!)
Sex & the Supremacy of Christ, John Piper
Devotional:
Streams in the Desert, Cowan.
My Utmost for His Highest (Tex & I re-read every 5 years) Oswald Chambers
Valley of Vision (Pilgrim prayers)
*** For FAMILY Devotions,: John Piper Series A Godward Life
Prayer: A Diary of Private Prayer, by John Bailie
EXTRA CREDIT! ::
From our HEAD LIBRARIAN: a true "Man of Letters"
Dr Bob Mayer
1. The Collected Sermons of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, edited by Isabel Best.
(Fortress, 2012).
Synopsis: Preaching, according to Bonhoeffer, is like offering an apple to a
child. The gospel is proclaimed, but for it to be received as a gift depends on
whether the hearer is in a position to do so. Offered here are thirty-one of
Pastor Bonhoeffer's sermons, in new English translations, which he preached at
various times of the year and in a variety of different settings. Each is
introduced by Bonhoeffer translator Isabel Best, who also provides a brief
biography of Bonhoeffer. The foreword is by Victoria J. Barnett, general editor
of the Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works, English edition, published by Fortress Press,
from which these sermons are selected.
In his preaching, Bonhoeffer's strong, personal faith— the foundation for
everything he did— shines in the darkness of Hitler's Third Reich and in the
churches' struggle against it. Though not overtly political, Bonhoeffer' s deep
concern for the developments in his world is revealed in his sermons as he seeks
to draw the listener into conversation with the promises and claims of the
gospel— a conversation readers today are invited to join.
2. Discernment: Reading the Signs of Daily Life, by Henri Nouwen (Harper One,
2013)
Discernment: Reading the Signs of Daily Life features the wisdom that spiritual
leader and counselor Henri J. M. Nouwen brought to the essential question asked
by every Christian and seeker: What should I do with my life?
Nouwen emphasizes listening to the Word of God—in our hearts, in the Bible, in
the community of faith, and in the voice of the poor as a way to discern God’s
plan.
3. The Twilight of the American Enlightenment: The 1950s and the Crisis of
Liberal Belief, by George Marsden (Basic Books, 2014)
In the aftermath of World War II, the United States stood at a precipice, with
astonishing advances in daily life, but technology and mass culture also threatened to erode the
country’s traditional moral character. As award-winning historian George M.
Marsden explains in The Twilight of the American Enlightenment, postwar
Americans looked to the country’s secular, liberal elites for guidance in this
precarious time, but these intellectuals proved unable to articulate a coherent
common cause by which America could chart its course.
A groundbreaking reappraisal of the country’s spiritual reawakening.
4. Confessions, by St. Augustine (Oxford World Classics, 2009).
Henry Chadwick, an eminent scholar of early Christianity, has given us the
first new English translation in thirty years of this classic spiritual journey.
Chadwick renders the details of Augustine's conversion in clear, modern English.
5. Mark Noll, The Civil War as a Theological Crisis (UNC Press, 2003)
The Civil War was a major turning point in American religious thought, argues
Mark A. Noll. Although Christian believers agreed with one another that the
Bible was authoritative and that it should be interpreted through commonsense
principles, there was rampant disagreement about what Scripture taught about
slavery. Furthermore, most Americans continued to believe that God ruled over
the affairs of people and nations, but they were radically divided in their
interpretations of what God was doing in and through the war.
6. C. S. Lewis: A Life , by Alister McGrath (Tyndale, 2013) [Great book, but I
like Jacobs better]
ECPA 2014 Christian Book Award Winner (Non-Fiction)!
Fifty years after his death, C. S. Lewis continues to inspire and fascinate
millions. His legacy remains varied and vast. He was a towering intellectual
figure, a popular fiction author who inspired a global movie franchise around
the world of Narnia, and an atheist-turned-Christian thinker.
You won’t want to miss this fascinating portrait of a creative genius who
inspired generations.
8. God's Forever Family: the Jesus Movement in America (Oxford, 2013)
Winner of the 2014 Christianity Today Book of the Year
The Jesus People movement was a unique combination of the hippie counterculture
and evangelical Christianity, and it attracted a huge new following among evangelical church youth,
who enthusiastically adopted the Jesus People persona as their own. Within a few
years, however, the movement disappeared and was largely forgotten by everyone
but those who had filled its ranks.
Friday, June 6, 2014
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