With changing leaves and cooler weather, this fall will also bring a ton of excellent new books! Here are 30 of our most anticipated books for Christian Readers…
These books wrestle with some of the deepest challenges of our day, and will guide us toward faithful living in the present and in years to come.
[ TOP 10 – Part 1 ] [ Top 10 – Part 2 ]
[ Literature ] [ NonFiction ]
[ Church ] [ Theology ]
Page 2: TOP 10 – Part 2
(In Alphabetical Order by Author’s Last Name)
Pastor Paul: Nurturing a Culture of Christoformity in the Church
Scot McKnight
(Hardback: Brazos Press, September)
According to popular New Testament scholar Scot McKnight, pastoring must begin first and foremost with spiritual formation, which plays a vital role in the life and ministry of the pastor. As leaders, pastors both create and nurture culture in a church. The biblical vision for that culture is Christoformity, or Christlikeness. Grounding pastoral ministry in the pastoral praxis of the apostle Paul, McKnight shows that nurturing Christoformity was at the heart of the Pauline mission. The pastor’s central calling, then, is to mediate Christ in everything. McKnight explores seven dimensions that illustrate this concept–friendship, siblings, generosity, storytelling, witness, subverting the world, and wisdom–as he calls pastors to be conformed to Christ and to nurture a culture of Christoformity in their churches.
Unfollow: A Memoir of Loving and Leaving the Westboro Baptist Church
Megan Phelps-Roper
(Hardback: FSG, October)
At the age of five, Megan Phelps-Roper began protesting homosexuality and other alleged vices alongside fellow members of the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas. As Phelps-Roper grew up, she saw that church members were close companions and accomplished debaters, applying the logic of predestination and the language of the King James Bible to everyday life with aplomb―which, as the church’s Twitter spokeswoman, she learned to do with great skill. Soon, however, dialogue on Twitter caused her to begin doubting the church’s leaders and message: If humans were sinful and fallible, how could the church itself be so confident about its beliefs? As she digitally jousted with critics, she started to wonder if sometimes they had a point―and then she began exchanging messages with a man who would help change her life. A gripping memoir of escaping extremism and falling in love, Unfollow relates Phelps-Roper’s moral awakening, her departure from the church, and how she exchanged the absolutes she grew up with for new forms of warmth and community. Rich with suspense and thoughtful reflection, Phelps-Roper’s life story exposes the dangers of black-and-white thinking and the need for true humility in a time of angry polarization.
On the Road with Saint Augustine: A Real-World Spirituality for Restless Hearts
James K.A. Smith
(Hardback: Brazos Press, October)
Following Smith’s successful You Are What You Love, this book shows how Augustine can be a pilgrim guide to a spirituality that meets the complicated world we live in. Augustine, says Smith, is the patron saint of restless hearts–a guide who has been there, asked our questions, and knows our frustrations and failed pursuits. Augustine spent a lifetime searching for his heart’s true home and he can help us find our way. “What makes Augustine a guide worth considering,” says Smith, “is that he knows where home is, where rest can be found, what peace feels like, even if it is sometimes ephemeral and elusive along the way.” Addressing believers and skeptics alike, this book shows how Augustine’s timeless wisdom speaks to the worries and struggles of contemporary life, covering topics such as ambition, sex, friendship, freedom, parenthood, and death. As Smith vividly and colorfully brings Augustine to life for 21st-century readers, he also offers a fresh articulation of Christianity that speaks to our deepest hungers, fears, and hopes.
Exactly as You Are: The Life and Faith of Mister Rogers
Shea Tuttle
(Hardback: Eerdmans, October)
Fred Rogers fiercely believed that all people deserve love. This conviction wasn’t simply sentimental: it came directly from his Christian faith. God, he insisted, loves us just the way we are. In Exactly as You Are, Shea Tuttle looks at Fred Rogers’s life, the people and places that made him who he was, and his work through Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. She pays particular attention to his faith—because Fred Rogers was a deeply spiritual person, ordained by his church with a one-of-a-kind charge: to minister to children and families through television. Tuttle explores this kind, influential, sometimes surprising man: the neighborhood he came from, the neighborhood he built, and the kind of neighbor he, by his example, calls all of us to be. Throughout, Tuttle shows how he was guided by his core belief: that God loves children, and everyone else, exactly as they are.
I Bring the Voices of My People: A Womanist Vision for Racial Reconciliation
Chanequa Walker-Barnes
(Paperback: Eerdmans, 2019)
Chanequa Walker-Barnes offers a compelling argument that the Christian racial reconciliation movement is incapable of responding to modern-day racism. She demonstrates how reconciliation’s roots in the evangelical, male-centered Promise Keepers’ movement has resulted in a patriarchal and largely symbolic effort, focused upon improving relationships between men from various racial-ethnic groups. Walker-Barnes argues that highlighting the voices of women of color is critical to developing any genuine efforts toward reconciliation. Drawing upon intersectionality theory and critical race studies, she demonstrates how living at the intersection of racism and sexism exposes women of color to unique experiences of gendered racism that are not about relationships, but rather are about systems of power and inequity.
<<<<< PREV. PAGE |
NEXT PAGE >>>>>
 Reading for the Common Good From ERB Editor Christopher Smith "This book will inspire, motivate and challenge anyone who cares a whit about the written word, the world of ideas, the shape of our communities and the life of the church." -Karen Swallow Prior Enter your email below to sign up for our weekly newsletter & download your FREE copy of this ebook! |
Understanding Christian Nationalism [A Reading Guide] |
 Most Anticipated Books of the Fall for Christian Readers!
|
 Hilarious One-Star Customer Reviews of Bibles |
Of these books I am most looking forward to reading the new novel by Ta-nehisi Coates, The Water Dancer.
I will (as a woman in ministry) delight in reading Peppiatt’s Rediscovering Scripture’s Vision For Women! https://www.amazon.com/Rediscovering-Scriptures-Vision-Women-Perspectives/dp/0830852719/ref=as_li_ss_tl?keywords=Lucy+Peppiatt&qid=1566496931&s=books&sr=1-1&linkCode=sl1&tag=douloschristo-20&linkId=4f22b14637d82a7ac909fd2274d624be&language=en_US