George Barna's findings about which books are having the greatest influence on pastors is stirring much-needed conversation about the general reading habits of Christians and the state of Christian publishing.
Peter Bogert at Stronger Church is asking for book titles pastors should recommend to their congregations. The categories he's looking for are: Bible reference, basic theology reference, God and salvation, following Christ, and home and vocation. Peter will post the results on his blog and Tim Challies will likely post them at Diet of Bookworms. Chime in with your suggestions.
5 comments:
I know that Keith would also recommend this book, but John Frame's book The Doctrine of God is very good. He touches on soterioogical issues as well (in an excellent and insightful way), so it should be in one's library. John Feinberg's book No One Like Him is another good theology proper text. As for books with a specific soteriological focus, I would recommend The Cross and Salvation by Bruce Demarest, as well as Anthony Hoekema's book Saved by Grace. As for systematic theology texts, one should at least have R. L. Dabney, Charles Hodge and W. G. T. Shedd (his Dogmatic Theology). Elwell's Dictionary of Evangelic Theology is a good reference book. Millard Erickson's The Word Became Flesh is good for Christology. If one has an interest in soteriogy as seen from a Calvinistic perspetive, then they should seek out material from Curt Daniel (his History and Theology of Calvinism is at www.SermonAudio.com, and is free). If one wants to get solid evangelical training in many areas of theology, they should check out www.BiblicalTraining.com also. The materials available on the internet for free seem endless. One can virtually go through seminary level training if they persevere through the better resources on the internet, whether it is written material or audio material. Navigating through the junk may be a challenge, but great resources are available. Anyone with a computer is without excuse.
This makes me recall a quote from Matthew Henry. He said something like, "We shall not only be accountable for what we know and did not do, but also for what we could have known but did not learn." If that is a true principle, then those of us with computers and sufficient time to learn may end up being the last instead of the first in the Kingdom of God. Tolle Lege! Tolle Lege!
No, no, no, Tony! You were supposed to leave the recommendations at Peter Bogert's blog. Go ahead, now. Go do it. :-)
LOL. Give a dork a break here! I did what you recommended ;-)
Well, at least some of your readers will get my good recommendations as well. *grins with fake humility*
hey ynottony- I checked out comments looking for reading material! Thanks!
You're welcome :-)
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