Try never to be the smartest person in the room. And if you are, I suggest you invite smarter people … or find a different room.
– Michael Dell
A tremendous challenge I face as an international missionary is being, in a manner of speaking, the smartest person in the room, biblically speaking. My job is evangelism, church planting, and discipleship and as such, leadership deliberately places me in areas where Christians are few. As a result, I lack the fellowship of mature believers with more experience, knowledge, learning, and age who can challenge me. Even when local brothers in Christ have insight and understanding exceeding my own, dynamics of respect and position in the community often limit their willingness to instruct and guide me.
Ministers and missionaries around the world rank their personal walk with Christ as their biggest challenge. The consistent pull of duties, languages, cultures, and family distract us from daily prayer, meditation, and Bible study. The stresses of failure, temptation, and finances fatigue us, leading down the pathway of burnout and sin. Being “the smartest person in the room” makes it less likely I’ll have someone close by to nudge me back along the right path, or inspire me to tap into the strength we have in Christ.
Thankfully, once every three or four years someone hands me $100 for books. I can buy any book that will feed me spiritually or train me vocationally. I also receive funds for retreats, online classes, and other materials that are not primarily printed. Sadly, because my surroundings lack experienced Christian readers, I have no idea what to buy. Therefore, dear readers, I request your input.
Please recommend your top five books you would suggest for a maturing, ministering Christian desiring additional growth. Also list five recommended courses, videos, series, classes that are not printed (Kindle or paper). A few rules:
No seminary classes; it’s a long story, but it just won’t fit the bill.
No CS Lewis or GK Chesterton.
No David Platt.
No Christian fiction/Joel Osteen.
Videos must be closed captioned.
No women-centric materials.
No family or manhood materials.
No history of Baptists, SBC, or Calvinism.
Aim for Kindle, not print. The airlines have weight limits.
Less devotional, more theological and thought-provoking.
I look forward to your responses.
Evil: Confronting Our Inner Hitler
This is a though provoking review of Mein Kampf and thoughts on evil based on Jesus’ list of seven deadly sins.
https://www.amazon.com/Evil-Confronting-our-Inner-Hitler-ebook/dp/B01FRM2INW/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1468707883&sr=8-6&keywords=brian+karcher#navbar
Less devotional…. Hmmm…. that is where I spend most of my time. Maybe we have a different definition of devotional? Here is my list. All these books have been very important for my spiritual growth and maturity. 1. Celebration of Discipline by Richard Foster, though his ‘Prayer’ is perhaps the better book. 2. The Return of the Prodigal Son by Henri Nouen 3. The Furious Longing of God by Brennan Manning 4. The Imitation of Christ by Thomas A Kempis- there is a newer translation on Kindle by William Creasy that I am really enjoying. 5. Waking the Dead by… Read more »
I should have added that essential to our Missiology is the very excellent
The Insanity of God by Nik Ripkin and his follow up The Insanity of Obedience.
The Celebration of Discipline has some harshly negative reviews, mainly due to Foster’s alleged reliance on eastern mysticism and forms of meditation. What’s your take on this critique?
I love most all of Richard Foster’s work. I’m not with him on mysticism and meditation, but I think he writes with great clarity. His book Money, Sex, and Power: The Challenge of a Disciplined Life is a great follow up addressing things unique to our age. That being said, I don’t recommend the book for the new Christian, due to what I think is a misunderstanding of meditation. More mature Christians are able to read it and be challenged by it, I think. Just be aware of those things going in. He is a Quaker, I think, and a… Read more »
I personally think he is very clear and correct in his contrasting of biblical meditation and eastern meditation. I have seen the criticism and I don’t get it, they seem to criticize him for things he explicitly says not to do.
Luke, thanks for the review. Strider, thanks for the response. Someone further down recommended the same book so I’ll go ahead and add that to my shopping list.
If I knew you better, I’d joke around by saying, “I’m holding you personally responsible if this ends up being a waste of 13% of my funds.” But I don’t know you guys so I won’t.
Ethan I can’t recommend enough Third Mil. thirdmil.org. Free and as extensive as you want it to be. Internet connection on the field essential. But if that’s sketchy, you can get just about all of it on PDFs and add to your computer. Check it out.
The PDFs look intriguing, especially some of the older works. I hoped the videos would serve, but they lack closed captioning. Thanks for this.
Ethan, I hope they can be of use to you. Explore the many ways Third Mil has set up their teaching materials.
One thing about the CC. I just partially played a video to be sure, but it looks like each video has a complete transcript to accompany the video instruction. One could literally read along word for word as the teacher teaches. Like this short video Q/A with Danny Akin. You’ll see the word for word answer below th video. http://thirdmill.org/answers/answer.asp/file/44532
Anyway, hope this can be of use.
I recommend to you Develooing A Biblical Worldview: Seeing Things God’s Way by C Fred Smith. Available on Kindle. While its focus is the West missionaries to whom it has been commended find the rubric for analyzing culture quite useful and it offers guidance on strengthening your Christian walk.
I’m with you on the e-books. They are a great blessing for missionaries. Here is my recommendation:
Misreading Scripture with Western Eyes: Removing Cultural Blinders to Better Understand the Bible Paperback – December 4, 2012
by E. Randolph Richards (Author), Brandon J. O’Brien (Author)
I echo Celebration of Discipline
Would add
Hearing God and The Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard
Lectures to My Students by Spurgeon
The Prodigal Gid by Tim Keller
Abba’s Child by Brennan Manning
If I had to choose a book on discipline, would you recommend Willard’s “Spirit of the Disciplines” over “Celebration of Discipline”?
Thanks for pointing me towards Dallas Willard. I think I’ve heard the name before, but did not realize he was an author.
I would recommend Celebration. Willard’s Spirit of the Disciplines is a further exploration of Foster’s work. It’s actually the middle book of a trilogy- Hearing God, Spirit of the Disciplines, and The Divine Conspiracy. I was trying to limit or to 5 like you asked. 🙂
I’m a Willard junkie. He’s amazing. I’ve read about half of his works. Still chewing thru several of them.
your inclusion of Platt in your no-read list alongside Osteen and with no explanation is curious. You may not be interested in this either, but Mark Dever just published a new little book called “Discipleship” which is quite good.
I didn’t list Platt alongside Osteen. I listed fiction alongside Osteen.
You won’t hear many Baptists say what I’m going to say, but I would suggest This Present Darkness” by Peretti. It is fictional, but it helped me years ago to visualize some spiritual realities in the field. It’s a spiritual battle every day, and we are all missionaries in one sense of the Word! This book helped me! If you like it, there is a sequel “Piercing the Darkness”
Here are four that are well worth your time, all on Kindle:
Kindle:
Developing a Biblical Worldview: Seeing Things God’s Way C. Fred Smith (B and H, 2015)
True Paradox: How Christianity Makes Sense of our Complex World David Skeel (IVP, 2014)
Holiness John Webster Eerdmans
Original Jesus: Trading the Myths we Create for the Savior Who Is Daniel Darling (Baker Books, 2015)
There are so many good books out there. Here are a few off the top of my head that should help a person in ministry today:
Speaking the Truth In Love – David Powlison
Doctrine of the Knowledge of God – John Frame
A Call To Spiritual Reformation – DA Carson
What Every Christian Needs to Know About the Quran – James White.
De Profundis by Oscar Wilde.
The Kindle version is currently free through Amazon.com. I’m not sure, though, what it is going to contribute to my walk with Christ and spiritual growth.
Prophetic Lament: A Call for Justice in Troubled Times by Soong-Chan Rah A study in the book of Lamentations. Best book I’ve read so far in 2016
A Long Obedience in the Same Direction: Discipleship in an instant society by Eugene Peterson. A study of the Songs of Ascents, Psalms 120-134. I first read this in 1983, and parts of it continue to echo in my life.
Sacred Rhythms: Arranging our Lives for Spiritual Transformation by Ruth Haley Barton.
Streams of Living Water: Celebrating the Great Traditions of Christian Faith by Richard Foster.
I have recently added Keller’s “Generous Justice”, Towns and Stetzer’s “Perimeters of Light”, and Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch’s “The Shaping of Things to Come” to update my list of ten essential reads. Also, I strongly echo Carson’s “Call to Spiritual Reformation” and thirdmill.org.
1. Peter Enns, Inspiration and Incarnation (easily the most important Evangelical book on the Old Testament in the last decade)
2. G. K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy
3. Kevin Vanhoozer, The Drama of Doctrine
4. N. T. Wright, Justification
5. Gregory Boyd, The Openness of God (in my experience, many Christians are closer to open theist than they would regularly admit)
One additional one: Five Views on Biblical Inerrancy. The book provides several avant-garde views that I found fascinating.
Wow! Hard to narrow down to five. I tried to keep in mind your criteria, but all of these may not meet them.
1. Leading on Empty- Wayne Cordiero* (a must read for Pastors and Missionaries)
2. Hell? Yes!- Robert Jeffress
3. 7 Things You Better Have Nailed Down Before All Hell Breaks Loose- Robert Wogelmuth
4. Already Gone- Ken Ham, Britt Beamer*
5. Already Compromised- Ken Ham, Britt Beamer, Greg Hall*
*(Indicate a must read for Pastors, missionaries and Student Ministers.)
A couple of interesting reads outside of the typical I’ve found helpful….
The Power of Habit
https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/the-power-of-habit/id446670958?mt=11
Getting Naked
https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/getting-naked/id378873859?mt=11
Willard – Divine Conspiracy
Whitaker – Witness
Willard – The Spirit of the Disciplines
On the flip side, if you will send me an email address I have something that I would like to pass on to you.
daniel m harding hotmail com
No spaces just jam it all together.
Ethan, you’re a brave man soliciting reading recommendations. I don’t usually let others pick-out my books, golf clubs, or fish. Rather than recommending 5 specific books, I’ll try a slightly different tack and suggest you consider five categories with some ideas for each. Someone already beat to me Spurgeon (I think most of his stuff can already be found online); almost anything by him is profitable for the soul. 1) Something Ministerial (don’t know your specifics but if you teach/preach, then one of the following would be helpful if you haven’t already read them. All are excellent.) a. Bryan Chapell,… Read more »
I asked the same question when we went the field in 1998. Know this though, apart from your call, only the Bible and bible study is going to transform you and help you remain on the field. Mark Dever gave me D.A. Carson’s bible study books, For The Love of God vols 1 & 2, months before we left for the field. These were a HUGE blessing to me personally and I am grateful for the gifts. Apart form these, consider selecting the following: Systematic Theology by Wayne Grudem (I realize this could be a seminary class, but it helps… Read more »