One of the things that have stayed with me since my freshman year in college (a pivital moment in my spiritual and intellectual journey, where Mark Noll’s The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind uprooted my sense of theological and historical self awareness) is an urgency in developing the mind as a way of loving God with our whole being. I have had great seasons of reading good books and long summer droughts where others things have occupied my time. However, as a minister of the gospel, I am trying to develop a more systematic approach to my reading diet. I hope this will be helpful to you as I remark over the books that make their way through my desk (I know some will not be of interest to you since I read in my field church history and patristics as much as I can).
One thing I am not going to do this year is a theologian study, because I have several I want to read. I usually read a few pages every day of a primary source material by one author. For example, I read Augustine last year. This year, however, I want to read works dealing with hermeneutics and the history of interpretation, so I will need to read somewhat broadly. I am sure I will dabble in Karl Barth as I engage writers like Hans Frei, Erich Auerbach and Richard Hays. I am also planning on reading Augustine’s sermons published by New City Press. So, we will see! I usually do not make my way through all of the books because of new works that are published or I come across ( but I do get to most of them). If any of you are reading any on the list, I would love dialogue partner!
Read Along with the Pastor
Generous Justice by Timothy Keller (December 2010)
Radical by David Platt (January 2011)
Here I Stand by Roland Bainton (February 2011)
Republocrat by Carl Trueman (March 2011)
Jesus Made in America by Stephen Nichols (April 2011)
Jonathan Edwards by George Marsden (May 2011)
Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman (June 2011)
Assist Me to Proclaim: The Life and Hymns of Charles Wesley (July 2011)
The American Evangelical Story by Douglas Sweeney (August 2011)
A Place for Truth: Thinkers Explore Life’s Hardest Questions by Veritas Forum (Sept. 2011)
Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe (October 2011)
Mere Christianity by C. S. Lewis (November 2011)
On the Incarnation by Athanasius of Alexandria (December 2011)
Preaching and Hermeneutics
Christ-Centered Preaching by Bryan Chapell
Between Two Worlds by John R. W. Stott
The Supremacy of God in Preaching by John Piper
Preaching the Whole Bible as Christian Scripture by Graeme Goldsworthy
Church History, the History of Christian Thought, and Theology
Augustine and the Trinity by Lewis Ayres
De Trinitate by Augustine
On Christian Doctrine by Augustine
Anselm by R. W. Southern
Anselm by G. R. Evans
Why God Became Man by Anselm of Canterbury
Thomas Aquinas, vol. 1 by J. P. Torrell
Thomas Aquinas, vol. 2 by J. P. Torrell
Thomas Aquinas by G. K. Chesterton
Peter Abelard by Leif Grane
Thomas Cranmer by Diarmaid MacCulloch
Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President by Allen Guelzo
Emily Dickinson and the Art of Belief by Roger Lundin
The Erosion of Inerrancy in Evangelicalism by G. K. Beale
History of Exegesis
The Bible in Christian North Africa by Maureen A. Tilley
Spiritual Exegesis and the Church in the Theology of Henri de Lubac by Susan K. Wood
The Word in the Desert by Douglas Burton-Christie
An Introduction to the History of Exegesis: Vol. 1 – The Greek Fathers by B. de Margerie
An Introduction to the History of Exegesis: Vol. 2 – The Latin Fathers by B. de Margerie
Medieval Exegesis, vol. 1 by Henri de Lubac
Medieval Exegesis, vol. 2 by Henri de Lubac
The Eclipse of the Biblical Narrative by Hans Frei
Disciplining Hermeneutics: Interpretation in Christian Perspective, ed. by Roger Lundin
The Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul by Richard B. Hays
The Moral Vision of the New Testament by Richard B. Hays
Novels
A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway
The Sun also Rises by Ernest Hemingway
For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway
The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway
Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe
Books Added Throughout the Year How to Write a Sentence and How to Read One by Stanley Fish A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingwy (His memoir detailing Paris in the 1920) of Education by John Milton The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin by Gordon S. Wood The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald What is the Gospel by Greg Gilbert God Crucified by Richard Bauckham
