Recommended Reading
Being Missional
Organic Church
Neil Cole
Churches have tried all kinds of ways to attract new and younger members, but there are still so many people who aren’t being reached, who don’t want to come to church. Leaders and laypeople everywhere are realizing that they need new and more powerful ways to help them spread God’s Word.Cole shows readers how to plant the seeds of the Kingdom of God in the places where life happens and where culture is formed – restaurants, bars, coffeehouses, parks, locker rooms,and neighborhoods. Organic Church offers a hands-on guide for demystifying this new model of church and shows the practical aspects of implementing it.
The Forgotten Ways
Alan Hirsch
Alan Hirsch is convinced that the inherited formulas for growing the Body of Christ do not work anymore. And rather than relying on slightly revised solutions from the past, he sees a vision of the future growth of the church coming about by harnessing the power of the early church, which grew from as few as 25,000 adherents in AD 100 to up to 20 million in AD 310. Such incredible growth is also being experienced today in the church in China and other parts of the world. From the theological underpinnings to the practical application, Hirsch takes the reader through this dynamic mixture of passion, prayer, and incarnational practice to rediscover the dormant potential of the modern church in the West.
The Shaping of Things to Come
Michael Frost & Alan Hirsch
Christendom is dying and needs to be removed from its life-support system. Starting with this frank assessment of the current church, Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch present an alternative model for ministry in today’s postmodern world. Instead of mourning the demise of the Western church as the center of society, the authors explain how the church can be reborn through incarnational mission, messianic spirituality, and apostolic structure. Church leaders who heed the authors’ call will see death turned into new life through the creation of a vital, missional church.
Church History
The Oxford History of Christianity
John McManners
Written by a team of expert scholars, this astonishingly comprehensive volume traces the history of Christianity from the Early Church to the present day exploring every aspect of the faith.
Community
True Fellowship
Art Katz
When God called us to establish a Christian community, I knew that it was a call to the cross, to humiliation and suffering. We were going to be living closely and intensively with other believers on a daily basis in which our defects, our shortcomings and our failures would be revealed. Out of the agonies and the joys, we gave opportunity for a reality to come forth that can best be described as “true fellowship.”
Devotional
Knowing God
J.I. Packer
J. I. Packer’s Knowing God has become a classic of the Christian faith. Why? While it gives us information about God with clarity and grace, it does much more—it aids us in actually knowing him, in building our relationship with him, and helps draw us closer to him in love and worship.
Desiring God
John Piper
Scripture reveals that the great business of life is to glorify God by enjoying Him forever. In this paradigm-shattering classic, newly revised and expanded, John Piper reveals that the debate between duty and delight doesn’t truly exist: Delight is our duty. Readers will embark on a dramatically different and joyful experience of their faith.
The Pursuit of God
A.W. Tozer
In the muddle of day-to-day life, have you somehow forgotten that Christianity is a living, vibrant relationship with a personal God? In this classic bestseller and recipient of both the ECPA Gold and Platinum Book Awards, The Pursuit of God reminds and challenges you to renew your relationship with your loving God. In each of the 10 chapters, Tozer explains one aspect of hungering for God and ends with a prayer.
The Call
Os Guiness
Best-selling author Os Guinness goes beyond our surface understanding of God’s call and addresses the fact that God has a specific calling for our individual lives. Why am I here? What is God’s call in my life? How do I fit God’s call with my own individuality? How should God’s calling affect my career, my plans for the future, and my concepts of success? Guinness can help you discover answers to these questions and more through a corresponding workbook perfect for individual or group study.
Grace
Saved By Grace
Anthony A. Hoekema
This is a comprehensive, dynamic, and practical presentation of the biblical teaching on salvation, including discusion of the role of the Spirit, union with Christ, the gospel call, regeneration, conversion, repentance, and more.
What’s So Amazing About Grace
Phillip Yancey
Grace is the church’s great distinctive. It’s the one thing the world cannot duplicate, and the one thing it craves above all else for only grace can bring hope and transformation to a jaded world. In What’s So Amazing About Grace?, award-winning author Philip Yancey explores grace at street level. What is grace? What does it look like in action? Are we lavishing grace on a world that knows far more of cruelty and unforgiveness than it does of mercy? Yancey offers compelling, true portraits of grace’s life-changing power. He searches for its presence in his own life and in the church. He challenges us to become living answers to a world that desperately wants to know What’s So Amazing About Grace?
Holy Spirit
Keep in Step with the Spirit
J.I. Packer
One of Christianity’s greatest scholars makes the person and power of the Holy Spirit accessible to all who strive for a closer walk with God.
House Church
The Global House Church Movement
Rad Zdero
God is once again bringing back the power and simplicity of New Testament-style Christianity. The Lord is raising up the global house church movement. Do you want to reach your friends and your nation with an approach to church life and church planting that is biblical and effective? If so, read this book. This book includes chapters on biblical principles, historical insights, practical tips, and strategic directions.
How to Study the Bible
How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth
Gordon Fee & Douglas Stuart
The primary task of Bible study is to determine what the Scriptures meant at the time they were written and how that meaning applies to us today. This vital guide focuses on the historical contexts of the Bible and explains differences between the Old Testament narratives, the Epistles, Gospels, Parables, Psalms and more. It’s a practical approach to Bible study — one that makes good sense and is easy to understand. This new edition includes, among other changes, a new section on the Song of Songs and an updated list of recommended commentaries and resources.
World Missions
Let the Nations Be Glad
John Piper
As part of his characteristic God-entranced view of all things, Piper roots mission in worship, prayer, and suffering. As he does so, he draws heavily not only on the Scriptures, but also on men and women down the ages who have obeyed the call of God to make the nations glad with the good news of the Savior.
Missionary Methods
Roland Allen
When Missionary Methods first appeared in 1912, it made a startling impression, challenging paternalistic Western missionary practice. It has remained in constant demand ever since. Profoundly biblical, Allen’s “methods” are drawn from a scrupulous examination of Paul the apostle’s own principles for missionary work. He argues that these apostolic principles – founded on an unwavering belief in the Holy Spirit indwelling new believers and churches – are as relevant today as they were in the formative years of the church.
The Spontaneous Expansion of the Church
Roland Allen
If it were once believed that the freedom of churches should be restricted to bring greater control to missions, Roland Allen sets out to overturn this conception. Warning against the danger of imposing greater limits on churches, the Author advocates that all members of the church, ‘natives’ and foreigners alike, must take an active role in its establishment and daily life.