I am in the US right now so I like to think of it as a good time to catch up on reading. That hasn’t been as true as I would like it to be. Nevertheless, I have been making some progress. Here are the one’s I am pushing through.

#1. Becoming a Missional Family; Fulfilling God’s Purpose in and through Your Family. <by P.C. Matthews. Urban India Ministries, 2014> This is not the type of book I would normally read, but I am glad that I am reading it. A student of mine is doing a paper on “Missional Families,” so in helping to research it, I came upon this book. It is a short book and I am 40% through it. It is a book written in Asia in Asian context. However, it seems to me to be broadly applicable. I will probably review it when I am done reading it.

#2. Four Views on the Church’s Mission. <edited by Jason S. Sexton and Stanley N. Gundry. Zondervan, 2017> What is the role of the church in God’s mission? While it seems like this is something that should have gotten worked out awhile ago, in many ways it seems to be a modern question. Voetius addressed this back in the 1600s but different views continue. The four views in the book are described as (a) Soteriological Mission, (b) Participatory Mission, (c) Contextual Mission, and (d) Ecumenical-Political Mission. Although I have only finished the introduction and part the first view. I am pretty sure that I am going to end up with a common view for me— all of them have a point. All of the short descriptions sound like they have merit. But that is fine. Truth tends to be in the nuanced overlaps, not in strictly walled categories.

#3. Encountering the History of Missions: From the Early Church to Today <by John Mark Terry and Robert L. Gallagher. Baker Academic, 2017> I will be starting to teach an online class in Missions History. In the past, I have used Ruth Tucker’s book, “From Jerusalem to Irian Jaya.” However, the 2nd edition is rather pricey for some of my students, so I am going with Encountering. This book does have the same problem I have for most mission history books— the great focus on post-Reformation missions, and little on missions of the Eastern churches. Still a quick perusal of the book looks very promising.

#4. Creed Without Chaos– Exploring Theology in the Writings of Dorothy L. Sayers <by Laura K. Simmons. Baker Academic, 2005> Dorothy Sayers is one I have little knowledge of except for several very interesting quotes. However, I have loved reading theology by thoughtful lay-theologians. I think their non-academic perspective often brings good things into view. I think this is especially true of writers whose fame comes from non-theological and non-academic works.

Additionally, I am using this time to go through and fix my book, “Ministry in Diversity.” It is a book on Cultural Anthropology— or better said, on Missionary Anthropology. I find the book useful for my class in the Philippines, but feel like I need to upgrade it for general consumption. Hopefully, I will be done with it before I travel back to the Philippines.

By the way, the two most successful books online are:

The Art of Pastoral Care

Theo-Storying: Reflections on God, Narrative and Culture

Both of them are shockingly inexpensive— especially in Kindle Format.