Know Why You Believe


Paul E. Little - 1966
    That's what a million people have already found in this clear and reasonable response to the tough challenges to Christianity. This edition, revised by Marie Little in consultation with experts in science and archaeology, provides twenty-first-century information and offers solid ground for those who are willing to search for the truth.

This Changes Everything: How the Gospel Transforms the Teen Years


Jaquelle Crowe Ferris - 2017
    But there is something more glorious than all these influences that has the power to change the life of a teenager: the gospel. Writtenby a teenager for teenagers, This Changes Everything is a deeply theological yet practical and accessible book on how the gospel radically transforms every aspect of the teen years, including pursuing relationships, managing time, combating personal sin, and cultivating healthy habits. In a culture awash with low expectations for young people, this book exhorts teenagers to embrace a gospel-centered perspective on their lives and pursue wholehearted devotion to Christ now.

Surviving Religion 101: Letters to a Christian Student on Keeping the Faith in College


Michael J. Kruger - 2021
    Answering questions such as How can Christianity be the only right religion?; How can we know the Bible is really from God?; and Wouldn't a loving God save everyone?, Kruger offers biblical, theological, and logical support for the Christian faith and provides students with the tools to navigate these challenging topics. College students wrestling with these issues will be encouraged to find security in God's unfailing word even in the face of difficult questions.

Do Hard Things: A Teenage Rebellion Against Low Expectations


Alex Harris - 2008
    And Alex and Brett Harris are leading the charge.Do Hard Things is the Harris twins' revolutionary message in its purest and most compelling form, giving readers a tangible glimpse of what is possible for teens who actively resist cultural lies that limit their potential.Combating the idea of adolescence as a vacation from responsibility, the authors weave together biblical insights, history, and modern examples to redefine the teen years as the launching pad of life. Then they map out five powerful ways teens can respond for personal and social change.Written by teens for teens, Do Hard Things is packed with humorous personal anecdotes, practical examples, and stories of real-life rebelutionaries in action. This rallying cry from the heart of an already-happening teen revolution challenges a generation to lay claim to a brighter future, starting today.

Already Gone: Why Your Kids Will Quit Church and What You Can Do to Stop It


Ken Ham - 2009
    And it's not just happening on the nominal fringe; it's happening at the core of the Faith. What are the factors that could cause the next generation to be lost from the local church? Ken Ham from Answers in Genesis commissioned Britt Beamer from America's Research Group to find out. In the first scientific study of its kind, Beamer surveyed a thousand 20-30 year olds who used to go to Evangelical churches on a regular basis but have since left it behind. The results are not just surprising, they are shocking: Those who faithfully attended Sunday school are more likely to leave the church than those who do not! Those who regularly attended Sunday school are more likely to believe that the Bible is less true! Over half of those who faithfully attended church feel that the church is not relevant to real life today. Statistic by statistic, Ham and Beamer blow the lid off basic assumptions and implications regarding faith, the age of the earth, the inerrancy of the Bible and the great disconnect that is taking place between our children and their church experience. The trends are frightening, but Already Gone shows how to fight back in our families, our churches and our world. We can make a difference today that will affect the statistics of tomorrow!"

The Benedict Option: A Strategy for Christians in a Post-Christian Nation


Rod Dreher - 2017
    The light of the Christian faith is flickering out all over the West, and only the willfully blind refuse to see it. From the outside, American churches are beset by challenges to religious liberty in a rapidly secularizing culture. From the inside, they are being hollowed out by the departure of young people and a watered-down pseudo-spirituality. Political solutions have failed, as the triumph of gay marriage and the self-destruction of the Republican Party indicate, and the future of religious freedom has never been in greater doubt. The center is not holding. The West, cut off from its Christian roots, is falling into a new Dark Age. The bad news is that the roots of religious decline run deeper than most Americans realize. The good news is that the blueprint for a time-tested Christian response to this decline is older still. In The Benedict Option, Dreher calls on traditional Christians to learn from the example of St. Benedict of Nursia, a sixth-century monk who turned from the chaos and decadence of the collapsing Roman Empire, and found a new way to live out the faith in community. For five difficult centuries, Benedict's monks kept the faith alive through the Dark Ages, and prepared the way for the rebirth of civilization. What do ordinary 21st century Christians -- Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox -- have to learn from the teaching and example of this great spiritual father? That they must read the signs of the times, abandon hope for a political solution to our civilization's problems, and turn their attention to creating resilient spiritual centers that can survive the coming storm. Whatever their Christian tradition, they must draw on the secrets of Benedictine wisdom to build up the local church, create countercultural schools based on the classical tradition, rebuild family life, thicken communal bonds, and develop survival strategies for doctors, teachers, and others on the front lines of persecution. Now is a time of testing, when believers will learn the difference between shallow optimism and Christian hope. However dark the shadow falling over the West, the light of Christianity need not flicker out. It will not be easy, but Christians who are brave enough to face the religious decline, reject trendy solutions, and return to ancient traditions will find the strength not only to survive, but to thrive joyfully in the post-Christian West. The Benedict Option shows believers how to build the resistance and resilience to face a hostile modern world with the confidence and fervor of the early church. Christians face a time of choosing, with the fate of Christianity in Western civilization hanging in the balance. In this powerful challenge to the complacency of contemporary Christianity, Dreher shows why those in all churches who fail to take the Benedict Option aren't going to make it.

Onward: Engaging the Culture without Losing the Gospel


Russell D. Moore - 2015
    That may be bad news for America, but it can be good news for the church. What's needed now, in shifting times, is neither a doubling-down on the status quo nor a pullback into isolation. Instead, we need a church that speaks to social and political issues with a bigger vision in mind: that of the gospel of Jesus Christ. As Christianity seems increasingly strange, and even subversive, to our culture, we have the opportunity to reclaim the freakishness of the gospel, which is what gives it its power in the first place.   We seek the kingdom of God, before everything else. We connect that kingdom agenda to the culture around us, both by speaking it to the world and by showing it in our churches. As we do so, we remember our mission to oppose demons, not to demonize opponents. As we advocate for human dignity, for religious liberty, for family stability, let's do so as those with a prophetic word that turns everything upside down.   The signs of the times tell us we are in for days our parents and grandparents never knew. But that's no call for panic or surrender or outrage. Jesus is alive. Let's act like it. Let's follow him, onward to the future.

The Gospel: How the Church Portrays the Beauty of Christ


Raymond C. Ortlund Jr. - 2014
    But this message also creates human beauty--beautiful relationships in our churches, making the glory of Christ visible in the world today.In this timely book, Pastor Ray Ortlund makes the case that gospel doctrine creates a gospel culture. In too many of our churches, it is the beauty of a gospel culture that is the missing piece of the puzzle. But when the gospel is allowed to exert its full power, a church becomes radiant with the glory of Christ.

The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert: An English Professor's Journey Into Christian Faith


Rosaria Champagne Butterfield - 2012
    She had a tenured position at a large university in a field for which she cared deeply. She owned two homes with her partner, in which they provided hospitality to students and activists that were looking to make a difference in the world. There, her partner rehabilitated abandoned and abused dogs. In the community, Rosaria was involved in volunteer work. At the university, she was a respected advisor of students and her department’s curriculum. And then, in her late 30s, Rosaria encountered something that turned her world upside down—the idea that Christianity, a religion that she had regarded as problematic and sometimes downright damaging, might be right about who God was, an idea that flew in the face of the people and causes that she most loved. What follows is a story of what she describes as a “train wreck” at the hand of the supernatural. These are her secret thoughts about those events, written as only a reflective English professor could."Conversion put me in a complicated and comprehensive chaos. I sometimes wonder, when I hear other Christians pray for the salvation of the “lost,” if they realize that this comprehensive chaos is the desired end of such prayers. Often, people asked me to describe the “lessons” that I learned from this experience. I can’t. It was too traumatic. Sometimes in crisis, we don’t really learn lessons. Sometimes the result is simpler and more profound: sometimes our character is simply transformed." —Rosaria Butterfield

Disruptive Witness


Alan Noble - 2018
    These two trends define life in Western society today. We are increasingly addicted to habits―and devices―that distract and "buffer" us from substantive reflection and deep engagement with the world. And we live in what Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor calls "a secular age"―an age in which all beliefs are equally viable and real transcendence is less and less plausible. Drawing on Taylor's work, Alan Noble describes how these realities shape our thinking and affect our daily lives. Too often Christians have acquiesced to these trends, and the result has been a church that struggles to disrupt the ingrained patterns of people's lives. But the gospel of Jesus is inherently disruptive: like a plow, it breaks up the hardened surface to expose the fertile earth below. In this book Noble lays out individual, ecclesial, and cultural practices that disrupt our society's deep-rooted assumptions and point beyond them to the transcendent grace and beauty of Jesus. Disruptive Witness casts a new vision for the evangelical imagination, calling us away from abstraction and cliché to a more faithful embodiment of the gospel for our day.

The New City Catechism: 52 Questions and Answers for Our Hearts and Minds


Timothy J. Keller - 2014
    The New City Catechism is a modern-day resource aimed at reintroducing this ancient method of teaching to Christians today.This short book lays out 52 questions and answers related to God, human nature, sin, Christ, the Holy Spirit, and more. Whether used devotionally, recited orally, or memorized over the course of a year, families, churches, small groups, and Christian schools will treasure this as a valuable tool for teaching the core doctrines of the Christian faith to children and adults alike.

Ten Words to Live by: Delighting in and Doing What God Commands


Jen Wilkin - 2021
    The Ten Commandments are words God spoke to a nation recently set free. They are words about obedience and holiness--timeless in their importance and wisdom. Yet today these same words are often misunderstood, forgotten, or simply ignored.Wilkin teaches readers how the Ten Commandments come to bear on their lives today, helping them to love God and others, live in joyful freedom, and long for that future day when God will be rightly worshiped for eternity. Ancient and timeless, these words cannot be overlooked. They serve as the rightful delight and daily meditation of those who call on the name of the Lord.

Surprised by Scripture: Engaging Contemporary Issues


N.T. Wright - 2014
    T. Wright, the influential Bishop, Bible scholar, and bestselling author widely regarded as a modern C. S. Lewis.An unusual combination of scholar, churchman, and leader, N. T. Wright—hailed by Newsweek as “the world’s leading New Testament scholar”—is not only incredibly insightful, but conveys his knowledge in terms that excite and inspire Christian leaders worldwide, allowing them to see the Bible from a fresh viewpoint. In this challenging and stimulating collection of popular essays, sermons, and talks, Wright provide a series of case studies which explore how the Bible can be applied to some of the most pressing contemporary issues facing us.Helpful, practical, and wise, Surprised by Scripture invites readers to examine their own hearts and minds and presents new models for understanding how to affirm the Bible in today’s world—as well as new ideas and renewed energy for deepening our faith and engaging with the world around us.

Is God a Moral Monster?: Making Sense of the Old Testament God


Paul Copan - 2010
    This viewpoint is even making inroads into the church. How are Christians to respond to such accusations? And how are we to reconcile the seemingly disconnected natures of God portrayed in the two testaments?In this timely and readable book, apologist Paul Copan takes on some of the most vexing accusations of our time, including: God is arrogant and jealousGod punishes people too harshlyGod is guilty of ethnic cleansingGod oppresses womenGod endorses slaveryChristianity causes violenceand moreCopan not only answers God's critics, he also shows how to read both the Old and New Testaments faithfully, seeing an unchanging, righteous, and loving God in both.

Gospel Fluency: Speaking the Truths of Jesus Into the Everyday Stuff of Life


Jeff Vanderstelt - 2017
    Is it possible this difficulty is because we're trying to speak a language we haven't actually spent time practicing?To become fluent in a new language, you must immerse yourself in it until you actually start to think about life through it. Becoming fluent in the gospel happens the same way--after believing it, we have to intentionally rehearse it (to ourselves and to others) and immerse ourselves in its truths. Only then will we start to see how everything in our lives, from the mundane to the magnificent, is transformed by the hope of the gospel.