Okay, friends, I hope you saw my big PART ONE of our epic FAVORITE BOOKS OF 2025 list. It is agonizing trying to rate or judge these books, some of which have become absorbed into part of my being, my memory of the year, my sense of things. Not every book leaves a mark, and I like skimming a lot — an occupational privilege and hazard. But so many are so good. The earlier post was mostly a list of my true favorites. Thank you to those who trusted my suggestions and took us up on a few. We live for this. And, whew, some of those books were really amazing for me.
Use the secure order form (the link is at the bottom) to order more and we’ll do the discounts and take care of the rest.
But there’s more. A lot more. Here, then, is the even more epic PART TWO of the best books of 2025. I’m not going to differentiate between those that are really, really great and those that are stellar and those that are fabulous and those that are necessary. Words fail me. Let’s just say these all richly deserve an honorable mention. I’ve already announced or reviewed most of these at BookNotes so use that search box in our BookNotes tab at the website to search out what you can find, if you need to.
Here we go, presenting true honorable mentions, some of the great books of 2025 (in no particular order.)
You don’t have to fret about finding the best; I’ve curated that for you. Send us an order today. All are 20% off.
You Can Trust a God With Scars: Faith (and Doubt) for the Searching Soul Jared Ayers (NavPress) $18.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.19
This truly was one of my favorite reads of 2025 and I still grab it off the shelf and page through it, looking for memorable stories, paragraphs, lines and phrases. Ayers is a great writer, a fine storyteller, astute about those who are suspicious of faith or who have been burned by harsh churches. I loved his movie and rock music citations, his general ability to bring just the right story or illustration to the narrative, and his very solid Biblical and theological insight. There are reflections about these complicated days but there is a high and constant view of Christ, too. This book actually covers so it is an enjoyable primer for anyone about the basics (and even legitimacy) of the Christian faith. As Leanne Van Dyk has said, it is a book for those who yearn.
Let me just say two quick things that I mean as utter and sincere selling points, features that delight me even if they aren’t central. First, it is lovely to see a PC(USA) pastor — born and raised in nondenominational churches, by the way — writing such a thoughtful book on NavPress. While some may think of them as a house that mostly does rather formulaic discipleship resources or inductive Bible studies, this is just one of many, many examples of NavPress doing some of the best books in the evangelical publishing landscape. So kudos for this bridge-building, faithful work. And, secondly, it’s nice to see an author who grew up in central PA making a national name for himself. I hate to be sentimental, but, man, I’d like it if you ordered this book so we can send it out from Jared’s old stomping grounds. You Can Trust a God with Scars is good for seekers, for the hurt ones, but also for any of us who need a good read to build faith and joy. And I went to high school with his parents. Come on!
Clear, compelling, and propelled by a soaring Christology, Jared Ayers breathes fresh air into the fathomless mystery of what it means to have a wounded healer God on our side. For a doubting, cynical generation, this pastoral, humble, persuasive voice is a giant step forward in the journey of faith seeking understanding. — Eric E. Peterson, founding pastor of Colbert Presbyterian Church
In an age of disillusionment and disenchantment, we need wise pastoral voices who bring a curious mind, an awakened heart, and a lively, compassionate pen to our many perplexing questions. We need voices like Jared Ayers’s, and I’m excited to support the work he’s creating and the beautiful gospel it evokes.— Winn Collier, director of the Eugene Peterson Center for Christian Imagination at Western Theological Seminary and author of A Burning in My Bones and Love Big, Be Well
Birds in the Sky, Fish in the Sea: Attending to Creation with Delight and Wonder Matthew Dickerson & Matthew Clark (Square Halo Books) $25.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $20.79
We’ve raved about this more than once (and highlighted it at two different events this past year, first, when it was brand new, at the big Jubilee conference in Pittsburgh last February where it sold out!) It is a lovely meditation on creation, nature-writing, Bible reflection, affirming the wonder and beauty of God’s good world. The linocuts and woodcuts of Matthew Smith are clever, fun, curious, and at times stunning. It’s a beauty, full of delight but also urgent. This is important stuff. One of the very best books of 2025. Spread the word.
And, you know, if Marilyn McEntyre — one of the great wordsmiths of our time and a true lover of literature —like it, it’s worth getting. I love her lines, here, endorsing it.
Whether you rarely venture into woods and wild or revel in nights under starlight, or simply love the local park, this visually lovely and richly thoughtful book will invite you to look again and be amazed and delighted at the creatures with whom we share the planet and the mystery of being at all, including those “formed to frolic.” The rare combination of personal reflection, poetry, biblical understanding and exquisitely detailed images makes it a book to linger over, reread, and share.
—Marilyn McEntyre author of Midwinter Light: Meditations for the Long Season
The Core of Christian Faith: Living the Gospel for the Sake of the World Michael Goheen (Brazos Press) $24.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $19.99
This. This is. This is one of the best books I’ve read all year and I’m very eager to commend it. I’ve reviewed it before in BookNotes so I won’t repeat myself, but just want to offer a celebratory hip, hip, hooray.
Goheen’s name is important in some circles as he helped Al Wolters revise and expand his famous Creation Regained: The Biblical Basis for a Reformational Worldview. He famously co-wrote The Drama of Scripture with Craig Bartholomew and then they did two follow ups, Living at the Crossroads (about the formation of a Christian worldview) and Christian Philosophy (for students studying in university.) If you know anything about our own origins story here at Hearts & Minds you’ll see his sort of perspective over much of what we attempt, offering resources to help people think missionally about all of life being redeemed.
Eventually, Goheen was called to really put into practice this transforming vision for missional living by starting a training center for some like-minded churches in Arizona. I absolutely adored his exceptional The Symphony of Mission: Playing Your Part in the God’s Work in the World (2019) which shaped much of his work in Arizona. He mentions training folks to get this wholistic Kingdom picture. How does he transmit that I wondered, this symphony of mission, everybody living out faith in their respective zones of life? What’s the secret sauce?
Now we know. The Core of Christian Faith is a book that summarizes the teaching he offers at The Missional Training Center in Phoenix on how to “live the gospel for the sake of the world.”
It is not pure or heady systematic theology as you might think from the title. As the publisher explains, Goheen “lays out a formation process that guides Christians to (1) return to the good news as a comprehensive and powerful message of God’s kingdom, (2) recover the Bible as the one true story of the whole world, (3) retrieve a deep consciousness of their missional identity, and (4) engage in a missionary encounter with culture.”
If time permitted, I’d say more. I hope those who like theology will order this, and it will maybe push them toward application a bit (and, maybe, a reformation of the core truths they sometimes obsess about or how to express those core truths.) And if you are skeptical of the language “core truths’ and doctrinal stuff, I invite you to think this through with Goheen. It will surprise you at how energizing and formative it can be.
Goheen distills a lifetime of pastoral and academic wisdom into a compelling vision for the church’s role in God’s redemptive mission. Built around a fourfold core for discipleship, it offers a practical and profound framework for faithful living. A timely and Spirit-filled invitation, this work will inspire congregations to embrace their vocation for the sake of the world. — Summer Montoya, director of spiritual formation, Redemption Church Gilbert
You Have a Calling: Finding Your Vocation in the True, Good, and Beautiful Karen Swallow Prior (Brazos Press) $21.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $17.59
We have honored Karen for her fine and thoughtful writing over the years. I was taken with her amazing memoir written in light of books she loved; what a joy that she did the first major biography of abolitionist and novelist and poet Hannah Moore (Fierce Convictions) and then we hosted her in the store when she did the groundbreaking book about virtue and reading (On Reading Well: Finding the Good Life Through Great Books.) Karen has left her mark with various sorts of resources on cultural engagement and, of course, literature. She has worked in higher education for years, and has had reason to counsel many young adults as they discerned their future vocations and careers. When she attended the collegiate Jubilee Conference in Pittsburgh last year with other campus ministers who use the language of calling and vocation, she exclaimed tome that this was her tribe!
And then this book came out this summer. I tis a compact hardback, not a tome, with a beautiful cover. I was going to be impressed and I knew I’d learn much, as I always do from her, but I’ll admit I was just a tiny bit worried, or at least aware, that there have been a plethora of such titles here of late. Like the topic of faith and work, we went from hardly anything a few decades ago to nearly a glut. Would You Have a Calling really bring new insights or fresh inspiration?
The answer is assuredly yes. It is one of the best little books on this topic, parsing the nuances of vocation and calling, of various meanings and the implications of this lingo. It is gracious but instructional, lovely, but full of quality information. There is big picture vision about purpose and destiny, but there’s lots of common sense, too. And we need common sense in this breathy conversation about this big topic of the search for meaning and purpose.
The second half brings something new to this topic, too, so even if you think this theological / worldviewish foundation is something you understand well, I commend how she brings the virtues of the true, the good, and the beautiful to the topic. Either half of this fine book should be award-winning. Together there is no doubt. You Have a Calling by Karen Swallow Prior, is one of our favorite books of 2025 and we name it with this very honorable mention.
All Things Together: How Apprenticeship to Jesus Is the Way of Flourishing in a Fragmented World Heath Hardesty (Multnomah) $19.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.20
Oh my, what a book this is, and what a great recommendation I want to offer. Yes, yes, an honorable mention, but also a full-throated suggestion for a fun read, full of stories and Godly orientation, helping “our fragmented liger an be made whole.” It invites us to “come apprentice to the One who brings healing to a fractured world.” As I have said more than once in our BookNotes this past year, I have a friend I admire who has compared Heath Hardesty’s writing to a young Eugene Peterson. I frankly would not have made that connection, but he is talented, wise, full of citations from literature (and pop culture in a way rarely found in Eugene’s books), and he offers a deep, winsome invitation for a “long obedience in the same directly.”
As I noted in a previous review, you gotta love a book — well, at least I love a book — about spirituality and faithfulness that is written, smartly written, by a blue-collar guy. His descriptions of his varied jobs were droll, if not out and out funny. I appreciate a pastor who has worked, literally, in plumbing and yet seems like a sage. Or, as one reviewer noted, has the soul of a poet.
In a way, this call to apprentice to Jesus is working in the same fields as Dallas Willard did, or as John Mark Comer does now. Full-life, spiritually-rooted formation in our creaturely bodies (oh how I love Romans 12: 1-2) is known to be what is needed — church is not a venue for inspiring entertainment or even pious worship but there is some integral connection between liturgy and life, between our interior lives and spiritual formation and how we actually live in the world This book offers great storytelling and well-told examples of those who are longing for something big to live for and want to know how to become the kind of people who can take up that adventure. He is writing about integration, a whole life, a multi-dimensional embodiment of following Jesus everywhere.
Jon Tyson the cool writer and pastor in New York City has a very impressive foreword in which he warns us not to read this book too quickly. He says to prayerfully look for those places in our lives that are “unseamed” (as opposed to seamless.) He is right. This may be one of the best books of its kind in 2025 but I think we will need most of 2026 to allow its advice to get through to us. Get it now and read it slowly.
There are six chapters in Part One under the heading “Re-Imagining Apprenticeship” and there are seven chapters in Part Two, habits and practices for “Re-Inhabiting a Fragmented World.” This is a really good book.
Soulwork of Justice: Four Movements for Contemplative Action Wesley Granberg-Michaelson (Orbis Books) $26.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $20.80
I’ve named this several times and each time I was impressed with how much I appreciated this book. Some of us have been trying to bridge the age-old gap between spirituality and justice (and dare I say, between love of God and love of neighbor) for much of our lives.
Those taken by a vision of our interior lives (from monastic contemplatives to pious Pentecostals) often miss the implications of their warm hearts for the broken world, especially broken systems and political injustices. Similarly, those called to the front lines of anti-war work, standing for the oppressed (and, these days, against our own government’s violent arrests of many fellow citizens!) are seemingly disinterested in things of the spirit. Let alone the Spirit. And so, on we go, various churches emphasizing one part of the gospel, and each side missing a huge component of Biblical faithfulness.
Since author Wes Granberg-Michaelson has served as the head of his denomination (the Reformed Church in American) and has spent decades with several global ministries (including the World Council of Churches) he surely knows this ungodly dichotomy and has spent much of his living trying to bring folks together, evangelicals and Catholics, prayer warriors and social justice warriors, those who care about the Word and those who care about the world.
In this book — absolutely a vital read for us all, now, and a “Best of 2025” — Wes is less trying to solve the bigger problem of how to bring together various tribes within the church, but, rather, how to bring the strengths of at least two major traditions into the same person. Can we be contemplatives, knowing God and our interior true selves deeply and be people of action, even activists? Can we do the “soulwork” of justice work?
There are a precious view books on this topic. Thomas Merton, of course, wrote about it, as did Parker Palmer, and, recently, Daniel Wolpert did Looking Inward Living Outward: The Spiritual Practice of Social Transformation. That could be a companion volume to Wes’s major work.
The Soulwork of Justice means a lot to me, not only because I feel strong that this is very important and not only because I trust Wes very much. (He’s a Hearts & Minds customer, after all.) More, though, I think this book has ministered to me, struck me, formed new thinking about age-old stuff. I raced through an advanced manuscript Orbis kindly sent my way, and then I read it again, later, slowly.
Complete with old diary entries (which are exceptionally illuminating) Wes offers four movements (as he calls them), each feeling a bit to me as if by a modern-day Henri Nouwen, maybe with some edge from Richard Rohr. He forged these four moves from his years of pastoral work and social action. (Did you know he used to be a top aid to an anti-war Republican Senator? Did you know he was for years the right hand-man to Sojourners founder Jim Wallis?) While anyone can benefit from this splendid work, it seems on the face of it that Soulwork is written for citizen activists and those aching to make a difference in the world. It is a guide to the inner work they must do if they are going to be whole themselves and not foist their issues on their public justice groups and peacemaking efforts.
He and his wife are now gently shepherding a small, rural Lutheran parish, and loving it. They are adept in Enneagram stuff, spiritual direction standards, and deeply Biblical sorts of spirituality. I admire this guy so much, and think Soulwork deserves not only much acclaim but much discussion. Why not buy a few and circle up some friends and ponder this together?
The Transforming Fire of Divine Love – My Long Slow Journey into the Love of God John H. Armstrong (Cascade) $27.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $21.60
Years in the making by one of the preeminent ecumenically minded evangelicals of our lifetime. John has been a pastor and evangelist, a leader at the top levels of evangelical networks, a fabulous and popular speaker, prayer warrior, midwife of renewal. But in the last twenty years he walked away (and in some cases was forced out) of some conservative (often Reformed) circles because his heart was breaking with the divisions in the Body of Christ. He took inspiration from an older essay and sermon by J. I. Packer and then committed himself to reach out to Catholics and mainline Protestants, Orthodox leaders and open-minded evangelical friends. His organization his called ACT3.
John has written several books on unity in the church and the kind of love that we need if we are going to adequately renew the Body of Christ in inter-denominational ways. All of his books are vital, important, gentle, and not as provocative as some say. He’s solid as a rock. We have them all.
And, now, this year, he has given us what may be his most meaty book ever, a substantial study of the nature of divine love. He is not the first to try to probe this inscrutable fire, but his humble study is one of the best I’ve ever read on this topic. The thoughtful forward is by Wesley Granberg-Michaelson (who also has a book on this Best of 2025 list.) Too many of our starting assumptions about the nature of God fail to start with the assertion in 1 John 4 that “God is Love.” This is a “readable primer to help you develop a doctrine that, he suggests, “can free you from guilt, fear, and many misconceptions we have about God.”
Five Views of the Gospel edited by Michael Bird & Jason Maston (Zondervan Academic) $24.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $19.99
Although some of these CounterpointsBible & Theology can be tedious, the back and forth of varying perspectives and the edenic tone, even in the critiques, are always very edifying and informative. It’s like reading four theology books in one, along with the responses of each author. Here we are approaching one of the most important topics, one that, sadly, is not settled. The older school debates between so called liberals and fundamentalists, or mainline vs evangelical, are less nuanced and unhelpful. While this conversation— all from solid folks who affirm the authority of Scripture and stand in solid historic faith traditions — sheds light on this huge matter. What do we mean (and more importantly, what does the Bible mean) when we talk about the gospel? If we don’t reflect on this every now and again, I’m convinced we will not serve God well. So this is a core book on a topic that needs clarifying and robust debate.
We have here what we might call the “King Jesus Gospel” (offered by Scot McKnight), the “Reformation Gospel” (by Michael Horton of Westminster West), “The Wesleyan Gospel (proclaimed by David deSilva), a Pentecostal perspective (by Julie Ma, with a PhD from Fuller, now a prof at Oral Roberts) and a Liberationist view (by Shively T. J. Smith; she is a much-respected United Methodist and ecumenical scholar, involved in the revisions of the NRSVue, and a professor of New Testament at Boston College.) The discussions are illuminating to say the least.
I liked Craig Keener’s comment that he found himself “agreeing with much in each essay and hoping that such dialogue can help us synthesize the best insights of each, while keeping Jesus’s identity and work at the center.”
Nijay Gupta notes that it will help readers “ponder the width, height, and depth of the glory of the good news of the Messiah.”
By the way, for those who follow these things, Matthew Bates, who I appreciate a lot (see his little book Why the Gospel: Living the Good News of King Jesus with Purpose) did an important book this year that I haven’t read but seems award-winning. It is called Beyond the Salvation Wars: Why Both Protestants and Catholics Must Reimagine How We Are Saved. Some bigwigs at a Southern Baptists seminary were so alarmed they had a big video presentation about it, warning readers, and Bates replied that they slandered him, saying things about his alleged claims in the book that he did not say and that no charitable reading could deduce. Such dishonest is an affront to the God of the gospel and such overreactions are in bad form. In light of that dust-up, Five Views of the Gospel is that much more appealing and their discourse is a model of congenial debate.
Ask of Old Paths: Medieval Virtues and Vices for a Whole and Holy Life Grace Hamman (Zondervan) $29.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $23.99
Last year we highlighted Hamman’s lovely Jesus through Medieval Eyes. While technically not an exact sequel it is a companion volume, another study of how the medieval world framed and shaped folks into classic Christian virtues. There has been a rediscovery, in recent decades, of both the value of studying the middle ages, and, importantly, the nature of character formation, virtue ethics, and how we are conscripted into a story that shapes who we are. This book explores how that happened in ages past and how these “old paths” might offer something useful for our own efforts of wondering how to become better people. She does this with an insightful realization of the medieval habit of coupling of virtues and vices, and explains it all by drawing on letters and sermons and art and more. Fascinating and very helpful.
For any of us who struggle with vice and virtue (that’s a joke, since that’ all of us, eh?) Ask of Old Paths could be a delightfully interesting, informative, and finally a transforming read, helping us learn how to live “a whole and holy life.”
Becoming God’s Family: Why The Church Still Matters Carmen Joy Imes (IVP) $22.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $18.39
I liked the first volume in this trilogy a lot. It was called Bearing God’s Name: Why Sinai Still Matters (and campout in 2019); I simply adored the sequel, Being God’s Image: Why Creation Still Matters and it was spectacular seeing her at the Pittsburgh Jubilee conference a few years ago [and she will be there this year, speaking there February 14 and preaching from the main stage on the 15th.] The great Christopher Wright wrote the forward to the first and former Jubilee keynoter Richard Middleton wrote the forward to the second. She’s a good writer, charming even, and a respected scholar, as you can tell from these other names eager to work with her.
Wheaton College prof (and Anglican priest) Esau McCaulley, author Reading While Black, wrote a great foreword to 2025’s Becoming God’s Family. Again, this is an indication of how many folks from varying circles value her work. With this third in the set, she has created a must-have trilogy of titles. I really believe these are some of the most accessible but profound Biblical studies resources of this century!
Becoming God’s Family is a theology, or I guess I should say a Biblical foundation, for the church. We are calling into a tribe, a community, a family, and this didn’t start in the time of Jesus or Pentecost. The early church and its struggle to find unity amongst great differences, is based on the covenantal promises of a God who calls creation into being and forms a community. The church is the upshot of a long, complex, and painful drama unfolded in the Bible.
As with the other two in this series, Carmen has links and suggestions throughout from The Bible Project. The guys who do that are young colleagues of hers, having studied under her own beloved professors. This summer, by the way, she invited people to shop with us, and recommended, among weeks of online videos full of ideas, a book by her first academic mentor, the late Ray Lubbock, who wrote Reading the Bible for a Change: Understanding and Responding to God’s Word.
Anyway, Becoming God’s Family: Why The Church Still Matters by Dr. Carmen Joy Imes, is one of the great little books of the year. Use it in your church!
The Anxious Generation Goes to Church: What the Research Says about What Younger Generations Need (and Want) from Your Church Tom Ranier (Tyndale) $19.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.99
Okay, should a summary of another bigger, esteemed (and truly award winning) volume win a Hearts & Minds award? Yes, yes indeed! The popular church consultant Tom Ranier here has done a huge service by summarizing much of the data from the mammoth The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt. Haidt is one of the great social scientists and public intellectuals of our time (and intellectually, he has become know as one who is not notably aligned with any ideological school of thought as far as we I can tell and is generally respected by scholars of the left and the right.) Yet, Haidt’s important work on the “rewiring” of children today needs to be updated, explored, nuanced, and— importantly for most of us here —applied to the unique struggles of Christian families, local churches, and youth ministries. So, while it may sound cheesy, The Anxious Generation Goes to Church is just what we need, asking (and answering) how church folks can respond to the alarming data and concerning trends documented in Haidt’s big work.
And, Rainier notices, young kids are going back to church. Some of the research he uncovers is actually hopeful. If the church is ready for them.
Of course Haidt is not the only one who has done good research into the rising generation or sounded the alarm about the harmful effects of screen technologies and social media on kids today. His coining of the phrase “the anxious generation” has stuck, though, and Rainer and his team are to be applauded for their bringing this practical and useful resource to us. Kids are interested in faith and many are emotionally fragile. What shall we do to serve them well in our congregations? Dare I say every church leader should be grappling with this?
There is a wise and useful foreword by Ryan Burge, another scholar with a knack for helping church folks get the big picture and discern what to do about it all. Look for his brand new book, by the way, just out, called The Vanishing Church: How the Hollowing Out of Moderate Congregations Is Hurting Democracy, Faith, and Us (Brazos; $26.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $21.59.) We just got it in and it looks important.
Sacred Attachment: Escaping Spiritual Exhaustion and Trusting in Divine Love Michael John Cusick (IVP) $26.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $20.80
There have been a number of recent books relating the interesting psychological notion of attachment theory to our alienation from God and self and description union with Christ and deeper spirituality in terms of, well, being well-held. I heard Walt Brueggemann allude to this 30-years ago and it blew me away. We may be uneasy in life because we didn’t form the most durable and gracious attachments in our babyhood or childhood, but God, the nurturing divine Mother and Father who holds us well, can heal that, once we know we are, as Nouwen often put it, beloved. People were almost weeping in the middle of a Brueggemann talk on Isaiah.
Michael John Cusick is the CEO and founder of Restoring the Soul, an intensive counseling ministry in Denver. He is a licensed professional counselor, spiritual director, and former assistant professor of counseling at Colorado Christian University. I don’t recall that he cites Brueggemann in this book (nor does he call God Mother) but he’s drawing on this deep well of relating our spiritual resilience and helpful faith with this matter of “sacred attachment.” Man, he writes wonderfully and offers a fresh take on spiritual formation literature — so much so that I want to name this as an honorable mention for one of the best books of 2025.
There are good discussion questions at the end, too, making it useful for a group or to read with a friend or counselor. The writing is vivid, the examples, stories, and illustrations ring true. It is poignant and strong. As Ken Shigematsu (pastor of Tenth Church in Vancouver, British Columbia, and author of Now I Become Myself: How Deep Grace Heals Our Shame and Restores Our True Self) writes, “I absolutely love this book! Cusick not only brilliantly unpacks insights from Scripture and psychology, but with breathtaking courage and generosity, he reveals his life to us so we can experience the joy of wholeness.”
Wow, listen to this from Curt Thompson; he should win an award for best book blurb:
We don’t believe we are loved until we feel it in our chests. Given how infrequently this happens, no wonder we are as exhausted as we are. But thanks be to God, Michael Cusick takes us on a deeply personal and comprehensively practical journey that invites the reader into the wide place to stand of which the psalmist writes. A wide place in which you become the beauty and goodness that you have been destined to become. Read this book and rest. Read this book and be revealed. But mostly read this book and know — in your chest — what it means to be loved. — Curt Thompson, The Soul of Shame and The Deepest Place: Suffering and the Formation of Hope
The Myth of Good Christian Parenting: How False Promises Betrayed a Generation Evangelical Families Marissa Franks Burt and Kelsey Cramer McGinnis (Brazos) $19.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.99
The religious book world — especially the enterprising evangelical book world — has for decades churned out hundreds of books about family and marriage. We have read scores and happily sold many. Yet (as much as Beth and I love talking about are marriage and as much as parenting littles meant to us) we’ve never been as big of a fan as some, I guess of these self-help guides
First, some Christian marriage and parenting books imply, wrongly, that the Christian life is mostly about focusing on the family. Secondly some were just odd, and some dangerously bad. Although we have carried a wide range of resources — secular ones, those from mainline and Catholic publishers, and, yes, many from traditionalist publishers like Focus —we anchored our family section with warm resources like Feast of Families by Virginia Stem Owens, or thoughtful stuff like Rodney Clapp’s Families at the Crossroads: Beyond Tradition Modern Options and of course our favorite Gender and Grace: Love, Work, and Parenting in a Changing World by Mary Stewart Van Leeuwen. What fun we used to have showing Parenting Is Your Highest Calling: And 8 Other Myths That Trap Us in Worry and Guilt. And how we appreciate the classy prose of Michael Mason in books like The Mystery of Marriage and The Mystery of Children. In more recent years we loved the Dorothy Greco title Making Marriage Beautiful. I could go on — there are so many good ones.
But yet, for every Parenting for Peace and Justice we’d sell, or The Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas or Seasons of a Family’s Life: Cultivating the Contemplative Spirit at Home by Wendy Wright we’d have folks looking for manuals affirming (unbiblical) sexist gender roles and super-strict discipline techniques. Beyond the almost cult-like stuff (BabyWise, Bill Gothard) there were seemingly fine books that had some ugly content.
This has all come to light in a recent must-read book called The Myth of Good Christian Parenting. We name and honor it here not because it was a favorite book or a delight but because was hard, but important. It includes a detailed look at bad books and programs that masqueraded as faithful. Gulp.
I couldn’t put it down and I will admit it made me uncomfortable at times. The sign of a good book.
This title deserves a very honorable mention for the detailed and nearly comprehensive study they have done about Christian parenting books over the last decades. Some of this includes older stuff, and some are fairly recent. It is an expose, a critique, and a positive call for better thinking, better resources, and more gentle way to be faithful to Christ as we raise our children. This hit close to home, mostly because there was so much in the book about the Christian publishing industry, the titans of our era (Dobson, etc.) and how we really should have been more discerning. There are powerful stories and compelling suggestions. This book is important. Thanks to the authors, Marissa Franks Burt and Kelsey Cramer McGinnis, and to Brazos for their brave, helpful work.
The Deep-Rooted Marriage: Cultivating Intimacy, Healing, and Delight Dan B. Allender & Steve Call (Thomas Nelson) $29.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $23.99
As I hinted above, and as I wish Burt and McGinnis might have made a bit clearer, not all faith-based family-themed books were dreadful. Yes, good people may disagree about gender roles and toxic views may not damage their books. (I disagree with Tim and Kathy Keller’s minor excursion into headship, for instance, but still regularly recommend their very intelligent Meaning of Marriage.) Anyway, there are great books in this genre, and some have been written by Dan Allender. I’m not even sure I always like the way Dan, a gentle and thoughtful hero in my book, has phrased everything (in, say, books he co-wrote with Bible scholar Tremper Longman like The Mystery of Marriage, a fine study on IVP, or God Loves Sex, an excellent book on Baker.) So, in light of the above title, and aware that not even our best writers and thinkers get it right all the time, I was unsure what I’d think of this new one.
But, wow. What a book!
I am eager to announce this as one of the favored books on my 2025 list. It’s a gem, thoughtful, deep, informed by profound studies about our interior lives, our traumas, our longings and desires. We have to be honest about what we bring to our relationships, which can create what singer-songwriter Mark Heard call “a climate of love.” We’ve got to work on it. I love Allender & Call’s used of the word cultivating. The words in the subtitle are so good — cultivating this honest ecology of grace and authenticity and attention to our stories can create “intimacy, healing, and delight”. This focus makes this book extraordinary.
The Deep-Rooted Marriage is not the simplest marriage book, but it is one of the better books in this whole genre in many a year. Certainly one of the best books of 2025. Three cheers for intimacy, healing, and delight! Three cheers for these two collaborative authors.
The Redeemed Reader: Cultivating a Child’s Discernment and Imagination Through Truth and Story Janie Cheaney, Betsy Farquhar, Hayley Morell & Megan Sabin (Moody Press) $17.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $14.39
How can we not honor this book as a major contribution for Christian parenting? What a significant website and newsletter they have and what a good book this is, collating and sharing their robust vision of thoughtful parenting by using great books with children. They have done amazing work and every parent (or church library) should have this.
I may not word every paragraph as they do, and I don’t worry quite much as they do about some of the philosophically complicated themes in children’s books these days, but they are routinely thoughtful, make an excellent case for the points they offer, making The Redeemed Reader a volume that stands on the shoulders of the still lovely Honey for a Child’s Heart and the must-have Wild Things and Castles in the Sky: A Guide to Choosing the Best Books for Children published in 2022 by Square Halo Books. The Redeemed Reader authors even cit Leslie and Théa and Cary from Wild Things so that’s nice. Their commitment to “truth and story” speaks volumes and they know their stuff.
Hooray for this. Get The Redeemed Reader: Cultivating a Child’s Discernment and Imagination Through Truth and Story for any Christian parent you know. (And then follow it up with Wild Things and Castles in the Sky.)
Children of the Book: A Memoir of Reading Together Ilana Kushan (St. Martin’s Press) $28.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $22.40
Can I list a book that I haven’t read? Okay, I started it. And read a handful of amazing reviews and long interview with the author, Ilana Kushan. I feel like I know this book but, in the name of transparency, really, I haven’t gotten to it yet. But I am confident I have to name it. It is simply breathtaking in its style, a thoughtful memoir about reading. About being read to, and about reading to children.
Here is why I’m so enamored with the idea of putting this on a list of Best Books of 2025. You see, the author is Jewish mother of five living in Jerusalem. She is passionate about reading, but only gradually comes to learn “how to relate reading not as a solitary pursuit and an escape from the messiness of life, but rather as a way offering connection and teaching independence.” This book is about her introducing literature — sacred and secular, as she puts it — to her children. She realizes it makes her a more compassionate reader herself and (yep)a better mother.
One of the bits in this remarkable book is her telling about reading the Torah with her children. Of all the many books there are about reading, even memoirs about reading, even about the power of reading to children, there are very few that I know that are, in fact, about reading Scripture together.
Children of the Book is arranged in five parts (corresponding to the first five books of the Bible.) She finds “profound parallels between the Biblical narrative and the daily rhythms of parenthood.”
She tells of “the first picture books that create the world through language for babies to the bittersweet moment our children begin reading on their own, leaving us behind, atop the mountain, as they enter new lands without us.”
This has been richly called luminous and from the bits I’ve read, I’d agree. It is beautiful, profound, and a delicious meditation on shared stories and “a life richly lived through literature.”
Contesting the Body of Christ: Ecclesiology’s Revolutionary Century Myles Wentz (Baker Academic) $24.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $19.99
Okay, this is another that I’m still working through and I can’t not list it. It is amazing, if scholarly, and fresh, if a very detailed study. I like Myles Wentz a lot. (He wrote a brilliant little book just a few years ago called From Isolation to Community and before that co-wrote a very compelling “field guide” to Biblical nonviolence.) His PhD is from Baylor and is the professor of Baptist Studies at Abilene Christian University in Texas.
This book — which carries a foreword by the weighty Canadian Anglican Ephraim Radner — is hard to explain, but it is basically using the four classic phrases about the church (“one, holy, catholic, and apostolic”) to see how congregations and church groups did or didn’t live into the theology implied in the phrases. That is, it is about our unity and our holiness and more. He shows how they were “remade, contested, and reaffirmed in surprising and innovative ways.”
Tom Greggs is at the Center for Theological Inquiry at Princeton and says, “Wentz leads readers in a scholarly way through stories and journeys of the Spirit’s work in the church…Global in horizon and ecumenical in foundation, outlook, and scope, this book offers a wise and exciting account of the four marks of the church in a way that offers hope and looks to renewal. It deserves reading and rereading by church people and theologians alike.”
See. You know I love this stuff. It may be over my head, but those of us born in the 20th century (or, shall I say, born again in the 20th century) should recall that these were tumultuous times for churches around the world. In this book, Werntz explores the landscape of twentieth-century ecclesiology. And it’s complicated and studious but it mattesr.
The publisher reminds us that:
The church changed tremendously in the twentieth century, with new churches emerging and old churches being renewed. This period encompassed the birth of the World Council of Churches, the rise of American evangelicalism, the Second Vatican Council, the coming of age of charismatic Christianity, and more.
I didn’t realize it when I decided to name it as one of the significant books of the year, but I now see that Christianity Today gave it their 2025 Book Award of Merit in Academic Theology. Told ya so. Ha!
The Hybrid Congregation: A Practical Theology of Worship for an Online Era Michael Huerter (IVP Academic) $25.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $20.79
Some years I’ve done lists of nothing but books from academic presses or scholarly houses. Or I’ve awarded the best of this sort, making it seem like I read more heavy stuff than I do. But, still, in this award I’m wanting to honor a combo of a genre (academic or university press books) and a topic (books about the local church and her worship.) To be honest there are dozens of fabulous-looking scholarly works in categories like liturgics, jurisprudence, aesthetics, sociology, history, or science. And, as you may guess, we have dozens of new books on the local church and various sub-themes from mission to conflict, leadership to worship. Anyway, we’ve got a combo here, a scholarly book on the local church. Whew.
One of the most useful recent titles that is pretty academic but important for even ordinary church leaders is, I think, this year’s The Hybrid Congregation. It is a popular version of his academic dissertation at Baylor on the nature and contours and spirituality of the online experience of church and how traditional congregations might develop hybrid ministries in healthy ways. There are huge theological implications and fascinating sociological points. Huerter asks, “In the constant flux of the digital revolution, what must churches understand about digitally mediated interactions in order to make effective decisions” about them?
This serious book includes interviews with leading scholars and practitioners (conducted by Zoom, I note with a smile.) It is in this sense these are “digital ethnographies” and he explores several online groups that have, in fact, fostered meaningful community. As the back cover explains, there is “reflection on church participating, embodiment, mediation, and virtuality in digital and hybrid spaces.”
If you are interested, use the inquiry page to ask for more resources on this if you want something practical and easy. I do not think this is impractical, but it is heavy, with diversions into studies of critical thinkers like Adorno and reflections about media ecology, of the working nature the internet, of the importance of music in church worship, the relational theology of Martin Buber and a look at what he calls “online ritual communities.” His views about music are worth the price of the book, and his call to form community in the digital age is excellent.
One cannot summarize brilliant projects like this, but I can say this: he is neither utterly opposed to digital community (as if talking on line isn’t real or doesn’t happen physical, which is obviously does) not is he unaware of the important voices calling for a resistance to the seemingly disembodied ways of the digital environment. Listen to how Terry York (author of Let Our Words Become Flesh) put it:
Whether we fear the hybrid congregation or fantasize about it, Huerter keeps our feet on the ground. He calms the fears of virtual-hesitant individuals and asks the virtual veterans to see beyond the screen. The questions raised offer an opportunity for us to reexamine our worship practices and to consider what expressions of embodiment they privilege or marginalize. — Terry W. York, author of Let Our Words Become Flesh
With the diagnostic rigor of his academic mind and the compassionate bedside manner of his pastoral heart, Michael Huerter gives a compelling and thorough assessment of the congregation in the digital age. Especially after the dislocations of the past decade, this book lays bare the myriad interlocking systems that produced our current moment of fracture and encourages us to refocus on the task of building richly textured Christian communities, whether online or off. — Joshua Kalin Busman, assistant dean of the Esther G. Maynor Honors College and associate professor of music at University of North Carolina at Pembroke
1 Corinthians: A Theological, Pastoral & Missional Commentary Michael Gorman (Eerdmans) $39.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $31.99
I hate to have to say this but I’ll admit, it is a massive, often technical commentary and I just didn’t read it all (yet.) But, believe me, it is one of the best in this genre in a long time, and Gorman is, as always, nothing short of brilliant in his formulation, style, and substance. I had reason to want to study I Corinthians a bit this fall and I was glad for this stellar resource. It is big, detailed, with lots of academic footnotes, but still is readable, upbeat, even, and designed to be useful to educated readers. That is, it isn’t a highbrow treatise for the academic guild or even just for seminary profs and Bible teachers. I think anyone with some awareness of Biblical studies or who has read a commentary before, would handle this fine.
Gorman here brings together cultural studies and exegesis, theological background and a bit about the history of interpretation, a concern for how to live this out faithfully in our congregations. The subtitle is not just a catchy phrase, but is Gorman’s Godly heartbeat. It’s clear in this volume. My, my, this is what a commentary should be! It deserves very honorable mention when we’re looking at books published in 2025. Kudos, Mike. Thank you.
Some of the Words Are Theirs: The Art of Writing and Living a Sermon Austin Carty (Eerdmans) $22.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $18.39
I sometimes, when touting this book on a podcast or before a group (or in my BookNotes review last summer), say this last, but I’ll lead with it: the title is a line from A River Runs Through It. That’s the kind of writer Carty is; we should know this well because he wrote one of my all time favorite books The Pastor’s Bookshelf: Why Reading Matters for Ministry. (I am not a pastor, of course, but I know a lot and care about many of them, and so I ate this up and used it in workshops and speaking engagements wherever there were clergy. Or people who might give books to clergy.) The Pastor’s Bookshelf is fantastic.
And so this is maybe even a bit more arcane. I mean, what self-respecting Christian bookworm wouldn’t want to read a book about pastors and reading. But a book on homiletics? On writing? Really?
I am sort of a nerd and like homiletics texts, or at least some of them. The role of the sermon is important in the worship of God and too often, well, it’s hard to crank out good ones every week. It’s hard, taxing, important work. I was very eager to year Austin’s eloquent and bookish words. It is an art, he notes, and part of that art is living it. Yup. Wow.
I adored this book. I think pastors and preachers and Sunday school teachers and professors and writers should all read it. If you care about pastors, or maybe don’t like pastors, you should read it. It is somewhat of a memoir so it isn’t painful, I promise. Sure there are good textbooks to wade through but the fairly short Some of Their Words Are Theirs is a real joy. One of my favorite book of 2025, honorably awarded.
A Teachable Spirit: The Virtue of Learning from Strangers, Enemies, and Absolutely Anyone A. J. Swoboda (Zondervan Reflective) $26.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $21.59
I can’t believe it has been out since the Spring and I reviewed it that long ago. I’ve highlighted it at more than one conference this summer and fall (and year-end podcasts) and declare it as one of my favorite books of the year. Truly.
Why, you ask? Well, I’d read anything by AJ (and really commend his other co-authored 2025 book Slow Theology: Eight Practices for Resilient Faith in a Turbulent World.) I appreciate his passions and wide knowledge — he has written books about eco-theology, doubt, suffering, the Holy Spirit, a famous on on the sabbath; his Gift of Thorns: Jesus, the Flesh, and the War for Our Wants that came out last year was way under-rated and a incredible read. So he writes a lot and is engaging and entertaining and informative.
But this new one has a special place because is sort of close to my own calling as a bookseller and occasional public speaker and sometimes Sunday school teacher. I want folks to see themselves as life long learners, as those being formed in ways where their faith makes a difference (in but not of the world, as I sometimes remind.) Having a “teachable spirit” is a New Testament phrase that gets at it poignantly. What are you learning this season?
Do you have a teachable spirit? Are you willing to learn (even from surprising places?) Do I?
In this fabulous book Swoboda ruminates on learning from everybody from children to experts, enemies and the dead, popular culture and our elders. The first chapter is on learning how to learn. It’s not just about reading books, but I can’t help but think that bookworms and readers will adore this. Hooray for this.
The Sabbath Way: Making Room in Your Life for Rest, Connection, and Delight Travis West (Tyndale) $18.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.19
I am not sure I met Travis West when I spoke at Hope College a few years ago and when I wandered around the offices at Western Seminary also there in Holland, Michigan. But, man, I wish I would have. I’ve got a number of mutual friends who admire West immensely (not least of which is the great writer Winn Collier who stewards the Eugene Peterson Center for the Christian Imagination there at Western Seminary.) I know people who have taken his energetic Hebrew classes and I have heard from others about his joy, his charm, his love, his integrity.
And yet, it has not always been easy as this captivating book shares. He and his wife have been through their share of tragedies and illnesses and their life together — beautiful in so many ways — has been painful. So it is with many of us, eh?
As I kept turning the pages in this excellent read I kept wondering what sort of person has this kind of tenacity and resilience and vulnerability and candor about life’s pains and yet is joyful present, happy to serve God and others. How does he do it? How does his wife, stricken with chronic pain, do it?
One of the keys is this congruence between their inner and outer lives. Robust as his whole-;life discipleship obviously is, The Sabbath Way invites us to a posture of delight, even of play. His exploration of sabbath themes — a day of rest, yes, but also a lifestyle of trust, a lifestyle of connecting with others — reminds me of a rare friend or two. I admire this book and I admire the author. It was a joy to write about it when it came out early in the summer and we are sure it is one of the most lovely books of the year. It was a personal favorite and if you love the Scriptures, you’l appreciate his insight. If you like reading about Sabbath, obviously, this is a winner and you will love it. If you long for a life of delight, rooted in the goodness of creation and the presence of God in all things, this book will foster and cultivate a spirituality of your days that will help sustain you.
These two excellent quotes (among many others) show why we think this was such a great book for 2025 and, certainly, a blessing as we move into 2026.
Reading this book feels like having a dear friend gently lead us into God’s presence. Without downplaying our busyness or our pain, it welcomes us into God’s rest, into the goodness of his life and love. This is so different from what we normally see and experience in the world and the church. We all need this book– I certainly did! — Kelly Kapic, professor at Covenant College, author of You’re Only Human
I need The Sabbath Way; you need The Sabbath Way. With cultural and economic forces that seem outside our control, we need to hear Travis West’s encouragement and wisdom to slow down, pause, breathe, and re-member our bodies, minds, and souls. This is not a call to enhance performance. It is a call to enhance our humanity. The Sabbath Way is a deeply spiritual and deeply humanizing project, and a timely gift to a culture desperately in pursuit of its next accomplishment. — Emerson Powery, Dean of the School of Arts, Culture, and Society; professor of biblical studies at Messiah University.
For the Love of Women: Uprooting and Healing Misogyny in America Dorothy Littell Greco (Zondervan) $19.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.99
As I’ve noted on the one above, there are some books that deserve honorable mention as one of the best books of 2025 even if they aren’t necessarily charming and pleasant and delightful. This author, Dorothy Greco, is in fact, charming and pleasant and delightful, and, in fact, wrote a rare book about marriage that is about beauty in relationships — Making Marriage Beautiful. She and her husband seem to have that lovely quality, and she wrote about it also in another book that is a bit on the rare side, a book to deepen the joy of those married for a while, called Marriage in the Middle: Embracing Midlife Surprises, Challenges, and Joys. She is super smart so in both of those books she does some cultural studies stuff, honoring the paradoxes (crisis or opportunity?). and moves beyond simplistic formulas. She can be fun and funny. So we like her a lot. But, alas, this recently-released book has been on her heart and mind for a long time and while we’ve never met, she has asked us to send books on occasion, so we’ve had an inside glimpse of some of what she was working on. Wow.
With a background in public policy stuff but well formed by a good local church, as a thinker who is a gracious writer, Dorothy is ideal to bridge the hefty gap between fans of feminist studies that use words like misogyny and patriarchy and more conventional evangelical Christians. The book is published by Zondervan, after all, so it is no progressive screed.
So if any BookNotes readers wonder, let’s lay that to rest: she’s written lovely books on marriage published by two stalwart evangelical presses (David C. Cook and InterVarsity Press.) This cannot be dismissed as “woke.”
But, also, let’s be honest: this is exploring some really dark stuff. It’s hard-hitting and, I think, an exceptionally valuable resource to accompany the post #metoo movement, such as it may be, to figure out how the church should react to the horrors of sexual abuse and crass sexism. In its gospel-centeredness, it is full of realistic hope.
And, to be clear, misogyny isn’t always seen in domestic violence and sexual abuse (which happens, we know, even in the church.) It is often subtle or systemic or related to structural / policy matters. Like racism, we must work on our own hearts and attitudes but we must also address the forces and systems, and For the Love of Women does just that. It is serious, but not dry. We really think our customers should order it.
We name this as one of the most important books published this year, and we are proud to have it be released by a respected voice in our Christian publishing landscape. I think it should be widely read, seriously discussed, prayed over and deeply considered.
As Carolyn Custis James (author of Half the Church and Maelstrom) puts it, “only when we understand the depth of the crisis will we be able to find remedies both globally and in our own cultural context. Dorothy has made a significant contribution to our understanding, and I pray her book will be widely read by women and men alike.” Well put!
Good people can, of course, disagree about the meaning of Biblical texts about women’s ordination or the meaning of the word “headship” in the New Testament. We strongly favor what we take to be the faithful position of affirmation and full authority women leaders. But this book goes beyond intramural debates (not that they are not urgent) and is deeper, more systematic, exploring the way abusive masculine privilege has harmed girls and women, in various sectors of the church and world. For the Love of Women is seriously Christian with insight for the local church but it offers a vision of the common good, helping to bring healing and restoration across various zones of our social life together.
For the Love of Women explores how this harm to women has been encoded and “baked in” to the spheres of healthcare, government, the workplace, media and entertainment, the church, and, yes, in our most intimate relationships. Sadly, alarming trends and mean rhetoric are on the rise in America. We’ve got work to do.
Those we trust have also raved about it. Professor Soong-Chan Rah calls it ‘essential.” Dr. Marlena Graves calls it “undeniably outstanding.” Listen to this urging by another award-winning author:
For the Love of Women is a prophetic, pastoral, and grace-filled book. If you are a woman, you will see something of your own experiences in these pages. If you know a woman, you will see something of her experiences here. If you love a woman — any woman, including yourself — I urge you to read this book which wisely and lovingly exposes a great wrong that is deeply woven into our whole world (including the church, and then wisely and lovingly points a way forward. — Karen Swallow Prior, You Have a Calling: Finding Your Vocation in the True, Good, and Beautiful
PLEASE NOTE: WE WILL BE HOSTING A FREE ONLINE CONVERSATION WEBINAR WITH DOROTHY GRECO ON TUESDAY EVENING, JANUARY 27, 2026.
I’ll highlight it again, soon, with details on how to register for this evening with Dorothy Littell Greco about her outstanding book. Mark your calendars now, please.
Nervous Systems: Spiritual Practices to Calm Anxiety in Your Body, the Church, and Politics Sara Billups (Baker) $19.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.99
Holy smokes. I’ve got this on my bedside, and have been reading it in bits and pieces, wanting to linger, and then speed up, gulping down pages, stunned. It’s so good. I’ll admit it’s one I’m still working on, but, man, this is a powerful read, a book that combines vulnerable storytelling — about her gambling-addicted father, about drunks and the Mafia — and keen insight about culture and our awful polarized situation. Its play on words is striking, eh? We think, rightly, that she will speak of neurology and anxiety, but there is also this sense that there are cultural systems (I’d call them principalities and powers) that are weirding us out. Yes, this examines problems in our bodies and in the Body of Christ.
As it says on the back, “it’s no wonder we’re overwhelmed.”
Her situation in a complicated family and with her own evolving faith is well told — an earlier book was Orphaned Believers: How a Generation of Christian Exiles Can Find the Way Home is also wonderfully written and explains so much — and I’m grateful for her serious insight and her memoir like ruminations. This book deserves the attention it is getting and I hope will become a best-seller in 2026. It launched in her hometown Seattle just this November.
Sara Billups masterfully takes her reader by the hand and honors the deep complexity of what it means to be human and follow Jesus in a world like ours. This is a thoughtful, challenging, and hopeful read. — Aundi Kolber, Try Softer and Strong Like Water
An extraordinary — and extraordinarily wide-ranging — tour through the valleys of anxiety that shape so much of modern life. Nervous Systems brims with rare candor, wisdom and humor. I loved it. — David Zahl, The Big Relief
Insane for the Light: A Spirituality for Our Wisdom Years Ronald Rolheiser (Image) $28.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $22.40
I was a little surprised how many (relatively speaking for our small mail-order biz) of this were ordered when we first announced it in late October. It was a good seller for us, and I guess that is part because Rolheiser is known. He is, I am sure, one of the most beloved spirituality writers today. He is a Catholic priest and the back blurbs are from James Martin and Richard Rohr and Sister Helen Prejean. It’s not every day we see a book endorsement from Basic Pennington, and the Celtic writer Herbert O’Driscoll weighs in as well (saying that Rolheiser can be lyrical, even, but “never sentimental — and all the time he is absolutely grounded in reality.”) SO, yes, when he has a major new book, it is noticed by those who follow these kinds of ordinary mystics.
But also, let’s face it. I think many of our BookNotes fans are aging, approaching their wisdom years. Maybe our gang needs this sort of thing. From excellent books like Aging Faithfully (the great little book by Alice Frying) to Parker Palmer’s On the Brink of Everything (with the wonderful subtitle “grace, gravity and getting old”) to Aging: Growing Old in Church by Will Willimon, just for instance, there are a lot of titles like this. It’s good to have Fr. Rolheiser bringing his incarnational sort of down-to-Earth spirituality to bear on this season of life.
I have not read this yet. I just turned 71. I guess I need to, eh? I’m sure it’s a winner, so here we go. Yes!
The Justice of Jesus: Reimagining Your Church’s Life Together to Pursue Liberation and Wholeness Joash P. Thomas (Brazos Press) $19.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.99
I’ve highlighted this already and could go on and on. Allow me just to offer a few friends who have raved about Father Thomas and about his book. You’ll note something significant in these enthusiastic endorsements and that is that they all realize (it is a theme of the book, actually) that Jesus — a Jewish Messiah shaped by the Hebrew Scriptures, the law and the prophets — not only cares about justice but created a church that must also. Joash Thomas studied at Dallas Theological Seminary and was nicely shaped by the best impulses of evangelicalism. He loves the Word, he loves the living Word, and he is committed to the local congregation, the body of Christ. Some books on justice work are not as evidently rooted in the experience of the local worshipping body. So, hooray for this. It is significant and beautiful enough that it would deserve this “best book of the year” award if were just about justice; it really is full of insight and, as a person from India, Rev. Thomas draws on the experiences of the majority world church. This is important.
But, The Justice of Jesus is also about the local church and how to do life together in a way that really does bear witness to the work God is doing among us and through us in a world of need.
Here are the key chapters:
- Part 1: Cheap Justice Versus the Justice of Jesus
- 1. Why Justice Seems Antithetical to the Western Church
- 2. The Cost of Just Discipleship
- 3. How Churches Today Are Prioritizing Justice
- Part 2: Decolonizing the Western Church
- 4. Decolonizing Our Theology
- 5. Decolonizing Our Communities
- 6. Decolonizing Our Budgets
- Part 3: How Your Local Church Can Prioritize the Justice of Jesus
- 7. Prayer
- 8. Advocacy
- 9. Partnership
Listen, please, do these short raves:
Joash Thomas is a gift to the world, and so is this book. I’m so glad Joash loves the church enough to critique it. Pass this book on to everyone you know. — Shane Claiborne, activist and author of Jesus for President and Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical
Joash’s deep love for the church shines from every page as he invites us all into the group project of liberation. — Sarah Bessey, editor of A Rhythm of Prayer; author of Field Notes for the Wilderness: Practices for an Evolving Faith
A timely and courageous gift to the global church, this book will leave you grateful for its depth, clarity, and uncompromising authenticity. — Danielle Strickland, advocate, and author of The Other Side of Hope: Flipping the Script on Cynicism and Despair and Rediscovering Our Humanity
Liturgies for Resisting Empire: Seeking Community, Belonging, and Peace in a Dehumanizing World Kat Amas (Brazos Press) $19.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.99
We here at Hearts & Minds received this book by a favorite Cuban-American writer in October and it released officially in early November. I adored the cover and just lingered over it for a bit, and then announced it at BookNotes. We adored her IVP book Abuelita Faith about women on the margins (and what they can teach us all about Biblical wisdom and spiritual and emotional health and persistence.) Her 40-Devotional Sacred Belongs was a powerhouse that came out in 2022 and we recommend it for anyone who needs to be reminded of radical truths about belonging.
Liturgies for Resisting Empire combines the special juices of both — passion, Biblical study, social action, a disposition to hear the marginalized, and shows us how to resist the dehumanization increasingly known in this secularized, modernist culture. To be sure, much of the ugliness comes from the Trump administration and the MAGA ideologues who applaud brutal ICE agents doing unspeakable things even to US citizens, supporting a level and sort of authoritarian police brutality we’ve not seen in our lifetimes. If we ever were reluctant to use dramatic language about resistance to the empire, it is time to take up that rhetoric. Indeed, there is an evil empire underscored by principalities and powers and they must be named and resisted. As you should know, we need prayer and wisdom and courage and faith, solid, theologically informed and Biblically-based, if we are going to form the beloved community and offer shalom in our messed up world.
Praise the Lord for voices like Kat Amas, and thank God for Brazos Press that brings such healthy, provocative, and important prose to us all. Liturgies for Resisting Empire is not only a favorite book of 2025, it is one of the most urgently needed. I put it here with some of my other “must reads” of the last year, and now is the time to give it a try.
For what it is worth, as I was surprised to see, and as I explained in my early review, it is not a prayer book or even a collection of “liturgies” (if you mean by that prayers or responsive readings.) Yes, each chapter starts with an invocation and ends with a benediction. There is a closing prayer, creatively worded, earnest and powerful. But the heart of the book are the homilies, if you will, good, strong prose, explaining what we mean by resisting empire (the first chapter is about joy) and why a deeply spiritual set of practices and rituals will be useful to keep us going in these times. If you wonder what people mean by decolonizing our thinking and writing, this is a great example. If you wonder how the early church sustained its witness in light of the brutalities of their day, this is a good read. Black writer Danté Stewart says her words “dance and sing in a way that made me rethink what it means to dance and sing and write as a theologian.”
“Armas makes her mark as one of the most brilliant biblical scholars of her generation.” — Karen González, The God Who Sees: Immigrants, the Bible, and the Journey to Belong
Racial Justice for the Long Haul: How White Christian Advocates Persevere (and Why) Christian Jeske (IVP Academic) $29.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $23.99
Okay, I’ll admit I’m cheating a bit on this one. The official release date was early January 2026 but we had it a month early (thanks IVP!) reviewed it at BookNotes. The author is a vibrant, even plucky writer (we loved her earlier book on traveling the world with a missions vision, 2012’s This Ordinary Adventure: Settling Down without Settling), not to mention a research piece about the work world in South Africa. We appreciate her global and spiritual journey (influenced by some of the same justice-minded evangelicals that inspired us over the last decades.) Now, she’s an anthropology prof at Wheaton, and has spent years researching this incredible book. There is nothing like it that we know of, a series book that is both informed by social science, shares lots of fascinating stories, and draws vital lessons for how to maintain a commitment to an obviously urgent task.
As this hefty project illustrates there is a fairly unique methodology here which included interviews with Christian leaders of color and White advocates. The qualitative ethnographic research is nicely shared, offering real-live examples of how white Christians can learn from leaders of color.
Insofar as Jeske is offering insight (as the subtitle puts it”) about persevering in advocacy, in a sense, this research and spiritual wisdom is good for anyone wanting to take up “a long obedience in the same direction.” We do not need flash-in-the-pan gestures or activists zipping from cause to cause. Tenacity based on humility, advocacy that is brave and long-suffering, vision that recognizes the nature of slow, reforming change, all are parts of how we keep going. There is stuff about lament and there is writing about grace. The stories are detailed and inspiring.
I think of Steve Garber’s new book Hints of Hope about how to be at peace with the proximate. I think of the inner work needed as explored in the aforementioned Soulwork of Justice by Wes Granberg-Michaelson. I think, yes, of Liturgies of Resisting Empire, named above. Sure, these are wise books to put into conversation, allowing each to shape you into a faithful servant of God’s Kingdom, for the rest of your life. Jeske is a very important ally and can point us towards sustainable discipleship and a way forward. Racial Justice for the Long Haul was not short or simple but one of the great books I’ve been reading in the last month and we honor it now. Order it today!
The Art of Asking Better Questions: Pursuing Stronger Relationships, Healthier Leadership, and Deeper Faith J.R. Briggs (IVP) $18.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.19
When this released early this fall it was an instant hit and if you haven’t ordered it yet, I’m sure you should and I’m sure you’ll enjoy it. Briggs is, as always, a handy wordsmith and an effortless writer (or, that is, reading him is effortless and he seems so fluid as to make it seem easy.) Yet, he has worked at his craft and he has worked at his pastoral efforts and even learned from his failure. (His first great book was, in fact, about ministry failures, dramatically called Failed. After that, I loved his Ministry Mantras that I often recommend for leadership teams, elders, boards and pastoral staff.) This new one is for anybody, and I mean anybody!
This books does just what he says in the subtitle — it offers clues to a deeper faith (learning to be curious about faith and asking questions about things that matter most is key) but, more, it invites us to ask questions of ourselves and of each other. Leaders need a self-awareness and asking good questions will help, but (again) whiter one is a leader as such The Art of Asking Better Questions is a skill that can be learned (and needs to be, I’m afraid.) JR has put his finger on something here and his wisdom is fantastic.
It seems the part of the book that will be most decisive for many is the stuff about asking questions of others. And of course, learning to listen well to what we hear. His visionary / big picture stuff is a delight, but he gets practical, too, offering samples and stories and strategies.
These habits and postures and skills can be learned; asking good questions is an art, but who doesn’t need stronger and better relationships? Get a few today and share them widely. You’ll be glad you did.
Tim Keller on the Christian Life:The Transforming Power of the Gospel Matt Smethurst (Crossway) $27.99 OUR SALE PRICE = $22.39
I think I had this on the short (ha) list of books I wanted to celebrate in this big list of best books of 2025 before I opened the cover. The book just looked great, modern but not weird, sophisticated but not stuffy, well made but not excessively expensive. It was a well made volume and a delight to look through. I had heard that the late Presbyterian pastor’s wife, Kathy Keller, had told a mutual friend that she loved this book, that even though she did not know the author and the book wasn’t written out of Redeemer’s impressive network, she was, almost surprisingly, delighted at how it captured Tim’s heart, his desire for a Godly and wholistic ministry in one of the the world’s largest cities. Tim Keller on the Christian Life tells that story, of course, but like a series Crossway does on other church leaders from the past (Luther, Calvin, Wesley, Bonhoeffer, Stott) it is more about what we can learn from their life and teaching. As such, this is a fabulous book not just for Keller admirers, but for anyone who wants to grow in an intellectually serious but spiritually robust way.
Keller was, on one hand, an old-school Reformed Calvinist who was taught at Westminster Theological Seminary. Although much of that school’s tradition is less than what we might call culturally engaged or attentive to the nuances of a secularized, pluralistic culture, there were influences there — just read Harvie Conn’s book Evangelism: Doing Justice and Preaching Grace or the cultural studies stuff by the brilliant Bill Edgar (also a jazz pianist and scholar of black gospel music) — and they rubbed off on Tim considerably.
Another school of thought within the broader Reformed tradition is the influence of the great theologian, social reformed and pastor turned Prime Minister of the Netherlands, Abraham Kuyper. Yep, he was the Dutchman who preached about “every square inch” of the good but fallen creation being claimed and restored by Christ, the animated head of what became known as neo-Calvinism (and which influenced our beloved Jubilee conference held in Pittsburgh, sponsored by the CCO whose motto is “transforming college students to transform the world.”) Keller, besides his gospel-centered vision of a transforming understanding and appropriation of justification through faith alone also had this socially-transforming cultural vision. It is no surprise his church started an innovative Center for Faith and Work and hosted speakers from pluralism advocate John Inazu, artist Mako Fujimura, human rights lawyer Bryan Stevenson, and Biblical scholar N.T. Wright.
Tim Keller on the Christian Life is a great read, even if you are not interested in the gospel as it is articulated in the old school Reformed dogma or the neo-Calvinism of contemporary Kuyperianism. Smethurst doesn’t even go into all of that exactly, but from my perch here at Hearts & Minds, Keller was not only amazing and influential, as this book shows in practical chapters about prayer and suffering and social action and grace, his ministry and writing brought together some themes that many ordinary church folks could learn from. It’s one of the great books of 2025 and deserves an honorable mention.
Read it in tandem with the authorized Timothy Keller: His Spiritual and Intellectual Formation by Collin Hansen and the fabulous little collection done in 2022 by Square Halo Books, The City for God: Essays Honoring the Work of Timothy Keller. But don’t miss Tim Keller on the Christian Life.
Disciples of a White Jesus: The Radicalization of American Boyhood Angela Denker (Broadleaf) $27.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $22.39
I had an advanced copy of the manuscript for this last winter and started it promptly; it came out in March. I am not sure when I finally worked in a book review at BookNotes but — as is often the case when we’re busy — I am sure I did not do it justice. I wished, in refreshing myself with it again, that I had pushed it harder, promoted it more widely. It is a good, good read, an inviting and interesting, and yet very, very important. Deadly important.
I like Angela Denker a lot. She was raised in an independent fundamentalist church and knows well the odd way some fundamentalists, charismatics, and conservative evangelicals have gotten mixed up with right wing extremism. We all know that the current mixed syncretism of idols of power and race with Christianity has eroded the witness of the church and given religious cover for terrible offenses. The way in which (religiously-inspired) hate groups are on the rise — and I’m talking about stuff beyond Trump’s affinity for the Proud Boys or even Tucker Carlson’s platforming Nick Fuentes and his neo-Nazi Groypers —is one example of this cultural moment. Angela Denker has a first hand understanding of the parts of the religious landscape that inform some of this stuff. Her study of patriarchy and how boys are shaped and formed within conservative church communities — from standard macho stuff found all over to deeply troubling misogyny — is detailed and graciously reported. It feels almost like a memoir, the best sort of embedded journalism as this mainline Lutheran pastor visits and talks with those who are raising boys to become soldiers in the culture wars and sometimes, macho fighters for white supremacy.
We really, really liked Denker’s earlier book, Red State Christians which also had a first-hand, memoir style as she invited readers to join her on her quest to understand fundamentalist and others who found themselves supporting MAGA and Trump. Because some of these people were once her own tribe, she was a perfect guide. As a mother of two young boys herself, she, again, cares about this topic and has some skin in the game.
As the back cover puts it, in Disciples of a White Jesus Denker “casts her journalists eye across the US as she explores modern American boyhood’s connection to the alarming rise of white nationalism and white supremacy.” I love Jemar Tisby’s wise observation (that the book is about identity and its malformation.) Read this:
This is a book about identity — its loss, its malformation, and the struggle to forge new ones. With the tenderness of a mother and the insight of a scholar, Denker pulls us off the path of easy outrage and leads us to look more closely at the inner lives of white boys and men. For those of us who seek a healthier church, community, and nation, Disciples of White Jesus is timely and essential reading. — Jemar Tisby, author of The Color of Compromise and The Spirit of Justice; professor of history at Simmons College of Kentucky
Readers should not be fooled by Denker’s storytelling ease and graceful prose into thinking this is simply another anodyne book about child-rearing. Her arguments about the sources and the persistence of racism, misogyny, and what she calls ‘brutish masculinity’ are powerful and, sadly, all too relevant. More important, she offers a way out — the examples of godly men who are working to subvert this toxic culture. —Randall Balmer, author of Saving Faith
Becoming a Person of Welcome: The Spiritual Practice of Hospitality Laura Baghdassarian Murray (IVP) $18.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.19
There are times when we give a title a “Best Book”of the year award because is it utterly captivating, delightfully great read as we say. Other times, we celebrate a book because it is breaking new ground, offering really fresh insight or contributing something important to a given topic or genre. Sometimes we think it is a significant book that needs to be considered by anyone working in that field. Happily, in Becoming a Person of Welcome any one of these motivations would convince me to give this an honorable mention; she covers so much. It really is engaging and wonderfully done. It really does offer new insight, bringing the popular conversation about and teaching on hospitality to a new level, for those who read it. And, yes, I’d say it is a must read for anybody thinking about this ministry or this theological topic.
The joys and value of this book are many and I could write more. In a nutshell we can say that this is the spirituality of hospitality, that is, what sort of interior character down need to create a posture that is hospitable. Hospitality, Murray shows, is not merely a practice, something we do. Yes, we do it — show grace to strangers, invite people to our homes, allow our time to be interrupted, learn from others, greet newcomers to our spaces with welcoming gestures and the like — but she is asking, down deep, are we living out of a well of graciousness, are we really welcoming, do we have hospitable hearts.
For some other writers, I think, this deeper dive to the nature of our inner lives and this call to explore in our spiritual formation ways to become the kinds of people who know how to be hospitable, might seem either strict and shaming or it could be cheesy and overly pious. Laura Baghdassarian Murray strikes a beautiful balance and presents a book that we stock in the store on our shelf about hospitality and on our shelf about spiritual formation. Hooray!
Why Christians Should Be Leftists Phil Christman (Eerdmans) $23.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $19.19
You can read my longer review of this from early last Fall but, I’m telling you, it really was a book I couldn’t put down. I didn’t always follow every line (although many were brilliantly conceived and eloquently written) and I didn’t agree with some, but, again, man: this was a Book of the Year for sure. You may not like it at all — that too many terms aren’t fully defined is one beef — but I think it would be a very valuable book to go through. Maybe with a group, even a politically and theologically diverse group, if you can manage it.
Phil Christman is a superb essayist, writing many columns and published pieces and two short collections, centered on his life as a blue-collar midWesterner. His first publisher of those two was a fitting indie outfit called Belt Press (as in Rust Belt) and, again, they were highly regarded in the world of letters. The first was MidWest Futures (2020) and the second was released in 2022 with the delightfully provocative title How Not To Be Normal.
I don’t think most know it, but he used his writerly chops to help edit a day-by-day devotional of the writings of John Calvin (now out of print.) He was raised, I gather, in a fairly strictly fundamentalist culture, or at least indie evangelical, and ended up at a Calvinist institution. His writing appears sometimes in the Bruderhof’s Plough journal and he teaches writing at the University of Michigan and also in a nearby prison. Anyway, he’s deeply middle America and writes cleverly, self-assuredly, with candor and wit, and is mostly pretty straight forward. He can be biting but usually he is charming and the book is full of grace.
I say all this to suggest that he is a good read, a reliable thinker, and that Why Christians Should Be Leftists is a rare sort of book. It does not have the fire of old-school evangelicals like Tony Campolo or Ron Sider; it isn’t dense liberation theology or even sophisticated political theory. He knows his stuff, but it’s mostly what I might call a meditation, a straightforward polemic, reflecting on the values of Jesus and how, if we are to be consistent in following the Rabbi, then we should align ourselves with movements that are anti-war and that urge charity and justice for the poor.
Of course he mocks ideological Marxists and in this day and age it needs to be said that one can be left-leaning, even socialist, without being a communist, or even a pinko. If you care about the Sermon on the Mount, say, and if you have ever been involved in any local organizations of a civic nature, you have to read this book. And if you haven’t, well, you really have to read this book. It was a personal fav for me in 2025.
Leftists don’t have to be Christians, and Christians don’t have to be leftists, but there’s a case to be made that the vision of the Sermon on the Mount ought to be honored above all in a politics of equality, where the last can be first not just in God’s eyes, but in the arrangements of this world too. Here that case is made with a wit, vigor, and steadfast attention to grace that are pleasures to witness in themselves. Read the book, and whether or not you find your conscience prompting you to walk into a socialist meeting, you will be challenged to think more deeply and more prayerfully about the proper outworking of your faith. — Francis Spufford, Unapologetic: Why, Despite Everything, Christianity Can Still Make Surprising Emotional Sense
The Father You Get And the Ones You Make, Believe In, And Become Patton Dodd (Broadleaf) $26.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $21.59
I adored this good book, whipping through it quickly because I wanted to find out what happened next. Patton Dodd is a writer I’ve long admired and a quite good thinker, and an eloquent representative of thoughtful, generous faith. He’s also funny. This memoir is his accounting of his own life through the lens of the men in his life — his own alcoholic father, other guys he admired, step-fathers and pastors and more. And, of course, how all of this influenced his own parenting style when he became a dad himself. I loved those parts.
It was the early 2000s, I think, when I crossed paths with Patton; maybe he was writing for an impressive journal edited by Andy Crouch. He was smart and funny and incisive in his insights about living faithfully in the modern world. But yet, we learned more in a powerful memoir called My Faith So Far: A Story Conversion and Confusion about his early immersion in a Pentecostal-type megachurch and a season at Oral Roberts University. Yet, he knew the messiness of faith and his story colorfully told of his navigation through certain sorts of exuberant religion and the real life angst of a Gen X kid turned religious adult.
This new one, The Father You Get, is a great read for men, for dads, but, to be honest, for anyone wanting a lively account of a man’s thinking about his own life and dad. Good or bad, alive or dead, you have a dad, right? It is amazing to me that remarkable blurbs on the back, some by those who themselves have had some issues with their fathers — Ian Morgan Cron, Jonathan Merritt, Nancy French, Stephen Prothero. It has been called brave and riveting and stirring and funny and insightful. It certainly was a personal favorite of mine in 2025 and I’m naming it a Best Book… with a manly back slap and big high five.
Here is how he explains what’s he up to:
This book is a memoir that is also about the work of storying yourself. It’s pegged to fatherhood, but it’s not just about men. It’s about coming to terms with the influences that formed you and the influence you have on the people you love.
I write about my dad, a mess of a man who messed up his family. I write about the father figures I pursued, the fatherly God my mom believed in, and the father I’ve been trying to become. I make fun of myself a lot, because storying myself helped me get comfortable with all my downsides.
Yup. This is one you ought to read. You’ll laugh and maybe cry and thank me later.
Rooted: A Spiritual Memoir of Homecoming Christy Berghoef (Reformed Journal Books) $22.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $17.60
Geesh, it seemed so long ago, almost a lifetime ago, even though it’s only been 15 years since Christy Berghoef wrote her amazing first memoir, a book called Cracking the Pot which reflected on how this “cracked pot” shifted from strict Calvinist doctrine and Republican politics to become a questioning, authentic, caring voice of a generative faith that was aligned with what then was called the “emergent” movement. Names like the great Phyllis Tickle and Brian McLaren and other well known thinkers graced the back of the book as she narrated her journey out of some pretty weird right wing stuff in DC as her husband started a progressive church plant; it was the sort of book that was more rare then than now, post-evangelical progressives finding their way in the world. But it stands as a great read and more than relevant now.
Now there’s a different name for this movement of evangelical young adults shifting away from their legalism and shame cultures — deconstruction — but in the emergent village of the early aughts, there was a encouraging and mostly positive vibe of reforming faith by rejecting Enlightenment-based postures of certitude and creating space for postmodern styles of worship. She wrote about some of this in her own voice, telling her own story and it was a great memoir. Shortly thereafter her smart husband wrote a book (we have that one, too) called Pub Theology: Beer Conversations and God. And to think, a dozen or more years later, back in Western Michigan, he ran for US Congress.
His running for congress is a critical point in Rooted — would their family even be safe given the militias and hate groups operating in their region? —and but it is her story, not his, and their journey home to a flower farm in Michigan is both charming and gut-wrenching, beautiful and intense, a wondrous bit of prose and, finally, an exceedingly hopeful story. I love the subtitle, about homecoming, don’t you? That they could manage to return to her parents plot of land and family business in a rigorously doctrinaire church culture within a famously red county with their hippie back-to-the land sense of beauty and awe and their capacious faith (he is now a UCC pastor) and pull it off is a sign of grace and God’s miracles. Rooted is about homecoming, yes, but it is also about slower living and inner healing, it is about forging friendships through neighborliness and nurturing a sense of place. It is about girl hood memories and a nearly middle aged mother. It is, yes, a story of a new kind of faith from what they experienced before, but it is not didactic. It is a memoir, a story, a journey.
I adore this book of her journey, a memoir of this stage in her life. Endorsements for this are compelling and lovely, from Parker Palmer and singer-songwriter Carrier Newcomer and Marilyn McEntyre.
The always hopeful Bill McKibben says:
Those of us lucky enough to have known a place and a community well and deeply will recognize all the joys and complications in this book; for others, it will be an eye-opening and heart-opening account of what’s still possible in this country.
The Place of Tides James Rebanks (Mariner) $28.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $23.19
I’ve almost saved the best for last, but that isn’t fully honest as I’m not even finished with this. I’ve known for months that I wanted to read this and that I’d love it and that I’d want to somehow celebrate it as a great book of our time, by a renowned, almost Scottish writer. (He lives in the Lake District of Northwest England near the famous Highlands.) His book The Shepherd’s Life is a stunner, beautiful and powerful and lyrical and wise, about being a sheep farmer. The writer of H is for Hawk called it “bloody marvelous.” We all love James Herriot, of course, and mean no disrespect, but this guy is a world-class author, a legend in the world of literature and letters. And he’s a sheep farmer and ecologist. His writing has been called “transfixing” and “elegiac as a tender hymn to a disappearing way of life.”
Here’s a funny little story. When I was publicly interviewing writer Jeff Chu — himself an “accidental farm hand” — about his book Good Soil, a question came from the audience about what he is reading now. The stakes feel high for me in such situations (especially if the learned writer and expansive reader asks if I know the book. Gulp.) Jeff said he had the new Rebanks in his bag (I think I’m remembering this correctly) and I was thrilled but perplexed as the book had not been released yet. He got it in the UK (or maybe somebody sent it from the UK) and so he had a jump on it. I exclaimed how exciting this was, how eager I was to read it (as a mortal in the US) once we get them. I think it was like a week or two later when The Place of Tides came in. I recalled how glorious Jeff said it was, how he so appreciated the writing (not to mention the author’s sense of place, his ecological vision, his work as a naturalist of sorts, alongside his farming and herding.) Rebanks has a degree from Oxford and used to have a job which — on the first page of the book — took him to the Arctic to an island along the coast of Norway. Norwegians took conservation seriously, his boss told him, and they could learn from them.
“Everything I knew about Norway could have been written on the side of a cinnamon bun,” in one of the most entertaining lines of the year. Soon enough he leaves the dull office of the tourist board on the island of Vega “asking the questions I was supposed to ask” and got on a fishing boat heading farther out to sea, to an even further flung island, exploring the lives of wild women he had seen in pictures, caring for birds in epic Arctic wildlife. And so his adventure begins. You will be hooked by the first couple of pages.
And maybe, for you, too, this beautiful, enchanting volume, A Place in Tides, will be a book of the year.
A FINAL HONORABLE MENTION TO EXTRAORDINARY, INNOVATIVE SMALL GROUP STUDY GUIDES
The Community Practice: A Four-Session Guide to Cultivating Community in the Way of Jesus John Mark Comer (Waterbrook) $14.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $11.20
I hope you know the marvelous book from a few years ago called Practicing the Way by John Mark Comer. We always keep it on hand. There are free online lectures and conversations about the book at his “Practicing the Way” website and they are really excellent — they are some of the best video stuff I’ve ever seen.
There is a jam-packed, fairly large course book that we sell that goes with the streaming content for Practicing the Way.
John Mark and the talented folks at “Practicing the Way” have now spun off a good handful of other spiritual practices (some from the first course, others new) offering four-week streaming on line (free) programs that are just stellar. You can even access online the free study guides to be used with these fabulous streaming lectures but it’s a lot to copy and a little complicated. We sell the real study guides that the publishers have released — crisp, intersting, multicolored, with enhancing color photos and worksheets and homework assignments and space for journaling. The videos are among the best I’ve seen anywhere and the workbooks are superb. We don’t always think workbooks are needed for classes watching videos but in this case we really recommended them.
The one shown here on “the community practice” course is one of several such four-week books — on sabbath, solitude, generosity, simplicity, prayer, service, Scripture, fasting — but this one is maybe the best (so far.) Comer weaves together Bible text and neuroscience and academic theories about group building and good advice about being intentional about forming small fellowship groups with whom we regularly eat together, share joys and sorrows, confess our sins and struggles, and remain loyal through conflict. Given the pervasive power of American individualism, this four week course is not enough, but it is plenty. It is fantastic and a good, good start to learning the practices of community. Get this little study guide and download the free streaming videos to see if you’d want to share them in your church or group. Highly recommended.
Let Peace Reign: Love, Justice, Dignity in God’s Kingdom Drew Jackson (IVP) $19.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $
IVP has alway done very workable, solid, helpful study guides. The LifeGuide Bible Study series remains our biggest sellers (although we are really glad for their New Testament for Everyone study guides created with just a page of content before the questions by N.T. Wright.) There are others.
Lately they’ve done some that are a bit more artfully done, with a more colorful format and a super classy design. They’ve got QR codes for more content (everything from poems and spoken word testimony and lecture.) And the group interaction is more complex, with various levels of involvement and different sorts of sharing (and some prayer practices) making them more interesting than merely answering the inductive questions (the format of the LifeGuide series.)
I do not know if the handful studies that look like this with the super graphics and bold print and creative explorations will be well branded as a series, but there currently arefour and they are called the Made for PAX Bible Study Series as they apply the principles from the Made for PAX ministry about everyday discipleship that includes working for peacemaking, equity and wholeness.
As much as the Bible talks about shalom, as much as we are called to be agents of God’s receptive reconciliation, as direct as Jesus was about peacemaking, there is precious little in the conventional small group format on this essential theme. We are thrilled — thrilled! — to celebrate this series and, in particular, this recent study written mostly by a speaker, poet, and public theologian who loves bringing together the themes of public justice and peacemaking with a poetic sense of contemplative reflection. Drew’s upbeat resource is ideal for groups just beginning a justice-journey but will be appreciated by those wishing to have a small group study on this topic. Whether you are an activist or not, Let Peace Reign is a six week interactive study with QR codes to watch more live videos that you will find truly enriching, challenging, and faithful.
Others in the Made for PAX Bible Study Series include:
Liberated at the Cross: Peace and Reconciliation in God’s Kingdom — A 6-Week Interactive Bible Study with Video Access by Kristel Acevedo (IVP) $19.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.99 We’ve been waiting for a lifetime for a Bible study guide like this — the strong visuals, the QR links, the interactive poems and such. The strong content of the power of the cross, the liberation Christ’s Kingdom brings, the solid teaching about this wholistic sort of redemptive vision— may goodness. This is excellent and groundbreaking!
We met Kristel, by the way, at Jubilee last year — she is amazing. We have another Bible study resource she did and she (and her work) is highly recommended
Migration: Experiencing God’s Care for Immigrants – A 6-Week Interactive Bible Study by Alexis Busetti & Dorcas Cheng-Tozun (IVP) $16.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $13.59 This one has brilliant, contemporary art and a few QR codes to bring up stories, poems, and testimony. Wonderfully multi-sensory. There is nothing like it.
Mental Health: Experiencing God’s Care for Our Mind, Body, and Spirit – A 6-Week Interactive Bible Study by Dorcus Cheng-Tozun (IVP) $16.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $13.59
What church isn’t talking about this? Which small group doesn’t know somebody struggling? I would bet that may readers of BookNotes have been looking for a small group study on this topic.
This one also has brilliant, contemporary art and a few QR codes to bring up stories, poems, and testimony. It is made with a real contemporary design flourish and the interactive content looks really helpful.
“The Made for PAX Bible Study Mental Health is an incredibly rich, layered, and compassionate mental health offering. Each week lovingly weaves insights from science, Scripture, art, contemplation, justice, and more to help create a tapestry of hope for the reader that is ultimately rooted in the kindness and nearness of God. I’m so grateful this resource exists.” — Aundi Kolber, licensed professional counselor and author of Try Softer and Strong like Water
BookNotes
SPECIAL
DISCOUNT
20% OFF
ANY BOOKS MENTIONED
order here
this takes you to the secure Hearts & Minds order form page
just tell us what you want to order
inquire here
if you have questions or need more information
just ask us what you want to know
Hearts & Minds 234 East Main Street Dallastown PA 17313
read@heartsandmindsbooks.com
717-246-3333
As of January 2026 we are still closed for in-store browsing.
We are doing our curb-side and back-yard customer service and can show any number of items to you if you call us from our back parking lot. We’ve got tables set up out back or can bring things right to your car. It’s sort of fun, actually. We are eager to serve and grateful for your patience. We are very happy to help, so if you are in the area, do stop by. We love to see old friends and new customers.