The Books They've Assigned Us

Here at Staff training for the CCO, we are taking two graduate-level courses on doing college minsitry. I'm excited about the required texts. Check them out:

The Drama Of Scripture: Finding Our Place In The Biblical Story by Craig G. Bartholomew and Michael W. Goheen.
I started reading this one last night. With the emergent emphasis on the narrative of Scripture, this book seems up the right alley. The authors are very influenced by NT Wright and Lesslie Newbegin, with their emphasis on our understanding the dramatic storyline of the Bible.

Engaging God's World: A Christian Vision of Faith, Learning, and Living by Cornelius Plantinga Jr.
My friend Miche said he was reading a Plantinga book--I was wondering if this was it. This book is about the concept of "shalom" as the key to understanding the overall framework of the story of Scripture (Creation, Fall and Redemption). He then seeks to apply that to our vocation or calling as Christians to serve others for their good so that they can be invited into God's Kingdom.

Evangelism Outside the Box: New Ways to Help People Experience the Good News by Rick Richardson
Richardson is the National Coordinator of Evangelism for InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA. Publisher's Weekly says of this book, "Here, [Richardson] provides a heartfelt challenge, offering an excellent analysis of postmodern thought as the current milieu for evangelism and a brief introduction to many useful resources for practical application." I'm all over that!

Shaping the Spiritual Life of Students: A Guide for Youth Workers, Pastors, Teachers & Campus Ministers by Richard R. Dunn
Dunn was a professor at Trinity when I attended there (in the Christian Education/Youth Ministry Dept). He is now pastor at Fellowship Evangelical Free Church in Knoxville, TN (one of the cutting-edge churches in the EFCA). His insights into reaching high school/college students will, I would guess, be very helpful.

Divided by Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America by Michael O. Emerson and Christian Smith
Emerson and Smith seem to argue that though evangelicals have been seeking to create racial reconciliation, we will always fall short because we do not look at the problem more holistically--they say that evangelicals have a piecemeal approach to social justice: we emphasize individualism and free will, and therefore we are predisposed to believe that most racial problems can be solved if individuals will only repent of their sins. They call white evangelicals to more sociological involvement and working toward eliminating inequities in economic policies.

The Measure of a Man by Martin Luther King, Jr.
King's theological underpinnings of his political and social philosophy of nonviolent activism. Shame on me for having not read anything by Martin Luther King before!

A Long Obedience in the Same Direction: Discipleship in an Instant Society by Eugene H. Peterson
I read this book 10 years ago in seminary in Chicago (my discipleship group under Dr. Mike Bullmore read it together, and I read it with my future-wife Linda while she was still in Ohio, as a long-distance way to connect spiritually with each other). Peterson's prose are outstanding, and each page contains challenge after challenge to Christian discipleship as he walks us through the Songs of the Ascents (Psalms 120-134).

How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth by Gordon D. Fee and Douglas Stuart
I've actually taught classes with this as my main text book, so it is very familiar to me...except that Fee and Stuart have updated the book recently, especially in light of recent scholarship on the role of narrative in Scripture. So (rats!!), I guess I had better read this one too!!