In today’s video, I am going to go through my Christian miscellaneous shelf. That is the bookshelf that is behind me. I have not read all of these books yet, and I am just going to kind of go from memory on these and a little bit off script, but we will give you some general impressions of each of these books.
Is It Really So?
This one, speaking of books that I have not read yet, just looked cool, and so it is on the decorative part of my shelf. I have not actually read it, but it has got some good reference material. Is It Really So? is a book with some tough Bible questions that people might pose, and it is good reference material for good Bible answers, a couple pages per answer on some tough Bible questions.
Living in an Imperfect World
Living in an Imperfect World by R. B. Ouellette. I got this when I was traveling on Witness way back in the day. I traveled through Michigan there. I forget the area of Michigan, but we went to R. B. Ouellette’s church singing with our mixed singing group, Witness, and we went into his office and kind of toured the area, and he allowed us to grab one of any of his books. Living in an Imperfect World was the one that I chose, and I read it on the bus throughout the summer, and it is just an excellent book. I appreciated Brother R. B. Ouellette and the work that he has done over the years and his faithfulness.
Heaven
Next is one of my favorite books. I mean, this is one of my favorite all time books. This changed my whole perspective on heaven, which I used to dismiss as something out there and distant, and, well, we cannot know too much about it. But this book on heaven was just so encouraging and fun and exciting and made me dream of heaven in such a special way, and I preached a whole sermon trying to summarize what I learned from it. It couples a lot of material from the Millennial Kingdom, and it does not really separate the Millennial Kingdom that much from the eternal state, and there is some overlap there. But I appreciated the humanity of heaven, the fact that everything we enjoy on this earth is going to be just amplified in greatness and beauty and pleasure and enjoyment in heaven. If we enjoy it now, then it seems that we will obviously enjoy it in heaven. Now, sometimes we might think heaven is going to be boring. We will just sit on a cloud and strum a harp all the time. And what will I even do? I really like working. Can I work? And there are aspects that he shows that in the Millennial Kingdom, yes, we will work and we will build and we will learn. So there are enjoyable things that we enjoy on this earth that I believe we will experience in heaven, and this book really helped lay a lot of that out.
Paid in Full
Next are just many 9Marks books and some other gospel books. Paid in Full is an excellent little book we use in some of our gift bags. It is just a good gospel presentation, just a short little 30-page booklet here.
I Will and I Am a Church Member
I could, I might, I can, I should, I will. Good practical book by Thom Rainer. I used to be on an email list of his, and he used to do a lot more, or I used to be at least in the realm of what he was writing. He might still be writing quite a bit, but I appreciated a lot of what he said. This is real practical on church membership, on getting involved, on serving in your church, in your local church. So I wanted our Sunday school teachers to teach through this. It is just a simple focus. Here is Christian living. Here is what Christians ought to be doing. So a good one right there.
I Am a Church Member, also by Thom Rainer. There are some people that downgrade or downplay the importance of church membership, but I appreciate that being a church member has some obligations. It has some teeth to it. It has some expectations that come with it. But there is some joy with that, too. As a church member, I am expected to give of myself to serve others and to be a part of this church, not a country club where I show up to take, but a church where I am a member there to give and invest in others. I appreciated the pushback against modern Christianity that just says, “I am here for myself, and you people better serve me.” No, as a church member, we have some expectations there. That is a good book there.
Church Membership
Along with that is the 9Marks series of books. This one by Leeman is excellent on church membership. Now, they would teach a universal church model, but in something like this, they might talk about some universal church out there, but the only way they express it, and I appreciate that, is through local church body connection. This whole book on church membership gives great weight and importance to becoming a member of a local body of believers, and not just chalking it up, if you believe that you are a part of some universal invisible church out there, to say, “Well, yeah, I am already a part of the church.” No, it makes it very clear that we ought to be a part of a local body of believers, and that comes with some expectations again. There is some imperium. There is some rule and reign that God has given to the church, and so we ought to be a part of that. Now, there are those that are dismissive of church membership and say it is not biblical: “We do not see church membership in the Bible.” This makes a good argument for church membership, that churches in the Bible knew their membership. They knew who it was they were accepting and who it was they were excluding. It has a good biblical basis, a good doctrinal and a good practical aspect to this book as well. And it is also very short. All these 9Marks books are very short and approachable and easy to punch through, but Leeman is a great, great author. I appreciate him.
Church Discipline
Church Discipline follows up on church membership. If you are a member of a church, that subjects you to being a follower of the teachings and the practices of that church, and any Christian who is not in line with what the church espouses to teach, well, then they are going to be excluded from membership. They are going to be excommunicated, or church disciplined, as we call it. So this takes you step by step. It gives you sample letters that a church can send to the membership, and to the one that is being church disciplined. It gives you good practical examples of situations that might cause church discipline. So a very good book. I was helped by this in the process that we went through at our church as well. Thankful for that.
Corporate Worship
Next is Corporate Worship. This is as practical and doctrinal as any of the others. It is just an approachable look at what we are doing when we gather together as a body of believers. We are gathering in a special time to worship the Lord, and Corporate Worship shows the importance of corporate worship, gathering together to sing and to worship God. It is an excellent and another good practical book.
Discipling
Discipling. I used this in a series on discipleship that I was putting together for preaching through on Wednesday nights. And this is one in a long shelf of books that I have on discipleship. This is just another excellent book, similar to the rest of the 9Marks books, very practical, very helpful. This is not the discipleship material itself, but this is encouraging churches to be disciple makers.
The Potter’s Promise
Next is The Potter’s Promise. I mentioned this. I think I did an entire video on this, or at least on Calvinism from Romans chapter 9. He deals with Ephesians chapter 1, Romans 9, and several other Calvinistic passages from a provisionist standpoint. So it is a good, helpful one of those miscellaneous Bible study books.
Rock of Ages Ministries and the Doctrine of Repentance
We have supported Brother Roger Napper of Rock of Ages Ministries for a number of years. He goes into prisons and leads people to Christ and encourages them to follow the Scriptures and get into discipleship materials. So Rock of Ages Prison Ministry has a lot of discipleship materials, and this is one of them. One of the highly debated topics out there is the doctrine of repentance. How much repentance is needed for salvation? What do you mean by repentance? Does a person have to change actions in order to be saved? So this is a good biblical look, a biblical view of the doctrine of repentance. Very, very helpful.
Alcohol
Next is a book by my friend Chris Chadwick. He pastors in a Navy town, so for a pastor in a Navy town to be speaking and teaching against alcohol, well, that is a bold move. This was written to be a conversation over the table with somebody, looking at the biblical backing for what the Bible means by wine. What does the Bible mean by strong drink? How did they make wine back in the day? And it goes through probably not every single Bible passage, maybe every Bible passage, but many of the Bible passages that deal with wine and strong drink, and then some practical abstinence positions. Why would we fully abstain from alcohol? It is a good, helpful book written in an approachable manner.
Now, this is next to that because it is on the topic of alcohol, but I have not read this one. This is Alcohol: The Beloved Enemy. But I got it from a pastor, a Baptist pastor, and I figure if it was good for him, then I am sure it is a good book.
Standards
Next is Standards by Tom Gibson, my friend Tom Gibson, and his book on standards was just an excellent book. It did not come down hard or strong on where we should draw our standards, but it encourages every Christian to have standards. What is a standard? Why do we draw the lines there? How do we draw lines? What was the purpose of standards? Should we just throw them out? How do I define my standards? How do I arrive at standards? So this is written from a very pastoral approach, a very kind and gentle approach to it. If you are looking for a book that is going to tell you exactly what those standards should be, this is not it. This is simply that we should have standards, and you as a Christian need to know how to draw lines for yourself and your family. Very, very good book. Appreciate that.
The Value of Camp
The Value of Camp by Walt Brock. This is the founder of the camp that we go to, Ironwood. Walt Brock went in the ’70s to the middle of the desert, got some water rights to a lake out there, started pumping some water, started building up some modular homes, and started to have camp with his own youth group, and then invited some other youth groups, and built up the camp over and over, and here we are 40-some years later, and Ironwood is just one of the most incredible camps you would ever see. Every time I go to Ironwood, I feel like the Queen of Sheba showing up to Solomon’s city and just seeing, “Man, everybody here is happy, and the countenance is great, and everything you have built is incredible.” I appreciate what Ironwood has done over the years. The Value of Camp is a book that they have written to show exactly that, the value of camp. Why do we encourage camp? What is the point of driving a couple hours, getting away from everything here, and focusing on preaching and activities for a few days? Why can we not just do that locally? Well, The Value of Camp is just a simple read. You can see it is just a few pages, probably not even 100 pages, right around 100 pages here, and it is a great explanation of why we encourage the camp ministry.
Discover Your Destiny and LifeQuest
Next is Discover Your Destiny. This was super popular when I was a new youth pastor, and everybody was reading it, everybody was teaching from it. This was back when the messaging out there was The Purpose Driven Life and all this from Rick Warren. This was not necessarily in contradiction to any of that, but it was from a good biblical Baptist perspective on what am I here in life to do? Where am I going in life? What is the purpose of my life? It was written to young people, trying to set them on the right course for life. It was hugely popular, so well written, so enjoyable to read, and I appreciate Discover Your Destiny, along with the workbook that goes with it.
There are other books that the author, Kerry Schmidt, has written, several books, and LifeQuest was one that I used with our young people. Discover Your Destiny was written for younger teenagers, and LifeQuest was written for older teenagers and young adults going into that phase of life where they are going to be making a lot of decisions on their own for the first time. Someone calls them baby decision makers. So this is just trying to set up young people for, what am I here on earth to do? How can I live a holy life? How can I live a life that is in line with the calling that God has for my life? If God says, “walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called,” what does that mean? How can I discover that? So Discover Your Destiny was a good one that we taught through. I do not even know if it is in print anymore, but it is on my “this is good” shelf.
So that is the Christian miscellaneous shelf. Lord willing, in the next video we will go through another one of these shelves. So God bless you. We will see you in the next video.
