Dear Reader,

The books that are published reveal a lot about our day, so it shouldn’t be surprising that recent titles have either been alarmist or addressing our alarmed times. You’ll see this trend in a number of the reviews featured below.

But even when dealing with heavy topics, I’m thankful for books that offer explanatory power about our current moment. I come away from reading these titles not despairing but with a fuller understanding, seeing layer upon layer and aware of how we got to this moment and what faithfulness in the future might look like. Three recent books have been helpful for me to this end.

1. David Wells, No Place for Truth: or Whatever Happened to Evangelical Theology? (Eerdmans, 1993). Brilliant analysis of modern culture and the church’s unfaithful response. A bracing and prescient book that is more relevant now more than 25 years after its publication. Don’t miss our review of the book.

2. Mark Noll, The Civil War as a Theological Crisis (University of North Carolina, 2006). Essential reading that one of America’s most painful chapters and the vexing problems it exposed. The chapter on the evolving biblical interpretations, both for an against slavery, is fascinating if also sobering—a reminder that we bring more into the text from the culture around us than we’d care to admit.

3. Timothy Keller, How to Reach the West Again: Six Essential Elements of a Missionary Encounter (Redeemer City to City, 2020). That Keller can pack in the decades of ministry insights into a 60-page book should be a remarkable achievement. And it’s free.

Reading books like these, rather than spending hours on inane and outrageous social media discourse, will actually help deepen our understanding. Lest I give the impression all my reading is this serious, I’m looking forward to Brandon Sanderson’s forth volume of his Stormlight Archive fantasy series. Even lighter fare can help us put our times in proper perspective and offer a measure of sanity in an otherwise difficult year.

Happy reading!

Ivan Mesa

Editorial Director