Engaging Cultures

Dear Pastor/Church Leader

Blessings of the Advent Season. May God grant you much grace as you speak into this important opportunity of openness. May your ministry be a prism for light to shine through and reveal the God colours of the world. In a C.S. Lewis talk (www.cslewis.org), Wheaton College professor Jerry Root asks, “What sound does grace make? Nothing. It means nothing to people until it touches the point of their brokenness.”

In Christian theology, Jesus reveals to us not only who God is but also what it means to be truly human. This true humanity is not something we achieve on our own; it comes to us as a gift .... The reception of this gift contains an ineliminable element of mystery that will always require faith. Jesus in his life, teaching, death and resurrection and ongoing presence in the church and through the Holy Spirit ... orders us towards God. He directs our passions and desires towards that which can finally fulfill them and bring us happiness. (Marquette theologian D. Stephen Long, The Goodness of God, 106-7)

Library Infrastructure Project

Together with some other Outreach Canada colleagues, I am working on a project to which you may be able to provide vital assistance. All pastors need mentors, especially young pastors. We want to provide an annotated resource base for young pastors, especially those who may not attend seminary, to set out a reading program early in their ministry. This gets them to dig deeper than the popular writers of the day. Do you have a favorite theologian or commentary, literature that builds a good cultural interface with the Christian faith? Our feeling is that pastors across Canada can help each other make the church stronger through championing great resources, in order to shape the prophetic voice of the future. A good example would be Kevin Vanhoozer’s book below. I have included other books that I think would make excellent reading for your ministry. Think about the possibilities for leveraging the future story of the church in our country.

Thanks for your consideration and prayers,

Gordon Carkner PhD

Is God Happy? Selected Essays ~ Lesek Kolakowski

The Road to Character. ~ David Brooks

The Pastor as Public Theologian: Reclaiming a Lost Vision  ~ Kevin Vanhoozer

Why Jesus? Rediscovering his truth in an age of mass marketed spirituality. ~ Ravi Zacharias

Faith and Wisdom in Science. ~ Tom McLeish

Daring Greatly. Brené Brown

Take and Read. Spiritual Reading: an annotated list. ~ Eugene Peterson

Reading for Preaching: the preacher in conversation with Storytellers, Biographers, Poets and Journalists. ~ Cornelius Plantinga Jr.

The Pastor as Public Theologian: Reclaiming a Lost Vision. ~ Kevin Vanhoozer

Birds on an Ethical Wire: battles about values in the culture wars. ~ Margaret Somerville

For the Beauty of the Earth: a Christian vision for creation care (engaging culture).  

~ Steven Bouma-Prediger

Letters to Doubting Thomas: a case for the existence of God. ~ C. Stephen Layman

My Name is Asher Lev. ~ Chaim Potok

The Romance of the Word: one man’s love affair with theology. ~ Robert Farrar Capon

 The Resurrection of Nature: Political Theory and the Human Character.   

~ J. Budziszewski