Christianity Today Book Awards 2004
We honor 22 titles that bring understanding to people, events, and ideas that shape evangelical life, thought, and mission.
This year we received 349 nominated titles from 45 publishers. CT staff selected the top five books in each category, and then panels of judges (one panel for each category) determined the winners. In the end, we honor 22 titles that bring understanding to people, events, and ideas that shape evangelical life, thought, and mission. Our judges comment on the winners:
APOLOGETICS/EVANGELISM
Going Public with Your Faith: Becoming a Spiritual Influence at Work
William Carr Peel and Walt Larimore (Zondervan)
Practical but never programmatic, this book emphasizes that witnessing is more what we are than what we do. It is helpful in delineating the limits and possibilities of workplace evangelism, and it provides a nuanced approach to cultivating relationships.
CHRISTIAN LIVING
My God and I
Lewis B. Smedes (Eerdmans)
The late Lewis B. Smedes's memoir is a compelling window into the messy, plodding process of becoming sanctified. Both accessible and inspiring, Smedes's reflections are central to corporate and individual spiritual life. His own story succeeds in drawing readers into the story of God's redemption in their own lives.
BIBLICAL STUDIES
The Resurrection of the Son of God
N.T. Wright (Fortress Press)
Consummately erudite yet eminently readable, this book magnificently demolishes every objection, ancient and modern, to the doctrine of the bodily resurrection of Christ. Rather than a defense, this is a positive argument for the resurrection—compelling in both its overall scope and its detail.
THE CHURCH/PASTORAL LEADERSHIP
The Emerging Church: Vintage Christianity for New Generations
Dan Kimball (Zondervan)
Relevant, cogent, and practical, this book contains ideas that are fresh and represent a significant thrust forward. The author thinks biblically about the nature of authentic church life—including worship, evangelism, and discipleship—and helps us to understand the church of the next generation.
CHRISTIANITY AND CULTURE
Doubts about Darwin: A History of Intelligent Design
Thomas Woodward (Baker)
Combines a well-researched history of the Intelligent Design movement with an analysis of the rhetoric of both evolutionists and design theorists. It is well-organized and accessible. Sympathetic to the design movement, Woodward's treatment of both sides is measured and fair.
FICTION
A Bearer Of Divine Revelation
Lawrence Dorr (Eerdmans)
This collection of stories is powerful and evocative. With taut syntax and precise word choice, Dorr's depictions of evil give rise to a poignant exploration of significant ideas and emotions. The stories are expertly crafted with figurative language and an interweaving of past and present.
HISTORY/BIOGRAPHY
Jonathan Edwards: A Life
George M. Marsden (Yale University Press)
The author thoroughly demolishes the stereotype of Edwards as the purveyor of sadistic religion that damns most people to hell. Setting him and his ideas in context like no other, Marsden handles Edwards's complex ideas with brilliant clarity without oversimplifying them.
MISSIONS/GLOBAL AFFAIRS
On Kingdom Business: Transforming Missions Through Entrepreneurial Strategies
Tetsunao Yamamori and Kenneth A. Eldred, eds. (Crossway)
This book offers prescient insight into what 21st century Christianity will require to claim for Christ the world's most resistant populations. The case studies and analytical pieces provide strategic approaches to building and strengthening the church in restricted-access countries.
SPIRITUALITY
Searching For Home: Spirituality for Restless Souls
M. Craig Barnes (Baker/Brazos)
Barnes creatively addresses the theme of drifting nomads searching for sanctuary. The book draws on formal and informal sociological research enlivened by the wisdom of pastoral experience. Weaving his father's story into the framework of Dante's Divine Comedy, Barnes makes the quest relevant, riveting, and prophetic.
THEOLOGY/ETHICS
Kingdom Ethics: Following Jesus in Contemporary Context
Glen H. Stassen and David P. Gushee (InterVarsity Press)
A highly readable textbook on Christian ethics intimately tied to the Sermon on the Mount. By locating ethics within the kingdom of God, with its tensions between present reality and future fulfillment, the authors give practical guidance while holding to the eschatological dimension.
Christianity Today Book Awards 2003
Evangelical leaders in numerous disciplines choose the year's top titles.
Nineteen titles receive honors this year for helping readers understand the people, events, and ideas that shape evangelical life, thought, and mission. CT received 300 nominated titles from 46 publishers. This year's awards, chosen by leaders in a variety of disciplines—including academia, the church, and journalism—honor books from well-known evangelical publishers, academic presses, and mainstream houses.
Apologetics/Evangelism
16 Nominees
Humble Apologetics: Defending the Faith Today
John G. Stackhouse Jr. (Oxford)
Stackhouse, the Sangwoo Youtong Chee Professor of Theology and Culture at Regent College, Vancouver, reflects on how to share Christian faith in a postmodern world.
Biblical Studies
36 Nominees
The Message: The Bible in Contemporary Language
Eugene Peterson (NavPress)
The prolific author and pastor completes his 12-year project to render the whole of Scripture in modern language—to the acclaim of readers ranging from J. I. Packer to Bono of U2.
Christianity and Culture
51 Nominees
The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity
Philip Jenkins (Oxford)
Jenkins, Distinguished Professor of History and Religious Studies at Penn State University, explores how 21st-century Christianity in the Southern Hemisphere will be more vibrant, orthodox, and culturally transforming than it usually is in the Northern Hemisphere.
Christian Living
40 Nominees
Engaging God's World: A Christian Vision of Faith, Learning, and Living
Cornelius Plantinga Jr. (Eerdmans)
The president of Calvin Theological Seminary writes on the grand theological themes of Creation, Fall, and Redemption.
The Church/Pastoral Leadership
24 Nominees
The Company of Preachers: Wisdom on Preaching, Augustine to the Present
Richard Lischer, ed. (Eerdmans)
Lischer, a professor at Duke University Divinity School, gathers insights on one of the highest forms of verbal communication.
Fiction
25 Nominees
In This Mountain
Jan Karon
(Viking)
The seventh novel in Karon's Mitford series finds Father Tim and Cynthia returning to Mitford, where the Episcopal priest struggles with ennui during his retirement.
History/Biography
30 Nominees
The Question of God: C. S. Lewis and Sigmund Freud Debate God, Love, Sex, and the Meaning of Life
Armand M. Nicholi Jr.
(Free Press)
Nicholi, an associate clinical professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, explains how Lewis's Christianity and Freud's nonbelief affected not just their ideas but also their lives.
Missions/Global Affairs
13 Nominees
The New International Dictionary of Pentecostal & Charismatic Movements
Stanley M. Burgess, ed.
(Zondervan) Weighing in at nearly 1,300 pages, this comprehensive work covers the world of enthusiastic Christianity from Africa, Central, to Zopfi, Jacob.
Spirituality
30 Nominees
Renovation of the Heart: Putting on the Character of Christ
Dallas Willard (NavPress)
Reading for people ready to make spiritual discipline a regular practice in their lives. Sample chapters: "Radical Evil in the Human Soul," "Radical Goodness Restored to the Soul," "Transforming Our Social Dimensions," and "Transforming the Soul."
Theology/Ethics
35 Nominees
Worldview: The History of a Concept
David K. Naugle (Eerdmans)
Naugle, professor of philosophy at Dallas Baptist University, surveys Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Protestant thinkers, and describes how this concept developed in the 19th and 20th centuries.
CT Book Awards 2002
Here are the books our judges—200 pastors, scholars, and church leaders—considered the worthiest this year.
posted 04/11/2002
Hundreds of books pass through our offices each year, ranging from Left Behind imitators to Prayer of Jabez knockoffs to self-published works about hidden numerical codes that prove God's existence.
But then comes the opportunity to consider more than 200 entries in our annual Book Awards contest. Long-standing evangelical publishing houses, daring new imprints, university publishers—all send us what they consider the best of their work that would be of interest to Christianity Today readers. Most of these entries renew our respect for the thousands of Christians involved in publishing books.
One of our judges raised a helpful point: Some books face wider competition than others do. With that in mind, we will mention how many nominees appeared in each category.
The past year was a rich one for thoughtful works by Christians. Here are the books our judges— 200 pastors, scholars, and church leaders—considered the worthiest this year.
Apologetics/Evangelism
10 Nominees
Truth or Consequences:
The Promise & Perils of Postmodernism
Millard J. Erickson
InterVarsity
Biblical Studies
20 Nominees
Justification and Variegated Nomism:
A Fresh Appraisal of Paul and Second Temple Judaism
D. A. Carson, Peter T. O'Brien, Mark A. Seifrid, eds.
Baker Academic
Christian Living
45 Nominees
If You Want to Walk on Water, You Have to Get Out of the Boat
John Ortberg
Zondervan
Christianity and Culture (tie)
37 Nominees
Encountering Religious Pluralism:
The Challenge to Christian Faith & Mission
Harold Netland
InterVarsity
Christianity and Culture (tie)
37 Nominees
A Visit to Vanity Fair:
Moral Essays on the Present Age
Alan Jacobs
Brazos
The Church/Pastoral Leadership
26 Nominees
Powers, Weakness, and the Tabernacling of God
Marva J. Dawn
Eerdmans
Fiction
22 Nominees
A Common Life:
The Wedding Story
Jan Karon
Viking
History/Biography
27 Nominees
Heaven Below:
Early Pentecostals and American Culture
Grant Wacker
Harvard
Missions/Global Affairs
11 Nominees
No Other Gods Before Me?:
Evangelicals and the Challenge of World Relgions
John G. Stackhouse Jr., ed.
Baker Academic
Spirituality
24 Nominees
Growing Pains:
Learning to Love My Father's Faith
Randall Balmer
Brazos
Theology/Ethics
46 Nominees
With the Grain of the Universe:
The Church's Witness and Natural Theology
Stanley Hauerwas
Brazos
CT Book Awards 2001
The books from 2000 that most captured the imaginations of some of the most engaged readers in evangelicalism.
posted 4/16/01
Each winter brings a different sort of blizzard to Christianity Today's offices in the western suburbs of Chicago as publishers deluge us with nominations for our Annual Book Awards. We consider it an honor that so many publishers—from small, family-owned companies to university presses—are vying for the attention of our judges.
No list, however comprehensive, can possibly honor every worthy book published in a given year. Sometimes our judges are so divided that their voting results in a tie, as in two of this year's categories. Other titles receive Awards of Merit because they came so close to the top of the list.
Next year we plan to improve the awards still further by refining categories, adding judges, and assigning judges to their specific areas of interest. Meanwhile, these are the books from 2000 that most captured the imaginations of some of the most engaged readers in evangelicalism.
Apologetics/Evangelism
Time for Truth
Os Guinness
BAKER
Biblical Studies
Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: Colossians, 1-2 Thessalonians, 1-2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon
Edited by Peter Gorday and Thomas C. Oden
INTERVARSITY
Christian Living
Death on a Friday Afternoon
Richard John Neuhaus
BASIC
Christianity and Culture
Border Crossings
Rodney Clapp
BAKER
Christianity and Culture
Habits of the Mind
James W. Sire
INTERVARSITY
The Church/Pastoral Leadership
ChurchNext
Eddie Gibbs
INTERVARSITY
Fiction
Paul: A Novel
Walter Wangerin Jr.
ZONDERVAN
History/Biography
The Smell of Sawdust
Richard J. Mouw
ZONDERVAN
Missions/Global Affairs
Can Evangelicals Learn from World Religions?
Gerald R. McDermott
INTERVARSITY
Missions/Global Affairs
Evangelical Dictionary of World Missions
Edited by A. Scott Moreau
BAKER
Spirituality
Reaching for the Invisible God
Philip Yancey
ZONDERVAN
Theology/Ethics
Renewing the Center
Stanley J. Grenz
BAKER
Christianity Today Book Awards 2000
CT picks the top ten books of the past year
"Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed," said philosopher Francis Bacon (d. 1626), "and some few to be chewed and digested." Here is Christianity Today's list of 1999 books most worth chewing on.
A couple of things were different in this year's selection process. First, we returned to a system in which books competed in categories. (How do we weigh a commentary against a work of fiction?)
We asked dozens of publishers to nominate books for one or more categories (as a result, some significant books were simply not nominated—a flaw we'll fix next year). We then polled about 160 pastors, scholars, and general readers, asking them to vote for the books they believed were "the most significant books of the year," meaning books that "have brought, or will eventually bring, insight to an issue or prompt a significant segment of the Christian world to believe or act differently."
Second, we asked voters to mark the nominated books they had also read. When we added the votes, the "read" votes weighed more heavily. (It is one thing to vote for a book based on reviews, a writer's reputation, or a colleague's judgment; it is something altogether different to support a book actually read.)
This system has its disadvantages. For one, it weighs fiction (which received the fewest number of votes) equally with books on Christianity and culture (which garnered the most votes). Thus the Awards of Merit, our wild-card winners: books (listed by category in order of votes received) that amassed a significant number of votes but not enough to win their respective divisions.
Every system has a bias. Ours bias tilts toward the concrete: these awards favor books that made a difference and that people actually read. Yet to evangelicals like us—who long to make an impact on the world—that is not a bad bias. So, taste, chew, and digest.
Apologetics/Evangelism
IS THE BIBLE TRUE? How Modern Debates and Discoveries Affirm the Essence of the Scriptures
Jeffrey L. Sheler
ZONDERVAN
Biblical Studies
A COMMENTARY ON THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW
Craig S. Keener
EERDMANS
Christianity and Culture
INTELLIGENT DESIGN: The Bridge Between Science and Theology
William A. Dembski
INTERVARSITY
Christian Living
THE BIBLE JESUS READ
Philip Yancey
ZONDERVAN
The Church/Pastoral Leadership
LEADERSHIP THAT WORKS: Help and Hope for Church and Parachurch Leaders in Today's Complex World
Leith Anderson
BETHANY
Fiction
A NEW SONG
Jan Karon
VIKING
History/Biography
SAINT AUGUSTINE
Garry Wills
VIKING
Missions/Global Affairs
THE DESECULARIZATION OF THE WORLD: Resurgent Religion and World Politics
Edited by Peter L. Berger
EERDMANS
Theology/Ethics
THE STORY OF CHRISTIAN THEOLOGY: Twenty Centuries of Tradition and Reform
Roger Olson
INTERVARSITY
Spirituality
THE UNKNOWN GOD: Searching for Spiritual Fulfillment
Alister McGrath
EERDMANS
Awards of Merit
Christianity and Culture
JUST GENEROSITY: A New Vision for Overcoming Poverty in America
Ronald J. Sider
BAKER
HOW NOW SHALL WE LIVE?
Charles Colson and Nancy Pearcey
TYNDALE
BLINDED BY MIGHT: Can the Religious Right Save America?
Cal Thomas and Ed Dobson
ZONDERVAN
History/Biography
ABRAHAM LINCOLN: Redeemer President
Allen C. Guelzo
EERDMANS
Theology/Ethics
EVANGELICAL TRUTH: A Personal Plea for Unity, Integrity, and Faithfulness
John Stott
INTERVARSITY