Don't Buy Christian Books from Amazon! | 10ofThose

Well, hello, everyone. I know that you clicked on this episode expecting to see Sean's beautiful face and hear

Jonathan Carswell's amazing accent, and you will. But first, I have to tell you about a giveaway that we're doing, because the kind people at Ten of Those have offered to give away 10 sets, that's right, 10 sets of J .C.

Ryle's Expository Thoughts on the Gospel. That's seven books cloth bound with bookmarks and a really nice case to you if you do three things.

One, you got to share this episode. Get the word out. Two, you have to like and follow us on all social media.

That means YouTube too. You got to subscribe. And then three, you got to tag somebody in the comments so that they can do the same thing and have an opportunity to win this set.

I hope you'll do it. I hope you enjoy the set. If you win it, we'll make sure to get in contact with you and let you know. So without further ado,

I hope you enjoy this episode of Ten of Those, number two. We're back with another episode of the

Room for Nuance podcast. I'm Sean DeMars, and I'm here with a return guest. Yeah, having me once means you've forgiven or forgotten me to have me back.

Is this just in life? Yeah. Yeah. Hey, you want to tell people your name? Yeah, I'm Jonathan, Jonathan Carswell.

Well, you opened us in prayer, brother. Gladly. Thank you. Father, we thank you for your goodness to us, your love and mercy and grace, which we don't deserve, but we're so grateful for it.

Thank you for the Lord Jesus, his death for us, his resurrection.

We long for his return. We pray as we talk now that you would help us pray.

Our tongues can be helpful or divisive, but we pray,

Father, that our conversation would be seasoned with salt, and the things we say would be pure and true and helpful,

God -honoring. We pray this in your powerful name. Amen. Amen. There's just something about somebody praying in a

British accent. I just feel like I make you more godly. I need all the help I can get. I'm a little closer to the throne,

I feel like. Do you know William McKenzie? I do, yeah, very well. I've prayed with him twice now, and I'm just like, brother, don't ever stop.

No, well, that is rather than accent, because I can't understand what he's saying, but I know he's holy.

You can't understand what he's saying? Oh, no, it's a whole different place. I know you think it's just all the same, but he's actually from a different country.

I think we're going to have to subtitle what you're saying right now. I was given advice when

I first came to the States. Somebody said, never let on that you're common, because in America, they'll think you're posh, and so I've never told anybody that actually

I'm very common. What do you mean by that, common? Common, so like a working class, or kind of not very educated, so that's me.

I'm not related to the king, but I'm related to one king, but not King Charles.

That's right. Yeah, and so people think I speak very eloquently and English -like.

Now, you remember from our last interview that I can do accents from all over the UK. How could

I forget? I mean, it's marked in my memory. Let's just do one more. Name a region. Well, why don't you do

Birmingham? Okay. Now, you got to listen carefully for this one. Yeah, I remember. It was very careful last time.

Yeah, very nuanced. Hello, governor. Oh, there we go. Uncanny. That was

Birmingham. It was Birmingham. Of course it was. We didn't even have to say. Now, I can also do like Australia or South Africa.

Right. I can do really, you know. Indian. Can you do Indian? I can, but I'm afraid.

Yeah, that's why I suggested it. All right. We did not bring you back on just to riff about how terrible your

English accent is, although we could continue to do that. It's just America took your language and made it better as we took so many things from your tiny little island and made it better.

You know, I'm a guest here, so keep going, brother. Well, don't you live here now? I do, yeah. So I live in Chicago.

So you're not really a guest. No. In the States. No, I'm not. Well, ask the

TSA agents. They'll say I'm a guest. Okay. Oh, I tell you. Do you not have your citizenship? Oh, no. It's a long old process.

So now I'm on a five -year visa that just got extended, though that process took four months, including a couple of shakedowns from the

TSA. But if they're listening, you know, we love you and thank you for your help and your service. But now

I'm on another five -year visa, and then you go green card for 10 years, and then it's citizenship.

So yeah. Long time. Yeah. Yeah. That's probably for the best. For your sake, yes. All right.

So we brought you back on the show to talk more about books. Yeah. The title of your last episode was

The Christian Book Guy. Yeah, yeah. Did you feel the weight of that title on your shoulders? It's why it's taken so long to, well, it's one of the reasons why it's taken so long to come back because I was just recovering from that.

But yeah. I think your episode was one of those surprise hits. Like, you know, we've had

Rosario Butterfield on and, you know, Jonathan Lehman and we have like Al Mohler's coming out soon.

You have big names and no names, and I'm one of the no names. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. Essentially, you just brought us right to the point.

But like, I just, like Matt Schmucker's interview was like that. Like, I did not expect Matt Schmucker's interview to be so widely appreciated.

And a lot of people were like, man, that Christian Book Guy interview was awesome. They didn't remember your name, by the way. Have you spoken to my mom?

Because she loved it. She did love it. Yeah. And so I figured let's, because I love

Christian books, you love Christian books, we think that the Lord really uses Christian books. You've kind of given your whole life, this is your ministry, because you think the

Lord uses Christian books. Let's bring Jonathan back on and talk more about that. Well, bless you. Thank you for having me.

Before we get into individual Christian books, in case, because we've grown a little since your first interview, in case anyone doesn't know what 10 of those is, give them the rundown.

Yeah, so it starts as a hobby in my bedroom. I was a youth pastor, and it came really from a passion to see people reading books that hold to the

Bible. There's loads out there, and a lot can take you away from Scripture, even though it's kind of Christian publishing and these sorts of things.

And so we wanted a place where people could shop, knowing that maybe they hadn't heard of the author or the publisher, or they'd not seen that book before, but they knew they could trust what was there because there was a team who were carefully vetting it.

And so we do, we road test what we sell. We know it holds to the Bible. We discount it with the idea that more can go out.

And then we use our profits to support areas in the world that otherwise resources couldn't be afforded.

So we like to say people are tithing when they shop with us. If they shop with us in the States, it's only a dollar shipping.

Again, we do that, and people say, how do you do it? Well, you kind of, yeah, we lose every time we do it, but it's to try and make it as frictionless as possible to get stuff that will point you to Jesus.

Yeah, it's our firm belief that if you can be reading things that are going to point you to Jesus, that can have a significant impact on your

Christian growth and therefore on your life and your godliness, how you go about day -to -day living, the decisions you make, whether it be money or the person you marry or where you live, is all impacted as you get to know

God and understand Him, relate to Him, and then worship Him differently.

And that's what we're seeking to do with books. We want people to grow in their knowledge of Him, not so that they're just puffed up in knowledge, but that it impacts their daily life.

And so, yeah, everything from how they wake up in the morning to what they talk to their neighbours about is being shaped by the books they're reading.

Now, number one, we want people to be reading God's Word. We never want people to be reading Christian books at the expense of reading their

Bible. And I think that is a danger. Spurgeon said, visit many good books, but live in the Bible. Yeah, that's right.

And that is a challenge. Sometimes it is much easier to pick up the latest release from your favourite author, but actually meet

God in His Word and then use books to support your reading of God's Word. And so that's what we want to do.

Christian books push people back to the Bible. That's right, yeah. And so we're wanting to get as much out as is possible.

There is one underlying passion for us, though, that all of what

I've said is kind of the foundation. But if I could only sell one type of book in the

Christian world, I'd want to sell evangelistic books. Because, you know, came here today,

I sat next to somebody. If she doesn't know Jesus, she will spend all eternity in hell.

And I have an opportunity in the day and age that I live in that not only can I speak to her, but I could give something that when we're long gone and gone our different ways, she has the means of the gospel still being spoken to her because I can put something into her hands that would point her to Jesus.

So we have a deep passion for that. And we can perhaps talk about that later. Did you give her anything? Do you know,

I didn't. She wasn't too interested. But I did have one this week. We were trying to get a quote for some windows and a guy came and we have a big yellow 10 of those van parked out front.

And they always say, oh, you know, what's 10 of those? And the way it reads is it looks like a hundred foot hose.

So they think that I'm a plumber or something. But yeah, I got chatted with him. I was able to give him something.

He emailed later on that day and said, do you know, I have a commitment to read a book a month.

So I'm going to make this my book this month. And I just don't know. You know, he says that maybe he was just trying to sell me something, but who knows?

It's just little seeds. And if I can scatter a lot of little seeds, then maybe the Lord will water and bring fruit.

I used to keep in my trunk copies of different books based on who I thought they would be a better fit for.

So I kept More Than a Carpenter by Josh McDowell. I kept The Reason for God by Tim Keller, Mere Christianity, a couple other ones.

And I would just always like, okay, I think this guy probably needs to hear from Keller. He'll probably speak to him.

More Than a Carpenter is probably better for this guy. But I would just always want to have a book on hand because you're exactly right. I can only talk to this guy for so long, but that book can stay with him.

I gave The Reason for God to my tattoo artist. I've been working her over for a couple months and I finally was like, this is my last tattoo that we're going to have together.

Get another if it means you can share the gospel, just cover up. But yeah, I feel with literature, whether it's tracks, booklets, books, whatever kind of is appropriate,

I think they can do three things. I think they can open the door of conversation. So you can get started by offering something.

They can continue the conversation. So that example of once they're long gone, they can keep reading it.

Or maybe you're in a relationship with somebody and you see them regularly, a neighbor, a colleague, you can perhaps read it together and say, hey, why don't we meet for a coffee?

So it can continue the conversation. It can also close the conversation. So yeah, the salesman, I'd probably never see him again, not with the price he gave me anyway.

But I can close the conversation by saying, thanks for coming and giving your quote, et cetera.

But here's what I could give you. And those three things, opening, continuing and closing the conversation,

I think literature can do. This is going to sound self -promotional. Interpret me at your best, at my best.

The Rebel to Your Will, it has been so easy for me to give away. It's been such a fantastic evangelistic tool.

I can just tell people like, hey, I wrote a book. I know this is kind of whatever, but it's my story and we're friends. And if you want to know more about me, read it.

And I wrote it in such a way that they're going to get the gospel five or six times in there. So interestingly, you might think that a book that I wrote about my own life would make it more difficult to give away, but actually it's kind of freed me up.

Oh yeah. And the length is good because that's not daunting. It's not, hey, can you commit 10 hours to this?

It's like, actually two to three hours, you're going to get this and you get the gospel. I'm not a fan of self -publishing at all.

I think if it's good enough, get it published. But that can be a different episode. Well, let's have a conversation about that. Okay.

I am writing, just me and you, nobody else. Well, it's the episode I'm on, so it will be nobody else.

So I have written two books that I think are good, that I don't think any

Christian publisher is interested in publishing. Right. And I don't know what to do about that. Okay. One of them,

I think I've changed the name of the title, Luke, by the way, Funny for Jesus. Imagine if Rebel to Your Will were not like really dark and tragic and painful, but actually like really funny, sort of like a self, like a memoir, but like hilarious.

And are they your jokes that are in there? They're my jokes, all original to me.

I think you're right. I'm not sure anybody would want it. Ouch and well played.

But in all seriousness, well, I guess a little bit more seriousness, the jokes are intended to communicate a theology of humor.

And I've kind of sent it around to the usual suspects. And it's just so outside of the box for Christian publishers, that they're just not interested in it.

I love this quote. Do you know the name Warren Wearsby? Sounds weird, but no. No, so he was at Moody Church in Chicago before Lutzer was on Back to the

Bible when that used to exist. And they said that 10 million people a day listen to him preach.

But anyway, he has a line of, in ministry, there is rarely room.

Oh, no, let me get this right. There is no room for comedy, but there is room for humor. And I've thought about that many times because when we do our book plugs at conferences and churches, we seek to use humor in a correct way because it connects people.

You know, you talk with somebody and you make them smile. You make them laugh in an appropriate way, humor rather than comedy.

Actually, it's often an opening of their heart or the conversation to be able to then share of serious things.

I think what is difficult is switching from comedy to serious.

And so when it comes to evangelism, it's why an evangelistic evening that's preceded by a comic or a open mic night often doesn't work because we're talking about something very serious.

But there is room for humor in ministry, I think. Yeah, I mean, what

I'm trying to do is use humor as a device to actually teach on a theology of humor. Because it just, it wouldn't match.

Have you got an example? I'll send you the manuscript. But it wouldn't match the warp in the woof of the book to teach a theology of humor as like, well, point number one, humor is ontologically this.

And point number two, humor is teleologically this. It's kind of like, if we're going to talk about a theology of laughter and joy and mirth and funny things, we have to do it in such a way that I think actually embodies that.

But again, it's just so outside of the norm of how Christian publishers are thinking about publishing theology books.

But I know that there's a market out there for it. There are some fantastic humorists who sell a lot of books.

We need to take our theology very seriously, but not take ourselves seriously. Quoting Mark Driscoll much?

Is that what he says? Yeah, he's the first person I heard it. Right, okay. Well, there you go.

That'll help the ratings. We're just going to clip that. Just, yeah. Okay, enough about me.

Back to you. Hey, real quick. By the way, if you have any more questions about Jonathan Carswell and 10 of those and all of that, go back and watch our first episode because we talk about it for like two hours and I thought it was a really great interview.

Real quick, tell us why Amazon is from Satan and why people should buy from 10 of those. It's not necessarily from Satan.

I do, like, they have no interest. Wait, wait, wait, hold on. You are trying to softball this, but when

I posted an Amazon link on my Facebook page one time, you emailed me and you were like, what are you doing?

You are beating the beast. Yeah. All right. They have no interest in your spiritual health whatsoever.

Why would you? Sounds like Satan. Yeah, like, why would you entertain that? Now, okay, they're convenient.

I get that. But you can live without buying from Amazon. I haven't bought from Amazon for 17 years. You can survive.

So they are convenient. They are behind the scenes.

There's a dark arts of them marginalizing and pushing out Christian publishers and good theology.

They do it deliberately and they do it subconsciously, but they have no interest in your spiritual health.

What I would say is, I don't care where you buy your Christian books from, but give it some consideration as to how more

Christian books are going to go out. And that isn't by feeding their space mission.

It is by going directly to the publisher. It is going to places like ourselves and others that are investing their money in things that you care about and you are just giving them money to invest in things that are against what you fundamentally believe.

And if you have not seen this interview or the previous interview, you could say, oh, I just didn't know that things like this existed.

But now you do know there's, and you I'm sure would be happy to promote like Westminster books. And yeah, just, if you're going to give your money, if you have the ability to give your money to one of these two companies, give it to the

Christian one, right? And we can do things that Amazon can't do and don't do.

So you have a seven -year -old son who's not engaged with the Bible.

Call us up, ask us, what would you get my seven -year -old son to help him get into the Bible? Give me some advice.

Would you send me a sample to have a look at? These sorts of things. Have you been to a Christian conference? Is there a bookstore there?

It's not Amazon who are trawling around the country to put up bookstores of carefully curated Christian books at those events.

Those sorts of things. Supplying your church bulk discount. Amazon don't offer bulk discount.

Supporting missions around the world that couldn't afford it. Amazon are not writing a check to those places.

In fact, even their charity, their not -for -profit work smile, they scrapped. They're not even doing that.

And so, yeah, I've started off British. I'm now going to go all out American.

I would encourage you with all my might, don't shop at Amazon. Shop at places that are going to support ministry.

They're going to further your heart of ministry and do it in ways that is way beyond Amazon and other places.

I like the American you better than the British you. Do you? Okay. All right, we'll go for it. Let's keep pressing into that. See, I prayed at the start that we'd watch our tongue and so I'm not sure the two fit, but yeah, no.

No, no, you've not said anything unbecoming. Okay, not yet. Yeah, not yet. Yeah, keep listening.

All right, so we're going to talk about books that we love, authors that we love, and for the rest of this episode, we're just going to try to get people excited about certain books.

Does that sound? Yeah, love it. So let's just start off. Well, I think we're going big. I just figure based on your patter so far, people are probably going to tune out pretty quickly.

Great, yeah. So let's just right at the outset, highlight the thing that I think you're most excited about right now, which is,

I'm going to try to hold this up for the camera, the J .C. Ryle commentary on the gospels. So you love

J .C. Ryle in general, but you are particularly in love with this J .C.

Ryle gospel set. I'm holding it up, the cameras can see it. The quality is,

I mean, yeah, you tell us about this, but let me just say, whatever you say, I agree. It's true. All right, bless you. All right, well,

J .C. Ryle, so he was a Brit, that isn't the only reason to like him. But if you haven't heard of J .C.

Ryle, he was an evangelical Anglican bishop. He was the first bishop in Liverpool.

In terms of his personal life, he was married three times, I believe. Three of his wives died, all three of them, well, of course they died, but they died while he was alive.

And he suffered, his father went bankrupt, and he had to work to kind of help his father financially.

But I think he was one of the finest expositors that certainly Britain has ever had. What he was able to do was to present deep truth in a way that the average person could understand.

And so he, there's books that people know, like Holiness or Thoughts for Young Men. Simplicity in Preaching.

Yeah, and that's just a little booklet. Most of these were booklets. Buy a hundred of those and give them away, yeah. But his expository thoughts, he goes through all four gospels in seven volumes.

Yeah, we've tried to do it really nicely. They've got, it's cloth overboard, ribbon marker, gold foil, comes in a box set.

We've sought to keep the price really, really low. So I think you can get it for $99 or you can get a couple for,

I know, $99. Which is super cheap for people. People may not understand how nice this actually is, but that's a really good deal.

Yeah, it's a great price. But the content, so what he does is in each section, you have maybe seven to 10 verses.

And then he just walks you through it. But it is not, it's not heady and heavy.

It is, it's light, but it's rich. I describe it as like a steak dinner that you're going out for an anniversary meal.

It is the best meal of the year. And then it's just chopped up nicely into digestible pieces.

Whenever I go to the Gospels, I have this. I think I've gone through it maybe three or four times now.

And every passage, there's just, oh, you know, I read back to my wife. Oh, listen to what he just said here.

It's just, there's great depth in it. Our passion, I mean, you can get versions of this, particularly in the older English though.

His English isn't, it's not like Spurgeon and kind of a bit treacly. It's kind of, you know, you can get through this anyway.

But we've sought to just lighten the text a little, modernize it a little bit. And, but our passion with this was how can we get a young generation using

Ryle as not only a sort of devotional commentary for their own edification, but also for an example of what it is to exposit

Scripture closely and carefully, but in a way that is at the level that the average person can understand.

And I think probably more than anybody of his generation, Ryle did that.

And there are examples today of people who do that superbly. But I just,

I love how Ryle does it. You read him and you think, this guy wrote this last week. You know, it is that sort of level.

I love it. So, yeah. Well, it's available on 10ofthose .com. There you go.

And you can go on and buy 10 if you so please. And what I would say, and I mean this with all my heart, if you look at anything,

I'm not convinced or I can't afford it or whatever. My email is jonathanat10ofthose .com.

Tell us what you can afford and we'll send it to you. We genuinely mean that. Amazon won't do that.

There you go. They've got a space race to pay for. What they will do is they'll say, it's Black Friday.

Here's a deal where they artificially inflate the prices by 40 % and then reduce them by 45 % and then say, here's a deal for you.

What they will do is they'll say to us, you ship it to us. We'll sit it in our warehouse.

We'll pay you 60 days after we've sold it. And oh, by the way, we can return it at any point at 10 of those is expense.

Oh no. Yikes. Okay. Well, let's just go, let's do a little back and forth on books that we love, books that have changed our lives.

Hopefully books that are available on 10ofthose .com. Sure. Because you read widely and deeply. You like, how often, like how many books are you reading a year?

Uh, last year I read 130. There you go. But, uh, many of those were audio books.

Okay. I think it counts too. I'm dyslexic. It definitely counts. You need everything you can get.

Yeah, that's right. And how do you approach your reading? Do you like map out? This is what I want to read in the year or this is my next two months.

How does it? I would really love to be able to be the kind of person that could do that. But I am just not.

Now being a pastor means that very often, uh, I will have my reading dictated for me, a small percentage of it.

But like if our elders are going through something for an issues meeting, I'll have to read that book. And that will kind of push aside certain books that I might be more interested in at a given moment.

If we're doing like elders training, I'll read that stuff. And that will kind of push us. So like, uh, earlier this year, we read through all of Wayne Grudem's, like thousand plus word ethics textbook.

Wow. Even Wayne's not read that. I agree. Yes. Helpful. Was it good?

Dude, it's fantastic. It's, it's, yeah, it was superb. Obviously you don't agree with every conclusion he reaches, but the clarity, the rootedness in scripture, so on and so forth.

But I would say even on that, if you're reading people that you agree with every word on,

I think there's an issue because there's only one book that has no error in it.

And even then sometimes you're going to read it and you'd be like, I don't know if I agree with this. And then the Bible confronts you, of course. Yeah.

So, uh, and then, um, like if I know that I have an interview coming up with like a guy who like,

I know that this book is going to be good. I want to help him promote it. Then I'll read that book. If I were not to otherwise read it.

But then other than that, it's basically just whatever I'm interested in at the moment. So it could go history.

It could be fiction. It could be theology. It's just whatever catches my eye. Or do you, do you? No, not all

Christian. I would say probably 50 % Christian. And then 50 % other stuff.

Yeah. Okay. So back to books that have changed our lives. You want to do another one?

Uh, yeah. So, um, I read years ago,

True Discipleship by McDonald. I don't agree with everything in it.

It's now - McDonald? Yeah. Like Ronald? No, not Ronald. I only said his last name because I couldn't remember his first name.

But thank you for highlighting that I couldn't. I want to say, it's gone from me.

So - It's okay. Anyway, it's Gospel Folio Press who publish it. And no book has challenged me as much as that book.

And some of that is because, yeah, I didn't agree with it. And I don't agree with it.

But it's probably a book that I should read again. Um, I read it when I was an early

Christian. Um, and so it shaped some thoughts. I probably should read it again and just kind of see where I'm at with it.

Yeah, that's right. It's fun to go back and reread old books and see how much you've changed. Yeah. Yeah. And hopefully what you've - what you're reading is changing you.

I don't know who said this. Maybe it's, uh, uh, anyway, I will see who said it if you can remember.

But basically the books we've read have shaped us. The books we buy are going to be the person we want to become.

It's something along those lines. And so when it comes to book buying, thinking, who do

I want to be in five years time? Um, is a really good question to ask. You know, is this book going to take me in the direction of the person

I want to become? Because books, if they're - well, all books will shape us for good or for bad.

So yeah, picking which ones. Um, so that was an old one. That's an old one. We'll go back and forth.

No, it's, uh, it's, it's McDonald's. McDonald's. Anyway. You didn't get either one of the names, right?

Sorry. Um, so this one, since you started with a bad one that forms you when you were young.

It wasn't necessarily bad. I just didn't agree with all of it because I just, I, I'm nervous that it, it veers towards legalism.

That's why. Well, don't read it then, uh, if you're listening. Uh, another book you probably shouldn't read, but the

Lord in his providence used in my life. Uh, do you know who Philip Yancey is?

Yeah. The Jesus I never knew. Yeah. So when I first got saved,

I couldn't sit down and read something for 30 seconds. I mean, I was a drug dealer. I was a hustler.

I ran the streets. And, um, my grandmother, who was an atheist

Catholic, uh, she was one of the founders of Narcotics Anonymous, like the drug rehab.

Yeah. She could quote the 12 step thing the way that old other grandmas can quote the

Bible, you know? So that was the world I grew up in. So she saw me in drugs and all this other stuff. And when she saw me get clean, she saw that it was because of Jesus.

She didn't believe in that, but she was just so happy that I had found something that had gotten me off the streets, that had gotten me clean.

So she went to the bookstore and probably just asked someone what would be a good book about Jesus?

And so she got this book and she gave it to me and I took it and I threw in a closet, you know? And then

I remember after, I think we were moving. I had joined the military. We were getting ready to move.

I was going to go to basic training. I pulled it out of the closet and I sat down and I went to go read it and I was enraptured.

I mean, Philip Yancey is a very good writer. He's a very good writer, yeah. And for someone who didn't know much about the Bible, who basically only knew like the thinnest veneer of the gospel, but believed it with all of his heart, to have someone sort of bring

Jesus to life for me in this way, even though certain parts of it now looking back were not as accurate as they could be, it really blew me away.

And I think that was the beginning of me becoming a reader. I was like, oh,

I know Jesus better now because of what I've read in this book. And if this can be replicated, if I can do this again, if this book will help me understand this part of Jesus better, well, then

I'm going to do that. So yeah, the Lord used it. Yeah. Imperfect though it is. And I think for those who aren't big readers, and I'm dyslexic,

I find reading really hard work. See, God does have a sense of humor for me in this role. But if you're not a big reader, then one, go for something that's going to excite you, that's going to grab your appetite.

So for me, it was biography. But, and also like, we're not going to judge how well you're doing spiritually by the size of book you're reading.

Correct. You know, I'm sure the Pharisees read huge tomes, but spiritually - Memorized them.

Yeah, probably. And so, don't always think that it's the thickest, fattest book that is going to spiritually enrich you the most.

It may, but equally, get something that you know is going to get your eyes onto the person of Christ.

That's what's going to do the work. If that's a short book, if that's a gently written book, it's not an academic, go for it.

And like hunger, it will grow. And then, yeah, you can develop what you're reading.

All right, so that was mine. I know you're going to get to Helen Rosevere eventually, so let's just do that now. All right.

I love Helen Rosevere. I love biography. That was, that's what got me started. So, A Man in Christ, the story of Hudson Taylor was the first Christian book

I ever read. But I learn a lot from biography. One, their failures.

I think that is important. There are some that just kind of, you feel like, did they need a savior?

But anyway, but you learn from their failures. The old ones are often very, very good as well.

And so, looking back at people who are dead that can't kind of climb off the altar is good.

But Helen Rosevere, she was a missionary to the Belgian Congo. If people know and have watched kind of Desiring God conferences, she spoke there one year with Jerry Bridges.

And the ministry that year between the two of them, I think was very, very special. But Helen Rosevere, she was a missionary there.

And she suffered during the uprising and the army captured her and she was raped and beaten and just horrific things happened to her.

Physically, and her famous line on suffering is that she really wrestled with and felt

God kind of saying to her of, can you thank me for trusting you with this suffering, even if I never tell you why?

And there is deep, deep theology in that. And I think through biography, you can see deep theology lived out.

Sometimes they get it wrong, but hopefully you see that worked out. And sometimes like Helen, you see it worked out.

I worked in Northern Ireland for three years. What's the name of the book? So the first one was

Give Me This Mountain. The second one was He Gave Us a Valley. And the third one is Digging Ditches. Christian focus.

So William Mackenzie, who you mentioned earlier, they're about to bring out, it was in three volumes.

They're about to bring it out in a one volume piece. But I had the privilege of living not far from her. And so we actually met once a week for about an hour, an hour and a half.

And she taught me the Bible for a couple of years. But can I tell you a story of Helen Rose? Tell me a Helen Rose story. When I was a youth pastor,

I would go into schools to do assemblies in the UK. They still, I don't know quite what it is, whether it's an hour a week now.

It used to be an hour a day where they used to have a religious education. And so they would have people like me come in and take their assembly.

And that was their box ticked for that. And I would tell this story and I would start with the kids.

And you know, the UK is just so anti -Christian now. But I would start by saying, look, kids,

I don't know whether you believe in God or not. But if you don't believe in God, I want you to explain how this story could happen because I don't know of any other explanation other than God.

And it also tells the value of Christian books. So all right, buckle in, it's about eight minutes. And so she was a missionary with the missionary organisation

WEC. She was coming to sort of later years in life. And they said to her, Helen, what we want you to do is we want you to travel the world, telling your missionary story and being an advocate for world missions.

So she came to the States and she just had a big wadge of tickets and she was travelling around. And this was pre 9 -11 or whatever, and years before that.

And she'd just spoken at a church and she had a really early flight the next morning. And the pastor and his wife said, look, we'll take you.

We're going on somewhere else. We'll just drop you off. So she said, okay, that's fine. So she got to the airport. She had her bags.

She got to the front of the line. She was flying American Airlines. She got to the front of the line. She realised she had no passport, no tickets and no wallet.

And she didn't know what to do. This was pre -mobile phones, long before pre -mobile phones. And so anyway, she said to the lady, she said, look,

I'm due on a flight with you this morning, but I'm not entirely sure where it's to, but I don't have my passport.

I don't have my tickets. Is there anything you can do to help me? And the lady said, look, you've no passport, no tickets, no chance,

I can't help you at all. And Helen just kind of explained. And the lady kept saying, you know, no passport, no ticket, just I can't help you at all.

Well, Helen pleaded with her best English accent and she was posh.

So she could speak with her proper English accent. And she said, look, is there anything, please, that you could do?

And the lady said, well, one idea. If you can find somebody who can act as a guarantor so that if you're not who you're saying that you are, they'll pay the cash.

And she said, well, I don't know anyone here. I don't have a phone. She said, look, there's a long line behind you.

That's all I can do. So Helen stepped aside and she prayed. And I think it was a long sort of holy prayer of Lord, help.

And that was it. And anyway, then she had an idea. So she went to the back of the line and she joined the line and she got to the front.

And she got to the front and the lady was like, oh, here's this crazy English lady. And she said, I've got an idea. Do you have, do you have a phone book?

And that gives you the date of the story, that it was a phone book. And she pulled it open. It was a big, thick one.

And she was flying from New York to somewhere, I think. And she said, look, could you look for the letters, R -E -V for Reverend?

And she said, okay. And she said, what letter? Oh, any letter, pick any letter.

It's like, you don't know the person. No, please, please just look for the letter. And so she went down and she found, yeah, there was, there was

Reverend Atkins. Please, would you call him? She's like, I can't call him. It's six o 'clock in the morning. You don't even know this guy.

Please, please call him. Well, the lady called her and Helen obviously only heard this one side of the conversation.

You know, got Dr. Helen Roosevelt here and she's flying from New York to so -and -so. And would you help guarantee?

Yes, no. She put the phone down a bit surprised and said, yeah, he will act as your guarantor.

He'll be here in 20 minutes. 20 minutes passed and this guy arrived and comes up to Helen and says, you must be

Dr. Helen Roosevelt. And she said, yeah, that's me. And you must be

Reverend Atkinson or whatever it was. And he said, I'm just delighted to act as your guarantor.

It's my, guarantor, it's just my privilege. Helen was ready to kind of take the money, get on a flight and say, hang on before you go, you need to understand why

I'm willing to act as your guarantor. He said, many years ago before I was a

Christian, before I was in ministry, my girlfriend at the time, we were travelling round the world and just living a life for ourselves.

It was drugs, it was alcohol and we were just backpacking around and doing our thing. And there was one night where we were in a country and we'd taken some drugs and we were just really, really sick.

We had no money and we just needed a place to stay.

And we stumbled across the British embassy and we thought, well, we're

American, maybe they'll help us. That's when relations were really good. And so anyway, they gave us a little place and there was just a little room and there were two single beds and very, very basic.

It was a bedside table and just a little light hanging from the ceiling which was just a little bulb on its own.

And my girlfriend, she just fell on the bed and fell fast asleep. But I was tossing and turning all night and I just couldn't get to sleep.

I felt so sick, I felt ashamed of who I was and I didn't know what to do. And so just trying to find some sort of magazine or game or something,

I opened up the little table next to my bed and there was a book there.

And so I began to read it and the book changed my life. And the book was

Give Me This Mountain, the autobiography of Dr. Helen Roosevelt. And his life changed direction.

He trusted the Lord. And I say to the kids in the assembly when I do it, I say, how do you explain that?

There are so many circumstances and chances and yet God used it.

And it's stories like that that mean, one, I read biography but two,

I believe in the power of the book. It may end up in a Goodwill store. It may end up in the

British embassy in some far -flung country that a druggie who's violently ill will read.

And God can ransom a soul through it. Wow, what a great story. Did she tell you that in person?

She did, yeah. Wow, that's so cool, man. Well, the rest of the episode is gonna be downhill from there, you know?

So hey, let's do a little, let's call it a little audible. Instead of doing this back and forth thing, which will probably take forever and we'll probably end up like sitting here thinking, oh, what about this book?

What about that book? A while ago, Room for Nuance put out a list of the 100 greatest

Christian books of all time. Yes. Let's walk through that together. All right. We'll just do brief thoughts on it and then you'll tell us if the book is available on tenofthose .com.

Okay. And we're not gonna highlight every one of them. Yeah. Okay. Number 99, Heaven by Randy Alcorn.

Have you read that? I have, yeah. Yeah, would you commend it? I would. What I would say though is read

Heaven for Kids because you'll get most of what he says. Yes. But he does it through questions for the kids book because Randy's book is what, 720 pages or so?

And - I've used it as a doorstop. Yeah, I didn't agree with everything, but I learned a lot. And I think most from it, it raised more questions, which actually were good and helpful and challenging because there are some things that we just don't know and yet some things that we can perhaps tease out.

But the questions book for kids is very helpful. And is that available on tenofthose .com? Nice. Have you ever read

Tortured for Christ by Richard Wurmbrand? Richard Wurmbrand, yeah. Very good. I'm probably not available on your website, but -

No, I believe it is, yeah. Wow, look at that. Yeah, I read that as an early Christian and it just brought to life to me the reality of persecution that our brothers and sisters face.

Obviously, they're not all going to be as extreme as that, but I didn't even know that that was a thing. Yeah, I think in that book, the challenge is one, his belief in the authority of scripture and sacrifice.

Those two things just come through, the sort of self -denial for the glory of Christ. Yeah, that's right, brother.

Evidence that Demands a Verdict. Yeah, I've never actually read it. That is another big tome, isn't it? Yeah. I've never actually read it.

I've read stripped down chapters of it, but - Yeah, that's like evidential apologetics. You know, look at all the prophecies fulfilled.

You know, here's the reason why you can trust the Bible. Here's the reason why you can believe that Christ actually resurrected from the grave.

It's all very good. It seems dated. It seems like even since the time I got saved, nearly 20 years ago, or I guess actually exactly 20 years ago, people don't reference it anymore, but it seems like it was much referenced back in the day.

Oh, an unbelievable sort of, it was the kind of equivalent of gentle and lowly of that era, but in terms of evangelism apologetics.

Sean McDowell, his son, I think has just done a revised version with him. So yeah. That's great.

I would love to get them on the show, by the way. Yeah. What is the gospel? This was number 94 on the list.

Greg Gilbert. What is the gospel by Greg Gilbert. Yeah. Really helpful. Was he on this podcast?

Yeah, he did an episode with us. I think he said that he wanted it to be evangelistic, and yet it's -

No, no, no. He wanted it to be for discipleship, and it ended up being, yeah, yeah. Yeah, because I would agree with him. I think it is better for Christians.

Now, that's coming from a British culture and context where biblical ignorance is rocket high.

And so I definitely feel that it's much more for Christians. Though I think where there's a churched culture, like you have still in the

States a little bit - Right. It does a different kind of evangelism. I think they're refurbishing that one.

They're kind of updating some of the references. I know you had Justin Taylor on. This would be my plea to Crossway.

If you want to get that out evangelistically, shrink wrap it in a pack of 10 and make it paperback.

You've made your money from it. Sell it for $15 for a pack of 10. I'm with you.

And I want to add to that. This may seem kind of an obscure point to make, but I can't take what is the gospel into the jail.

Because it's hardback. Because it's hardback. So put it out in a soft cover so I can get it into prisons and jails. Yes, we will clip that.

And we will send that directly to Justin Taylor. Justin, if you listen, I love you, brother. Yeah, no, it's a great idea.

Number 93 on the list, Passion and Purity by Elizabeth Elliott. Have you read it? I have read it. Okay, probably a while ago.

I probably need to read it more. Interesting. Cool, this could be a whole episode.

I think we have kissed dating books goodbye. Nobody will touch it because they are scared.

And yet, teens, students that we are seeking to point to Christ, where do they turn for advice on how to be godly in their relationships?

I messed up massively. And I had loads of books. And now there's nothing.

I'll go a step further, if I may. I feel that the people who are talking about it are, and we need their voice in it.

We need to hear what they're saying. But they are usually people who have, Christians who struggle with same -sex attraction.

Heterosexual Christians are not talking about this issue. And we desperately need them to. Yeah, that's right.

Yeah, so what was once like a massive phenomenon, kissing dating, I kissed dating goodbye, is now kind of dead.

I think like the Canon Press, Doug Wilson World is doing that. I don't agree with their,

I don't want us to call it courtship legalism, but there's very strict view on courtship as biblical.

So we need more options for that. We need a breadth of opinion.

Yeah. Because the problem with the sort of phenomenon of I kissed dating goodbye was, it was one guy who was young, and it kind of, but actually if we had, multi -authored books generally don't sell.

But on this topic, I would say it could be hugely helpful to have a breadth of opinion that is all rooted on holiness and godliness.

I love it, brother. It would be great to see it happen. We're going to clip that one too. Delighting in the

Trinity, we put as number 92. Just a book to not just merely analyze

God as Trinity, but to actually enjoy God as Trinity. Another similar book, which is not on the list, is

Friendship with God by Mike McKinley, which was his adaptation of John Owen's Communion with God.

Good, have you read either one of those? I've read both of them. I didn't agree with everything in Friendship with God, but Delighting in the

Trinity by Reeves helped reframe my view of God as Father, and I'm really thankful for that.

And that's on 10ofthose .com. Both of them are, yeah. There we go. Number 90 on the list, Valley of Vision.

Yeah, do you know, you can clip this. Say it. I've just never got on with it.

I've found it really hard. I find the prayers are often just,

I find them very heavy, and yeah, just never really. Just more into light prayers, just kind of superficial.

That's right. Yeah, short prayers like Jesus told us to pray. Amen, brother. Yeah, moving on.

I love that you were willing to say that there. Okay, this was 89. I said we weren't going to go through all of them individually, but man, it's so hard because there's so many good ones.

I just put the whole series - It's yours. Rebel to your will. How's that get on there? It would be higher up than that.

It'd be a little higher up. Yeah, it'd be number one. 2 ,000 Years of Christ's Power by Nick Needham.

Yeah, I haven't read every word, but yeah. I think now - Five volumes. I think

I kind of petered out on the fourth volume, came back in the fifth volume, but the first three alone. Yeah, and a different sort of book.

You're not going to sit on the beach and read that. Speak for yourself. Yeah, but yeah, it's a different type of reading, but deeply valuable.

And to have an understanding of church history, I think is very, very important. Another book that's going to come up later, we'll just talk about it now.

The Unquenchable Flame by Michael Reeves. Yeah. Takes church history and makes it fun. Yeah. Nick Needham's makes it accessible, both of which you tend to not find in history writing.

You talked about humor earlier, like you don't often laugh out loud with church history. Nick Needham will make you laugh out loud.

And Michael Reeves too, man. When he talks about some of the early Anabaptist stuff, I mean, dude, I'm just rolling.

But it's dry because he's a Brit. Yeah, it's very true. Yeah, so both of those are available on 10ofthose .com.

Ooh, 86, Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God by J .I. Packer. Yeah. I haven't actually read it.

Okay, well, I have, let me tell you about it. This is the book that you give to people when they go, well, what about John 3 .16?

I mean, you can sit down with them and you can like have a Bible study and I've done that a hundred times, literally. Or you can say, hey, if you're really, if you're really, this is the book that I give to people who

I think are on the edge of seeing Reformed soteriology in scripture, but they're just trying to figure out how the pieces fit together.

J .I. Packer comes along and he goes, oh, here, let me help you with that. And it's not a big book. It's, I think a hundred, if it's more than a hundred pages.

It's not big, but it's expensive, but yes. Is it expensive? It is expensive. And you guys sell it? We do, yeah. Okay, but absolutely superb.

I mean, if there's like a book on Reformed, if there's like a canon of books that you have to read to get acquainted with Reformed theology,

I would definitely say like this, this has to be in the top five, you know? Okay. The Gospel According to Jesus by John MacArthur.

Have you read that? No, I haven't, no. Okay. Here's a book that people are kind of poo -pooing on lately, but I have it as number 80,

Radical by David Platt. Yeah. What do you think about that? Should we, should we, should we poo -poo on this book now?

I personally wouldn't. We sell it, and I would encourage, I would encourage people to read it, definitely.

I wouldn't, we wouldn't sell it if we weren't thinking it was something people should read. Why are they poo -pooing it? Well, they say that he's selling a vision of the

Christian life that is too radical, you know? Michael Horton wrote, and they marketed this exceptionally well.

The ordinary. The ordinary thing with the same color scheme and everything. And his whole thing is like, yeah, but what about the verses that say, aspire to live peaceful, quiet lives, work with your hands?

But you have to understand the context that Platt was writing in, you know? He was writing in one of the wealthiest churches in one of the wealthiest parts of Birmingham, where everyone's driving a

Mercedes into this multimillion dollar building every Sunday for church, and he's seeing people just content to live the American dream.

And he's like, yo, there's a part of the Bible that's supposed to confront you on that. Yeah. And isn't this, we see this so often in scripture,

I think, of this tension of two that are, they're equally right at the same time.

And that is good and right. And so yes, live at peace as much as you're able.

But equally, you see injustice, or you see somebody heading to hell, live a radical life.

Like, you cannot be ordinary when you know people are going to spend eternity in a place that is going to be the worst, away from God.

We can't do ordinary for that. Now, does that mean that we're kind of some like, off the chart, kind of all the time?

No, we can't do that either. But there is, so there's this tension of times where we will be radical.

And there's times we'll be ordinary and we'll live at peace. And so, can we go for both of them?

Yeah, I think we can, and we should. Number 76 on the list, The Biggest Story by Kevin DeYoung.

I think The Biggest Story Bible Storybook is far superior. We've read it three times now as a family.

Are you talking about the short one or the large one? The large one. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, so The Biggest Story was the first one that came out, and then it is

A to Z of the board book. And then that Bible is, I just think, superb.

And I would encourage families, if you've read The Jesus Storybook Bible, or you've read The Beginner's Gospel Story Bible, there'd be two that I really recommend to start with and that graduate onto Kevin's biggest story.

Outstanding. We read it for an entire year in our family devotionals. Accessible, bite -size. If you are not a fan of Second Commandment violations, if you think pictures of Jesus are, there are none of those in the book.

So, beautifully illustrated. Anytime they go on sale for like half off,

I just buy 10. All right, drop us a line. We'll look after you. I just buy them and I give them away.

And yes, it is for the children in our church, but it's also for the parents. As a parent, you learn loads through it.

And I think in his writing, you can tell he's got kids because it's not turgid. He's got a fun sense of humor.

Back to that thing of like, you make a connection as you make people smile. And our kids have learned tons through that.

Conscience by Andy Naselli. Have you read this? Yeah, I have, yeah. I think it's his best book. I mean, yes, he's written, he's now becoming more prolific.

He's writing a lot, but that's the book that he's written that it really can be a paradigm shift for you.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I really like it. Preaching and Preachers by Martin Lloyd -Jones. I've never read it.

Okay, well, if you have a bathtub in your house, you're carnal. Okay. Okay. Oh, this is good.

A hymnal, the Trinity hymnal. Do you guys sell hymnals? No, not really. How come? Most of it has moved online, though Keith and Kristen Getty are doing a hymnal next year, and so we will be selling that because we distribute for them.

Okay, good. 71, Gentle and Lowly by Dane Orland. Should that be higher? In some ways, what

I would say is, put it wherever you, the reader, put it. I gotta say,

I found it really difficult. I didn't hugely enjoy it. A lot of people did.

I've heard that from a lot of people. What I would say, though, is having read it and then having read Deeper, Deeper did my heart so much good.

But I think it probably helped me more that I had read Gentle and Lowly first to have read Deeper. But this is the thing with books, you know, they are subjective.

And what is one person's kind of, oh, number one, is another number's 82 for somebody else.

In some ways, that's where I'd say, you know, we are different personalities. We're different characters.

We're different education levels. Reading levels, time levels, even financial levels, because these cost, not from 10 of those, but these cost a lot of money.

It's why I'm slightly nervous about reading lists, because the reading list of Sean 18 years ago is very different to the reading list today.

And that's okay. And so let's not undermine Sean 18 years ago to what you're reading today.

But yeah, put it where you like. Okay, all right. The Rise and Triumph of the

Modern Self by Carl Truman. Yeah. Yeah. I haven't read it all. It's a big old book. Did you read the popularized version of it?

Yeah, I just felt it lacked Christ a bit. But I do think it is, it's worth reading.

All right, Carl Truman, not into Jesus, noted. Hi, Carl. Yeah, I felt he just could have had a bit more of Christ in it, though we do sell it.

I think it's helpful. It was more sociology and history than theology. He got there for, what, give him credit for those last 10 pages, man, you know?

And it was endorsed by Ben Shapiro, that should tell you. And in terms of accent and talking, yeah, in terms of accent and talking, cool, he nails it.

He really does. I could listen to him and I am a Brit. I could listen to him all day.

Oh, I hear you. You hear me? Let's skip, skip, skip.

Ooh, number 65, The Reformed Pastor by Richard Baxter. You don't like it. I can see it on your face.

Go ahead, man, tell us why. I'll save that conversation for another time. Okay, 63, The Christian Ministry by Charles Bridges.

Yeah, no, I haven't read that. We gave it away at T4G a few years ago at Mark Dever's request, but no,

I haven't read it. Okay, and are you a pastor? No. Okay, well then, listen, it really is for pastors.

If you're an aspiring pastor and you're listening to this, this is the kind of book you can't sit and read all at once.

You don't read Charles Bridges all at once. You'll be eaten alive. You read like a few pages a day or you read a whole chapter a week and you take the time to reflect on it.

He's also historically situated as he's writing and that affects the way that he deals with certain issues and that may not translate.

Like race, is that what you mean? No, no, no, no, no, no. Okay. Yeah, yeah, ignore the racism, but the rest of this stuff is super good.

We'll go on, like what? Yeah, so, you know, he says things like, don't spend too much time gardening.

Like that's a carnal affair. Yeah, yeah. Or, you know, he's in a situation. I'm not going to read it because you've just hit my love.

He's in a situation where a lot of people want to get into the ministry in England because they know financially that they'll be taken care of for the rest of their lives.

Yeah, house, a pension. That's right. So the way he talks about remuneration in there doesn't apply to my context, but I can understand why in his context he would say that, you know, so.

Um, Reform Dogmatics by Herman Bavink. Yeah. I've not read all of Bavink, and I think a lot of people that say they have probably haven't.

He's kind of become the cool guy. When they say they've read Bavink, what they mean is they've read his last name.

And they're probably like me saying it wrong most of the time. I used to say Bavnik. There you go.

Um, okay. Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices by Thomas Brooks, number 56.

Yeah, um, I read it probably 10, 12 years ago, so it's a long time since I've read it.

But just good classic Puritan. Is it available on 10 of those? It is. Of course it is. Okay, what about this one?

It's gonna, this one I bet you don't sell. The Complete Works of George Herbert.

We don't sell it, but if you want it, drop me a line and we can get it for you. Are you a fan of poetry? I'm not, but my wife absolutely loves it.

In fact, she's got a master's in it. I didn't know you could do that, get a master's in poetry. I thought you meant get away.

I can, believe it or not. You can, believe it or not. God is a God of miracles. All right, 52. The Gospel According to John by D .A.

Carson. It's his commentary on John. Yeah, the pillar commentary. Maybe the most popular commentary on the Gospel of John?

Yeah, and certainly in that series, the pillar series, yeah. Yeah, I mean, he's, we love

D .A. Carson. Number 50, the MacArthur Study Bible. Yeah. Are you a study Bible guy?

Yes and no. I think there's a danger of a one -man study

Bible, because the danger is you get the Bible through the eyes of that person.

And so that's why I am more in favor of committee study Bibles like an

ESV or an NIV rather than a one -man. You know, the new NIV, I guess it's not that new anymore.

But the NIV study Bible that came out after the ESV study Bible, because I'm super reformed.

I was like, you know, ESV, ESV. And then the NIV came out. I was like, wow, wow, wow.

And it's Carson and Moo. It's like, they're okay. Yeah, they're fine, whatever. But it's superb.

Yeah. Like it's, in some ways, much better than the ESV. Yeah. Yeah, but don't tell anybody I said that. I really like the

Gospel Transformation Bible. The way I describe it is the

Jesus Storybook Bible as a study Bible. So wherever you're reading a scripture, you know, how can you pull on this thread and see a gospel line?

But it is, yeah, it's a shorter study Bible because it's just looking at that rather than. I think Greg Gilbert came out with the

Epic Story study Bible where he basically just helps you make biblical theological connections.

I think they were the notes from the Transformation Bible put into a book. Oh, really? Yeah. I did not know that.

I believe that's true, yeah. There we go. Okay, big fan of biographies. Yes. Number 46 on the list,

To the Golden Shore by Courtney Anderson. You're going to ask this. I haven't actually read it, but it is a stage plug at Cross in six weeks time.

So I need to have finished it by then. Because you won't plug a book unless you've read it?

Correct, yeah. So were you going to read it before then? Yeah. Prepare to have your mind blown. Well, I'm looking forward to it.

But yeah, I need to have done it before then. Because yeah, when we stand up at a conference or a church and we recommend books,

I want to recommend what I believe in. And to believe in it, I need to know what it's saying.

And so, yeah, it's going to be in these next few weeks. There you go. Here I Stand by Roland Banton.

Kind of the original Martin Luther go -to biography. Yeah, I haven't read it. Okay. Letters of John Newton by John Newton.

Yeah, I haven't read all of it though. I've read some of his letters, but yeah.

Let's move up the list a little bit. Number 38, Chosen by God, R .C. Stroll. I haven't read it.

Okay, this is one of those books where if somebody's wrestling with reformed theology, you just give them this book.

I mean, it's a little different than what I was saying earlier. The J .I.

Packer Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God is kind of like, what do you do with John 3 .16? Or what do you do with He Desires That None Should Perish?

Or what do you do about limited atonement? You know, like if you're really struggling with that. This is the book, just what do you do about predestination?

What do you do about election? R .C. Stroll clearly, powerfully, biblically just walks you through the doctrines of grace.

And by the way, are you reformed? Uh, so reformed is an interesting word. Because in the UK it means something different.

Reformed soteriology. I wouldn't be a five -point calculus. You're not, okay. No. Well, but we still love you, brother. I do believe the

Bible. Amen, there you go. So it is, and even if you disagree with it, even if you disagree with some of the arguments he's making, you're going to walk away understanding grace greater than our sin, more than you did before.

And I absolutely believe that. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, you're going to say something else? Well, let's move on.

Okay, we'll move on. No, I'm just kidding, go ahead. No, like when people say, are you this?

Are you that? I'm nervous with that because, you know, what are the things?

I think we, 10 of those have, from some people, they think they're this.

And they never do what you just did and said, well, what do you believe? And so that's why

I'm nervous to say, well, I'm this or that. So to say you're reformed or not, that can mean one thing in America, it can mean a totally different thing in the

UK. And so I prefer to kind of have the opportunity to say what

I do believe. Which is Arminianism. Not at all, no. I don't believe that either.

But what I would encourage people, because I say this to myself as well, this isn't just to other people, but if you think somebody is something, go and ask them.

What do you mean by that? Yeah, it's such a good question. And, okay, so that's what you mean.

How does that work its way out? So how does that impact your

Bible reading? How does that impact your evangelism? And let them explain rather than you assume.

And I think it sometimes hurts when people assume, oh, he just said he wasn't reformed.

Why is he even on this podcast? And that is where people go. And yet just take the moment to say, okay, well, what does he believe?

He just said where there's sin, there's more grace. I can get on board with that. So that's what

I would encourage. All right, number 37, The Bruise Read by Richard Sibbes.

Yeah, I find Sibbes harder than Michael Reeves does. I do too. Yeah. The guy who discipled me,

Mark Dever, he's, you know, Sibbes this, Sibbes that. I always struggle with him. I think the first third of The Bruise Read is phenomenal.

The last two thirds, kind of like wrap it up, brother. Yeah, well, and on that, I would encourage people, if you're reading a book where that's the position, move on.

There's no law that says you have to finish the book. The books are there to serve you, not to rule you. And so if kind of trudging through that, now discipline is a good thing, but if trudging through that is stopping you reading something else that's going to be more helpful, give it up and move on.

Yes, and life is short. Yeah. And you know what? Maybe it's just this point in your life where you,

I mean, have you ever tried to read a book and you're like, ah, what is this? I can't get into it. And then you go back to it five years later and you're like, this book is amazing.

Yeah, because I wasn't ready for it. I wasn't mature enough. I was in the wrong place. I didn't give it the attention it needed, whatever. Yeah, totally.

Or the books can just be objectively bad and you should just move on. So like Lord of the Rings, you know what

I'm saying? Yeah, I do. Dude, the elves and the languages and Luke gets it.

Okay, number 35, The Weight of Glory by C .S. Lewis. No, to be honest, the only

Lewis I've read is Screwtape Letters and one volume of Narnia. Well, then let's replace this one.

Let's talk about the Screwtape Letters. A fan? I am a fan. I think it's extremely clever.

And if book writing is to help the reader think and consider, he nails it.

There's an audiobook version of the Screwtape Letters, which is absolutely phenomenal. You get a good voice actor like Andy Serkis from Lord of the

Rings. Maybe the best thing about Lord of the Rings. He's in a dramatized version of the Screwtape Letters where he is

Screwtape. Look at Luke perk up. You mentioned Lord of the Rings and he's all in.

Yeah, so Andy Serkis narrating the

Screwtape Letters worth our time. Okay. Just to say Audible is owned by Amazon.

Don't forget that. Oh, gosh. Okay. Spotify is excellent. Are they though?

Yeah. A bunch of liberal Swedes. Yeah, maybe not. I don't know if they're Swedish or not. Number 34,

The Hiding Place by Corey Ten Boom. Brother, I can see it on your face. Let's go. I'll just,

I'll give you one line from it. There is no pit so deep that God's love is not deeper still.

That is something R .C. Sproul and I can agree on. The Flea Story, which we're not going to do it.

I know, let's not ruin it. I don't want to spoil it, but yeah, yeah. Just for nothing else but The Flea Story. Have you ever seen the movie? No, I can't do that.

Is it good? Should I try it? It is. I mean, it's 1985, 89 type thing, but really.

No way. The book's so good. I can't take the chance of it ruining it for me. And let me just say, if you've got young readers or non -readers in your church,

Baker have just brought out a visual graphic novel of it. Brilliant.

Really? Yeah. Okay, good. Send me a link to that later. Like prison work. You should try and persuade them to get that into paperback because that is a great, great book.

That's so cool. Oh, did I say it's on 10ofthose .com? 10ofthose .com. Okay, I did. 33.

This guy's not, this guy's not reformed. So you're going to be totally into this. See, the category is reformed.

Or non -Christian. You qualify it all you want, all right? You do not live in an atonement.

You are many in the me, my friend. That's kind of like how I am with geography. If it's not Canada or Mexico, I don't know about it, you know?

Yes. Okay, The Pursuit of God by A .W. Tozer. Yeah, Tozer's an interesting one, isn't he?

What do you think? The most important thing that you can think is what comes into your mind when you think about God.

That's Tozer. That is Tozer. His, some of his theology stuff can get a little wonky.

A little, not a lot. And some of his critiques of the American church, I think can be overly harsh in such a way that I don't think if he were writing to the church at Corinth, he would recognize them as a church, even though the

Apostle Paul does. Nevertheless, his relentless push for us to pursue

God, right there on the title, you know, is something that I think I'm always going to be refreshed by.

I'm always going to need. And so it's a ministry that I largely appreciate. What do you make of his sort of mysticism?

I'm not a fan. No? No. But would you recommend Tozer? Well, it's on your list. It's, you would recommend it.

Well, the term greatest was used on purpose, not best. For clickbait.

Yeah, that's right. I think you have to have a sort of matrix that includes impact.

Yeah. It can't be impact devoid of good, or else we'd have heretical books on here. But if people are basically

Christians and they're writing books that are basically Christian, and they've had a significant impact, I think they at least have to be considered, which is why number 100, and that's on purpose, on the list was

The Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren. Rick has since gotten even crazier and even worse, and I would never give away one of his books, and I would not recommend his ministry.

And I think his speech on the floor of the Southern Baptist Convention recently was evident of tremendous spiritual pride.

I think the decision that he's made to promote, and let me just keep going, to promote a movement in the

SPC for female pastors is abominable. It's out of sync with God's word. And I don't think because of 1

Corinthians that he should be recognized. Nevertheless, that book is more good than bad.

And it's basically, John Piper read it and made the decision to invite him to come speak at his pastor's conference.

This is one of those books where everywhere I go, I know someone who got saved from something related to The Purpose Driven Life.

I hear like Paul Washer, John MacArthur, John Piper, and The Purpose Driven Life.

Anyways, I'm rambling. No, it is interesting. And I think for pastors listening, it is really important to know what your congregation are reading and for you to read it.

So 20 years ago, you would have needed to read it. Totally, yeah. And today, it's

Jesus Calling. I was, can I tell you this? I was at a Shepherds Conference spinoff.

We're providing the bookstore for it. And the first book I was asked for was Jesus Calling. And you think, oh, this environment, you know, probably, you know, they're going to know that that isn't first book.

Hey, do you have Sarah Young's new one? No, we don't. And let me like gently explain why.

Actually, I think that's probably for females. The newer version of that, I think, is John Mark Comer.

Yeah, now he's interesting because he uses toes as a sort of - Well, he'll use whoever.

He'll quote anybody. He'll quote Satan if he thinks it'll be a clever way to make his point. Yeah, yeah.

Wyatt Graham has recently come out with an article doing a survey of his theology.

And I think he's spot on. So do you guys sell his books? I found his thing.

Oh, John Mark Comer. Yeah. We have done in the past. And I've read them myself or had one of our team carefully review them.

I think we're nervous of selling him now. And so there's a cautiousness there.

Yeah, good. Christianity and Liberalism by J.

Gresham Machen. I haven't read it. Okay. He has this great analogy where he says, liberal

Christianity is like a taxidermied animal. In so many ways, it looks like the real thing, but on the inside, it's not alive.

It's just full of fluff. It's one of those books that it was written at a certain point in history where you would think it would only be relevant to that point.

But if you read it carefully in light of what's going on, you just see it's just as relevant today as it was back then.

Sadly, yeah. Yes, sadly, that's right. Okay, what about, we talked about this one earlier a little bit.

Oh, maybe you didn't mention this one. 31, Through the Gates of Splendor by Elizabeth Elliott. Yeah, I didn't mention it, but yeah,

I love it. I would encourage college students to read that and just prayerfully consider what they can learn from what they read.

Best quote from that book, he is no fool to give up what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.

Yeah, by Jim Elliott. Number 30, Shepherding a Child's Heart by Ted Tripp. Yeah, don't apply everything that I read in there, but yeah, very, very good book.

The Cross of Christ by John Stott. He's a Brit, you're gonna like this. He is a Brit. Yeah, I never finished it actually, but he is unbelievable.

He was one of those rare people who equally good as a preacher and a writer. That is very rare.

So yeah. The Whole Bible Commentary, number 27 by Matthew Henry. Do you use

Matthew Henry? I haven't personally used him for a long time. I did when I was a youth pastor.

And yeah. Just reliable. And again, to your point of, in terms of books that have made a massive impact, that was really one of the first things that was available on the internet for free.

And yeah, very, very good. Yeah, that's right. The Mortification of Sin by John Owen, number 24.

Yeah. Very difficult to read. Very. Because of the prose, but if you can make it through that, worthwhile? It is worthwhile.

You could do what I do and get somebody like my wife, who's a very good reader to read it to you. I find that helpful.

Nice, okay. I think that's what they call an audio book, but. That's right, yeah. You have a, you married your audio book.

Yeah, I married my audio book. Number 23, Lectures to My Students by Charles Sproul. Yeah. Again, it's not a book that you're going to sit down and read in one go, but I would encourage anybody in ministry to just, in a disciplined way, work through that.

Yeah. Did they read that through in the internship? No, but.

They used to? No, but for our intern class, Mark bought us all copies. Did he buy them?

He did buy them. Did he? Yeah. He just gets them for free, doesn't he? No, he bought these, yeah.

I talked to his, I'm not even guessing, I talked to his assistant about this. I like that. Yeah, me too, yeah.

Mark's the kind of guy, whether it's in the budget or not, if there's a book that somebody needs, he's going to get it to them, you know?

He's not been on Room for New Art, has he? No. Is that a sore point? Yeah. I would say,

I think you'd agree. In terms of Christian discipleship,

I don't know of anyone else in the Western world that has done more for one -on -one discipleship than he has in the last 30 years.

Yeah, however, whatever time frame you want to say. In my lifetime, which is only 20 years or so. I was...

You didn't even get it. It was such a silly thing, I just moved past it without acknowledging it. That's what people do with my dad jokes.

They just will try to move the conversation forward. And you're trying to publish them. Yeah, that's right. Is that fair?

I mean, I know he's a dear friend to you. Yeah, no, I think it's more than fair, brother. I would say, I was reading recently

Jeff Chang's Spurgeon the Pastor. Okay, yeah. And on every page, I was like, Mark does that, Mark does that,

Mark does that. And I think he's had the same kind of impact. One of the interesting questions,

I think, is like, who is the Spurgeon of our day? Some people would say MacArthur. Some people would say John MacArthur.

I already said that, sorry. Some people would say John Piper. I would say Mark would throw his... His hat should be thrown in there.

But the area that I specifically would wanna highlight for Mark is the way in which his ministry has impacted ecclesiology.

I mean, I remember 10 years ago in the city where we are recording this episode,

I was trying to find a healthy church in one of the most church cities in America. I was trying to find a healthy church for some friends of ours.

And I had a couple of things in mind, like do they have elders and this, that, and the third. And I found like one.

I found another one that was Presbyterian, but that was off the table. So there was a Presbyterian church that was otherwise healthy, but off the table.

And then one. Bro, there are like 20 churches in our city now who ecclesiologically are very sound.

And I think that's owing almost entirely to 9Marks and the way God has used them. But I would go a step further to say, so I agree with you, but the impact has come through his love and dedication for individuals.

Yes, I agree. Which has then spread what he then teaches because to that point of the love of disciples and then because they know his love for them, they listen to what he says and it spreads.

It really is evidence of the power of finding the few right people to pour into.

They just came out with an episode of pastors talk today on the internship program there.

I was listening to it on my run this morning. And he says one of the things that he considers when choosing an intern is, is this going to be the kind of person who will try to influence others for good?

So he's not just going, do you love Jesus? Do you want to be a pastor, right? He's even above that looking for guys who like,

I think that this guy will be a multiplier. Are you going to pass it on? So I'm going to pass it on to him because I trust that he...

Listen, it's worth investing in a guy who will only invest in two other guys. But if I can invest it in a guy who's going to invest it in a hundred other guys, you know, then that's probably more worth it.

And I wonder how he obviously doesn't know for sure, but I wonder how he discerns that. That is a fascinating question.

If only Mark would come on this podcast, you could ask him. If only he would. Come on, Luke, pull those strings.

Let's move on. Yeah, there is, I think it's probably intuitional.

And when you've been doing it for so long, your antennas are just probably really sensitive, and his track record, imperfect, because remember, he's a human being and all.

But his track record on choosing guys who will then go on and influence other people is tremendous.

Well, the guy who discipled me at college, he was an intern at Capitol Hill. And yeah, so thankful for that.

Yeah, praise God for that. Number 21, The Prodigal God by Timothy Keller. Yeah, I mean, is it 10, 12 years now?

I didn't love it when it came out. I just kind of thought, I'm not sure this is as new as everybody thinks it is, but it had a massive impact, huge impact.

Yeah, I have come to love it more every time I consider it. I've only read it twice.

It's one of the few books I would consider a reread. But Keller was clear to say, like,

I just got this from Edmund Clowney. I find it particularly useful in my context, where one night

I might be in the jail, and I'm addressing the younger brother. And the other night I might be, or the next morning

I might be teaching a homeschool class, and I'm addressing the older brother. And the more I read scripture, like I'm, okay, so I'm in Romans.

I'm preaching through Romans right now. Romans one, just obvious rebellion, all these exchanges, you know, the glory of God for the glory of creation, truth for a lie.

He's talking about homosexuality, and then he lists these 21 deeds. And then in chapter two, he goes to the

Jew, the older brother, and he's like, and don't you think that you are exempt from this either? So the more

I look, the more I see how this paradigm is actually all over the

Bible. I don't know who said it, but from that passage, somebody once said, when

God rescues, he always runs. And when God judges, he always walks.

Slow to judge, runs to rescue. I love that. You're talking about the father runs to his son, which would have been very undignified.

Totally, yeah. But walks to judgment. Are you a fan of the Book of Common Prayer? No, because, well, only personally.

In terms of its content, yes. But I don't like routine. I'm kind of here, there, and everywhere.

And so, yeah. You're my spirit animal. Yeah. Same, buddy. The Cost of Discipleship, number 20 by Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

I would encourage people to read it, yeah. I have nine marks here at number 18. Yep. Talking about books that change as you change.

I remember the first time somebody gave me a copy of Nine Marks. I was at a church that was basically sound.

Yep. Ecclesiology wasn't great. And I was struggling to figure out, like, oh, why do

I feel like something's off here? You know? And he gave me the book and I read it and I was like, eh, you know, like expositional preaching, great.

You know, but there was stuff in there, like I didn't understand the whole biblical theology thing. Yeah. And then

I ended up moving to D .C. And as a member, I joined Capitol Hill Baptist Church.

And the book came to life to me, you know? Like you had to, you have to. And so anyways, the point that I want to make with that is, you can give books to people, but sometimes they have to breathe in the air of the atmosphere that they're reading about in the book.

They got to be on the planet. Reading about the planet isn't enough. I cannot tell you how often I've tried to talk to people about congregational singing and they just don't get it.

They don't see it until they experience it. Yes. You know? Yeah. And many other things. Yeah. Congregational singing is an interesting one.

I feel that it is weaker than I've ever known it.

And I don't understand that, because if our theology is better, is clearer, we've got all these books, and yet, my honest pneumonia, it's like, come on.

Brother, you got to come to Sixth Avenue one Sunday. All right. So I was recently - I'll sing out a tune.

It will be a noise rather than a - You'll stand right next to me and we'll be singing off key together. We, I was on a sabbatical recently.

I had 12 weeks off, thanks to the kindness of my church. And I resolved to visit different churches every week.

Yeah. And I was blown away at how little singing there was in these churches.

Expositional preaching, elders, you know. Prayer was kind of hit or miss. That's another thing that's kind of lacking in otherwise healthy churches.

Praise God that we've made so much progress on expositional preaching. So I don't want to denigrate any of that. But another manuscript that I sent you that you haven't responded to the email about is fine.

It's totally fine. I wrote a book on congregational singing. Okay. And we hold conferences, one -day worship conferences.

And we're trying to do everything we can to get churches to sing more, to sing better. I mean, it's another thing

Mark has championed. I mean, it helps you can sing, but. Yeah, I agree. Okay.

Hey, you're hanging in there. We're doing great. Here's kind of a deep cut, a difficult read.

Maybe for someone with dyslexia, a 10 times difficult read. Number 16, The Religious Affections by Jonathan Edwards.

Yeah, I did give it a go. I didn't get very far, I'll be honest, but. Well, since you didn't finish that one, let me encourage you to check this book out.

It's by Ben Stevens. Right. He took Jonathan Edwards, the purpose for which God created the world, and he modernized it.

Have you heard of this? It's called Why God Created the World. Okay. You can see just what he did with the title.

Yes, PNR do it, I think, do they? Okay, I don't know. I think it's PNR. All I know is

I wish somebody would do that with every Jonathan Edwards book, because it is so easy to read and he doesn't sacrifice any of the logical precision and biblical rigidity that Edwards employs.

Yeah. All right, I'll take a look. I love, a bunch of people are doing that. So McKinley with the

Friendship with God book. I think Justin Taylor and Kelly Capik did that with Owens, Mortification of Sin.

And who did it with Contentment? Again, I think it's a PNR book. They took, what is the book on contentment?

Anyway, similar sort of thing. It is helpful because language does change. Yeah, there's rich theology in it.

Yeah, Lord, raise up more men and women who are doing that kind of good work. Who can understand the puritans and change it for us.

All right, number 15, Don't Waste Your Life by John Piper. Yeah, I think chapter five is outstanding.

I love that Crossway have done that as just a one chapter thing. Again, I would, so it's called

Risk is Right and that's the name of the chapter and it's his seashells talk basically put into a chapter.

Yeah. Okay, number 14, The Bondage of the Will by Martin Luther. I haven't read it. A shockingly fun read.

Really? Yeah, man, you know, Luther is his greatest strength. He had a sense of humor. He did. Greatest strength, greatest weakness.

Sometimes he will just come out swinging on something like in his altercation with Zwingli about the

Lord's supper and you're like, whoa, dude, calm down. This is totally unnecessary. But then he'll do it on the question of like the human will and who's actually in control, is it

God or you? And dude, he knocks it out of the park. Mark Dever actually used to read this as part of, he used to be a youth leader.

Right. And so he would take his youth group and he would read sections of it to him and you think only Mark Dever? Yeah. Well, I've read it again since hearing that story and I'm like, actually, dude,

I could see myself doing that. Okay, here we go. I'm going to put two holiness books back to back.

13, The Holiness of God by R .C. Sproul. You read it? Yeah, well, not all of it. Okay, you started, you couldn't finish it.

And then number 12, Holiness by J .C. Ryle. Yeah, I mean, Ryle would be my favorite.

I'd probably, in between those, I would put in Kevin Young's Holiness. Yeah, addressing contemporary concerns.

Yeah, and I think he just does a great job of kind of the fundamentals of Ryle putting it in.

I think for Sproul, it was more just, I'd read Ryle first and so it was kind of, yeah,

I just didn't feel it was kind of. Which is another interesting thing about how a book hits you, right? If you've consumed this book before that book, this book may not hit you as hard or like you said earlier, if you read this book first, it might actually prime your pump to get you even more lit up by this other book.

Totally. Yeah. An interesting one with that is Jerry Bridges. So The Pursuit of Holiness and Discipline of Grace.

Yeah. Now, he, I think, said he preferred Discipline of Grace and I'm not surprised, you know.

It's a bit like, so Gentle and Lowly came out first and who wouldn't want that? Gentle and Lowly. Rejoice and Tremble came right afterwards.

That's a bit hard. Yeah, not as popular. But I think Michael Reeves wrote that. He did, yeah. And it's good, but it just is on a, it's a different tone and it's different.

But Pursuit of Holiness, Bridges and then Discipline of Grace, those two together,

I think they should be read together, actually. Yeah, nice. One of the things I didn't say earlier about Dane Ortlund's Deeper, which he's going to be on the show, so I'm excited to have you on.

Make sure he talks about the book he published with us called Surprised by Jesus. I will, if Luke reminds me.

The rare instance where a sequel is as good, if not better, than the original. Yeah.

Yeah. And I think, yeah, I mean, we talked earlier about reading them together. I think Deeper is that theology applied and lived out.

And Dane, he's a talent. He's a very, very helpful writer. Very good.

His little booklet through Nine Marks on Hell is superb. And not easy to, you know, a huge topic like that on what, 40 pages or so?

Greg Gilbert has another little one on Should Women Be Pastors? Again, a very difficult topic that you think there's no way they can get this done in 40 pages.

But he, both of these are just an example of thoroughly subject matter experts who know the subject matter thoroughly.

Yes. Which I just said the same thing twice. I'm not the one to write a good sentence. Your big tome is one sentence, yeah.

But I got done reading Greg Gilbert's little Can Women Be Pastors in the church question series. And I thought, nobody needs to write a longer book than this.

You know, that's how good it was. Okay. And listen, I'm skipping over a lot of big names here, on the

Incarnation by Athanasius. You probably don't have that on 10 of those. Do you know, I think we do, because we do the store for the

Knowing Faith podcast. And I think they recommend it. So yes. Well, there you go. Number nine, Knowing God by J .I.

Packer. Another Brit. Yeah. I'm not sure I'm allowed to say what I'm - No, say it brother.

Let's do it. Cause I got something to say too. I'll just put it like this. We're trying to, we're working with his estate to make an accessible version of that.

That's right in the vein of what I was going to say. I give copies of that book away because it's one of those books, it's in like, when you hear people's testimonies, it's always there.

It's always somewhere around. Like the Lord has used it in a tremendous way. And the fruit that's been born from it has been sustained proven fruit.

But I have found for myself that it's difficult to get through. Yeah. Yeah. I've definitely found that.

We mentioned, you mentioned Cross of Christ earlier. Because it's long, there's a lot of meat in there.

There's a little known UK book called Cross Examined by Mark Maynall who studied under stock that does that for, it's like the high school level of Cross of Christ.

It's called Cross Examined. It's really good. Anytime somebody can dumb something down, I'll probably buy it and read it, you know?

And that's available on 10ofthose .com. Yeah, I don't know whether Cross Examined is available in the US actually, because it's

IVP UK. But yeah, drop us a line, we'll send it to you. Yeah, okay. CS Lewis fan?

No, I mean, I screwed eight letters and none yet. No, it's a bit, it's a bit airy -fairy for me.

Institutes by Calvin? I mean, I've not read it all. I've read sections of it.

I do find those sorts of works hard. Yeah, I do too. Yeah, I still sometimes power through, but I often find them difficult.

You know, one of our questions, you did the rapid fire questions last time. One of them is you're trapped on an island with one psychology.

And people often say the Institutes by Calvin. And I am always shocked by that.

I mean, I appreciate John Calvin. I don't hate him. I think his commentary sometimes can be like a lot of work for a little bit of gold in the bottom of the pan kind of a thing.

But with so many amazing, modern, contemporary systematic theologies, yeah,

I would, especially as a Baptist. Are they saying it because they think they need to? I mean, that's disingenuous. Unkind of me.

They think they're going to get their reform credit up. Sorry, Doug Wilson. Yeah, I think the most unique answer we got was

Ligon Duncan von Maastricht. Right, who gave you that? Ligon Duncan.

Oh, that's what he suggested. Yeah, he was like, yeah. I said, what would be your, you know, systematic theology chapter on Ireland?

He said, von Maastricht. And I said, who? Now, apparently this is the guy that Jonathan Edwards says was like the greatest mind of whatever.

You know, like Jonathan Edwards loves this guy. Like, I trust these guys. They just have a much, much bigger brain than I do.

And I'm not saying that to like, you know, I just, academic work is a struggle for me.

It always was. I spent more time outside of the classroom than inside the classroom because it was a lot more fun outside the classroom.

And that's just where I'm at. But, and that's where I feel like reading, there are some books that you say, you know,

I really want you to get it, but I would, I'd never say every Christian should read this.

Right. Because, you know, poor old dying thief, he didn't get through anything. And so like we do, we want to grow in our reading, but I fear there is a little bit of, everyone's reading this, or I think

I should say that I've read this. And if I don't, basically I've lost my salvation.

Second class Christian citizen. You're telling me you haven't read XYZ. Um, we're in the top five now, by the way.

All right. Number three, Desiring God by John Piper. Yep. That's another hard to get through book. It is. Yeah. Yeah.

He, he has become much more concise as a writer. I heard you say, was this with Justin Taylor that you said in the last few years?

And I think writing is a craft. And so if you don't have a lot of time to give to it, and so, or the opposite, if you have more time to give to it, you will become better.

I'm sure that's, that's true in him. I hope somebody is in his year recommending that he take that book in the same way that Rise and Triumph was simplified and other works have been simplified.

I hope someone is in his year saying, let's take Desiring God, trim it by two thirds and get it into a smaller paperback.

So I think I can say this, all of John's works that have been published in different places have all, the rights have all gone back to John and Desiring God and will now be solely published by Crossway with the exception of,

I think, two. Maybe even those have gone back. So yeah, Ben, just because that's probably how it could happen.

Wow. Praise God. And if you weren't supposed to say that, we're not going to edit it out. Excellent. Again, hi,

Justin. That's right. Number two, Confessions by Augustine. Yeah, I haven't,

I haven't read it. Kind of the original biography, if you will. Yeah. Number one.

You put it there for a reason though. Number two, I mean, that's, I just, there's a lot below it that has had remore.

Yeah. I mean, I think City of God, which is also in this list and Confessions have just done more to shape

Western Christianity than almost any other book outside of the Bible. Yeah, perhaps without realizing that, you know, people today perhaps don't realize in that.

Yeah, that's right. And so when you talk about greatest books, one of the things you want to ask is, well, how many people are reading them?

Well, the people, you may not be reading it, but the people that you like to read were probably formed by reading it, you know?

So now that I'm trying to remember what number one was, I think I know what it is. All right, hit me. Well, is it Pilgrim's Progress?

It is. It's a good memory, dude. Well, it's, I mean, that has, yeah, that has just gone and gone, but yeah.

Well, what do you think about it? I personally like it. I think when authors use allegory like that, it's really helpful, grabs your imagination.

I think the devil actually uses it a lot. You know, we dream of things that kind of have a hint of truth in them, but we, now, where's this going?

Like Pilgrim's Progress, it's not the devil's idea. You know, but I think it can be really helpful to give us a picture of things and using pictures to bring through truth.

Yeah, I mean, we've read it with our kids. We've used the little Pilgrim's Progress one. It was really helpful, so yeah.

Yeah, one of our elders was in a text chain recently with another local pastor.

He texted us, I don't know why he texted us, but he was like, I'm done trying to read Pilgrim's Progress. This is like my third time reading it.

I find it boring, difficult to get through. And our fellow elder, Russell Berger, made fun of him and said, oh, well then maybe get the little, like the little.

Dude, I only will read the little Pilgrim's Progress from here on out. It's like Heaven by Randy Elkhorn.

Get the kids question and answer book. Like, and I think, I know it was kind of a little joke, but I think we've got to get away from the superiority of Christian reading because not everyone's where you are and you weren't there once and that's okay.

And we should encourage people with that. And if that means they read the kids version or the graphic novel version of The Hiding Place to get them going, go for it.

Absolutely. Go for it. And also this should be an exhortation to writers that want to write theology.

You can write in a way that is engaging, entertaining, clear.

And that entertaining does not necessarily mean, I mean, like people, I think in their mind, they think if it's entertaining, it's not godly.

I'm reading a manuscript for Alex Duke's book on Genesis right now. I mean, it is rip roaring good time writing, you know?

And I don't feel like he has been in any way sacrilegious as he's writing this stuff.

So I think theological writers need to do a better job. Listen, I get it. In seminary, you had to write in a very academic style, you know, and that's trained you to write a certain way.

But this is why you also need to be a pastor. You need to learn how to speak to average people. Spend time with people. Absolutely, absolutely.

And the qualities that you just listed there, if your writing isn't that, please don't write because actually it does more damage because people are then getting that book thinking, oh, if this is what

Christian reading is like, it's not for me. And the challenge, and they have a huge responsibility and they do a great job on the whole, but publishers, please don't publish them either because you are harming

Christian reading. Yeah. I understand that if you're writing a treatise on the hypostatic union, you're gonna have to be very precise, very technical, so on and so forth.

But, you know, a lot of the stuff that's out there, you don't need to be that technical. You don't need to be that precise.

You can be more engaging. You know, a good example, going back to Kevin DeYoung, of someone who does high level theology where you do need precision, but he does it in a way that's more accessible than not.

Yeah, it's Kevin DeYoung. Yeah, and on Kevin, you see, Kevin could have published in the last 10 years another 10 or 15 books.

He has the brain and ability and he has a phenomenal work rate. So he does have capacity, which is incredible when he's got,

I think he's got like 144 ,000 children. I think so, yeah. So he could have done it, but he's served the church by not doing it, actually, because it means what he's put out is really top -notch and that actually enables more reading.

And so I'm grateful that actually, as odd as it sounds, that he hasn't just churned out and churned out.

Last question about books. What is your all -time favorite Christian book?

This is not the best. This is for you. What is the book that you think, yeah, I think this is my favorite? That is really hard because I think books do different things at different seasons.

In this season. In this season. Well, two books that I've read recently,

The Lord of Psalm 23 by Gibson. Yeah, I did the audio book. It was very good. Yeah.

But I probably want to say Ed Welch. There's two books of his, one on depression that P &R do, and it's a devotion.

And I would say, I've never met him, but I've met him in his writings.

I've never met somebody who has understood and empathized depression.

Like Ed Welch. But his book. When People Are Big. Well, there's that one, but I was thinking

Created to Draw Near on Priesthood. I remember that kind of stood out to me.

That was probably four or five years ago. But yeah, so I'm reading his one on sort of a devotion for those with depression.

The compassion and understanding of that man is really remarkable and so helpful.

Well, brother, we've taken up enough of your time. Is there anything else you want to say to our viewers or listeners before we wrap it up?

I'm grateful for you and for having me on. I would encourage you to get that J .C. Ryles set. If you can't afford it, jonathanat10ofthos .com

and it's Jonathan spelled the way God spells it in the Bible with an A -N. jonathanat10ofthos .com

We'd just love to get your copy. What we might do, I'll probably end up giving this away at some point because I don't have anywhere to keep it since it's our building burned.

But what we might do when this episode drops is do a giveaway. Let's do it. And we'll say, well, at our expense.

No, no, we'll. Okay, we'll work together. And we'll say whoever shares this episode, you know, we'll say like, you know, share this episode and then we'll pick like two or three people who do share it and give away copies.

Well, we're 10 of those, 10 sets. Well, we'll give 10 sets away, but people really have to get it shared.

Not because there's anything important here, but we want people to be reading good stuff. Yes, yes, yes.

Wow. Praise God. Thank you for your generosity. 10 sets. Don't forget, Luke. How could you?

This dude just blew our face off. All right, let's pray. Lord, thank you so much for Jonathan and his ministry to the broader church through the publishing of good books.

Paul told Timothy to bring the books so we know that they matter. Help us,

Lord, to be the kind of people who take up and read, take up our Bibles and read and then take up other good books that help point us back to the

Bible, that help us understand the Bible, that help us do a better job obeying the Bible, treasuring the

Bible. Lord, we, the men who are sitting here in this room, we know that our lives have been drastically changed for the better by the grace of good books.

We also know that your word says that you give as a gift to the church, teachers, and praise you,

God, that those teachers sometimes write down what they teach and put it in a book so that we can continue to profit from their teaching.

Lord, we pray that you would raise up many more faithful teachers and authors and publishers for the edification of your church and for the glory of your name.