What is it Like Publishing Christian Books? | Justin Taylor

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We are back with another episode of the room for nuance podcast. I'm Sean here with Justin Taylor, Justin.

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Will you open us in prayer brother? Sure Lord, thank you for this day. Your mercies are new this morning.

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We pray that you would be with us by your spirit Pray that we would honor you in this conversation that we would edify anybody who listens we pray this in Jesus name

00:33

Amen Amen, Justin. Can you start off just by giving us? Three to five minute version of your testimony how you came to know the

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Lord. Yeah Grew up in Sioux City, Iowa going to a Methodist Church.

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I Don't know that I heard the gospel a lot from the pulpit, but my mom is the world's greatest evangelical

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Evangelist and she tried to like teach all my Sunday school classes. So Heard the gospel a lot growing up Prayed the sinner's prayer when

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I was six, I don't Maybe the Lord made me born again at that point, but I think that I really understood the gospel at an

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FCA camp in ninth grade between my ninth and tenth grade year and you know the classic questions of If you were to die tonight

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Where would you go? How sure are you that you would be in heaven on what basis would?

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The Lord let you enter in and you know I was like, I think I'd probably get in and I tried to do the right things and I believe in God So just understanding

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Grace understanding imputed righteousness. It was like the lights went on in the room. So Whether I was converted at six or sixteen not a hundred percent.

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Sure Yeah, just know that I love the Lord following him and I think he had his hand upon me

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Wow praise God brother What is an executive vice president of publishing?

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Yeah Publishing a book publishing. Yes crossway books. Okay, it's in Wheaton, Illinois.

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I actually live in Iowa. So I work remotely From there. Have you always done that? No, I was there for a dozen years and I was home

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Our families are there and we relocated back there after COVID during COVID pre COVID Okay, so you were you were ahead of the curve?

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Yeah, and it was a little bit COVID pun by the way Right. Yeah, try to flatten the curve

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Yeah, and it was a little bit more Dicey situation before COVID like can we actually do this?

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Can we make this work especially as a executive vice president But yeah, the

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Lord's Lord's been kind to us. So we have a number of executive vice presidents so there's an executive vice president of of sales and of operations and of the

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Bible publishing side and so I'm overseeing the book publishing side You have managed to not exactly tell me what you do

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You told me that there are other executive vice presidents and what they are over. Yeah I think the easiest way to say it is that that I am in charge of what books we are evaluating and bringing in and Oversee that the publishing committee.

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So the way it works in publishing is You know, you might write a great book and you did write a great book

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You're not paying me to say this but on the plane ride down here read Rebel to your will and really appreciated what you wrote

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So, you know that you didn't just write that book and send it to a publisher and they said yeah, we'll publish it

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Authors propose books and they say here's what I want to write. Here's who I'm writing it to here's how long it's going to be

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Here's the argument. Here's how it's different from other books. And so we're fielding proposals bringing them in Evaluating them crunching the numbers kind of putting them through a theological grid so I do other things, but that's the the heart and soul of Evaluating which books crossway is going to publish and then we decide as a as a team and there's a who's on the committee

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You want names? Is it just like, you know, a couple random people around the office yeah, like the president of our company is on the committee and a guy's representing sales and Editorial so the good it's it's kind of a mix of different folks that kind of look at it from different perspectives

04:27

Do you funnel those to them? Do you do you kind of sift through? The massive proposals and yeah them what you think are the best.

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Yep. So roughly each month. We'll be looking at 10 to 15 different proposals that have kind of made it to that Level, I'm sorry 10 to 15 out of what like I don't even know.

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I mean there's Submissions at crossway org if anybody out there has an idea they can send it and you know, it gets funneled

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Some of it happens through relationships. There's book literary agents who kind of our filters for certain projects, but Once we get it there.

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We have a whole kind of evaluative system where we're scoring every project so that you know

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It's there's always subjectivity when you're evaluating a book, but we're trying to bring some objectivity to it

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So we're we're scoring, you know The the writing style the content how much the book can distribute so it might get low on One part and get really high on another part might be brilliant writing might not sell a ton of copies

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So we're trying to just think through it from a ministry standpoint Crossways a nonprofit organization and I love working there as I get they've got just a heart for Global missions and seeing the glory of the

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Lord extend throughout the earth. Yeah Man okay so many threads to chase there.

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Let's start with this You when you get a book and You are excited about it.

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Yeah, can you push it through? Can you come in and be like guys? I'm Justin Taylor I'm the executive vice president of book publishing.

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I have a track record behind me We should really do this and get behind this or you do kind of hands -off

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Trust the committee. Yeah. Yeah, it's a little bit of a balancing act. I I can pretty much turn down any book

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I want but I can never greenlight a book on my own So there might be books that I'm really excited about and I don't always get my way and I'm glad in the way that everything's set up we evaluate as a team and Pool the collective wisdom would begin every single meeting with scripture and prayer and just ask the

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Lord like we know we could do this In our flesh, we've got talented people in the room, but we want to be led by the

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Spirit We want to make God honoring decisions. And so yeah, there there are books that I think like I think the committee may have missed this one but Sometimes, uh, you know,

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I be outvoted So it's not like my vote or the president of the company Josh Dennis like his vote is weighted more than anybody else

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It feels like 98 % of the time we reach a consensus and we're pretty happy with our our decisions

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But you know at that point the whole books not written We usually don't ask we don't want authors usually write don't write a whole book and then send it to us write a couple chapters

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Propose it send it to us and we can evaluate it You know, we're not infallible and we don't know how books are going to do

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You know where you have to kind of put down a number of how many do we think this book is going to sell?

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So we're trying our best and we don't know everything but yeah, we're trying to serve people

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Yeah, like to read good books. Is there is there a book that you have passed on that you regret?

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Paul Miller's the praying life we We looked at it and we just thought oh,

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I don't know if this quite works. We didn't have the whole book. Yeah But looking back like man, that was a book we should have published

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So that was that was many years ago, but we I think we missed on that one and now we're publishing a lot of books with Paul and The praying church is his follow -up book that we had the opportunity to publish.

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So we we got that one nice Is there a book that you've published that you look back and you go?

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Ah, we probably should have done that if there was I probably wouldn't say Maybe like a distant

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Yeah, I'll say that we we published Mark Driscoll's books, oh, yeah and You know listening to Mike Cosper's podcast is

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Interesting podcast Objectively, but also as somebody who published his books trying to think did we miss that?

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Were we part of the problem or? Was that a justifiable decision in the time at the time?

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Those are hard things, I mean, I think clearly now with some of the things he did in terms of his

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Pastoral way of approaching people and handling things it was it was not the right fit

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It was time to to move on. So none of those books are in print anymore but As I think back like I'm not evaluating somebody else

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I'm evaluating my former self right and I want to be gracious to my former self in the sense of like Yeah in the future when you when things become clear things get revealed

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Hindsight's 2020. So there are things like that where we Publish an author.

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There's a moral feeling we have to move on Not because we're trying to punish them because we feel like we have a stewardship to say to readers

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This is this is somebody who is qualified to to teach and we trust they may not be perfect We may not agree with every jot and tittle of what they're saying

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But we're putting forward something that not is just good content, but somebody with godly

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Character is standing behind it. Is there a scenario where you will publish a book from someone that Later down the road.

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They might fail like like Mark did or they might move from the faith

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But you think that the book itself is worth continuing to publish No It which is a distinct question from is the content still good, right?

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So, you know, there are Mark Driscoll chapters or you know, if we had published a book by Josh Harris I looked the other day at that, you know, he wrote a book called humble orthodoxy back in the day before he

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Apostatized and left the faith. That's I mean you look at that book. It's very good content

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If somebody didn't know who wrote it they would read it they could be edified by it He's saying true things.

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He's saying encouraging things. He's saying convicting things. He's saying insightful things. And so somebody

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Leaving the fold doesn't change good content and yet at the same time.

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We don't feel comfortable Continuing to put that forward You know because somebody could pick that up and think

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I'm just assuming that this is a trustworthy author. This is somebody worth following. I want to follow them on Instagram and So the content can be good.

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It can be worthwhile even reading but as a publisher, we don't feel like we should be continuing to stand behind it in that way because it's not just purely a

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Transactional thing for us, you know, we're not just in it to to make money We feel like we have some spiritual obligation to serve the church

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That seems super wise brother You have been around the young restless and reformed movement for a while I guess even is it a movement anymore?

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but if it's not you were kind of there from beginning to end and You've seen a lot of that a lot of brothers fall away sisters, too

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Yeah, would you care to reflect on that how's your heart what does that do to to your own faith, you know, yeah

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Yeah, it's been a sadness I Was gonna sound weird. I don't think I've ever actually told anybody this but I Keep like a

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Microsoft Word Timeline on my computer. It's because I don't have a great memory with dates

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Like if you said when did you start your blog? Oh, I don't know 10 years ago 15 years ago So I just started like I'm just gonna plug in dates personal life just even professional things, you know when did

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I come to Crossway and At the end of it I started keeping a little list of like there's people who wandered from the faith people who got disqualified from ministry for Adultery or for alcohol abuse and you know,

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I hope that list doesn't continue to grow but it's sad and it's just a reminder of Guys that I you know prayed with and hung out with and shared life with and who are no longer walking with Jesus or some of them are but you know our our divorce now or have

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Committed grievous sin and Is it doesn't? It doesn't shake my faith.

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It makes me sad and Lament I've tried in those situations here and there to to keep an open line of communication

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You know somebody like Josh Harris We weren't best of friends but we with a few other guys try to get together once a year or so and just hang out and talk about ministry and Greg told us that it was at one of those meetings with Tulian that the idea for what is the mission of the church came?

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Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, right and totally and I think it was driving the car and talking with Kevin and So yeah, we we get together.

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We talk about ministry stuff. We talk about what's happening. And so like with somebody like Josh, I I wouldn't want him to ever think like, yeah, we were friends

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When we were both Christians and now that I'm not a Christian Never heard from these guys for the rest of my life

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So, you know, I don't text him or write him regularly but it try to just drop a line here and there and just say, you know thinking of you would love to see you at Some point and you know,

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I've I've asked him before What do you think about Jesus these days and just see if there's you know, can we keep any any line of communication open?

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So what kind of response do you get from that? I It's it's complicated question for me and you know, maybe maybe we can talk in person which

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I you know, that's that's fine by email, but Yeah, I I look forward to any opportunity

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I could never have I I just don't want to be one of those guys that that because somebody leaves the faith

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I I write them off and and never tried to reach out. So there's definitely sadness.

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I mean the movement I Think it exists. I think it had its heyday, but I don't think it's like that You know the emergent church like that that just morphed into something different.

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I mean, it's still people who are progressives and Yeah, I think the the

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YRR thing still exists maybe just in a different form maybe hopefully in a in a more chastened humbled matured form to some degree but I Think it was a force for good.

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I think there was probably a lot of lessons Yeah, amen, brother, and maybe we'll come back and talk about that more back to crossway and publishing stuff

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I have heard that most Christian books that are published are not profitable and That a lot of publishing houses kind of Like they are the bills get paid when you get the big fish

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So for crossway that might be something like gentle and lowly like a gentle like a bestseller like that Kind of pays the bills for the next ten years

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Accurate inaccurate. I think that it's accurate I don't know as if it's really as accurate with crossway, but I think that there's some

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Publishing houses where they have they might have more of that model Years ago,

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I heard I think Donald Miller talking about he'd written blue like jazz and he was under contract to write a follow -up book and He was he just couldn't pull it together

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He was late on it and he found out that his publisher like they had to lay people off because they were

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They were banking on that cash cow coming in and so crossway doesn't have that model

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There are books that that way outperform other books and they are super helpful for the rest of the company, but Yeah, we tried to evaluate with each book

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We've recognized saying a more academic book is not going to sell to the same degree there are some books where We're probably not going to make any money on it

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Long term, but we we feel you know for ministry reasons like this is a really

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Valuable project, of course, you can't do that with all projects or you don't have a job so it's great when you have that intersection of books that are genuinely edifying and Serve the church and a lot of people recognize it.

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So, you know Kevin's book biggest story has done really well and Dean's book on gentle and lowly and So that's that's what excites us

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I think I've never worked for another publisher. I I personally would hate to to work for a situation where there's books that make a lot of money in order to kind of Fund books that I think are really edifying or really helpful or I'm really discerning some

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Hopefully what we're publishing the crossways all Oh Gentle and lowly

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I'm a contrarian a little bit. Yeah, and everyone was like Holy and I was like, whatever.

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I read it didn't know how much I needed it. So good first chapter. I was like, okay And and then

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I saw several months later that Free copies were being given away. How many were given away in total?

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Do you think? Yeah, I'm not sure there was a Somebody who came along and funded a lot of just had a heart for that book and had a heart for God's people and said

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I'm gonna help you guys Distribute. Yeah, and who was thousands? His name was

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Sean DeMar And but then you did the same thing with the

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Rediscovering Church. Mmm book with Lehman and Colin Hanson. Did someone come along and do that or is that just crossway?

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Yeah, I can't remember with that one I think that somebody may have said that we want to help there and it was a

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TGC nine marks crossway and just a huge desire post kovat. Yeah, like guys remember

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Church, yeah, you don't just get to stay home and yeah and download it Yeah, so that was a it was kind of a cool project for those guys to come together

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Yeah, and say let's let's rediscover what church is and what God's plan is When you guys did that the first gentle and lowly which

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I know somebody else paid for but still I mean you guys probably Ate some a little bit on that too. If somebody's gonna pay for it.

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You guys probably were willing to accept Less profit as well. And then the rediscovered church book.

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I just thought What a fantastic testimony to crossway because you guys say like this is ministry first But a lot of people say it's ministry first but when it comes time to like actually put your money where your mouth is that is not always the case and so I Was really encouraged by that I know a lot of people were really encouraged by that and it had to be

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Encouraging for you to know like man this is the company that I work for it that I've given so many years of my life to and hopefully

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I will continue like Yeah, there just had to be a feeling of like deep Thanksgiving to the Lord for that Yeah, absolutely and I want to just publicly honor

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Lane and Ebeth Dennis who Lane's parents founded the company in the 1930s as a gospel track company and and their thought was

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The gospel needs to go out but tracks shouldn't just be

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Poorly designed that there should be beautiful design to go with beautiful content That was their heart back in the 1930s and then

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Lane and Ebeth in the 1970s started the crossway part of it with Publishing books eventually added the

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ESV Bible on to it, but they're just such humble godly people that Literally Lane has never led a meeting that I've ever seen without opening up the word praying and explicitly

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Just commending ourselves to the Lord asking for his help asking for his guidance for his

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Blessing upon the company and you know So all of the the money that comes in is is kind of being tied towards global projects

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They've got this million Bible campaign. And so there's there's folks in the company who just get up in the morning thinking

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How can we how can we do theological famine relief as Bill Walsh?

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Calls it at crossway, you know, like there's there's not just physical famine going on in other countries but there's theological famine and there's you know, prosperity gospel infiltrating and pastors who don't have

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You know They they might not even have a physical Bible and they don't have copies of resources

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And so it is really gratifying and humbling to work for a company that it just has that heart for ministry

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Okay, so on that note I can think of one two, three

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Probably keep going and you can probably think of them with me Publishing companies that probably started off with the same mission and vision who have since Abandoned it or severely compromised it what keeps crossway on the narrow path

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What will keep crossway? Yeah, I Think this is not just the the

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Sunday school answer, but the grace of God I I have said to my colleagues

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Let's just not ever assume just because the Lord has been faithful in the past or we have been faithful to him

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That that's going to just continue Till kingdom come that we need to consciously not just assume but but put that forward before us that we

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We want to be faithful and we you know We are explicitly as it's part of our bylaws that we want to publish in kind of the historic

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Reformed stream and that can include Lutheranism Anglicanism Baptist Presbyterian Reformed But we you know, we have kind of a confessional framework that we're seeking to operate in But yeah, you can write a thousand bylaws and that's not going to keep you faithful This can always be contravened, but we have a godly

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Board that that oversees we have, you know, godly leadership and Yeah, it's

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When you do good things you get encouragement and Then you have to decide how am

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I going to think about this encouragement this this praise these these accolades

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Are we going to give the glory to the Lord and ask him for more? Are we going to start to think like yeah, we're all pretty good at publishing

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We win these awards and the Lord's really lucky to have us Exactly, and we can laugh about that.

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But that that can subtly infiltrate an organization mindset and so yeah,

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I think ultimately what is keeping us what is going to keep us as the grace of the Lord and Related to that is just a conscious

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Reliance on the Holy Spirit Lane would quote from I Think it's

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Francis shape Francis and he is shaper. I think he is Schaefer wrote the book tapestry

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And she says in there kind of an anecdote about her and Francis Schaefer sitting there together at their kitchen table

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Wondering what would happen to ministries and organizations if somebody? Physically cut out all of the verses in the

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New Testament about relying on the Holy Spirit Like would any decision -making Be different and I said wait, you know as we look around to organizations a lot of them would just operate in the same way and so I think consciously relying upon the

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Spirit and asking the Lord for help and for wisdom and you know the book of James style

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We lack wisdom. You're the only wise God you give it freely to those who ask and so we're asking

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Wow. Praise God I'm gonna have to go look look up that That's that it's from either

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Edith Schaefer. Yeah, okay, and my my blog is like my filing systems

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Yeah, we're coming back to talk about the blog But yeah, I threw it, you know, that quotes on there someplace

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That's how I find stuff. Just search my name and like a quote Okay some time ago there was a

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Particular internet Presence person. I someone said their name Who was like, yeah,

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I'm thankful for crossway. They've published my books in the past and without them Doing that my movement probably wouldn't have taken off but They're starting to go sideways.

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They're starting to go a little Thoughts on that Yeah, do you know what

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I'm talking about? Yeah Thoughts on how people go sideways or no thoughts on the idea that crossway is kind of shifting to the left.

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Yeah, okay Yeah, I think I Think whenever anybody says that Whether we're talking about crossway

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TGC T4g, I think the first question is always like oh, why do you think that?

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Because I think sometimes people can just say things and then things get repeated enough that somebody starts to think yeah, that's true

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Everybody's saying that So that would be the first question. It's just like okay. What's the evidence?

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Where where do you see that and kind of putting the ball back in somebody's court and saying?

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Well, that's interesting thought like, you know Tell me why you think that versus just kind of repeating something that that somebody's said

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Yeah, I think you would be hard -pressed to find a lot of evidence that that Crossways going woke or drifting left.

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I mean you're complementarian You know, you don't publish any egalitarian stuff. You don't publish any weird side be sexuality stuff, right, right?

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Yeah, maybe race stuff. Maybe that's the angle there. Yeah Yeah, I think

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I Think sometimes Anything or anyone who is a multi -directional puncher?

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And and isn't just only punching left is accused of you know, not being faithful to the team but I you know

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I think biblically like We we call it as we see it and we combat errors and there can be errors to the right and there can be errors to the left

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So, yeah, I I mean if you look at an issue like Abortion, I think we've published two of the best resources.

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There are Scott Klusendorf's book case for life and Marvin Alaski and leave us

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Leah Stavis new big book on the history of abortion. I just finished it. It was fantastic Long, right, you know homosexuality.

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We've got Kevin de Young's book on what does the Bible really teach on homosexuality and You know if somebody wants to say that John Piper's bloodlines

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You know, I don't think you have to agree with every jot and tittle but you go back to that book and it's faithful It's seeking to go back to Scripture.

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It's not talking about CRT it's trying to say like what is what is

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Genesis and what does an Ephesians say about Book of Acts about race and about what the

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Lord's doing and trying to think through biblical principles So, yeah Crossway doesn't publish biographies

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Not true. Okay. I was talking with Matthew Martins. Yeah about Raymond Johnson's book.

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Yeah, and he I said, well, have you gone to Justin with it? And he said they don't really publish biographies So there's a distinction between memoir.

30:06

So you're calling a liar. Just checking No, I An autobiography or a memoir tells one's own story.

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So what you did with Christian focus Christian focus, right? Yeah, that's right rebel to your will by multiple copies for friends and family.

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Thanks, brother Cuz I'll tell you what Christian focus ain't ever done It genuinely is a searing

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Insightful book and praise God for your story That's a John genre that we have historically shied away from And we don't say that it's wrong to publish it.

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You know, we're glad for your book I hope that Raymond's book gets published but a Personal experience story just tends not to fit what we're trying to do.

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We have published biography Which is a story of somebody else's life a little bit more historical.

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So so two recent examples We don't publish a lot but Steve Nichols did R .C.

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Sproul's biography Lucy Austin did Elizabeth Elliott's biography and we're doing a

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Think this yeah, we've talked about this a little bit publicly But lives of faith and grace is a new series for kind of middle school on up kids

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Like on Martin Luther, you know What I'm Katie Luther's short kind of biography series for kids and I think aunt

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Coughlin told me you guys are doing one on Millennial Haynes. Yeah, yeah, he's written. I'm excited about that.

31:31

So yeah, you do do biography. Look at that Yeah, but you just don't do much of it. We do biography but not kind of autobiography memoir, right?

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Okay, 21 servants of sovereign joy. Yeah. Wow Yeah, I can't when I heard about that it blew my mind because I've listened to those

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John Piper. Yeah so many times When I said I'm going to be interviewing Justin Taylor, what questions should

31:53

I be sure to ask him? I got a bunch of crazy questions, obviously But one of the questions was will you do some kind of compilation for J.

32:01

I Packers stuff in the same way that you've done it for for Piper stuff That's a good question probably not

32:13

For some somewhat complicated reasons of when we did it with Piper he really has only published with like three or four publishers mainly crossway a couple with Baker As it was easier to kind of corral all that Packer his career spanned 70 years and he's publishing with British publishers and American publishers

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We have republished or kind of licensed a number of Packer books rediscovering holiness

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Keeping step with the Spirit knowing God So if you go to crossway dot

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Oregon type in Packer because he's some beautifully designed new books probably not Collected works.

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There is a collect and shorter writings of Packer it's four volumes if it's not widely available, but if you can get a hold of it, it's really worth its weight in gold it's kind of his his shorter writings and Nobody nobody did it better than Packer packing stuff in a

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He used to say Packer by name Packer by nature Hey, do you do you want to hear a little factoid?

33:29

Sure. I found out the other day that I said, no Oh, well, I'll do it. Anyway, I Found out the other day that all answer females.

33:36

Did you know that? No. Yeah, if they were males, they'd be called uncles. Yeah Right Okay, I heard that you

33:44

You had a dad joke contest with a little boy, is that true? Yeah, that is true.

33:49

Did you hear that from Ed Moore? Yeah, yeah, and I won you won In your face little

33:56

Jimmy Maybe if we have time at the end, I'll tell you Ed Moore's favorite joke.

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Okay, okay Let's talk about you. That's the way to get the listeners to keep us. Oh, yeah

34:08

Yeah at the end if you can make it all the way You and John Piper. Yeah So many threads to pull on here.

34:15

Let's start with this You were the editor and you were you were basically you did everything for a fetch fetch fetch script

34:23

Am I saying a shrift? Fetch? Rift is the German? Yeah, let's can we not come up with an English word?

34:29

That's better than that. I still don't know how to spell it. I need to read What does it mean?

34:35

Compilation. Yeah, I it's just basically a book to honor somebody at a certain stage of their career.

34:41

Okay, here's my question Yeah, a little premature. No, yeah Were you looking at him thinking?

34:48

Ah, he's gonna go anytime soon. Now. We got to get this out. Yeah, what year was that? I mean that was probably

34:55

He's 70 you're bad with dates now. I'm very major. You need your document. Yeah, I've got my laptop

35:01

Yeah, it feels like it was like 10 years ago. Yeah, but you know 10 years ago He was probably 65 years old.

35:06

So kind of a traditional retirement date and You know, he was pastor for 33 years at Bethlehem But he's writing so much in like the the last stage of his life

35:18

I don't hope that doesn't sound bad. But I mean he is getting old. He's what 70 78. Yeah the last stage of his life

35:24

I mean, he's cranking it. Yeah, but he's always cited Jay Christie Wilson. I think he heard at a

35:29

Conference who said like I wrote a book a year from age 70 to 90 and that's what

35:35

I wanna do Did you read his? Little blue book on lifelong learning Yeah, we've in conjunction with Bethlehem College and seminary where he basically is laying out like this is our philosophy of education of Learning and that's what the school.

35:54

It's a small college and seminary is trying to say like learning is is really important for You know, why do you teach kids to read and so you can know the

36:06

Bible and then You know one of the taglines of school is Reading the great books in light of the greatest book

36:14

For the sake of the Great Commission. Yeah, so I love that vision. I Read it.

36:20

I was blown away. I was not expecting that You know how it is with Piper books. You've read one you've read them all which is it we say that we joke about that But it's really not true

36:31

Christian hedonism is Infused and everything he does but when I read come Lord Jesus, even though I didn't agree with all of his eschatological conclusions

36:39

I just thought oh man, if I would have read this kind of eschatology book as a young Christian, I would have cared more, right?

36:47

So anyways when I read his book on lifelong learning, I was blown away. I bought a bunch of copies

36:53

I'm gonna have our guys and in our elder training read it. I mean, it's just so good Would you like about it or what stood out to you?

37:00

This is where we flip it. No, I start Yes, you know, I don't know that I can succinctly and clearly put it into words, but I I am an intuitively curious person

37:10

I'm a bit of an auto autodidact. I don't have much of an education. I mean like I don't have any education

37:17

And and a book like that is like the Christian hedonism fuel I need to keep doing what

37:23

I'm already doing right like be inspired Look at the word look at the word in the world and be amazed by it and spend the rest of your life

37:32

Exploring the glory of God and in the place where he's put you I mean It's just jet fuel for the ability to keep going when sometimes you're like do

37:39

I really want to read another book or you know? So one of the fascinating things about Piper and if you've listened to Piper for any amount of time

37:47

You'll have heard this that he He does he's not a Kevin de

37:52

Young DA Carson who just read an incredible amount of books

37:57

I mean you ask Kevin or you ask Carson or some of these folks al moeller like have you heard of that book?

38:04

Yeah, I read it last night John Piper is not like that. He can't read quickly.

38:10

He can't Mentally read more quickly than he could physically pronounce the words which makes him a very slow

38:16

Reader but and his mentor at Fuller Theological Seminary Dan Fuller was sort of like that, too

38:23

Like they're just not like I've read thousands of books But they kind of determined if I'm gonna be able to make it

38:29

I got to read this book deeper than anybody else can read it So that's an encouragement for us people who like I can't read everything

38:38

But I can go deeper than than other people and look at the book Yeah, I think

38:46

John Piper's writing is getting better with age I've always loved

38:53

John Piper's preaching who hasn't and the ideas and the Conceptual nature of his books obviously life -changing the

39:01

Lord has used them tremendously But early I don't know how you would define early

39:07

But some of my earliest reading of Piper was always labored I just his writing style is not particularly enjoyable to me

39:15

Which is interesting because I found that there are certain guys who are fantastic writers and not very good public speakers

39:22

Piper World -class public speaker preacher some of his early books. I had trouble

39:27

Reading but it seems like the last four or five books. He's put out They've the writing has gotten better and I wonder if that's because he's freed up from sermon prep

39:37

Which steals not steals because it's a good thing, but it does consume a lot of that energy

39:44

Yeah, so I wonder if now that he's freed up from that. I don't know. Anyways, I'm rambling.

39:49

Does that make sense? Yeah, I mean and who knows with your own story. You're you're also More mature you've read more you have more to build on that's true

39:58

Now, you know if you went back to some of those earlier works, you know It's hard for me to say and hard to kind of evaluate his his writing

40:04

But I think you are on to something with with desiring God which came out 86 87

40:10

He wrote that just in the margins like he didn't have a writing leave He didn't have a sabbatical a lot of stuff was going on in the church and he's kind of just squeezing it in here there and I think now in his

40:23

His retirement from pastoral ministry has given him

40:28

I think more breathing room To to let a book marinate and in a different way than just the the pressures of a growing church and Small children at home.

40:42

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He's in a completely different world. I think that he was 30 years ago.

40:47

Praise God. Yeah. Now I heard that you had I'm asking you to brag on yourself, but Give us the history.

40:53

I heard that you had a pretty big hand in getting his sermons online. Is that true? Uh, I don't think so I Yeah, so never

41:03

No early when I first started working for him I would edit the sermons and would you know help put them online, but I Went to Bethlehem in 1998 got married the day after our honeymoon

41:17

We we moved up there was in that first class of the Bethlehem Institute and the website had just gone online

41:24

You know kind of in the the 90s, but there's a man named Mo Bergeron Who Started putting the he

41:33

I think he called it Piper notes And he would take the sermons because Piper manuscripts every sermon, which has been a gift.

41:40

I mean he With his gifting. I mean he could have just been like yeah, I just have an outlier But from the beginning he manuscript everything and and this man

41:49

Mo Bergeron They're they actually Desiring God went back and did kind of a story a feature on him.

41:55

You're just a humble Yeah, it's a really encouraging story about this guy who just like he loved reformed theology is reformed

42:03

Baptist guy and he just wanted to make

42:09

Sermons available to lay people and this isn't the day when like people were sending out tapes or CDs You had to like order in if you wanted it

42:17

Yeah, the internet you were still putting in your AOL disk and right, you know dialing it up Yeah, and now every

42:24

Tom, Dick and Harry has their sermons online right for better or worse, right, you know Luke let's make sure we get my sermons taken down All right, let's talk a little bit about the

42:34

TGC blog that is where I first came to know of you so I get saved

42:43

Tried to Go to church doesn't go super. Well, I was a drug dealer tried to go to like Maybe the worst caricature of a

42:52

Southern Baptist Church. You can imagine I was like if this is church I'm out I get caught up in the

42:57

Prosperity Gospels. The Lord is very kind to use John Piper to lead me out of the prosperity.

43:03

Do you remember that Prosperity Gospel sermon jam? Yeah. Okay. Well me watching my space in my

43:09

Living room that sermon jam was the beginning of the end for me with the Prosperity Gospels. God so came out of that And then so Piper was kind of the gateway

43:18

I started reading Piper books or listening to Piper sermons Then he would reference, you know, R .C. Sproul and I've got who's that and I go get that book

43:26

I mean that was all I was all I knew to do and then somehow I got to TGC and Pretty much every day when

43:34

I got to work I would open up TGC and I would go to your blog and I was what's what's Justin Poston?

43:40

So yeah, talk to us a little bit about your blog how you got set up there What is some of the fruit that you've seen?

43:46

Why have you chosen to stay with a blog at TGC because a lot of the people that you started off blogging with are no

43:52

Longer there. Yeah. Yeah Yeah, I a guy named Hugh Hewitt who's a political commentator and a

43:59

Christian wrote a book called I think it was just called blog And he he just said everybody should start a blog and I I thought man

44:08

I'm late to the game, but I I did it and it was at blog spot calm

44:14

It was called theological blog spot calm. I mean who knows how to get to a great title like that Looked over at my bookshelf

44:22

John Stott's between two worlds book on preaching was right there like it's pretty good

44:28

Description of what I want to try to do kind of bridge the gap between a couple different Things and so fired it up and yeah in its heyday

44:39

Some people called it the Christian dredge report Meaning that pre

44:47

Twitter pre social media that was kind of like Where we went to see like what's what's new?

44:54

What are people talking about? So I probably Overly blogged but you know it would

45:01

I mean if you remember back in the day It was not like here's a mini essay by Justin Taylor It was like hey

45:07

Piper did this. Here's a here's a paragraph Here's Matt Chandler just did a new sermon.

45:13

Here's a link and just short stuff, you know short quotes But kind of keeping up with you know, kind of like I'm Christianity today

45:23

I'm tracking like here's the news this person just retired this person just died this person just got appointed you know

45:30

Tully and chivagin is now the Seated the At Fort Lauderdale with D.

45:37

James Kennedy. He's the new pastor So kind of breaking news and that kind of thing. So I think as the years have gone on Social media has supplanted that need to kind of be kind of frenetically on top of of everything

45:50

So I was kind of doing that on my own Ben pays came to me with TGC and said do you ever consider moving over to TGC and We'll you know provide the the website and any support you need and so yeah,

46:07

I've been with them ever since and Yeah, the the whole heyday of blogging, you know has kind of I think subsided but I still think people find valuable things online and You know

46:21

Twitter or X is Interesting, but it's very ephemeral.

46:26

I mean, it's like You know, it stays up permanently, but if you've ever gone back and like oh there's a really good tweet

46:35

Three months ago. I mean, it's not right use of to trying to find anything. It's designed of like kind of flash

46:42

What do you call a tweet now? Is it still a tweet or is it? Am I going to X today

46:49

Like you say like oh, yeah, I saw your okay. Yeah Whatever yeah, so I've stuck with TGC I think

46:59

I think their model is more Publishing articles and so the blogs are kind of a thing that are still there

47:07

But I mean I consider it a privilege that they they have a lot of eyeballs looking at it.

47:12

I love their confessional framework and I Don't I don't do it that often anymore, but I also have an evangelical history blog with Tommy kid who's a

47:25

Historian of evangelicalism, I think it's Thomas kid Thomas kid. Sorry. He's a historian

47:31

Justin, please So wait, so that's on TGC you do that with him. I didn't know that I thought that was just his thing

47:36

Okay, nice. I would love to get him on the show. Yeah, great. Yeah Kevin Dion a new book on I think he's doing one in the second

47:47

Great Awakening He wrote a book on the first Great Awakening so you could have money for that. Yes, I would love to do that I mean just you know, talk to him and ask him what he thinks about what

47:57

Ian Murray wrote about it Hmm This is not intended to be like clickbaity controversial stuff

48:06

This is genuine like as a Christian who loves good books and who cares about Christian publishing because books change people and people change the world that kind of a thing

48:15

I want to ask you about some practices some uncouth practices from the general publishing world that have made their way into Christian publishing

48:23

But certainly not to cross way Ghost writing. Yeah, can you talk to me about I think a lot of people hear that word thrown around and they don't really know

48:34

What to make of it or how it happens. Can you talk to us about that? Yeah, I Don't have a lot of Experience thankfully with it.

48:42

So I don't know all of the practice I think there's some people that you know, if you talk to literary agents or other publishers they would kind of know how how all of that works, but I think that it can probably be a spectrum of You know like like your book that you just published this third time.

49:02

I've mentioned your book right dude. I mean, trust me I'm counting. Thank you Now the problem is there's only like a dozen people that are gonna be watching or listening to this interview.

49:11

So Trust me, I know that You Know you have a story and you may feel like I'm not a writer

49:21

But I've got a really compelling story and so could I and this is trying to pitch it in the best possible

49:27

Like could I take somebody who's a really gifted writer who's experienced and have them write this you tell the story and honestly,

49:36

I mean How many celebrity actors or actresses or athletes like, you know,

49:42

Michael Jordan is he a great literary he's gonna probably tell a story to somebody and they kind of help shape it and he approves it and I don't know if this is anecdotal or not or apocryphal or not but I heard

49:55

Charles Barkley was not very happy with some of the things that was in his autobiography like Your name's on the cover.

50:03

So I think that It's perfectly legitimate in my view to have

50:10

Michael Jordan with John Doe sure and you kind of recognize this is

50:15

Michael Jordan story He approved it. He's providing the material but somebody came along and helped him shape it

50:23

I would say that even more strongly than that. I mean like Michael Jordan probably didn't write any of the book, right?

50:29

He he's probably being interviewed by this writer and the writers basically writing at all Yeah, is that fair to say you think yeah,

50:35

I think like with the book spare on Prince Harry, okay is a very good writer who who wrote it, but he had just like constant zoom sessions

50:46

You know, he's getting the material. He's shaping it sending it saying what do you think? Right accurate, right?

50:52

What do you want to add to it? And honestly, we wouldn't want to read Prince Harry probably writing in his own, you know, like Now I appreciate you being very charitable, but I mean there are go ahead

51:06

Yeah, the flip side of it is guys who say That's the model.

51:11

I want to do I don't want that other guy's name on there because I want people to think I wrote the whole thing and so it's kind of this secretive like Yeah, somebody did that for me, but I'm not telling you

51:24

I just think put the other person's name on there. Of course the ghostwriter Or shaper or heavy editor is going to get paid either way but I think it feels deceptive to have

51:37

Just one person's name on the cover when in reality. It was a collaborative project, you know, the the

51:45

In the opposite direction of that on the other end of the spectrum. You have someone like Jamie Dunlop who wrote Compelling community and he wrote like every word of that book but he like Demanded that Mark's name be on it with him and Mark was like brother

51:59

I didn't write this book and Jamie said Literally everything in this book is something that I've learned from you over the last 20 years of you being my pastor

52:06

So there's a sense in which I don't feel right for your name to not be on here because you're essentially a co -author

52:12

That's like the highest standard of integrity. I don't want to get in John Piper will not even do like Like an email blast and have his name signed to it if he didn't write every word

52:27

So, you know, it'll say like Josh edder and John Piper. Yes, because he has that like not just books, but anything

52:34

I mean there was one time when I edited a piece of Piper's like I think modern Reformation asked for something in justification

52:39

I took something Piper had written and kind of rearranged some things and added an opening sentence. He's like, okay

52:45

We're gonna call it John Piper with Justin Taylor. It's like none of these ideas were me But he you know, he's such a stickler on that and I admire that integrity

52:55

I've also heard he's just a stickler with editors in general Like I said this isn't this way on purpose.

53:01

You better have a good reason for changing it. Yeah, I think he wants to see Where you put the commas and we don't yeah

53:08

But I think you know writers also if you have a good editor who understands. Yeah, and it's trying to help

53:16

Yeah, you can be the most careful person in the world and you're you're not going to write something typo for you, so oh, yeah

53:23

Yeah, I heard once that Thomas soul got an edit back from a publisher back when you would be mailing things, you know, and Edits that were suggested were very light and soul was basically just like I'm not gonna publish through you anymore

53:40

And he wouldn't publish somewhere else. That's a bit much. I mean, I guess if you're Thomas soul You can maybe do that.

53:46

I think probably probably still that's a bit much, but I'll tell you Praise God for good editors.

53:52

I mean, that's what they do. They're gonna help They're good I think Jeremy Rinney last night said It's like you have a like a clay pot and they come along and they put that beautiful sheen on it and make you sound

54:03

Smarter and and better than you really are Now you used to be an editor Yeah, so I edited for Piper And I've edited books

54:13

I've never been an actual like book editor per se like Crossway's got a number of Upstanding folks that you know, we'll edit a book start finish.

54:22

I've never done that But I've I've been the general editor for a number of books. Let's talk about endorsements

54:28

Yeah, so on my new book Do your will I have a new book? Hmm I got four guys that are my friends to endorse it now

54:39

Maybe it's because of the kind of book that it is I wanted somebody to say like the stuff in this book is real.

54:45

We know Sean we can we can like vouch for this But I've realized the more

54:50

I'm getting into this world That there even for my first book the endorsements that we got for it

54:58

Which was like a book on the prosperity gospel We're all just people that I knew but there are a lot of endorsements for books that that the publisher set up from people who don't know the person and Sometimes haven't even read the book

55:11

Can you talk to us about that? Yeah you know, we we try to As as publishers, it's hard to control that like, you know, did you read every single word?

55:25

GI Packer told me once that he He read the first sentence of every paragraph of a book

55:33

And you know, that's a way to kind of you're you're not missing any of the flow of it

55:39

But you're not getting you kind of get that with the right author you get the the big idea Pretty quickly.

55:45

So yeah, it's it's hard to know I mean there was a book without naming names that came out recently and and then some people tried to kind of walk back there endorsements that Are like yeah,

55:56

I didn't have time. I I Didn't didn't read it carefully enough and So, yeah, do you pay people to write not you publishers pay people to write forwards and introductions?

56:08

No, I guess not an introduction. That'd be from the author but like a forward. I think that'd be pretty rare Okay, most most do it out of the kindness of their heart.

56:17

Yeah, nobody reads them anyways Yeah, I mean, I always read the acknowledgements. Yeah, I was kind of shocked like a lot of people don't read introductions

56:27

Yeah, you know I used to skip right over I used to not reading her introductions and then I read more about Adler's how to read a book

56:35

So now I read the introduction and I read the closing chapter Table of contents and then I go back through and read it

56:42

Any Naselli Mutual friend says that he is come or he is coming out with kind of a more

56:49

Christianized More compact version of that book. I'm really excited about that Yeah, cuz more

56:55

I mean, it's good, but it's long. It's a bit much right? Yeah. Yep, and he's very concise

57:00

He does not tend to go on, you know rabbit trails and that's so true. What is the best -selling book that crossways ever published?

57:11

The Bible The ESV. Well, yeah, I mean that's best -selling book of all time So I have to think okay, if you added all of those together, that's probably a cheating outside of the

57:21

ESV back in the day It was probably a Frank Peretti's this present darkness, which is fiction.

57:27

Yeah, I completely forgot about that You guys publish fiction. Most people don't remember. Yeah, Frank Peretti, but you still publish fiction

57:34

Yeah, we don't do a lot. There was a season before my time when crossway was publishing like Youth fiction and Western novels and okay kind of a fiction editor and For the most part we've we've moved away from fiction except doing kind of for younger kids a lot of Somewhere fiction these days.

57:57

Yeah We have to be respectful of your time. Let me go to some of these rapid -fire questions.

58:04

I Have many other questions that I didn't get to so maybe we can do a round two Hey, huh?

58:11

Good. I can make a room for nuance joke. Okay, did Bush knock down the towers? No moving on tea or coffee neither

58:22

Yes, let's go. Just water No something caffeinated zero

58:29

Dude, do you like Mountain Dew zero or you prefer the diet? I don't like Mountain Dew zero. It's too close to the real thing

58:35

Okay. Yeah, but you're a Coke zero guy. I'm guessing Coke zero Pepsi. There's no bad either. Okay Okay, if you're on a desert island and you only

58:44

I think I know the answer to this you only get to keep the preaching From one of these guys Dever Piper Keller Sproul Johnny Mac.

58:50

Who do you keep? Not the Mars to it. Definitely not the Mars Say the list one more time

58:57

Dever Piper Keller Sproul or Johnny Mac Singler Ferguson, okay

59:04

I'd say Piper of that list. Yeah, but if but if not Piper Sinclair, I was like listening to Sinclair yeah,

59:11

I think that's a little bit of a cheat though because I just want him to read the ingredients off the back of a

59:17

Shampoo, but yeah me and I'll enjoy it, you know Okay, favorite non -fiction author or book you can choose

59:30

Always get in trouble with these because the one that comes immediately to mind Is all the president's men, yeah all the

59:40

Kingsmen And but there's some kind of you know sexual stuff

59:47

Yeah, so try to skip that stuff. But I think the writing Robert Penn Warren is just So good in terms of what he does with words and metaphors

59:57

I sometimes just put up an audible just to listen to like five minutes. So so rich.

01:00:03

I'm not a huge fiction guy I do appreciate fiction. But yeah, so you're an audible guy. Yeah, I like audible.

01:00:09

I love audible I've been trying to get more people into it. It's like you're busy You're not that good at reading get the information in however, you can you know

01:00:18

Mountains or Beach Beach champagne or wine

01:00:25

Not a big drinker, but it's a wine. Okay. Do we really go to the moon? I think so.

01:00:30

Okay Android or iPhone iPhone macaroni salad or potato salad

01:00:35

That's a macaroni and cheese or just potatoes.

01:00:41

Okay night out or night in night out Concert or football game football game the the

01:00:49

Hedgehogs right the Nebraska Hedgehogs the Cornhuskers. Ah, okay Morning person or night owl night owl

01:00:56

Burger King or McDonald's why not both? Yeah at the same time

01:01:03

Mexican or Italian. Oh part Italian so I Think Italian you talking about the food.

01:01:12

Yeah, I was asking which was your least favorite race Burgers or barbecue.

01:01:20

Mm -hmm Gotta go back to the why not both but For this one choose.

01:01:26

Let's force the issue Burger okay least favorite candy

01:01:32

Mmm, junior men, that's pretty bad. Should I do it Luke? I mean black licorice

01:01:38

Yeah, pretty nah, you're not you're not with me. Okay Chinese takeout and not good

01:01:45

Chinese takeout like bad time like you might get sick. Yeah Chinese takeout or sushi

01:01:51

Definitely Chinese takeout Everybody chooses Chinese takeout. That's so funny cold or hot

01:01:59

Food or body temperature. I'm gonna leave this one open to you Cold okay rock or rap

01:02:14

Yeah, you're gonna close Christian right so you were big into like lyrical theology and all that stuff, right?

01:02:20

Yeah, man me too I miss it brother You know shots coming out with a new album. Yeah, I was in Portland.

01:02:26

He played it for me. Mm -hmm Amazing. It's even on this. Yeah, huh?

01:02:33

Shy is a mystery wrapped in an enigma who lives in a black cloud of darkness

01:02:39

He's shy. He's shy. He's like one of my good friends, but like I can barely get ahold of him

01:02:45

He says he's open to the possibility, but I don't even know what that means But I'm telling you when

01:02:51

I heard this album, yeah, I was like, oh This is what I've been missing. It's so good favorite

01:02:57

Christian rap album Yeah, I don't know it albums enough, okay probably probably something from shy yeah

01:03:08

Yeah, me too Right classical or jazz

01:03:20

Trapped on an island with one systematic theology The first one that comes to mind is

01:03:31

Burkhoff, okay All right, Burkhoff is I had to read Burkhoff cover to cover for RTS and You know, there's a lot of good stuff out there.

01:03:42

He just gets right to the point really clear Nice Which him you get to choose more than one would you want to be sung at your funeral?

01:03:54

Hmm It as well. Yeah, that was

01:04:00

Jeremy Rennie's choice last night, too. How many holes does the straw have more than two?

01:04:12

All right, you ready for the Ed Moore joke, yep What's not it? It's not a closer. This is this is the closer

01:04:20

So this has been waiting this entire podcast like just working through I think so And by the way, it's not

01:04:31

Ed Moore's joke, it's Ed Moore's favorite joke that I tell okay All right out of the many jokes that I tell that are good and funny

01:04:38

So this is the story of my friend who has a big pumpkin head Okay, like a big pumpkin head.

01:04:45

So he Oh Nice I'll be sure to No, no, we cannot

01:04:53

Man, that guy's got a big head So here's how a guy got a big pumpkin head literally a pumpkin.

01:04:59

He found a genie in a lamp You know I'm talking about that old trope He you know, you rub the lamp genie comes out you get three wishes

01:05:08

You get it, right first wish he wishes for all the money in the world Genie says okay.

01:05:14

I grant your wish Wealthy beyond I mean just the oil the oil titans of the

01:05:20

UAE have nothing on this guy, right? He's the wealthiest man in the world. Great. Genie. Genie says second wish he goes, you know,

01:05:26

I want the most beautiful woman in the world Your wish is my command gets her and and honestly, what else could a man want right in life?

01:05:34

He's got all the money in the world. He's got the most beautiful woman at his side so then his one wish left and He really drops the ball

01:05:46

He wishes for a big pumpkin head. Isn't that weird? All right.

01:05:53

Well, that's the end of the episode It's Ed Morris favorite joke. I mean Ed literally gave himself a hernia laughing at that joke

01:06:02

This is a joke you told him. Yeah. All right That's it that's and you don't think it's funny yeah

01:06:14

Okay, well, let me pray for help Lord Jesus, thank you for my brother

01:06:21

Thank you that you have called us to yourself and not just to live in individual silos and relationship with you

01:06:30

But you have called us into a family and Lord and in many ways it feels like the family is

01:06:38

Constantly dealing with friction here on earth, but one day we won't be one day We'll be at home with you in our perfectly prepared mansion, and we will bask in the glory of your light

01:06:48

Forever and ever so Lord In light of some of the conversation that we've had here today.

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We pray that you'll help us to walk uprightly that our lives and Our hearts will commend the gospel.

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We pray that you'll keep us in our respective ministries. Keep us faithful Lord. Do not let

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Satan find any way into Into this situation help us to to follow you faithfully all the days of our lives.

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Let our testimony be not one of popularity or prestige but of faithfulness

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Lord we look forward more than anything to the day when we get to stand before you and hear well done good and faithful Servant enter into the joy of your master

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And we pray that you'll keep that reality before us as we move forward what we are working for what we are laboring for Is many souls from all tongues tribes and nations to come before you and to hear that commendation